I slept well. You know how when you are mega tired, it often takes longer to unwind and your sleep is then interrupted? I think in the last couple of days, I wound myself up so much that I went beyond tired. I was out by midnight and didn't wake up until after 8. Amazing. (Or, is it that I skipped my lunch coffee, only because there was no place or time for it? One can never be sure as to the causes and effects of these things.)
Looking outside a side window, I see it again -- that St Paul de Vance skyline.
Looking toward the front big window, I can just catch a strip of the Mediterranean.
Breakfast -- simple but near perfect. (Missing: fresh fruit. An apple would have put it at 100% for me.)
I've met the two dashing gentlemen who seem to run the place. Or at least assist Ann who may well own the Villa and be their mother. I can't figure it out and I'm here for such a short time that I wont try. In any case, they were all lovely and sympathetic, not charging me for the missed night. They all remind me of the characters in the art in my room, which I'll show you because it's so appropriate for my stay -- the rain! The umbrellas!
And now to Paris. It is strange, I know, to be flying there. I always take the train. Why wouldn't I -- it's fast reliable comfortable and it bypasses the whole airport scene. But this time I went with the free for me flight (gotta use up those miles!). It's also a question of time. I'd have to backtrack to Marseille and change there. To arrive in Paris at a decent hour, I'd have to leave early. Too early.
So I catch a ride to the airport. And then my flight to Paris.
In all these movements by cab, encounters with various French people along the way, you may wonder if anything has changed in their attitude toward Americans. My sample is so small right now that I hate to pass judgment, but I'll tell you this much: for me, it feels like things have changed. In my past visits here this year, people were eager to engage. To voice their opinion. To question American support for our current administration. This time I am met with avoidance and silence. Politeness supreme, but there is also that refusal to talk about it. As if doing so would be too painful, both from the economics of it and the emotional charge. To me, it feels like they've given up on trying to understand, because after the last escapades, there's nothing more to say. We know what's at play. Best not to put it into words. I'll let you know if perhaps I just stumbled on the wrong sample of people. Paris may be different.
The flight is on time and easy. I take the train to the city and walk past the Jardin Luxembourg down to Le Baume.
And oh, am I glad to be at this hotel, in what I love to think of as "my room."
I have gone through so many residential changes in these years, with more to come, and yet, here in Paris, Le Baume has been my home for more than twenty years. The stability, the feeling of familiarity and kindness of the staff, knowing every detail here and liking it all -- this is exactly what I need right now. I have no desire for adventure in Paris. I just want to take each day at a time and run with it as the mood dictates. I can do that here like nowhere else. I am immensely happy to be back.
Immediately I head out to the park. Why? Because Paris is sunny today. It may well be the only sunshine I'll get on my trip. I want its glow and uplifting brilliance. Too, in January and especially on the weekend, the park really does belong to Parisians. (Not exclusively -- there will always be visitors here, even in late January.) If I want to feel myself to be here, in this city, then walking the boulevards of le Jardin Luxembourg is the way to do it.
It is so crowded with seemingly content people that I have to smile. Even at the height of the tourist season, it's never this packed. Of course it is, wouldn't you go out on a warmer, sunny day, after a blast of winter? (Paris had snow last week. Today it's 48F/9C.) Not a single chair is empty. No problem, people find ways to relax and face the sun.)
I've skipped lunch again, deliberately this time. My hotel is next to a shop selling teas. I buy packets of hibiscus-red fruits, including strawberry. At le Baume, I pick up a warm almond croissant -- they put these out for you in the late afternoon. Delicious!
I unpack. Here for four nights (with a brief trip after to the country, to another familiar place, for a forest walk). Tonight, I'll do nothing unusual. (Perhaps all the time I'm here I'll do nothing unusual.) Indeed, I even go to the restaurant that I've adopted as the easiest and most comfortable meal for me -- at Seulement Sea. So yes, seafood once again. And then home. You have no idea how good it feels to be returning late in the evening to Le Baume.
In the evening I sort through the puzzle of my return. Just to make things more complicated, I want to see if I can come back a day earlier. There are technical reasons for it. Of course, given the storms pushing through the US, everything for this coming week is booked solid. And still, I make the effort, giving up only late into the night. I write about this because I have long understood that in travel, nothing is set. You can move things around some of the time. And I always try, if it strikes me that a change may be for the best, though as tonight demonstrates, sometimes you just cannot do it. Still, I think you should try and not rest with something you think may not work as well as you had hoped.
with so much love...
