Without Reservations (3 page)

But later, while waiting to board the plane, another feeling crept in, one I couldn’t quite identify. Was it apprehension? Or just too much champagne? Such thoughts were swept aside, however, once I felt the plane lift off the runway, headed for Paris.
This is it
, I thought, tightening my seat belt,
the beginning of the next part of my life.

To my dismay, I arrived in Paris not an excited woman but an anxious one. Without warning, halfway through the flight, my sense of excitement deserted me and a new, less welcome companion arrived: a complete failure of nerve.
What am I doing on this plane
? I asked
myself. Panic was lurking beneath the question. What had seemed a wonderful idea—
une grande aventure
, as my friends put it—began to feel like an ill-conceived fantasy that should have provided fifteen minutes of amusement before being discarded.

By the time my plane landed in Paris I had considered every bad outcome—from loss of livelihood to loss of life—that was likely to result from my incredible mistake in judgment. It was a little before eight in the morning and the air terminal was chilly and deserted. A tiring wait to get through customs was followed by a longer and more tiring vigil at the luggage carousel. By the time I had retrieved my bags and made the long trek to the public transportation area, my mood was dangerously low. I decided to cheer myself up by taking a taxi to my hotel instead of the bus that dropped passengers off at some central location.

“Rue de l’Université,” I told the driver, directing him to my hotel. He’d never heard of it. “On the Left Bank,” I said. “Rue de l’Université. Off the quai Voltaire.” He shook his head and sighed wearily, as if to say,
It’s no use trying to understand these Americans.
Then suddenly he lurched into gear and abruptly hurled his taxi into the traffic headed for Paris.

It is a long drive from the airport into the city, one that offers little in the way of scenic diversion. The truth is, there is no difference between the morning rush-hour traffic in Paris and that of any big American city: bumper-to-bumper cars and lots of ugly industrial parks separated by the occasional cluster of sterile high-rise buildings. The hour-long trip did nothing to bolster my morale.

Just as I was wondering whether it was madness or stupidity that had landed me in the back of this taxi, something happened: we entered the city of Paris and the Seine came into view. Silvery and serpentine, it moved like mercury through the center of the city, a mesmerizing force. From the taxi window I could see the
tree-lined quais along the river. A few more minutes and we were on the quai Voltaire, driving past ancient buildings, their stone façades tinted a rosy pink by the morning sun.

Here it was that Voltaire had lived and died, I thought, looking at the silent buildings, each one with a story to tell. As I allowed myself to be drawn into the net of beauty and history that hangs like a bridal veil over Paris, my excitement grew.

We drove along the Seine, turning finally into the heart of the Left Bank, into the narrow, picturesque streets lined with bookshops and galleries and cafés. Ernest Hemingway once lived in this neighborhood, and so did Edna St. Vincent Millay. The thought buoyed my mood even more.

By this time the sun had burned through the early mist, leaving the air fresh and damp, as fragrant as the ocean. I felt elated; it was the same feeling I’d had as a child when, headed for the beach with my parents, the first whiff of sea and salt air would blow through the open windows of our trusty green Plymouth.

The taxi made another turn and then stopped in front of a small old building that from the outside bore little resemblance to a hotel. I was more or less dumped out into the middle of the narrow street, and with the traffic piling up behind us, horns blaring, I counted out seventy dollars’ worth of francs. The driver pocketed the money, unloaded my belongings, and immediately drove off, leaving me and my suitcase—a large black number about the size of a baby hippopotamus—at the curb in front of the hotel.

I peered through the glass door, looking for someone to assist me. The place appeared deserted. Draping my raincoat around my neck, I slung my tote-sized handbag over one shoulder, a small duffel bag over the other, propped open the door with my left foot, and proceeded into the lobby, dragging my suitcase behind me.

It was my first look at the small hotel, once a private residence
dating back to the seventeenth century. I’d decided to stay there on the advice of friends who knew and liked it. Immediately upon entering, something about the small reception area put me at ease. The furniture, under the original vaulted ceilings, was old and beautiful; the winding wooden staircase was polished and gleaming; and in one corner a young woman was arranging long-stemmed, fresh-cut flowers in large Chinese porcelain vases. There was a sense of history here. And, just as important to me, a sense of order.

It was also, I might add, the hotel’s first look at me; at the rumpled, tired, luggage-intensive figure slouching toward the small reception desk. But those who work in hotels are not unused to seeing people at their worst. After all, the word “travel” comes from the Latin “trepalium.” Which, loosely translated, means “instrument of torture.” So whatever judgmental thoughts may have passed through the mind of the receptionist, she tactfully kept them from appearing on her face.

It was still early, a little before nine, and my room, she informed me, would not be ready until 12:30. She suggested I take a walk.

Outside, the shopkeepers were washing down the narrow sidewalks. In the air I could smell bread baking. I headed for a café I’d seen on the rue Bonaparte. I stopped on the way to buy a
Herald-Tribune
at a newsstand where a large gray cat sat grooming himself on a stack of
Le Monde
newspapers. Timidly, I touched the cat’s head. “His name is Jacques,” said the elderly proprietor proudly, “and he is very friendly.” I scratched Jacques under the chin; he immediately began drooling. After that, my first stop every morning was to see Jacques and, as I came to call his owner, “Monsieur Jacques.”

By 10:30 I was seated in a neighborhood café near the rue Saint-Benoît, reading the paper, sipping café-au-lait and wondering,
Is this really happening? Am I really in Paris? Do I really not have to go to the office or write a column or go to the supermarket?

As if to answer my questions, a tall man wearing a tuxedo and a beret walked by, pushing before him a perambulator. In it I could see an accordion, and behind that a puppy and a cat. I turned to my waiter who answered my question before I asked it. “Madame, he is on his way to the place Saint-Germain-des-Prés to perform for the tourists.”

Yes
, I thought,
I really am in Paris.

I left the café and walked along the rue Bonaparte, scanning the numbers above the doors. When I came to Number 36, I stopped. The sign outside said: HÔTEL SAINT-GERMAIN-DES-PRÉS. It was the small hotel where Janet Flanner lived in her early days in Paris, and I had come to pay my respects to her. Of course, she was no longer around—she died in 1978—but it’s my belief that you can remain as close in feeling to the dead as you can to the living. Sometimes even closer.

I entered the lobby, an elegant, refined space that in all probability bore no resemblance to the modest surroundings in which Flanner lived in the 1920s. At that time it was a hotel where young American expatriates with talent but little money rented rooms. Still, it was from this hotel that Flanner began filing her fortnightly articles, signed with her
nom de correspondance
, Genêt.

“May I help you, madame?” asked the receptionist.

“No, I am here to meet a friend,” I said, walking the few steps to the breakfast room at the rear of the lobby. Breakfast was over
and the room was empty. It seemed as good a place as any to deliver my respects to Madame Flanner:

Well, I finally made it here to thank you
, my thinking voice said.
So thanks for sharing with me your fifty years in Paris. I couldn’t have asked for a better guide.

After leaving the hotel I walked along the tiny rue Jacob, a charming street that seems to surface suddenly at a little garden near the rue de Seine and then, several blocks later, disappear into the rue de l’Université.
Now this is more like it
, I thought happily, as I popped in and out of the bookshops and antiques galleries along the street. It was at this point that, high on a combination of strong coffee, excitement, and jet lag, I found myself actually skipping.

Later, of course, when the first exhilaration lost its edge, another question would present itself: how does one structure a life that has no responsibilities or set routines? Such an existence, I came to see, had the potential to deteriorate into idle wandering.

But on this particular day I was open to wandering, to idleness, to losing myself in the glorious ether of Paris. I wandered through the narrow streets, my mind spinning, going over all the things I wanted from this trip.

A list began forming itself in my head: I wanted to take chances. To have adventures. To learn the art of talking less and listening more. To see if I could still hack it on my own, away from the security of work, friends, and an established identity.

Of course, I also wanted to lose ten pounds, find the perfect haircut, pick up an Armani suit at 70 percent off, and meet Yves Montand’s twin, who would fall deeply, madly, in love with me.

My first chance to get my self-improvement plan rolling presented itself in the form of a cosmetics shop I passed on the rue de Beaune. I stepped inside. It was an elegant shop, staffed by beautiful young Parisiennes with perfect skin, perfect hair, and perfect bodies. Dressed like doctors in crisp white jackets with name tags, they moved like models through the aisles of glass shelves piled high with eye balm, corrective facial masques, and salmon mousse hair balm. I was approached by Françoise, who, in addition to her lab coat, wore a Hermès scarf and Chanel earrings.

Françoise asked if I would like an analysis of my skin. It struck me as a wonderful idea. “What are your problem areas, madame?” Françoise asked, her concerned voice suggesting there might be many of them.

Within minutes I was like an analysand on the couch, blurting out my long list of problems to Françoise. She listened, jotting down notes on a white pad with a Mont Blanc pen. Undaunted by the challenge I presented, she proceeded to fill a white wicker basket with items from various parts of the shop. She then explained the purpose of each product and the miracles that would result from using it. Always, she ended with “I myself use this product, madame.”

That was good enough for me. In less than twenty minutes I blew almost half a week’s food budget on creams, balms, and restoratives. What better way to celebrate the New Me than by sprucing up the façade of the Old Me? Besides, I told myself, I’d make up for it by eating in cheaper places. Still, I worried a bit. Between the taxi from the airport and my foray into the world of French cosmetics, I’d already spent a lot more than I’d planned.