X.

Xavier came to St. Tropez for the weekend. It was sublime to have him here with me, even just a flick of him. I kept losing my breath, I wanted to show him and tell him so many things. We would get to a destination (after long scooter rides where he would pull stunts, like swinging the scooter back and forth in a swerving motion, which I did not like at all - it was like he was mocking my poor little lady. To be fair to him, my scooter's top speed is 50 km/h. Pathetic, but still) and Xavier, in his very French way, would remain unastonished. "Yeah, babe," he would say, gazing out at pristine, turquoise water: "C'est la mer méditerranée." Unastonished. Can you believe the sun, the sky, the wind, vineyards on the side of the road, the little village? "Yeah, babe." OK - so Xavier's family have a home two towns over and he did spend all his childhood summers here, even licking ice cream cones in the port of St. Tropez, but immune to all of this? I don't think so. Plus, I have discovered some things with which I know deep down he really was impressed (this, for example):



In any case, I was impressed with him on a number of occasions. By his baby pink shorts (and my hat, again, avec).



By his ability to explain what was going on here - said with a casual shrug, as if everyone had probably performed this undertaking at some point in their boy/girlhood. (The first scooter was out of order, so the guy behind just rode with one leg out, pushing his friend forward - this was not readily apparent. These two were teenage fools):



I was impressed when we pulled up to a parking area with clustered scooters that looked like they were in cahoots, making plans, they were so packed in, and Xavier's solution was to just to break them up. Break up the cliques. He just started moving scooters. No space to park, just rearrange. Very aggressive. Impressive. I was a little nervous that those who had just been scolded might take it out on my fair lady when we walked away - that we might find her tipped over when we returned (but there was no peer revenge in the end).

He shrugged at these flowers and the door behind them.



He did not, however, shrug at this puppy. He squatted down and pet it for a long time and made a pout-y face on top of it. We even walked past the little guy a second time on our way back from dinner to stop again.



Xavier also told off people in lines. It was really refreshing to watch him at work with the very same people in the line at the boulangerie who had made me growl softly a few mornings by just squeezing in front of me at the moment the woman working behind the counter switched to the next person and before I could say, mais, they had already placed their order. Xavier, by contrast, saw their tricks straightaway, turned to them unabashedly and ordered, "la queue c'est par la!", banishing them to the end. One person tried to explain, saying he had thought there was a separate line where one orders patisseries and where one orders things from the boulangerie. Xavier: "Did you also think there was a separate line for drinks and for the bread too?" (followed by the classic French pfff blowing noise out of skeptical cheeks). He is not one who will ever be walked on. He may be unastonished, but he is really hilarious at it.