Why Dana makes me laugh

Dana: How many Notre Dames are there? Must be a franchise; McNotre Dame.

Dana

So my friend Dana arrived from Oakland on Monday. I went in to Paris and met him for a day/night of grown-up time in Paris before bringing him back to Rouen for a week. Dana and I have been friends since high school. He lived in Santa Cruz, California, where I spent summers and holidays with my dad. Dana and I have always seemed unlikely friends, and yet he is one of only a handful of people I can say I’ve been friends with for over 20 years.

Dana and I have almost nothing in common except for a shared history and a fondness for 80s music. He is a large Filipino man with mod tendencies and a fondness for zombie movies. Thing is, he makes me laugh harder than any other friend I have. (In fact, the only other person who makes me laugh as much is my mother.) I have no idea what it is about him, but during the 24 hours or so we were in Paris I laughed nonstop. And I was strikingly aware of how different that felt that my usual days. It’s so nice to be able to have a sense of humor and so hard sometimes to do so with a 3-year-old. It’s really something I need to work on—lightening up.

Despite Dana’s jet-lag, we wandered around Paris for about 11 hours. He had never been there and had a must see list of the Louvre, Notre Dame, and the Eiffel Tower. We met at the hotel (Hôtel Eber, a perfectly fine, cheaper place in the 7th arrondissement) and decided to head to the Louvre. Dana wanted to see the Renaissance paintings, and I’m always game for a world-class museum. I think Dana had no idea what he was getting himself into. We wandered around for 5 hours and still didn’t see an entire section. We worked in a few of the greats that he had studied in art history class, and I was able to sneak in the last part of the 3-part Picasso show going on around Paris (this one was his influence from Delacroix—just showing a handful of paintings and sketches. I still must make it to the Picasso museum this trip).

After the Louvre I decided to take Dana to a brasserie I like that serves good vin chaud right next door to Notre Dame. We didn’t expect the cathedral to be open, but we actually found ourselves able to walk right in during a mass. There was a soprano singing a hymn, and the overwhelming smell of incense burning. We sat for a few minutes and then wandered around a bit before heading back into the cold night air for our next destination, dinner.

We stuffed ourselves full of classic French brasserie food (escargots, duck, and a crèpe for Dana; onion soup, salmon, and crème brulée for me) and then decided to head back to our neighborhood. On a whim, we decided to see how far it was to walk to the Tour Eiffel. Not far at all it tuned out, and so we were able to hit all 3 of Dana’s Paris sights on Day 1. When we got to the tower, it was all lit up in blue lights. This is apparently a special thing they’re doing while France is the head of the EU, and will change any day now. Since there were no lines, we decided to take advantage of the opportunity to ride all the way to the top of the tower. If either of us had been paying attention, we would have realized that since we couldn’t see the top of the tower, due to fog, we wouldn’t be able to see anything from the top either!

Instead we had a terrifying, hilarious ride up to the top (alone, with an elevator operator who kept his face pressed into the corner the entire ride!). At one point, when we were higher than anyone should be without an airplane and we’d both realized how bizarre this guy was, Dana turned to me and said “Well, I’m scared shitless”. For some reason the way he said it just cracked me up and we laughed the rest of the way to the top (where there was literally zero visibility).

After that we headed back to the hotel where Dana crashed as soon as his head hit the pillow. The following day we slept in till 10am (ah, what a luxury!) and then roamed around Paris aimlessly for a few hours before taking the train home to Rouen.

The Day the Music Died

Today would have been my father’s 66th birthday. I owe so much to him, including being here in Rouen now. He was a magical person who loved encouraging people to think out of the box about how to live their lives. While in Paris this week Anna and I lit a candle for my dad at Notre Dame. I bawled my eyes out while she sang “Happy Birthday Dear Zeda”. I love you, Dad. Happy Birthday.

Update: Not to be all woo-woo, but as soon as I finished this post I got up and looked out the window. There, directly in front of our house, was a giant, bright, arcing rainbow. The first I’ve seen here. Every little bit helps.

Paris

Paris was a whirlwind. On the train back I said to David, “Did we really just take the train into Paris yesterday?” We packed in a lot.

On Tuesday we arrived in Paris at 11 am and took a taxi directly to the hotel to drop off our stuff. We’ve found a great B&B that we’ve made our home when we’re there. It’s expensive, but any decent place seems to be and this is a lovely, small (12 rooms), place owned by a British couple who make their own jam (need I say more?). They go out of their way to make you feel comfortable, have a fridge and dining room you can use for meals, and have Wi-Fi.

After getting settled we walked to the Eiffel Tower and then hopped the Batobus for a quick ride along the Seine to the Musée d’Orsay. Having learned that food always makes my daughter happier, we stopped in at a lovely little Italian place for some pasta and a glass of wine first. I then decided to resort to the use of bribes to convince her to “rest” in her stroller for an hour while David and I cruised the museum. Of course, the resting never happened, and there were several meltdowns in the museum, but it was well worth it. Afterwards I had to make good on my promise, so I took us on an interminably long and circuitous route (I misread the map) to what turned out to be fabulous gelato (for A) and much needed coffee (for us).

The following morning, after the requisite croissant and jam at the B&B, we set off for Notre Dame (billed as a “castle” to Anna). Surprisingly this was among the easiest sightseeing destinations we’ve had with Anna, probably because I kept pointing out all the “kings” and “princesses” on the walls. The best part, however, was the creche which had been modernized with computerized lights that I’m at a bit of a loss to describe. I’m embedding photos that won’t begin to do it justice. Suffice it to say that we were all mesmerized for a full 10 minutes just watching the baby Jesus and his princess posse get all sparkly and colorful.

Of course by then little miss was once again starving, so we stopped for fabulous crêpes and vin chaud at a stand by the cathedral. (Side note: vin chaud is a hot spiced wine and is super yummy. I Googled for recipes and plan on drinking it daily for the rest of the winter in place of the Emergen-C I was drinking stateside.) After we refueled we headed to the Centre Pompidou, stopping first at the amazing fountain outside. Despite the rain, we all had such a great time looking at all the outrageous Niki Saint Phalle sculptures (I got some great photos — definitely head over to the Flickr page to see them all).

Inside the Pompidou I got a painfully short, but totally rapturous 45 minutes to myself in the Art Moderne 1905-1950 section, which is where my passions lie. Room after room of Picasso, Matisse, Chagall, Miró — just ecstasy for me. I will definitely be going back for several hours before our trip ends. This was followed by (what else) more food, this time awesome Israeli falafels in the Marais district (I could seriously lead eating tours through Paris). Then we raced to the previously mentioned stroller rental shop, cabbed it to the hotel and then to the train station, and were back in Rouen by dinner time.

Today we just hung out and took it easy. Anna found a copy of “Monsters, Inc.” which she’d never seen (up till now, the only feature film she’d seen was “Finding Nemo”) so we put it on the big screen here with the projector and all sat together watching it. Quite a treat to just watch a matinee on a Thursday afternoon all together.

And now, it’s bedtime. Bonne nuit.