Sara does skiing

When I was a kid, my mother invested large amounts of money in my skiing education. My sister and I, every year, heavily kitted out, would be sent to the mountains to learn how to ski. I was never very athletic, but I liked skiing. There's an element of fun, of freedom, of swishing glory about going down slopes. And when you go up again in the mechanical chairs, you get to enjoy the beautiful contrasts between the dark rocks and the crisp, smooth layer of snow.

My boyfriend's parents own a lovely apartment next to a skiing resort and he invited me for a few days. I haven't skied seriously in years, but I jumped on the opportunity. I needed a break, and I wanted to spend some time with AD, and even the prospect of meeting seven of his friends was not enough to deter me.

The train station in the mountains was typical of any small French station: empty and gloomy. I waited for the bus that would take me up, and discovered that I was the only passenger in a 200-place bus. Up we go. The driver was a small, bearded man, with clever eyes. When he engaged me into conversation, I answered politely, trying to keep my eyes on the road so I wouldn't be violently sick.
Turns out he was a militant Muslim and obviously quite keen on converting me.
"What does faith mean! Why don't you accept God in your life?"
I was slightly worried by the fact he did not seem to pay any attention to the winding roads ahead, and tried to talk in a placating way. Whenever he got heated up, he waved his hands away from the steering wheel. I was feeling very nauseous by this point. After swerving violently, the bus almost crashed into a rock. I was almost hoping we would have to stop, so I could be quietly sick behind a tree. No such luck: I was theologized at for an hour.

Finally we arrive.

AD was waiting for me at the bus stop and I was so happy to see him. Still very dizzy and unwell, I went to the apartment to Meet the Gang.

It went quite well. I liked his friends and got along well with them. And oh, the skiing. AD is a very good skier, but I'm a very reckless one. I love skiing very fast and jumping off bumps, and taking difficult slopes. I had a lovely time. At the bottom of one of the slopes, AD smiled at me.
"You have a very...aggressive style."
We skied mostly with his ex-girlfriend-turned-best-friend, who was a good skier and great company. She also adores mountain cheese, so we bonded over that.

Skiing all day, cooking huge cheese-based meals in the evening, and then talking all night to AD: pretty much perfect.

Of course, on the way back to Paris, I had to take an (empty) bus back with my theologian driver, who continued to proselytize and piss me off, but this time I didn't feel so queesy, so I could react intelligently, instead of murmuring monosyllables while clutching my seat.

Now it's back to work. But I have a few freckles on my nose to show that I had a holiday.

milkshakes and fries

It's snowing outside, and I'm reading a book about international law statutes. I'm holding a cup of hot tea between my hands, warming them, trying to concentrate. I like his desk, but I work on his dining room table, with art books and novels scattered about, and the Harrowgate Toffee I brought back for him from Cambridge. Just slam the door when you leave, he told me, before going to the movies. I like working in his flat, surrounded by his things.

I took him to his first classical concert. He overtipped the usherette, so that she moved us to wonderful seats in an empty theatre box, full centre, and we listened to Beethoven together. Then we drank lots of champagne and I forgot the entire conversation we had. I was afraid I had said something wrong, something mean, something scared, but the next morning he was there, and he hugged me. He was there.

Let's take this day by day. I said, OK. I don't know what that means, but I'm going to try. We have our own lives, our own things, and when we go out together to have dinner with friends, we never stay too close. But then he smiles at me from the other side of the room. There's a tacit convention between us: this is who I am, this is how I am. I'm not better than this. Day by day.

For my birthday we're going to have milkshakes and fries in the best milkshake place in Paris.

You're strange, he said. And it's strange how well we get along. We're very different.

I like him.

Special Snowflake

(The sign said originally "Road works closed to the public"-Chantier interdit au public- but some nihilist soul transformed it into "Happiness and opportunities denied to the public"-Chance interdite au public)


It's snowing here in Paris! It hasn't happened in years. In France we react to snow in a way that amuses my now American sister: "What, a couple of inches and you can't deal?"
No, we can't. As soon as the smallest flake arrives, salt trucks arrive. Accidents multiply. People complain. (Well, even more than usual). I'm sitting in the library, looking at the snow from the window. I love watching it. I remember when someone first told me that each snowflake is different. I didn't believe them. I went to look it up and then I tried to examine flakes under my father's big lense, but they always melted too fast.

In America, I learned the expression "Special Snowflake". At first I thought it was redundant, since every snowflake is special, then I realized it was an insult. I think it's a very poetic insult.

And the worse of it is I do think everyone is a Special Snowflake. I don't mean that anyone deserves special treatment, but that we are all different. We may behave in predictable patterns, but then so does snow. And to me snowflakes are so poignant in their sad descent, their perfection beyond my grasp or my lense. I know that many wonderful people cross my path too briefly for me to know just how special they are, and all the alternative lives I could live are as short-lived as a handful of snow.

So I'm reclaiming the expression. It sounds like an endearment to me.

"Come here, my Special Snowflake!"