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I’m not home, Paris. Or at least that’s how I feel. I accepted some time ago that love is my dining table and it could be anywhere. I guess I’m mostly ridden by guilt and fear instead of love at the moment and so I feel rather homeless.
I want to be alone with you and my words, where I could hope to feel most free. But logistics and responsibilities keep stopping me and now I fear that I just want to be with you to escape logistics and responsibilities. Maybe I should just focus on being alone with you and my words and let logistics and responsibilities crumble in the background. With or without fear or guilt.
I’m focusing on being alone with my words right now, Paris. Because I’m not with you. And I don’t know what to say. I just want to be held, despite all my sins – for all my sins; for everything I’ve felt guilty doing – or not doing – as a mother, as a lover, as a child, as a human. It always feels good when I’ve tackled logistics and responsibilities, when I know everyone I care about is alright, but then I’d stop and feel as if I have not done anything.
I feel like I’m not doing anything. And if writing is the only craft I know, or so I keep bragging, I know I’m not doing my craft well, if at all. Rain has been raining, single leaves have been falling, hearts have been breaking and I’ve had to focus on other matters and that drives me away from being one with myself. And that drives me crazy. For reference, Eurostar train from London being held for a couple of hours near Paris did not drive me crazy, the fact that it happened while someone was waiting for me at Gare du Nord did.
I feel scattered. I want to be selfish one more time. I want to sit in the dark for hours or days; to get out of my room only when no one’s around – or when I’m ready; to walk a long walk in silence, perhaps in my head; to eat my supper quietly; to go to a bar or a party and sit alone in a corner – all that without having to explain myself to anyone, and, preferably, without having to hurt anyone, not even myself. I want someone to make love to anytime it feels urgent; I want food on my table when it’s necessary; I want the dishes to be washed, the laundry to be done, the house to be cleaned without me lifting too many fingers, if at all. I want to be loved without looking pretty; I want the kids to be well provided for without me chasing the money; I want to not feel guilty whenever I see someone unhappy.
But this love, however thin, won’t permit me, Paris. So I’ll smile in my morning tears. For knowing myself and my momok so well. For knowing that, I’ll feel good again once I’ve picked up the dirty clothes from the floor, made scones for my sleeping boyfriend, par exemple, ordered a linen flat sheet for my son, sent my daughter a picture of a vintage brooch my boyfriend and I picked for her, and finished this letter to you. For knowing that it may only feel good temporarily, because all I really want is to be alone with you and my words. Until I’m stripped of the clothes, the flesh and the bones and feel so light and so much thinner than the love I’ve got right now. So light and free. Free to love, or just to be.
londres, le 3 août 2025
je t’embrasse!
– d.o.
Imagined Paris 