My Life in France, Part Deux 🥖🇫🇷

Paris, summer 2010, age 22

The year is 2010. The President is Obama, and thrilled in my mama. I’m 21, and still barely know how to drink. (I’m a late bloomer, okay? I won’t even lose my virginity in this essay series.)

I have one goal burning in my chest like the eternal flame: it’s to get back to France. I wanted to turn 22 on European soil, dammit. And I wanted to improve my French.

If I were Rocky Balboa, this would be my running-up-the-stairs moment. I had already done the training montage: I had drank raw eggs (i.e., stayed in with my French text book for 13 consecutive weekends). And thanks to my professors and internet penpals, I had attained a kindergarten level of fluency in French. This meant I could speak in four word sentences, expressing emotions ranging from hunger to happiness.

I needed to level up.

I mean, I wanted to do more than conjugate Dr. Mrs. Vandertramp verbs (anyone remember those from 9th grade? The action verbs? Devenir, revenir, monter, rentrer, sortir, venir…). I wanted to breathe physical action into those verbs — I wanted to go, be, do!

But there was a problem: I only had like, $100 to my name. $50 after my weekly expenditure of cold brew and Chipotle.

Enter Lizzie. Lizzie’s not only my Mom’s business partner, but she’s my godmother. I call her my fairy godmother, for the number of times she’s waved her magic wand (or credit card) and said, “bippity bop pity boop!” (Seriously, there is NO ONE more generous in this world than a lesbian without kids). I wish everyone had someone in their lives that they could go to, not just when they’re in need, but when they have some desire fluttering just out of their reach. Lizzie’s been that person for me. She bought me my plane ticket. When the ticket agent asked which airline I was flying, I answered, “Orbitz?” My mother was Liam Neeson levels of terrified.

Next, I needed somewhere in Paris to stay.

Enter Frederique: Frederique was a French girl who had done an exchange in my hometown with a friend of a friend. When said friend connected us over Facebook, Frederique said that I could stay with her family. As luck would have it, her brother’s apartment was vacant for the summer — he was in the French military, stationed at some kind of Hexagon, which I figured couldn’t be the exact equivalent of our Pentagon. But anyway, it was in the 7th arrondissement.

I didn’t know it at the time, but this was like the Paris equivalent of the Upper East Side. The Eiffel Tower was right outside my window, coyly showing off her legs for me. If I saw this happen in a movie, or Emily in Paris, I would’ve scoffed at such unrealistic writing.

Of course, the apartment was in an 19th century building, with no central air, on the 10th floor. I would be sweating up there like Robespierre the night before his execution. But, at least I had a place to stay!

Frederique has also left a teensy lil footnote about me paying her parents something. But I hoped that we would become such good friends that she would let this slide. ’Cause all I had was a Capital One card with a $750 credit limit and a 14% APR, fresh out of the envelope. (I mean, it worked for Greta Gershwig in Frances Ha, right?)

I went through TSA all alone, feeling sheer exhilaration. This was going to be an adventure of a lifetime!!!! Once aboard, I sat flanked by a fifty something couple who were headed to Paris to visit their daughter, who was studying abroad. It was clear to me, as they told me the details of their trip, and argued over what arrondissement their hotel was in, that they were one of those lackluster, chewed-gum couples. My excitement fizzled like a flute of Veuve Cliquot after midnight. Suddenly, I felt claustrophobic in between them.

What the hell was I doing, going to Paris by myself?? Are you kidding, Car?? I no longer felt like a confident, cosmopolitan woman, I felt like a scawwwed, scawwed wittle girl. I actually thought I could leave my Mommy?? I wanna go home! Let me off this thing!!

But it was too late — we were wheels up to Paris now.

— — — — —

It was 2010, and the world was a very different place. The Kardashians were on the cover of InTouch instead of Vogue. Trump was still on the Apprentice.

It was Steve Jobs’ penultimate year on earth, but his legacy, the iPhone, had only disseminated through maybe 60% of the millennial population. The other 40% had CrackBerries.

I was the crumb of the pie chart who still had a flip-phone. That meant that I had to use a sketchy internet kiosk at Charles de Gaulle airport to tell my Mom I had safely landed in Paris.

Then, by some absolute fucking miracle that proved the universe loves me, I managed to put myself on the train to Paris, with 1.) no internet 2.) no sleep and 3.) and the dreamiest brain ever manufactured. For reference, this is like Gen Z finding a book in a library by using a card catalogue.

When I stepped off the train (*sighs*)…now this part is key. I ask that you give me your undivided attention. Because you deserve to have Paris through my 22-year-old goggles.

The first thing I heard when I stepped off the train was a musette. The notes of the French accordion unspooled through the warm June air like a child blowing bubbles. Transfixed, I let myself by carried along by the crowd, blurting apologies for my bulky suitcase (“Desole…desole…”). My eyes roved over the cream-colored chateaux along the rivereria, which looked as sumptuous as slices of Vienetta ice cream. Along the piers, mimes performed to clapping crowds, all over the backdrop of that musette…

The smell of crepes flicked my nose. I stopped for the Tunisian man who was making them and ordered one. The batter browned swiftly on the griddle, a perfect circle which he folded, radius on radius, over an egg and gruyere. When I bit through the mealy crackle, I felt enfolded by angel’s wings. I remember this as one of my favorite meals ever, but it could be because it had been seven hours since the in-flight peanuts.

When I got to Frederique’s brother’s apartment, I collapsed in a contented heap of jet lag and sensory overload.

It wouldn’t be until I woke up, hours later, that I even took in the Eiffel. She would be flashing her

lights through my window every night, tempting me away out of my sleep like a snazzy sorceress.

Photo by 🇸🇮 Janko Ferlič on Unsplash

Part Trois coming soon. This essay series is my notes for a one-woman-show, coming this spring to Brooklyn!!

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