C’est La Paris
“This is Paris.” I thought. Finally!
Earlier that morning, I had completely laid to rest my expectations of France that had been let down over and over. I’d already seen the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, and had French Onion Soup… in France. Yet, I felt something was missing.
I was staying in a cozy apartment right around the corner from Sacré-Cœur Basilica, a beautiful cherry-topper of a monument, being that it’s at the highest point in the city. When I arrived in Paris, I had this feeling that my life would change, I don’t know why; I was expecting to be blown away by its ‘Joie de vivre’, the ‘Je ne sais quoi’ of it all. That French romance you know? You hear all these stories of Paris: that it’s so cultured, romantic, and full of captivating history. I guess I expected all of France’s cliches to French kiss me as soon as I got off the plane and feel dazzled. What happened, was Paris took me on a love affair, and I was too busy not feeling in love, rather than realizing we were still getting to know each other.
Little by little, though, my expectation was replaced with appreciation. The thunderstorm that trapped my wife and I against the Basilica wall hiding from the rain, when everyone else ran away, it allowed us to look up at and appreciate the water gushing out of the Gargoyle eavestroughs once the rain cleared. Finding a row of Lilac trees, my absolute favourite tree and smell, leading straight to the Eiffel Tower was a wonderful surprise. Seeing the look on my wife’s face when she saw Notre Dame, and studying the intricate craftsmanship on every inch of that building, only to go in and see an actual service going on, echoing through the vaulted arches. Then having my mind blown realizing I was eating French Onion Soup, or, Onion Soup, in France. Those were the little dates, trists, and unexpected surprises Paris had to show me. These moments were slowly breaking down my walls.
But it wasn’t until the morning I spoke of earlier that I realized I was in love, that I wasn’t looking at Paris with expectation, but with appreciation. I left the apartment early in the morning to get coffee for us, and walk the streets on my own. I walked down Rue Lamarck, with coffee in hand, and I’d stopped to get some bread to have when I went back to make breakfast. That moment, I looked around on the quiet, but steady street, I saw five other people with Baguettes under their arm just like me, tearing off pieces to eat and enjoying their lives; that’s when I laid to rest all my expectations. I felt like a true Parisian, minus I can’t speak a lick of French.
But the moment that subtly made me realize “C’est la Paris”, said with my finest French accent inner dialogue, was when we’d taken a walk to Pont des Arts, the famous ‘Love Lock Bridge’. It’s so named for the thousands of locks clasped to the bridge, attached by couples to seal their love, or a secret, then tossing the key into the Seine River below. My wife and I were just sitting on a bench along the bridge, breathing it in- it was pretty amazing to be in the presence of that much symbolic love.
Then I saw her, a young Parisian girl. I didn’t interact with her, and I never really saw her face, but that didn’t matter because I knew who she was. She was Paris, this was the personification of Paris.
A pleasant feminine figure: art sac over her shoulder that she’d just stuffed her Baret into, leaning on the bridge while on her quaint bicycle, holding a Baguette in her other hand, love locks in the background. So many of France’s cliches just whispered to me, I smiled and thought, “This, is Paris.”.
