My Life in France — Part Un

An American girl reflects on her passionate love of France

It’s a truth universally acknowledged that an American girl must have a fetish for French culture.

Go into any Marshalls or TJ Maxx in America. You’ll find evidence of my claim. The supply is there to match the demand: Eiffel towers on bedspreads and curtains. Dogs in berets on plates. The word “Paris” in fancy font, to resemble a street sign from the Paris of Baudelaire. Someone is buying all this poofy pink crap. If you haven’t bought it yourself, your Aunt has most definitely bought it for you.

I believe the desire to go to Paris beats in the heart of every girl born in the land of Kraft American cheese. It’s resides beside “see T Swift in concert” and “marry Timothee Chalamet.” It’s a feminine ideal that transcends generations, in the way that Dolly Parton does. For an American girl, Paris is synonymous with class and culture; timeless elegance and beauty. Things that our country, with its infinite highway of Dunkin Donuts and Burger Kings, may be accused of lacking.

My Francophilia was a little more extreme than the average American girl’s. For one, I minored in French in college. I committed to learning the language the way a leading lady in a Tarantino movie commits to bloody revenge. The year I was 21, I stayed in on Friday and Saturday nights…