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Paris Diaries:If you can make it here

I woke up to find the day overcast and decided to put off Versailles until the next day, which would hopefully be sunny. Instead I decide to give Les Invalides a quick pass before heading to the Musee de Rodin before finally stopping at the Eiffel Tower. My late friend David had told me to go to the Musee de Rodin the first time I went to Paris (David was the one who told me if I went to Paris men would be throwing themselves into the Seine to prove their love to me) and I never managed to get there. This time it was a priority. If it wasn't for his recommendation, it was because of my deep love of statues. It seemed that the Musee de Rodin would be the unique blend of my dearest loves-Paris and statuary.

But before I went there, I figured I would give a quick jaunt into Les Invalides. Sure because of the weather every step I took was like razor blades up my Achille's Tendon, but it's just pain. And I didn't come all the way to Paris to sit with my feet up and wonder what the Thinker really looked like.

I got off the metro and began to wander in the general direction of Les Invalides both being drawn to investigate some picaresque streets and warning myself that if I did so I might not have the energy to really enjoy the Rodin and that was, after all, the most important thing on my Enforced Cultural Death March that day.

I was pretty pleased that I was holding up under the pain until one of the guards at Les Invalides embarassed the hell out of me by yelling across if I was alright because I seemed to be walking in some pain. Well I was fine except for the urge to now go and hide out in my hotel room lest another guard worry about my feet. Still I foraged ahead. Later when I came out it seemed from his attention that instead of trying embarass me, he was trying to flirt with me. What he couldn't come up with a "You look nice today. What's your name?" line? I suppose as a guard that probably wasn't smiled upon, but he's French. He should be able to come up with a better intro to seduction than that.

I didn't bother to go into the museums at Les Invalides, firstly because I had no desire to do so, but secondly because everyone who had gone, even true francophiles, assured me that it was an utter waste of time. Still the walk to Les Invalides, the sprawling impressiveness made me come to one important realization.

I had to get a book deal. I had to find a way that some publishing company would pay to send me to Paris and have ridiculous adventures with men (reading tarot cards by the Seine, getting picked up by cab drivers, trying to delicately hint to young Algerians that they need a shower) and then come home, put my earphones on and write about it for three months. I mean good christ, Peter Mayle turned living in Provence into an entire cottage industry. And he doesn't even have any sexy material. (And thank the good lord for that. Pete, fyi, not an invitation for you try your hand at some erotica.)

I decided that it could be done, and that in fact what I should write is a Single Woman's Guide to Paris.

Of course, immediately I was assailed with doubt. Sure I would think there is a market. I was one of the truly crazy bitches who went to Paris by herself, who enjoyed not really understanding the language, who preferred to be alone than to be with morons just for the sake of company, who enjoyed going on an enforced cultural death march instead of taking the Da Vinci code audio tour of the Louvre. But no one, not even on my best day, thinks me representative of a demographic. I'm a lone ranger, not an every girl.

But then I thought, "Hey it wasn't that kind of thinking that got your ass here, so there must be a way." I thought that if I tried to market/write the guide as a personal essay and insane adventures with advice thrown in about how men come onto you (the oh so creative "So, how are you?" or the inviting "Would you like a drink?") and how to properly pack for such an adventure (put deoderant and other toiletries in a bag-nothing else is necessary). I could market it as a David Sedaris meets Sex in the City only in Paris type of thing. Sure, that sounds to me a lot like bacon ice cream, but it's the type of thing that makes market people light up like the Rockerfeller Christmas Tree.

There's a song about New York that goes, "If you can make it here, you'll make it anywhere." Well despite disability and insanity and sept. 11th and the black out and several major depressive episodes and the general asshattery of NY men I had made it there. And then just to prove a point, I made it to Paris and nothing more than a pocketbook I had some of the best days of my life. And if I could do that, well then getting a book deal, that was going to be the easy part.

Labels: paris, single girl's guide to paris

Bad Bunni posted at 9/12/2007 08:15:00 PM |

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