Serge led us up the steep four flights to his ancestral apartment where the ever-pragmatic Gisela [whom I don’t believe we’d since since we were in Chalon-sur-Saône in 1991 for an artists’ residency] had prepared the place immaculately for our visit.  We were soon, however,

down, in constant conversation, the street to la Palette, his replacement local since Orestias  closed, for lunch outside where I learned many things, including but not limited to how much the French still enjoy their cigarettes, as well as that the origin of the People’s Synthesizer had been inspired by Pulsa’s* [A group with whom I enjoyed a peripheral association for many years through correspondence and sporadic collaboration, none involving electronics] and though their machine had no descendants Serge’s lives on, now semi-legendary…plus we all had lots to say about friends mutual, lost or current and much much [but never enough] else before the two of them took off for Veneux while L. and I settled in until five when in a slight rain [not shown] we walked a very few blocks to meet our great friends

Enrico and subsequently Itaka at the elegant Les Editeurs for tea/coffee and talk.  Enrico, with the as yet unmet Bernard Becker, current owner of Radar Ranch, will be in Benicia Tuesday the 16th for food and maybe business, which just shows how far behind this blog might be running…so far behind, in fact, that that most pleasant lunch [sans ‘business’] was over a week ago now.  E. and I. left for a musical recital, we located a sad supermarket for a few essentials [Givry, for instance, not sad at all], then went home to hole up with our minimal provisions and backlog of work, not venturing out until after breakfast when [E already flying West] we connected with Itaka at le Cafe Buci [best orange juice ever, croissant, and hot drinks

while waiting] for a privileged look in on her mother’s studio in a tiny courtyard in magical hidden Paris, just around the corner and up a passage from the cafe.

Late morning we walked the Rue du Seine to the Seine where directly across lay the Louvre for

several annoyingly disappointing experiences; long security lines, non-functional credit card

readers and finally mobs to wade through to reach one of the vaunted fifteen or so eating establishments where all we found was a long line snaking towards packaged

sandwiches and reheated quiche but were at least able to sit down outside and finally study the Map on which we located some Wings of Interest and another restaurant [wanted to see what we’d missed].  So, refreshed if not sated, we retraced our steps through the galleries

of Selfie-Shooting Orientals among massive turgid canvases around to and through les Artes

Decoratifs to find the Area of Interest [and restaurant] inexplicably closed off…hmm.  We slogged more stairs in search of Northern Europeans where, after the ‘moderns’ [many looking very like thrift store finds at best] and galleries of gigantically overwrought religious motifs – shit’s always crashing out of or into the sky, right?

– came up against yet another inexplicable  and unexplained closure.

Back through the overwroughts and under-accomplisheds to find the ascenseur crammed with wheelchairs wanting Down, so descended via the same seemingly endless stairs past interesting-looking rooms of meso-American pottery which came too late; we were beat.

…plus had to beat back through more hordes to the chaotic grand-central-station-like lobby under Mr. You Will Pay [for climate control]’s ecologically stupid pyramid [People do love this thing, right?], after which, seeking Escape, we finally found an inconspicuously humble escalator

leading upwards into, eventually, the Light.

Outside [note wife asleep in the cab]

for the walk across the river, up the rue, past the Canine

and up the many stairs…

Next morning we stayed in until the Delacroix Museum opened, two doors up and in every way

a much welcome anti-Louvre; intimate, quiet, contemplative.  It was the painter’s last home, having returned to the arrondissment of his birth to work on a final commission, St. Suplice,

He added a studio in the garden in the back, where some of his collections, sketches and

contemporaneous works reside, as well as in the house, and St. Suplice was a short walk away.

A walk we took as well,

returning through the neighborhood

to la Palette [this time eating in] and home for

more catching-up work.  An early dinner at Cafe Buci, settling inside by ourselves

[sidewalk cigarettes, motor fumes and perfumes being too much for our country sensibilities] for meltingly delicious Fois Gras de Canard, endive salads and pinot noir

was followed by a tour of the neighborhood’s many artful shop windows

and home to finish up the Givry for dessert and our too-soon-last night.

Last day allowed a mere morning’s walk…we soon packed off

for the Gare du Nord which we were fortunate to reach with what seemed like more than enough time but, due mainly to the obtuseness of the Brits’ “Border Forces”, nearly wasn’t.

We boarded the train with minutes to spare [hundreds behind us probably didn’t] where I found myself seated next to no window and after two and a quarter hours

were back in jolly Angleland, regardless.

Up in the Heights of Hampstead a Bolognese was simmering on the Aga…

*Coincidentally enough the person pictured in the article cited was the young Serge Tcherepnin, seated absorbing Mystic Truth[s] at Harmony Ranch, Connecticut.