Five Minutes in Paris

Paris, "City of Lights", core of civilization and mother of clichés. For there are few other places in the world that seem to invite cliché, that stock of expected images and experiences, with such intensity. The grand architecture, the sharp-shouldered Haussmannian boulevards, the little shops and the women in their little draped scarves--all are there on the surface, the presumed garnishments. And yet, it's all just a tease, an invitation, for what lies beneath and around this little "island of France." The word "cliché" itself has become so commonplace in our language that we forget it is French.

            Americans in Paris are almost as hoary an image as the street cafe. We provincials come to Paris, and have been coming here for more than two centuries, to get our first taste of difference, of the realization of life based on separate assumptions. In America, it often seems we live in spite of those around us, those other people with their competing needs and the shadow of institutions looming over us. We see life as a struggle, and happiness as something to be "pursued".    

            Call it a truism, call it cliché, but Paris presents a different conception. It's one where contentment isn't chased, it is merely inhabited. Parisiens are often seen as aloof, or grumpy, but at root they live out an optimistic idea. People-watching is the pastime of Paris because people--not natural vistas, not money--are the real story.