un baton dans les roues

This weekend Mr French’s passport disappeared. We’ll never know if it was stolen or simply lost, but all signs point to somebody having removed it from a zipped pocket in a restaurant cloakroom. Regardless, it is gone… 24 hours before he flies off to Kentucky for business and 2 weeks before our holidays abroad.

As they say in French, “Panique abord!” It takes two weeks to get a passport in France, which means he would miss our flight abroad, destroying a much needed, extremely anticipated dream trip. Our first true vacation in 14 months! The only way to get an expedited emergency passport is if you have a business trip planned and the necessary proof. As luck would have it, the tickets to Kentucky were booked weeks ago. Fantastic. We’re in!!!

His assistant organizes everything, calling in advance and telling him to go to the Police station with his police report, ID photos and a sworn affidavit that he really is meant to be going away on business. We show up hours before the place closes. I have called, his assistant has called, we know that they absolutely must see him given his dire situation, but the young girl at the un-welcome desk refuses to let him through. I desperately try to call the help number, but can not get through, and we are too traumatized to raise a real ruckus in a Police station.

Back home I finally get through and they can confirm that it was an error, but it is too late for today, come back tomorrow. Here’s the rub; his flight is booked for tomorrow morning. He will now be returning to the Police station AFTER his planned departure, which means he no longer has a business trip and no longer qualifies for an emergency passport. We are in the merde.

The next morning with three different variations of all of the necessary papers in triplicate, we are in front of the Police station where cold winds from the Seine have us dancing for warmth at 6h30 in the morning, a full two hours before they open their doors to the anxious public. Mr French (my hero) has had the ingenious idea of re-booking his business trip for next Tuesday. We are hopeful, but not confident, currents of nervous energy running through our bodies like the electricity in the thunder clouds we see blowing in from above the Conciergerie.

More than 100 Parisians, French citizens from every walk of life, are with us in line; the trop-chic-pour-vous young man lugging his Hermes travel bag, a bright red silk scarf tied like an ascot, the Ivory Coastian aunt in a three piece navy blue, pinstriped suit and a precion-cut bright red bob, the exhausted teen squatting on his heels, slightly green after a night of partying, hiding under the hood of his navy sweatshirt, the two exuberant young black men in wide jeans and funky, intellectual glasses, waxing nostalgic about their high school years, the Parisienne accessorized with a leather jacket, Louboutin pumps and a matching teen daughter, the slightly plump 20-something in a pink track suit who has had her passport stolen, the lunatic behind us who keeps trying to strike up a conversation as she kicks her Dr Scholl sandals across the busy street and the practical businessman with his Decathalon camping stool, keeping him comfortable as he sits and waits while reading his book.

The doors opened at 8h38. The crowd rushes in, remaining orderly but fairly excited. I put my bag through scanner and pass through the metal detector. Alarm bells start sounding, the woman is barking at me excitedly and French suddenly sounds like a strange, foreign language. I have been up since 5h30, standing in the cold for hours and I am not quite sure what is going on. The people in line behind me, particularly the ones still in the blustering cold, are not looking happy. What stupid idiot has left a Swiss Army in her bag? That would be me, forgetting that this is a police station not an art museum?  I apologize profusely as my Victoronox is confiscated and I am given a ticket to reclaim it when we leave. We’re in.

Two hours later, Mr French has submitted his application and it looks like we’ll be going on holiday after all. Disaster averted?

Messieurs et mesdames, I have lost my inspiration.

At first I found this alarming and was deeply concerned. I’ve only been blogging for about 12 weeks, and I’d already lost my voice? Then I opened Le Figaro and discovered that I was suffering from a syndrome that is sweeping the nation; everyone in the country, from Besançon to Carcasson is suffering from vacation-itis.

Today, the front page of the online edition has articles on the lovely provençal town of Gordes, the cheese haven of Rocamadour, and St Jean Pied de Port in my beloved Basque region. There are even places I’d never heard of, like Barfleur, Bantôme, and Conques. There are warnings about the Nile flu in Greece and the expected lines for lottery tickets on Friday the 13th.

With the 14 juillet safely behind us, the 15 août is now bleeping on the radar and we are all ready to set sail, fly, or hot air balloon it away, getting our sorry selves to some where other than home. Last minute, non-planner that I am, I have been getting ready for two weeks now and Mr French, the guy who usually throws his bag together an hour before heading out the door to Charles de Gaulle for a week in China, is already packed.

From the mountains, to the beach, from cultural visits in international cities to hunkering down in the family home by a swampy lake, the French are ready for a change of scenery, and I am, too.

As I head out on my morning run, I’m blind to the Seine, already picturing myself tackling the 8km loop around our holiday marine lake. At the fromagerie I futilely search out the rare local cheeses we can’t find in Paris, hoping for a taste of far away. And on the menu for dinner each night, its fish. My body may be in Paris, but my mind has gone fishing. Or rather, body boarding.