It is a tragedy that hit real close to home.  Since returning, we have discussed buying an apartment in Paris, getting one for the holidays, renting at another time, because Marsha fell in love with the city.  It is not just me that "gets" the magic of a Large City with so much electricity about Life and Living.  My wife "got it" also. This morning, France's neighbor/rival/ally/thorn in its side - Great Britain - got a big taste of death,  Wholesale Death, done by jobbers for some stoopid.reason.

On Friday June 10,  we rode the train back to our beloved Paris for one last "go at the old girl".

When we hit Fiorenze, we went into tired, alert tourist mode.  No place to sit, eat and tend luggage.  So we had some snackage stuffs and bought water and went out on the platform that the Artesian should arrive on.  We found a bench hundreds of meters from the inside mayhem.  That became our oasis and observation deck for a couple of hours.  We watched all sort of humanity come and go to their various destinations.

Boarding in Fiorenze put us at the second seating for dinner in the dining car.  Somehow there was a massive migration of people to our sleeper car. A large group of Italians, that obviously hadn't planned on the sleeper car facilities, discovered the option of bunks versus the reclining seats in the regular cars.  They had cabins on all sides of us, and were always opening our door to look in.  It seems as they were celebrating someone's birthday.  I am the first to enjoy a good celebration, but don't get between me and food...when I am starving.  These folks were at the same dinner sitting as we were.  They became a "black hole" for waiters and sucked all the servers away from the rest of the paying crowd.  I finally pulled my own corkscrew (a shrewd acquisition for the earlier picnic) from my pocket and opened the bottle of wine that was sitting on our table.  It helped.  Food arrived slowly, but the wine was helping.

We retired for the evening and again I slept like a rock.  When we arrived at Gare de Bercey in Paris we were  rested.  When we arrived back at the Sully St. Germain, there were people waiting for rooms.  We let our favorite desk-man know that we were there, and he remembered our request for a larger room.  He pressed the key to Room 1 into Marsha's hand and whispered "We must be discreet, people are waiting for rooms."  Room 1 is the best in the house.  It has a courtyard off of it, lots of room, and...lots of room.

We then got on the Metro to go see le Musée  d'Orsay.  I had spent so much time in Paris in the past, and gone to so many museums, but had never been to Orsay.  It was originally a train station.  It is one of the finest museums in the world, today.  Most of its collections are from the Impressionist Period and forward.  We discovered the café for a light lunch and a bottle of wine.  What an oasis.  Efficient service, good food, and beautiful art all around.  Yes, it cost more than most dinners do.  It was worth it.

We could feel our holiday winding down.  Another day, and we would be rejoining the world as we knew it.   We finished our visit to Orsay and heard a warning over the PA system warning of Pick-Pockets working the museum.  Too late, we had learned a lot in a few weeks.  Everyone was a suspect to me.  We worked our way back to the hotel for a break and prepared for another evening in St. Michel.

Assietes a Casser - Tous les Soirs (Dishes are broken nightly).  Greek bistros break plates on the door step, basically to get your attention.  It did. These are "prop plates" no finished glaze, just the first stage of becoming a dish.  The Maitre d has a few in one hand and as people approach, he throws one on the threshold of his door.  It is great theater.  Marsha negotiated a table at the front door so we could watch the street, the grill, the people, and she could get a breeze. She also created one with a Wine List used like a fan.  She used more things as fans over the course of our trip. and fially bought one that night that had "Paris" and all kinds of tourist stuff silk-screened on it.  She opted for the one WITHOUT Lace. At Les Argonautes a marvelous rosé followed our first glass of cassis (free Drink - eat Here).  And we then selected what kind of skewered food to have them grill for us.  I had shrimp the size of Flipper and Marsha got pork.  Dinner at Les Argonauts was fantastic.  The Maitre d'/barker used our table for his coffee and to stack menus and still unbroken plates.

Watching people is great.  The places in St. Michel often have no outdoor seating as the space is so limited on the sidewalks.  Marsha's choice for the breeze was perfect.  We were able to get a photo of us by our waiter

Then we had to finish the souvenir list.  I bought berets, and Marsha bought lighters for the TSA folks in Cinci (even unfilled they posed a threat - and even though the Paris security folks let them pass, as they were NON-FUNCTIONING, the Cincinnati folks took them from Marsha's carry-on bag.  I should have made sure that they were in the checked luggage, with my corkscrew, so that they could be lost by Delta Airlines in a series of Airline Screw-Ups that you can read about later).  We then bought packages of coffee and the above mentioned fan for Marsha and all sorts of little stuff.  St. Michel is so alive.  It has a little of everything, and I could happily live out the rest of my days in that quatier. 

 A flower vendor sold me a rose for my beloved, and then tried to Hustle it up to half a dozen.  I grinned, admired his determination, and offered to go back to ZERO flowers, Zero Euro.  The purchase remained a single red rose.

We knew that this would be our last full night... a Saturday night, as Sunday night we would be packing up early for home.  We stopped in a grocers' for this and that, anything to savor the taste of the city that I have loved for 35 years, and Marsha had come to love overnight.  As John Sebastian said in "Do You Believe In Magic?" ... "ITS LIKE TRYIN' TO TELL A STRANGER 'BOUT ROCK'N'ROLL".  I had a crocheted chain of bags linked together of little crap that we were picking up.  It was Saturday night in the City Of Lights.  I was with my bride and all of the wine and fine food as we wove our way through streets and alleys of book shops and collectables, and cafés, and people.  

Its not about youth, as I once thought it might be...when I was young.  
Its not about pretty people, as I had feared, as I had never been one.  
It was about all people, all shapes and sizes and pedigrees, all that in some way or another were seduced by this Dame Grande d'Europa. 

And all the things that are part of "taking holiday" were wrapped into that evening stroll.  The anticipation of returning home to a couple of pissed off cats.  Giving up a pace of living that had become as comfortable as your oldest sneakers.  Wake when you wish, eat when you are hungry, stop and watch the children play, and the trees sway and birds steal their lunch from the gutter.  Stop and drink some wine when the feet and spirit needs a second wind.  Finding the simplest magic trick in a magic shop that was around the corner.  Buying a replica of the "One Ring" from "Lord Of The Rings" in another store, one to wear on a chain and remind me that with the magic, there is obligation.

We had yet to get inside the Louvre, and Sunday was our last chance.  Yet, we did not want to give up Saturday night.  We are not young adults anymore.  We take longer to do things, and are able to afford to do others longer than we could have if the calendar were 30 years earlier.  It was our Honeymoon, and it was a city that has 70 year old couples snuggling on park benches or walking hand in hand.  It is where the "air kiss" was perfected...on both cheeks... for all your friends.  It is a city that will return kindness, when you are able to initiate humanity.  If you are willing to meet it half way, Paris brings a bottle and a dish to pass.  The people are wonderful, detached enough to be enigmatic, yet passionate enough so that when the day wears down, so does the Big City Pace that one must maintain to not get trampled.  By the way, honey, stand on the droit(right), pass on the gauche(left), be it escalators or moving sidewalks.  Not everyone is on holiday, so we must stay out of the way of the poor schmucks that aren't.  

And slowly we walked back up the hill to the Panthéon.  Back to the Sully-St. Germain.  Way before the night was over, it slowed to a crawl and a stretch on the bed leading  to the inevitable slumber of the weary traveler.  Sunday and our last 24 hours in our new "home" was on its way.  Our hearts were very much in Paris that night, and as you read this, they are still there.  After a month, we still discuss the next trip back.  Finding an apartment, buying one, retiring there.  Going there for Christmas.

I think I know what Marsha found there.  Coffee, the way she always wanted it, but was too bull-headed to try.  Wine in varieties that were not her norm.  Food that amazed and delighted.  Architecture that is an art.  History older than the country we live in.  Walking on paving stones  that were there before we declared our independence from Britain.  And a pace of living that suits her life.

And I found a guy I lost track of some 30 years ago.  Someone asked what was the best part, and I have to confess, I told the tale of the night I was on the streets alone.  The night that I hit the student café to use their Wi-Fi.  I loved the time I spent with my wife.  I have always been a person that can travel and tour on my own and have a real good time doing it.   The night I was hitting the local coffee house was me finding myself as me.  Not a guy that sells carpet, or only speaks English, or is defined by family, friends or possessions.  I was a guy, being myself with no filters.  No regard for friends' or family's boredom with what I do as diversions.  It was no great thing, but it was something that had burned itself into me so many years back.  Walking the streets and alleys of Paris and feeling like the world had more possibilities than Delta Airlines has excuses.  Yes, I forgot my age, I talked politics and philosophy in a salon in Paris, like others have done for Centuries.

Paris is great on so many levels.  Saturday night 51 years and one week after I was pushed kicking and screaming into a cold world from a warm womb and board.  Labor pains were soon to start.  We were soon to get pushed out of the security and comfort and euphoria of  Paris.  Jobs, loved ones and home and responsibility were soon to call.  But we still had Sunday to lick the spoons from the desert that was Paris.  Le Louvre...or "Wow..That is the real thing" as it is often called.

Remove all doubt to email me.

craig@alldoubtrodgerson.com