Good news! Karyn has decided to be French with me for the week! Now we need an official start date, and I think it will be Friday.
In the interim, we are studying up on how to become French. My first order of business is a FaceTime call with Stacey tomorrow morning. If anyone knows what’s happening at the French clambake, it’s Stacey.
But since I wanted to start right this minute (which feels super American), I turned to Google. I found a bunch of websites that gave me broad strokes on what we’ll need to do.
At Mon Petit Four, they suggested the following:
Embrace mealtimes. [Girl—or guy—not a problem.]
Incorporate more walks into your day. [This will and won’t be hard. It won’t be hard to increase “none” to “one,” but I also haven’t consented my bad knee about my plans. Unfortunately, I don’t live anywhere I can walk to something interesting or fun. But if I cross the highway, I can go to a peat moss farm! Ideally, I should live elsewhere. But that’s the plan, anyway.]
Practice less is more in terms of clothing. [By this they mean, having a few fine things, rather than seven of the exact same Talbots sweater in slightly different colors and degrees of pilling. So a purge is likely in order.]
Visit a farmers market. [I’ll have to see if any are still in season.]
Dress your best. [Suspect they would eschew the track pants with the hole in the crotch I am currently wearing.]
Pamper yourself. [I am all over this.]
Pick up a real book or actual newspaper. [But digital doesn’t get newsprint on my hands!]
Visit a theater or a gallery. [Does the Volo Auto Museum count? I mean, they have a Batmobile…]
Slow down and take it all at a leisurely place. [Nice in theory.]
Practice joie de vivre. [Meaning…?]
Okay, that was some help, but I figured there was more to it.
From Leonce Chenal, the instructions are:
Be a flâneur. [This means be an idler or a lounger. That might be tough. I am not one to take it easy. I like to joke that I will die at my desk, but when it happens, it probably won’t be so funny.]
Master the art of discretion. [But what if I don’t have anything to hide because I have a big, fat, attention-seeking mouth?]
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