How the City of Light and Love Reminded Me to Embrace Life

Why, despite years of complaining, I decided to “ look for the good.”

We read other writers on Medium for a variety of reasons. I recently wrote a piece about regret, so the headline below caught my eye. I was curious to read what end-of-life patients were sorry they hadn’t done. I’d read and liked Sara Burdick’s writing before. Also, my daughter, who graduated from nursing school at 52, is now a hospice nurse like Sara.

Turns out, a major regret of patients on their death bed is that they didn’t do what they wanted. Many regretted that they hadn’t traveled.

I Don’t Like to Travel

I’m not rushing my own death-bed scene, but I can assure you, I won’t be uttering the words, “I wish I’d traveled more.”

My dear friend Carla couldn’t believe it. Whenever she shared details of an upcoming safari, a camel ride to the pyramids, or some other exotic adventure she and her partner were planning, she’d ask:

How can you NOT like to travel?”

If by “travel,” you mean toting bags city-to-city, packing and unpacking in unfamiliar rooms, riding on buses or trams or pedicabs, count me out. Admittedly, I’m curious about camels. Giraffes, too. But when I think about what one has to endure to meet them in person, a zoo sounds more manageable

Ironically, the reality of my life is that for the last 20 years, I’ve lived sequentially in several places. One of them is Paris, a city on every traveler’s list.

I do nothing but complain about Paris — or at least that’s what my partner, a diplomat, thinks. She gets defensive. It’s because of her work that we live here.

With news of her first posting in Paris in late 2008, neither of us entertained my joining her. I had young grandsons then and wanted to watch them grow up. Just as important, my friends and work colleagues were in New York. For eleven years that back-and-forth arrangement suited me. It also never gave Paris a chance.

I can hear it now, a chorus of angry, bewildered readers exclaiming:

Get a grip, you ungrateful shrew. Boo-hoo — marooned in Paris, taking walks beneath the Eiffel tower every day. Where do we send donations to finance your rescue?

I know, I know. But it’s just not that simple.

The Lessons of Living in Paris

“You won’t let me go into a supermarket, but you want to schlepp me to Europe?” I said to my partner shortly after she had been appointed Ambassador to France — the proverbial offer no one could refuse. Occurring in the midst of the pandemic, it would be her second posting in the City of Lights. But this time, thanks to COVID, I couldn’t travel as freely as I’d done in the past.

At first, I just thought it would be more of the same, just a longer stay. I kicked and screamed. But a year-plus later — long enough to feel I actually live here — I have to admit: I’ve learned more about myself than Paris.

Just because others embrace it, chase it, or dream it, you don’t have to.

I might be curious to hear death-bed epiphanies or how others to respond to new life stages and challenges, but only I can decide what strategies or plans are right for me. Blindingly adopting a standard or a practice is, at best, like trying on the wrong-sized clothing. At worse, it can be suffocating.

To borrow from the fictional Stuart Smalley on Saturday Night Live, a lot of “should-ing” — doing what someone else deems “correct” — poses as advice these days. Instead, take a page from Becky Diamond’s playbook and be a “disruptor.” Mother of a 10-year-old, Becky stopped “should-ing” all over herself by tuning out the cultural messages about motherhood and listened to her own inner wisdom.

You take yourself wherever you go.

Any “place,” be it Paris or New York, is a set on which the drama of your life plays out. Different characters come on stage. The scenery and props change. Regardless, you are the constant — the protagonist.

The script is different in Paris — spoken in French, among other challenges — but I’m still me. Turns out, I do in Paris what I do everywhere else I live: cook, see friends and acquaintances, pick up new consequential strangers daily — and write. What’s there to complain about?

No place is ideal or without drawbacks.

When I bitch and moan about the place I’m in, I forget how blessed I am.

Paris is a magnificent city. If I could fill it with New Yorkers and my “people” back home, it might even be close to perfect. Then again, although New York is “home,” it doesn’t have the Eiffel Tower or to-die-for croissants. Both cities lack the small-town feel of Northampton, Massachusetts, where I once lived. And none of the aforementioned have the ocean, which recharges me.

When asked my “favorite” place, I inevitably answer “Fire Island,” a small beach community built on a sandbar in the Atlantic, accessible only in the summer and by ferry. The town, if you can even call it that, has no cars. The few overpriced restaurants are nothing like the fine dining in Paris or New York. The point: You can’t have everything anywhere — and maybe you don’t need it.

Having a foot out the door doesn’t bode well for any relationship — not even when your partner is a city.

Ask any therapist: If one person is always angling to get out, the relationship is doomed. If you want to make a union of two work, both of you have to be willing to hang in — do stuff together, share intimacies, respect each other. Paris never threatened to abandon me; I was the one who kept leaving.

For over ten years, I visited sporadically, returning because I “had” to — it was where my human partner lived. I gave her time and commitment — but I never committed to the City. When I returned in December of 2021, the pandemic prevented me from leaving. And by the time I could travel, to my surprise, I didn’t want to. I had settled in, accepted that I needed to build a relationship with Paris. It felt best to stay.

Challenging yourself is one key to a good life — and, if you’re lucky, a long one.

How you define challenge depends on who you are: learn how to play Bridge? reach out to a stranger? run a marathon? leave a dead-end job? Anything that chafes against the familiar and involves reasonable risk makes you grow. Sometimes life itself presents challenges — a new lover, a first child, an illness. You might see change coming — or it might take you by surprise. Either way, embracing your fears and stretching yourself lets you know you are what spiritual teacher Jeff Foster calls “passionately alive.”

Yes, it’s a risk to donate your life to what you love and what moves you and brings you joy, but I can only speak from experience and say that it’s absolutely worth it, because having a comfortable and predictable life pales in comparison to feeling deeply, passionately alive and meeting each new day with fresh eyes and an open heart.

I am grateful that Paris forced me out of my comfort zone and into the unfamiliar. As my old lady Zelda always reminded me, “Look for the good.” There’s plenty of it here. I just have to be willing to see it.

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