A Lot Of Paris

Yesterday, we met The Exchange's parents for lunch. They are lovely people. But why wouldn't they be given how lovely The Exchange is. They are almost as I imagined them to be, having seen photographs of them before.

I note the different expectations we have of our sons. The Exchange's parents expect him to be cultured and successful. I expect The Boy to be independent and happy. I adore The Exchange because he is interesting and interested, he has vast interests and knowledge areas that make him worldly and sophisticated, we have easy conversations. Recently, I discovered The Exchange likes Asian cinema. How unusual is that in a 17-year-old? They like The Boy because he is smart and funny and generally easy-going. Most of all, they like him because he's happy. His happiness is infectious.

We met at an old French restaurant. They tell me Napoleon held meetings there. The menu claims Voltaire, Balzac, and others have dined there. It is indeed a beautiful, grand restaurant. But I had the feeling I too have dined there before. I can't remember when. That's the thing that's hitting me about Paris this round. Memories merge and meld, then separate. It feels like I am having frequent deja vu moments. I can't tell if I actually have been to a place or whether I just imagined I've been there.

After lunch, The Exchange spent some time with his father while his mother helped us get train tickets to London and hunt for posters. The Man wanted posters, no, mammoth movie or art posters, to cover his walls in Kabul. He saw a few interesting ones, but none that he wanted on his walls.

We ended up at the Pompidou Centre where we looked at Paris from the top of the building. You can pick out most of the monuments and areas of Paris from here. I like aerial views. They puts a place in perspective. The centre has a vast collection of modern art. They rotate the displays every six months so even if you live in Paris and only go to the Pompidou Centre once a year, there is a good chance you will see different works in the galleries.

Maybe our appreciation for art is dependent on familiarity more than genius of the artist. I have trouble liking minimalist abstracts. You know, where three large panels painted in white hang on a wall and they call that art. Or they put a tube structure in the middle of a space and put multi-coloured transparent fibreglass panels around it so you can peer at the object through the panels. I don't get that.

But the whimsical surrealists and cubist paintings of Picasso and Braques - I loved those. I didn't use to. But walking through the Pompidou yesterday, I did. Maybe it's because I am now used to these paintings. I liked how the colours blend, how the image is fragmented and deformed to suggest the subject, and how the appeal of a painting depends on composition. I think these guys were playing with negative space, so you interpret life not by looking at what's there, but what's not there. But when you you put what's not there on canvas, it becomes there, and I don't know what to make of that, except that it's jarring.

Ooh it rained all afternoon in Paris. I don't mind it though everyone is complaining. I like walking in the rain without cover. In fact, I harbour a kind of fantasy of walking through the rain in the streets of London and Paris. But I didn't walk Paris in the open rain. My companions would have thought me crazy. But The Boy, my son who turns his body and pushes me away when I touch him in normal gesticular conversation, would have been embarrassed. I try not to embarrass him all the time. He keeps saying, I just want a normal mother. I don't know what that means.

Alone time is good, I need so much of it. I like exploring a city on my own. Maybe that's the source of my deja vus. They are snippets of memories of me wandering through Paris alone.