Blue Dress Hot Mess

Series: The Paris Diaries: 12/03/25-13/03/25

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.

12/03/25:

I bought the Gucci boots. I heard Carrie Bradshaw “But where did all my money go? I know I made some” and Rachel Green “They’re my: I don’t need a job, I don’t need a boyfriend, I’ve got great boots boots!” on repeat in my head. I don’t want to record the price, because they are already worth more than that to me. They come with some return tax I don’t understand. I texted my friend: better than sex.

13/03/25:

My first conscious waking thought was of my Gucci boots. It is a good sign: I could not have left them behind. I intend to sit later in my navy Damson Madder pyjamas with blood-red twills and my Gucci boots on my feet. I intend to feel like Carrie Bradshaw. I wrote before – years ago – of feeling like Bridget Jones. I was sitting, then, on the floor of a London flat wearing a pair of knickers to stop itching carpet (I wasn’t wearing anything else) and drinking a glass of Chardonnay. How much has changed, but the girl I am now – the one who intends to spend her Thursday evening in Paris feeling like, embodying, Carrie Bradshaw (sadly minus the Cosmopolitan) – is the same girl who sat writing then. I knew as soon as I put one foot – my right big toe, in fact – inside the sleeve of the Gucci boot that there was no going back. This road I was walking (and the boots – who were not made for walking but for wearing – that I had chosen to go in) was quite obviously a one-way street towards the end of my savings. They are – technically – a size too small. But – oh, Cinderella – the shoe fits. Not only does it fit but it feels like coming home; they are my feet’s first set of house keys. They unlock the door into heaven.

If I never get married – and, frankly, at this specific moment in time the likelihood is getting more and more remote – I can safely say that I have had my Bridal Moment. I had a ridiculous image of myself wearing the boots on my wedding day, plumes of white dress frothing around their tawny monogrammed nylon and leather heels. I felt the butterflies of first love, the grabbing “I must have you now“ (I took the single boot off the display shelf and asked the woman – in French so quick and fluent it surprised even me – if I could have the other one because I had to try them on before I thought twice about it) of those first tingles of intimacy, and it was only the presence of Gabriel pulling at his lead while trying to chew through a pair of vintage Dolce and Gabbana sling-backs the prevented the wedding day tears. I bought the shoes. I had to. Nothing has ever been so impulsive nor correct. A homecoming, in a pair of Guccis.

And just like that Gabe and I walked home past Notre-Dame with a bootbox in an unlabelled cardboard bag on my arm. I wanted a siren: convoi exceptionnel. Precious cargo. Stay clear.