The brother’s passport pages were so crammed with stamps that accordion extensions bulged the back cover. He’d had to renew his passport two years early because of the wear and tear. As I thumbed through it, counting forty-three stamps to Africa alone, I felt something shift in my soul. My own passport lay nearly empty beside it—just two lonely stamps marking a life lived entirely for work.
I had met this fashion and travel photographer at a dinner party during my first visit to Paris at age 38. A committed workaholic civil rights lawyer, I’d been snobbish about devoting time to non-productive activities such as leisure travel. In classic American fashion, I thought, “Me, relax?” As a recovering Catholic with free-floating guilt, exacerbated by ingrained perfectionism, I figured I’d relax after achieving my career goals—full equality for my race and gender.
During the dinner party, someone asked the photographer, who was also a photojournalist for UNESCO, how he managed to take so many holidays. He glared at the questioner incredulously and explained, “I don’t take vacations. This is my lifestyle; this is how I live. I work two months, and I take two months off.” His words struck me like lightning. Here we were, both living vacation-free lives, but his was a remarkable, fun, and exciting lifestyle, whilst mine, as a workaholic, was a deathstyle. The realisation was soul-defining. Instantly, I knew that my life would never be the same.
In Paris, I experienced a kind of cultural shock which, once I adapted to it, became a delightful revelation. Oh, I get it: Americans “live to work”—the French “work to live.” I was beginning to discover an entirely different way of being alive, one that ignited a new verve within me: joie de vivre (the joy of living).
Paris oozes with art, culture, markets, gardens, galleries, and cafés. I began spending hours sitting on café patios, sipping wine, reading books, and watching people pass by. I strolled through gorgeous parks and became gleefully lost in the labyrinth of city streets. I immersed myself in the Black expat community, attending their parties, film débuts, and jazz concerts.
A foodie and cook, I became instantly enthralled with the vast farmers’ markets that pop up daily in different neighbourhoods. I fell in love with the smell of freshly baked bread wafting from Paris’s many boulangeries. It was wonderful to see so many people walking down the street with baguettes under their arms and poking up from their bags. I became a huge fan of traditional French food and took a cooking class.
During my three-week stay, I managed to visit many fascinating museums and art festivals. This new world began to transform me, creeping into my soul and reshaping my understanding of what it meant to truly live.
The cosmic fortuity of meeting that world traveller, as well as my maiden visit to Paris, taught me the importance of bringing balance to my life—of making time for beauty, music, dance, travel, and play. I learned that I could get far more pleasure from life than I had been allowing myself to have. Paris was an invitation to revamp my life.
Shortly after returning home, I consulted my financial planner, who helped me rethink my attitudes about saving, spending, investing, and working. She suggested that I start a travel fund. I knew I would have to be creative, disciplined, and persistent, since I wasn’t particularly lucky or rich. I converted my underutilised two-car garage into a one-bedroom flat and faithfully deposited the rent into a special account.
In two years, I saved enough money to take my first solo trip around the world. That journey and its unparalleled ability to bring so much magic and joy into my life even propelled me to launch a new career as a travel journalist.
Now, having wandered through 70 countries, completed two solo journeys around the world, crafted two travel anthologies, and shared my stories through countless magazine articles and television broadcasts, I understand what Paris truly gave me. She was the birthplace of my soul—not just my creative spirit, but my hunger for personal freedom, my lust for discovery. Paris made me a traveller for life, transforming a workaholic lawyer into a nomadic storyteller. In her cobbled streets and café-lined boulevards, my true self was born, and from her embrace, I learned to live with joie de vivre flowing through my veins like wine.
Bonne Journee!
No city seduces as skilfully as Paris. With a sly, knowing wink, the City of Light steals your heart with one clear, small joyous moment after another. Linger too long on the Pont des Arts and passion may nudge your slumbering spirit awake, or kiss your lips, or turn you into a whimsical work of art.
–H. Thompson
It’s true, Paris is where I became possible. It’s where I became free.
–Janet McDonald
I have become Parisianised…the great merit of the place is that one can arrange one’s life here exactly as one pleases…there are facilities for every kind of habit and taste, and everything is accepted and understood.
–Henry James (1876)
I cannot tell you what an immense impression Paris made upon me. It is the most extraordinary place in the world!
–Charles Dickens (1844)
Open my heart and you will see engraved inside of it, Paris.
–Paraphrased from Robert Browning Quote
If I had to choose between heaven and Paris, Paris would win every time.
–Ossie Davis
I love Paris because Paris loves me!
–D. Long
