VIVA LA MACAROON!
14March, 2012
We left Paris yesterday and took the high-speed train to Avignon and, from there, drove to Bonnieux, and really, all I want to write about right now is the surprising experience of being back in Provence. However, Paris must be given its due, particularly the experience of living with our French friends, A and D, whom I have known for 21 years and whom Joel has known for perhaps 10 years longer.
On Monday evening, our last evening in Paris, we sat outdoors at a restaurant around the corner from their home. A rich experience partly because it was March and yet warm enough to dine outside; partly because the atmosphere reminded me of Italy, and partly because the food was divine…but then, that’s Paris.
Toward the end of the meal we talked of the joy of having spent these days living together, finding a rhythm that allowed for silence, and the profound value of such friendships as we age. Then D asked us if we could remember all that we had done during these days and it took all 4 of us to compile the list of events:
THURSDAY afternoon, after unpacking we all strolled through the Luxembourg Gardens before taking tea and Scones at Bread & Roses, a café the likes of which we often long for in NY where our neighborhood has no such thing or anything remotely like it. I believe, at D’s insistence, that more than scones appeared at table, scones whose airiness thankfully made way for what was to come: a quiche and a lemon tart and some macaroons, all making their way down our gullets; this tea-time sojourn marking the beginning of our lives as force-fed geese.
Another walk alleviated the calories, somewhat, making room for A’s exquisite slow-cooked salmon for dinner, followed by apple pie and caramel ice-cream and an early night – sleeping next to a generous bowl of chocolate.
FRIDAY morning the army, called to duty, embarked on a table of pastries and croissants, cheeses, fish paste, butter and jams. Thus fortified Joel went off to the printing lab (in preparation for his May exhibition in Toulon) while A and I went for a long walk which brought us to lunch in one of those elegant Parisienne parlors of delicate china and bouffant coiffeurs, the air redolent with butter, eggs and sugar and, voila, Another plate of macaroons.
Joel, meanwhile, was in a taxi returning from the lab when he received a phone call from England informing him that The Royal Photographic Society would like to give him its Lifetime Achievement Award this September. We celebrated with a pot of tea, chocolate truffles and another round of macaroons, followed by a walk during which we pretended to work up an appetite for dinner.
Dinner took place in a famous restaurant celebrated for its meat. We set the pace with escargots, one of which escaped its shell and shot up the wall, before slowly descending leaving a trail of green garlic butter. Not to be intimidated A and D ate half a cow each, Joel downed a side of veal, while I did my best with the better part of a lamb. Oh, right. There were also rather a lot of French French fries. Plus I did the decent thing and ordered a plate of spinach. Our stomachs now heroically expanded, we made our way through tarts, cakes and ice-cream.
SATURDAY morning Joel and I took for our selves, stopping at a tiny shop that sold tiles made from Tuscan marble polished by artisans to reveal natural seascapes and rustic scenes. We bought three, each unique: a start to a collection, which we will affix to the wall behind our stove in NY.
And we were happy: happy to be lovers in springtime Paris; happy to window gaze, to remark on French children, French style and French architecture. The day was warm, the trees beginning to push forth their buds, the Seine as mythic as ever.
Then we rendezvouzed with our friends and drove to the Marais, where D drove in circles looking for parking. We espied a young man packing something into the back of his car and asked if we was leaving. “No,” he said, “It will be 15 minutes before I finish loading the car.” A, who is one of the most beautiful and refined women I’ve ever met, also has a pure streak of the peasant in her, which allowed her to hop out of the car and suggest we help him. So, while D sat double-parked, Joel, A and I made perhaps 20 trips back and forth between the young man’s hatch-back and a showroom in an inner courtyard where he had just had a show of his self-designed clothes. And so it was that for 15 minutes we 3 old farts schlepped boxes, props, 2 racks of clothes and a sewing machine.
How it all fitted in to that car I do not know, nor can I imagine what the punk young designer with his shaved head and piercings thought of us. When we had squeezed the last item in I asked him if perhaps he had an elephant, too. No, he said, just that, pointing back to the courtyard where a branch of blossoms the size of small tree lay on its side gasping for air. Pas problem, said A, picked it up and rammed it into the back of our car. And so it was that with a handshake and a ‘merci’ the young designer left and we slid into the last remaining parking spot in the Marais.
Maggie Photo
But, of course, now it was time to eat! So off to the Marche des Enfants Rouge, a trendy outdoor market that also housed cafes. Once again we parked, this time at what I’m sure was the only remaining table in the whole place…it was teeming with gorgeous young Parisienes.
The area is also known for its galleries and so once the last morsel was cleaned from our plates we went of in search of art; a disappointing venture redeemed only by the beauty of some of the spaces in which the so-called art was housed.
We returned home in time for the arrival of one A and D’s 2 beautiful sons, a young man full of vigor and achievement and fun who holds a special place in our hearts.
And, with the aid of some green tea, we all stuffed in some more macaroons before Joel made salmon cakes for dinner accompanied by a huge salad courtesy of A.
SUNDAY morning we took to ourselves to catch up on work and in the afternoon we all went to see “The Iron Lady” which, in spite of lukewarm reviews, we found to be interesting and well-made. And of course, Meryl Streep’s performance was magnificent. Her ability to find the humanity in Thatcher’s character had us all sobbing toward the end, the 4 of us reaching for each other’s hands in the dark: for the moment that had us sobbing was the long moment that awaits those of us nearing the end zone; the moment when one of us will inevitably leave the other behind.
But let’s not get morose, let’s go home and have a dinner of fois gras washed down with non-alcoholic champagne and
- I kid you not – fois gras macaroons!
