Blue Dress Hot Mess

Series: The Paris Diaries: 14/02/25-15/02/25

Notes for the confused reader: Gabriel (Gabe) is a dog, not a child. This is a collection of pieces from my notebook, typed up; as such, some is written in real-time, some with the benefit of hindsight. It is fragmentary, but so is my mind. If something says (FA) in brackets, read: French Accent.

I am drinking an enormous black coffee, and eating vanilla-almond granola. Yesterday I’d eaten two cakes before lunch, so today I thought I ought to strike a balance; my pre petit-déj will shortly be followed by a real petit-déj of something in the pastry departement, most likely filled with chocolate. When in Rome, and all that. The sun is creeping up the rooftops of the building opposite as I write. Saturday morning in Paris is surprisingly peaceful.

I have decided that the men in Paris are very handsome. The girls are sultry, but extremely beautiful. They do not smile (except, perhaps, at the puppy, but even then their ‘coucou-ing’ does not extend to the girl at the other end of the leash). I shall have to keep going back to the boulangerie by the Musée d’Orsay (luckily very near me) because the garçon who served me today was really quite good looking, and I was too focused on my viennoise au chocolat (occupational hazard of the croissant-hunter) to look him in the eyes. If I frequent the place daily, I may be granted in deuxième chance (FA). Some are in pursuit of love; some of happiness. I am in quest of a croissant. (It sounds either like a poorly-clad euphemism, or like it ought to be my Instagram bio. I think I’d naïvely settle for the latter, except that really I am in quest of a pains au chocolat, but if we read it as a euphemism that sounds rather painful. I’ll have to give the bio a miss, for now).

Gabriel has peed once more inside, but this time he made it past the Second Floor Doormat and chose the foyer at the bottom of the stairs instead. Embarrassing. (Since writing the above I have made accidental amis with the man on whose doormat Gabriel has a tendency to wee. I would tell him — only I won’t, because a) I’m too scared, b) what does it really matter?, puppy pee is surely only water, and c) – perhaps my most valid reason – I have absolutely no idea how to say “I’m terribly sorry but my puppy has a penchant (FA) for peeing on your doormat. Really, you ought to take it as a complement as your doormat must smell particularly nice, since it’s the only one he ever chooses to pop a squat on”. Somehow, I don’t think that will wash with the tall, science-y, be-shorted (in -3 degrees, I can only assume he was going cycling. Perhaps he’s some well-known winner of the Tour de France) Fronch-mann (FA) who just met us on the stairs. I say met, but I was mid way through trying to drag the puppy away from said man’s doormat to avoid a repeat-offence when this man opened his door, so it was a brief “Bonjour” and a lick (in Gabriel’s case, not my own). Besides, Gabe’s now taken to the communal foyer. It’s about half a step from the outside world (where lavatory activities of all kinds are permissible), and therefore much more fun).

Bridget Jones (Folle de Lui) was everything it ought to have been; frazzled and British, to the extent that I blinked twice as I emerged into a Parisian sunset, not from cinema-eyes but from a sort of double-take at my newfound reality. St-Germain-des-Prés was suddenly very alive before me, looking like a celestial Goldilocks, and making my presence in Paris suddenly appear very affronting. Everything is at once very much a dream, and deeply, thrillingly real. The sky was blushing as she hid behind Paris. Perhaps the sun is shy, and her date for Valentine’s Day had just arrived to take her out. Or perhaps she is only too aware of the sinful activities of the people whose lives she has illuminated today; she retires early, like a lady, to bed – quite alone, unlike most of those self-same people.

The puppy snores. Loudly. I hope he doesn’t wake the neighbours. Then we really would be in trouble.