Entrez — French — 'come in'; what you say through a door
France —— butter, blue doors, and no reason to hurry
VISITED
A door I have walked through.
ItalyCities
- Paris Haussmann boulevards, deep-blue doors, and a museum on every third corner.
- Lyon The one the cooks send you to; bouchons, two rivers, quiet confidence.
- Nice The Côte d'Azur pace — sea in the morning, nothing urgent after.
- Annecy Alpine lake town, canals and mountains, almost unfairly pretty.
The table
- A croissant, still warm The whole argument for getting up early in France.
- Steak-frites Ordered at a zinc bar, no notes, no substitutions.
- A cheese board Chosen by the waiter, who is right and knows it.
- Un café at the counter Standing up, quick, watching the street do its thing.
Saved pins
- Musée d'Orsay ↗ A railway station full of light and Impressionists; better than the Louvre for an afternoon.
- Shakespeare and Company ↗ The English bookshop by the Seine you can lose an hour in.
- A Left-Bank bistro, no reservation The plat du jour on a chalkboard, a carafe, the rest of the evening.
From the register
France is the easy door — a train under the Channel and I am somewhere that has decided, collectively and centuries ago, that lunch is not to be rushed. I came back from the first trip a little annoyed at how good the ordinary things are: the bread, the coffee, the light coming down a boulevard of doors all painted the same confident blue.
The door here is a tall Haussmann double, wrought-iron grilles over the glass, a little balcony above — the Paris the whole city agrees to look like. The chime is a musette: two reeds beating slightly out of tune with each other, the sound of an accordion three tables over that you didn’t ask for and wouldn’t now give back. Brush past it and it wheezes happily along with you.