Day 66/1 The last time I saw Paris

Thursday 19th.
Today is the 5th anniversary of the death of my best friend/sister Taney. She had endured a hard life but found love finally with an Australian man. She died just three months after they married. I was matron of honour at her wedding. Strangely we were on the train from London to Paris when we heard the news, and here we are, five years later, spending our last day in Paris.
It’s a glorious day - a clear blue sky which we haven’t seen in over a week. It’s warm too and the Paris skies are calling us. We waited until today to make our trip down memory lane - a visit to our old hangouts at St Germaine des Pres. We walked just a few doors down and saw the amazing church of St Gervais ( Tony says an ancient ancestor of Ricky Gervais) on the way to Chatelet metro station. Paris isn’t at all friendly towards people with disabilities. We saw some tourists, one of their members in a wheelchair, gazing perplexed at the stairs down to the Metro, with no way of getting the wheelchair down. The station is weird….with long passages to the various lines. Every few yards there is a flight of stairs….wither up…or down. Just to get to line 4 we manoeuvred 12 flights of stairs. I was completely stuffed before we even reached the platform. But it was worth it. St Germaine was everything we remembered it to be….charming, quirky, arty. When we made it up into daylight Tony wondered if he could remember where Les Deux Maggots was. And there it was facing him, just a few feet away. The patron saint of travellers seems to have everything within our reach. Les Deux Magots is Paris’s literary café. Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir discussed philosophy over cofee….Picasso regularly had his Pastis there - even Ernest hemingway made it his hangout when in paris…and of course Tony and I are among the glitterati! We sit and order Café Crème. It comes in little brown jugs…the tray looking so beautiful that I just have to take a photo of it. It’s served by a waiter in black monkey jacket and waistcoat, a bowtie and a long white apron. The whole ritual wreaks of class and of course Paris already does class effortlessly. But class comes at a price…almost 10 Euro ($15) for two coffees. We figure it is worth every cent as we sit and watch the passing parade. Later we look for Le Petit Zinc - a reasonably priced Bistro masquerading as a grande salon of la Belle Epoque. It’s Art Nouveau interior is just magic. We discovered it and had dinner there on our last trip and now the hostess invites me in to take photos. Later we wonder through St Germaine, down the windy cobbled streets. When we come back to Paris it will be to this place, which feels so much like home. We walk to St Michel and have coffee in the Square near the exotic fountain and statue of St Michel himself. WE stroll along the Seine before finally reaching home, where we empty the suitcases and start to repack.
And there is the last lovely surprise. Tony’s French flag…the one he has encouraged to unfurl itself every day, has finally broken free from the trap of the flagpole and is proudly displaying its Tricolor….fluttering in the breeze. Tony is thrilled, as if all his cajoling is responsible for the flag fluttering. Silly but charming - and worthy of Paris. We dine out tonight at a bistro we have been salivating over for two weeks. It’s in our street and has that look that could only be Parisien. We stuff our faces with food and divine Sancerre wine. Then, almost too full to move, we wander along the side of the Seine as darkness closes in.
Now the holiday is almost over, and this is the last entry before we fly out. When I’m home I’ll look back and ponder what this 66 days has meant and perhaps post an addendum. What if anything have I learned about myself? About Marriage - and life over all. It’s too soon to tell yet But three things have been enforced. I love life; I love my husband; and I love France - Paris most of all.