3 Times A Camel Coat | Fashion On The Streets in Paris

Which one is your favourite?

Photos streetfsn

"Bandolier cuff" (customed fit)

Clemence Poesy | Teal & Bordeaux

 

She's French, she's gorgeous and she is called by the melodic name of Clemence - not much there is left to do wrong but on top with it all she's got a great sense of style. Her approach is never complicated or fussy instead her take on simplicity is always intriguing and effortless. Love this combinattion of teal & bordeaux which is one of my favs for autumn.

Camel Over Jeans

source landflondon.blogspot.com

Just Stop For A Moment

Im Moment jagt mich eine Prüfung nach der nächsten durch die Woche. Seit letzter Woche besteht mein Lebensmittelpunkt aus viel Kaffee trinken, wenig Essen, noch weniger Schlaf und dem Lernen für mein Studium mein Leben. Wie für viele von Euch auch hat mit Herbstbeginn auch mein Studium seinen Anfang genommen. Soweit so gut - ich will - ich muss- vor allem ich kann, das sind die treibenden Worte die ich mir vor Augen halte, wenn ich während Studium, Job und meiner Familie einfach an meine Grenzen gerate. Das Studium soll die schönste Zeit deines Lebens sein - so behauptet es zumindest die weit verbreitete Meinung unserer Gesellschaft. Der typische Student führt ein Studentenleben, welches nach Ansicht vieler Nicht-Studierenden ungefähr aussieht: Viele ausgelassene Parties feiern, unbeschwert in den Tag hinein schlafen und sich mit dem erschnorrten Geld der Eltern sein Lotterleben finanzieren. Dass die Realität eine ganz andere ist, wissen Meinungsforscher und Ethnologen seit Jahrzehnten und ich nun auch. Als Studierende in berufsbegleitender Form sowie Mutter zweiter Kinder weiß ich welche riesen Herausforderung es ist alles unter einem Hut zu bringen. Schlagwörter wie effizientes Zeitmanagement  und Doppelbelastung sind für mich nicht nur karge Theorie, sondern Praxis. Doch jammern hilft nichts und es treibt mich vorallem auch nicht voran. Ich muss da durch, weil ich es will. Deswegen habe ich zwar auch genau wie viele anderen Menschen ganz viele Vorsätze, manchmal hilft es jedoch an genau einem Tag wie heute, einfach einmal etwas anderes zu tun und für einen Moment anzuhalten und das tun worauf man Lust hat. Wie sieht Euer Alltag aus?

Cloudy With a Chance of Romance: A Cloudy, Fall Sky in Paris

 Along the Seine

"A cloudy day in Paris beats a sunny day almost anywhere." - Moi

On my recent trip, we walked along the Seine many times. I took the photo of the boats on the Seine while we walked along the path where I thought Gene Kelly danced with Leslie Caron in "An American in Paris." 

Turns out, the movie wasn't even shot in France! Practically the entire film (except for just a handful of shots) was done on a back-lot at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studio in Hollywood, California. !! (To read more, visit http://geneius.webs.com/thisstarcalledparis.htm.)

Hemmingway: Revisited (This is for those of you who like to read)

When I was in Paris the last week of September, I stayed at a hotel which was only steps away from where the famous writer Ernest Hemmingway lived and wrote.

'The Hemingways arrived in Paris on December 22, 1921 and a few weeks later moved into their first apartment at 74 rue Cardinal Lemoine. It was a miserable apartment with no running water and a bathroom that was basically a closet with a slop bucket inside." - http://www.lostgeneration.com/paris.htm

 

As a Creative Writing/English Literature major in college, you bet I read Hemmingway. And the 1920's happens to be one of my all-time favorite periods of history (along with the 1970's!). Anyway ...

After over two decades of writing "junk" mail as a direct marketing creative director/writer, I think it's fair to say I have drifted far from my beloved Eng Lit heroes and heroines. I could feel the bookbinding strings pulling me in ... as I daydreamed and stood under Hem's apartment on rue Cardinal Lemoine.

On my last day in Paris, I went into a charming bookstore on that very same street and bought my personal copy of Hemmingway's "A Moveable Feast" which chronicles his time in Paris when he lived on rue Cardinal Lemoine. I read most of it on the plane ride back to the states and finished it shortly after arriving home. The book's title refers back to the writer's famous quote to a friend in 1950, in which he said:

"If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast."

Yes, Hem was lucky enough to have done just that. But I must add that you can do the same as a femme d'un certain age and it too will stay with you. Thank gawd!

Just today, a friend who's about my age came over for lunch, and we shared our Paris photos with each other. She brought her photo albums from her 2004 trip to Paris with her husband and two-year-old son to share with me. And I showed her my digital photos on my computer. It was fun to relive our travels and tales with each other.

Back in Paris, one of the women on my tour had borrowed a book to read from the hotel lobby's bookcase. It was the aforementioned "A Moveable Feast." This was before I had bought the book, and maybe it was because she mentioned she was reading it and asked me about the writer that I purchased my own copy to take home with me. This woman said she was reading the book but wanted to know what made Hemmingway such a great writer. She couldn't understand. Did I know? I guess if you just have the memoir, which is what "A Moveable Feast" essentially is, without reading his actual work (fiction), you miss the boat.

So to while away my days now that I am no longer in Paris, I read a book I never finished that's been on my bookshelf for quite some time - The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway: The Finca Vigia Edition. I read the stories  languorously, some of them again and some of them for the very first time, and feel closer to this writer than ever before. And I understand what made him such a great writer.

Thanks to Paris.