Deux Mille Douce

Bonne année to all!

One of the best trends of this new year (and I'm SO glad French tradition permits wishing Happy New Year for the whole month of January) is this phrase: deux mille douce.

Of course, in French, 2012 is deux mille douze.

Deux mille douce. Two-thousand and sweetness; two-thousand and softness.

I like it.

Wishing you all a deux mille douce.

Change the Clocks in France

Remember that for one week, starting on Sunday October 30, France and the United States are just a bit closer.

Time-wise.

Yes, just my little public service announcement reminding you that residents of France will move their clocks back one hour on Sunday October 30 at 3 a.m. In the U.S., the "fall-back" will take place on Sunday November 6.

So for one week the time difference between East coast U.S. and France is 5 hours (8 hours for California).

You're welcome.

Meeting Ella Fitzgerald, part 2

So I ended up at an Ella Fitzgerald concert, totally, totally inappropriately dressed.  Read part one here.

I was entranced, thrilled, watching and listening to every Ella move, every note.  Thankful that the sun was setting, all eyes were focused on Ella on stage and hoping no one could see me in my grungy get-up.  Ella sang all the familiar favorites, and it really was a dream come true. About 20 feet away from my idol.

K no doubt noticed that I knew every tune by heart.  To her, Ella was someone famous that her father knew, but she clearly wasn't in the die-hard fan group with me.

Then.  Intermission.

All I wanted to do was cower in my seat, arms crossing over my lap.  I spotted the Deputy Mayor of Boston, a few other luminaries whom I knew vaguely and I just wanted to don the cloak of invisibility. You have to understand, I looked totally gross and shabby: windblown, unshowered, salty, sandy, wild mane of hair.  Everything unkempt one can look like at the end of a day at the beach.

Intermission.

"Let's go backstage!" says K. "With my VIP pass we can go back there, no problem!  You're such a fan, you can meet Ella."

Daggers of pain, angst.  "No, I can't possibly -- look at me!"

"Jeeeez, Polly, when will you ever have this chance again?  Don't be ridiculous.  Who cares?"

"I care."  Talk about being torn in two.  No. No. No.  Yes. Yes. Yes.

But I bit the bullet.  I rose from my seat, followed K past the "No admission" sign to the back of the stage, and after we waited outside the makeshift dressing room for a few minutes, out came Ella.  Elegant and larger than life in her long shining satin dress.  I think it was purple. Was it my imagination, or was there a halo-like aura about her?

I stammered.  What can you say to Ella Fitzgerald that isn't a cliche?  What can you say to explain meeting her while looking like a bum?  Nothing.  I shook her hand. And I said, "Miss Fitzgerald, you have been my idol since I was 12.  This is the greatest moment for me."

She smiled kindly and looked a little tired. I think she pretended not to notice my insultingly slapdash appearance. "Why, thank you, dear."  At least I think that's what she said. My ears felt filled with cotton.  My brain was in another planet.

"Could I have your .... signature?"  I had never asked for an autograph before.  Damn, that was the word I meant to say:  autograph.

"Of course."  She signed my program.  I think K winked at her or gave some other inside signal, and we left. 

My heart was pounding, and to this day, I don't know whether it was because I was actually meeting Miss Ella Fitzgerald, at long last.  Or whether it was from sheer embarrassment.

Meeting Miss Ella Fitzgerald

Starting a new series of summer posts.
Boston, 1982.

It is a steamy Massachusetts August evening, and I've just returned to my Beacon Hill apartment after a long weekend at the shore. The phone rings. It is my energetic and fun-filled friend, K.

"Hi, Poll. What are you doing tonight? Are you free?"

I'm always a sucker when questions are phrased this way.  I forget to ask "Hmm, what did you have in mind?" Instead, I quickly mentally prioritize the probabilities and give a hasty yay or nay.

"Oh, K, I'm just exhausted. I was with [new beau] at the beach house all weekend. And I simply have to go to Lewando's and do my laundry. Can we get together some other night?"

Then the killer.

"Oh... sure," says K.  Then, slyly, "It's just that I have two free tickets to Concerts on the Common, and Ella Fitzgerald is singing." Pause. "Do you like Ella Fitzgerald?"

My heart hurtles out of my forehead or somewhere, and my voice catapults from exhausted to panicked. "OH-GOD-OH-GOD!! I'd love to see Ella Fitzgerald in person! Forget laundry and everything else, this is a dream come true!" After all, I'd been faux-scat singing along with Ella at least since I was 12.  I knew all of her songs. I owned most of her Verve records on vinyl. She was my idol.

K sighs or snickers or harrumphs faintly on the other end of the line, I think. Like, "Oh thanks, you wouldn't want to get together if it was just me, but you will if it's Ella Fitzgerald?"

But wouldn't you?

So we hastily arrange to meet in half an hour in the middle of the Boston Common, outside the enclosed area for the concert.

"Concerts on the Common," to me, sounds like a picnic-and-blanket affair, so I stuff my red canvas LL Bean rucksack with an old tablecloth, some Triscuits and cheese, a swiss army knife and a bottle of wine, and climb up the hill to the concert area, wearing tennis shoes, ragged old shorts, and a faded polo shirt, my salty hair pulled quickly into a high pony tail to keep cool in the hot summer evening.

I circle around the chain link fence, looking for K. Finally I spot her, outside a gate marked "VIP entrance." She is bubbly and blonde and wearing chic summer whites. "C'mon," she admonishes, "we're the last to arrive."

She steers me over to the rows of seats (seats?? where on earth are our fellow picnickers and blankets? I'm wondering.)

But no. Are we to be sitting in an anonymous 18th-row seat where my abominable outfit will go unnoticed?

No, we are not.

Are we on the fourth or fifth row where I could at least attempt to hide my grungy get-up?  No, we are not.

Are we in the second row of the VIP section, with the silk-and-linen-clad dignitaries from the City of Boston?  Yes, we are.

Is it dark enough so that no one can see me? No, it is not.

Can I hide under a rock?

Not if I want to see and hear Ella.

K, um, has neglected to tell me that her father is Ella's Boston PR agent. There is no escaping.

I try to sit demurely on the folding chair and be incognito until the concert begins. Covering myself with the vintage tablecloth is a fleeting option that I quickly abandon. Blessedly soon, the lights go on, and the show cranks up. Oscar Peterson warms up the crowd, then Ella -- MY Ella -- arrives on stage. I am in heaven. She is dazzling, warm, fabulous.

-- to be continued

Meilleurs Voeux

Joyeux Noel, Bonne Annee, Happy Holidays to all and best wishes for 2010! 

When I dust off the snow, I'll be back with my Top Ten Things I Can't Shake from Paris.

I promise.

A bientot!

Dear Abby: Should I go to France?

There's always a first time for everything.  Today I wrote to Dear Abby. 

No, no, no.  I didn't ask her how to solve any of my dilemmas (what? me worry?) but to commend her for a spot-on response to a college student's quandary.

Dear Abby:
I'm a college freshman, majoring in French but taking other languages as well. I don't know what I want to do with my life, but I know that I love learning languages.  My friend, "Lacey," has offered me the chance to stay with her family in France during our next summer break...

You can read the rest here (after the grandma's grooming query). 

I'd been out of the Dear Abby habit for a long time, until recently when I subscribed to our local daily as an implusive gesture of solidarity for the print industry.  (The recycling bin is taking a hit, though, as is my green-er social conscience.)

I whip through the news section (I've already read most of it online), and settle in on local events, comics, Eugenia Last's eerily accurate horoscopes, and then dear Dear Abby.  Cover to cover, about four minutes.  It takes me longer to walk down the hill to fetch it than to actually read the thing.  So I do have a quandary:

Dear Abby:

Should I cancel my newspaper subscription?

Save the Polly Waffle

Sometimes a news item comes across ye radar screene that has little to do with the general thrust of this blog.  And such was the case today.  I learned, to my utter dismay, that an Australian chocolate bar with the delicious name of  "Polly Waffle" is about to be given the axe by the Nestle chocolate company.

Really.  How dare they?  Just in time for the holidays, and Polly gets a pink slip.  So heartless. Honestly, corporate HQ, what were you thinking?

Polly Waffle has been around for 62 years, way longer than yours truly.  Surely it's not age discrimination?  In any case, the name is so... catchy!  There is even a Facebook group to save the Polly Waffle.


Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I'm compiling my next post about the top ten things I still haven't adjusted to one year after my departure from Paris.  Stay tuned.

Please don't pick the flowers

In my recent peregrinations on the East Coast of the U.S., I came across this sign.

It struck me as funny. Because in the multitudes of delightful flowering gardens both public and private in Paris, I never saw signs admonishing passersby not to pick flowers. I guess it's simply understood: if the beauty of the landscape is there for all to admire, you just don't snap off a blossom to take home for your personal use.

Which brings me to a delicate confession. Perhaps an analogy? Or just a story.

A few years ago a Certain College Student Who Shall Remain Nameless had come home to Paris on summer break, with one of his pals from school. One morning, after the gents had spent the previous evening acquainting themselves with Parisian nightlife, I found near their sleeping quarters an exquisite, huge rose. Pale salmon, petals edged with deep pink. A prizewinning bloom.

When they finally awoke, I asked about the rose.

"Um, I don't remember exactly where we got it," said my darling miscreant. "I think it was some garden near the Eiffel Tower."

Aghast. I was aghast. But I held my composure. "Sweetie, I said, "there are so many gorgeous flowers growing all over Paris. No one picks the flowers. It's just not done."

"But it was in a spot where no one would really notice," he said. "I didn't think anyone would mind. It was just one flower, and it smelled great!"

"I know," I replied. "But that's not the point. I don't even need to say the classic 'if everyone did this' what the consequences would be. The point is that someone else -- whether a professional gardener or some little old lady -- spent a lot of time cultivating that rose. It belongs to that person, who lovingly grew that flower so that the the rest of the world could enjoy it."

"So," I concluded my sermon, "I know you won't ever EVER do this again. But if some time you lose your senses and commit such an egregious mistake again, please do me one favor."


"Okay," he said. He seemed genuinely contrite.

"Please promise me that if someone ever catches you in the unforgivable act of snatching a flower from a garden, you'll make up a really convincing Parisian-style story. Fabricate a clever story and tell them you simply had to have it to win the heart of a beautiful girl you were in love with. Anything. Just don't try to defend your right to take a flower because you thought no one would notice or care."


I turned and walked away to fix some coffee, shaking my head at how much I'd learned in Paris.

Deferred Maintenance

This house was simply too remarkable not to share.

I passed it in Chatham, Virginia, as I was on the home stretch of a long road trip. And it got me philosophizing as I wove my way down the ribbon of highway.

Kudzu: it's kind of like aging, or bills, or any of life's inexorable trials or tasks. Once you stop paying attention to the details, you're in deep doo-doo.

There certainly must be a tale to tell about this place. I'd love to know what it is. But I can't imagine that the owners ever expected that their once-lovely cottage would end up looking like a cross between the cottage of Blanche Neige and the castle of La Belle au Bois Dormant.

O QWERTY, Where Art Thou?

Zell here I q, in Pqris hqving q greqt ti,e except the zifi connection qt ,y hostùs house isnùt zorking so I hqvr ot use the French keyboqrd zhen the co,puter is qvqilqble for ,e to use:

This is not q poisson dùqvril1:

Dpnùt zorry; Iùll upsqte zith so,e reql English once I cqn get ,y hqnds pp or shuld I sqy ,y fingers pp on qn Q,ericqn keyboqrd once qgqin:

Qnd Iùll include lots of photos fro, ,y trqvels: It is zonderful to be bqck; even for q short zeek; qnd nqturqlly Iùve spent ,ore ti,e visitng friends qnd the city qnd not so ,uch ti,e leqrning to use azerty:

So,eone else cqn trqslqte in the co,,ents if you cqnùt figure out thie gibberish: ?es Qpologies1

Q bientot1

Monday Morning News Mini-Roundup

1. Who knew there was a Little Paris -- 20,000 strong-- in Brooklyn? "When they order French cheese, they pronounce it the right way... They do eat a lot of cheese." Read the story here.

2. What Frenchman holds the record for writing the longest sentence?

Wrong: it's not Proust!

It's Mathias Enard, in his novel, Zone. 150,000 words. One sentence. A lotta lotta commas.

3. Dinard, in Brittany, is a favorite spot of mine. And yes, I always do breathe better when I'm there. But whodathunk its salty waters were bottled into Afrin Nasal Spray? Well, it's actually a rinse.

4. France 24 TV news broadcasts are now available on your iPhone, live, in English, French, or Arabic. The app is a free download.

Now all I need is an iPhone.

5. If you haven't read it yet, HuffPo's article on "What We Can Learn From French Women." I have now realized that there will never, ever be enough written about the allure and the habits of French women. The world has an insatiable appetite for their secrets to success. Keep reading!

*** Update: I had to add one more news item by Charles Bremner. Apparently the funny/whiney French web site Vie de Merde is now available in Amurikan. A vos plumes!

November Still Life

On a dark November evening, packing up my most prized possessions, I find myself poring over my stash of French magazines that are older than I am. I flip through images of dramatic, vivid 50's fashion advertisements, photographs of outdated Renaults and mechanical devices, and portraits of statesmen, socialites and artists long departed.

In a 1954 issue of Plaisir de France, I come across this image in a review of an exhibit at the Galerie Charpentier.

It murmurs. It sighs. It whispers "November" to me. The painting, entitled Pain et Vin Blanc, is by Georg Flegel (1563-1638).

It's the grey that beckons. So many variations on grey. Matte, soft, shiny, muddy, pearly, mushroom, muted, pewter, cloudy, silver greys.

This reminds me of Paris in November. The grey -- no, the many many greys -- are exquisite this time of year. Daylight can't find an edge. Tree bark, cobblestones, sky, building cornices, the Seine: are all in subtle shades of grey begging you to stop and notice.

So hard to describe. The grey is anything but bland or boring. The nuance is moving.

Apparently the Yup'ik language doesn't really have 200 words for snow. But I think the French language shoud have a thousand words to describe Parisian grey.

August 1

Ils sont partis en vacances, je crois ...

The Incredible Journey

Bee and I had a hankering to get out of town for a spell. Bless that girl, she has inherited my love of tootling around the French countryside.

So I rented a car, we assembled maps, and headed south from Paris for an overnight road trip. Her job was to navigate, and in short order she learned that getting where you're going in France is not the same as in the US, especially if you're travelling only on the backroads, the routes départementales. Knowing la direction means not the compass direction or the road name, but the next town that you're heading for. She is now a crackerjack co-pilot and maneuvered us through golden wheatfields, past troglodyte houses, and found clever shortcuts through a few zones industrielles to keep us from the traffic fray in smaller cities.

Favoring spontaneity and serendipity, by early evening we still hadn't made reservations for the night's lodging. We parked in the shade in Vouvray and I called a few numbers of B&Bs I had scribbled down hastily prior to departure, after having googled the keywords hotels - charme - vouvray. The first place, in Amboise, was full. Second number, bingo! They had a suite with a little kitchenette available for one night. Sounded perfect. It was on the other side of Tours, about half an hour away.

Getting there, on a périphérique north of Tours, we began having second thoughts. The area was looking very industrial, not exactly the French countryside we had hoped for. Then as if by magic, the tacky commercial road simply vanished and we were again in the middle of serene fields and small villages. We found the quaint village of Mettray, and the tree-lined driveway to La Cornillière.

We instantly cooed with awe and delight as we drove through the stone gates. There could be no more ideal spot for us than this! A compound of ancient stone buildings, perfectly restored with just the right feel, the right patina. The jovial host greeted us and gave us a tour of the grounds while his wife finished preparing the rooms. The fields, the paths in the fragrant woods, his potager. The yet-to-be-renovated dependencies, a pigeonnier, and a rustic barn.

We were in heaven. Our cottage was sublime and simple, with antique tile floors and panels of Toile de Jouy on the walls. Comme il faut, not over-the-top. The entire place was authentic and charming; we knew already that we would want to return to La Cornillière when we had more time to spend.

Making the usual small talk, the owner asked where we were from. "Ah, oui, the East Coast of the US?" he said. "Yes, I go there often. In fact, we are spending two weeks in August in Maine," he continued, naming a small remote island.

My jaw dropped. "You -- are -- Didier!" I gasped. "I don't believe it."

His jaw dropped. "Vous êtes la soeur de Mag!" Eight years ago, he and I had met for about 10 minutes, right on this porch, one sunny afternoon, when he stopped by with his island hostess, my sister's best friend.

I will believe in the Fates, kismet, and the gods of serendipity for the rest of my life.

Catherine Espinassou

La Cornillière

Mettray

Indre-et-Loire

02 47 51 12 69

catherine@lacornilliere.com.fr

Jump! A New Blog

I always told my kids that it's impossible to skip down the street without smiling.

Go ahead, give it a try.

Sometimes being up in the air, temporarily feeling freed from gravity, is just plain fun.

I think the same holds true for jumping in the air. So today I started Jump! http://jumpingpeople.blogspot.com/

I was inspired by photographs that I already have of people jumping, and then seeing some of my daughter's friends jumping in photos on Facebook. The plan is to publish photos of people all over the world jumping up in the air for any reason. It makes me smile.

Check out Jump! and send in your photos. Share the joy. And the links.

Ceci est juste un cadeau

Yesterday, spotted on rue Mazarin in the 6e.



The sign taped to the back fender of the creation


It says "Ceci est juste un cadeau. C'est du grand art. Bravo."

Why we love Paris

Embarking on the second week in June and the weather lingers grey and cold, it's good to remember why we love Paris.

First off, when your name is Polly, you simply have to stop by this street.

Then there are other reasons, like indulging in this charming and inexpensive African restaurant that just opened in my neighborhood in the 7e arrondissement. With a quiet terrace in the back. Lilting music, excellent, simple cuisine. The warmest greeting of any restaurant in Paris. Add the house Ginger Drink and it's simply exotic. It'll warm you up until the nice spring weather returns. Especially if you add rum.

Déjà vu all over again. Has anyone else watching the French Open had the same impression? Something about the Roland Garros logo, which we've been seeing non-stop for the past few weeks, seems so familiar. Oh, right! That ubiquitous Starbucks logo...

My favorite way to see the sites of Paris by boat. I think I'll get the annual pass for €55. Heaven, when the sun is out.

The second annual PPP: Parcours Parisien de la Photographie June 10 - 30. So many vernissages... so little time.

And, finally, I love the Eiffel Tower, too, but...this?

My Night at the Oscars

For reasons that I won't go into, I found myself awake at 4 am today. I figured as long as I was up and semi-alert, I'd check to see what was happening at the Academy Awards. Even in the States, I don't watch the Oscars every year, but this year I was rooting for Marion Cotillard, who will now be the French Ambassadress to Hollywood with her Best Actress win.

I couldn't watch the ceremony on French TV (Canal+ is available for free only at certain hours) and had to glean the news of winners drip by drip from the Oscars web site. Torture! So forgive me if I'm being picky, but I had too much time on my hands in between announcements. I was going nuts staring at the same typo over and over on the screen.

What with the writer's strike just ending, there must have been a shortage of proofreaders to double-check the information on the site. 5:01 a.m. "Best Foriegn Language film was The Counterfeiters." Wait, wait -- or should that be The Counterfieters?

Madame Polly-Vous Fussbudget sent them a quick email from Paris saying "It's 'Foreign', not 'Foriegn.'"

Lo and behold, they fixed it within an hour.

A few thoughts.

1) It's highly possible that other viewers informed them of the misspelled word; but most other people were busy watching the show, right?

2) I know that I make typos all the time. But I don't have a Hollywood budget. Just a Pollywood budget.

Lookalikes

For the French/American "celebrities separated at birth?" files...

François Cluzet and Dustin Hoffman.

Thierry Lhermitte and John Philip Law

Julie Ferrier and Bonnie Raitt

Overheard

I don't usually eavesdrop on other people's conversations.

Wait, did I just actually say that? What a lie. Rewind, start again.

In Paris, I love to eavesdrop on other people's conversations while I'm reading or writing at a café. It's my version of auditing Parisian Life 101.

Midweek, lunchtime on the terrace of a bistro in the 6e arrondissement. An artsy-intellectual older woman chain-smoking unfiltered Gauloises, with a picher of red wine in front of her. (It was almost too perfect a cliché.) Presently her colleague, about 30 years her junior, arrived at the table. Younger woman wearing a jaunty hat, looking intelligent and hip, but not over the top. Here are slices of their conversation I captured, in between bites of my poulet fermier.

OW, smiling and giving bisous: Oh, ma chère, how sublime you look! Here, have a seat. Would you like some wine?
YW: Just a glass, to warm me up.
. . . . .

OW: You know, when it's cold, I like to wear thick socks. They keep my feet warm. It's true, les chaussettes are not très sexy, mais... after all, long nude legs emerging from fuzzy socks: ça a de l'allure!
YW: Or maybe wearing woolen stockings with a garter.

. . . . .

Lunchtime conversation about books. Then,

Waiter clearing their plates asks if lunch was all right: "Ça y était?"

OW (not at all unpleasantly, just matter-of-fact): Non, pas du tout.
Waiter: What was wrong?
OW: Oh, I don't know... It wasn't warm enough; the potatoes were too greasy.
Waiter: You should have told me; I could have heated it up or changed it.
OW: Don't worry, monsieur, I'll come back here anyway, I assure you.

Waiter leaves and returns showing her a plate of tarte tatin:

Waiter: When it's time for dessert, we'll offer both of you this. It's home-made.

Waiter leaves.

OW, pleased: You see? It's important to express yourself in the right way. Honesty is clarity, when presented well.

Conversation shifts to expressing oneself in the editorial world. I didn't record full bios, but OW is a retired editor, YW is a current editor.

YW: Sometimes it's important to have a giant eraser. And hard to know how to deal with a difficult author.
OW: Of course, there is a time in the publishing process when the author has to hate the editor and the editor has to hate the author.
YW: I was working on a manuscript that I abhorred. It was completely awful, a flop. But in the process of editing it and re-working it, I ended up loving the text.
OW: When you have to fix a work that is really lamentable, that's when an editor shows her stripes.
YW: Yes, this one had to be almost completely overhauled. But the directrice de l'éditorial felt that deep down there was something there. And the author had a connection somewhere.

Shared laughter.