A winter's day.

Morningside Park and the Church of Notre Dame brooding above is one of my favorite places to walk to in the city. Especially in the winter.

La piscine.

There are people in St. Tropez who would never go swimming here (la Ponche - the least touristy, but most charming area of town) - too close to town, maybe a little gritty, seaweed deep down, etc. The people who do are pretty great: 13-year old boys who do backflips off the side of the concrete edge, me (cannonballs and dives), kids (cannonballs too), old ladies who breaststroke in the water and watch the tricks with a big grin on their face. To be fair, this is the closest swimming hole to the heart of St. Tropez and it is never crowded. The water is deep enough to dive into. I swim far out in this pool and then climb the ladder again to jump off again. I keep telling myself it will be the last time, but I just keep jumping back in.

Rambling Paris and New York thoughts.

Look at all those windows. Like stars in New York.


And this is where the row boats take a break next to drippy trees.


Back to Paris - another church looking like King Kong, ready to eat the street it faces. Get ready Miss June.


A velvety red Paris staircase with shadows only Paris could keep.

Shadows on the petals.

Today the sun was out in batches, and when it was, they ruled out working productively.

Au revoir for now.

An ode to...

Mlle.

La cathédrale Saint-Alexandre-Nevsk.

This one is hidden so nicely, you are walking along in the 8th arrondissement and then rue Daru and this Russian Orthodox Church pop up on you. Quite an imposing and lovely surprise. It looks like it shouldn't fit in its position in the city, but somehow it does.



I loved the community board, where Russians in Paris post their announcements.

Parisian Finale (to a day).

Sun of the Corsican variety.

I went swimming here.



And here.



Here too.



I went to Corsica alone. I invited Xavier; he was uninterested (or employed, I couldn't figure out which weighed more in his 'no'). He's pretty bossy (one of the things I really do like); so I am (I like that more). So, ça va, quoi. I not only went without Xavier, I also went for three days with hardly any words. The time drew out like a stretched out slinky - I had so much more of it than I ever thought I would. So it would seem that words stab time and force it into smaller clods and ergo you get more bits and less overall taffy (that which, for me in Corsica, was stretched). At least that is how I feel about it after being soused by words again today. There were all sorts and they all seemed to take on overimportant personalities: backer, commander (the squishing kind), incomer, monkey (the mimicking kind), grownup, encroacher, vamp (love those - especially in gay paris), enchanter - the words all around me today felt like beings who were taking form and closing in. Strange words to describe words. But these characters also made the day whiz by (tightly wound slinky). I also read Colette in Corsica, which might have something to do with it. Brilliant (I am in love).

Iles Sanguinaires.

Magnificent. They loomed out there - the Sanguinary Islands in Corsica. I was taken.





There was a trail to climb to the stone tower - the sea hemming every side, the wind surging - a sea mistral, sweet not mean, as I ascended.





The view from the top was straight down, dizzying.

But wait...

Before I go - or went - at this point I am mid-travel, there was this. This is the Conservatory Garden in Central Park (at 106th Street and Fifth Avenue). You must go now. The blossoming will not last. I was furiously riding my bike from work to get home in order to race to the airport and in passing, I couldn't not stop. These gates open onto the most delightful garden - transport you out of New York to European gardens. I could only stop fleetingly and now I'm pining to return, thinking of the path of pink petals and the rest of the gardens (it is pretty extensive) that I didn't get to witness.








(Ignore the lady on the bench's little sneer).

Lunar.

Walks in Provincetown sometimes feel like lunar rambles - colossal sand dunes, wide stretches of white, tides moving over a space devouring it, gripping it and then letting it go again. You feel like you are somewhere at the very end of something and there is just a vast sweep in front of you.







Until you arrive somewhere else. Like this lighthouse. Then you aren't on the moon anymore, but just at the very end of the projecting mass of land called Cape Cod.