Church of Saint Augustin with its unique red crown. |
Favorite cat and window combination. |
I needed to go to the brown café on the right. "Café ~ Thé ~ Chocolat" was too hard to resist! |
Aunt Daphne, Marc, and I met up for lunch on Rue Mouffetard in the 5th arrondissement. It's a bit tucked away on the metro line 7 from the main tourist attractions, but if you want a street with great Parisian everythings...Rue Mouffetard is the one!
Chocolat viennois at its finest. |
This is my chic Aunt Daphne. |
After we exhausted every room and hallway of the Carnavalet, we started the trek back to our hotel via a few shopping stops to get ready for our night at the ballet!
I could do this...everyday. Thanks for the perfect dress, Daphne! |
Mike and Daphne invited us to [enjoy the premier of the ballet Rain at] the Palais Garnier.
The bracketed information was mostly irrelevant. Any chance at going into the opera house was a no-brainer.
Daphne and Mike looking stunning (and small)! |
Rain was a contemporary piece with ten dancers and an enormous backdrop curtain of cords. The performers sprinted, leaned, jumped, twirled...maybe every verb you could imagine molecules of rain creating? The costume colors went from shades of light pinks to bright fuschias to neutral tans.
There wasn't really a storyline; a story wasn't necessary. This choreography centered on the beauty of movement, and how that related to the magic of rain.
We can learn a lot from this kind of choreography; we don't always have to create incredible adventures in order to make great memories. The adventures can even come to us on their own, like Mike and Daphne did during their Europe trip.
We will do well to remember that the rhythm and cadence of everyday life can be just as beautiful (if not more) as the spectacular high and low points.
"Instead of wondering when your next vacation is, maybe you should set up a life you don't need to escape from." - Seth Godin
My "vacations" don't really fall into the "escape" category, but I think this quote I came across on Twitter can really hit home for a lot of people.
This European life is that life we don't ever need/want to escape from (or leave, for that matter).
But you're more than welcome to join us on any leg of the journey.
We would like to extend a special thank you to Uncle Mike and Aunt Daphne for loving Paris with us!!!
The Complete Mike & Daphne Series:
Act 1: Paris Sets the Stage
Act 2: Symphony and Sport