Busy Bee
I’m in Paris on Substack business.
If you think that being an affable dinner companion on Saturday and making charming small talk at at a bigger event on Sunday evening hardly counts as ‘business’, then I will put you in touch with my accountant. You’re clearly of a mind.
I’ve spent time in Paris at several different stages of my life, and each represents a significant moment for me.
At 8 years old, I realised that some people speak and think a totally different language. I was frustrated at my childhood friend M-‘s insistence on saying everything in a way I couldn’t comprehend, and relying on my mother to put it into English. Then it clicked. I still remember that moment and think about it when people who do speak English are saying things that I still can’t for the life of me comprehend.
I remember some people simply think and speak differently to me.
And there are several other moments that I’ll race thru to get to the one I’m experiencing now, in this moment. Staying with the same family friends as a teenager and being forbidden from going on a date I’d somehow cooked up in French. A romantic trip in my 20s and turning down the chance to buy an antique ring, and realizing what that meant for my intentions in that relationship.
To now. The end of an exclusive dinner. I have brought my family to Paris for the weekend, and my wife looked after the kids for the evening. At the end of the dinner, they were all asleep, it was Saturday night, and I thought ‘I can take advantage of this rare opportunity to sit by myself in a café and enjoy a drink and a look about’.
But as I walk through the streets of Bastille, towards my apartment in the Quinze-Vingt district, past the revelers and the flâneurs and the beautiful and interesting-looking folks sitting and sipping, I think… nah.
There’s nothing I’d rather see than my family. All abed. Sleeping peacefully.
And here I am. And here they are. And all is right with my world.
Bon soir.