For all my love of cities, there is something unspeakably touching about this simplicity, about the kind of place where your child could still ride their bike all around town and promise to be home for dinner. Maybe we shouldn't be too quick to mourn these places; maybe they will evolve and survive. A town's soul, after all, has more to do with its people than with places to buy artisan bread or local beef.
Tag: France
the runaway bride
Question: how many people does it take to stuff a voluminous wedding dress into a modest carry-on suitcase? Answer: two, if one is unsentimental and can bear the agony of rolling, folding, and crushing the garment into a form one-quarter of its original size while the other watches in horror. The non-sentimental character in this …
a modest proposal
I have a fiancé? I felt like I was acting, like Mom and I were doing undercover research for an exposé on the bridal industry.
swf seeking family of four: the almost au-pair
"I wasn’t looking for eligible bachelors, but married Frenchmen with children. In other words, I was the newest addition to Au Pair World dot com."
getting to know you…sunshine blogger award
One of the things I've most enjoyed over my year in Cannes has been gradually building up a blog readership. I sat down one day full of ideas and wrote about how speaking a second language opened my eyes to the greater absurdities of life itself. Many of you seemed to relate, sharing humorous stories …
from newlywed to retiree: on places, and what it means to love them
It's interesting what we block out when we dream of or anticipate a place. We must ignore the great unspooled ribbon of mind-numbing highway. The ugly big-box stores. The cloud cover that renders a day as colorless as a lump of pizza dough. Sometimes I think we reserve those kinds of stringent observations for home: to criticize what we are used to and tired of.
the proof is in the profiteroles: on “dieting” in france
Dieting is not an especially French activity. Nor does it feel particularly patriotic to live down the street from a small market and ignore the siren song of its milky white goat cheeses and fresh baguettes. But that's what I did (or tried to) for a whole month. All in the name of health, I …
Continue reading the proof is in the profiteroles: on “dieting” in france
