How would you like to sip your morning coffee here?
Or look out of these windows on to a French street below?
Let’s go back a bit. Back to this summer in France. I think it all started with one of those ultra-modern 1-cup coffee pod coffeemakers in the apartment we were renting. I arrived in Dijon a couple weeks before my husband did. This space age caffeine dispenser was the first thing I noticed in our kitchen and I knew immediately that this would not do for my coffee-obsessed husband. He doesn’t drink much, but he’s quite particular about what he does ingest to fuel himself before his morning bike ride to work.
After consulting long-distance with him and visiting a French big-box store to report on available alternatives, he finally agreed to a French press pot. Not ideal (the sediment, you know) but workable for his time in France. I bought him one and he gratefully accepted it two weeks later when he got to town. That pod machine sat ignored in its prime counter real estate for the rest of our stay. And he needed that coffee bad after sleeping every night on a mattress that sloped to the south on one side and was barely long enough for him to stretch out. Antique beds are good to look at but not meant for sleeping.
We lamented the fact that we would have to leave behind an expensive coffeemaker at the end of the summer. We lamented the money spent on cheap plastic Tupperware-like containers I had to purchase and leave behind each time we came to Dijon. We longed for better knives for dinner preparation, pans with lids that fit, and something larger than a dorm-sized refrigerator. I wanted a bathroom at least as big as the distance between my fingertips. During the summer’s rainy periods I dreamed of whiling away the afternoon in a proper reading chair. I hated hauling heavy hiking boots between home and France.
We knew there were many more trips to this Burgundy town in our future. So about 72 hours before I got on a plane for home, Brad and I began the process of looking for our own piece of French paradise. We’re two academics. We don’t do anything impulsively. We usually research everything out the wazoo. But we shrugged and said, “Well, it wouldn’t hurt to just look. Then over the winter we could research and talk to English-speaking expats about how you buy property in France, all the financial implications, taxes, and paperwork so we’d be ready to consider it next summer.”
Then we walked into that second apartment on the list. We were done for. Light. Soaring windows. American-sized bathroom. American-sized refrigerator. Chandeliers. Space. A balcony illuminated by belle époque stained glass.
After consulting long-distance with him and visiting a French big-box store to report on available alternatives, he finally agreed to a French press pot. Not ideal (the sediment, you know) but workable for his time in France. I bought him one and he gratefully accepted it two weeks later when he got to town. That pod machine sat ignored in its prime counter real estate for the rest of our stay. And he needed that coffee bad after sleeping every night on a mattress that sloped to the south on one side and was barely long enough for him to stretch out. Antique beds are good to look at but not meant for sleeping.
We lamented the fact that we would have to leave behind an expensive coffeemaker at the end of the summer. We lamented the money spent on cheap plastic Tupperware-like containers I had to purchase and leave behind each time we came to Dijon. We longed for better knives for dinner preparation, pans with lids that fit, and something larger than a dorm-sized refrigerator. I wanted a bathroom at least as big as the distance between my fingertips. During the summer’s rainy periods I dreamed of whiling away the afternoon in a proper reading chair. I hated hauling heavy hiking boots between home and France.
We knew there were many more trips to this Burgundy town in our future. So about 72 hours before I got on a plane for home, Brad and I began the process of looking for our own piece of French paradise. We’re two academics. We don’t do anything impulsively. We usually research everything out the wazoo. But we shrugged and said, “Well, it wouldn’t hurt to just look. Then over the winter we could research and talk to English-speaking expats about how you buy property in France, all the financial implications, taxes, and paperwork so we’d be ready to consider it next summer.”
Then we walked into that second apartment on the list. We were done for. Light. Soaring windows. American-sized bathroom. American-sized refrigerator. Chandeliers. Space. A balcony illuminated by belle époque stained glass.
My American-sized bathroom and refrigerator
And that’s why I haven’t been blogging much. Or on social media of any sort. Or responding to e-mails. Or coming up to breathe.
We’re buying an apartment in France. The French love paperwork. The French speak French. I’m taking two language classes a week because it finally matters if I can pronounce anything correctly (when I need to talk to plumbers in the future). We’re gathering documents. I’m making long-distance phone calls to people who don’t speak English to verify that they were the ones -- and not some Nigerian prince -- who sent us the e-mail telling us to wire large amounts of money with lots of zeros to a special account. I’m writing e-mails (in French) to our own personal French banker asking tons of questions, to which he always seems to reply (not in English, of course) some version of “There, there. No need to worry. We’ll talk about that when we meet on Friday.”
I’m trying not to panic about the fact that I read on a French-language news site that a transportation strike might start on Thursday, the day I touch down in Paris. Alone. Without Brad and his magic French language talents.
But when I’m suffocating under an avalanche of e-mails and searching for important information in a file box full of documents in French and their translated English versions, I pull up on my computer the picture of my balcony and imagine the morning sun as I sit there sipping my own cup of tea made in an American-sized mug and not an espresso cup. And I think about putting Brad’s French coffee pot, which he packed up in August and left with a friend, on our counter.
We’re buying an apartment in France. The French love paperwork. The French speak French. I’m taking two language classes a week because it finally matters if I can pronounce anything correctly (when I need to talk to plumbers in the future). We’re gathering documents. I’m making long-distance phone calls to people who don’t speak English to verify that they were the ones -- and not some Nigerian prince -- who sent us the e-mail telling us to wire large amounts of money with lots of zeros to a special account. I’m writing e-mails (in French) to our own personal French banker asking tons of questions, to which he always seems to reply (not in English, of course) some version of “There, there. No need to worry. We’ll talk about that when we meet on Friday.”
I’m trying not to panic about the fact that I read on a French-language news site that a transportation strike might start on Thursday, the day I touch down in Paris. Alone. Without Brad and his magic French language talents.
But when I’m suffocating under an avalanche of e-mails and searching for important information in a file box full of documents in French and their translated English versions, I pull up on my computer the picture of my balcony and imagine the morning sun as I sit there sipping my own cup of tea made in an American-sized mug and not an espresso cup. And I think about putting Brad’s French coffee pot, which he packed up in August and left with a friend, on our counter.
Internet connection for this trip is so far an unknown commodity because I haven’t made arrangements to have it set up yet. I should be able to post a couple of updates before I return home just before Thanksgiving. Meanwhile, share with us in the comments box the most impulsive thing that you have done when traveling. Or ever. If you dare.