It is long walks to nowhere and everywhere, losing your way halfway through, finding something you never imagined you’d see by the end, losing sight of your limitations when you come face to face with the same streets where your heroes once walked.
It is losing touch with your past and finding what you lost all at once. It is fresh bread and cheap wine, a warm bowl of soup on the sidewalk, cold air and warm sun, cigarettes and hot chocolate.
It is a feeling of belonging somewhere that seems to go on forever, even after you’ve covered it on foot time after time. It is old and new, beautiful and hideous, full of love but nobody wants to talk to you. There is a freedom in this isolation that I have yet to find elsewhere.
Paris is where my midnight self comes to life in the daylight. Where my wildest ideas seem possible, and a blank page is a possibility, not a menacing reminder of failure.
It is the city of my dreams, the only physical place where I feel completely at home.
C'est Lidi 