The City of Love

After choosing the wrong terminal to exit the RER from Paris to reach Chris' KLM arrival and being honked at by a bus to indicate where to find him, I awaited anxiously and nervously for him to exit the customs doors, inspecting each person that passed with hope. In the end I turned around to find him standing there with tears yet happiness and relief in his eyes. We hugged and cried for a bit and then moved on to start our European adventure. It was odd to see him in a beard and what my mom refers to as a "dooflopper hat" but he looked gorgeous as usual and I fell instantly back into the comfort of being with him. It was as if those three months were three days. But he had been sick the whole flight and got no sleep so once the hotel finally let us check in we took an easy first day in Paris; a nap, a stroll along the Seine after eating at my pizza place in the Quartier Latin by Notre Dame, carousing around the Louvre since it was free but only going to exhibits we wanted to see, a gorgous walk down the lit Champs-Elysées until the Arc de Triomphe where we headed in for the night. In the end we saw all I hoped we would in the three days. I went inside the Opéra Garnier for the first time to see the Chagall ceiling, we saw the Christmas shopping madness and decorations of the Galeries Lafayettes (but oddly the streets were mostly empty in Paris, most people leave for Christmas to their families in the countryside I believe), amazing Chris by the height and oddity of the Eiffel Tower and then continuing through the Champ de Mars to l'Hotel des Invalides (and giving directions to people from Charlotte), seeing Sacré Coeur and Montmartre (both the poor and the calm parts), going for vin chaud in the Christmas market by l'Arche de la Défense, and taking a walk down the Canal St. Martin to see fake homeless tents for a media ploy. It was a good trip for me also because I saw a side of Paris that I hadn't seen without meaning to, a more realistic side of the city that made it less dreamlike but the romance was everpresent spending my time there with Chris. It was nice to re-remember his little antics, such as the look he makes when he really enjoys the food, and nice to see how happy being there and with me made him.