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Bonjour Paris!

It’s been three days since I left you following my successful poetry reading – en français – accompanied by Michelle Linus’ piano composition opening for Wawan Sofwan’s monologue I was producing with Sandy in a cellar in Montmartre. That, and the subsequent unscripted interview with the actor at Café Le Maung and the spontaneous reading of a scene from Ibsen’s “Doll’s House”.

I’m writing to you from a new space. I’ve been switching bedrooms on the barge in preparation for a change and I have been able to feel at home in my new room pretty much immediately. I felt uneasy, albeit slightly, when I was changing the bedding, which was the first thing I did, but moving about in this room with my stuff from the other room lent me a sense of belonging.

Solving problems and making things work in the space attached me to the space – for the present moment – or was it the relaxing and feeling good in the space before solving the problems and making things work?

Yes, before and not after. This is how you keep me in your life, Paris – for the present moment. Other than the present, I am learning to detach myself from. I promised myself not to worry about outcomes and the future tends to worry me. As long as I’m doing something or, more importantly, feeling a certain way, future outcomes are either guaranteed or irrelevant. Shall I say this is how I keep you in my life, then?

This feeling good and satisfied, this feeling free and in love with whatever it is now is what I want to maintain. The past might see it as the future outcome and that’s about as much connection that I’m willing to have with the past, that is to teach me that whatever happened there led me to this feeling good and satisfied, this feeling free and in love. No, no – this feeling good and satisfied and free and in love is what solved whatever problem happened there!

Wait – how could I even call anything a problem if I keep maintaining this feeling good and satisfied and free and in love in the first place? Because people and things exist outside your mind, dear? They challenge your inner peace; they block the flow of your inner river from time to time. So, anyone and anything outside of me is the problem? No, a problem isn’t a mismatch between what is and what you want it to be; a problem is a misalignment between what is and how good you feel about it.

From my rigorous experience, ou bien experiment, ou bien training, by life itself, working on the feelings solves the problem. When I manage to feel good in the face of any situation, things unfold just the way I’d like them to – usually wonderfully. Wait – do things unfold they way you’d like them to or do you just perceive them that way?

Ah, it’s only eight a.m., let’s lighten up! I haven’t even had my Coco Maung Sumatran coffee from Le Maung yet – the gorgeous vintage red spiral staircase to the kitchen is on the other side of my new bedroom, but no: things actually unfold the way I’d like them to when I feel good and satisfied and free and in love. According to your perceptions and feelings? Trust me, perceptions and feelings are the only things that matter. Work on keeping them good at all times, at least most of the time. By focusing on only the good stuff and ignoring the not-so-good stuff? Hey, I thought we were supposed to lighten up?

Yes, yes. Let’s talk about the Marilyn exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery on Friday evening past investment bank hours and the sneaky kisses – I meant mirror selfies – in the elevator going up and down several times. Let’s talk about the hour long walk and the sneaky kisses – I meant giggles – each time we saw the river. It took longer than an hour – so many rivers in London! Let’s talk about Ella Fitzgerald on the record player and the sneaky—no, just kisses. Kisses and pure joy.

According to your perceptions and feelings? Trust me, Paris, perceptions and feelings are the only things that matter, especially when they are as good as this. Even lost my voice from kissing – I meant laughing – so much!

londres, le 21 juin 2026

je t’embrasse !

d.o.