Paris, I Love You but You're Bringing Me Down

by Rosecrans Baldwin

  From reading the news and hearing stories from office friends—from female colleagues, and from male colleagues—an indubitable truth emerged about Parisians, that when they fell in love, they really fell in love. No aspiration was more important, profound, or dangerous. They didn’t go into it with reluctance or self-consciousness. They respected love like they did beauty: among life’s highest states.

  * * *

  The last Friday morning in January, Paris was a melancholy bubble. Dribbling rain, infernal cold. On the Champs-Elysées, as I exited the Métro and began my march up the hill, drivers sat in traffic, huddling inside their cars with the windows closed, or cracked open with a cigarette protruding like a snorkel.

  I could picture the tables crammed at Café de Flore, with guests warming their hands over café crèmes—tourists downstairs, locals upstairs on the ugly but oddly charming brown vinyl seats. And in some Montparnasse garret, more likely a couch swap, a young woman who’d traveled all the way from Montana, or Vermont, was sitting down to write the Great American (in Paris) novel.

  Meanwhile, I was going to the movies. Which could have been great. That morning, Pierre had asked me and a coworker named Arnaud to meet him at a theater at the bottom of the boulevard. A new film, Whatever Lola Wants, was being released soon in France, and the producers had asked for a “viral ad campaign” to bring in audiences. Well, worst movie I’d ever seen. Perhaps someday it would be a cult favorite—but I doubted it. The story had a blond American moron deciding she badly wanted to become a belly dancer after her Arab friend showed her footage of a master performer. The American, named Lola, then unleashed her gullibility and bodacious flesh (she was bodacious) upon Egypt in order to learn the Orient’s ways while sleeping around, offending local customs, and by hook or crook becoming an icon of gyration.

  According to the publicity packet, Whatever Lola Wants intended to bridge East and West. Sure, on the back of every French cliché about Americans.

  “You know,” Arnaud said as we walked back to the office, in the rain, “that was actually pretty good.”

  “That was the worst movie I’ve ever seen,” I said.

  “Come on,” Pierre said, “the worst?”

  “Well, maybe the girl,” Arnaud snorted. “She was bad. And annoying.”

  Pierre chided me, “It’s a popcorn movie. It’s for fun.”

  For a while, we climbed the Champs-Elysées in silence. Then I was forced—forced—to explain how the movie had been an exercise of stereotypes: Americans as childish, naive, brutal, vulgar, thoughtless, selfish, domineering idiots—

  “Don’t forget hot,” Arnaud said. “Her body? Waouh.”

  “All we’re seeing,” I continued, “is what France already knows: dumb Americans and backward Arabs.”

  “Well,” said Arnaud, “it is for a French audience.”

  We reached the office, and the rain slowed. Pierre plunked down his shoulder bag and lit a cigarette. “Remember,” he said, “there was a gay Arab in the beginning. Isn’t that progressive? You don’t see many gay Arabs in movies.”

  “I don’t know,” Arnaud said. “It was kind of P.C. Hey, I have an idea. Okay, what if we made belly dancing the new thing for women in Paris? We organize classes, start Facebook groups, throw an expo. You could do it in gyms, you know?” He turned to me: “It’s popular in the States, right? Rich women learn how to be strippers? Maybe we make that the new fashion in France.”

  “Maybe this could work,” Pierre mused.

  Across the street there was a hubbub outside Fouquet’s, the storied restaurant. A passerby said Sarkozy was inside having breakfast. At the same time, Carlos the programmer came outside to smoke. He laughed when he saw me, and pulled me close by the shoulder: “What’s up, my Negro?”

  Then he noticed the publicity packet in our hands.

  “Dude, what?” He shouted in English, “You guys going to the movies? Man, this is bullshit.” He turned to me: “Yo, dog, why you so hooked up?”

  24

  One evening commute, I made a list of what’s typically seen on Paris streets: People coolly bumping into each other. Posters for expos about beekeeping or cheese. Comics stores and hobby shops. Motorcycles equipped with fleece mittens and lap blankets, to shield their drivers during winter. Clothing boutiques for two-year-olds that sell exquisite cashmere sweaters so small, so unlikely to suit a toddler for more than five weeks, that their obscenely high prices make sense: to wear such a thing was a privilege, even for a day.

  I made another list, of what there wasn’t in Paris: No berets anymore, except on tourists. No more mustached bistrotiers. No Yale dropouts in khakis. No one loitering on Rue de Tournon. No bistros worth their price on the Boulevard Saint-Germain.

  Bien sûr, there were still plenty of three-star restaurants. Beautiful parks to visit, and booksellers operating on the Seine. Fashion boutiques and épiceries, and boîtes libertines for politicians who wanted to let down their pants. Books penned by intellectuals about sex, yes, of course—which, I’ll point out, always seemed to be discussed in newspapers and magazines with an academic, detached familiarity, like your next-door neighbor had just shared with you his poems.

  But no, Parisians were not rude, I told Americans who asked—it’s what everyone asked—at least no ruder than typical employees at Disney World. A single s’il vous plaît on your part went a long way. I said, You try being asked for directions every day in seven languages.

  And yes, there was an expat store in the Marais that charged twenty-four euros for a bagel sandwich. Yes, most everyone in Paris spoke a little English, but speaking English in Paris remained a dead horse. Yes, poivrotes wore American Apparel leggings to flaunt their Parisian asses, which remained flawless, absolument.

  Something new I learned: Mikhail Gorbachev had ideas about luggage. His face was the latest emblem of Louis Vuitton. For our digital campaign, he’d chosen Moscow as his city to remember, though during the interview we arranged, Gorbachev basically suggested that Moscow was a shitty convention center with bad traffic.

  But when asked about luggage, specifically how he packed for traveling, Mikhail Gorbachev got excited. He packed his own bags, he said, and had a special method for stowing his shirts. He could imagine how his ideal suitcase would be designed. And so on.

  Up next would be Keith Richards, Keef to the French. I begged Pierre to let me interview Keef. Pierre said no, the photo shoot and interview were being done in New York, and he couldn’t afford to fly me over. However … “The plan is for Keef to talk about London,” Pierre said. “So we will make the movies about London. I thought you could go do that instead of me. Chloe is upset about me taking so much time working.”

  I said yes, of course, happily.

  It sounded a long way away from infant nutrition.

  At that point, I was taking time off from working on my novel to let it sit, and reading a lot of Henry Miller. He’d been pressed on me by Scottish Keith. Nothing highbrow, Keith insisted, only the good stuff, the sex that frightened Americans. Under the Roofs of Paris, for example. I started it one morning on the Métro. I was on page two when I started worrying about people reading over my shoulder: Marcelle wants us to look at her. She’s bending over her father with his prick in one hand, gesticulating with the other, and calling loudly for an audience.

  Living abroad pierces your skin until one day you prevent it. You make yourself unshockable. The buildings on Rue de Rivoli give no new light, and you cease to see things fresh.

  Same day, it was a chilly Wednesday, during my park time at lunch I thought how I didn’t want to reach that point, but it seemed bound to happen, Henry Miller or not. If I inspected myself honestly, the Paris I knew best was from my commuting hours, before sunrise or during the dark blue winter twilight, and it was difficult not to think of Paris, my Paris, as a hallway in a shopping mall.

  But Henry Miller nagged me for thoughts like that, for being so pedestrian.

  * * *

  A note fro
m the government arrived at the beginning of February: our health-care cards would be further delayed until proof of my employment was supplied.

  Of course, proof had been supplied. But this letter was from a different ministry; they needed the proof supplied to them. Dossiers not being shared between ministries, I guessed.

  Plus they’d need copies of our birth certificates, certified French translations, et cetera.

  Thankfully, our physical well-being was fine. But the problem of our health cards had become arduous. The prescriptions we needed we purchased at full cost, from our pocket. Health department officials assured me over the phone that as long as we saved our receipts, we’d be reimbursed down the line, once our cards arrived. But that day appeared to be far away. Until then, our monthly budget would stay tight, and get tighter.

  Lindsay texted to say she’d found a new boyfriend, Christian. We’d meet him that night, Lindsay said, at some party of Georgie’s at a new club in the Latin Quarter, above a block of art galleries.

  The cold became penetrating after dark—it got into the bones—but the Left Bank that evening was alive with people carousing, eating daube niçoise, drinking wine in cafés behind plastic walls erected for winter.

  The club, a new construction, had a peculiar fusion: white leather, loud house music, and a sushi menu with fish priced as high as cars. When we arrived, Richard the redheaded cupid was just leaving. He looked miserable. He told us the party was extremely dead. Ten minutes later, Lindsay showed up alone—tall, blond, and pissed. Her new boyfriend would not be surfacing, she said. He’d promised to come, then he broke his promise, and they’d had their first fight. Rachel suggested she bring him by for dinner the next weekend. Lindsay said okay, but we shouldn’t get our hopes up.

  “Holy mother does he have issues with eating,” she said. “Meaning, he doesn’t eat. He smokes four packs a day and drinks Coca Light, but that’s it.”

  Informed she’d just missed Richard, Lindsay said, “Well, you know he’s got money troubles.” Apparently Richard was depressed, Skypeing everyone he knew for consolation. Either money from his father wasn’t being doled out anymore, or Richard was expected to start adding to his own pocket. Richard had even begun busing tables in the Marais, Lindsay said, at the restaurant that served diner food to American backpackers—his Parisian nightmare.

  After ten more minutes, the club was full. We mingled. Georgie was chatting up several stockbroker types, their hair oil looking très Société Générale. But again, who was I to judge? Wasn’t I standing there, too? Hadn’t I become a mingler with expats?

  My portrait’s title was easy enough: Schmuck with Heineken.

  And then we’d had enough.

  A minute later, we were out on the street, and Rachel and I decided it would be our last event with A Small World, and Lindsay said yeah, hers, too.

  * * *

  End of the first week in February, I finally read my novel. Five a.m., the hour was black and icy. In the newspaper office across the courtyard, SORTIE signs were backlit in the dark, and Paris was a submarine.

  But in the kitchen, as the baseboard heaters clicked on and smelled of flint, my book seemed to hum with life. At least for the first hundred pages, every turn of the plot was a surprise, even to me, and I was thrilled.

  Fifty pages after that, I was ready to throw it out the window.

  The book was DOA.

  Oh, I knew enough to be able to say that, I swallowed whole careers. Carved up classics that never lost their power while I marveled at Greene, Austen, and Roth, never mind the regional specialists—never mind the global spymasters, island voices, and whiz kids whose novels I admired.

  By the time I finished reading, I knew that in my book, there wasn’t much essential being.

  Soft stuff, true soft stuff, seemed to be the hardest trick to pull off.

  That morning, Paris was not partial. It was frigid, gray, and wet. The sun came up. The city’s colors colluded. No birds, no green. Rachel made breakfast and I left for work wearing a scarf, my coat, and a sky-blue baseball cap.

  On the Métro, I thought, I’m no writer, I’m barely a rédacteur.

  * * *

  Let the hills ring: Sarkozy married Bruni in a modest ceremony attended by few guests. According to People magazine: “Acting as witnesses for the couple were French businessman François Bazaire of the LVMH Groupe and Mathilde Agostinelli, communications officer for the Italian luxury goods firm Prada.”

  Something smelled off to me. When a luggage/fashion executive acted as one witness, and the other was Prada’s head publicist, wasn’t it likely—wasn’t it obvious to everyone—that the marriage of the Italian supermodel to France’s top divorcé had been arranged as a marketing exercise to benefit Europe’s economy?

  Mid-February, a coworker’s cousin set up a parfumerie in one of the conference rooms. She was a big girl in three shawls. Evidently she made and sold her own perfumes. Some idiots, Doo-Doo and others, went in and spritzed themselves, so the whole office stank. For the rest of the day I had a jarring headache.

  “Are you okay?” Olivier asked in the afternoon, peering from behind his monitor.

  My head was resting on my desk.

  “Do you remember,” I said, “the day in autumn when I ate my lunch here?”

  “Ah, you do not like the smell of the perfumes.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, “but it’s too much. And this is not just an American thing.”

  Olivier laughed. “No, you’re right. I have a headache, too. Let’s open the window.”

  Olivier got up and opened the French doors to the balcony. A cold breeze blew in. Olivier announced loudly that if anyone wanted the doors closed, they could move to another room, but he and his American friend needed to be able to breathe, thank you very much.

  25

  Back in October, Rachel had experienced a knee injury after running in Buttes-Chaumont. In December, we’d both gotten the flu. After the flu, Rachel caught a head cold in January. After the cold, une gastro knocked us down for a long weekend.

  Vertigo came last. Rachel woke up one morning, tried to sit, and fell over as if she’d been spun around in a food processor.

  “What’s the matter?” I said.

  “I have no idea,” Rachel said. “Every time I sit up, the room spins. Not just the room, but me, too.” She squeezed my hand. “It’s scary.”

  Behind the wall, a power drill screeched. There was nothing trompe l’oeil about it: as of February, we now had construction on all six sides of our apartment. Upstairs, downstairs, north, south, east, west.

  I didn’t say it, but perhaps a drill had reached her inner ear.

  The American embassy’s website gave us the number for an ear, nose, and throat doctor (ENT) on Rue Royale. The doctor herself answered the telephone. She said she could see us before lunch. Doctors were like that in Paris—they answered their own phones and often they’d see you within two hours, frequently in offices that were part of their own apartments.

  We went through the doctor’s living room to reach her study, on wood floors smoothed down to leather. Large windows overlooked a sunny courtyard with boxed fruit trees. Rachel could barely walk. The short trip from the Métro station to the doctor’s building had been an ordeal of stops, starts, and spins. At least it’s nice out, she’d said.

  That day, Paris was awash with gold light.

  “And you haven’t changed your medication recently?” the doctor asked Rachel after she’d done a few tests. Birds chirped outside with full hearts.

  “No,” Rachel said.

  “Well, you should probably see an ENT.”

  “You’re not an ENT?” I said.

  The doctor typed on her glossy white laptop, all its cords neatly hidden from view.

  “I can recommend one, in the eighteenth,” she said. “He knows all the treatments. And he speaks English very well.” She telephoned and obtained us an appointment for two hours later.

  We took the Métro
up to the eighteenth arrondissement. By that point, Rachel’s symptoms had settled down. As long as she didn’t jerk her head, she could walk. Both of us were starving. The second doctor’s street was mostly offices, but there was a chain steak restaurant on the corner, the French equivalent of Sizzler. Inside, the bar was strung with promotional St. Patrick’s Day advertisements.

  “Look at that,” Rachel said, pointing out the window after we’d sat down. The sidewalk was bustling, the sky was cloudless—Paris, the all-access picnic. “This could be our perfect day.”

  “What about the vertigo?” I said.

  “Oh, forget the vertigo,” Rachel said. “We’re in Paris, we’re having lunch together. Imagine if this is what Paris was.”

  At the ENT’s office, we sat in the waiting room with a pair of grandparents holding gossip magazines that they scanned and passed back and forth. They looked seventy, maybe eighty. I wondered if they remembered the Paris of horse slaughterers, the Paris of patrons behind aluminum bars and flowers brought home from Les Halles.

  A stooping giant summoned the grandparents into his examination room, patting them in through his door. Twenty minutes later it was our turn.

  “Yes, hello,” the ENT said as we walked under his arm.

  We sat in chairs opposite his desk.

  “You are … Rachel?” the doctor said, consulting his notes. He looked up, hesitating to smile. “And you are feeling?”

  He did not speak English well. He ordered Rachel to sit on an examining table, and said things like “Good, yes?” while shoving her down until her eyes filled with water. Then he flipped her the other way. He said, “You feel sick? You make sick now?”