The Paris Year was born 10 years ago on the streets of New York. The conception process had in actuality been years in the making and had involved visions of Italy and other exotic locales, until I settled for more practical purposes on New York City in the summer of 2002. With a one way ticket, a samsonite suitcase (which I still can’t seem to part with) and a place to actually live (secured two days before I left) I felt as prepared as I ever would be. I didn’t know a soul in the city, I didn’t have a job but I had a burning desire. I still believe that’s all you really need to do anything. I had your textbook experience my first few weeks from the gypsy taxi driver ride in, to my cockroach infested walk-up under the Queensboro Bridge in which I had only enough money to live in for two months. But I digress. Those are other past stories and maybe one day I will write about.

Flashing forward to 2007 my fifth year in the City and I proudly considered myself a through and through New Yorker. In some ways I feel like I had grown up in the City. It had taught me so much and I loved it dearly. Yet I was exhausted. Tommy had ended up moving to New York unexpectedly a few months after I did. Our courtship taking place over the years in what will always be my fondest memories. Yet here we found ourselves in the spring that year the air heavy with change. Him at a company that had been dwindling down to its last pennies- an end bittersweet but inevitable, myself at a thankless job as a corporate legal assistant that served to pay the bills, but offered nothing in return with the exception of the almost regular abuse from asshole attorneys. After one particularly trying day, in which my boss at the time had thrown a tuna sandwich at me (I had no idea he had such an aversion to pickles) Tommy watched me come home slam the door and take two shots of vodka. It was time. Not even springtime in New York could help.

SO we did what a lot of other unemployed dreamers might do. We decided to travel. Tommy had made some amazing connections in his job in investor relations for a biotech company. Even angel investors who had lost their shirts stayed friendly. We were offered by one such angel of a man to stay in his flat in Paris. You didn’t need to ask twice. I had been to Paris on three separate shorter trips before, and each time had become more and more enamored.

The three weeks we stayed in Paris sealed the deal. Well for me. In so many ways it was not what we expected. The flat ended up being tiny maids quarters in the attic of the main apartment, it rained 19 out of the 21 days, we both got hit by massive allergy attacks due to a foreign tree being in rare bloom, neither of us spoke any French, which  was decidedly frustrating especially as communicative New Yorkers. And on top of that we both felt the pressure of being unemployed, what our future held and the overall reality of life looming over us. In spite of all this I loved every rain-drenched minute. Even the sad ones. It felt good to just be there. Like Paris understood. And here I apologize because I know I risk sounding like so many other stereotypical Francophils experiencing this phenomenon. I loved being away from the skyscrapers and bustle of New York. Paris is no sleepy city but there was a calmness an openness. I could breathe.

We got a break the last few days of our trip and we were invited to stay in the main apartment. Oh how breathtaking it was- situated on the corner of Avenue Montaigne and George V with sweeping floor to ceiling french doors that commanded such a magnificent view of La Tour Eiffel that one would think it might have been constructed to be perfectly centered for our interior viewing pleasures.  The maids in true French form lovingly did all of our laundry ironed to perfection and Tommy’s dress shirts starched unlike anything we’ve ever seen since. He was feeling the groove of Paris too, but when it came time he happily boarded the plane to get down to the French Riviera-completing the last leg of the trip.

When we returned to Manhattan the city was experiencing its first heat wave of the summer and it stunk. How had I never noticed how filthy it was? The trash piled up on the streets, the rats which seemed to be everywhere (yet I could have sworn having never seen one my first few years) And the rush. The mad rush. Noone sat leisurely. Everyone had somewhere to be, somewhere to go. Had that been me? New York is a lot of things but it does not take kindly to the unemployed. Meanwhile we were at a standstill. Do we leave New York? Look for jobs? Go back to California?

So it was there one late saturday morning walking back from our favorite brunch spot in Hells Kitchen (which looked especially Hellish that day) that I proposed the idea. How about Paris? I might as well have told Tommy we should fly to the moon. His look said it all. I remember him even laughing at the absurdity of the notion or joke of it all. Yet I wasn’t kidding. And so that day began many talks, discussions, conversations on the subject. I would be lying if I said none were heated. But I knew how far to push. Nothing was growing from it but the seed was planted.

Now we find ourselves married, two kids later and back in Santa Barbara. With the exception of a couple of years during the baby phase (knee-deep in diapers and sleepless nights) I have not let up on Paris. In 2015 I made a hard push for the move but atlas it was not in the cards. I did get a consolation prize of an amazing trip for our anniversary. It was my first time back in nine years. I knew while there that this dream was not out of my system. Much like I found myself many years ago during that one spring in New York, the fall of 2016 had a similar change in the air. From our countries political climate being especially precarious (to say the least), to our children, whose childhood suddenly seemed to be moving at warp speed, and all the while I could feel our roots getting deeper imbedded into the soils of life. And wasn’t that good? Hadn’t I learned in all those years of yoga to stay rooted? Groundedness was good. But flying even better I reasoned. In the end it was destined, as they say the stars and planets in the Universe lining up. I knew in my heart this had to be the year. Reflecting, I realized that I had had such an array of wide-ranging experiences in Paris-from the investors incredible apartment, to the hostel life in college, to low-budget hotels in questionable neighborhoods to indulging on our anniversary trip at the classically revered Le Meurice. All so unique and all so memorable. From living on baguettes and cheap wine to dining at the most amazing restaurants ever, I have loved the totality of it all and so happy to have seen it in all its glory and grayness.

By February 2017 Tommy finally agreed, after about six months of information, explanations, spreadsheets in which I presented him. Once he conceded he got on board fairly quickly. It’s been a whirlwind of a year and most of it spent preparing for this move. Now we find ourselves approximately a week out from the dream. Well my dream that has now become the families dream. Even with all of its emotions I have enjoyed the journey that has brought us to this point. Our family adventure. Our Paris Year.

“Fais de ta vie un rêve, et d’un rêve, une réalité.” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Make your life a dream, and a dream, a reality