Next week I am going to Paris for five days with my son and younger daughter. Years ago I rang a friend to ask him and his wife to supper. 'We can't come', he said, ' E... has gone to Paris to do her Christmas shopping'. How cool is that? It seemed like the pinnacle of sophistication. I was really, really jealous. One day - that would be me.


And, eventually, it was. (Typically, much later on, I told E.. how impressed I had been by her gift-buying expedition and she laughed like a fool. 'I wasn't getting presents at all. I have an old lover who lives there and I go over and have a little fling with him when I need a break from my family. Especially in the run-up to Christmas'.) Well .......... sadly I don't have any old lovers in Paris, or even any friends. Our only useful contact was my daughter's American ex-school friend who was doing a course and had a perfect central flat last time we went. She has now gone back to New York and it's probably all for the best as she apparently has a penchant for younger brothers and might well have made advances to my son now he's a bit older. Which my daughter said would totally have ruined their friendship.


- posted by Iris @ 11/22/2003 02:08:00 PM comment