Paris Smells Like Stinky Cheese
Maybe it's the fact that my beautiful parisian window overlooks an open air fish/cheese/meat market. Maybe it's the fact that the dogs poop on the street and no one tries to avoid getting it on their shoes? Maybe it's the fact that there are so many people crammed into this space that one can't help but radiate any one of various ripe scents. I smell goat cheese, brie, camembert, toe cheese, armpit cheese, cheesy tourists, cheesy slogans... you get my point. So despite all the romance and joie de vivre and pretty buildings, shops, streets, rivers, skylines, and whatever else might be lovely and attractive about Paris...it still smells like fish, B.O., dog doo and cheese.And yet, here I am. I guess that's a testament to what's nice about it!
No Matter How loud Your Music is you Can't Drown out this City!
Taking the metro this morning I turned my music up as loud as I could just to give myself a little taste of home and try to make it a little easier to ignore the creepo in the chair next to me. Even with James McMurtry trying his hardest to bring my head back to Missouri and Middle America, the constant rythym
of the metro wheels and the opening and closing of the doors and the people yelling and teenagers singing and hobos begging and the street musicians playing forms this kind of background symphony. I wish I could rerecord it. It would be the soundtrack to Transitional Callie. Someday my adulthood will be written into a tune that blends gentle hearted midwest country with parisian street performers.
of the metro wheels and the opening and closing of the doors and the people yelling and teenagers singing and hobos begging and the street musicians playing forms this kind of background symphony. I wish I could rerecord it. It would be the soundtrack to Transitional Callie. Someday my adulthood will be written into a tune that blends gentle hearted midwest country with parisian street performers.The Real Paris is TINY
If you actually get into t
he real guts of this city, everything comes down to size. You know, where people really live and work? Where tourists try to avoid because it's too "iffy" and french people tend to congregate because there aren't any tourists? As a tourist in Paris you get off the giant plane and take the LONGEST ride into the city past the 30 story apartment buildings and down the 6 lane highways. Than you stand there next to the eiffel tower with your chest puffed out, and you have finally found something as big and proud as your ego. Let me tell you though, the deeper you get, the more life gets boiled down into the pure essentials. On the surface it's tiny rooms and tiny coffees and tiny toilets and tiny cars, beds, chairs, meals! But the main thing I've realized after all this, as I look through my giant window onto the tiny street below, is that sometimes it's good to be a little smaller...you can actually see the view.
he real guts of this city, everything comes down to size. You know, where people really live and work? Where tourists try to avoid because it's too "iffy" and french people tend to congregate because there aren't any tourists? As a tourist in Paris you get off the giant plane and take the LONGEST ride into the city past the 30 story apartment buildings and down the 6 lane highways. Than you stand there next to the eiffel tower with your chest puffed out, and you have finally found something as big and proud as your ego. Let me tell you though, the deeper you get, the more life gets boiled down into the pure essentials. On the surface it's tiny rooms and tiny coffees and tiny toilets and tiny cars, beds, chairs, meals! But the main thing I've realized after all this, as I look through my giant window onto the tiny street below, is that sometimes it's good to be a little smaller...you can actually see the view.
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