Walking in Batignolles – the last au revoir

one last stroll through Paris after lockdown

Walking in Batignolles is the final post of The Reluctant Parisian that was written in Paris. We moved back to California in November of 2020, right before the second Paris lockdown began. Some posts have been archived as I work on a memoir of the Paris years. You can now read and listen to my Paris stories at The Wandering Writer. Just go here to get my Paris stories in your inbox.

I do still post at the Reluctant Parisian occasionally about France-related books, French style, and other things still on my mind about living in the City of Light.

During our final week in Paris at the end of October 2020, I ventured out for one last walk to Batignolles. Although traffic had returned to the boulevards, the city still felt somewhat deserted. I had stirrings of affection for Paris I’d never felt before the pandemic. We’d all been in this together for such a long time. Now, when I saw the clerk at the Franprix or the machine-gun toting gendarmes along Avenue Gabriel, our “bonjours” held more warmth, our nods more familiarity.

On that quiet autumn Tuesday I set out from our home in the 8th arrondissement under a gray sky, walking the block and a half along Rue Rembrandt to Parc Monceau. The park had been my oasis in the center of the urban storm, green and vibrant in a city of browns and grays. On countless days, I had escaped our apartment and the book I didn’t feel like writing to walk through the park and order a crepe from the snack stand beside the carousel.

That Tuesday I skipped the crepe, as I had one thing on my mind: coffee. I exited the park, veered right on Ave. Georges Berger, and crossed Malsherbes, where Berger becomes Rue Legendre. The light caught me at the corner of Legendre and Toqueville, in front of the old brick house on the corner (19 Rue Legendre), so out of place among the whitewashed buildings.

I crossed the busy Rue de Rome, where ugly modern apartment buildings tower over the train tracks. The first time we walked this route, the day after our arrival in Paris, we were searching for our nephew Jack’s favorite restaurant, Crepe Couer. We didn’t yet know that everything closes in Paris in August,  and the few things that don’t close for the entire month do close on Sunday.

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Michelle Richmond is the New York Times bestselling author of six novels and two story collections. Her books have been published in 31 languages.

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