Escaping Paris Lockdown

Ile-de-Noirmoutier, Saturday, March 28, 2020

On my last day of work at Le Cordon Bleu two weeks ago, I wore latex gloves. The boulangerie class I often translated for had visibly shrunk. “They left France already,” explained the remaining bread students, two of whom wore masks.

It was their artistic piece exam day, but that’s not the only reason why everyone was so tense.

“No need to panic,” joked one student when the chef stepped out of the room. “We’ll have plenty of decorative bread baskets during the crisis.”

It seemed more wasteful than usual to be making art out of perfectly good flour and butter.

On my walk home from work, I passed by the public pool where my son was supposed to have a swimming placement test in a few days. “Closed until further notice,” read a large sign on the door. I could have sworn it had been open that morning. Things were moving fast. Just two days before, President Macron had announced that all French schools and universities would be closed jusqu’à nouvel ordre. I had a strong suspicion that my son’s tennis class that afternoon was going to be canceled. I called the courts and sure enough: the sports stadium where he had his weekly lesson had been closed by municipal order at 2 pm that day. 

By late afternoon, we learned that all cafés, restaurants, and “unnecessary” stores would be closed to the public starting at midnight.

It was happening. Paris would become a ghost town just like Milan and Wuhan.

Usually when things got rocky in Paris, I could torture myself by imagining how life would be so much easier back in Southern California. But this time was different; the same nightmarish mess unfolding in France seemed to be imminent in America, too.

We were all trapped.

The next day, Sunday, strict lockdown (or confinement) rumours began circling online. After dinner, while our children played in the living room, we hurriedly phoned friends and neighbours from our tiny Paris kitchen to tell them that we were packing our bags. We would drive to Noirmoutier—an island off Nantes— early the next morning. My husband’s family had a house there just a minute’s walk from the beach. There was also a garden and more rooms than in our Paris apartment.

 

We weren’t the only Parisian family to flee the capital that week. The French phone giant Orange estimates that seventeen percent of Parisians—roughly over one million people—escaped the Paris region when we did.

Just the Friday before, parents had been musing about organising play dates in the park and study dates with friends to help pass the long days when schools would be closed. “We won’t go to the movies,” one friend had told me outside school Friday afternoon, “but I can’t keep my five children indoors for five weeks.”

The idea of remaining inside a Paris apartment with children for weeks on end with none of the usual reliefs like museum outings; picnics and bike rides in the parks; coffee and goûter with friends in cafés; or extracurricular activities was unthinkable for many.

 

So we left. We left behind our decent WIFI connection, boxes of Lego and Kapla, and puzzles galore for a slice of green, open space.

It almost felt like going on vacation; we could hear the roar of waves like freeway traffic from the front yard as soon as we arrived. The first two days, I even took the kids for short walks on the beach; we made sure not to go anywhere near other people. But these brief escapes wouldn’t last; by Thursday, metal gates and large white signs barred our entrance to the beaches.

 

We were left with the garden. In the evenings—after densely digital days of juggling screens, scanners, and printers, so our son could connect to his distant learning class and do his homework and my husband could work—our household could finally unwind.  We’d all made it through another day. The kids cut branches for the fire, and after dinner, they brushed teeth, grabbed their jackets and pulled boots on over their pajamas. The nights were clear and beautiful. We never could see any stars in Paris.

 

Timeline:

Thursday, March 12: President Macron announces schools will be closed as of Monday, March 16

Saturday, March 14: the French Prime Minister announces that all restaurants, cafés, movie theaters, and unnecessary stores will close at midnight; municipal sports facilities close in Paris

Monday, March 16: President Macron announces lockdown for all of France beginning at noon on Tuesday, March 17

Tuesday, March 17: all city parks and gardens close in Paris

Thursday, March 19: French authorities begin closing access to beaches 

"Le Facteur" Always Rings Twice

Felicity Huffman as Lynette Scavo in Desperate Housewives

Frustration. Hair-pulling frustration. That is what June in Paris means. More than the heat, it's the endless, mind-numbing lists of "documents" needed for all the different "dossiers d'inscriptions" that do me in every year at this time. If you want your kids to do any kind of "activité" or be enrolled in any kind of day-care program or school for the following September, you need to fill out an application and provide various "documents." And we're not talking about online forms and PDFs here. Sometimes you actually have to call (often several times before being able to speak to the "directrice") in order to set up an appointment just to collect said list of "documents." It's almost enough to make you consider not working so that you can home-school your kids (and somehow also teach them violin, ballet, piano, tennis, and taekwondo). But if reason gets the better of you and you decide to enroll your children in activities with other children, then be warned: don't toot the victory horn too soon. One morning after waiting a week for my daughter's medical form to come back from her pediatrician's office, I naively thought I could tick "fiche sanitare" off the list for her "garderie" application. I recognized my self-addressed stamped envelope when I opened the mailbox and could already feel the elation of being able to proceed to the next step: calling the "directrice" to set up an appointment to drop off the completed paperwork. But when I picked up the envelope, it was suspiciously light. That's when I saw that it was in fact torn and empty. I couldn't believe it. Not only would I have to go back to the "garderie" for a new medical form and call back the pediatrician's office, but I was also going to spend part of my day filing a "réclamation" form with the post office. Please don't tell me you need
a "dossier" to buy a bottle of rosé.

Where Are You From?

Lucille Ball, Keith Thibodeaux, and Desi Arnaz as the Ricardos. [Online image] 1956.

Whether at home in Paris or back home in California, I get asked the same question. Where are you from? It's like I have "foreigner" stamped on my forehead no matter where I go. (Well, stamped on my tongue is more like it.) After 10+ years living in France, my English does have a bit of a lilt to it, and I end up "searching my words" (and, yes, translating French expressions directly into English). And as for my French: well, I never could pronounce "r," "ou," or "u." My French in-laws love trying to make me say words like "citrouille" just so they can hear the tortured syllables escape my American mouth, as my brain searches in vain for safe alternatives: "potiron"? There's only one thing I can do: swallow my pride and admit that the person asking me the question has the home advantage. . . though I do have the advantage of having two homes.

Bringing Up Bébé

 

Katherine Hepburn as Susan. [Online image] 1938.

I didn't like Bringing Up Bébé from the minute I heard about it. And I never would have started reading it if my French mother-in-law hadn't sent me a copy last year while I was on vacation. I mean, an American mom in Paris writing glowing anecdotes about "French mothering" (that has be an oxymoron, by the way)!? She can't be talking about the same French moms I see on a daily basis. Ok, I'll admit (grudgingly) that Parisian moms may have the guilt-free "work-life balance" down better than we English-speaking expats. But if embracing the mantra, "the perfect mother doesn't exist," means that you have no qualms about pushing your Maclaren down the street with one hand while dangling a lit cigarette from the other, I'd really rather continue living with my Anglo-Saxon guilt. 
As for the whole relaxed-and-seductive French mother spiel: of course they're cool and collected and sneaker-free! They're holding down a desk job all day--not chasing after a toddler! I still remember running into my husband's French colleague (and mother of two) last spring. She was out on her lunch break, and I was hurrying to the bus with my son after a Gymboree class. "You look tired!" she told me in surprise. A few months later, our two families spent a summer afternoon together because we were vacationing nearby. "I'm exhausted!" she said, admitting that being an around-the-clock mom was hard work. I managed what I hoped was a cool and collected smile of empathy, while my sandaled, vacation-happy feet took me for a triumphant victory lap--without the least bit of guilt.
 

Plastic or Nothing?

F. Huffman & D. Savant in DH

Asking for bags at a Paris grocery store (La Grande Epicerie aside) can feel a lot like pulling teeth--deeply rooted, French teeth. You hold your breath as the checker eyes your groceries--trying to eyeball the bare minimum of bags needed to carry your bananas and yogurt home in one piece--before doling them out begrudgingly, one by one.
Walking down the street later with your coveted sacs--especially if they're brightly colored Monoprix bags--you can't help feeling a bit triumphant. You can already see their pink glow lining your bathroom wastepaper basket or enveloping your bathing suit after tomorrow's swim.
But now all that is ending. Later this month, Monoprix will no longer be giving customers plastic bags at checkout. So it's back to buying drab army-green trash bags--or splurging at Fauchon when you're in need of some sacs en rose.

Switching Sides

"Not the other breast," my French husband whispered to me during a wedding ceremony last week, as he saw our baby finishing up on one "side." Breastfeeding has come a long way in France, but a few societal barriers remain. And nursing in a church seems to be one of them. I've breastfed in just about every public place possible here: on the bus, in restaurants, parks, and cafés. Even in front of my French in-laws. But as I left the ceremony mid-feed to continue on the chilly stone steps outside, I couldn't help feeling like I'd come up against a wall. Like when I mentioned La Leche League to a French mother I saw breastfeeding her one-month old. (LLL has the same bum rap here that yoga did six or seven years ago. People just assume it's a cult. That said, you should probably avoid attending "free" yoga classes in Paris.)  Once I was sitting down, though, enraptured by my baby's eager mouth, "always thirsty for the pure spiritual milk," I decided to think positively. After all, my husband actually understood now how breastfeeding works: switching sides and all. And my in-laws now knew first-hand what nursing on demand meant. So in some small way, I was showing the unsuspecting what breastfeeding was all about. Maybe one day it would even make it to Wii Fit. A Balance Board has got to be warmer than church steps.

John Krasinski and Jenna Fischer as Jim and Pam Halpert. [Online image] 2010.

Let 'em Cry, Let 'em Cry, Let 'em Cry!

As a new mother in Necker's maternity ward, I just assumed that my roommates (I was there long enough to have two) both happened to have severe emotional disorders--or hearing problems. What kind of person would just sit there chewing on tepid pintade while her newborn screamed? But my roommates were not the odd balls out in French motherhood. Apparently the French still believe that you can spoil a baby. Give into her caprices now (i.e.: pick her up), and you'll spend the next eighteen years with an obnoxious, whiny, manipulative monstre.
My Parisian gynecologist summed it up when she saw me flinching on the examination table as my two-month-old hollered in his stroller, just out of my reach. "Does that really bother you?" she asked as she continued the post-natal exam. I realized she was talking about my son's cries.
Yes, I'm afraid it does. Sucks to be human.  

Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable as Scarlett and Rhett Butler. [Online image] 1939.