F Train to Paris

In which a Jewish family from Brooklyn moves to Paris, France for two years of work, school, and adventures.

 

I walk around Paris every day, blogging in my head, but I rarely manage to get any of it down on paper, let alone actually post it here on my blog. So I hereby promise to try harder. Next week is the Toussaint (All Saint's Day) vacation--the kids have a week off from school--and we're going to Rome. After that I will become a more disciplined, regular blogger. I hope.

My washer and dryer, which haven't worked since September 1, are finally fixed, and my new refrigerator arrives tomorrow. I am beginning to feel like a human being again instead of a laundry drone, although with so much laundry to catch up on it is still my main occupation. But I hope never to have to visit the laundromat on the rue Bois le Vent again. Over the past six weeks Ralph and I have spent two hours doing laundry there every Sunday, with an extra trip for me at least once a week. A couple of times he even went to work late so he could help out with laundry, the darling. So for those who are jealous of our marvelous life in Paris, there's a dose of reality. In the past six weeks, I've been to zero museums, but I've spent an awful lot of time at the laundromat.

And my plans for the rest of this week are pretty uninspiring. Lots of errands, and some typical expat wife stuff. Today I gave myself a break and slept late to try to fight off a cold, while Ralph took E. to school. Then I went to a dance class, and in a few minutes I will go grocery shopping on my way to pick up E. Tomorrow is the refrigerator delivery and then literary salon in the afternoon, the last session of a series on Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison. On Wednesday afternoon, I'm hosting a small Halloween playdate (being careful not to call it a party, for fear of someone feeling left out) for E. and about five of his American and British friends who feel Halloween deprived. On Thursday there's dance class in the morning, a ladies' lunch at a friend's house, and then a bake sale at E.'s school. (At some point in the week I'm baking cupcakes, and I foolishly volunteered to help serve the goodies to the kids in the afternoon.) Friday is the usual Shabbat shopping and cooking, which gets more intense every week as the days get shorter. Also, any last minute pre-trip errands will have to be done on Friday. Some time this week I need to squeeze in a haircut.

In short, life in Paris is like life pretty much anywhere else, except that sometimes you get a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower or the Arc de Triomphe as you go about your business.

But here's a good example of how special life here can sometimes be. R., who is in 7th grade, went on an overnight class trip last week in connection with their study of the Renaissance. They went to the Loire Valley, where they visited a bunch of chateaux--Chambord, Chenonceau, Blois--and learned about the history of the period, the people who built the chateaux and lived in them, and the architecture. He came home full of enthusiasm and couldn't stop talking about everything they saw and did.

posted by: pariskleinmans at 11:57 | link | comments |