Midnight in Paris
Midnight in Paris
Chapter 4
It was unnaturally warm for a late summer night. Brakes squealed, cars
accelerated, glass bottles rattled in wicker baskets on bicycles going by.
Neighbours were still yelling friendly banter at each other through the windows
of their apartments across the cobbled streets far below. It was midnight in
Paris, a late September evening and the “City of Romance” was showing no signs
of going to bed anytime soon. He was hungry, hungry but not for food that comes
on a plate; he had eaten a bowl of French onion soup on the Champs Elysees just
a few hours ago. No, his hunger was for sights and sounds and scents to add to
his collection of memories, along with as many smiles as he could find.
He nodded at the clerk and stepped out of the lobby of his hotel onto
the tiled sidewalk following the natural slope of the city south towards the
river Seine. He strolled leisurely
down the Rue de Louvre where he could walk in any direction for hours and never
grow tired of entertaining his senses. After all, these were the very streets
that Hemmingway walked. As he walked past Les
Halles, he wondered about “The City of Romance” and what creates such an
ambience that the whole world talks about it. He couldn’t quite put his finger
on it, but there was no doubt about it, Paris had it, and by the end of the
night he would know why. Along the way, he enjoyed the sounds of party-goers in
the apartments above the shops, laughing happily drunk people spilling out onto
cobbled brick streets where they sipped their wine and blew cigarette smoke up
into the night sky. He walked past restaurants, shops and cafes. Straight and
gay candlelit conversations at sidewalk tables blended with the soothing jazz
he heard on outside speakers. Lovers joined hands, lips and bodies on park
benches, in horse drawn carriages and while walking, a nice contrast from England
where public displays of affection are rarely seen. Beautiful women, tall and
slim in their hip hugging skirts walked towards him meeting his glances, their
hips swaying no less than if they were on the runways of Milan, their matching
outfits with designer heels, belts, purses and perfumes. He began collecting
smiles.
Noticing the Eiffel Tower off to the south west, on the other side of
the wide river, he returned to the Louvre, the most visited if not largest art
museum in the world, where he had spent the better part of his day until
closing time. Memories of Antonio Canova’s “Psych
ranimee par la baiser de l’Amour”(Psche Reviving Love) and Michelangelo’s
“Dying Slave” still floating through the theatre of his mind. He continued
west, along side the closed but aromatic public garden named Jardin des Tuileries, it’s delicate
perfumed flowers, ivy’s and manicured shrubs inviting him back when it is open.
He came to La Place de la Concorde,
the largest public square in Paris, and along with dozens of tourists still
milling around, he watched the cars and taxis zip around the largest traffic
circle he had ever seen in his life. Awestruck, he took a picture of the rotating light on the top of the Eiffel tower in
the shadow of the Egyptian obelisk. He stopped to admire the fountains and statues of long dead French kings
and sat for a few minutes on the steps of the famous luxury Hotel de
Crillon, formerly the headquarters of the German High Command during the
occupation of WWII. Many years before that, King Louis XV, Queen Marie
Antoinette, Princess Elisabeth and a dozen other members of royal families lost
their heads to the guillotine here, along with over 1300 commoners, in this
very spot!
From there, he strolled up the Champs Elysees, the widest retail street
in the world with all its top name brand glitter and bling. Eventually he came
to the Arc de Triomphe at the west end of the Champs Elysees, another
one of the most famous monuments in all of Paris. 164 feet tall and 148
feet wide, this imposing four sided arch sits in the centre of La Place Charles de Gaulle, yet another
gargantuan traffic circle. The Arc de Triomphe honours French war
veterans and beneath its vault lies the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier from World
War I.
Strolling back to towards the
Louvre he found an open liquor store where he selected a chilled bottle of
French champagne and bought it, leaving it in the paper bag. As he walked back
towards the Louvre, he sipped on the gassy liquid, belching happily as he
continued exploring the French capital block by block. He took his shoes and
socks off and crossed the wide lawn south of the Louvre, he took note of the
couples sitting on the grass having late night picnics, checkered red and white
tablecloths spread out on the ground with lit candles and baskets of cheese,
long French loaves, wine bottles and glasses scattered here and there. Lovers
lay sprawled in intimate embraces and from dark corners in the hedges came
ecstatic grunts and moans. He smiled, sipped on his champagne and walked across
the street to the banks of the Seine, where an esplanade runs for miles up and
down both sides. Hundreds of happy people, mostly young adults, sat in the
moonlight, laughing, drinking, dancing, groping and listening to musicians who
play saxophones, clarinets and drums under the streetlights. As he watched, a
group of giggling teen girls ran hand in hand past him, down the esplanade. One
quickly broke free and ducked under a tree, hiking her skirt up and leaning
back against the trunk, giggling at him as she spread her legs and peed in the
dirt.
Half drunk, he walked on until he
came to the Pont del'Acheveche, one of 37 bridges which cross
the Seine, and took
the stairs up to street level, where vendors were selling vintage art
collectibles, comic books and novels from their carts. He wandered across the
bridge, its sides heavy with lover’s padlocks gleaming in the moonlight. He
smiled at the thought of returning one day with a sweetheart, and locking their
names to the bridge forevermore.
After another hour of walking
towards the Eiffel Tower, he finally came to it, though it’s lights were turned
off at 1:00 am. It lost none of its majesty sitting there in the moonlight,
presiding over the sleepless city. He satisfied his sense of disappointment
with the purchase of a fresh and delicious Nutella crepe on the street and
walked back across the Seine over the Pont
des Invalides. Realizing it was 4:30 am, he walked east on the river side
of les Tuileries, past the Louvre before heading north again on the tiled
sidewalks of Rue Saint-Denis hoping his hotel would be where he left it.
Senses dulled by the now empty
bottle of champagne, he….
