I nodded my agreement with Amy in much the same way I’d passively acknowledged her prayer on the street corner last night. She was the one having all the fun and all the joy, celebrating the three little lost sheep that had come back to us.
But then, she was the one who took the first step of faith and asked. I had written off the luggage as lost for good.
An hour later, after we each took a fabulous shower with a fragrant bar of hotel soap, and fluffy buttery croissants were resting merrily in our bellies, Amy gleefully wiggled into her skinny jeans. “They fit! I can zip them up easily. Look!”
“Voilá!” I said, sharing her moment of success. I poured myself another cup of coffee from a simple thermos coffeepot that was oh so elegantly French with its trim style.
“Travel agrees with me,” Amy said in a brazen tone.
I laughed so hard I had to wipe the tears from my eyes. My friend had come a long way in twelve hours. Fresh starts like the one we were experiencing are so sweet after a disastrous first run. I had great hope that we were in for a much smoother ride from here on out.
“Would you mind if I unpacked everything before we go exploring?” Amy asked. “I need to hang up a few things; hopefully the wrinkles will fall out.”
“Fine with me. We have the rest of the day, the rest of the week to see everything we want. Take your time.”
Settling on the edge of my bed, I watched Amy unpack. First one full suitcase, then the other. It was like watching a magic show; I kept waiting to see what she would pull out next.
“Do you have any white rabbits in there?”
“Any what?” She pulled out a long scarf, oblivious to how much she was mimicking an illusionist.
“I just can’t believe how much you fit into those two suitcases.”
I had hung up my four articles of interchangeable clothing in our narrow closet and had used two hangers. Amy used the other ten hotel hangers and then pulled out a dozen of her own metal ones. The next outfit she hung up was really something: a rich golden-colored sleeveless dress. It had a sash around the waist and a full skirt. The top was accented with shimmering brocade and came with a short jacket trimmed in the same extravagant material.
“Wow! Where did you get that? I’ve never seen that outfit.”
“Grandmere made it when I was in college. I’ve never worn it.”
“Amy, it’s gorgeous.” I stood up to examine the details.
“I know. And it fits me now. It was too small in college, but I never told Grandmere after she sent it to me. Even when I couldn’t wear it for the past twenty years, I just couldn’t get rid of it.”
“Hold it up. Oh, Amy, the color is beautiful with your hair and skin.”
“I know it was crazy to pack this, but I thought I might wear it if we went out to some fancy place for dinner.”
“Definitely.” I glanced at my one wrinkle-free knee-length travel skirt and tried to think of what I’d wear if we actually did end up going somewhere nice enough for Amy to don her designer outfit.
“It’s really beautiful,” I said, focusing on Amy and not on my limited options. “And it’s timeless, you know? It’s the kind of outfit Grace Kelly could have worn in the fifties, yet it’s still in style today.”
Amy smiled. “Grandmere would have loved you even more for saying that.”
Finishing the task of unpacking her excessive wardrobe, Amy reached for a final nibble of her neglected croissant and declared that she was ready to take on the day. We exited the hotel with a minimalist plan. We vaguely knew we wanted to start with the Musée d’Orsay, an art museum near our hotel. The Louvre seemed too daunting for our first day, and being less than eager to take another taxi or figure out the Metro system, we opted for a place close enough to walk.
As we stepped from under the protective and lengthy portico arcade of the Rue de Rivoli and paused to cross the road, a zesty breeze caught up with us. We marched across a wide bridge marked “Pont Royal” and stopped halfway, buttoning up against the breeze.
“Let me take your picture.” I motioned for Amy to stand by the railing. As I stepped back, Amy stretched out both arms as if wildly embracing the fresh air of Paris like a long-lost relative.
When I joined her by the side of the bridge, we paused to look down on the Seine River. The slow canal wound its way around the neck of medieval Paris like a green ruffled boa. The ancient face of this city was certainly age-creviced beyond anything a vat of wrinkle cream could do for her. But she was regal and proud and greeted us with her shoulders back and her chin forward.
We crossed the bridge and stood in line for tickets to the Musée d’Orsay, which was located in the huge transformed central train station. I skimmed the tour book, trying to remember why Amy wanted to come here first. The book said the Orsay museum was proud host to art from the 1800s, which meant it was rich in examples of impressionism. This was the place to experience the best of the works of artists such as Renoir, Degas, Cézanne, van Gogh, Gauguin, Manet, and, of course, Monet.
Amy’s reasons for coming here were clear. These were all her favorites. We picked up a brochure in English and made our way past a maze of bold statues. Amy headed for the elevator up to the impressionist level, where she entered her garden of delight and buzzed from one work of art to another like an overachieving bumblebee.
“Ooh, look! Water Lilies by Monet!” Amy was beaming.
We stood next to a woman with honey golden hair who was calmly observing the painting Amy was so excited to see. It was a familiar pastel blue painting of a footbridge over a tranquil lily pond.
“Would you like to know a little piece of trivia?” The woman smiled warmly.
“Sure,” Amy said.
“Monet actually built the bridge you see in all these paintings. He designed it based on an engraving he had of a Japanese bridge. The bridge and his home are located about an hour from here in Giverny.”
“Really?” I was drawn in now.
The woman nodded, warming up to the topic. “Monet painted en plein air. Outside. He learned this from Boudin. Monet often rose at 5:00 a.m. and wandered along the river in Giverny observing the rows of poplars and the fields of red poppies.”
“That explains why he kept painting poplars and water lilies,” Amy added.
“Yes and no. Monet said he wanted to reproduce what existed between the subject and himself. He wanted to capture the elusive feel of light, sound, and air and express those qualities in his artwork. Do you see? He painted the same subjects over and over but captured them at different times of day and under different conditions to give the sense of what was happening in that untouchable space between the artist and the subject.”
“What brochure did you pick up at the door?” Amy fanned the thin flyer we were handed when we paid for our admission. “I’d like to get the one you have.”
“No brochure.” The woman blushed. “I’m sorry if I went on too much.”
“No,” we both said.
“That was fascinating. Do you work here?” I asked.
“No. I lead art tours, though. My group left yesterday. I don’t go home until tonight, so I thought I’d slip in for one more afternoon of gazing. I’m Jill, by the way.”
“I’m Amy. This is Lisa. We’re from Lexington. How about you?”
“Wellington.”
“Where is Wellington?” I asked.
“Oh, sorry. Wellington, New Zealand. I forget that my American accent throws people off. I grew up in California, but now I live in New Zealand.”
For the next hour and a half Amy and I sank ourselves gratefully into the most amazing private art tour with Jill. We learned that Monet had astigmatism as well as cataracts and painted the world as he literally saw it with all the colors blurred. We studied van Gogh’s bedroom and his self-portrait that he painted three months before committing suicide. Jill encouraged us to linger over a glass display case that held a statue of a ballerina by Degas. The statue posed for us with her chin up and best po
inted toe forward.
“Look at the details. The illusion of depth and the even muscle tone,” Jill said. “Now look at the face. Do you feel the personality of the young woman who modeled for this piece?”
I was so grateful for the way Jill opened our eyes to details Amy and I would have flitted right past. All these great pieces held so much character and story.
We entered another room and Amy said, “Ooh, my grandmere had a copy of this painting in her bedroom. I never realized it was a Renoir.”
Jill told us the background of the familiar outdoor scene in which a crowd of women and men in Victorian garb were dancing and dining. The painting Ball at the Moulin de la Galette, Montmartre had been painted in 1876.
“There is so much life and movement in the art from this period,” Amy said. “It amazes me how many of these pieces were painted right here, in and around Paris.”
Jill smiled a knowing smile at us, her compliant pupils. “That’s why I always bring my groups here first, before I take them to the Louvre.”
“Well!” Amy nodded to me. “I’m glad to know we made one wise decision so far. We arrived last night, and our introduction to Paris was a little bumpy.”
“Oh?” Jill looked at us sympathetically.
“It’s a long story,” I said. “If you have time to hear it, I think we should at least treat you to lunch to thank you for the private tour.”
“I’ve already eaten, but a cup of tea would be nice,” Jill said.
“We heard that Angelina’s is good. It’s on the same street as our hotel, so we know it’s not far,” Amy suggested.
“Of course the recommendation for Angelina’s came from the taxi driver who stole our luggage,” I added as we headed out the door.
“Stole your luggage?” Now Jill was the eager listener.
We retraced our steps toward our hotel and filled her in on the escapades of our first night in Paris.
“Unbelievable,” she said as we crossed the Pont Royal again and glanced at the tour boats meandering their way up the river. “And you two haven’t even been here twenty-four hours.”
“I know. Frightening, isn’t it?” I said.
We all laughed, and Jill added, “I’d say you’re definitely having a Sisterchicks adventure.”
“Sisterchicks.” Amy turned to me. “What a great word! Best friends but with a little attitude going on. I like that. That’s us, Lisa. We’re Sisterchicks.”
We started walking again, and Amy grabbed my arm. She pretended to throw me over the bridge and into the river.
“What are you doing?” I squawked.
“Sisterchicks go in Seine!” she spouted. “Get it? Go insane? Go in Seine?”
Jill’s highly contagious laughter filled the plein air around us, prompting Amy and me to laugh with her.
The buoyant camaraderie continued at a lively pace. We came upon a charming sedate café, and Jill said, “Would you mind if we stopped here instead of Angelina’s? I need to use the restroom. I’ve been here before. It’s very nice.”
“We don’t mind,” Amy said, and I nodded my agreement.
We entered the intimate little café filled with Parisians. Amy and Jill both went off to find the restroom while I waited for them by the front counter. I was asked something several times. I assumed I was being asked if I wanted to be seated. I shook my head, said thank you in French, and tried to look like I knew what I was doing.
Beside me on the counter I noticed two plates with small pieces of cut-up pastries. One looked like a cream-filled éclair. The other pastry I didn’t recognize. Assuming them to be free samples, I took a bite of each. The éclair was especially good; I reached for another small piece.
That’s when I noticed people were looking at me. I’m not paranoid by nature, and I really was trying to overcome my biased opinions of Paris. But these people were staring at me. They were talking about me, too. I just didn’t know what they were saying. I wondered if this was a locals-only sort of place, and they realized I was an outsider.
I considered finding a table instead of standing here, so obviously American and lost. But I didn’t see any empty spaces. Reaching for another sample of the éclair, I checked the corners of my mouth to make sure I didn’t have big globs of chocolate stuck to my face.
A man in a suit stepped up and spoke to me in French. He placed a plate with a knife and half of a croissant next to the other samples on the counter.
I smiled.
He pointed at the sign above the counter, which was, of course, in French. Then he pointed at the plate he had just placed next to the other samples. He seemed to be waiting for me to say or do something.
I assumed he was adding to the selection of samples so I said, “Merci,” picked up the knife, and demurely cut off a corner of the croissant.
The man went ballistic. He waved his hands in my face and pointed to the door.
I scurried outside, my heart pounding as I waited for Amy and Jill to find me.
“There you are.” Amy stepped out of the restaurant a few achingly long moments later. “What are you doing out here?”
“I think it’s a locals-only place. The manager made me leave.”
“Why would he do that?” Jill asked. “I’ve eaten here before.”
“I don’t know. I was standing there waiting, and this man in a suit came up and pointed to a sign on the counter and then yelled at me.”
“What did the sign say?” Jill asked.
“I have no idea.”
“I’ll go find out,” Amy slipped back inside and returned shaking her head. “I don’t understand what the problem was.”
“What did the sign say?” I asked.
Amy gave a shrug and repeated the posted message word for word. “Please place your dirty plates here.”
I scurried away from the café window as fast as I could, with Jill and Amy hot on my heels. They pelted me with questions for half a block. I stopped in front of a pet store window and blurted out what had happened, how I had stood there in front of all those sophisticated Parisians “sampling” everyone’s leftovers from their dirty dishes.
Amy pressed her lips together. Her eyes were huge, but she didn’t uncork her reaction until she was sure I’d be okay with it. She looked at Jill and back at me. Jill was turning red in the face and didn’t appear to be breathing.
Realizing that the two of them might pass out in front of me due to their extremely good manners, I let loose with the laughter bomb, shattering the decorum I’d already lost. We laughed until we cried, clinging to each other and leaning against the storefront window so we wouldn’t fall over in hysterics. A man from inside the pet store came out and shooed us down the street, away from his customers.
We laughed all the way to the entrance of Angelina’s. This time all three of us had to use the restroom after laughing so much. Amy insisted I go with her and Jill so they could keep an eye on me.
We calmed ourselves and took our seats by the front window where we ordered chocolate drinks and joined in a toast. The goblet-sized specialty drinks arrived at our table wearing thick dollops of whipped cream on top like a French boudoir wig from the court of Louis XIV.
With white moustaches all around, we laughed some more in this larger, airier café. A well-dressed grandmere and a young boy in a school uniform with an embroidered patch on his blazer pocket sat together. As he dipped his long spoon into his dish of ice cream, he seemed to be telling her a story that made her smile. At another table a man sat reading a newspaper while the woman across from him was pressing buttons on her cell phone. No one in this friendly café seemed to notice that the three of us weren’t laughing in French.
I loved listening to Jill laugh. Her wonderful giggle took the sting out of my grand faux pas.
We settled into a chatty sort of conversation by the time we were drinking ourselves down to the layer of chocolate moustaches. Jill told us this was her fourth trip to Paris. Leading art tours was a midlife sort of dream that her bes
t friend, Kathy, had talked her into pursuing.
“It’s been wonderful,” she said. “I haven’t had any significant problems during the past three trips.”
“Well, then you might not want to hang around us too much,” Amy said. “We do seem to attract more than our share of ‘special moments,’ as my mother-in-law would call them. We’re not like this at home. Really.”
“You will forgive me, won’t you, if I have a hard time believing that,” Jill said.
“I guess we do have our moments at home, too, but it’s all been a little more compact and intense since we left,” Amy said. “If we didn’t have the assurance that God was taking care of us every step of the way, I’m sure we’d both be a mess by now.”
Jill smiled and nodded.
I knew then that the three of us had more in common than a bunch of giggles.
“It’s His mercies, you know,” Jill said. “They really are new every morning.”
“Yes, they are,” Amy agreed.
I didn’t want any of this to end. The sound of Jill’s laughter. The way the waning sunlight was coming through the front window of Angelina’s and touching off firefly sparks from Amy’s jewelry every time she turned her head. Each glittery bead in her necklace seemed to have its own spark of life. All of them were dancing around her neck like a Renoir painting packed with vibrant Victorians picnicking on a summer afternoon.
Every woman of every generation deserved to sit in the sunlight with such friends on such an afternoon and laugh and sip chocolate and know in her heart that God’s mercy would be new again the next morning.
Jill’s art lessons had gone inside me. My eyes had been opened to impressionism. These things around me were familiar: Amy, chocolate, tables, chairs. But something was different. Ethereal. Something mysterious was at work in the space between my surroundings and me. A sort of translucent beauty that was hidden in that untouchable space where there are no maverick molecules.
How does a human capture that sort of nearly invisible motion and magnificence?