Life in Paris in a Haussmanian Apt, a couple of blocks off the Champs Elysees.
We are now happily ensconced in our apt a couple of block off the Champs Elysees, and close to the Arc de Triomphe. It’s really a beautiful space. As I mentioned on my instagram post on the same topic, interior design is of huge interest to me and knowing we are going to be here for at least a year has me putting my mind to getting settled in it to the best of my ability.
The owner is a Fashion Designer in LA (and her husband) and they have a penchant for high end French furniture. Most of it is Roche Bobois, and our family room couch is definitely, er, ‘cheerful’ as my granny might say trying to be diplomatic about something she thought to be very loud. But I must say the jewel tones have already grown on me and it’s also super comfy so I’ve embraced it.
Because I am who I am, I had to rearrange the furniture and artwork a few times. My family is so tolerant. They come to expect it now. (Full disclosure: I also do this in hotel rooms if I’m there for more than one night. It’s not their fault they can’t read my brilliant mind!. Hahaha….brilliant/insane….it’s a thin line.)
First to go was the massive TV in the family room. We watch on ipads anyway and I’m really not a fan of TVs being seen in rooms. So I hid it in a closet and the table it was on became our low slung coffee table to accompany our low slung french couch. (It’s kind of a Japanese style vibe to me, and I imagine us sitting cross legged doing (very thin!) puzzles, eating sushi or playing board games (or bananagrams, right Maile!?).
Then I moved a desk from another room and now I have a writing perch that quite delights me. (I’ve started compiling a ‘you know you are old when you get excited about ________’ list in the style of those memes you see on the same topic.) Getting excited about a desk seems right up there with vacuum suction power and kitchen cloths that magically resist smelling gross but I digress…. So now I’ve got my desk, complete with dimmable desk light which only took us to 5 stores to locate. I don’t like harsh overhead light. I don’t know what to say, but I’ve got the whole of the Hygge lovers with me on this one.
And from this vantage point I can see/hear the world of the courtyard happening to the right and the world wandering past the street to the left. A friend asked me if this apt has inspired any specific topics or genres for writing. My immediate thought was ‘Rear Window’, the Hitchcock movie where James Stewart is home bound with a broken leg during a hot summer and spends so much time looking out the window at his neighbors who are living with their windows open and he hears and sees a lot and one night he thinks he sees a murder occur in one of the apartments across the way.
I relate to the way he has nicknames for all the people he observes. One of my favorite things to do is eat alone in a crowded restaurant and observe the other people eating and create narratives about who they are and what they are doing. I can go really deep into my imagination about where they find themselves and what they are speaking about. It’s the best when I can’t actually hear what they are saying and can only lip-read the occasional word.
In that vein, we have new neighbors who have suddenly made their presence very much, well, present. That’s my diplomatic way of saying they are bloody loud. I think it’s a couple and young child. The lady of the house tromps around in heels in the morning and the man of the house appears not to be of the shy bladder variety. The sound of him peeing echoes down one of the small interior courtyards and comes into my ears as though he was in the next room. ‘Waterfall Wayne’ seems not to suffer from prostate issues and I had him pegged in his mid 30’s. But what is throwing me is his weekend music choice. He listened, very (VERY) loudly to a French classical music radio station. And he listened to it the ENTIRE weekend. I can’t wait to see what happens next weekend. Will he mix it up with something else? Can I send Roo upstairs with a request?
But Double Dubs n Co have some damn fine geraniums in their window boxes which are very much putting ours to shame which brings me to my next post, “Competitive Geraniuming”. I know, I know….how can you even wait another second for this wildly exciting topic? I hear you, and I’m on it, my people. But now it’s time for bubbles. And look at the flutes here!? I need a stool just to reach the rim of the glass.
