Blue Dress Hot Mess

Series: The Paris Diaries: 21/02/25

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.

Dates unknown: Notes from Paris 

We rode at the front of the driverless train in the Metro, looking out of the enormous windscreen. The was a black hole in front of us, and behind us a train-full of people. 

Gabe and I have just met the leopard-coat lady from the first floor’s chihuahua. It was not a happy meeting. The chihuahua (in pink to match his mistress, who was in jogging leggings of a similar hue but who seemed to prioritise speed walking over running) appeared to wish to sound the alarm to every other chihuahua in Paris the Gabe posed an enormous threat to their general population and, perhaps, entire species. She did so at the very top of her lungs, straining at her lead, ignoring the cries of ‘Mais c’est Gabriel” (I was flattered the lady remembered; we met briefly, five days ago, but I’m pleased my puppy makes such a lasting impression. He will be a man-about-town someday). At a quieter time I’d like to speak to this lady more. We met again, later that day, and she asked me to go for a walk with her next week ‘sans chiens’. She said it would be quieter and we could talk properly. She says it can be lonely to be so young in a foreign country. She works in a Maison de Luxe, and has kind blue eyes.

We have walked, and sat in front of the Louvre. The sunshine is beautiful, and everyone seems so happy. It is bliss to see. I feel full – of food, yes, but that kind of satiable hunger is not what I mean. This fullness only wants more, a greedy beast which is at present lolling comfortably in a state of full-stomached security. People smile on the street. Great gaggles of school children with disgusting looking dried bread-and-cheese (always hyphenated, since if it weren’t it would be virtually impossible to differentiate between the bread or the cheese) are sitting on the steps and singing stupid chants and screaming at each other about nothing in particular. A group of eleven year old French boys made kissing noises at me. I smiled, and looked down at my notebook; I was not blushing (I think in the circumstances of me being Adult (though that does’t seem right) a blush  would have been boarding on Criminal), but it made me grin to remember how awful we’d all been, on school trips, aged 11, and – though I know I’m no pensioner – I was pleased that the enfants d’aujourd’hui had the same kinda fun. 

With my eyelids closed and the sun shining through them I could be anywhere. But I am in Paris; with Gabriel, this funny little being who rushes up the stairs in front of me and waits on every landing looking worried just in case I never reappear. (I always do, panting slightly: we have a lot of stairs). I am convinced he’ll have acute separation anxiety when we get back to England. If we go back; I’m so very tempted not to. Life is gentle, done my way. I might buy myself some champagne. No, I don’t think I can go home to life before This. Here, I am a writer. I have silky hair (Carrefour only sold Garnier avocado shampoo, but it has proved revolutionary), and I write. That is all. 

I saw homeless man outside the supermarket yesterday using a bottle opener to open a large bottle of rosé at 2 o’clock in the afternoon. (The time itself is of no relevance; it was the bottle opener which caught my attention). 

Paris is different in the rain. It feels grungier somehow – like living in the ash of someone’s cigarette – and it smells like the riverbank. Oddly, the greyness suits this city. The rain comes down in wires, and I sit and watch it through the open window. I feel French. I’ve just seen a man teach his six-year-old son how to pee against the walled banks of the Seine. The rain allows for endless renditions of ABBA in my head (laughing in the r-eine). I’m going to give the puppy a bath. 

21/02/25:

I woke to bells and pigeons. There were bells in my dream – school dinner – but no pigeons (I wasn’t sharing), so I knew I was no longer dreaming and that I must be awake. The sun has returned, making it feel like a holiday; after one simple day of damp I had forgotten Paris in the sunshine. It makes her blush. The people who inhabit her streets daily seem almost oblivious; they rush, their horns honk, their cigarettes are crushed out before the burning white stem meets the safety of the fawn. There is pace in this city. My French friend says Paris never stops. Something always happens in Paris. I believe her. 

I let the sunshine play through my eyelids. It means I was walking blind – eyes closed – but that didn’t matter. I wore all white: fluted sleeves, white jeans, thick, heavy gold heart chain — with a blue silk bandanna around my head. I looked like an angel pirate. Or a pirate angel. I think they leave different impressions. 

We were stopped by two little old ladies by the Pont Neuf. They asked me in very clear-spoken, high-pitched French (she was wearing pink glasses, and had her bleached hair cropped close to her scalp) where Notre-Dame was. The giggles which rose inside my stomach had to be suppressed. They were French; I was (am) not. They did not assume I was English, nor, I don’t think (after I told them to cross back over the bridge and then turn right — they’d been walking steadfastly in the wrong direction, towards the Eiffel Tower, which, though due North, was not at all where they wanted to go) did they guess it. We spoke perfect clear-cut, high-pitched French, and wished one another a “Bonne journée”. I hope they found Notre-Dame. It is hard to miss.

Gabriel and I walked on to the Pont Louis-Philippe, and watched a man play the piano with the island before him and Notre-Dame at his back. It is easy to imagine a hunchback.

I do not think of myself as a storyteller. They are like witches, and wear hats, and lure children into caves. I am a writer. I write. 

I ate truffle pasta for lunch, and am now full. Gabriel ate some Parmesan which made him so thirsty he drank a full dog bowl of l’eau (which the waiter brought him specially) and then weed every 10 minutes for next two hours (twice in the Passages, which at least make very atmospheric toilettes). He is now asleep. My laundry is strewn all over the flat so that you can’t sit down without sitting back on a pair of lace knickers – which I suppose is the reality anyway – provided you’re wearing them (lace ones; yours may be boxier, or slinkier, or covered in yellow rubber ducks. I’m not suggesting you’re not wearing any at all), – but you never think about that when you sit down on chair. I do have a laundry rack, but it wobbles and collapses and terrifies Gabe so I find the backs of chairs to be less fraught when being a Domestic Goddess.

The window is open. The heat – a full 16° – reads as: Stifling with the Occasional Raindrop, and I almost feel like it should thunder.