On est toujours "in flux."

A lot has happened since the last time I posted. I managed to keep a regular blog when I studied abroad -- it's a little harder to maintain for a year and not four months. ANYWAY. I had Christmas with my parents. Owen and I went out with my friends to the Latin Quarter on New Years. I finally had a solid day of (maybe) good teaching. I moved! I'm now living in the 14th arrondissement in a technically-one-bedroom-but-we-actually-have-two. My roommate is perhaps the most chill, nice person I have ever met. Our apartment has an oven (in which I have already made enchiladas!) and a shower that will provide you with more than ten minutes of warmth. We even have a washing machine. Our metro stop is flanked by cafes that are open late and two movie theatres, and we're within walking distance of really good shopping and a street where there's always a market. The buildings are elegant, we have a lot of wonderful boulangeries, lovely Parc Montsouris, and even a neighborhood giant -- it's a decoration on a building...pictures to come.

Okay. So now for the bad news. My new commute takes an hour and a half, and I have to time it pretty carefully because I take the metro to one train line to a different train line to a bus. This is okay, although not ideal, but today Paris and its environs had a collective panic attack because it's been snowing lately. Now, Paris is a lot like Seattle in that people do not know how to handle snow. But it's even worse because everyone relies on public transit. During last year's snowstorm in Seattle, the buses hardly ran, and it caused a lot of problems. And not very many people in Seattle even take the bus. In Paris, we've got the metro, RER, and then transit systems in the suburbs, that -- with the exception of the miraculous metro -- are fraught with delays, accidents, and interrupted commutes. Just to give you a better idea of what happens -- today, instead of the metro, two trains, and a bus to get to work, I took the metro, a train, another metro line, another train line, another train line, and finally a bus to get to work, all because of a technical problem at one of the stations in Paris that kept traffic from leaving towards the southeast all day long.

And yesterday the bus I take to work didn't even come, so I walked from the train station to school. An hour.

I just got home from work today after too many transit connections, and a long walk through the neighborhood. It feels good to be home in my cozy but freezing apartment with a cup of tea.

I still feel like I'm in a bizarre state of missing my family who just returned to the States and getting used to being on my own again, except with a roommate, so that's different too, and I'm getting oriented to the new neighborhood as well. I really love it here, and I don't miss the 13th at all, but sometimes I just expect these transitions to be seamless and they never, ever are. I'm honestly quite frazzled at all of the organizing things I have to take care of, so I'm taking it one day at a time. And trying to manage my time better -- which, by the way, is way harder in real life than it was in college, when I felt like I was always being productive just by reading books and doing art projects. It's hard. It really is. Although I know objectively that pretty soon this will just be home. Until then, I'm contenting myself with baguettes tradition from the boulangerie and learning how to cook pork and potatoes and going on long walks in the quartier and sitting down to many a cafe creme. And enjoying the perks of having a roommate. Dinner parties on a cardboard box  with "Franco-Mexican cuisine" have already begun. And by Franco-Mexican, I mean we couldn't find all the right ingredients.

A la prochaine!

C'est un total eclipse of the heart

A couple of things:

1. I really miss burritos.

2. My discount grocery store plays the strangest French versions of American songs. Last time it was "Let the Sunshine In" from "Hair." Today it was "Total Eclipse of the Heart" and the song from "Flashdance." Surreal when you're digging through the discount gouda selection. Or really just surreal...

3. The funny thing about grad school applications is that they make you write. This week I've written way more than in the whole time I've been here. I am conjuring up images of spending next year in New York or Boston or Iowa or SoCal. Or, you know, Wisconsin.

4. About a month from now, my family will be in Paris!

5. Today I ran to the Bastille from my house. Turns out it's like 4 miles. So I guess I'm getting back in shape.

6. I made pasta puttanesca successfully for a second time. Mastering the art of normal cooking is coming in right on schedule.

7. One of my friends has a jar of peanut butter. Our level of excitement over this is kind of ridiculous.

8. Still people-sick. Who wants a postcard?

9. Leonard Cohen's music was totally made for Paris. Nothing makes me feel quite like a young bohemian writer making my way in Paris like listening to Leonard Cohen while cooking in my shabby kitchen in my tiny apartment between looking out at Paris night windows over the courtyard and writing.

10. Or perhaps I'm just kind of pretentious.

Plastic Wrap Jesus, Our Lady of the Garage, and A Bad Case of People-Sickness

I found out this week that the beautiful old church at Place Jeanne d'Arc near my apartment is called Notre Dame de la Gare. This is pretty much "Our Lady of the Train Station," or, less charitably, "Our Lady of the Garage." Coincidentally, I live down the street from a Portuguese bookstore that sells Jesus figurines, which are some of the scariest I've ever seen. I mean, the concept of Jesus doesn't bother me, it's just these bizarre plastic figures that are grotesque and crucified. I don't know. Crucifixes, particularly of the gory Catholic variety, have always sort of freaked me out. The most terrifying Jesus on display, and one that has never been sold since I've gotten here, is still wrapped in its plastic wrap. It's creepy enough to see Jesus looking all battered and scary. But the plastic wrap adds (my apologies) a whole new layer.

So there you have it. I live in the quartier of plastic wrap Jesus and Our Lady of the Garage. France does weird stuff with religion.

Today I ate American French toast for the first time in probably months at one of my friends' apartments. It definitely beat Parisian petit dejeuner, where you have to pay about 8 euros for coffee and a croissant and get hungry twenty minutes later.

So much of my life here revolves around food. Have I mentioned that I love grocery shopping here? It's way cheaper than it is in the US, and probably the only that is in France. Two days ago I discovered the holy grail (can't seem to get away from these religious references...) of food shopping -- the French discount grocery store, where you can get fromage blanc (France's delicious answer to plain yogurt), honey, fair trade coffee, and all of my weekly staples (couscous, lentils, eggs, fruit, veggies) and even sort of fancy stuff (harissa! olive oil! organic things!) all for around a euro each, if that.

Mmmmm. I love saving money. And I love cooking delicious things. I am learning how to cook here, and definitely not in the Julia Child sense of the word, either. But given that I could probably count the number of times I cooked anything before coming here, and also that my kitchen is literally two hot plates, a minifridge, and a sink, I think I'm doing pretty well. Couscous and lentils, harissa, kidney bean burgers, a variety of omelets... the next project is pasta puttanesca.

As always, at breakfast we started talking about not leaving. And it's tempting. I'm applying to grad school this winter, and if I get into one of my top choices, I'm definitely going. But I thought about it a little. I mean, if I was going to be here for more than a year, I probably wouldn't want to stay in my tiny apartment. I would probably want to find something cheaper, and maybe a little bigger (c'est possible!) in one of three Ms: the Marais, Montparnasse, or Montmartre. Or the 17th arrondissement because I know it and love it.

And I would want to get a magic jack for my computer (it turns your computer into a phone, way easier than Skype), and probably a toaster oven. And I would probably need more clothes. And a renewed visa. And probably a little more patience with the whole French bureaucracy thing.

But I thought about it.

And then I remembered that while I don't get homesick much anymore, I am constantly people-sick. I miss getting coffee with my friends at home and at school and walking around Greenlake together and going out dancing and doing stupid things like watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" or searching for bubbletea in the university district at midnight or listening to Leonard Cohen driving around late at night. I miss watching "Mad Men" with my parents. I miss the back office at 826. And you know your life has gotten kind of strange when the people you miss are on both coasts of the United States and even in different countries. How did I get here? I left Seattle for college when I was 18, and I spent four years in Northampton, well, four months were spent in Senegal. That's key. I'm pretty sure that's when the wanderlust happened.

And now I live in Paris. And depending on where I end up getting into grad school, I have no idea where I'll be around this time next year.

A while ago, my mom told me that most 22-year-olds don't live by themselves in Paris. One of my friends said that if she could transplant the people she loves at home to Paris, she would never want to leave. And they're both right. Such is the conundrum of being one of the 22-year-olds that do live by themselves in Paris. If you happen to know one of us, we probably miss you. A lot.

Sometimes, though, I wouldn't have it any other way.