Seeking more joyous inefficiency

Observations on the streets of Paris

Not a postcard

I just got back to Portland after a 10-day vacation in Paris with my friend,

giyen

. It’s hard to say that without feeling a little sheepish. I mean, I sort of hit the jackpot. 10 days of art and elegant gardens and history and grand boulevards and beautiful people and sidewalk cafes and incomparable food! In Paris! With my friend!

The jet lag is mostly behind me and I’m settling back in at home. Funny how our trip already feels dream-like. Part of the magic and frustration of travel is the change in one’s mindset and behavior that feels effortless while you’re away, but quickly fades once you return.

I’m thinking about how it felt to be a human on the streets of Paris.

Walking around Paris felt like a portal to a way of being with people I haven’t experienced in a long time, and I deeply miss. At a time when we’re facing an epidemic of loneliness and a lowered baseline of social ease left over from pandemic lockdowns, I can’t stop thinking about how different it felt there.

There was a liveliness and conviviality we noticed in the shops, on the trains, and walking through parks and past cafes. I’m not talking about American-style friendliness with big smiles and eye contact, but something more basic and seemingly mundane: the simple fact of people interacting and being close in a variety of ways.

I wish Substack had smell-o-vision

There was lots of touching (romantic and non-romantic)

So much hand-holding! Couples, sure, but also friends of all genders and parents and their adult children. Boisterous young men striding down the street with arms thrown over each others’ shoulders, women holding hands as they walked and chatted, restaurant servers warmly clapping the shoulders of their regulars, and sweethearts walking arm in arm and hip to hip. We all have our own personal space needs, especially post-pandemic, but the normality of seeing all this non-charged, casual touch made walking around Paris feel intimate and human.

The sidewalk cafes were packed, and not just with tourists.

Paris is famous for its sidewalk cafes, but wow, were they packed! Every night! People were practically draped over each other as they laughed and talked over drinks, bites and cigarettes. People were seriously out and about. Apples-to-oranges, perhaps, but I couldn’t help but notice the contrast with quieter “third places” back home.

Also: we didn’t see many phones on cafe tables.

Phones were noticeably scarce.

It wasn’t just the restaurants. Giyen and I remarked on how few phones we saw around us while we ate our picnic lunch in a park. The benches were full of people napping, reading books or newspapers, chatting or just taking in the scene. There were also a couple adorable make-out sessions in progress. Very few people were scrolling on their phones.

Same thing on the trains — lots of people looking out the window, reading, daydreaming…not so many phones.

We were amazed, and then we were sort of sad about being amazed. It shouldn’t be so striking to see human beings relaxing in such everyday ways. Should it? And yet, it was.

I know, everything’s rosy on vacation.

The “life is better in Europe” trope is overly simplistic so I don’t want to push these observations too far. But the deep well of longing my time in Paris cracked open is worth some attention.

I miss the small human connections I took for granted before social media and Internet shopping erased them. Not just more time with friends, or more friends in general, but the casual, often nonverbal interactions with strangers, “parallel play” in parks, and undistracted presence in my physical surroundings. I knew this already, but it took spending enough time outside my usual environment to really feel it.

I’ve let myself get lulled into a complacent, defeatist belief that this is just how we live now. Paris showed me I’ve got more agency at my disposal, but I have to push myself to use it.

Vacation isn’t real life, and I can’t just transplant the Parisian lifestyle to Portland. But there’s plenty I can still do to shift my social experience at home.

• I’m disrupting my scrolling habit by practicing tough love with an app blocker. I uninstalled social media apps a long time ago, but I still have a problem with random Googling and checking the New York Times multiple times per day. Substack Notes is also becoming a problem. With my app blocker active on my phone and iPad, I can only access my browser and the Substack app during a 2-hour window each day. If I miss that window, 🙅‍♀️.

• I’m making smaller but more frequent trips to the store. Since I can’t scroll on my phone I’m more inclined to browse and chat with folks.

• I’m carrying a book and a notebook with me. If I find myself with in-between time, I read, journal, doodle, or look around.

• I’ve set up reminders to call friends instead of text. It takes more time to call and sometimes I alarm my friends (“is something wrong??”). But what better way to use my time than to invest it in my relationships?

It’s just a start, and I’m not gonna lie — some of these shifts are uncomfortable.

Breaking old habits involves friction and time. I feel a squidgy, jittery feeling when I reach for my phone and remember it’s blocked. But my life literally depends on this, so I’m sticking with it.

I spent years digging under the couch cushions for spare moments. That’s no longer necessary now that my kids are grown. It’s time for more joyous inefficiency!

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📝 NOTES OF NOTE

• Sarah Von Bargen touched on similar themes in 3 Comically Small Things That Radically Improved My Life (and One Not-Small Thing) at

  Yes & Yes
  .

• I loved

  Sarah Wheeler
  ’s scruffy hospitality story about her “successful" crafternoon and stoop cake + coffee. “What’s the metric for opening yourself up for community and having it be worthwhile? I suppose, only that connection occurs. I am still deeply afraid that everyone secretly hates me, and every time I invite people to the movies and get crickets or lead a workshop and have to move everyone up to the front rows at the beginning so it isn’t embarrassing, I cringe. But it’s worth it, every time. For one person, one interaction, and for all the times you embarrass yourself and it means something to someone else.” 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 Read If You Build It They Might Not Come at
  Momspreading
  .

• I’m not a muffin person but that hasn’t stopped me from craving these blueberry muffins by

  Alison Roman
  . Speaking of cravings,
  Catherine Newman
  ’s Illia Chicken was so delicious I made it again the next day with a $1 can of Herdez Salsa Verde.

• I topped the chicken with pickled red onions and maintain that keeping a jar of pickled onions in the fridge makes everything better. Quick pickled onions take minutes to make and very few ingredients: I use this recipe at Bon Appétit. I was out of apple cider vinegar so subbed white vinegar and it was fine.

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Thanks for reading Parent of Adults. I’m Asha Dornfest, a Portland, Oregon-based author & parent of two young adults, and this newsletter is my invitation to compare notes on life beyond the empty nest.

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