Paris Day deux

Tuesday saw the Litzenbergs in a little bit of disarray. No matter how hard we tried (which probably wasn't that hard) we couldn't seem to get our act together. We started the day with no one sure of who was and wasn't going to breakfast. At first, we thought that everyone was going to meet up in an hour after first contact. That turned into an hour and a half with a vague idea that my sister was going to enjoy the opportunity to sleep in. So my parents, my trophy wife, and I all headed off to find some breakfast. After walking for about ten minutes, we settled on a little patisserie that fit the romanticized view of French bakeries. The place had a young woman working behind the counter and a grey haired man in his fifties clearing the tables. As we were ordering, all of us jumped out of our skin as the man dropped what must have been dishes for a 12 course meal. He didn't just drop them all at once in a single crash, it was more of a 10 second waterfall of dishes. After the initial cacophony, he used a table near him to help him lean down and pick up the tray he had dropped. This caused the table lean over and for him to drop even more dishes onto the floor. My dad said he hoped the guy was the owner, because he wasn't likely to have his job long after today. The food was what you would expect from a patisserie. Lots of carbs in a flaky crust. After a sugar rush breakfast and some fabulous coffee, we headed back to the hotel to try and pick up Andra. Unfortunately, Andra assumed that we had left her behind for the day (as I said before, we were all doing a great job of communicating and planning that morning) and was trying to catch us on the river boat tour, as my parents mentioned they wanted to do the tour first. Suzanne and I headed for the most visited graveyard in the world and my parents headed for Notre Dame to try and catch Andra, as she said that is what she wanted to do first. Learning from our mistakes in communication, we left messages for Andra to meet us at Notre Dame (Suzanne and I were going to meet my parents there later) split up to conquer the city. The graveyard Suzanne and I visited is most known for being the burial ground for Jim Morrison of the Doors. Not really a selling point for either me or Suzanne, but it is a fabulous graveyard and well worth the trip. Here are some pictures from Suzanne's camera. Now truth be told, they weren't taken on day deux, they were taken on our last day in Paris. We had to come back to the graveyard, as I was on top of everything on day deux and made sure that I remembered the camera, but didn't bring and memory cards to put in the camera.


This one was particularly interesting to me as I found the optimism genuinely inspiring and the idea of poking fun at death very endearing. Keep in mind, these all come from a graveyard, not a museum. The statues are all exposed to the elements and some gravestones were nothing more than rounded humps with the words long worn away.

This young lady was absolutely beautiful. There is a sorrow in her almost whimsical drawing of the name of the deceased that tugs at my heart. I spent quite a while looking at this tomb and could not stop being amazed at the absolute beauty I saw here.




This tomb seemed designed to fit the description everyone would use for a tomb at the beginning of a horror movie. Everything about the tomb seemed to play on our fears of mortality. If Dickens needed an inspiration for his ghosts of Christmas, here was an easy place to get it.

I'll finish with this one. She looks like she is just waiting patiently for a loved one. A very nice and optimistic sentiment. Waiting for the return of a loved one who has passed on also has a very spiritual significance for me.

Sorry for the delay on these. More to follow soon. I promise.