Au revoir, Paris

I will end this adventure the same way I started it: sitting in an airport, writing a blog entry. Snow is falling outside, blanketing the runways and the wings of the planes. When I first sat down to write this, I found myself gazing out the windows, following the snowflakes with my eyes as they lazily drifted to the ground. And then I looked at the departure board only to see the word “Delayed” blinking next to my flight to Frankfurt.  Needless to say, those snowflakes, whose beauty I was so recently admiring, not longer inspire feelings of serenity, but instead represent tiny pangs of anxiety as I think about the time required to make my flight transfer in Frankfurt to Boston.


At any rate, the delay will provide me with the leisure to reflect further on my time in Paris.  I will miss many things about the City of Lights: eating lunch outside at a sidewalk café in December, the Juliet balconies lining the walls of the brick buildings, ducking into a world-class museum to avoid a passing shower only to find myself still in the museum long after the rain had passed, standing on the Champs Elysees with the glittering of the Christmas lights surrounding me, seeing the Eiffel Tower lit up from the train, the musicians on the metro who play and sing for pocket change filling an otherwise mundane space and moment with music, and of course Anne and Lou and the friends I made with whom I shared so many adventures.
On a less sentimental note, I will not miss the following things: the strikes, the exchange rate, the pressure of needing to catch the last metro of the night (or else be forced to pay an outrageous taxi fare or wait until 5:30 AM when the metro opens up again-- I’ve done both and don’t recommend either). Oh, did I mention the strikes and exchange rate?

I have had a three month romance with a city, and will, I’m certain, look back on this time with warmth and the deepest gratitude in my heart.

A la prochaine, Paris.