Like most historic cities, Paris is full of beautiful, architecturally and culturally significant churches. Here are a few of my favorites.
The oldest church in the city is Saint-Germain-des-Prés, begun in the sixth century as part of a powerful abbey. Little of the original building survives, and the current church, in the sturdy Romanesque style, dates primarily from the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
While the nave frescoes date from a nineteenth-century renovation, the paint colors of the walls, columns and ceiling give a good idea of the original Romanesque appearance. The church is a popular venue for concerts. A gospel choir from Alabama was performing when we visited in 2002.
The Cathedral of Notre-Dame, in the heart of Paris on the Île de la Cité, is one of the world’s great monuments of Gothic art and architecture. Construction began in 1163. The western façade, towers and rose window were completed by 1250.
The Cathedral was heavily damaged during the French Revolution. The row of biblical kings between the portal and rose window, for example, were beheaded because they were mistakenly identified as kings of France. The current heads are nineteenth century reproductions. Many of the originals, discovered in the late 1970s during an excavation, are now on display at the nearby Cluny Museum of Medieval Art.
Interior of the nave, showing the classic Gothic elevation of arcade, triforium and clerestory.
My favorite view of Notre-Dame, from the southeast, showing the eastern apse and its famous flying buttresses, the first of their kind.
The mid-thirteenth-century Sainte-Chapelle, an example of Rayonnant Gothic architecture, was the royal chapel of Louis IX , also known as Saint Louis. Built to house the king’s newly acquired collection of Passion relics, the church resembles an enlarged reliquary. Today it’s surrounded by the gated and heavily secured Palace of Justice.
The upper chapel is known for its extraordinary expanses of original stained glass. Due to advances in Gothic building techniques, the stone framework of the wall is minimal. Unlike many of the large Gothic cathedrals, which were constructed over centuries in fits and starts, the Sainte-Chapelle was completed in a quick five years. The style of its stained glass, sculpture and architecture is therefore remarkably coherent.
A smiling angel in the upper chapel.
The lower chapel, with its brilliantly painted and gilded tracery, is a lovely spot for small concerts. During my Paris summer, we attended an unforgettable chamber concert of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.
Steps leading to the Basilica of Sacré-Coeur atop the hill of Montmartre, the highest point in Paris.
Sacré-Coeur, begun in 1875, was built in the Byzantine-Romanesque style reminiscent of domed churches in the Dordogne area. Dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the church was funded by public subscription as an offering of penance after France’s defeat in the Franco-Prussian War.
In the crypt, a statue of Saint Denis, the patron saint of Paris. Bishop of Paris in the third century, he died a martyr’s death by beheading atop Montmartre hill. According to legend, he picked up his head and walked six miles, preaching all the way. The early Gothic church of Saint-Denis marks the spot where he was said to have died.
A view from the dome, well worth the walk, unless one suffers from claustrophobia. The path up, not surprisingly, is along a very narrow, winding stone staircase.
All the transparent life layers have flipped by in a whirring flash. I’m back to the present, and it’s April 13, 2014. But the past is incredibly close. It circles around me like a bird immediately overhead; I hear the beating of its wings and feel the air they displace. In the garden of the Cité Universitaire on the southern edge of Paris, I feel as though I’ve just learned the resolution of a suspenseful film. I don’t know the end of the story (thank goodness), but I’ve discovered the end of the middle, and it’s an immense relief.
Throughout my teens and twenties, whether I’d ever marry was an open question. I knew I wanted marriage, but I wanted it with the right person. I’ve never held to the notion that there’s one perfect match out there for each of us. There are no perfect matches. Probably, for most of us, we might come across several people over the course of a lifetime with whom we could forge a more or less happy union, depending upon circumstance and our commitment to perseverance. But it’s a limited number, while the number of bad choices is huge. And making that choice is a tricky business, as the divorce rate attests.
I bided my time for so long because over and over, I’d seen that Right One morph into a Never Mind. Appearances are deceiving, as are first impressions. In a recurring dream, heavy with doom, I found myself married to one of my many Mr. Wrongs. They were all nice guys, but after a promising start, they turned out not to be right for me. I didn’t want that dream to become a reality. As I stand here with my husband, my husband of nearly nineteen years, it hits me like a revelation: I found a good one, and I think it’s gonna work out!Whew!
He’s my Mr. Right: with H in front of the Maison Internationale at the Cité Universitaire.
Like many women, I’d worried that in postponing marriage, I might miss out on being a mother. I knew I wanted a child some day. Certainly one child. Possibly two, if I got started early enough (although that seemed unlikely). But not three or more. I know my limits. I had grown up a contented only child. I saw no reason to crowd up the house with kids. But I really wanted my shot at motherhood. Would I get it? The answer seems to be revealed anew: Yes, yes, yes! I’m here with my daughter, my fifteen year old daughter. I got my girl! The girl I’d always wanted. While I had prayed for a healthy child, boy or girl, I’d secretly always wanted a daughter, with the hope that she and I would be close, just as my mother and I are.
Me and my girl, my buddy, in the garden of the Cité. My old balcony and its open door are visible above.
How glad I am that I went back with my family to my former Paris residence. Given the opportunity, I will continue to return to such places supercharged with memory. The swirl of emotions they stir up is not for the faint of heart, nor is the undeniable reality of time’s passage. There’s no doubt about it–I’m quite a bit older. Perhaps older than I’d ever imagined being at nineteen. But in returning to this spot where I was so memorably youthful, I can still sense the essence of that youth, which seems to hang in the air like the smoke from fireworks on a hot July night. I’ve changed, but I haven’t changed. I think I’ve gained some wisdom over the years. My ninety-four-year-old grandmother once remarked to me that she still didn’t feel truly old. I’m starting to understand how she feels.
In going back, I came to see more clearly who I am and how I became that way. And it has made me emphatically grateful for the loving family who went there with me, for the first time.
Standing in the garden of the Cité Universitaire this past April, below the room that served as home during my college summer in Paris, I felt like I was in a time warp with tunnel vision. I could reflect on successive Paris life layers at once, one atop another. Today’s post concerns a time thirteen years after my travels in France as a grad student. It’s 2002. For the first time, I’m in France and I’m not a student. It feels strange. The responsibilities of adulthood have caught up with me. I’m a wife and mother, here in the city with my husband and my parents. We’ve left our nearly three year old daughter at home with H’s parents.
It had long been a goal of mine to accompany my parents to France. During my year in England, we had traveled together for three weeks, but we hadn’t yet done France. In the spirit of parental sacrifice, Mama and Daddy had repeatedly stayed home and paid, or helped pay my way. We had always said Sometime, we’ll all go. That sometime seemed to have arrived in 2002. We were all healthy and ambulatory. H, like me, was eager to return to France. Fourteen years had passed since his semester in Rennes. The overlap in the timing of our European student adventures had provided us with a point of commonality that may have been crucial in drawing us together initially. (See That French Connection, April 2014.) Ever the dutiful son-in-law, H didn’t complain about traveling with his wife’s parents, or sharing the tour-guide obligations.
Our daughter was old enough to understand that we weren’t leaving her for good. H’s parents were willing and able to care for her. Very briefly, we considered taking D with us. But I could see how the trip would unfold. She’d be continually preoccupied with something that seemed totally inconsequential to adult eyes. Under the fascinating spell of fallen leaves in the dirt, she’d be oblivious to the historic splendor all around her. My entreaties would go unheard: Look up, sweetie! Look at the beautiful towers. See those funny creatures way up high? Those are gargoyles. My mother would miss most of the sights she’d anticipated for so long. In an effort to make the trip proceed more smoothly for the rest of us, she’d devote her attention to placating her granddaughter. I’d feel guilty. We’d all be testy. Best to leave our toddler with Grandma and Grandpa at home, where she could enjoy, unimpeded, the pleasures of domestic leaves and dirt.
On our first day in France, May 2002: H and my parents at a crêperie near Notre-Dame.
My objectives for travel abroad have varied according to the stages of my life. As a student wearing the rose-colored glasses of youth and freedom, the realm of possibility was vast. Who knew what adventures, what fulfillments of fantasy lay ahead? Caprice, romance, astounding coincidence–while I didn’t take such winged creatures as my due, I also didn’t rule them out entirely. Who’s to say absolutely that I would not meet a sensitive, handsome young man as we admired the same obscure, underappreciated painting in the Louvre? Was it utterly impossible that he’d be involved in the thoughtful restoration of his family’s ancient and immense château? That my fresh American sensibility would invigorate him like a breath of fresh air? That we’d fall in love and live happily ever after among the rose-blanketed walls of honey-colored stone? That the surrounding village would be peopled by delightfully eccentric and charming characters, who would hold us particularly dear as Lord and Lady of the Manor? Such a scenario was clichéd, antiquated and extremely unlikely. But it wasn’t entirely impossible. After all, I was young. Anything was possible. And I’d experienced the unlikely before.
On this trip, it’s a different story. As a no longer young adult traveling with my husband and parents, my goals are considerably more modest and down-to-earth. I’m looking forward to seeing my parents appreciating my favorite French sights, and to comparing student experiences with my husband. I’m hoping for beautiful scenery, comfort, the avoidance of injury, illness and mishap. While my parents are hardly frail or weak, they are, obviously, even less young than I. A successful visit will be free of emergency room visits, crippling accidents, assaults and major transportation breakdowns. It will mean not losing Mama or Daddy temporarily or permanently on the Metro. Perhaps most importantly, it means an uneventful return that brings us back home safely to our little daughter.
Without incident, we check off the sights my mother the history buff had been waiting years to experience: Notre-Dame, the Sainte-Chapelle, the Louvre, Versailles, the Arc de Triomphe. (Daddy is sunnily content to go wherever she, H or I suggest.) We avoid misadventure but find ourselves on its heels several times, as when we stumble upon the aftermath of a purse-snatching and the apprehension of the thief. My parents are hardy, adaptable, unfussy travelers. They don’t even grumble when, after wandering the Versailles gardens and Marie Antoinette’s Petit Hameau, we miss the last passenger trolley and have no option but to walk for what seems like many miles. We enjoy several pleasant days in Paris before we head to the Loire Valley. Mama wants to see some châteaux.
We take the TGV train to Tours, where we rent a car. Although in 1988, Daddy drove Mama and me swiftly and confidently along Britain’s winding roads, this time he’s happy to yield the wheel to H. Our home base in the Loire Valley will be the picturesque little town of Amboise. The royal Château d’Amboise, a multi-turreted castle worthy of Sleeping Beauty, is the centerpiece of the town. It’s a short, lovely walk to the Château du Clos Lucé, where Leonardo da Vinci, as artist and inventor in residence and buddy to Francois I, spent his final years. The Châteaux of Chenonceau and Azay-le-Rideau are nearby.
The Château d’Amboise.On the grounds of the Château d’Amboise is the 15th-Century Chapel of Saint-Hubert, said to house the remains of Leonardo.The town of Amboise seen from the Château ramparts.The Amboise clock tower.The Château du Clos Lucé.Chenonceau.H and I at Chenonceau.
Also within an easy walk from the center of Amboise are several so-called troglodyte homes built into the cliffs of soft tufa, a kind of limestone. The stone, evidence of a prehistoric sea that once covered the area, was quarried for local building. The resulting caves offered unique housing opportunities. Much sought-after, they’re typically equipped with most modern conveniences and need no heat or air conditioning.
An Amboise cave home.
From Amboise, we drive west to Rennes. Although it’s familiar territory for my husband, I’ve never been here. As we walk through the old town and the University section, he recalls his student days. I’d heard the stories, now I can experience the setting first-hand. He points out the buildings where his classes met, the cafés, parks and shops he frequented. As he shows me the route he took to school, I can see him riding through town on his moped, blonde curls visible under the helmet. Thankfully, he was wearing that helmet when a truck hit him one morning. Were it not for that helmet, it’s doubtful we’d be standing here together.
In old town Rennes, a pizza delivery cyclist loads up.
Although H had been in sporadic contact with his French host family since he stayed with them in 1988, he hadn’t told them our travel plans. Our time would be short, and a visit could be awkward since my parents speak no French. But on the road to Mont Saint-Michel, H realizes that we’re tracing his old route to town. Their home is so close. Seems like we almost have to drive by. H has no trouble spotting the house. As though on cue, his French parents are walking out the front door. They recognize H immediately, after fourteen years and no prior notice of his arrival. Monsieur and Madame Treguier welcome us warmly. They are merrily insistent that we return for dinner that evening. We find ourselves saying yes. Who knows when we’ll be back? My parents urge us to go. They’re invited, as well, but they’ll stick with dinner at the hotel. That’s probably a good decision, since Daddy tends to find any long conversation tedious, even if it’s in his own language.
That night, after a beautiful day with my parents at Mont Saint-Michel, H and I are treated to what feels like a homecoming meal. The Treguiers’ younger daughter lives in town and is able to join us. Of course she’s a grown woman now, but H remembers her as a little girl. Madame Treguier brings forth dish after delectable dish, seemingly effortlessly from her tiny kitchen, beginning with a dramatically heaping platter of bright red langoustines. I really don’t know how she does it. For H and me, it takes all our collective brain power to speak sustained, passable French for several hours. The constantly flowing wine helps, until it hinders, and we have to resort to covering our glasses with our hands. The Treguiers are as generous with their wine as H had remembered. In fact, as soon as we arrived, Monsieur Treguier had proudly showed us his brand new wine storage area, his “cave,” built under the garage.
It’s a wonderful, celebratory evening. I get to peel back the layers of my husband’s life, just as I have my own. I see him as his host family remembers, as a very green, very American college boy. They recall fondly that when he first arrived, they secretly despaired. Would they ever be able to communicate with him? He had had only one year of college French, and his language skills were rudimentary. Fortunately, he showed remarkably swift improvement, and his charm was immune to the language barrier. Wow, I thought. With many more years of French study behind me, I’d lacked the courage to stay in a French household during my Paris summer.
Seeing H through the eyes of the Treguier family brings to light one of the traits I most admire about him: his quiet confidence. Whatever the challenge, if he considers it worthwhile, he’s up for it. Immerse himself in a totally French-speaking environment with minimal skills? He’ll manage it. Drive an enormous delivery truck through all the boroughs of New York City? Sure. Fix the car, any car? Easy. Repair the hole in the ceiling? Yes. Master windsurfing on his own? He’s done it. Teach his daughter to ski? Of course. Show her a better approach to that algebra problem? Certainly. Yet he’s never showy or arrogant. He has no ancestral château, but what a guy. Indeed, what a great guy. I can tell that the Treguiers agree.
That night in Rennes, the Treguiers’ deep affection for my husband is apparent. What’s more, they extend their high regard and good will graciously to me, and even to our daughter, back at home. They urge us to return in the near future, to bring her and spend more time with them. As we say our goodbyes, it’s like leaving a family reunion in some best of all possible worlds. It’s one of those times when the bonds of true friendship are revealed at their strong, resilient best, stretching across miles, years, languages and cultures.
Mont Saint-Michel in Normandy, one of my favorite spots in France. (See European Vacation ’75: Part II: Mont Saint-Michel, April 2013.)
That day at the Fondation des Etats-Unis, looking up at the balcony of my former room, the life layers continued to flip by. I can see myself back in Paris as a grad student. I’m spending this year primarily in London, researching my dissertation in medieval art. It’s April of 1989, and my friend Laura had joined me in London. Together, we had made our way to the south coast and crossed the Channel.
It’s seven years since my summer in Paris. It surprises me, but I feel considerably more mature. Maybe it’s Laura’s companionship; perhaps her air of confident capability is wearing off on me. The stamp on my forehead that once read CLUELESS AMERICAN COLLEGE GIRL!! has evidently worn away. The throngs of loitering young men check us out but generally don’t pursue us. Shopkeepers treat us with respect. Some even call us Madame. Although this last point strikes me as overkill, otherwise I thank my lucky stars for the perks of aging. Paris is a familiar, gracious presence, and it’s good to be back.
Laura and I outside our very bare-bones hotel, April 1989.
We find a cheap hotel just off the Fontaine Saint-Michel, in the midst of what I think of as the old neighborhood, the Latin Quarter. The hotel is pretty awful, but it’s certainly affordable, the location is great, and its oddities are the source of many laughs. It’s not worth our time and trouble to trudge the streets in search of a new place, so we stay put for five days or so.
With Laura, against a backdrop of Notre-Dame.
When Laura flies back to the states, I’m joined by a friend from England. I have an Apocalypse manuscript to examine in the city library of Toulouse, so we head south. It bothers me that I have no recollection of how we got there. We must have flown. There seem to have been no high-speed trains back then. I have a vague, unpleasant recollection of trying to speak French on a pay phone with the airline. One way or another, we got to Toulouse, an ancient university town of rose-brick medieval buildings and tropical charm.
The Romanesque Basilica of Saint-Sernin in Toulouse.
It’s a bank holiday weekend, so the Bibliothèque Municipale in Toulouse is closed. Throughout this year abroad, bank holidays keep popping up. Many I anticipate and plan for, but others come at me, unexpected. I take them in stride; they offer a good excuse to postpone work and relax. On this occasion, we opt for additional sightseeing in the South of France. We take in the nearby historic cities of Albi and Carcasonne, then head to Provence, where we spend several gloriously unhurried days in Nimes, Avignon and Arles. The gray chill of April is yielding to the sunny splendor of May, and the countryside has an air of lush enchantment.
In Albi, the fortress-like early Gothic Cathedral of Saint-Cécile towers above the muddy River Tarn.Carcasonne.
Atop the hill is the fortified medieval Cité of Carcasonne. Its striking resemblance to a fairy tale village is likely due in part to its comprehensive nineteenth-century restoration by Viollet-le-Duc. The newer part of town surrounds the walled center section.
The old town of Carcasonne, seen from a perch along the wall.Another view of Carcasonne and its walls.
On our last night in Carcasonne, we seem to be floating in a slightly surreal multicultural soup. At a rustic traditional restaurant in the old town, we eat cassoulet, the area’s famous casserole of duck, goose, pork and white beans. During dessert, an Irish band plays Leonard Cohen songs, the lyrics translated into French.
The cloister of the Romanesque Cathedrale of Saint-Trophime in Arles.
Another cloister, at the Romanesque Abbey Church of Saint-Pierre at Moissac.
Once we return to Toulouse, my friend goes home to England, and I’m on my own. The library opens, and I spend a couple of days with my manuscript. One afternoon, I go to the nearby town of Moissac to see the medieval Abbey of Saint-Pierre. The church is adorned with a wealth of Romanesque sculpture, which I’ve studied since my very first art history course. The carving is dramatic, highly stylized and exuberant. What a thrill it is to be in its visionary presence.
On the trumeau of the south porch of Moissac Church, the prophet Jeremiah appears to be frozen in a contorted, contemplative dance.
I return to Paris by train, stopping for one night in the picturesque town of Souillac on the Dordogne River. The scenery between Toulouse and Souillac is amazing. I’m more and more smitten with each village we pass. Look: there’s the medieval bridge of Cahors, as neat and tiny as a child’s toy. In the distance I spot the perfect hilltop village of Saint-Cirq-Lapopie. My dog Popi, six years gone now, has his own French town, I think. It’s appropriate; he had such class and style. I’m envisioning future trips to the lovely Dordogne Valley.
I can’t remember why I stopped in Souillac, but I’m glad I did. I find the nicely situated and aptly named Hotel Belle Vue. The day is warm and bright, and I wander the old, narrow streets with no particular goal or destination in mind, one of the great luxuries of leisurely travel. Before long, the buildings give way to flower-filled meadows. I stop to watch some ducks paddling in the river near an old mill. After a while, I follow a grassy pathway winding uphill. At the top of the hill, the path emerges from trees and foliage to reveal the village below, clustered around the domes of the Abbey Church of Sainte-Marie. The scene is quaint, timeless and peaceful. It could be an image from one of the illuminated manuscripts I’ve been studying. I couldn’t have dreamed up a more poetically satisfying finale for my solitary exploration. All these years later, I carry it with me, like a treasure.
My hilltop view of Souillac, May 6, 1989.The eleventh-century Abbey Church of Sainte-Marie in Souillac, built in the Byzantine Romanesque style.
Returning after many years to a pivotal, memory-charged place verges on the overwhelming. That day at the Cité Universitaire, I could see the young college student version of myself overlaid with that of the middle-aged wife and mother I’ve become. Briefly, both versions coexisted, and it was unnerving.
I saw the stages of my life like a design done on multiple sheets of transparent plastic. An early layer shows me at nineteen, near the beginning of my stay in France. I’m at the desk in my room, writing a letter home. I’m aware of how fortunate I am to be in Paris. I had known it wouldn’t be the place of idyllic enchantment that the movies show. Still, I hadn’t expected to be quite so disenchanted. I’m surprised at what feels like borderline disappointment. My friend Jackie had participated in the same program the summer before, lived in the same building. She’d described the trip as a “blast.” I’m not having a blast, and it bothers me. I should have gone the year before, with Jackie. I feel petty and petulant. I almost wish I were back home.
I’m sheepish in my homesickness. I hate to admit it, but I miss my parents. I miss my dog. I miss my best friends. I guess I miss my boyfriend, although this recollection is less clear. I’m certainly disappointed that the local youths who trail us everywhere (and there are many, because we are obviously American, and they’ve apparently heard that American girls are supremely willing) are not exactly the cream of the crop. We’ve learned to pretend not to see them, to say nothing. If we look blankly through them, if we show no reaction, they usually go away. Some are more persistent than others. Some become belligerent. While we rarely feel truly afraid, it’s wearing to have to be constantly on guard. I know how the chickens in the henhouse must feel when a fox is on the prowl.
July 1982: Joanne, Nancy and I at the Cité RER stop, on our way to the Sorbonne.1982: Too much time on the Metro could be a drag.But after a while, things start to look up. On the main staircase of the Fondation, August, 1982.
Another layer, toward the end of the trip. I’ve come to terms with Paris. So I didn’t have a blast every day. But there were far more fun times than bad. We’ve learned to feel at ease in the city. We understand the Metro. We’ve checked off the major tourist sites. We’ve discovered favorite spots we’d never before heard mentioned. I’ve worked my way through the Louvre, room by room. It was free on Wednesday afternoons, and I took full advantage. Often, up in the remote nineteenth-century galleries of French painting, it was just me and the guard soaking up the atmosphere of quietly magnificent landscapes by Rousseau, Millet and Corot.
We’ve made new friends among those in our group, become closer to those we already knew. We’ve had many laughs and some adventures. We’ve ridden in a little French car through Paris traffic. We’ve bicycled through a forest near Compiègne. We got locked in the historic Père Lachaise cemetery but managed to find our way out. Fending off local young undesirables has become second nature. And we did meet some perfectly nice local boys, had a couple of chances to sit at cafés speaking French with them, just as our textbooks had suggested we might. We discovered that four-franc wine was quite drinkable. We learned that the best place for our big group to enjoy an affordable, easy-going meal was an Algerian restaurant in Saint-Germain-des-Prés.
We were not wholeheartedly welcomed by every citoyen. But each time we experienced a stranger’s animosity, others followed with gestures of kindness. On Bastille Day, for example, waiting for the Metro at the Châtelet station, a drunken man took unexplained offense at my hair color. As I’d already noted, blond hair stood out in Paris, but it hadn’t yet provoked this sort of ire. Les cheveux blonds! Les cheveux blonds!, the man sputtered, pointing at my hair and approaching more threateningly with each exclamation. The French crowd muttered its disapproval, and a powerfully built, well-dressed man placed himself as a reassuring barrier between the man and me. Another night, when we found ourselves in an unfamiliar area after the last Metro had departed, a couple walked with us to the bus stop and waited until we were safely aboard.
August 1982: on my balcony at the Cité, shortly before we left Paris.
In the photo above, I’m holding my only major purchase, a bust of a porcelain-headed lady decked in fur and feathers. She struck me as perfectly Parisian. Her current home is atop my piano.
By the time we were to leave for our two-week tour of the countryside and other notable French cities, I was almost sad to say goodbye to Paris. My early feelings of disappointment had vanished. Sure, the area around the Cité was a little messy. But all in all, the city was more beautiful than I had remembered it seven years before. And as for the French people, well, they’re people. My friends and I had often been amused by the cultural differences we observed. Why would the French do this, or that? Why not the American way? Isn’t that funny? But fortunately, we had come to realize that these differences are, in truth, unimportant.
The variety of surface details from culture to culture gives life interest and humor. But at a deeper level, we’re more alike than different. Warmth and good will need no common spoken language. They transcend all barriers. Our summer in Paris had helped us learn perhaps the most important lesson of travel: the ties that bind us as humans are stronger than the forces that pull us apart. Of this truth, travel offers living proof.
My friend Nancy and I attempt attitude-filled poses at the Cité Universitaire, July 1982.
I had not been back to the Cité Universitaire since I lived there that summer thirty-two years ago. (See That French Connection, April 2014.) I hadn’t expected to return on this trip. I thought it would hold minimal interest for my husband and daughter. But on our first day in Paris, a Saturday during spring break, we found ourselves engulfed in crowds. The area in front of Notre-Dame Cathedral was a roiling sea of humanity. The line for the Sainte-Chapelle stretched for blocks. We expected Palm Sunday at all the expected sites to be equally busy. This factor may have persuaded H and D that we should visit the Cité, located in an unfashionable area at the bottom of the Paris map. Tourists would certainly not be flocking there.
I had remembered the Cité as being far removed from the city center. I was surprised to see that it was only three stops from Luxembourg on the RER. I was also surprised to see the complex looking almost exactly as I recalled it, but spruced up and considerably less seedy. It wasn’t exactly run-down in 1982. Perhaps indifferently maintained is a good way to describe it. The grounds were wild and weedy, closer to messy than pristine. Litter was common. This past April, the Cité was looking comparatively fresh, fit and clean. The plantings were lush and well-tended. The buildings were grander and more imposing than I had remembered. And there were fewer shady characters skulking about.
In this view of the back of the Fondation des Etats-Unis from July 1982, I’m the red blotch on the balcony, fifth window from left, one floor from the top.
My little room was perfectly adequate, and I loved my balcony that looked out onto the big evergreen tree, the then-scruffy garden, and the Mexico building. On the top floor were much sought-after artists’ lofts, with high ceilings and skylights.
The Fondation, April 2014.
In the photo above, the open balcony door at the right suggests that the current resident was in my old room. The same red-orange draperies adorn the windows. The tall tree still flourishes in the courtyard.
July 1982: I do laundry in my room. Trying, and succeeding, in looking pitiful.
Although the institutional décor left something to be desired, I enjoyed that humble, well-worn room. In addition to the vinyl-covered armchair, there was a decent bed, desk, and a reading lamp with a shade covered in peeling contact paper. The open balcony doors provided all the air conditioning needed. Not a single mosquito, gnat or fly ever flew in. Toilet cubicles and showers were down the hall, of course. There was no adjusting the water pressure or its temperature in the shower. You pushed a button, which triggered a quick burst of water that lasted about three minutes. Luckily, the button could be pressed multiple times, or I never could have rinsed the shampoo from my hair. The atmosphere was classic Paris student.
The sight of those bare shelves in that room reminds me of how lightly and simply I traveled that summer. Some aspirin, soap, toothbrush, a little make-up, some paper, pens and pencils, a book or too. My address book and airmail envelopes for letters to the States. I did bring a travel iron, at my mother’s insistence, which I don’t think I ever used. Its adapter was nearly as large as the iron. No cell phone, iPod, iPad, no laptop. From the looks of the trash bin at my feet, I had recently polished off two boxes of French crackers. My friends and I snacked on packaged melba toast-like crisps and La Vache qui Rit cheese. For further between-meal sustenance, I had brought a large supply of grape Tangy Taffy from home.
Thirty-two years later, as I stood there in the garden behind the building, my husband and daughter by my side, looking up at the open door to my old room, the memories swirled around me. Some were vivid, others were just out of reach, like dreams upon waking. The experience was unsettling. I understood then why some prefer never to return to such places. As for me, though, I’ll go back. Those chances to glimpse the present through the eyes of the past, and vice-versa–they add a richness to life that I want to savor. Even if there may be bitter along with the sweet.
View of the Pantheon from the Luxembourg Gardens, July 1982.
From the Pantheon and our hotel, it’s an easy walk down rue Soufflot to the grand gated entrance to the Luxembourg Gardens, a green oasis in the heart of Paris’s streets of stone and brick. The name is proof that the French don’t forget their history. In the early seventeenth century, the land was owned by the Duke of Luxembourg. The palace and gardens owe their existence to Marie de’ Medici. After the assassination of her husband, Henry IV in 1610, the Italian-born Queen needed a change of scenery and a move from the Louvre. She bought the land in 1612 and commissioned a palace and gardens inspired by her memories of Florence’s Pitti Palace and Boboli Gardens.
The circular lawn panel.
The fifty-five-acre park features expanses of perfectly manicured lawn, bordered by allés of carefully tended horse-chestnut trees and bright flowers that change with the seasons. Many statues accent the greenery.
The Italian Renaissance-style Palace was completed in 1627. It now houses the French Senate.
The central pavilion of the Palace.
A popular spot in the park is the eight-sided pond known as the Grand Bassin. While children sail sturdy rental boats, parents may relax in the rows of green garden chairs.
Pelouse interdite.
Lawns are scarce in Paris and highly prized. Early on during my Parisian student summer, our group was picnicking in a park. We noticed an approaching gendarme, gesticulating enthusiastically. We thought he was happy to see us. Soon it became evident that we had mistaken his exasperation for overt friendliness. We learned then that the pelouse is typically interdit. In the Luxembourg Gardens, some of the lawns are preserved by alternating pedestrian access. While the above panel was off limits, a nearby one was populated by picnickers and sun-seekers.
Our daughter claims a perch between French Queen and a local child.
The Medici Fountain dates from the time of the Palace.
One of my favorite spots in the city is the Gardens’ Medici Fountain. The strangely beautiful, grotto-like structure reminds me of something I’d hope to see in a dream. It stands at the end of a short allée of chestnut trees. Even on the hottest summer days, by the fountain it’s cool and quiet in the welcome shade.
You take some of this park with you when you go. Your shoes will be coated with a tell-tale layer of fine white dust.
Many significant Paris attractions were within easy reach of our small hotel by the Pantheon. Typically, we’d begin our excursions by heading down rue Soufflot. One afternoon during our visit twelve years ago, my husband and I took an opposite route. For us, and perhaps for the typical tourist, it was the road less traveled. We followed the narrow streets behind the Pantheon, down the hill for several blocks, to emerge onto a lively little square. The upper stories of the old buildings leaned in all around, as though in intimate discussion. We had stumbled upon La Place de la Contrescarpe.
La Place de la Contrescarpe, seen from our entry point on rue de l’Estrapade.
It was a warm day in May, and we quickly settled into an inviting outdoor table at La Contrescarpe, one of several cafés bordering the square. We sipped our beers and watched locals running errands and socializing. The school day had recently ended, and the square was abuzz with activity and the musical sounds of French conversation. Teenagers from nearby lycées headed to the cafés or chatted by the fountain in the leafy center of the square. Parents and younger children paused for gelato, pastries and baguettes at the many small shops.
La Contrescarpe.
Because we discovered the square near the end of our trip, we didn’t get a chance to return. When we discussed plans for this visit, my husband and I agreed that we should go early and often to our favorite little Place. On our first day back in Paris last month, after leaving our bags at the hotel, we set off down the familiar streets for lunch at the café.
The square was just as we had remembered it, just as authentically French, still relatively untrodden by throngs of international tourists. Because the weather was sunny but chilly, we took an outside table within reach of an overhead heater. Thanks to these, April in Paris is more comfortable than ever. H and I ordered our celebratory “cinquantes,” 50-cl draft beers that we associate with an unhurried afternoon in France. Our daughter sampled her first Croque Monsieur. Or did she have the Croque Madame, topped with a fried egg? One of those, which she heartily enjoyed, along with her Orangina. The food was tasty, and the service was efficient and polite. The waiter understood our French without any apparent trouble. What’s more, he continued to address us in French, something we’ve learned to take as a compliment. It was quite the pleasure to be back.
La Contrescarpe became our local café, our destination for rest and refreshment after hours of sightseeing. It was a prime spot for viewing Parisian street theatre, which continued unabated. Several featured players, quirky character actors, as it were, returned again and again. Occasionally, when they became overly boisterous, they were courteously but firmly shooed away by the café staff. We enjoyed the feeling of being part of the scene.
View of La Place de la Contrescarpe from our outdoor café table.
I didn’t realize until after we had returned home that the Contrescarpe area, traditionally a working class district, has a rich historical association with writers. Rabelais frequented the area’s taverns. Balzac set much of Le Pere Goriot in the neighborhood. Victor Hugo’s Jean Valjean haunted its streets in Les Miserables. James Joyce wrote Ulysees there. George Orwell lived and worked in the neighborhood.
Its most evocative literary ties, however, may be with Hemingway. Just steps from the Place, and within sight of our table at La Contrescarpe, is the apartment at 74 rue Cardinal Lemoine, where he and his first wife lived in cheerful poetic poverty. On the opening page of A Moveable Feast, Hemingway writes how “the cold wind would strip the leaves from the trees in the Place Contrescarpe.” He rented a small garret room for writing around the corner on rue Descartes, in the same building where the poet Verlaine died in 1896.
I had generally avoided reading Hemingway because I wasn’t drawn to tales of bullfighting, fishing, boxing, or war. But A Moveable Feast, a memoir of his early years as a writer in Paris during the 1920s, had been on my to-read list seemingly forever. About two years ago, I read it. Hemingway’s Paris, so vividly and often comically evoked, was the Latin Quarter. “My” Paris. I remember appreciating the many references to my favorite spots, to the names of streets I traversed as a student. Like Hemingway, my friends and I were always on the lookout for cheap places to eat and drink. We were familiar with his Paris, of great beauty, bare-bones accommodations and inconvenient plumbing.
But the repeated mentions of La Place Contrescarpe, I’m disappointed to say, rang no bell of recognition. I recall thinking the unusual name sounded vaguely familiar, but I didn’t realize Hemingway’s first Paris home was immediately off that very same square H and I had enjoyed so much. I had no idea that as we sat at our favorite café table, we were facing the writer’s former “flat at the top of the hill.”
Hemingway avoided the café that adjoins the house he lived in. Then known as the Café des Amateurs, he described it as “the cesspool of the rue Mouffetard,” “a sad, evilly run café where the drunkards of the quarter crowded together.” While we didn’t sample the current café in that location, preferring our post across the street, it looked perfectly pleasant, neither sad nor evil. Obviously times change. I can’t help but be relieved, however, that it wasn’t La Contrescarpe or a previous incarnation that received such a bad review. I like to think there were spring evenings when Hemingway, happy after a successful day of writing, joined his wife Hadley at an outdoor table there on the Place de la Contrescarpe. Should he have appeared during our visit, “Midnight in Paris” style, my family and I would have been glad to clink glasses with him in a contented “Salut.” I know he would appreciate the cinquante as much as H and I did.
Our favorite table at La Contrescarpe, with a view toward rue Cardinal Lemoine. The former Café des Amateurs is now the Café des Arts.
For me, one of the great pleasures of travel is returning to a well-loved place. “My” Paris is the Latin Quarter I came to know as a college student. That summer, on weekday mornings, two friends and I would take the RER train from Cité Universitaire to the Luxembourg stop. We’d emerge into the lively bustle of Paris to that unique smell: car exhaust, of a distinctly Parisian type, mingled with the freshness of the new day. We’d walk past the elegant Luxembourg Gardens and the big corner cafés, glimpse the Panthéon at the end of rue Soufflot, and continue down the Boulevard Saint-Michel for a couple of blocks to the Sorbonne, where we had our classes. We’d pass a restaurant where a waiter, setting up his tables, would blow us a kiss and make the beating heart gesture. That kind of chivalric appreciation could brighten even a dismal day. And that summer, dismal days were few.
August 1982: Toward the end of our Paris summer, my friends and I posed for photos around the Latin Quarter, trying our best to look cool. Above, Joanne and I on rue Soufflot, with the Pantheon in the background.
April 2014: My daughter and I try to recreate the photo. The dome of the Panthéon is currently undergoing a massive re-stabilization.
Each time I’ve returned since then to Paris, the Latin Quarter has been home base. With each visit, I discover more to love. Twice now H and I have stayed at the same hotel immediately across from the Panthéon. This area is in the heart of historic Paris, with its roots in the Roman era, yet it’s a bit removed from tourist circuits. While the big tour buses swing past the Panthéon, on the sidewalks you’re likely to pass more actual Parisians than foreign sightseers. Many Americans are apparently unaware that there is a Panthéon in Paris. A typical comment is “I thought that was in Italy.” For the record, it’s a grand neoclassical building inspired by the classical Pantheon in Rome and situated on a hill known as the Montagne Sainte Geneviève. Begun as a Roman Catholic church dedicated to Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris, it was finished during the Revolution as a humanistic temple honoring the great men of France. It may look familiar to Americans because its majestic dome and portico were architectural sources for our U.S. capitol.
Surrounding the Panthéon on its Place, or square, are elegant buildings that function as centers for civic and student life. There is the Mairie, or Town Hall, of the fifth arrondissement, where locals marry, vote, attend concerts, meetings and special events. Opposite the Mairie is the University of Paris Law School. Another neighbor is the Bibliothèque Sainte Geneviève. This library’s arched reading room appears in many Art 101 textbooks because of its early use of structural cast iron. Near the library is the beautiful Church of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont, dating from the thirteenth through sixteenth centuries. Behind the Panthéon sprawls the historic Lycée Henri IV, which incorporates buildings from the medieval Abbey of Sainte Geneviève. Below are some of my favorite views in the old neighborhood I adore.
May 2002: View from our hotel of the Place du Pantheon. From left, the Law School, the Bibliothèque Sainte Geneviève, and the portico of the Panthéon.
April 2014: View from in front of the Panthéon looking down rue Soufflot toward the Luxembourg Gardens and the Eiffel Tower. The colossal bronze statue of a portly nude man was installed in January. A work by the Chinese artist Hong-Biao Shen and entitled Mongolian(Standing Position), it immediately became a popular photo-op destination.
The typical Paris street sign offers explanatory information.
April 2014: the entrance foyer of the Mairie.
In the light of sunset this past April, the buildings of rue Soufflot glow coppery gold.
At the gates of the Cité Universitaire, July 1982.
As I’ve mentioned, I was lucky to receive an early formative introduction to France, its language and culture, thanks to a remarkably dedicated middle school teacher. See Vacation ’75: Part I: Paris, March 2013. Mrs. Correll emphasized the value of college study abroad, and I took her at her word. The summer after my junior year at UGA, I headed to Paris. Courses were held in the hallowed halls of the Sorbonne, where Mrs. Correll had received her Master’s degree. We had the option of living with a Parisian family, but I found the prospect of total immersion in French too daunting. My residence that summer was a dormitory at the Cité Universitaire, a complex for visiting international students.
Aren’t I original? With the gargoyles of Notre-Dame, July 1982.
My husband came to love France during his undergrad years at Union College in Schenectady, New York, a small liberal arts college that aims to turn out well-rounded students. Scientists as well as artists are encouraged to spend time in foreign study. H majored in mechanical and aerospace engineering, but he also studied French. He lived with a French family during a semester in Rennes, and before the program began, he and a buddy meandered through Europe by train. I distinctly remember telling a friend about H soon after we’d met as grad students, “He’s an engineer, but he speaks French!” My friend agreed that this was quite unusual. Maybe things have changed, but in the early 90s, the typical Princeton Ph.D. who toiled in the labs of the E-Quad did not speak French, unless it happened to be a native language.
H at the Loire Valley Chateau of Chenonceau, October 1, 1988.
As I look back, I see that our mutual interest in French was a primary factor in bringing my husband and me together. Now, after nearly nineteen years of marriage, we share so much: a home, a church, fundamental values, a daughter, family, friends, a dog and a turtle. But we began as two strangers with very little in common. When we met at that grad college barbeque, he was just beginning his engineering courses at Princeton and his research into “the thermal decomposition of nitrous oxide.” I was writing my dissertation on medieval illuminated manuscripts, having finished my coursework and research abroad. My funding had run out, and I was working as a professor’s assistant in Intro to Modern Art. Our interests, on the surface, could hardly have been more different. And then there was the age difference. He was a dewy twenty-two. I was about to turn twenty-nine. Those seven years appeared to stretch like an unbridgeable river. No betting person would have put money on our going on a second date. Maybe not even a first.
But there was that French connection. We couldn’t discuss manuscript illumination or the burning of nitrous oxide for very long, that’s for sure. But we could talk for hours about France and our experiences there. Did that French link make him think twice about me? Consider that I might not be a hopelessly artsy, aging pseudo-bohemian? Was it the point that convinced me of his unexpected depth, of some wisdom beyond his years?
French was, and still is, a fertile area of common ground between my husband and me. While neither of us makes any claim of fluency or expertise, our appreciation for the country and the language is genuine and heartfelt. We don’t sit around and speak French and think how sophisticated we are, or how cool we sound. We know we don’t sound particularly cool. But we find humor in what we consider the quirks and oddities of the French language. For example, to our American-trained ears, the word pneu (tire),sounds silly. And we find it amusing that a stick to stir coffee is called, rather formidably, “un agitateur.” But then we reconsider and agree that the word is decisive and definitive, unlike our American terms. (Is it coffee stir, or coffee stirrer, or stir stick? I really don’t know.) The French seem to have a specific word for everything, and we respect and admire them for that.
Our mishaps in speaking are a source of many laughs. A favorite story is from H’s student days in Rennes. He’d bought a little second-hand moped to take him from his family’s house into the center of the city. One night after late partying he locked it up near the university and got a ride back with friends. The next day it was gone. He reported the missing moped to the police, saying “Quelqu’un a violé ma mobilette.” He was asked to repeat his story to officer after officer, each of whom maintained a strenuously serious expression. H was pleased that his report was being received with impressive gravity, certain that swift action would be taken to retrieve his trusty vehicle. Only later did he realize he’d been saying that his moped had been violated, rather than stolen (volé).
H with friends at Chenonceau, 1988.
H and I first traveled to France together in the spring of 2002, with my parents. They had funded most of my several visits but had never set foot in France themselves. We thought about taking our daughter along. She wasn’t yet three. We didn’t consider it very long, since H’s parents were willing to take care of her. We’d wait until she was old enough to appreciate the wonder of being in a foreign country.
Then, as they tend to do, the years zipped by with lightning speed. We realized we were in danger of waiting too long for our family trip to France. Our daughter’s idea of the perfect holiday is no longer hanging around with her parents, even if it does happen to be in an exotic locale. And before long, she would be a young woman in college, no longer our captive child.
This past spring break, the three of us flew to Paris.
A blog about motherhood, marriage and life: the joys and frustrations, beauty and absurdity, blessings and pain. It's about looking back, looking ahead, and walking the dog.
