Home Again, Home Again

Another sporadic post about different things today, but all having to do with being home from France.

 It is a bit weird. We went walking on the trails yesterday and someone passed by and said 'Hello'. My brain panicked and then I laughed at myself after they passed by and I managed to say "Hi" back instead of "Bonjour." It's like, "What the heck???? Why are random strangers talking to me??? Oh, yeah. I'm home." 

And, yes, I did have to fight myself to not say "Bonjour" instead of "Hi." I'm going to blame the French workers at the Paris hotel, because sometimes they'd just automatically speak in English for us, but, being nice, I responded in French when I could.

After walking, we went to get apples at the orchard. Applesauce time!!! I look forward to this all year, as many of you know. When Mom got done paying for apples, she admitted that she had to stop herself from saying "Merci". 

I think being in France for 15 days has messed with us just a little bit. 

Okay, maybe quite a lot. At least, it has for me.

We went out to breakfast this morning...no big surprise if you know my parents. I was craving eggs not cooked in cream and cooked longer the American way. When it came out, I realized that the omelet was huge. I really think portions are smaller in France...well, except at Colette's where she wants you to eat until you're unconscious. I'm blaming her mother, who was the same way because she lived through WWII.

I also found myself getting really sad as I ate my omelet this morning. It finally dawned on me when I had finished: the cheese is different. It is actually disheartening. I miss French cheese. And the extra flavors that I've gotten used to in the meal. It's just different here.

Let's talk about what I missed here in the US while in France for just a bit:

Cherries. I missed cherries something fierce. Every time I commented about that to Mom, she laughed and reminded me that we were in France, not Michigan. Yep: I missed cherries and peaches. I feel like the French are really big on raspberries, apricots, and, in Normandy, apples.

I also found myself missing my piano a lot. I've recently started playing it often. To enhance my sadness on not having my piano, my hands started hurting a few days after we arrived. It's like training your muscles to work out extensively and then going cold turkey: the muscles don't like that. I just got done playing my piano for an entire hour before sitting down to do this blog.

Of course, we missed our family. We also missed our little princess...our spoiled little dog, Maggie. When I got home late Friday night, I walked in and she started barking until she saw me. Then she ran up to me like I am on her friends list and gave me a few kisses. It was so surprisingly nice. I need to go away for two weeks more often. Usually, I'm not on that friends list.

 Mom missed being able to talk to our family on the phone whenever she wanted to. The whole, "You have to wait until we have wifi or when they would be up."

She also missed not being able to understand the homily at Masses. And not having people speak English as the first language got tiring after a while.

I missed having my own room. Not that there was anything wrong with having to share with Mom. It's the introvert in me. I think the main problem was that we were constantly "Go, go, go!" and I didn't have any down-time and time to myself other than a few hours at night.

As crazy as it sounds, we missed our hairbrushes. We left the ones we normally use at home and took smaller and/or different ones with us. Maybe the men won't get it, but I'm sure some women reading this post do.

Mom also says that it was really hard with transportation when we were on our own: figuring out the buses and not knowing our way around. (We're talking right now, brainstorming what we missed, and I mentioned that curiously I didn't miss my car like I did in 2017. That's how the transportation conversation came up.)

It was also tedious having bathrooms that were the size of a postage stamp, as Candace from "Phineas and Ferb" would say. And Mom had to get used to having the toilet in a separate room from the shower and the sink.

Also strange: Mom says she didn't really miss her knitting needles because we were constantly busy. However, she did miss having the chance to pull out any sweater she wanted to wear every day instead of just the few she packed. (I limited her on the number she was allowed to take. I wasn't going to let her take 200 sweaters for two weeks.)

I feel like there was something else I wanted to talk about, but I don't remember. Oh, I know what it was! Packing essentials! Maybe I'll post about that later.

Until then!