Rainy days in Paris

Paris in the rain is glorious, especially if the rain isn’t hard and unrelenting. My wife Gaywynn and I were in Paris, staying in the 16th arrondissement at our friend Philippe’s grand apartment in May. Philippe’s place is on the rue Raynouard, not far from the Seine, within walking distance of Trocadéro. We stayed a week. We stayed long enough so that we fell into a kind of domestic routine. That included shopping for food. It’s a lovely way to experience Paris, and we were grateful.

Some days it rained. It never stopped us.

Philippe walked us around his neighborhood, showed us where he shopped for food, greeting all the shop owners who clearly knew him. Later, we followed in his footsteps. We cooked a few meals for Philippe, and so we needed to buy food.

Where we were.

We did our shopping mainly on the rue de l‘Annonciation, a narrow pedestrian street that flows into the broader, longer rue de Passy. We walked it many times, up and back, passing by all those shops and stores that truly sustain a neighborhood—butcher, produce, wine, bakery, seafood. Each is its own world, pulsing with tradition and high standards. Paris is a city of shops. (How many cities do you know still are?) They give you intimacy. They individualize you.

Rue de l’Annonciation. It became ours.

Sometimes, we would eat at Aéro, a brasserie at the end of rue de l‘Annonciation on the Place de Passy, where we could sit outside. We came to think of it as our brasserie. That’s what happens when you stay for a while in Paris. You find a place to call your own. You make an attachment to it. It belongs to you, and you belong to it.

After a week, we belonged to our neighborhood and to Paris.

We bought meat at Les Bouchers Doubles at 43 rue de l’Annonciation. We bought vegetables at Marché Couvert de Passy. We bought pastries at Aux Merveilleux de Fred—yes, I know, “Fred” doesn’t sound French—and bread at Aux Pains de Manon, both on rue de l’Annonciation. Did any of the people behind the counters recognize us by the end of the week? I’d like to think, or to pretend, they did. They always smiled, in any case.

Les Bouchers Doubles themselves.

Marché Couvert de Passy. We bought artichokes there.

Aux Merveilleux de Fred. When school lets out, there’s an endless line.

Some days we went to Monoprix, a store I like very much. The name, Monoprox, is not very romantic. It’s a practical place, with a practical name, and I always feel practical shopping there. You don’t shop at Monoprix for souvenirs, but you do find things you need. For splendor, Gaywynn and I went to La Grande Épicerie de Paris on rue de Passy, where we found the best France has to offer. It was amazing to see what they considered exotic produce from America—they sold Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, for example.

The entrance to Monoprix. The name is in red.

It rained several days while we were there. I never minded. I think rain brings out a stunning aspect of Paris. It makes the city moody, and me as well. I feel I’m a poet when I walk rainy Paris. Rain is disparaged too much, more than it should be. People talk about rain as if it were some kind of setback. It’s rain. That’s all. You can get wet. It’s all worth it when the rain is falling in Paris, and the gray light makes everything the best black and white film you’ve ever seen, and you smell the damp air and hear car tires hissing on the wet streets.

I think you can be a citizen of Paris by right of passion.

When it rained, we might dart into the Librairie Fontaine, a sweet bookstore on rue de l‘Annonciation. We discovered one of the young employees, who spoke flawless French, was American. I’d never heard any American speak French as well as he did. What I wouldn’t give to be able to work in a French bookstore! Well, here’s to reincarnation.

Inside Librairie Fontaine. All those marvelous books.

I speak French passably. If a Parisian speaks, as they do sometimes, at the speed of light, then I’m lost. If the conversation is at a reasonable clip, though, and it’s just the two of us, I can manage. Speaking a language not your own and that you don’t speak fluently is a lesson in humility and error. But when you speak French in Paris and are understood, that’s a chest-rising feeling. So, I jump in. I never mind being clumsy. They’re not going to report me.

Returning after a long day on the Left Bank, we walked from our Métro station, Passy, up the long hill to rue de Passy. We didn’t have the climbing energy the students who disembarked with us had. Never mind. There was Desgranges bakery waiting at the top, on rue de Passy, with something weight-increasing, but God did it taste good. That gave us the motivation we needed.

Then home to rue Raynouard, into the small, slowly-rising elevator, off at our floor, inserting the key Philippe had given us, opening the door, throwing ourselves onto his couch, restoring ourselves, and then ready, in a while, to venture out again.

Our corner of Paris. It’s in our heart.