20 days of my 30s...

Just to right-size expectations at the outset: I can't be a good writer every day. To paraphrase Anne Lamott...it matters more to sit down and do the writing.

Today's poem is one that has resonated for a lot of women over the years -- after so long being told no, the idea that maybe God has a broader vision for us than the circumscribed life offered to us just feels...right. 

God Says Yes To Me

Kaylin Haught

I asked God if it was okay to be melodramatic

and she said yes

I asked her if it was okay to be short

and she said it sure is

I asked her if I could wear nail polish

or not wear nail polish

and she said honey

she calls me that sometimes

she said you can do just exactly

what you want to 

Thanks God I said

And is it even okay if I don’t paragraph

my letters

Sweetcakes God said

who knows where she picked that up

what I’m telling you is

Yes Yes Yes

I have to admit that all the things mentioned in this poem are a part of my life: melodramatic? check. short? check. sometimes with nail polish and sometimes without? check. don't paragraph!??!?!? check.

But I'm also going to apply this poem to something it was never intended for. And which is, at least on the surface, far more frivolous:

I was in my 30s when I learned (from my fabulous aunt) that YOU CAN MAKE RISOTTO IN A PRESSURE COOKER. And it takes 7 minutes. Seven minutes!!!! No stirring! Just beautiful delicious creamy happiness, less than ten minutes after you put the lid on. 

And even better than that (and this is where the misapplication of the poem comes in), you can literally put anything in a risotto. Whatever is in your fridge or pantry will probably make a delicious risotto. I have made pizza risotto, enchilada risotto, last-things-in-the-fridge-before-vacation risotto... 

And sure, purists might claim it isn't really risotto. Maybe they think it's a casserole or a one pot rice dish. But you know what? I asked God if it was okay to make enchilada risotto and God said Yes Yes Yes! Why wouldn't you want something delicious like that?

Sure, the vast majority of the time I end up with mushroom, or sometimes mushroom and leek...sometimes I add greens, or broccoli. But other times I go wild with "toppings" that probably no Italian would ever stir in...and honestly, they don't know what they're missing. 

This lesson from my aunt is probably the most life changing thing, on a practical level. Because now I eat risotto every week, instead of just when I go to a restaurant. And I can turn anything in the kitchen into dinner in 10 minutes. So that's a pretty great thing to carry forward into the rest of my life!

this week I had a carrot and half a head of broccoli languishing a bit....
into the risotto they went.
I added some fresh tomatoes on top to up my 5-a-day quotient, lol.
I made and ate this, and cleaned up, and made a cup of tea to relax a bit,
in the 55 minutes I had between Zoom meetings yesterday.

24 days left in my 30's, and...

 ...I was today years old when I learned how much sugar is too much in one sitting.

I used to wonder why people described some desserts as "too rich to eat more than a few bites." Well, today, age 39, 11 months, and 6 days, I officially reached the age where I understand.

Because I have eaten so much sugar in one sitting tonight, I cannot focus on poetry. 🤣

But also because I'm sure you're wondering what on earth I can have eaten: it was a skillet butterscotch blondie. The recipe was for two (enormous) pieces.......I may have eaten more than one but less than the whole thing, and I now believe that honestly it's probably four servings, not two despite what the title of the recipe said. And for the past three hours I've been feeling alternately a little gross and super tired like a child crashing half an hour after the crazy birthday party.

So apparently my forties will be the decade in which I moderate my dessert eating to something more reasonable....or at least spread it out over more meals during the day instead of scarfing it all down at nighttime! 

I'll be back tomorrow with poetry and reasonable lessons that I really should have learned earlier in my life. LOL.

26 days of my 30s

Today my usual morning workout was disrupted because the website for the current class I'm doing was down. That meant that instead of whatever was on the calendar for today, I did a quick from-memory run through of a previous workout instead.

As I was doing it, I was thinking about how much effort I put in over the past decade to disentangle exercise from food. I definitely used to think of exercise as a way to "earn" some sort of right to eat what I wanted. And that, my friends, is not healthy. All those programmes that involve earning more calories through exercise so that you can eat more....that's a terrible mental/emotional relationship with both exercise and food.

Learning that exercise is a good and desirable thing in itself, and that how I choose to eat is separate from that (though still needs care along with enjoyment!), is, if I'm 100% honest, still a work in progress. But I have come such a long way that I have hope that maybe by the time I turn forty in 26 days, I'll have it all worked out. 😂

Today's poem has literally nothing whatsoever to do with this, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. It's about that turn of the season toward 40...and though I have no intention of dying my hair (too lazy), I do intend to live on in a blaze of glory, LOL. 

This is "Pushing Forty" by Scottish author Alison Fell...whose birthday must also be in the autumn, as she perfectly captures the way things are at this time of year and this time of life.

Just before winter

we see the trees show

their true colours:

the mad yellow of chestnuts

two maples like blood sisters

the orange beech

braver than lipstick

Pushing forty, we vow

that when the time comes

rather than wither

ladylike and white

we will henna our hair

like Colette, we too

will be gold and red

and go out

in a last wild blaze

not my dinner today, but so delicious I am happy just remembering it from a few weeks ago! I'm so happy I learned to make my own pizza.

Vegetarian haggis

In the lead up to moving, I was frequently asked about being vegetarian in Scotland.

"Won't you have to start eating fish?"

"It's such a meat-and-potatoes place, how will you be vegetarian?"

"Isn't the food there awful?"

"What about haggis?"

I often respond with the simple reality: a) though of course fish & chips and haggis are a thing, food in the UK has dramatically improved in the past 15 or so years, having moved toward a sustainable/local foodie-type culture; b) Edinburgh is one of Europe's most veggie-friendly cities. I can name about five vegetarian or vegan restaurants off the top of my head (that would be 4 more than all of McHenry County, IL), and the vast majority of restaurants in general list their vegetarian things on their own menu section, or they label everything so you can tell what's safe. And there are a lot of options, not just a side salad! Even the local chip shop has falafel! **

I went to one of these vegetarian restaurants just today, in fact.

There's a more foundational point here though, which is:
I've moved here, I'm not vacationing (though there's plenty to make it feel like holidays, including the sunny weather!)...which means that nearly all of my meals will be ones I cook myself. I live in a flat, with a kitchen. I have been stocking it with pots and pans, pantry staples (oil, legumes, rice and pasta, etc), and tons of fresh local veggies. There's a bakery just two blocks away, and a lovely little greengrocer in the high street that gets a variety of veggies and cheeses delivered each day, and a ton of supermarket options ranging from Aldi to Tesco to the (slightly strange but weirdly awesome) frozen food store.

So...yes, it'll be just as easy to be vegetarian here as it was in Crystal Lake. Perhaps easier, even, since when I *do* eat out, there are more choices.

What I have noticed in a week of grocery shopping is this: everything is clearly labeled as to where it comes from, so I also have a much easier time choosing food that doesn't have to travel thousands of miles to my plate. Which is not to say I'll never eat anything that wasn't grown on this island (because hello, avocado is delicious!) but it does make many of my everyday shopping choices more clear, and I'm all about informed decisions, especially where food is concerned!

And now it's time for some pasta with kale and marinara, some wine, and then some Belgian chocolates. Because, well...compared to going all the way to the USA, Belgium - Scotland is basically local, right? ;-)


**Full disclosure: c) there is such a thing as vegetarian haggis, and it's still not good.
And also d) potatoes are my favorite food, so no problem there. ;-)

that time cooking dinner made me cry

It's been 10 years to the day (November 26, 2005) since my first visit to the pyramids of Giza (and Sakkara, and the temple/city at Memphis...but Giza is the part most people recognize).

It's been 10 years to the Fourth Thursday Of November since I returned to Egypt after my mom died--I went "home" when she died, and after a few weeks I went "home" to Cairo, where I celebrated Thanksgiving with the other North American mission personnel from at least three denominations. I even managed a green bean casserole, which was harder than it sounds.

Tonight I was making black beans and olives--which is so delicious, even though it sounds weird, so just stick with me--which was one of what might be called my mother's signature dishes. It's the thing most people still remember, even all these years later. I both miss and try to recreate lots of things she used to make--enchiladas, homemade refried beans, bagels (ok, I haven't tried those...hers were so good I just can't bring myself to do it). She decorated cakes and indulged curiosity brought on by cookbooks and later the advent of the internet.

But black beans and olives...seriously, people, delicious. With basically three ingredients:
green olives (with pimientos)
black beans
garlic
you can have so much goodness on your plate you won't even want to eat anything else.

(I did...I also had brussels sprouts, cooked Susan's way. So it was a Scott Sisters dinner at my house today.)

Anyway, while I was slicing what turned out to be a sort of obscene amount of olives, I was thinking about my mom. Which, who are we kidding, is what I do in the kitchen anyway. But then I started thinking about Thanksgiving, and how ten years ago I actually worked really hard to be back in Cairo by Thanksgiving, because a) I didn't want to miss the trip to the pyramids, and b) I couldn't imagine Thanksgiving in the US without my mom.

So while I was remembering that, and slicing more olives, and using my pressure cooker (thanks mom) to soak beans without waiting overnight, and I thought about all the people who made that possible. Laurie, in the Louisville office, who kept her AOL Instant Messenger open all the time and arranged my plane tickets within minutes of me asking. (and who sent flowers!) Beverly and Martha, who planned a beautiful service so I could have that before I went back. The congregation of Church of the New Covenant, where every single person stayed after Sunday worship for the extra service. My fellow YAVs, who tried their best in a very strange situation they didn't sign up for. The RevGals, who were virtually present at every time of day or night. (when blogger got comments, I lost all the comments I used to have when I had an add-on service for them, so you can't tell, but they were there, I promise.)

In general I feel like this October-November has been harder than others. I'm not sure if it's because it's a big milestone year, or if the early onset winter is ruining my coping skills, or having a knee injury (which she had a few of in her lifetime) or what. But I miss my mom a lot. All the time.

So I thought I'd just look in the drawer where I keep a few things. Nothing drastic, just a few pieces of paper.

Note to self: it's never just a few pieces of paper, even if it is.

obituary....so little space to sum up so much life lived in just 47 years

the card that came with flowers

Beverly preached a homily in the form of a letter from my mom to me, in response to this letter I wrote while she was dying thousands of miles away. This is the first time I've pulled it out of the drawer since she gave it to me, ten years ago November 20. I can barely even read it because just remembering it puts me into ugly-cry territory.

cooking by the box

Recently, a friend gifted me a free week of Blue Apron. It's a service where they deliver a box containing recipes and all the ingredients--exactly the right amount--for three meals (each with two servings). It seems like a great idea! I already love Door To Door Organics, which delivers me a box of organic veggies and fruits every Thursday. So what's not to love about trying a new recipe without committing to buying a pound of something when I only need a tablespoon? Seems promising.

I got my box last week, and I confess that I haven't had time to cook much. I didn't anticipate my schedule correctly. In any case, here's what's in the box:
*Beet Apple and Goat Cheese Sliders, with potato-frisee salad
*Chole (a chickpea stew with vaguely indian/middle eastern spices) served with naan
*butternut squash canneloni

I plan to make the last two tomorrow (so I'll have leftovers ready for the busy weekend!). I made the first last night--the beet sliders. (no pics, sorry...I didn't know I'd be blogging about it.)

First order of business: everyone in the world has heard me announce that I hate beets. I think they taste like dirt.
Second order of business: I am a firm believer that anything is better with cheese. Goat cheese is even better still.
Third order of business: I try so hard not to waste food.

So here we went, into beet-land, last night.
The recipe page has pictures all over it--pictures of the ingredients both whole and prepared, pictures of the cooking process, pictures of the finished product. It has step-by-step instructions that any middle schooler could probably follow. It was well-organized, telling me to do some things while other things were cooking. The stuff in the box was all clearly labeled with what it is, which recipe it is for, and storage instructions (i.e. "keep refrigerated").

And the end result was surprisingly delicious, I have to admit. I wouldn't choose to make the sliders again, because honestly I would have been perfectly happy to have apple-goat cheese sandwiches and skip the beets. But I did eat 1.33 servings of them, and not only because I was thinking about how I should try to eat more things like beets because they are good for me. It genuinely tasted good. I think the combo of goat cheese and mint (??!?!?!?!) was amazing. I was a little sad not to have thought ahead to the fact that assembling the sliders as directed would mean that they would not be suitable for leftovers. Since I am one person and the recipe makes two servings, I should have found a way to hold on to the prepped innards of the sliders and just toasted the buns when I would want them. I ended up needing to either eat more or waste some, because they couldn't be re-heated.

and the salad? OMG. I was so happy to eat it again for lunch today (with an avocado added because otherwise the avocados on the counter will turn mushy!).

The actual process of cooking?
well...
Maybe tomorrow's experience will be better, because I see that they lay out the steps in a certain order on purpose.

for those who missed the subtext on that: I didn't exactly follow the directions the way they were written.

I'm sure it comes as no surprise to those who know me in person that I have a hard time with recipes. I love to cook, and I own a number of cookbooks, most of which sit unopened on a shelf just waiting for the day I finally run out of experimentory steam. I am the kind of home cook who looks in the fridge and pantry and says "I can totally make something out of kidney beans, soy curls, spinach, barley, eggs, nutritional yeast, an avocado, and almonds." (actual contents of my pantry right now.)

I am less the kind of cook that follows directions.

I think Blue Apron is a great concept. I suspect it puts good cooking within reach of many many people who would otherwise eat cereal or fast food. I will probably get another box sometime in the future. But I am not the target audience for this service. I think the recipes look great, and the one I've tried so far tasted good despite by skepticism and inability to just follow the directions.

I just like to have a little more wiggle room, a little more creative space, when it comes to my kitchen adventures.
In short, I want it to be an adventure. And I have yet to have an adventure when the guidebook is still open in my hand.

all the things

I have officially eaten all the things, both at my own house (deviled eggs, tofurkey, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, crescent rolls) and at a friend's house (cheesy potatoes, cheesy green bean casserole, veggie stuffing, cheesecake brûlée). I have also played games, petted both cats and dogs, laughed uproariously, and had serious conversations about politics, race, the meaning of justice, scripture, and the history of cuckoo clocks.

I have struggled with what to say about the justice situation in this country. I am distressed by how easily we dismiss the suffering of others. I am angry about how little we value life in all its fullness. I am saddened by the divide that seems more cavernous than ever. Part of me hesitates to write what I think, because I recognize that I have the privilege of not engaging. And another part of me wants desperately to cry out alongside my fellow human beings, insisting that our voices be heard. I am not certain of the best way to say what, honestly, so many people are saying without anyone paying attention. I am not certain of how to use my privilege in this conversation and movement.

But here is what I know:
We are created in the image of God. Not just some of us, all of us. To throw even one life away is a tragedy. To put that dead life on trial without the benefit of openness, defense, cross-examination, or discussion of what evidence might mean is a perversion of humanity, as well as a gross misuse of our American justice system. To stereotype everyone in a profession, or a neighborhood, or a skin color because of one person is short-sighted and ridiculous.

Every act of violence hurts more than just the person who is injured or killed. Not only is life lost, but  the soul of the perpetrator is also damaged. A family is torn apart. A community grieves.

Every time.

Every Michael Brown, every Darren Wilson--one lost his life, the other his humanity. And we who look on with indifference: we lose our humanity too.

How long will we put up with this? How long will we stand by as people are killed for the slightest things? (no matter what you think of Michael Brown, tell me how you justify the 12 year old boy with a toy gun being shot on sight. tell me how you justify the kid on the playground. tell me how you justify the kid in the stairs of his apartment building. tell me how you justify the guy being choked to death on the street. and the hundreds of others happening every day.)

How long will we allow death to take hold, both physically and spiritually? How long will we avert our eyes from grieving mothers, traumatized siblings, friends and classmates who see no other way out than to fight back?

We who have the privilege of ignoring the situation have created the situation. When will we be part of the solution rather than perpetuating the problem? When will we stop insisting that life is a zero sum game, and instead learn that we're in it together--and that when one part of the body suffers, all suffer together with it?

Today, as I am stuffed with potatoes, I am also hungry--with those who are starving and with those who hunger for justice. Today, as I snuggle into my warm bed, I am also cold and alone--with those who are on the streets, forgotten and overlooked. Today, as I laugh with friends, I am also grieving--with those who see no light shining in the darkness. I hope you are too.

Getting Ready

it's almost Advent--the season of getting ready.

but before that, there's other stuff to get ready for.

Namely: MASHED POTATO DAY!

I am in possession of potatoes. and butter. and milk.

I also have french cut green beans, campbell's cream of mushroom, and french's french fried onions.

I have a library book.

I have blankets.

I have cookies.

I have cinnamon rolls.

I'm ready.

Good thing, because let me just tell you, everyone in Crystal Lake was at Jewel today at 5:30pm. The entire parking lot was full and every aisle of the store was packed. I can't even imagine what it'll be like tomorrow.

Sadly, Jewel was all out of sermons on Habakkuk.
(guess what I'll be doing while everyone else is last-minute shopping, making pies, and frantically cleaning their houses for family visits?)

Sabbath

If you unexpectedly had three free hours on a weekend morning, what would you do?

I suspect lots of us would fill them with things we haven't had time for--chores, errands, etc.

But what about filling them with the things we can't afford to not have time for--rest, renewal, and reminding ourselves that the world does not revolve around us nor depend on us.

That's what we're doing at church this weekend. We had a potluck dinner tonight (with more amazing food than we knew what to do with), which led right into a time of worship with communion. Tomorrow morning, the church building will be dark while the church (us) allows the Spirit to do her thing, recreating us, filling us up, and giving us the chance to let go of our illusion of control.

In the Jewish tradition, the Sabbath is a time for no work--which includes writing and drawing, because God the creator rested, so we too rest from creating.

It's a hard thing, to just BE rather than DOING all the time.

I don't know if I can completely let go for the morning, but I look forward to seeing what God will get up to when we leave space for that work, rather than filling it with what we "should" do.

I couldn't even get all the food in one photo. three  tables of mains, plus a table of desserts!

listening to jazz while waiting for mommy to bring dinner

cooking and baking

Tomorrow night we're having a potluck at church. It's going to be amazing.

Whenever there is a potluck, I almost always bring two things. Mostly because I'm a vegetarian, and I generally assume that there won't be much veggie-friendly at a potluck...and also because I like to show people that vegetarian food is delicious.

For this potluck, I'm bringing two soups. Because: winter. First will be my aunt's recipe, a vegan potato corn chowder. The other will be a crockpot version of the chili that Amy and I created in seminary (the original recipe includes the words "If Teri is coming over in 30 minutes, cook on high and stir constantly, as if over the flames of hell.").

I'm also bringing an apple crisp with a pomegranate sauce, because I have a TON of apples and 2 pomegranates just waiting for me to do something delicious with them.

I'm also in charge of bringing some delicious pie crust snacks like my grandma used to make at holidays--pie crust, butter, cinnamon, sugar. So good.

Plus I had to make myself dinner today (butternut squash and sage pasta, side of brussels sprouts. mmmm.)

All this cooking has me mentally connecting to my mom and grandma. I think about how I used to beg my mom to double the topping for fruit crisp. I roll out the pie crust dough using her marble rolling pin and marble pastry board. I follow my grandma's instructions to spread the butter with my fingers and be liberal with the cinnamon. I make things up when it comes to "pomegranate sauce" because frankly recipes are overrated.

I love to cook. I used to love to cook with my mom, and now I cook with her tools and appliances, hearing her voice in my mind as I neglect to measure anything. It's not the same, but it's better than not at all.

(and also, everything so far is DELICIOUS. yes, I always taste before I serve to others!)

last sheet, in progress!

postcard from paris

yes, I’ve been away from Paris since Friday. but that’s how long postcards take, isn’t it? ;)

I landed in Paris with distinct ideas about what I should do—I’d had advice that spanned “see all the museums!” to “you don’t have time for museums, just walk around and eat and look and sit in cafes.” Add in that I landed there on my birthday, and was going to spend the night in Versailles the first day, and all kinds of other travel realities (for instance: I landed at 9am…).

John the beloved. check out his curly golden locks.

medieval choir stalls with little benches on the folded up seats, so monks could rest discreetly while standing. lol.

a cell at the Conciergerie

lunch

honestly, I don't even remember now what this was. I'm sure it's important though.

So, day 1, I dropped my luggage at what may be the best place ever: City Locker. I love the people of City Locker, though I’ve never interacted with any of them. What a fantastic idea, to create video surveilled locker spaces in different parts of the city, accessed with a code sent to you when you reserve—and you can reserve in advance on the web or from your phone while standing outside. So great. I dropped my luggage off in locker number 1 and headed out for an unencumbered day of sightseeing.

I wandered a bit, visited the Cluny (the Museum of the Middle Ages) (because I’m a dork and I like that stuff), but the unicorn tapestries are away on tour while the room is renovated. Good thing I saw them (or were they replicas?) at the Met’s Cloister a few years ago. I wandered some more, grabbed lunch from a tiny crepe-and-panini place, (3.50!), and found my way to the Conciergerie—the prison where 2,800 people (including Marie Antoinette) were held and beheaded during the Revolution and subsequent Reign of Terror. And yet they don’t even have a guillotine on display. Really? What an opportunity! But alas…no. Just cells and exhibits and a whole floor of really weird art. Like wax-statues-of-old-men-in-automated-wheelchairs-rolling-randomly-around-the-space weird.

Next door is St. Chappelle, a chapel with some of the most gorgeous stained glass, and tons of it. The whole place is filled with color, because the windows are practically floor to ceiling and wall to wall. Nice.

After some more wandering about, it seemed like time to get the train to Versailles. Where, it turned out, I was staying basically in a palace with a view of the palace. seriously. And I had dinner in the restaurant there (not the original plan, but it had started to rain so I got over the idea that I would walk around and find something…). I have this to say about my birthday dinner and specially ordered (in advance) birthday dessert:

O.

M.

G.

it's a meringue outside with three flavors of ice cream inside. with little bits of edible gold leaf. seriously. #versailles

not only were the staff incredible, bringing me all kinds of things and wishing me a happy birthday about every five minutes, the atmosphere was beautiful and the food was incredible. Seriously, so much goodness. Roasted, braised, mashed…every bite was amazing.

Almost immediately on entering the room I knew I should have stayed two nights. Not only because the place was so amazing, but because there’s something about the first stop on a long trip being for only one night that was exhausting to think about. So note to self: always try to stay two nights at the first place.

My day at the Chateau de Versailles was pretty incredible. There’s art, gilding, decadence, beauty, and bizarreness practically in the air. I took a guided tour of some parts of the palace you can’t see without a tour, and also wandered the public areas, the gardens, and the two Trianon palaces and their gardens. Because, you know, every queen needs two extra palace (“Grand” and “Petite”—hahahahha) in addition to the palace she actually lives in. Think of it as a way to keep the locals employed. Or something.

this whole place is covered in gold leaf. not paint, not some replica: actual gold. all over, inside and out.

I can just picture Marie Antoinette: "I'm tired of the gold leaf palace...I want another one, in pink marble."

Back in Paris for two days, I made judicious use of 10 metro tickets: visited the Basilica of St. Denis (where the kings of France are buried)—that’s right, I’m practically stalking Stuff You Missed in History Class, and I got to see the tomb of Catherine d’Medici. Because, as previously noted, I’m a dork. Went to the Monet museum, where I saw 45 paintings that were the collection of Monet’s youngest son—he left them all to the museum when he died in the 60s. Yes, the 1960s. They were AMAZING. I know that sophisticated people are supposed to think impressionism is lame. But seriously, I love it. So I guess I’m not a sophisticated art viewer. Oh well. Give me Monet any day. I went to the Pantheon and saw the tomb of Madame Curie (and a bunch of men who were important, like Victor Hugo and revolutionaries and blah blah blah). The lantern is being worked on so Foucault’s pendulum is down until 2015 or 2016. sigh. I used the stairs to climb the Eiffel tower (well, to the second floor), then went to the top and had champagne while watching sunset. I visited Notre Dame but the towers were closed that day (sad). I tried to visit Eglise St. Etienne du Mont, with the only surviving rood screen in Paris (again—dork), but it was inexplicably closed. I looked at the Louvre and the Pompidou from the outside. I ate cheese. I drank wine. I ate chocolate. And ice cream. I bought scarves. I wandered neighborhoods. I looked around old churches and took pictures of stained glass. I ate crepes! I saw adorable city parks. I got told I’m beautiful by people not related to me and who were not selling anything. I practiced my French (which is in a terrible state).

eglise st. eustache

this one's a little hard to see...that would be the graves of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI (or what's left of them...)

Catherine d'Medici in front, Henri II next to her...

I may have a little bit of a d'Medici obsession.

at Places des Vosges

my one (accidental) nod to what's in the background of my whole trip (life)...

do you hear the people sing? 

I saw a fashion photo shoot. When you see this chick in a magazine, you saw it here first...

mmmm.....cheese....

this was every bit as amazingly delicious as it looks...

and this was even more delicious than it looks. Crepe with salted caramel sauce and pears. omg.

I enjoyed Paris. I’d love to go back. But I wouldn’t say it captured my heart or imagination the way Glasgow or Edinburgh do. The spirit of Paris is different…something about those Scottish cities just…I don’t know. I can’t even describe it (in fact, I’m tempted to say something like “Paris is just missing something…some little je ne sais quoi.”) It could be because I didn’t have much time, or because I’m traveling alone, or because I didn’t speak the language well enough. Or maybe my expectations were too romantic or idealized. Whatever the case—it was nice, but…

So, next time, Paris, I’ll be practicing my French before I go, taking a friend, and spending more time. We’ll see. :-)