Walking Paris - Working Walks

 

This morning my plan was to see the exhibit of Impressionist artists at the Orsay Museum. I could have taken a cab or Uber but I love walking to discover what is inside of a walking city like Paris. My only regret at doing so is that there are so many quirky surprises around each corner that they all wash into one.

  History is quirky in Europe. Look at me... I’ve been to Europe but twice in my entire life but I have some judgments & observations about Paris that are most certainly not objective. These observations are but comparisons. A reverse Alexis De Tocqueville I am not, but having lived in the USA most of my life I am qualified to scratch the surface of outward reality on the subject in a cup of sophistication with a dash of pretense.

The Orsay was a train station,
hotel and restaurant built for
the 1889 Paris World's Fair

  The buildings have been around a few years... like centuries...
like millenniums. In my country, if a building is older than 50 years, it becomes registered as a historical site. Otherwise, it gets torn down and replaced by a newer and more disposable one.

  An American tourist can be seen from a distance. Sure, the way we dress is usually taken to an extreme degree of casual, but this is no longer a marker exclusive to us. Worldwide, people are dressing down so that it is getting harder to identify us by our wardrobe. However, here is one that we share with each other that is ours to claim in Paris. Our most common denominator here is obesity... not morbidly so, but I’d say most Americans over the age of 30 or 40 can be identified by our girth. The younger folks are still fairly fit and one has to adhere to cultural dress & gym codes.

Cezanne

I haven’t gone into a McDonalds, Burger King, or Starbucks yet. Nor have I checked out Crazy Horse or the Folly Berger either. I’m not much for night life. I steer away from crowds... just don’t like standing in line. I haven’t been inside the Shakespeare & Company Bookstore because there was a line to get in. I was ready to endure a long line at the Orsay Museum, but I got lucky because I was ushered to the front of the line by a very sweet young lady who saw me with a walking stick. True, I am old and I am handicapped, but it was nice of her. She is one of the reasons I love Paris

American Girl glued
to Cell Phone

I also love Paris because obnoxious people think Parisians are rude. They are not rude. They are brief with language unless they are saying something, and this seems rude. How dare a New Yorker accuse the French of this case of the kettle calling the teapot black. When I am in a grocery store or elsewhere I to am brief. However, this is because I am naturally rude in my use of English instead of French (though I try).

I am in a city that is young compared to Rome but ages beyond the

American perception of time. It is where Caesar camped among the Parisii tribe calling it Lutetia Parisiorum in 52 AD and rich enough in 885 for the  Île de la Cité to be sacked by the Vikings. I can stand by on any of the bridges the Seine flows under and see a cavalcade of history roll under with its stream where tour boats and working barges share its ancient highway.

 Of course, I may be wrong. My word isn’t gospel. Ain’t that a hoot? Yeh, I’m wrong about a lot and that’s why I don’t wish to be mistaken as an authority and not be mistaken for an authority by myself.

See, I told you that I was no Alexis de Tocqueville.

I walked to the Orsay Art Museum today. Poured down rain a half mile before I got there. Ducked under the iron bridge with an American woman and her daughters. They loved it because the rain was not an inconvenience but an adventure