In the Twilight of an Era

              This past September, I was running on a beautiful Saturday morning with R, one of my best female ( and yipee, American! ) friends here. We wound through the market at Maubert-Mutualité, where we had stopped, tempted, by luscious grapes and canteloupe, to browse and buy. My head was spinning fresh from the drunken freedom of a post-nanny summer sort of freedom, if you can call what this is freedom. We were discussing our lives as we finally crossed the Seine from south to north, left bank to right bank, towards the Caféothèque where our group was meeting at the end, when she said something very profound that I have since come firmly to believe in:

               Our lives are not a unified entity but a series of lives strung together. 

               A set of different experiences and changing hopes, visions, and dreams that on any given whim or twist of events can change and push us in directions we could never predict.

              And little did I know this past September that I was standing on a swivel point.

*  *  * 

             If there is something of which I know I am truly guilty, it is of looking too far into the future, of trying to divinate what is coming, or in some way to construct it. To engineer my future so I can control my anxiety about it.

            This year has been a lesson in letting that go and giving myself over to the what's next? and not being afraid of it.

            It's been a tough, tough lesson.

           But now as I stand in the twilight of one era of my life, I cannot help but look back. And it seems the universe is throwing me back to loose ends, old guests, people I once knew. It is only natural, I suppose.

*  *  * 

            I was chatting with a very old, and very dear, friend of mine, another R. We've known each other since we were 13 and 14 respectively. She's in Texas now, doing fabulously. We were updating each other on one another's lives when it occurred to me to ask about Mr. SYS. 

           ¨How is he?¨ I asked, out of curiosity. 

           ¨ I haven't heard from him in a while, but last I did he asked me about your blog.¨

           I have two. This one, and it's slightly older, much more serious, artsy, writery companion that I started when I first came over here. SYS used to read it, and his family too, but when I cut him out of my life I cut his family out too. Hard core chopped them off, facebook and all. So it would shock me, unless he heard through word of mouth, that he reads and knows about this blog. But I wouldn't doubt he could find it either. I am not afraid of that. 

            Let's make one thing clear: I have no shame in what I write here. I would not be comfortable putting it on the internet if I did. I wish him nothing but the best; it was simply time to go our separate ways. 

             ¨ That's strange,¨ I said. 

             ¨I didn't give him the link,¨ R replied. ¨I just didn't respond.¨

              I responded that I didn't mind if he did: after all, he lived our story too. And I genuinely feel bad about cutting off his family, because I grew up with them...his parents watched me grow up too. I have nothing against them, but I cannot keep their son out of my life and keep them in. 

              I asked R if his parents knew what had happened between us, and she said no, but that they agreed that if that was what had to happen it did, but that they missed me anyway. I miss them too. And I miss the person I thought their son was. And I miss the person I thought he could be. 

              But I don't miss the pain and the agony, I don't miss the emotional heaviness of it all.

             Now it is nothing but a phantom memory that I look back upon every once in a while to remind me where I came from, and to remind myself not to go back there, or to ever become that version of myself again.

              I realized tonight that my main mistake with SYS, and with all the people I have dated, and even lots of people in my life in general, has been this: I am too quick to be too generous of myself and my time and my thoughtful gestures. I am not careful enough about who I dole out my generosity to, I give blindly and without discretion. With the men I date, it is because I want so badly to convince someone to stay, to choose me, to keep me that I have completely forgotten that they should have to convince me to want to keep them too. That they should have to work for me because I am worth it and I deserve it.

               I wasn't like that with SYS.

               Lesson learned. 

              I was in the twilight then too. 

*  *  * 

               I am truly in the twilight of an era. I gave my notice to nanny boss yesterday. I simply have to survive another three months. 

               The thought that in three months I will no longer ¨have kids¨ to occupy all my weekends, that I will be able to actually DATE like a normal person, actually GO OUT like a normal mid twenty-something, not be at someone's beck and call, decide what I do on my Saturday mornings, is so so so strange. And so profoundly liberating. 

               I am ready to move on. I am ready to change lives. 

               It is always sad to say goodbye to one life you have lived because it is always the death of something, the death of one relationship or one version of one's self, but like snake skin, must be shed. Dare I say it, it's almost like breaking up with someone. 

                I am breaking up with nannying. I am breaking up with all the remnants of American Lindsay. ( As my oldest girl kiddo put it,  I am not ¨American¨ but ¨ Ameropean ¨ ). I am breaking up with academia ( at least for now, we'll see ). 

                And it is all so scary and so liberating at once. 

               In the twilight and into the dark we go. 

               

             

This is What Happens When you Erase your Blackberry

               A few weeks ago, when I was trying to clean the memory in my blackberry, I accidentally erased the whole damn thing. Blame it on my misunderstanding of French technology terms, it happens every once in a while. I quickly recuperated what was essential and the rest, many numbers of which I didn't need, people I no longer kept in touch with, I let slide.

               Last night I was in the kitchen making dinner for the girls at about 8 pm when I received the following text message from a number not in my phone:

                ¨ Je suis rue du bac ce soir si tu veux qu'on se voit.¨

                Translation: I'm near the rue du bac tonight if you want us to see one another. 

                Oh I know who you are.

                I played dumb:

               ¨Excuse me, who is this? I accidentally erased all the numbers in my phone and don't know who this is!¨

              ¨Monsieur Lawyer.¨¨
   
              ¨I'm working in Fontainebleau, I'm not available, sorry.¨

             ¨Ah yes, of course. Good luck then!¨

             ¨Merci.¨

             ¨Let me know if you want us to see one another.¨

             BECAUSE THE FACT THAT I HAVEN'T RESPONDED TO YOU SINCE DECEMBER, THE FACT THAT I HAVEN'T MADE ANY MOVE TO TRY AND SEE YOU, AND THE FACT THAT I HAVE FLAT OUT ASKED YOU WHAT THE HELL YOU WANT FROM ME AND YOU CAN'T RESPOND, AND THE FACT THAT I HAVE OPENLY MOCKED YOUR SINCERITY ISN'T ENOUGH OF A HINT BUDDY!?

            GOOD LORD.

            It took everything I had not to chew him out via text message!

            The JACKASS.

           My response:  ¨D'accord.¨ Ok.

           And I will keep my class and hold it at that and not try and see him and see if he takes the mother effing hint. If he doesn't, I will then proceed to chew him out.

           Like seriously, HOLY MOTHER OF SWEET BABY JESUS, sometimes these Frenchmen are as oblivious as BRICK WALLS. And this one is working on a PhD in INTERNATIONAL LAW. That doesn't give me much hope for the rest of the species!

            Good lord, what a tool.

           I deserve better than some stupid numbskull who just wants to see me IF and WHEN it works for him and makes no f*cking effort to try and get to know me or what I like and what moves me and ACTUALLY APPRECIATE ME AS A PERSON.

           GARRGGG.

           I'm in a rant mood.

           Bring it universe because if there is any one else you want to throw at me, I'm ready to box here. Get me my gloves and we'll rumble. Throw it at me as hard as you can.

            Je suis, d'après tout, une battante.


         

         

           

Lonely

              Valentine's day is tomorrow, and I have to admit it's a holiday of which I've never been fond. I'm sure there is many a woman, single or taken, who can agree. It's not that I don't think the idea behind it is great, but it's the commercialism I detest. That, and the fact that since I was a teenager I have always preferred to call it National Single's Awareness Day. Can we momentarily point out the fact that that acronym is NSAD? As in, S-A-D? The other thing I detest, besides Valentine's day, is the conception that being single means you're entirely alone, mopey, and sad. ¨Single and sad-ulous,¨ is what my parents like to say as a joke instead of ¨single and fabulous.¨

               What is it about our culture that glorifies the heterosexual couple and sees it as the be-all-end-all to happiness? Any one with half a brain knows that sometimes, being in a couple can lead to making you ANYTHING but happy. It's no guarantee of bliss. Relationships, especially good ones, are a lot of work. Coupledom does not forcément = happiness.

              But alas. I have always managed to find a way to become single before, or right before, Valentine's Day, and have never spent it with a significant other. One day my day will come and then I'll join the ranks of happy couples living in apparent, glorious happiness and hand-feeding each other chocolates over candlelit tables with huge vases of two dozens roses...

               Puke.

              I'm a romantic for sure, but even that is vomit worthy. I prefer the type of everyday thoughtfulness that steadily feeds relationships, stickie notes left on mirrors, small gestures. And one day I suppose someone will want to keep me around and give that back to me too.

              I've yet to find them.

*  *  * 

              On Tuesday afternoon, I was on campus for a seminar at 17h. I was sitting in the hallway reading Plato when I got a text message from the Rocket Scientist. He was sorry, but he'd have to hang out another time, he had some urgent experiments to press onward and he would be in his lab all night. 

               I didn't even know we were supposed to hang out on Tuesday? 

              Sigh. 

*  *  * 

               Instead, I went, as I had planned, to E's place. He'd had a soirée on Saturday night that I had to miss because I was Disneylanding it up with the girl kiddos. I am tired of my life not being my own and not being able to participate in things I really, really want to. With this nanny gig coming to a rapid close ( just about three months left, hallelujah! going to crack open so many bottles of champagne at the end!) I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but I am SO DAMN excited about the things I'll be able to do. I was sharing this with E Tuesday night: 

                 ¨Oh lord, I can go to my first Bastille Day in Paris EVER!¨ He laughed out loud at my enthusiasm. ¨And I can go to the Journées du Patrimoine in September!¨ In two years, I'd never been able to go; I always had to work those weekends. ¨ And I can travel!¨ I chuckled. ¨And I can train for marathons again!¨

                  I was so excited I couldn't shut up. At that point, we were eating the  leftover curry he had made for his soirée and for which he had expressly invited me over to try. I received a call on Sunday night to come and eat it with him, but I wasn't able to make it before Tuesday.

                  ¨ And you'll be able to salsa again with me and then'll you'll be so good at it you can give classes and get a job in France that way,¨ he laughed. He was serious about the salsa'ing but not the job. 

                  Gulp. Last time I salsa'd with E was last may when we were ( sort of, if you want to call it that ) seeing one another. He's adamant about starting up salsa with me again now that he's done all his PT for the major knee injury he had this summer.

                   Sigh. 

                   It's at moments like these that I can feel myself weakening, especially with Valentine's day drawing nearer, and even more missing FWB. In that moment, in his living room, on his nice black leather couch, and staring into the light in his light brown eyes, I had a moment where I just wanted to hug and hold E. Not because I feel anything for him romantically, but because I am lonely. Because I just want someone to share this crazy life with, to laugh with, and because I know I am trying to fill a void in the space that the FWB left.

*  *  * 

                    E and FWB are two very different people. I find it amazingly crazy that I could have been interested in such different people. Quite honestly, it makes me question what I want and need out of someone. Call these test runs I suppose.

                    E is funny and witty as all hell. He's a smart as a whip smart-ass engineer whose teasing will give you a run for your money, the very kind of intellectual sparring partner that I thrive on. He can dish it and I can dish it right back. He's worldly, well traveled, and curious about everything. To boot, he's got an artistic side...he is a beautiful photographer, and gave up drawing long ago...though he was rather talented I must say.  But then there is something very somber about him. An inner silence and calm, a seriousness and sternness. A bit of a coldness, a bit of analytical distance.  He is, above all, on equal footing with me mentally. Our minds both move at a hundred miles a minute and I have, and still appreciate that, about him.

                   FWB is funny, but in a very warm, charismatic sort of way. He's intelligent but not in the way that E is. He is not your ¨lock it down, in the library, gotta study¨ sort of smart; he is people smart and wine smart and street smart. He's athletic, a rock climber, with a penchant for adventure, also well traveled. But he can't play with me on my mental level, he's not as much of an intellectual. I liked this about him because it released me from being too trapped in my own Ivory Tower, I appreciated his joie de vivre and his warmth and his continual happiness. His fierce love and pride in his region. His ambition and his dreams. His extroversion.

                   So which of those two, if either, was the better ( temporary ) fit? And what do I need in someone else that pulls from their positive character traits?

*  *  * 

                      I know all too well the intense shockwaves of being fed up with singledom. I have not been ¨coupled¨ for more than a few weeks at a time since I was 17. In many respects, this has been good for me: through college I never got tangled up in a serious, intense, consuming relationship before I was ready, I was able to figure out very well who I am and what I want in someone, and I evolved as my own person. In other ways, it has been psychologically brutal: what is wrong with me? why doesn't anyone want to keep me? what am i doing wrong?

                      The problem now is this: there is nothing ¨wrong¨ with me per se.  I know what I want and am coming to understand, more each day, not just what I want but what I deserve, and I will not settle for less. Sometimes the price to pay for that is singledom. But I also believe it is better to have none than to have the wrong one, so I'll deal. This feeling of being alone is just that--a feeling. 

                    I understand that I am not alone stricto sensu. I have a lot of wonderful people in my life that I love and who love me back. And I'm a fiercely independent young woman, but doesn't mean I do not have intense moments of loneliness, and this one hit good and hard.

                    Even though I am not dating E, there is something about being around him that makes me feel a little bit less alone and more alone at the same time. Less alone because I know that spending time with him and talking and laughing does me good: last night we laughed over how much I epically FAILED at Wii Fit balance games and how much he kicked my ass at them last night in his living room. But then sometimes I feel more alone after leaving his place, because I want the friendship I have with him with another guy PLUS the romantic component.

                   For now I'll regroup and let my moment of weakness pass.

                   One day I suppose I'll find what I'm looking for.

                  For now, I'll be single and fabulous.

                   

           

                   

                

The Rocket Scientist

        About two years ago, during my first séjour here on on visa number one, I went out one evening in the 5th with some friends near the end of my teaching contract. We were celebrating my acceptance to grad school here and my impending departure in two weeks. One of these friends, a female PhD in geology, brought along with her three of her colleagues, also PhDs. Two of them were English and one was French and we were headed for the English pubs with the idea that the little American was going to teach the Frenchmen how to play beer pong.

         While we were headed up the rue Monge, I started chatting with one of the PhD geologists I'll call the Rocket Scientist. I'm a friendly person who can hold a conversation, so this didn't bother me. When he figured out I was American, and not French, he was pleasantly surprised. We ended up being on the same team for beer pong in the pub and that was when he invited me to hang out later that week, on Saturday. I naively agreed.

*  *  * 

           The Saturday morning of the exact Saturday I'd agreed to hang out with the Rocket Scientist, I saw our mutual friend, R. And then, after chatting with her, it occurred to me that Rocket Scientist considered this thing a date and I thought it was strictly platonic.

            Oh shit.

            I suddenly felt a pit in my stomach. I really didn't want to go meet up with Rocket Scientist anymore, but I wasn't going to be rude and cancel last minute, and the least I could do was give him a shot. So I did.

*  *  * 

              We met up at Odéon and then what ensued was a long as hell marathon date. What is it with these Frenchies and never-ending-first-dates? We walked around a lot, and I got to know more about him. From Nantes. Oldest of four children. Studying planetary geology. A few years older than I am. Working and researching for the French equivalent of NASA.

                Slightly overbearing and trying to grab my air and the small of my back and mentioned, on the first date, wanting to take me to Nantes and make me try Kouign-amman. Speaking of which, what is it with these Frenchies and wanting to whisk you off to their little hometowns!?

                 We went from the Jardin de Luxembourg to the fifth where we grabbed coffee. He then asked me a pertinent question that caused me to panic:

                  ¨ Do you think one day you'll end up a dual citizen?¨

                  As I was only 7 months in to this now going on 30 month journey, the thought of leaving my country and becoming a dual citizen hadn't really occurred to me, so I panicked and told him no, that I needed to go back to the States for my PhD. Oh how time changes everything. She is a cruel, cruel mistress.

                  After coffee we wandered some more, then eventually grabbed dinner. Oh lord, marathon dates with these Frenchmen, I warn you, they last all day! It's like they get you in their presence and are terrified to release you! I liked Rocket Scientist as a person but felt like I had absolutely no chemistry with him, which was a shame because we were both very intellectual and curious and if I had been attracted to him, we would probably be fairly compatible. But I can't fake chemistry.

                   He saw me to the métro later that night, and our goodbye was admittedly awkward. I know enough now to know that most well raised Frenchies will not try and kiss you on the first date, but I was terrified he would try and I didn't want to reject him. If there is anything I hate more, it is rejecting people. I don't like hurting feelings.

*  *  *

                   I heard from Rocket Scientist on Facebook later that week. I nearly vomited when he, at my impending departure, let out this phrase:

                   ¨ I'll be thinking of you while you're thirty thousand feet above the Atlantic.¨

                   I'm a hardcore romantic, a Charlotte York to the core, but even that was grossly too saccharine for my liking. I repressed the urge to up-chuck.

*  *  * 

                    Every now and then, over the past two years, Rocket Scientist will chat me on Facebook. I'm friendly and far to busy to ever see him, so I keep it strictly platonic. Though lately he's been trying to hang out again. Texted me this past fall while I was on vacation duty in the countryside wanting to know if I wanted to go to a concert. Had to decline. Invited me out to his apartment for barbecque this summer with his buddies, as they are all PhD nerds.

                    ¨You know, kind of like the Big Bang Theory,¨ he referenced the television show. I asked him how his research was going. I can't really tell you much about it except that it involves lasers and the planet Mars.

                      ¨Good,¨ he said, ¨slow but steady.¨ He again invited me out to his place. I said that sounded fun if I eventually had the time. He messaged me this past week wanting to know if I was free, I said I did't know with nannying yet, but to text me.

                   Part of me is curious to see if things could've changed over the past two years and if maybe I could click with him now the way I didn't two years ago, and the other part of me is terrified I still won't click with him and then I'll be a bitch who has to turn him down a second time, and I really don't want to do that. He is a great person, but I'm just not sure there is, or ever will be, anything more than platonic there for me.

                   No one ever tells you that there is a space-time continuum to dating and attraction, because you can fully be head over heels in love with someone at one point in your life and ten years later, never want to go near them again. It's what complicates this romance thing: not only do you have to click and be attracted to one another, somehow in the insane chronology that is life and fate, both your space-time continuums must somehow line up.

                    And that is no small feat.

                    I don't know that I am ready to plunge right back in to dating and quite frankly, I don't have the time right now with two jobs, two potential jobs with visas, a Masters thesis, and somehow surviving to June. I do not know if I should give this (WOA HOLY HELL) persistent guy another chance, because it's pretty insane that after not seeing him for two years and only going on one date with him, he still seems to want to see me.

                    My heart is still a little bit bruised and while I'm not wallowing I'm not apt to putting the energy into dating right now that it demands. I don't know.

                     On verra...
         

The Love of My Life

              In all this chit-chat about Frenchmen, it dawned upon me that I really haven't touched upon this country, or why I am here in the first place, and even what really propelled me here and why I've stayed so long. Many American gals find themselves here at some point for a semester or a year during their undergraduate career and hop right back over the ocean afterward. Another lot come over after school to teach English for the French government (like I did) and then again, return home. Another batch of those gals, even fewer, stay on for higher degrees after teaching English and then, once again, return home. Then there are the few and the bold who never return home, but ¨come home,¨ and never leave France again.

               Am I going to become one of those few?

               Perhaps.

              Who the hell knows? I don't have any answers at this point.

             But what I can tell you is about my story with this country, why it is mine and why it is so special to me, and why--despite it taking me this long to figure out--France is the love of my life.

              Consider this my love song to France.

* * * 

              My love of this country goes back to single digits. I am four and my mom reads me Madeleine before I go to bed.

                   I kiffe this book so hard it sets off the beginning of a life-long obssession with this country, proof that books really can change lives, if this literature girl ever needed more solid proof of that.

                   Fast forward to the 5th grade. At this point, I'm eleven and enrolled in GATE classes. We have a project to present to the class ten words and phrases in a foreign language of our choice. Of course, my choice is French. For Christmas that year, my mom gets me another life changing book:

                 
                     This time, it's the story of an American girl who writes to a French boy, with side by side translations. And I literally remember sitting glued to this book in my step dad's lazy boy arm chair scanning the pages word for word trying to memorize the translation of English words in French. I was hooked. 

* * * 

                    Malheureusement, in America, kids have to wait ( for the most part ) until high school to learn a foreign language, and by then it's a sad, two-year requirement sort of affair, and most kids drop foreign language study after that like a hot tamale. At least in California, where I grew up. Luckily I had the option to study French for four years. I started at fourteen and I bolted like an Alaskan sled dog racing the Iditarod to my second period French class my first day of high school, I was so so so excited.

                    And then I became that girl. The annoying as hell beotch who, despite reading Molière's Tartuffe in English translation in her English class, INSISTED on reading it with a faux French accent aloud, much to the dismay of the ENTIRE SOPHOMORE CLASS. The insane chick who, when reading Patrick Suskind's Perfume as a senior, produced a phonetic pronunciation guide for her class because she couldn't stand to hear her beloved second tongue butchered. The girl who was predictably the French club president, attempted to make quiche and King's Cake and sables among a myriad batch of other things from scratch. The young teenage girl who, rather shamefully and bashfully, admits here that when she saw Disney's Ratatouille in theaters, she weeped a little bit at the scenes in which Remy peers over the Parisian night sky. The young woman who dreamed that one day, despite not knowing how, she would visit that country she loved on the other side of the Atlantic.

*  *  * 

                     Once I got to college, I figured I'd keep up my French. You know, just so I wouldn't lose it. I hadn't considered being a French major. What, after all, would I do with that? But then I threw in the kit and caboodle and double majored in two languages and literatures. Without a single regret. And after a collegiate existential crisis of figuring out I DIDN'T want to be a lawyer (thank you two internships!) I took a hard look at what I really loved, and one answer leaped out at me: I love French. 

                      So I became a French major. And then I got it into my head that I wanted to become a French professor. An honors thesis ensued with an adorable little Parisian professor. While I knew I wanted to go to grad school, I also knew I was burned out and needed a break. My senior year I was accepted to become an English Teaching Assistant through TAPIF and I was assigned to Parisian suburbs to teach elementary school kids English for nine months. 

                     France was finally within reach. 

*  *  * 

        

                       The night before boarding my first flight to France at SFO, I was afraid. Afraid I would get to France and be disappointed, or that it wouldn't be what I was expecting, or that I'd be really homesick. That I wouldn't mesh with the country I had dreamed about and fallen so in love with all these years. 

                      Luckily, none of that proved to be true. None of it happened. In fact, quite the opposite: I fell ten times more in love. My French rapidly improved. I lived with a French family and learned a ton about French culture. My accent smoothed itself out, becoming less and less pronounced. 

                      I did not want to leave after my teaching contract. I still envisioned a career in academia, and my honors thesis adviser ( the adorable Parisian ) suggested I stay on for my Masters degree here. So I applied, was accepted, and did. 

                       My first year of Master's study, I worked on the 17th century. Low and behold, after a fair amount of genealogical research, my stepdad discovered that ( as fate would have it ) I am French on my mother's side. Our ancestors left France under Louis XIV mid-17th century to found Montréal in Canada, which is how we made it to the US. But in the sixty-page treasure trove of a PDF documenting our family tree, we have the likes of Archange Langlois, Marguerite Le Preuvier, Simon Drouillard, and Catherine Guichelin. Born and baptized in various parts of France, mostly Normandy, others in the Gâtinais, and even a decent chunk from Paris. Of those born in Paris, they were baptized in the likes of Saint-Sulpice and Saint-Germain-dès-Pres and even Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois. One of our ancestors was even the coachman for Queen Anne of Austria, the mother to Louis XIV.

                       Is it serendipity I chose to study the 17th century long before I ever knew this about my family roots? Or is it just buried deep within my blood? 

                       I often walk home from campus on foot, traversing the Left Bank from the 5th to the 7th, in a pleasant stroll that I know by heart, passing by the above mentioned churches. I cannot help but gaze at them in awe and feel an intense connection to them knowing my ancestors set foot there. I cannot help but cherish walking down rue de Seine and rue de Buci in the Odéon region of Paris knowing my ancestors lived there. 

                       It all makes sense now: French, and France, is in my blood. 

*  *  * 

                       Over the past two years, I have assimilated in this country. My French is strong enough and my accent smooth enough that the French often mistake me for French. I couldn't be more damn proud of that fact. It has only taken a life time of dreaming, ten years of study, three of them extremely intensive and in immersion on site, to achieve that. 

                        If you had asked me five years ago if I would ever expatriate, I would've laughed in your face. If you had told me I'd consider becoming a dual citizen, I would've laughed even harder. But somehow, it seems, I am doing these things. It is when I think back upon the fact that, for many, many years, my mother would remind me just how worldly I am, that this all seems to make some sort of sense to me.  

                          I like to joke now that I am not expatriating; I am simply ¨repatriating¨ the family back to where it rightfully belongs. 

*  *  * 

                       It was in September of last year, after 'breaking up' with E, if you want to call it that, that it hit me: I am not in love with these Frenchmen, or at least I haven't really truly seriously fallen for one yet, but I am in love with France. I love this country and its roots, its history, its culture, its foundations.  

                       This may sound traitorous, but I have never truly felt American. I have never had a sense of connection to the United States. This is not to say that I do not love my home country and ¨native¨ culture; there are wonderful things about the US of A. But France reverberates within the very chords of my inner being. I absolutely feel in tune with this country. 

*  *  * 

                       For nannying this weekend, I could be found at Disneyland with my two girls, their musician father, his girlfriend, a special Disneyland guide, and a bodyguard. A motley crew of seven people, we were walking through Sleeping Beauty's castle when the Air and Hymn of the French Monarchy, which was written for Henry the 4th, and is also recognizable as the song used in Sleeping Beauty for the arrival of the King and Queen in the film's opening, that it struck me how engrained this all is now. 

                        I turned to my two girl children and explained to them what the song really is and how cool it is and how old it is. Dad and girlfriend were dead silent. 

                        It reminded me of how on Friday, when their dad picked them up from school and I was giving him driving directions through Paris and telling him to pass by the Panthéon that it really hit me how engrained it all is. Dad of girls exclaimed ¨I don't even know what the Panthéon is!¨

                       How can you NOT KNOW what the Panthéon is as a FRENCHMAN and a decently educated one at that? How can you NOT KNOW? 

                       I am ¨American¨ and I know! 

*  *  * 

                       One of the requirements in a naturalisation dossier is that you show proof of assimilation. Most studies show that immigrants assimilate within five years, which explains why most nations require immigrants to be on their territory for at least five before applying for citizenship. This is certainly the case for France. 

                      You also have to show proof of decent knowledge of French history and understanding and acceptance of the French Republique's laws. 

                      Seeing that I know a lot more about French history and culture than a lot of Frenchies, I think we're solid here. Only thing to add to the dossier? A picture of me in a beret with a baguette, cheese, and wine. Bien sûr. 

*  *   * 

                       My nanny boss asked me the other day if I am staying in France for a guy. 

                      ¨No,¨ I explained. 

                      ¨Good,¨ she replied. ¨Because at your age Frenchmen are pretty capricious. They change their minds a lot. They go abroad, they don't commit, they move around. Things aren't solid at this point.¨

                      ¨No,¨ I said again. ¨If I stay, I stay for me. And no one but myself.¨

                      Which is true. I know far too many an Anglosaxon woman who has stayed for the French guy and had it blow up in her face later. I refuse to acquire citizenship through the marriage route. So many women go that route that it's nearly farcical. 

                       If I stay, I stay for me. Which is going to shock the hell out of the préfecture: a single, un-PACS'ed, American woman, asking for French citizenship!? What the hell, are pigs flying?

                       It is nothing in the ordinary. But then again, neither am I. 

*  *  * 

                      France is the love of my life. It has been my whole life long. Now I am at the point where I fully commit to this country. I will be pulling a naturalisation dossier this year. I will be asking for dual citizenship. Not just because I love this country, but because WHY the hell not? I'll admit it's on my bucket list. I'll admit it's also partially strategic: get me an EU passport and I have access to working and living in all of the EU sans visa. Ever. 

                        But most of all, it is because France is the love of my life. 

                        My fear is this: How will I ever explain to Monsieur François Hollande, to the French government, to the Consulate in San Francisco, to the Bureau des Naturalisations at the Préfecture de Police abutting the Hôtel de Ville, and to the intimidating fonctionnaires in charge of my naturalization dossier, that the love of my life is not a person, but a language and a culture and a patrimony and a country?

                         In a nutshell, that's how I got here, to this place and this time and this blog. About dating Frenchmen. Which is really about so much more than Frenchmen.

                         Frenchmen come and Frenchmen go, but France is always with me. 

               
                         

Tonight I Can Write

              On Thursday morning, I ran across newly posted photos of FWB on his Facebook. In the picture, he and his rock climbing buddies had made an early evening excursion to the Dentelles de Montmirail and they were all together smiling as the sun went softly down below the edge of green horizon. He was smiling wide as usual.

              I crave that smile the way I crave air, I yearn for the way he made me laugh and how much fun we had together. I love how I felt like a flower blossoming, petals unfurling beneath the sun with him and basking in the warmth and beauty of the day. I miss how absolutely, downright goofy he is and just what weirdos we could be together. How he drove his little Saxo through the winding backroads of the Vaucluse hidden behind a pair of Ray-bans smiling ever wider.

             Tonight I can write ( not the saddest lines ).

             Tonight I miss a memory and let the dew fall to the pasture.
 
             Tonight I know a photo can make you miss someone, that in all of the eighteen months you've known him, with whom you've in reality only shared about four weeks in face to face presence.

*  *  * 

             Like a phantom my heart is haunted by the ghosts of what could've been, not black and deep with regret, but with the ephemeral transparence of the what if, of the we-were-too-young, of the you-are-still-too-selfish, of the I-made-the-mistake-of-giving, giving, giving out of my fault-fully generous nature. Of the you-might-never change.

             I walk through the grey pavement of this beautiful city and I think that I do not regret you. Not one bit. But I think about how you will regret you. Maybe not about me. About the what-if that you let slip away. About the stars spinning in the sky over an illuminated city when we are different people.

             When I see the Seine running cold I want to write about how I miss you, but about how I know I cannot go back to you. You need to grow up. You need to learn to give more. Maybe this is because you are an only child, and nothing has ever impeded you. And you refuse to let anything, even a woman, change your mind. I hold it not against you. But one day the you that you are now will look back and wonder, perhaps, and I will be a different person. One not so willing to miss you, and one not so willing to fight to keep you. One much wiser and less willing to depreciate her own value.

              I am not sure you will change. I know I will.

              Maybe this story is over, maybe it is not. But I am writing it, and tonight I can write.

              Tonight I can write that yes, I miss you, and it is ok to miss you. But one day I will not miss you anymore, and then you might finally miss me. These are not the saddest lines I will ever write, but they are perhaps some of the most nostalgic.

              Tonight I can write.
           
           

Theme Songs for Men

       Maybe this is a Lindsay thing, or a girl thing, I don't. But I definitely have certain songs that remind me of certain gentlemen I've dated. So here it goes! My horrible pop (and otherwise) music compilation for the guys mentioned in this blog. Consider this the (temporary) Sexpat in the City soundtrack.

        In General for the Frenchies: Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg, Je t'aime...moi non plus

        My First Love: Keith Urban, Somebody Like You

        Mr. Seven Year Saga: Nickelback, Far Away, Rascal Flatts, What Hurts the Most, John Mayer, Assassin, Taylor Swift, You Belong With Me, Kanye West, Love Lockdown, Gotye, Somebody That I Used to Know, Jordan Sparks and Chris Brown, No Air

        E: Shakira, Addicted to You

        Monsieur Lawyer: Frank Sinatra, Fly Me to the Moon, Jean Baptiste-Lully, Les Folies d'Espagne, Orianthi, According to You

       FWB: Lady Antebellum, Just a Kiss, We Owned the Night, Céline Dion, Taking Chances, Claude François, Belles belles belles, Alexandrie Alexandra, Chanson Populaire, Plumb, A Real Life Fairytale,
Tori Amos, A Sorta Fairytale.

        And who the hell knows what's next?

        For now, it's break time.

        Onward, the light brigade...

Paperman

If you haven't seen this already, I fell in love with it a few afternoons ago. And it gave me some hope again in finding the right person, one day, at the right moment.

Life is a series of serendipitous moments on which our choices swivel.

This is why I study literature, and this is why I write and tell stories...to produce things like these. And if I'm lucky maybe one day I'll get to make a living doing it.

Who the hell knows?

Anyway, enjoy :)

Twenty-Five and Kicking!

        The Sexpat officially hit quarter life status yesterday. Thank you so much to all of you who sent me kind wishes and thoughts! It was a day like most others, with work and school and all, except that it ended with me in a taxi on my way from my second job to Le China near Bastille. I was running QUITE late because of a conference call I, and the logistics manager for this new job, D, who is my age, had to have with shippers in the states.

         I called G7 and hopped into a cab and started chatting with the driver--like I normally do, silent car rides are weird to me, and I enjoy it--and we had such a great convo that by the time we got to Le China he was so sweet and offered me my cab fare as a birthday present. Not a bad way to start the evening!

          Little did I know Le China had been booked for a soirée privée when I got there so the hostess sent me away from the main room and down stairs. I tried to sit down at a table. The waiter informed me that it was 18h45 and there would be another soirée privée arriving at 19h30. ARGHH! So I parked myself at the bar and ordered a DELICIOUS drink called a fleur de chine...think litchi, raspberry juice, white grape juice, Malibu coconut rum, lemon, and sugar. So so so good and at happy hour, half price at 6 euro a glass. Damn good. Downed two of them.

          Then friends slowly filtered in--R and Miss Tortillas and my canadian friend S that I met through FWB and P (who is a running friend and works with me at second job) and Olives (another running friend I haven't seen in ages!) And last but not least, near 8h30, E-man.

            We had a good time with good convo and being downstairs turned out to be great! There was live music and we were all highly entertained and the ambiance was fab. People slowly left until it was just E-man and I. We were hungry but decided to venture up to Montmartre, which I NEVER do.

             We ended up restaurant hunting at 11 at night wandering the hilly streets of Montmartre and then when we were resigned to heading back down to Montparnasse because everything was closing, we decided to go up to Sacré Coeur for the hell of it to look at the lights. He legitimately has been in Paris for 15 years and HAD NOT BEEN TO SACRÉ COEUR in nearly ten! And I'd never taken the funiculaire at the bottom to the top, so it was fun and the view was stunning.

             Then we wandered to the Place de Tertres and ending up eating at a place called Chez Eugène for the hell of it and called it a night around 00h30 and ended up hitting line 12 at Abbesses to my stop, rue du Bac, and his at Notre-Dame-des-Champs.

              When I got home, I finally opened his present: a LOVELY classic Longchamp tote in hunter green. I texted him to let him know I got home safe and that he shouldn't have gotten me anything. His response?

              ¨You deserve it for putting up with all my crap... :-p ¨

              Oh my hahaha.

*  *  * 

               On another note, I finally heard from the FWB again. He sent me an e-mail to say Happy Birthday and that he had gotten his glove, which he had lost somewhere in my studio but that I found, in the mail ok. Which is exactly what I asked him in a text on Sunday...le sigh. That said, he surprised me that a) he even remembered my bday and b) that he sent me the PHOTOS of us as I requested for my birthday! and on my birthday! (Good GOD maybe I need to work on my expectations from gentlemen...in retrospect that just sounds SAD i got that excited about a dude remembering my bday...) I now have visual digital records that this whole fairy tale happened.

                I wrote him back to update him on my life and ask him about his news, but I'm happy we're on good terms. I'm busy going about my life and I'm definitely back on the horse...I did my mourning. Now I am on to lots of bigger things and seeing what 2013 and 25 has in store for me!

                WHO THE HELL KNOWS!?

                But then again, I ran across this little piece of wisdom on FB and I couldn't agree more:

                ¨If a person wants to be a part of your life, they will make an obvious effort to do so.
                 Think twice before reserving a space in your heart for people who do not make an
                 effort to stay.¨

                And I'm going to make an effort to keep that in my head as the year goes on.

                 Love to you all and thanks for celebrating with me near and far.

                 For now, I'm 25, alive, and kicking!