Slush Pile #1: The French Lunch
The best way I can describe the French way of living is lunch. A French-Algerian finance consultant complained about New York in this way over a cigarette in Paris: “On Wall Street they think I’m crazy for taking an hour for lunch. Americans just grab a salad in the Uber or turn it into a meeting to crunch numbers. I need to sit down and have a real meal in a restaurant with some wine- Is the point of making money not to enjoy yourself?”
The bus driver on my 9 hour bus ride to Bordeaux stopped the bus every couple hours to roll a filterless cigarette and inhale, his grey knit sweater the same color as his curly hair. We stopped for lunch at a typical gas station stop, with food better than most Minnesota cafes, and my American instincts kicked in. I immediately bolted to the bathroom, praying that if I was fast enough I would be able to grab a sandwich on the way back to the bus. Food in hand from a successful bout of pointing and nodding with two of the four French phrases I know, I bite into a pear, ravished, as I scuttle back to the bus, ten minutes into our stop. Only one other passenger follows- a British lady (a Frenchwoman would never wear such hideous pants). The bus is locked. The bus driver is slowly chatting to the gas station attendant, enjoying his second cigarette. I go back in, and all the seating inside the rest stop cafe is taken, tired French travelers young and old sipping away the dust of the road over small cups of strong coffee.
15 minutes in, the bus driver is seated with his cafe chicken sandwich, fruit dessert, and drink, napkin folded on his lap with his newspaper, adjusting his spectacles. I’m pacing the store, trying my best not to beg the smokers outside for a cigarette. Following the sandwich, fruit dessert, and drink, the harried travelers are all waiting outside the bus, backpacks strapped. The bus driver slowly rolls another cigarette and smokes it.
One of my favorite activities in France is dog-watching. Ferenczi observed that “Character traits are secret psychoses,” and we express our own psychoses best through our dogs. Dogs are man’s best friend and most friendly holding cell of our Freudian habits. A friend of mine who clearly suffers from undiagnosed anxiety has a prozac prescription for her poor dog, while my family dog Lulu was, like my father, always on a diet yet hopefully gazing at another piece of pie. In France, most dogs are quite chubby, looking contented and ready for a nap, while the populace balances their taut leashes on trim wrists. In America, it is tantamount to animal abuse to have a fat dog, while most white midwestern housewives eat so poorly I wonder how their insides haven’t simply run away from boredom. A dog has 12 years to live- it would be criminal to not give them a proper French lunch.
Eve Babitz said that Italians are children, which is why she and I get along with them so well because we are children. The British are rowdy teenagers- already ready for a pint and insecure enough to push their culture on their world, once upon a time. The French, then, are grandparents. They sit outside cafes, stubborn and amused as only the old can, shaking their heads at people who don’t know how to eat or drink or love.
“Paris in the rain” happens every 30 minutes… no wonder existentialists were French