
When my family lived in France, there was a mimosa tree growing outside our bathroom window. Smelling the flowers again brought back such a vivid image.
In the morning, it can still be cold, not that I'm ever out at that hour because it still doesn't get light until around 8, but there's a way that the air is starting to feel lighter, and when I venture over to Cortésine Park, there are smells of things starting to happen under the earth. Today I said hello to little daisies growing in the grass, along with the tiniest of periwinkle flowers. In the afternoon, no matter what the weather app says (cloudy, sometimes rain), it's sunny, pushing me out the door to La Mado for a café, where I'll sometimes write on my phone instead of laptop. No laptop lurkers here, instead talking.

They can't all be flattering. Me at my post.
Early on in my stay here, I wasn't ready to commit to the place I was staying for longer than February 5th, but soon after was, by which time it had been rented out for a few nights here and there. I deliberated for 10 minutes about the drag of packing all my things up a few times versus the drag of losing this location, and decided being a nomad wasn't so bad. Plus the lady who handles all the airbnb business, my first friend here, has been flexible about letting me leave things in secondary closets. So, it was off to "the Americans'", or the devil's valise, as my friend who also stayed there called it, as she got sick and I couldn't sleep, which is unusual. It's only a 10 minute walk, but just outside the city center, and while it has many mod cons that Jaubert doesn't have, being inside it is well, American, and makes breathing a little harder for me.

OK, there's a nice view from the bedroom at night

US of A
But at this point, it doesn't matter so much where I am for a few days. I know the lay of the land, have enough to do, and have started to be plugged in. Or is it plugged in? Within the last few weeks, I went all-in on the social opportunities, telling myself that I'd trying anything once. So, it's been a blur of things, one of which was a trip to Marseille to a Sicilian restaurant down a very narrow alley in an old, quiet and leafy residential neighborhood. It was situated in a built out garage that adjoined the two-storey house of the restaurant owner, and was full on a Wednesday at lunch. There is a store selling Italian produce in the back. It was a very good meal, curated by the kind Milanese woman who gave me a ride both ways, who provided context for why we were eating and drinking what we were. With the exception of one person who I had spoken to the week prior for about 20 minutes, they were all strangers, and I was the only native English speaker, though the intention of this monthly international luncheon is for English to be the lingua franca.

Sicilian lunch in the garage. Syria, US, Mexico, Italy, Syria, Cassis via Singapore, Paris and Thailand.
After the Franglish meet-up group last Saturday from 5-7pm, someone suggested going out to dinner, so about 12 of us marched off to a sushi restaurant nearby, and I sat next to a French engineer about my age who works at the unviersity and a French younger guy who looked like he spends a lot of time at the gym and works in cybercrime and AI. It was a lot of fun and a beautifully random group of people of both genders, wide variety of ages and nationalities. There were other nice meetings this week as well, inside, outside, lunch, morning coffee, afternoon apero, I was starting to see how this socializing could become life!
Last night I wasn't really feeling it, but pushed myself to go to the Franglish, after all what else was I going to do on a Saturday night? I slumped into my seat rather than my usual skip. As more people showed up, I became the only woman of about 12, staring at a sea of French and American men, all about my age. Something inside of me shut down. I tried to fake it for a while, but couldn't figure my way out, I had hit a socializing wall. After an hour, I excused myself and dragged my tired ass home.
It's a funny thing. The opportunity to tap into so many different nationalities has been one of the greatest priviledges of being here, I have loved it. But I realized that the combination of French not being my first language and all these people being new, necessitated me having the same introductory conversation over and over and over and over. Boston, digital nomad, chasseur de tête, Amsterdam weather, wedding in Carpentras, lived in Cassis as a young child, Centreville, 2 months, May. Of course, this is the natural start of any relationship and one that is meaningful will progress beyond, but with a few very nice exceptions, that's where these relationships are right now. And last night, I could't do it again.
On my way home, I began to wonder about the phenomenon of uprooting every few years. Most of the ladies at the Sicilian restaurant had moved from country to country, many times, with kids, for their husband's work. What is it like every time you pick up and go, leaving friends behind, starting all over? Does it affect the way you make friends? What you do? How involved you get? Do they, like me, get "just done"? This may be just me, but it would be particularly hard to be the one in the relationship who is always reacting to the life changes of the other, though I would imagine decisions are made together.
So, I came home that night and did some cooking, then started yet another book I'd have never chosen, but is in English and here at my place, The Ghost Writer by Philip Roth. Got some things scheduled this week but dialing it back a bit. French haircut. stay tuned!

Love these bouqet garnis that are available at the market. Making soupe bonne maman. Olive oil, one leek, two carrots, one celery stick with leaves, zucchini, bouqet garni cooked till caramelized, add broth, cook for a bit and then wiz. Good for what ails you.

Finished product

I bought these mushrooms from a man even older than me, whose big smile highlighted his many missing teeth. He tried to upsell me, with the wink of an eye, at 24 euros/kilo. When I dumped them out, at home there were pine needles in them, which you can sort of see (I left them in for added flavor, then took them out when cooked). So, I guess these were no hygenic, farmed mushrooms and likely a fair amount of labor was involved. And yes, they were delicious, roasted with a shallot and some soy sauce and olive oil, sherry vinegar on top when they were done.

Finished product, day 2

Mussels that really came out of the sea. Lots of scrubbing, but worth it, so much flavor.

Cours Mirabeau, main drag in the old city. Cafés, cafés, cafés. Always happening.

One of a kajillion fountains, on the Cours Mirabeau. I believe this one is spouting warm spring water, and love that there are green things growing out of it. There are usually birds on top.

The big fountain at the end of Cours Mirabeau with statues of Justice, Commerce and Agriculture watching over us

There's a story here, I've forgotten what it is. At some point, I'm going to do a tour of all the doors of Aix, and will report back then.
Miss you all!
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