So I left Paris.
But not until the afternoon. When you travel from Europe to the Midwest, you have two choices: take a wee early flight, so you're basically up and out before dawn, or take the late one. In normal times that late one is not the cheapest on the planet and it has awful connections to Madison. So in normal times, I set the alarm, I ignore the inconvenience, and schlep my suitcase to the RER station to get to the airport before Parisians are even thinking of wiping off the last croissant crumb and heading out to work.
This time, however, I was lucky. On so many fronts, and one of them is that I was able to get a late (3:50pm) departure.
I wake up nice and late (because, you know, I had stayed up nice and late), I have my same old breakfast downstairs (and it's fine and it's free, but in normal times, I'd trot down to Les Editeurs at least for one morning bread product meal. The croissants and the people watching are both way better there).
And now I have two hours to be a flaneur again. Well, not really that: I need to find a big bag. I will never learn this simple lesson: however little you buy in Paris, there always will be something (books this time), and it wont fit in your little carry-on no matter how much you sit on it trying to get the zipper pieces to come together. So I have to do what I've done a million times here -- find something that is not expensive and not a waste of money (meaning it'll have a life after this trip) to carry on, while I send the suitcase through with the luggage.
I hate sending stuff through because you then have to wait in Detroit to claim it and process it through customs and it takes time, but what are you gonna do... Either don't buy cookies and books and sweaters for the kids or spend your last morning in Paris looking for a bag.
But you know what -- there are worse ways to spend two hours in this city! Especially since the weather is once again totally with me.
I pop into the Jardin de Luxembourg where I dodge the occasional jogger and admire the fall colors...
And then I weave my way through familiar blocks, aiming for shops that have served me well before.
(Hey, do you know this sculpture of the Centaur? I pass it a lot, as it's on the way to the Bon Marche food halls. Do you see that it contains yet another Statue of Liberty? Bet you can't find it, though in all fairness, the monument is rather dark. Today is the first time that I spotted it!)
(Here, I'll help you with a close up. See it now?)
And just steps away from this I find my shop with the perfect bag. I will never leave home without packing it with me for the return. I promise.
And then I meander, pausing again at a cookie shop (because suddenly I have plenty of room!), looking into bakeries, taking big whiffs there, admiring everything. I have this unease about when there will be a return trip. These days you can't make plans. You really do have to learn to live in the moment.
(I must have gazed into a 100 pastry shops such as this one...)
(Boulevard St Germain, in a fleeting moment of emptiness...)
I love this last stroll through Paris, but, too, I'm thinking about those back home, and the farmette, and Ed's work on the farmhouse, and the mess I may find in the kitchen, and too many cats coming inside because there's no one to tell him that too many cats are coming inside.
A lot to smile about!
* * *
At the Paris airport, there is the usual chaos. I cannot believe that this is called a light travel season! I have left over frequent flyer privileges so I can duck most long lines but still, it cannot be said that people are staying home. They are not staying home. I wear my super duper mask (thank you, maskc for supplying me with all those pretty colors!) and stay away from people who think these things were invented to keep the lips shielded.
I have a bit of a wait and so I find a spot where the closest people are also wearing super duper protective N95s or some such. I notice that the woman is leafing through a guide book. She's my age and both she and her husband are American. From Georgia actually. They just arrived at CDG and and are heading out with a small group to Cairo, then Jordan.
I admire that. I ask them if they have any hesitancy at all -- they say no, not really. The trip had been long in the planning and cancelled twice already so they decided just to go already. I know many people, retired people, who feel this sense of urgency -- as if the window of travel is closing on them. Now or never.
I hope they have a fabulous trip! I know they'll have a fabulous trip.
* * *
The thing about foreign travel is that it changes you. Perhaps this is the way it is most noticeably different from just watching a movie or reading an essay about a distant place. Those, too may shape your perspective, but going somewhere, across an ocean perhaps, really does stir things up inside you so that you emerge, well, not the same.
I don't know yet which moments will stand out for me, but there were many that already are percolating in my head. Down to the last elbow bump as I left my beloved little hotel and said a bientot (see you soon) to the hotel staff there.
* * *
As I arrive home, I get a text from Ed saying simply "I'm vacuuming."
There is a moon, not quite full, over the farmette tonight. All is quiet, beautiful. Just as I left it.
