I think the hardest part of every day in Paris seems to be the morning....we've got a trend here that we haven't quite figured out how to break. I think the kids were hoping that John would "save the day" and this morning would be smooth, but if anything it might have been worse. We got moving for the day, and it was just wall to wall complaining. The day started out much cooler, and cloudy...chilly enough for a long sleeve top and pants. Lucia left the apartment with a tube top and long light weight cotton skirt. I think she may have left some stuff in the car, and also just wasn't willing to sacrifice fashion for comfort and so when she couldn't find something that looked ok (by her standards, which are unique at this point in time), then she just gave up and I guess decided to freeze. Except that she didn't freeze, within 10 minutes of leaving she was begging for my favorite scarf, which I was happily wearing, and which I gave to her because I can't say no.
So as we're walking along, our destination being the parked car because Romeo left his tennis shoes in there and his flip flops are hurting his feet, and they are too chilly for the day. The car is a solid 20-25 minutes away. Everyone is complaining within 3 minutes, but by everyone I think I probably just mean it was mostly Lucia, and possibly Gia. It's hard to remember, usually it's not everyone, usually it's just two of them, but loudly. I'm pretty sure Ava had her ear buds in and was listening to music, tuning everyone else out.
We tried stopping at two bakeries, no one wanted anything sweet, they wanted "real" food. I had a headache before we ever reached the car park. Romeo got his shoes on, and somewhere during that time frame Lucia had been on her phone and found a Five Guys restaurant. Yep, they have them all over here. It's the McDonald's of Paris now. So Lucia is just adamant that we are going, she can't live without that, for what now appears to be brunch-time food. I think we we're all so sick of hearing her complaining about being hungry that we agreed (truthfully she was going either way, so it was just a matter of whether we walked with her to the not-terribly-great-north-train-station-area.
The ironic part is that Lucia is obsessive about trying to NOT eat stuff that gives her acne (and by acne I mean whatever she has that she calls acne, but most people would just call it normal teenage zits). She doesn't eat dairy, cuts her sugar intake WAY down, things like that. We walk into Five Guys and the place literally SMELLS like acne, yet somehow the idea that a BLT is not on the approved no-acne food list never occurred to her. She came out with a bag, leaking grease and looking gross, and she was happy as a clam.
The rest of the kids were starving, so we headed toward the Marais, and out of the sketchy neighborhood. I don't specifically remember this neighborhood, although I know I've been in it before, but I will say that I notice more homeless people in the areas I do know well and can compare mentally with five years ago. More homeless families in particular which is very striking. We also were on the metro yesterday before John arrived and there was a group of younger women, speaking a language I didn't recognize, and they were sitting on the metro floor blocking the door, eating sunflower seeds and dropping the shells all over the place. Two different passengers warned me that they were pick pocketers, and to hold our bags tight. There have always been pick picketers for sure, but all I know is that the vibe has felt different, there is an energy, or maybe strife in the air in Paris that wasn't here before. There is an anger, frustration maybe....but you can sense something just walking around in little ways and you can see it in people's faces.
The walk to the Marais was at lest 30-40 minutes, which was about 45 minutes longer than anyone had patience for. John in his ever-mellow-just-go-with-it-manner was trying to quash the uprising, but it wasn't in his favor.
Eventually we arrived, and I'll just say by that point we ended up having to break up in two's to prevent bloodshed. Ava and Lucia went off for green smoothies (obstensibly Lucia needed hers to counteract her greasy BLT), Gia and John went to this cool looking pizza/Italian place because she wanted pizza, and Romeo dug his heels in for lasagne at another place he saw, so I went with him. He ate his whole salad, and his whole lasagne--the kid was famished. Sometimes you just have to roll with the new vision, I think we had hoped for a big family lunch, but that was NOT in the cards.
Post lunch we trolled around the Marais which is such a pretty area. Loads of little shops and cafés. The kids walked in a pack, and I snapped a pic down there of them in action...arms flying, I think Romeo is hitting Gia and Ava is double over in laughter at something Lucia said. It's a tornado of movement--all the time. We shopped a little, stopped for wine, and then stopped at the Picasso museum which is in the Hôtel Salé (an absolutely breathtaking 17th century building.) Besides Picasso, the museum was displaying the work of Alexander Calder which are beautiful. His mobiles are just these airy works of balance, space and shape. John ended up leaving earlier with the girls because they were not being quiet or soaking it in, but the littles and I walked around quite a bit and saw some pieces that were pretty amazing. I'm not a huge Picasso painting fan to be honest, but I'm intrigued with his work, mostly his sculptures. Calder I really love.
They had quotes on the walls from both artists all over the place: Calder, "The admission of approximation is necessary, for one cannot hope to be absolute in his precision. Hey cannot see, or even conceive of a thing from all possible points of view, simultaneously." For some reason that quote struck me, probably for the same reason the next quote by Picasso struck me....the leap of faith artists (and anyone really) takes.
Picasso, "Each time I begin a painting, I have the feeling of leaping into the void. I never know whether I'll land on my feet. Only later do I evaluate more exactly the effect of my work."
We stopped in a beautiful church afterwards and everyone lit a candle...Romeo did two, declaring afterwards when we were sitting on the church steps talking, that he had to do another one (apparently his prayer didn't work the first time, or whatever he does in his head when he lights the candle he wanted to do again.)
The adventure continued as we tried to make our way home via metro. It would have been ok, but because of Bastille day all kinds of stops were closed, which we didn't realize until we were already on the train and found ourselves way out by Le Defense. Eventually we made it back home at about 7:00 p.m., having walked at least 10 miles (I'm using my Apple Watch to refer to miles walked...so you know it's actually for reals.)
It was a gourmet burger place for dinner, which was very successful, and easy because it was almost directly below us. After three days of walking 10 plus miles a day, I'm starting to feel like my feet need a rest. One more day in Paris though, can hardly slow day when we only have one more day.
Signed, ME {lv}
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