Category: Memoirs

 

Bookstores can always entice me – for hours. Today my time with books is usually spent at the library or Half Price Books. But when I was eighteen and living in Meudon near the city of Paris, I remember wandering through the city’s numerous antique bookstores. The books were many colored, weathered, and leather-bound. Antique bookstores are scattered around the Latin Quarter and Ile-de-la-Cité at the city center.  Stepping down into them from the cobblestone streets, they’re usually tiny shops with dim lighting and a dusty scent.

For fresh air I shopped for books and prints along the Seine. Artists and sellers displayed their inventories from small wooden stalls or cubbies attached to the stone river walls.

After browsing at length I enjoyed perusing my latest find at a corner café. A café au lait (French coffee with steamed, frothy milk) within arm’s reach while warming up inside, or sitting outside in the sun in warmer weather. Heavenly.

Go here to see a panoramic view of Paris in fabulous detail.

 

 

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Today it is a particularly gray and dismal mid-winter day here in Minnesota. It’s a perfect day to remember the sandy, summer beaches of my teen years.

On hot, summer days, when we needed to cool off, my friends Patty, Vicky, Shannon and I would ride our bikes down Highland Parkway to Ford Parkway. Biking past Highland Shopping Center and Powers Department Store, we would cross the Mississippi River Bridge and emerge into Minneapolis. From there we would ride along Minnehaha Parkway finally arriving at Lake Hiawatha.

As a lake, Hiawatha was smaller than Lake Nokomis only a few blocks away. But because it was smaller fewer people went there and the beach was less crowded. By the time we arrived we were hot, sweating and tired from our bike ride. We would fling our bikes on the ground, run to the lake, stepping quickly across the hot sand and wade into the cold water – shorts, T-shirts and all. Instant relief!

Afterward as we lay on our beach towels, we listened to station KSTP on our transistor radios. Songs from The Beach Boys, The Beatles, The Four Tops or The Temptations floated around us. We were shiny from Coppertone suntan oil and smelled like coconut lotion. Our sunglasses were full of oily fingerprints and our day-glo flipflops were full of sand. Our wet hair dripped in the breeze. True to our teenage years we would talk, talk, talk.

Finally as late afternoon arrived we would pack up our soggy towels and head home, stopping on our way at the nearby Dairy Queen for an ice cream sandwich. A perfect end to a perfect afternoon.

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It’s New Year’s Eve in Minnesota. Unlike last year we are not in the midst of a blizzard – but we do have plenty of snow. Perhaps we will take a late night walk as we did a few years back.

Another year, when it was very cold and late – close to midnight – my husband suggested we bundle up and head out. So we put on our boots, jackets, hats, scarves and gloves and got into the car. I had no idea where we were going. He drove up Cedar Avenue into Minneapolis and turned right on Nokomis Parkway. He parked across from the lake. We got out. There was no one around. There were no cars. It was completely dark and silent. We crunched through the snow and began to walk around the lake. It was so cold; we saw our breath in the freezing air. We saw stars. We heard the hoot of an owl. Starlight lit our path. We walked for awhile – about halfway around the lake. Very romantic. I remember it still.

Happy New Year to you!