Tomorrow we are moving out of central Paris. No more Eiffel tower and no more Louvre.
We are moving into the banlieue of Montreuil, just east of Paris. Moving out of a 6th floor walk up/tiny one bedroom apartment and into a house with room to throw concerts and parties in. Something feels momentous about moving out of the middle of the city and into the fringe. FB is on an overnight trip to get our things out of storage tonight and I'm sitting in the dark in a near empty apartment drinking a beer next to my two month old sleeping son and feeling sentimental. I took him on a walk today to say goodbye to an arrondissement he will never remember and I was filled with contradictory feelings. On one hand, I feel burned by this area. The lightning speed and intense colors of my life in New York has been replaced with the slow burn of an elusive Parisian candle. Friends have come and gone here and in my solitude I haven't yet found the equivalent of the fiery humor and tree trunk solid of my NY circle. I know it's here somewhere, hidden like the garden my window looks out onto, the garden where nobody has gone in the two and a half years I have been staring at it.
We walked today, my son strapped to my front looking at the world with fresh eyes and me having a big think. As we passed by the infamous taxi stand where two sets of people stole a cab from me while I was in labor in the middle of a snowstorm, I got enraged all over again and thought that most of all, I will not miss the lack of community in this area and the general frosty and negative attitude. BUT....I WILL miss walking a block to the Seine river, the beauty of my surroundings, my boucher and cheeseman but most of all, my dearly beloved and worshipped Eric Kayser bakery, also known as the best bakery in the entire universe and beyond. It's currently donut season there so I ate 12 of them yesterday in honor of my departure....
Au revoir little apartment in the sky on the left bank.
You were kind to me and a lot of music came out of these walls.
As I move onto my next Parisian adventure, I will always remember my time here with a smile...
