Paris 1992: Part One

Bonne année mes amis! For the month of January 2026, I will be in Paris again, albeit pas exactement. You see, I’ve rediscovered a journal of my travels there in October 1992, and as happens when revisiting magical times, I’ve found myself in Paris again on my 47th birthday.  January as we know well can be long and cold, so my plan is to take you with me over the coming weeks, back to the City of Light and a fall in Paris that was truly magical.

For my birthday that October, Kit gave me a lovely journal in which to capture what was to be our first trip to Paris.  Across from his inscription inside the front cover, I glued a picture of un petit éléphante being carried by a colorful air balloon past the Eiffel Tower. Before long, the journal grew as fat as the little elephant with letters, postcards, plane and train ticket stubs, menus, photographs, hand-drawn maps, and notations that remain a delightful chronicle of our excellent adventures in Paris, 17-24 Octobre 1992.

Looking back through the journal’s pages, I am reminded that it was a simpler time when people still wrote letters and mailed postcards written while sitting at sidewalk cafés.  Months before we left Breakfast Creek,  letters had flown back and forth between our local bureau de poste in tiny Hartsburg, MO and our son Hayden at his Paris apartment. Back then without an iPhone that took incredible pictures, had the ability to access instant information, and provided GPS maps, I traveled with a hefty camera plus lenses and several dense travel guides. Sans iPhone or cell phone, I was as prepared as I could be in those times for mapping our explorations on foot around and on the outskirts of Paris. 

That week, we stayed at 31 Rue de Saintonge in Paris’s Arrondisement 3, and Hayden stayed across the Seine with Kit’s niece Kashya.  Before our arrival, he’d prepared an “area plan” complete with sketches of the apartment’s floor plan, drawings of how to assemble his three part French coffee maker,  names of local boulevards and streets, color codes indicating the location of his post office, a great bakery to eat baguette, pain au chocolate, croissant aux beurre d’amande, a restaurant along Rue Bretagne where we could find poule roti (great roast chicken), coffee shops with great cappuccino, handy supermarkets, pharmacies, newsstands, and the location of Metro Line #8.

Warmed by cozy sweaters and a wall furnace, we began our days with un petit déjeuner of Hayden’s quick oatmeal and jus d’orange prepared in our tiny kitchen. Each morning, we descended the winding flights of stairs to the street, and filled with excitement, we marched forth into the city!  Mais bien sûr, we saved plenty of time for a quick nap back at Rue Saintonge after our full days of march…march…march…before dinner each night.

Our first exploration took us from Rue Saintonge to Rue Bretange, alive with Sunday morning activity. Along the way, we walked past the cours des halles (our corner green grocery) where early each morning I watched from our third-floor balcony as deliveries of fruits et legumes were delivered—tomatoes, green beans wax beans, huge lettuce and cabbage heads, onions, shallots, garlic, potatoes, lemons and many varieties of apples. 

The Place de Vosges—considered by many to be the most beautiful square in the world—was our first destination.  Entering this magnificent 17th century arcade surrounding interior gardens, we found ourselves at a lovely open-air café under one side of the arcade.  There I experienced my first flakey pain au chocolat pastry and frothy cappuccino.  In my journal, I later made a note that French author Victor Hugo lived in an apartment in the Place de Vosges, perhaps while writing The Hunchback of Notre-Dame.  

That night, Kit and I enjoyed our first dîner in the neighborhood at Chez Omar—vin rouge and  Omar’s French Algerian couscous (which Omar explained one does not eat with bread).  Back at 31 Rue Saintonge that evening, Kit sipped a glass of wine and penned the following note in my journal before heading to bed.

Darling,

Wherever you are on this day, as you write in your journal and reach this page, recall the loveliness of our Parisian visit.  Hour after hour, day after day, of sweet exploration…just as we both hoped it would be.  What fun to think that we actually put it all together and walked through so much history past while in Paris!  I hope that words flow into the journal and that the pages come alive with your thoughts and visions. 

Te adoro, K
(To be continued….)