Our Parisian Love Affair

When I was in the 11th grade, rumor had it that Greg Wingo was going to ask me to the football banquet. He was our quarterback—gorgeous. If you don’t understand the significance of a 16 year old girl’s excitement over a Greg Wingo invitation, this blog is not for you.

The moment had come, he was on approach. The 6th hour bell had rung and I was loitering in the high school parking lot. Then.

I had volcanic diarrhea. Shit myself, I did. I saw ol’ blue eyes coming and I took off like a vapor. The pants I was wearing that day became known as the doodie pants in family lore. I never went to that banquet.

Relationships! Am I right?

Decades ago in the beginning of my love affair with Paris—Le Début—I experienced forceful déjà vu. You’ve been there? When you meet someone you feel you’ve known forever?

La Séduction began in 2013 when my sister Joan and I trudged to French immersion school in Paris’ bitter winter for 11 weeks. My teacher was as mean as a wet panther. Paris was playing hard to get but I was lovestruck.

From 2014-2019 The Husband and I spent about four months in Paris. We were on familiar terms with her. The French have a verb for this “Tutoyer”. Paris je t’aime is an example of the tutoyer. And I do.

La Pause 2020. As Rachel said to Ross, we were on a break—Covid.

We returned to Paris in September 2021. In France, September is called La Rentrée, the return. Covid was raging but París was magical. I wrote a poem.

We will be with my sisters and nieces this Thanksgiving, in our tiny (rented) apartment in Paris. Perhaps we’ll call this phase of our relationship Remercients—thankful

La Rentrée Paris 2021

The streets were marvelously empty. Empty of people empty of trash from metro tickets. Empty.

The streets were full. Full of energy of Parisians of laughter. Of people in the boulangeries buying bread. My do the French love their bread.

The lines were non-existent. The lines for the Louvre for Musée d’Orsay for the Arc de Triomphe.

The lines were long. For the bread. And the Saturday butcher and the Sunday butcher. The lines were long for ice cream and for scooters, and on falafel Sunday. The lines were furiously long on falafel Sunday.

Paris was quiet. Quiet at night when we were sleeping. Quiet at the gardens.

And it was noisy. Noisy people returning from holiday, noisy children returning to school.

Only in French— is there a word for this and it’s simply “the return”, La rentrée.

Covid. Isolation. Fear. Dismay. Death. Grief. Uncertainty. But now…

La rentrée.