Vernon Lee, will you haunt me?

What does haunting mean? Can it be the words of a writer a hundred years ago who expresses so beautifully the thoughts you hold yourself?

The passionate feeling for places depends very largely on a habit of craving for the beyond: beyond the plain which intervenes between us and the mountain range; beyond the hill, the pass between us and the seashore. And it is my experience that the Genius Loci is sure to haunt the turn of the road where our daily walk comes to an end; or the place where the rocks, growing too steep, close in the mystery of the stream; we feel him immanent in every valley which opens and closes again as the train or the motor rushes by. All our finest pleasures require forestalling in wish and fancy ; and it is doubtful whether nine-tenths of them are not due to such forestalling. This does not mean that the finest happiness exists in anticipation only, but that when it really comes in the present its most exquisite essence is but the remnant of expectation and longing.

The sentimental traveller: notes on places 

Vernon Lee, who wrote these words, lived in the Residenza del Palmerino, a villa just below the Fiesole hills that was first constructed by a jeweler to the Medici family some six centuries ago.  It passed through several Florentine families and was, for a time, a monastery before Lee bought it in 1889. She hosted the literati of the time and today the children and grandchildren of the painter and writer who bought the villa in 1935 host and promote artistic events in the Residenza.

Residenza del Palmerino

And in April I’ll make it my home for a week. Looking for a place to cocoon and write and just be in Italy after a tumultuous beginning to the year (hospital stay for a bizarre injury, a trip to Africa cancelled, being laid off from my job of seven years) I found the villa on SabbaticalHomes.com. Exceedingly fortunately, I am to be there during a week that a room was available (and at a writer-friendly budget of 200 euros!).

At first I was lured by the beauty and history and peace. Then I became intrigued by the writer who called it home a century ago. Her short fiction explored the themes of haunting and possession, wikipedia tells me, but she “was also known for her numerous essays about travel in Italy, France, Germany, and Switzerland which attempted to capture the psychological effects of places rather than to convey any particular piece of information.”

I checked my library to no avail for her books, evidently long out of print, but had better luck on Google books, where I found the passage above. I read it and reread it, enchanted, shared it on facebook, and read it aloud to my husband before falling asleep dreaming of the villa and the long-dead writer.

She wrote about haunting and possession. When I stay at her home, what if I can conjure something of her spirit? The part that led such captivating words to flow from her pen?

She says in her dedication to The sentimental traveller:

To whom should I dedicate this book, if not to you, dear neighbour and fellow-traveller ? Neighbour, not merely in a brick-and-mortar (and, since I have built it, let us hope, not incommodious) dwelling, but in the closer vicinity of thought and feelings. And fellow-traveller, also, down the sloping twilit years, as well as across the woods and vineyards and old gabled market-places of this unmetaphorical world of space. It has always seemed to me that to know a country one must have friends belonging to it ; bodiless friends, perhaps, in book or music score …

Shall I not take her as my friend in Italy then? Since I will be staying in her (decidedly not incommodious) dwelling? As my friend perhaps I can seek out a friendly haunting from her. Why not be mentored by an English writer born in 19th century France who made her home in Italy? I like a spooky ghost story as much as the next person, though it gives me the shivers to think of a real ghost. But couldn’t sharing a space, if not a time, with the writer provide a chance to seek her ghost? At least the ghost of her gift, in the hope that she can share it? I don’t know. But I’ll find out.

I’ll dream until then of my room in the villa, waiting and wondering:

are there perhaps in time, as well as in space, enclosed places of the spirit, little regions of tender memories and peaceful hopes, set with wonder-trees bearing deathless blossom and fruit ? A tiny now, safe embosomed in happy yesterdays and to-morrows, which (like the plains looked at from the hills, or the hills from the sea) are of the mirage blue of dreams. All of us, surely, have known such days of causeless and pervading joy ; have, by some spells impossible to learn, found ourselves admitted within those vanishing, longed-for isles, those closed valleys, where the gold-dust of sunset lies tangibly on all things, and our own thoughts all wear an aureole.

The view from my room

Maybe I don’t want to live in Paris

I want to live in Paris. This is my dream; has been for years. I feel incomplete, like a limb, or at least a major digit, is missing when a trip to Paris is not on the horizon. It was less than a month after returning from a week there in September that I managed to plan a four-night “stopover” en route home from a work trip to Zambia in January. My addiction is that severe.

I love being in Paris as much, I think, as the dog asleep now at my feet loves me. I cried on the second day of my last trip, in the shadows of the archways at Place du Vosges, tears dripping, nose running, sniffling like a woebegone child as I explained to my girlfriends that I’m crying because, snuffle, wipe, I haaaa-aaa-aaa-ve to leave. (They promptly took me shopping and I bought this dress to console myself.)

When I want something badly enough, I make it happen. And I’ve been plotting for years to make a move, sure that somehow, someday, I will live in Paris. But I’m beginning to think that maybe I don’t want to after all. I’m still ridiculously, hopelessly, fiercely in love with Paris. But if Paris is always the light at the end of my tunnel, I no longer have that light if I’m there. Right?

If you have Paris, what lives up to it?

A Parisian man said this in the book I just read, the book that I’ll partly blame for my decision to abandon my dream, or at least acknowledge that it’s not, in fact, my dream – Paris I Love You But You’re Bringing me Down.

It’s true though. If I’m living in the most beautiful city in the world, the city that I can walk for days with no plan, nothing but a huge smile on my face, what do I have to look forward to beyond that?

Recollections of Paris past and dreams of Paris future prop me up through monotonous days at home. Nothing compares to the glee of booking a flight – except arriving. I can – and do – spend long, delicious hours mulling over where to eat and what to eat and what streets to wander the next time I’m there. I’ve collected articles and stories and ideas for future trips for years. I barely blink when I find I’ve forgotten to do something I meant to do — restock my spice cabinet with goodies from la Grand Epicerie, maybe — because I’ll just do it next time. There will always be a next time. I didn’t even go into the Eiffel Tower until I’d been to Paris nearly a dozen times. What’s the hurry? It will be there.

And that idea, that Paris is always ahead of me, allows me to toil through a day job, grocery shop in an American supermarket, face another humid Kentucky summer morning or dismal December day.

If Paris is no longer a dream, then what do I dream of?

Life in Paris blogs flourish online, weaving magical tales of perfect life in the city of light. Everything is lovely, a misty, romantic pleasureville in these blogs. But I know Paris better than to buy those glorified, simplified, “don’t you envy me” cotton candy confections. Paris can be a pain in the arse. Big time. I know this. Rosecrans, the author of ‘Paris I Love You’ shows me to be true what I feared – that living in Paris, you can lose the magic. Bureaucracy, language, a daily grind — even there! — can add up to the bursting of the shiny bubble. I don’t want to lose that, even if it means I will never live there.

I’ll always be looking in

“There should be a name for when you’re in Paris and you already miss it,” says Rosecrans. I don’t have the name, but I know it all too well, this feeling. The last time I stand on a bridge and look out over the Seine, my heart breaks. It will never truly be mine. It’s only on loan (like a library book, says the author). And I grieve when I have to give it back, mourn that I can only ever have my fleeting moments there. But I never, ever say goodbye. Rosecrans understands this perfectly. He says:

saying goodbye to Paris was something a person did when he knew he was dying. Otherwise Paris was forever one day soon.

I think that’s what I need. More than I long to try (in vain, surely)  to truly have Paris, I need  to always know that it’s one day soon.

I live in Lonely Planet’s #1 travel destination for 2013 (Louisville)

I used to go into major funks when I’d come home from a trip. Often I’d quit a job, move towns, or otherwise disrupt life because my hometurf was so unsatisfactory. I don’t do that anymore now that I live in Louisville. I preach a lot about how cool my city (home for eight years now) is, and now the rest of the world — namely Lonely Planet — is taking notice. I got to chat a little about why that is on WHAS Great Day Live.

WHAS Great Day Live

In a short segment I didn’t get to talk about nearly as much as I’d have liked to, so here are a few more reasons Louisville is #1 in my book, too.
In no particular order: A wine shop where I can pick up the best bread this side of the Atlantic and enjoy a neighborly chat with the family that owns it, Greenhaus; burgers that converted me to a burger lover, Grind; my weekly yogurt parfait and Spanish Latte that makes every Friday an event to look forward to, at Please & Thank You; a restaurant where I’ve never had a bad dish in at least a hundred visits, Eiderdown; the staple of my lunch diet, chicken salad at Hillbilly Tea; the serendipity of a banh mi shop opening the week after I return from Saigon hooked on the sandwiches; parks to roam; pizza for every mood; and bourbon. Also, some of the coolest people anywhere. Until I can move to Paris, there’s no place I’d rather be.

How to eat fried worms

Tags

Andrew Zimmern, Hanoi, Southeast Asia, vietnam

Crickets aren’t so bad except the scritchy feeling in your throat on the way down.

Chicken feet curry. Sauteed crickets. Barbecued crocodile. These were all warmups to the Main Event. The bite that planted me firmly into bizarre foods territory.

First, let me tell you a little story. On our first trip to Europe in 2001 (oh, but we were just babies) I wouldn’t even eat shrimp that arrived on the table with the heads and legs still on. I would covertly slide them under a napkin so as not to offend, after I did mightily offend a Parisian waitress when I couldn’t – wouldn’t – eat a single thing on my seafood platter. We’d saved for a year and a half for the trip, and in order to have a splurge dinner on our anniversary night, I sneaked into Brian’s waiter apron early every morning to pilfer some change that I collected until I had a sum I thought would buy a fancy dinner in Paris. For whatever reason we ended up having seafood, though the extent of my seafood experience at the time was limited to the cheddar biscuits at Red Lobster. I’m still struck cold at the thought of that waitress’ glare. “what?” she sneered in that inimitable French way. “You no like?” We paid our long-saved francs and beat a hasty retreat.

I have become a bit more of an adventurous eater since then. Especially since I abandoned my vegetarian ways – after so many years of not eating meat, I kind of figure meat is meat and what difference does it make what part of the animal it comes from, or really, even what animal it is. Add to that my seemingly endless attempts to be a badass, whether in weightlifting, sports, or adventure eating, and I’ll try just about anything. We make steak tartare at home, I adore bone marrow, and when our farmer friend gives us brown paper sacks of mysterious parts (lamb balls, anyone?) we tackle them as a project.

Photo by Van Cong Tu

So when Tu, our street food guide in Hanoi, stopped by the lady squatting on the side of the street over a box of worms and a frying pan, and asked if I wanted to try them, I didn’t want to say no. The worm cakes were a delicacy, he assured me, and he wasn’t just egging me on. Tu was a fantastic guide, educating us on the ways of Vietnamese food culture, and everything we’d eaten so far had been exceedingly delicious. Mixed with onions, dill, eggs and mandarin peel, the cakes were fried until they looked a little like potato cakes – a dish I love.

I was in – they didn’t look so bad. And then the worm-cook picked up an already fried cake and dropped it into the oil. Gross. It could have been sitting there in a pool of grease for a minute or a day. But I was already committed. She (re)fried the cake, removed it, gave it a cursory blot on newspaper, and wrapped it in a piece of was paper for us.  Flaccid and oily, it could not have looked less appealing. It was piping hot though, I’ll give it that.

GoPro and Tu’s camera trained on me, there was simply no backing down. I took a tentative nibble. It was as revolting as I anticipated. But at least I was done. I’d tried it. “Wait!” Tu said, “I need to get another picture.” Taking a bite when you don’t know what it will taste like is one thing. Going back for another taste of limp, double fried, revolting worm cake is another matter entirely. But what the hell? I took another bite and pawned it off on Brian (who gamely ate more than I did).

Chowing down on some worms. Photo by Van Cong Tu

Like many unpleasant things, once it was over, it passed into the realm of excellent stories. I found a way to work it into conversations for the rest of the trip. “It wouldn’t have been so bad, maybe,” I’d say, “except that she REfried it,” as I dramatically described the scene for fellow travelers. I didn’t mention the nightmares that plagued me all night, as I tossed and turned, feverishly regretting the worms. In the worst timing ever, and unrelated, as I’d started feeling badly much earlier in the day, I succumbed to some terrible stomach bug overnight. Tiny bites of rice and toast were my only food for three days after. So even if the worms had been a good experience, they’re now inextricably intertwined with getting sick.

I still thought it was pretty badass of me to eat worms. Then I happened to interview the Bizarre Foods guy Andrew Zimmern for a story this week. Near the end of our conversation, in asking him how he addresses food safety, and whether he worries about getting sick, I had to try to give myself some cred, and mentioned my worm tasting. I expected nonchalance or perhaps a spark of surprise, a sense that he was impressed this random writer in Louisville had dared to eat worms in Vietnam. Instead, “why did you eat worms?!” he demanded.

Well how the hell do you tell the Bizarre Foods guy why you ate worms?

“Because they were there, and I could,” I feebly replied.

The guy who will eat anything reprimanded me. “I am extremely, extremely vigilant about what I eat,” he said. “I would never eat worms from someone on the side of the street unless there was a long line of locals.” Better still, he prefers to forage for them himself and eat them raw. Raw! He’s a braver soul than I. Now that I know how to eat fried worms, I think I’ll call it a day.

From Vietnam, with love? It’s complicated

Tags

saigon, travel, vietnam

HaLong Bay

It’s easy to see now how naive I was. I pictured Vietnam as the wide smiles of Thailand, but with pho and banh mi instead of Pad Thai. Friends’ tales painted a picture of a wondrous place, a rainbow happy land I’d fall in love with. Maybe it’s a place we’d even want to retire to. Exotic and lemongrass-scented, a tumultous but fascinating history, Vietnam beckoned, already poised to become my Favorite Place Ever.

Then we landed in hot and crazy Hanoi. The visa agent scammed us on our payment. Withing five minutes of leaving the airport we saw  bus hit a motorbike, and send the guy crashing to the ground — and keep going. A scooter buzzed by bearing a rack of roasted dog carcasses. This was not the Vietnam I imagined. Hot, dirty air swirled about and into the car as a maelstrom of traffic immediately showed us anything goes. Brian and I looked at each other, fairly speechless. We got to our hotel room, and after moving from a sunny room with a view that reeked of cigarette smoke to a mildewy interior room with no window for the same price, I barely wanted to step out into the chaos. This wasn’t Thailand. This was crazytown. We’d stayed at The Peninsula in Bangkok, my surprise treat to Brian for his 40th birthday. Cocooned in luxury and bliss high above the metropolis, we weren’t prepared for this yet.

But I didn’t come this far to be a chicken, so we set out, learned to cross the street, and explored Hanoi, then Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Island, and on to Saigon. With each day I grew more conflicted about Vietnam. I wanted to love it, and wanted to be the kind of intrepid traveler who could embrace the chaos, the filth, the challenge of people constantly ripping us off and my inability to communicate. The disappointment to find that maybe I’m not so adventurous after all stung me. And at the same time I realized what a pathetic first world problem this was, amidst millions of people who live on a fraction of what I’m privileged to earn, to want so earnestly to like these people, to be more to them than a cash dispenser.

Saigon traffic

I wanted smiles and caramelized fish in a clay pot. I got ‘no’ everywhere I turned, and food poisoning. I wanted exotic. I got squat toilets, trough style with a stench that gagged me. I wanted adventure. I got confusion and bewilderment, people  ceaselessly trying to sell me things I didn’t want and “tourist” prices on par with western Europe. Frustration and disappointment warred with guilt over having any kind of negative thoughts about people who’ve been through the atrocities they’ve suffered at my country’s hands. When the cyclo driver doubled our agreed-upon price I was just sad, sad that we were no more to him than a few bucks. But I can’t even imagine his life, so who am I to begrudge him those few dollars? At home I live in a house of about 900 square feet that my mom calls tiny. Our motorbike tour guide, a local man 50 years old, took us into his home — a dark, cramped shack of corrugated metal perched on stilts above a reeking river where he’s lived his entire life. My home is a grotesque excess of space and things compared to his. My complaints about the water pressure and wifi in my $37 a night hotel were quickly made shameful and embarrassing.

At home, as long as I choose not to watch reality television, I don’t have to see pain in other people’s lives. Life in Vietnam is lived outside, turned inside out onto teeming streets and crowded alleys. Men with stumps for limbs, or sightless eyes, thanks to the American War, peddle lottery tickets, waving them in your face – and no wonder! As a form of welfare, people with no way to really work can purchase the tickets in the morning and sell them all day. If they don’t sell them all, well, then they just lose out. It’s a business. A harsh one, like so much else about life in this country. This is no Paris of the East. This is no delightful vacation of frolicking and tropical drinks. This is a place that forces a traveler to confront ways of life and realities about the world and themselves they’d maybe rather not.

My future being read

But amidst the searing heat and frenzy and disappointment in myself were glimmers of joy, little pieces of Vietnam I could grab hold of to love. An inky black iced coffee poured over creamy sweetened condensed milk. A little boy running out as we zipped by his Cat Ba home on scooters, to give Brian a high five. The giggles of women who wanted to ask questions about my hair, so unlike theirs, and who said it was “pretty, very handsome,” and compliment from one who liked my sharp French nose in contrast to her own flat one. The gnarled old lady who didn’t have the exact right change for the cutting boards I bought who just gave me chopsticks instead. The cold bliss of fresh coconut juice. The perfection of a banh mi from the guy on the corner. The surreal moment when the monk in a temple at the end of a dirt road, on the banks of the Saigon River, read my future and told me to be calm, just calm down. The serene beauty of a lotus pond on the Mekong. The haunting echoes of a death prayer and joy of a wedding chant. The discovery that I love the custardy rich goodness of durian.

And best of all, the pure, beautiful smile of a woman we made a small gift to. Outside our hotel in Saigon, in the alley, like in a million alleys around the country, a family opens their home to sell food to travelers and locals alike. The nearest one to our hotel did a booming business with locals, so we knew it was good, and spent a lot of time perched on plastic stools watching life go by, wondering at the seemingly endless array of things people can carry on one of the nearly six million scooters in the city, waving away the also endless vendors who approached us with sunglasses, fans and tourist knick knacks for sale.

One afternoon, when I was nearly reeling from exhaustion – I don’t sleep when I travel and it had caught up with me —  a young man appeared with a massive smiling Buddha for sale. It was so unexpected and absurd I just dissolved into laughter. And couldn’t stop laughing. Tears streamed down my face and I feared I’d wet my pants I laughed so hard, as he continued to punch numbers into his calculator, lowering the price. Evidently a hysterical Western woman with wild blonde hair laughing like a lunatic is the key to bargaining. Without ever saying a word, he got down to 250,000 dong – about $12. Feeing guilty for laughing, fearing he’d think we were laughing at him, or disrespecting the Buddha, I gasped to Brian that we had to buy it.

One of the ladies of the house, who’d shared the smiles I so coveted with me earlier in the day, showed a keen interest in our purchase. With a couple of her handful of English words, she asked how much. We told her what we’d paid, and jokingly, Brian asked if she wanted to buy it. We certainly couldn’t take the thing home in our backpacks. She got a pen and newspaper, and on a corner wrote 300,000. She wanted the Buddha! “You can have it,” I said. “It’s a gift.” She didn’t understand, nor did my sign language explain. A somewhat cranky-looking woman who spoke English appeared to buy something. She asked what was going on and I explained that we wanted to give the Buddha as a gift. “She doesn’t want it,” she said. Dismayed, we left, carrying the heavy Buddha.

All day the next day I thought about it. I knew she wanted it. We decided if nothing else we would just leave it on their doorstep and go. The following morning, our last day there, we went down with the Buddha in a large grocery bag and took our stools. Windy, the woman’s soft-spoken niece, who liked asking me questions about our life in America,  welcomed us. “Iced coffee with milk?” she asked. I liked that she knew our order. We placed the bag on the table and Windy’s aunt came over and saw what was in the bag. Her face lit up. “For you!” I said, pointing from myself to the Buddha, to her. This time she understood. And the smile that bloomed on her face made the dreadful flight around the globe worth it. For that moment I could forget the challenges, the frustrations of Vietnam, as my Grinchy traveler’s heart melted under the glow of her smile. Everyone who stopped by for their breakfast was treated to the same smile as she showed off her Buddha and excitedly told them that we gave it to her. She took the Buddha and put it in a place of honor in her house, which we could see of course, as we were sitting in the alley outside her living room. Windy refused to let us pay for our coffee or my banh mi. “You are nice people,” she said. “Good luck to you.”

Buddha finds a home

I’m still sort of trying to wrap my mind around our experience in Vietnam, but I’m grateful that it ended as it did. I’ve never given a gift to anyone in my life at home who showed such pure joy and appreciation at receiving it. What’s funny is I’m sure she doesn’t realize the gift was really to me.

I went to Paris and all I got was a macaron (tattoo)

Except for the pain (right, I’d managed to forget the mad pain that comes with a tattoo) my macaron tattoo was a perfect Paris experience.

I only wanted to get the tattoo, on this, my 10th trip to Paris, if the artist Sailor Roman, who describes himself this way:

My project is to devellope a modern/traditionnal european sailors tattoo spirit based on my childhood taste for adventures stories. My tattoos are made for travelers, Sailors, wanderlust seekers, adventure junkies and hedonistics dudes.

could see me. And though it’s usually quite a wait to get in to see him in his apartment, in the magical way that trips to Paris have, he could see me the following week, when I’d be in town.

My friends and I lunched for hours beforehand where I fortified myself with a little champagne, a little white wine, a little red wine, and lots of bread. I was stone cold sober at my first tattoo, and I wasn’t going to repeat that.

Running late we had to pedal our bikes furiously up Blvd. Voltaire to get to the apartment. Fittingly, Romain (his real name, not his tattoo name) was on the top floor, where his windows overlooked heartbreaking views of Paris rooftops.

With early Serge Gainsbourg playing, a cold glass of Orangina at my side in case I got woozy, and my good friend Tracy letting me hold (read: crush) her hand while Julie kept me distracted with running commentary and questions, Romain worked with a sure hand and light touch. At various times I counted in French, insisted he tell me jokes, took breaks to sip my drink, and bit my other hand to keep from letting the threatening tears slip.

At last it was over and all was well. My forever reminder of Paris had me beaming even before Romain, who told us he comes from a pirate family, poured me a celebratory shot of spiced rum.

I found a macaron shop just a couple doors down from his building. I was just out of cash. This is what friends do: Julie unstrapped her purse from her bike after she’d spent several minutes securing it for the ride, so she could give me some euros for a box of macarons. I stood on the street, fresh macaron on my tummy, and macarons all around to share.

In all the excitement I forgot to check to see if the macaron is life-sized. Luckily I picked up some Laduree macarons at the airport, so I had a way to measure. And of course it is perfect.

P.S. Here’s the story behind the beginning of my macaron obsession (excerpted from my column in Food & Dining magazine from my days there as editor).

It was a travesty that I’d never tasted a French macaron, despite my yearly trips to France. In my defense, I’ve never considered myself a dessert person. I’d take cheese after a meal over a cloyingly sweet confection any day. And the colorful array of pastries in Parisian windows were candy to my camera, not to my tastebuds – or so I thought. I loved taking pictures of the little jewels, but thought they were a frivolous nibble for the Marie-Antoinettes of the world, nothing for a foodie to take seriously.

But as a winter twilight fell on Paris one February day last winter, I made a pilgrimage to one of the foodie nirvana places I keep on a mental list – Pierre Hermé. France’s youngest Pastry Chef of the Year, Hermé is celebrated for his magnificent confections. I strolled from my hotel near the Eiffel Tower to Saint Germain des Prés, chilled through by the time I arrived an hour later at the small, glowing shop more reminiscent of a jewelry store than a pastry shop. Inside the bright, warm store people queued up to select their precious treats. Precious indeed – I chose the macarons because they were the only thing in the shop that wouldn’t cost more than I’d budgeted for dinner.

The clerk waited patiently for me as I carefully considered my options, pointing “la, et la, et la … et la,” selecting rose, wasabi, salted caramel, and balsamic vinegar flavors. He carefully wrapped my treasures and took my euros – the four small macarons cost about €7 – more than $10. I left the store and perched on a nearby bench by the cathedral St. Sulpice and bit into my first macaron.

I exclaimed out loud. How could something this amazing be of this planet? As I bit down the thin shell shattered into a cloud of intense flavor that melted, cloaking my taste-buds in sheer joy. I was in love. It took three bites to reach heaven. I meant to only eat one so as not to ruin my appetite for dinner but I couldn’t help it. I reached in the bag and plucked one more – this time I knew what to expect and closed my eyes the better to savor the rapture. I saved the other two for dessert which I partook of like a religious ceremony back in my room that night, each one three bites of bliss.

I obsessed over macarons the rest of my time in Paris. I had to bring some home to my husband – how could I know that joy like this existed and not share it? The epicerie inside Publicis drugstore on the Champs-Elysées boasted a Pierre Hermé counter. On my last afternoon in Paris I chose a box of seven to take home. After the clerk packaged them up and rang me up my resolve failed. “Et une autre, pour moi. Un petit cadeau” (And another for me. A small gift) I said, smiling already with anticipation. And in this chic shop on one of the grandest avenues of Paris, the young man grinned and handed it to me. No charge. Paris, je t’aime!

I didn’t even have the decency to make it back to my hotel room. I stood outside the store in the late afternoon sun and slowly savored my last three bites of heaven in Paris.

The macarons I hand-carried home didn’t even last 24 hours. Bereft in a gray, macaron-less world since, I’ve dreamed of those bites, only very occasionally able to find macarons in Louisville.

The secrety society of meat sweats (aka a day in the life of a food writer)

I’m so thrilled my first post for the wickedly funny xojane.com went up today. It was a fun chance to make a little fun of the travails, such as they are, of food writing. Check it out!

If I told you I had to eat at 10 restaurants in 24 hours once researching a guidebook, or that I had to judge a dessert contest and partake in 40 varieties of sweets, you’d play your tiny violin, wouldn’t you?

Let me eat cake!

Tags

Alain Ducasse, paris, Plaza Athénée, Sahara

I live in the regular world, full of regular things, but I know that there is magic to be found. And of everywhere in the world I’ve been, I know Paris to be where  the most magic is found. The simplest thing can make me nearly tear up with joy, or at the least smile till I think my face will split; an entire shop dedicated just to pistachios, a crunchy baguette stuffed with oozing camembert and slathered with salted butter, a caramel ice cream cone from Berthillon, savored in a bit of pale winter sunshine on the Ile St. Louis. These are small pleasures, but memorable ones, and everyone can enjoy them.

But there is another world, one where the magic whisks you away to a place of opulence and blissful luxury, where every care is tended to, every need foreseen. I’ve said before I like nice hotels when I travel, but there is one that is perhaps the grand dame of all luxury hotels in Paris, perhaps the world. I’d never even so much strolled past the Hôtel Plaza Athénée but of course knew about it. I knew it as place a world away from the simple and charming places within my budget where I like to stay. So when I was invited to stay at their treat, as media, I flew directly to cloud nine.

We were scheduled to stay there on our last night of a 16-day trip,a trip that included an overnight trip by camel in the Sahara desert with no facilities – a euphemism by the agency that helped book the expedition for no toilet, no water, no electric, no heat. Our bed was a mattress in a pigeon feather-filled tent. Not to say I didn’t love it! The endless stars in the blackest of skies was possibly the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen. But roughing it is decidedly not my style, and the thought that kept me smiling through some travel “discomforts” was that of the Plaza, awaiting me in Paris like a beacon of luxury.

All the daydreaming, and speaking of the hotel in verbal italics – “we’re staying at the Plaza,” we’d say – still couldn’t prepare me for sweeping into into the lobby – literally, it was wildly windy – just after sunset on a December night. Leaving the taxi, rumpled and disheveled from a day of travel from Morocco, we were folded into the fantasy of the Plaza, ushered by a dapper doorman to the reception desk in the intimate but grand lobby, where we needn’t trouble ourselves with giving our names to the desk – he handled that bothersome detail. The clerk presented our door keys in an elegant red folder and Aude, the press contact, directed us to our room through amber-perfumed hallways. The first sign that it would be even more special than I had dreamed was the door number: it had two. Aude opened the door and we stepped in. The room – the suite – lay before us. No power on earth could have prevented my mouth from dropping open at the sight. All crystal, plush seating, mirrors, gilt, heavy silk draperies and flowers, and yes, that was a bottle of champagne chilling alongside a platter of chocolate cake. I had walked out of Arabian Nights flying in from Fes that morning, and into a Marie Antoinette dream.

I couldn’t decide where to look first, eyes darting to take it all in as I tried to not sound too much like a girl from Kentucky presented with the most extravagantly luxurious living quarters I’d ever seen. A desk and library, a fireplace with ceiling-high mirror – with flat screen tv built in – two couches and two chairs, and we were still just in the living room. Aude showed us to the bedroom, past an open bathroom door, and the crystal chandelier elegance continued in there. She welcomed us and left us to our joy in the Prestige Suite.

I skipped around the room like a child on the most splendid of all Christmas mornings, taking in the chocolate cake on the table, the Alain Ducasse champagne, and then I lost Brian. “Do we have this wing, too?” he called from down a hall where he’d found a dressing room and another bathroom, all marble and mirror with Dior – DIOR – toiletries arrayed on the counter. The bellman presently arrived with our bags. “Shall I have housekeeping come unpack for you?” he asked. It was all I could do to not giggle – our bags contained nothing but dirty laundry and souvenirs at this point. “No, we can take care of it,” I replied.

Left to our own devices we spent a few wild moments running around looking at everything, marveling at the delicious decadence. “Should stay in the room?” we wondered aloud – we’d planned to go to dinner for a final celebration of the trip. If the concierge could get us into l’Atelier Joël Robuchon we would go out, we decided. If not, we would stay in. Meanwhile Brian popped the champagne and filled our glasses. We were almost too dazed to toast. While the concierge worked his magic calling the restaurant I ran around the suite – the size of our entire home – giggling madly, and jumped on the bed for good measure before drawing a white-tea scented foamy bath in the deep tub. I emerged after a good soak, and ensconced in my heavy Plaza robe, feet tucked into cushy Plaza slippers, tried out the Dior skin crème supplied with the toiletries, although surely I needed nothing else to make me glow at this point.

We reluctantly left the room to stroll to our dinner, and though the tasting menu was one of the most amazing meals of our life, we couldn’t wait to leave to return to our own little Versailles. The room had been cleaned and bed turned down while we were out, soft lights welcoming us back. I perused the pillow menu, thought about ordering a beauty pillow, but the lure of the soft bed was too great and dove promptly in.

I awoke early, sad that it was the last day of our trip, but excited to check out the bicycles the hotel offered guests. A luxuriously long shower under the rainfall showerhead, a brief time lounging in the robe while Brian got ready, and we left our private palace for the lobby where the concierges were only too happy to arrange the bicycle loans for us. Les velos were ready promptly outside, darling red bicycles with tiny headlights and bells, and we hopped straight on to head out for Angelina’s for breakfast. We rode down the Champs Elysees, made our way through the Place de la Concorde and down Rue de Rivoli, where we left our bikes with the Plaza’s sister hotel, Le Meurice, next door to Angelina’s. After our wickedly decadent hot chocolate and breakfast, we pedaled over to the Eiffel Tower to say goodbye to Paris for this time. The only thing that could have drawn me away was our suite and the waning time left before our 12:30 checkout for our flight home.

We sadly finished our packing – I suppose we could have called for help – and rang downstairs for the bellman. One last look around our all-too-brief home, and we left the Plaza, and Paris. Tears welled up in my eyes as the taxi pulled away. “The next time we come back,” Brian said, trying to cheer me up, “we’ll be looking for an apartment.” If only it could be in the Plaza!

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Motherload

Look what I found!

When I was a kid I found a lot of four-leaf clovers. My mom thought that made me lucky. I hoped that luck would carry over into my first morel-hunting expedition Saturday when my mom took Brian and me out into the woods behind ——— —- —— (you know I can’t tell you where).  She had seen one earlier in the week and left it, hoping to return to find more. That was the trial run, spotting one where I knew one existed. I was still a bit giddy when it appeared, magically popping out of the sodden leaves and greenery.

My eyes swept the ground, hoping another morel would materialize. I covered a lot of ground before the first one showed itself to me. That’s morel hunting — long stretches of frustration, then sheer jubilation. An hour or so of traipsing yielded a handful of the mushrooms, just enough to sautee and top an egg with.

After a good downpour, we went back out Sunday, starting in the part of the woods where we’d found the few the day before. Brian and my mom each found one on the trail right away so I had high hopes.

A good while later I was pretty dejected. Brian, with his eagle eyes, had found several. I’d bagged one — one I think he had stepped on; they’re that invisible. Following all the lore around the mushrooms, I’d peered along fallen logs, under May Apples, and had scoured a ridge. Then, as is my fashion, I’d been distracted. I heard a cat meow. What was a cat doing back in these woods? I’d wandered toward the sound until I saw the cat, who promptly disappeared. I’d lost my fellow hunters, and pushed my way through a briar patch to work my way back to where they continued their search under the dripping green canopy.

Wow!

Then. I swear, it was like a scene where the heavens part and the angels sing and the sun beams down. A single morel the size of my hand glowed 10 feet away. “WHOAH!” I bellowed. My mom heard me and started making her way to me. And then. Then, in the blink of an eye, the waiting treasure revealed itself to me. I was standing in the midst of the motherload. They were everywhere, the illuminated mushrooms so big some of them had fallen under their own weight. I fell into a sort of raptured fit, squealing, clapping, laughing, jumping, tears streaming down my face until I sunk down, fearing I’d literally wet my pants with glee. “LOOOOOOOK,” I shrieked, “there are so many!!!! They’re so big!” I was mad with my discovery, unable and uninterested in containing my delight. I couldn’t believe my eyes — it had to be a morel mirage.

Brian and my mom had arrived by now and we joined in a primitive jubilant rejoicing. “Don’t move!” we cautioned one another, “you’ll step on one!”

We gathered up the bounty, nearly hysterical with laughter and excitement. My hands quivered as I broke morel after morel off at the stem. How much of this adrenaline is evolutionary from finding an abundance of food, and how much is the thrill of the hunt? I don’t know, but if I could bottle and sell the euphoria that bubbled up when that motherload appeared, I’d make a bloody fortune. There were so many we even grew picky, leaving behind those that seemed past their prime, or were smashed. On and on the bounty went, along with our calls of  “bring the bag, here are two more,” “here’s another one!”

The loot!

We took careful mental note of where the magical mystery spot was, counting off paces from landmarks (it’s 20 paces from —– and another 30 from ——, then look for the split tree with all the dead bark at the bottom, next to the rivulet). Then with our mesh bag full to bursting (mesh so that you disperse the spores) we triumphantly emerged from our spot, bound for home and a kitchen.

Victory!

The loot weighed in at 2.3 pounds, almost unimaginable the previous day when we’d gleaned so few. The glee lasted throughout the day, sending little shivers of excitement every time I recalled the moment I entered that vision. After divvying up our shares, Brian and I headed for home, enjoying a most pleasurable discussion along the way about how to prepare them. We fell upon the idea of crepes with asparagus, gruyere, caramelized red onions and the morels.  I’ve had the good fortune (maybe all those four-leaf clovers) to have some staggeringly good meals in my life, but let me tell you. That dish, heaped as it was with the morels that I’d found ,was one of the most amazing things I’ve ever eaten.

Can’t wait for morel season next year!

Asapragus, gruyere and morel crepe

Get off the bus

For three years we’ve lived an experiment — being a one-car family in America. I’d like to say I did it to be green, but really I just didn’t want to spend the money on a car. When Brian lost the privilege of a company car, we did the math on buying a new car, balanced that against being able to take our amazing trips, and travel won. I bought a bus pass and spent the last three years taking the #2 bus. Sometimes it was ok, sometimes it was not.

I expected to continue on indefinitely. Not that I especially enjoy waiting at the bus stop when it’s zero or 100 or raining, or prevailing on friends for a lift to the doctor, or paying 20 bucks for a taxi when I absolutely had to get across town (TARC is fine for getting downtown. not so much across the city). But it worked most of the time.

Then an exciting development. I took on another freelance job — editing Food & Dining magazine. Suddenly my time would be a lot scarcer.  There’s no magical way to put more hours in the day (and I love sleep too much to give that up) but there was one big time-suck besides Facebook. And that’s the bus. 45 minutes from my office door to my front door. Or 15 minutes by car. I made the decision in about a minute.

So I picked out a 10=year-old Volvo wagon (a car with 210,000 miles can fit in a traveller’s budget!) and I’ll take what’s likely my last bus ride home tomorrow. So long, TARC.