There is a time for building, and a time for living and for generation-T.S. Eliot

I was sitting on my couch yesterday talking with a good friend who was visiting Paris from California. She asked me if it was smarter to rent something here or to buy. I said that it depends. Why was she asking? She said that the general atmosphere in the US has become unbearable for her and her husband because of politics. She had visited with another group of friends two days ago and that had been the focus of their conversation. Selling and moving to Paris (These were all people who love Paris). I was a bit stunned. She lives in California and I saw California as a refuge from all the insanity. I guess not. You can’t not know what’s going on all over the country if you own a computer or a TV or both. Maybe with the mid-terms coming up, the volume has risen so high that the desire to run away from it all must seem so attractive.

I left in 2013. Before there was Trump (although we were going through the Tea Party mess). I wasn’t making myself crazy by trying to decide to leave my country because of principles. I left because I could. I had retired. I wanted to experience another culture, really experience it, and came to Paris for a year. That was one month short of nine years ago. I haven’t gone back. To be considering a permanent move without knowing anything about what the future holds seems very brave to me.

That was the other thing we talked about. The future. We are both at the age where one has to be thinking “where do I want to get old?” “Where do I want to be old?” The US has wonderful Continuing Care Retirement Communities. France does not. France has a wonderful medical system. The US does not. If I can no longer live independently, if I have to depend on someone or someones, what country do I want to be in?

These are huge questions. Honestly, I try not to think about them very often though I should. Yet, it was a pleasure discussing it all with my friend yesterday. A pleasure because we are like-minded and putting it all out on the table. I recently put an offer on a house in Normandy. I had an inspection done by a wonderful Scotsman and I told him my age and asked if he could look at the house with that in mind. He was happy to. He told me the house wasn’t suitable for someone my age, meaning if I had to redo a room or a bathroom to make it more handicap accessible, it wasn’t possible in that house. I patted myself on the back for having the foresight to even think of that question much less ask it.

To me, thinking about leaving the country feels like a little death also. It’s great to move if you are going towards something, have excitement about new things, having a chance to start over again somewhere else. But that isn’t what people are saying when they are talking about leaving. They say it with sadness, that it is so scary to live in the US right now. I don’t envy them.

Meanwhile here in Paris….. I was down near Notre Dame last week. Before the fire in March of 2019, my favorite view of Notre Dame was looking at it from behind; the roof held up by flying buttresses. I’d stand about half a kilometer east on the left bank and take deep breaths looking at the extraordinary beauty of that cathedral against a blue sky. Now all you can see is scaffolding. And cranes. And more scaffolding.

Two years ago, there was talk that Macron wanted the rebuilding finished by the 2024 Summer Olympics which are being held in Paris. No one believes that can happen. According to the Smithsonian website, the clean up was finished this past August and the rebuilding started in September. The government is still hoping to finish it in 2024 and has actually announced that it will be open to the public in the Spring of 2024.

There was a contest, at one point, to design a new roof for the cathedral. There was even one with a swimming pool, I’m told. Now the new Notre Dame will look exactly like the old Notre Dame. Which makes me glad. “The French Senate rejected calls to replace the spire with a modern design, ultimately voting to restore it to its “last known visual state.” But France’s National Heritage and Architecture Commission did approve proposals to modernize Notre-Dame’s interior with new additions like contemporary artworks—a plan that some critics described as a “woke Disney revamp.” “A parallel initiative to invigorate Notre-Dame’s surroundings is also underway. Funded by Paris City Hall, the redesign includes planting more vegetation in the area and installing a cooling system, the New York Times’ Aurelien Breeden reported in June. Per the Times, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said that Notre-Dame “had to be left in its beauty and have everything around it be a showcase for that beauty.”—smithsonianmag.com

This is what Notre Dame will look when finished.

And finally, I’ll end with a word about the peacocks in Parc de Bagatelle. I took my Sunday walk to the park four days ago. The first thing I do when I arrive is check up on the cats. If there is a volunteer there feeding them, I have a chat. That’s how I learn the stories about them. And now that I know that peacock tail feathers have a life cycle, I’m watching the male peacock carefully. I saw a peacock before a cat. He was looking in the opposite direction. It looked as if some pine needles had gotten caught under his back feathers. As I got closer, I realized what I thought were pine needles was the very beginnings of the new feathers.

Scattered on his back are what look like tufts of cotton. When the tail is completely grown out and he makes a fan to attract a female, it’s possible to see all the white fluff. This seemed unusual to me - to be able to see so much fluff even when both back wings were flat on his back. But I’m just learning and watching. I have no idea what the norm is.

It seems that today has been about cycles. The life cycle of the peacock tail of feathers, the cycle of a beautiful cathedral that has had parts destroyed by fires in the past, and the lifecycle of a political movement. With nature, it is truly a cycle. I lost my home in California to fire and built a lovely home from the ashes. With what’s happening in the US, one can only pray it cycles out and get into action to give it a big shove. That means Go Vote!

A bientôt,

Sara