Home alone

I've been doing just exactly as I please. Since Denis left for the RSNA conference in Chicago Saturday morning, the only demands on my time have been my own. I was always somewhat of a solitary child, and I suppose you could say I haven't changed that much.

As much as I enjoy human interchange, I also like my solitude. I revel in being able to entirely write my own program for the day, spending my time doing exactly what I want.

Now, that isn't nearly as indulgent as it sounds. I am passionate about this website and the business that goes along with it. So doing what I want means doing more work, with fewer distractions. But that doesn't stop me from noticing the special kind of serenity and space of concentration that comes from calling one's own shots for every hour of the day.

Maybe I'm not quite as boring a workaholic as I make myself resemble. On Saturday afternoon, after Denis took off for the airport, I actually went shopping! To understand why this is noteworthy, you should know that I almost never shop in this, the world's most shoppable city. A part of me would like to, but I simply don't have the time. There's always something more urgent to do.

However, I had a special private offer card (read discount) from one of my favorite stores (Ventilo) and this was the last day it would be valid. Plus, I had wanted to take some photos of shoppers and holiday sights for another postcard later this month. The kind of shots I wanted were impossible to get without venturing into the Shopping Zone.

So I went to Ventilo and forced myself to be patient enough to actually shop. It was worth it, as my card gave me 30% off anything in the store, and I left with a badly needed pair of slacks and some things to go with them. Afterwards, I wandered around the Place de la Madeleine snapping shoppers and happily observing people.

After watching enough of them gawk at the basket of fresh white truffles (over 5,000 euros a kilo) from Italy in the Maison de la Truffe, I started feeling hungry. I went inside and had a dish of tagliatelle with cream and shavings of black truffle. I decided the 75 euros that the same dish would have cost with white truffles would be better off put toward an entire--if small--white truffle to take home and cook with when Denis got back. I sipped my glass of very good white Sancerre and thoroughly enjoyed my lunch, happily inhaling truffle-scented air with every bite, as the entire place smells of the fungus. I took the Métro home, as it was now raining, and spent the rest of the day and evening happily working away.

Yesterday morning I went to the Raspail market, which is entirely organic on Sundays and altogether splendid. My Sundays spent in Paris are so rare that I never miss going to this wonderful market when I'm here for the weekend. I took my time, taking pictures, and of course, choosing from the wonderful fruits, vegetables, cheeses, fish, wine, and on and on that are on display there.

Every market in Paris has its own personality. Raspail is particularly wonderful because the people who go there take great pleasure in the process of shopping. Most of them are regulars, so friendly conversation flows abundantly between seller and buyer, and among friends who bump into each other.

Like most writers, I am addicted to observing people. The Raspail market is one of the most pleasant places to indulge this passion because nearly all the interaction is friendly or humorous. They are paying attention to their children, and to other people's children. People are taking their time, suspended in that curious, luxurious thrall of Sunday morning, so different from every other morning of the week.

I was standing in line at one particular produce stand, waiting at the "check-out", if you can call it that. I was admiring the girl working the cash register. With a mane of curly chestnut hair, a bright purple pullover, and a brght pink sort of boa around her neck, she was brilliantly multi-tasking her way through the morning. It was absolutely astounding how many people she took care of simultaneously, sneaking a few coins for someone's single item into the drawer while someone else was counting out their change. And all the while, she kept up a sharp and friendly banter with every single person. No one was overlooked or unaddressed.

The absolutely harmonious way she did her work must have made me smile, because when my turn came, she asked me what I was pondering. "I was just enjoying watching you work," I said, "And listening to people's interactions...so pleasant."

"Oh!" she responded, with a big smile. "I see everything here. Iam a sociologist! I could write a book. Let me tell you, sociologists who sit behind desks? They know nothing. You have to get out here in the midst of people to understand them."

Judging from her consummate skill in relating to her work and to those around her, I wasn't about to argue with her.

I drove home through a slowed-down, Sunday Paris, and nosed the car almost nonchalantly into its bay inside the courtyard. Coming from the land of triple car garages with automatic door openers, it's taken me a while to get to the point of near-nonchalance about exiting and entering the building. Let me describe what this process is like, because when I observed other people doing it before I got my car, it made me wonder whether getting a car would be worth the effort of getting in and out of the building.

To get out, I have to first open both of the big, double, extremely heavy wooden doors that face onto the street. While a pedestrian exit is easy--touch a button and pull open one half of the door, to get the car out, I have to unlatch and pull open both halves of the door. Because they are old and they stick, this takes me on average five supremely hard tugs using both arms and bracing my heels on the floor.

Next come the multiple maneuvers to get my car extricated from among the others in the courtyard. This task is complicated by the fact that my obnoxious neighbor wants to make absolutely sure that no pigeon drops anything onto the virginal hood of his expensive new Audi convertible. He therefore parks said car in a position more or less in the middle of the courtyard, well away from the roof of the building from where pigeons are aiming their projectile droppings. I can just eke my way out, and by backing and turning 3 times, get my car sufficiently lined up with the narrow tunnel leading from the courtyard to the exterior double doors.

Remember, this setup was designed for a horse-drawn carriage, not for the passage of an automobile. My car has literally about 2 inches to spare on each side, which means that I have to enter this tunnel straight on--hence, the maneuvers. I still cringe, grit my teeth in dread of hearing metal screech against stone walls, and have to resist the urge to squeeze my eyes shut every time I exit the building. I'm convinced that if I do not do these three things, I will in fact scrape the sides of my precious car while my obnoxious neighbor leans out of his window and cackles with glee.

Once the car is safely beyond those stately doors, I have to stop it, poised as it is halfway on the sidewalk, halfway in the street, go back inside the building, push the double doors carefully shut, turn the latch, and let myself back out as a pedestrian, scuttling into my car so as not to block other pedestrians trying to pass on the sidewalk.

Next comes the hair-raising moment of easing my car into the street, which is narrow, one-way, and has parked cars packed along both sides, including one on either side of our "driveway" (a definite exaggeration, as it consists of the part of the sidewalk that is directly in front of our doors). These two cars are invariably parked so that their bumpers are right at the limit of our entryway, or even extending into it, so that getting into the street without nicking the car on the inside of my turn onto the street nor the one on the other side of the street often takes two or three more backing and turning maneuvers. The stress of these is enhanced by accomplished Parisian motorists smirking while they wait impatiently for me to finally get out of my driveway so they can continue barreling down my street and intimidate the pedestrians crossing at the corner.

So, when I say that I nudged my car almost nonchalantly into the courtyard, you can see how very relaxed I was feeling this solitary Sunday.

Solitary Monday has been a very productive day, and it is now almost 11 p.m. as I wind this postcard to a close. I'm still looking forward to two more days of unfettered solitude, by which time I'll be more than ready for them to end. But having had them will make me appreciate more than ever the quotidian delights of Denis' and my particular folie à deux. Home alone is nice, but home for two is, well, cozier.

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