We'll Always Have Toledo

I haven't done anything outside of my routine for well over a week. Aside from taking 2nd prize in a Halloween Costume Contest, that is. So, my routine? Awake at 6....okay, snooze button until 6:30. Then up out of the cozy bed, coffee brewing, NPR on, and into the shower. Then out of the shower, into the clothes, hair dry, face on and coffee in mug, English Muffin in hand. Work at 8, lunch at 12:30, gym at 6, dinner at 8 followed by a book in bed and then.....awake at 6....:30. Mind-numbingly boring, non?

I made the mistake of discussing this mundanity with my mother this week. The Grande Dame of Quotidian Existence (sorry, mom) was very quick to point out that my expectations are far too grandiose for life and suggested I break the monotony with a new hobby like knitting instead of, as she put it, "going off half-cocked" and moving to Paris. Can a 6-year-plan really be described as being "half-cocked"? So, all of this got me thinking about perception and expectation: how can a life that is so common to me be so comforting to someone else?
Copyright © 2008 A Southern Belle Goes to Paris, y'all

I don't think humdrum routine is at all uniquely American and although in my mind everyone living in Paris is chic and wakes every morning to singing birds, church bells chiming the hour and a p.d. of croissant and café au lait in Limoges porcelain on a beautiful terrace overlooking a well-manicured parc or romantic streetscape before making their way onto the cobblestone around 10 for a day of exploring Paris and sipping things from very small tasses while reading Proust, I am well aware that this is a faulty perception. Maybe at the end of this journey, I'll move my life to Paris and find it lacking the cinematic lustre it has in my fantasies when it, too, becomes stale and routine. But my money is on the maybe not.

Is the idea that something (a city, a change in life, whatever it may be) isn't what it seems to promise a valid reason to say "nah, pass" and accept a horizon of boring? Not to me, but perhaps to one who perceives exotic as scary rather than appealing. If you told me Toledo isn't as glamorous as it seems, I'd definitely believe you. But people don't write poetry about Toledo, there are no movies about Toledo (April in Toledo, anyone?) and I'm pretty sure no new fashions are coming out of Toledo. Although, I have to admit, songs have been written about Toledo by John Denver as well as Elvis Costello and Burt Bacharach, though Denver's not so favorably, supporting my theory. (No offense, Toledo, you just popped into my head.)

Because I believe that living in Paris will be wonderful, I think it likely will be, even if it isn't in reality as great as I dreamed. I had a French boyfriend years ago who failed to live up to all of my expectations as a boyfriend, but our relationship was a wonderful experience and worth all of the time I put into it - I wouldn't change a thing even though the end result was less than I desired. And maybe my mom's heart-to-heart has done me some good - instead of "going off half-cocked" and moving to Paris in 6 years, perhaps I'll go off "full-cocked" and make it happen in 3.

So, before I get back into my weekly routine, I'm going to curl up on the sofa with a porcelain cup of chocolat chaud and watch "Toledo, je t'aime" again.