Notre Dame Archives - Nadine Walks

My Notre-Dame Story

April 20, 2019

I began scrolling back through the photos on my computer to look for Notre-Dame. I knew there were going to be a bunch, but I was almost surprised at how many. Actually, I began laughing when more and more appeared. It seems that I not only spend a lot of time walking by Notre-Dame whenever I’m in Paris, but that I take a few photos each time, too.

Then I dug through my old photo albums, the thick and heavy ones I somehow managed to cart back from France after my junior year abroad. Page by page I searched through the photos and it seems that this habit is nothing new; it appears that I took a photo nearly every time I passed by Notre-Dame back then, too.

I might have 100 photos of the cathedral from at least a dozen trips to Paris, between the years 2000 to 2019.

Readers here have probably noticed how much I love Paris, but I’m not sure if I’ve ever mentioned that it all starts with Notre-Dame.

When it was time to pick a language in 7th grade, I listed French as my first choice, and I got into the class. I can’t remember exactly why I wanted to learn French, and not Spanish or German, only that I was certain that it was my top choice. I remember that hanging on the wall in the classroom was a poster of Notre-Dame, and sometimes during class I’d stare at it. In fact, that poster might have been the best thing about 7th (and 8th) grade French class; learning French was hard. Really hard.

But I continued with it through three years of high school, quitting after my junior year and vowing that I’d never study the language again. I’d put in my time, I’d tried, but understanding French eluded me.

What did pique my interest in those days was art and art history. I took drawing and painting and photography and I wasn’t very good at any of them (I think I got better at photography later), but I realized that one of my favorite parts of art class were the days when we had art history lessons. During my junior year I also took a Humanities course, and I chose to write about Notre-Dame for one of our papers (I also got to ponder the meaning of life through a paper on Siddhartha, analyzed the lyrics of Eleanor Rigby, and delivered a persuasive speech from the point of view of Scarlett O’Hara. That was a great class).

When I got to college I had to take one language class, and I tested into an intermediate level French course. Recalling my middle school and high school misery, I poured every bit of effort I had into that class, not wanting French to be the downfall of my college years.

It’d be nice to say that all my effort paid off and I could finally understanding French, but that’s not exactly what happened. The effort did pay off in that it gained the appreciation of my professor, a notoriously tough instructor who either loved you or hated you, and graded accordingly. She decided she loved me, and all but forced me to apply to spend my junior year studying in Toulouse, France. (This might be a bit of an exaggeration, but I remember parts of our conversation about my future, and hearing her say, “You do want to see France, don’t you?”)

Spending that year abroad was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. It was both wonderful and really tough. Sometimes I hear of my peers’ experiences in study abroad programs around that time, and they often involve tales of communal apartment living and lots of alcohol and late nights and a generally carefree life. My program, on the other hand, was rigorous. The philosophy was for students to become immersed in French culture and life. During that year, I often felt that the expectation was for me to ‘become French’, and I struggled with this quite a bit. I lived with a host family and took third-year level art history courses at a French university, with French students. Even when around my American peers in the program, we were strongly encouraged to speak in French, and our wonderful director could be very stern if he heard us speaking English.

My French wasn’t great when I arrived in Toulouse, and it was a shock to be whisked away by my host family and only understand about a third of what was going on at any given time. Much of the first few months of life in France were like that, and rather than becoming French, I think I spent a lot of time thinking about what it meant to be American, and missing my family back home.

But even though these first few months were difficult, there were these amazing moments sprinkled throughout, probably several amazing moments every day that made the challenge worth it. I was living in France, buying baguettes and riding a bike and finding the quickest route into the city center. I was meeting up with my friends and trying different restaurants every night, and learning how to like coffee, and how to tolerate wine. I was learning how to communicate, too, how to understand more and more every day. I was learning how to be part of a different culture.

But more than those smaller moments, it was the promise of Paris that got me through those first two months. As a group we’d taken a few small, local day trips around the region, but the big Paris trip wasn’t until the end of October, nearly two months after we’d arrived in France. I’d been counting down the days, so anxious to just be in Paris. Paris was the reason I’d continued making the effort to learn French, it was the biggest reason I’d decided to study abroad, at the time it was the place I wanted to travel to the most (it’s probably still the place I want to travel to the most, if I’m being honest).

We arrived in Paris after a very turbulent flight, immediately getting on the RER and somehow ending up underground in the Louvre (my memory may be totally wrong here, but I remember taking a tour of the Louvre before even breathing Paris air). The trip was a tightly organized affair, with something scheduled nearly every hour. From the Louvre we went to our hostel and had about 30 minutes until we had to meet downstairs for dinner.

I looked the map I had carefully folded and put in my purse. I saw that our hostel was nearly in the very center of the city, and very, very close to Notre-Dame.

“Does anyone want to go out real quick and find Notre-Dame?” I was sharing the hostel room with 5 of my friends, and two of them agreed to come with me.

We went outside and for the one of the first times in France, I felt giddy, and free. We bent our heads over our maps and wound through the streets and headed over a bridge and one of my friends said, “I can see part of the cathedral!”

I put my head down, covered my eyes, and my friends grabbed onto my arms. “We’ll tell you when to look up!” they said.

We stopped walking, they gave me the signal, and I raised my head.

We were standing at the back of Notre-Dame, the part of the cathedral that had long fascinated me: those flying buttresses and the small round windows, all underneath a wooden roof and an impossibly tall spire.

I looked at Notre-Dame and immediately spun around. It was so beautiful that I had to look away.

I have felt that way every single time I see the cathedral. When I arrive in Paris, I often stay in the same hostel that our group stayed in on that first trip to Paris. I walk the same route to the Île Saint-Louis, I put my head down when the spire first appears, and then raise my head to take it in all at once. It is almost always the first thing I do when I’m in the city, and I don’t feel like I’m in Paris until I’ve seen Notre-Dame.

On that first trip, Notre-Dame gave me something. It gave me peace and comfort, and more than anything, a feeling that I belonged. That I belonged there, standing underneath the buttresses. That I belonged there, in Paris. That I belonged there, an American in France. Notre-Dame belongs to so many people, and it also belongs to me. I’ve always felt that it’s my special place in this world, a place that I can always go back to.

Last summer, I had a picnic along the Seine with three of my La Muse friends, and we chose a spot not far from Notre-Dame. We sat and laughed and ate and drank, and I remember sitting back as the sun set, thinking, “I can always come back here. Notre-Dame will always be here.” I took a silly picture, a selfie, angling the camera so that a blurry Notre-Dame was just visible in the background. I wanted to remember the pure joy of that moment: a picnic with friends along the Seine, underneath a setting sun, Notre-Dame looming in the background, reminding me that it would always be there for me.

I was in Paris in February, just for a long-weekend trip. I’d found a cheap flight and I remembered what I had told myself the year before, and perhaps every year since I first went to Paris in 2000. “It’s there, waiting for you.” I wasn’t staying in my hostel this time, but in an Airbnb apartment in the 12th arrondissement, the furthest from the center I’d ever stayed. It was strange, arriving in Paris to a place I wasn’t familiar with. Arriving and not seeing Notre-Dame right away.

But after settling into my room I set back out, walking block after block, the Seine on my left, the Bastille on my right. I passed through the Marais, walked down the street past my hostel, over the bridge and onto the Île Saint-Louis and there was Notre-Dame, lit up by the setting sun. I was late to meet my friend, because I couldn’t pull myself away. That golden light, that beautiful cathedral, right where I’d left it.

When I heard, on Monday, that it was burning and that the spire had fallen, I was sitting on an outdoor deck of a restaurant in Key Largo with my sister. I’m pretty sure I made a scene. I felt frantic: scrolling through my phone, texting and messaging people, reading the news. Inside, in the bar, we watched a television broadcast that showed the cathedral on fire. I had to walk away, to be present with where I was and who I was with, but there was a pit in my stomach all day long. I felt like I was holding my breath. And it wasn’t until I learned that much of the cathedral had been saved that I felt like I could exhale.

It’s still there. It’s different, it’s not what it used to be, it’s not whole. But it’s still there.

I had to write about Notre-Dame, if only to share some part of what it means to me, to add my own story to all the others. It’s about what is lost, about art and history and religion and faith and the story of a nation, but it’s in the individual stories, too. Notre-Dame is the center of Paris, but in some ways, it’s my own center, my center when I’m on my own and out in the world, totally unsure of myself, trying to find my place.

Notre-Dame became my place.

Crêpes and Cathedrals; Day One of Post-Camino traveling, Santiago to Paris

August 4, 2015

This is going to be a disjointed post; I thought about not publishing it at all, but I wrote the first half while I was in Paris and I like reading the immediacy of it. In fact, I loved writing that way while I was on the Camino: in the moment, from cafés and bars and sometimes the high perch of my bunk bed in a crowded albergue. But I’ve been home from Europe for over a week now- nearly two weeks- and the ‘real time’ of this post is no longer real. I’m not in Paris (however much I wish I were). I’m home and I’m writing about Paris and some of this I wrote while I was in Paris and some of it I’m writing from where I am at the moment… at a small round table in a Panera cafe, drinking an iced cafe mocha that was supposed to be a hot mocha despite this 93 degree heat, but I didn’t have the heart to tell the sweet and kind barista that she had made me the wrong drink. I don’t even really like chocolate coffee drinks, but this was something I used to order when I was 22, the year after I graduated college and wasn’t sure what to do and would spend time writing at a Panera in my hometown.

So I came here today, because I think I wanted to sort of recapture those feelings I had when I was 22, at least a little. I wrote a lot about France back then- my time abroad- and writing felt like this thing that was so full of possibilities, that had no limits. I didn’t think much about what I was writing and I didn’t share it with anyone and I only wrote for myself, and it was probably the easiest writing I’ve ever done. So I thought I would recreate the scene a bit and write about Paris and see if I can keep writing like I did when I was young(er), keep writing like I did on the Camino.

So here are some thoughts from Paris:

This could practically be called the 32nd day of my Camino even though my Camino ended. I’m counting it because I was following yellow arrows, in Paris, inadvertently, because I took the metro in the wrong direction. I shook my head at myself because I felt like I should have known better. When I realized my mistake I got off and switched platforms and tried to go in the right direction, but I wasn’t fast enough and almost got caught in the closing doors of the metro car. I should have known better about this, too. But I was flustered, maybe not used to traveling this way after walking for so long, maybe still half asleep, my body moving slowly. Whatever it was, I decided I needed to get out from under ground and find some fresh air, regardless of how far I was from my hostel. Far is sort of a relative term for me these days.

I started walking and soon came across yellow arrows. I think they could have been Camino arrows- maybe- and in any case they made me smile. I’m not sure how far I walked, but it didn’t feel too far (what is ‘far’, anyway, after having just walked across Spain?), but I was tired. I AM tired, I think I need to tuck myself away somewhere and spend all day in bed. But first I have this fast trip in Paris. It’s a little difficult to be in this city that I love so much and to feel so tired, but I’m trying to reframe the experience and just enjoy it how I can. If that means meandering around aimlessly, stopping a lot on park benches, finding a chair by the Seine and settling in for awhile, sitting in cafés and drinking coffee… I think that’s a fine way to spend time in Paris.

Leaving Santiago was easy and hard. In some ways I really felt like this Camino ended well and that I was ready for the end, but it’s always hard to leave something you love. And hard to leave people you’ve grown fond of. I have this scattered family all over Spain right now: they’re days before Santiago, in Santiago, on the way to Finisterre, on the way to Muxia, on their way home. I got to say goodbye to some but there are lots still out there, still walking their Camino. So in many ways, I wish I were still walking, too.

But leaving wasn’t as hard as it was last year. Maybe it’s because I was able to come back, and it showed me that if I really want it, I can always go back. Leaving Santiago doesn’t have to mean leaving forever, leaving the Camino doesn’t have to mean leaving forever. I don’t leave these people forever, either; the best parts of my day were the messages I received: one from Jill, wishing me a safe journey to Paris. One from Nicolas, telling me that he is 40 kilometers from Finisterre. And a comment on my blog from Krysti and John, two friends from last year’s Camino. We haven’t been in touch for a year, but they told me that they’d been following my journey this year since Day One. I was standing at the luggage carousel in the airport in Paris when I read that, and I had the biggest smile on my face.

It was right around this time when I looked up and noticed an older man and woman across the room, waving at me and pointing to the corner. That was when I saw what I was waiting for: my walking stick. How this couple knew that I was waiting to pick up my stick I have no idea, they must have seen me checking it in Santiago. There it was, in oversized baggage: my tall wooden stick, covered with a fluorescent green wrapping. Getting it to Paris wasn’t as much trouble as I feared; just 20 euros to check a “bag”, 7 euros to wrap the stick.

So maybe that’s another reason this feels like a Camino day- I walked through the streets of Paris with my pack on my back, the walking stick in my hand. I found my hostel- the MIJE, my home away from home- and put my stuff up in my room. I’m in a shared room, but right now there’s only one other person’s stuff next to a bed on the lower level. I’m on the second “floor” at the top of a narrow set of heavy wooden stairs. There are six beds up here but maybe I’ll luck out and have the space to myself.

(later)…

It turns out I was the only one in my section of the room, and I was grateful for it. I had been wishing for this, wishing I could have a single room somewhere. That I could just have an early night and settle in, curled up on my bed with my phone and some wi-fi and a Twix bar. I got to do this, but that came a little later. First I had to spend a few hours in Paris.

I remained tired throughout the day. I thought that maybe I should have had a plan, that I should have picked one thing I wanted to do and forced myself to do it because I was in Paris and even though I think I’ll always end up coming back, I never know for sure how long it will be until I return to this city. But instead I walked for far too long down the Rue de Rivoli, stopping in one shop after another looking for a plain and cheap t-shirt. Shopping was the last thing I wanted to do but wearing a fresh t-shirt was the thing I wanted the most, so I forced myself to do a little shopping. (I came away with a 5 euro blue t-shirt from Forever 21, which might be considered a little sad considering I was in Paris, but I was satisfied. I just wanted something clean and new).

And then I did the only thing that I ever really HAVE to do when I’m in Paris, and that was to walk by Notre Dame. It’s one of my very favorite places in the world, and it’s one reason I like staying at the MIJE so much; Notre Dame is just a 5 minute walk away. I stayed in this general area the entire night: sitting on a bench behind the cathedral, occasionally admiring the architecture, watching kids play in the park. When I was hungry I walked a short distance to the Ile Saint-Louis and found a small crêperie. The restaurant was narrow, the kitchen off to one side with a man flipping the thin crêpes by the front window, three tables tucked against the wall in the front room, and a larger seating area in the back. An older couple were eating in the front of the restaurant when I entered and I was seated nearby- feeling a little self-conscious being alone, but also comfortable in this small and quiet space.

I ordered off of their ‘menu of the day’- maybe I was still in the habit of pilgrim menus and menu del dias, or maybe I just wanted to eat a lot of crêpes. The first plate was a crêpe complet: ham, emmental cheese and an egg. A mug of cidre, a buerre/sucre (butter and sugar, simple but the best) crêpe for dessert. The crêpes were enormous and delicious and unlike anything I’d eaten for the past month in Spain. I ate slowly, dipping each forkful of my crêpe into the runny egg yolk, savoring the simplicity of the handful of salad arranged on the side of my plate.

I wandered around after dinner, crossing a bridge over the Seine to head back to Notre Dame. Families waited in line for ice cream, a man played an accordian, an endless wave of people snapped photos. I found a bench and settled in to watch the sun set, with the Seine in front of me and Notre Dame just off to my left. After a few minutes a young man approached me and began to talk. He thought I must be Swiss, I think I let him down by saying I was American. He stayed with me for ten minutes, telling me how he had just moved to Paris, that he loved this area of the city, that French wine was the best. I was polite but reserved and eventually he got the hint and left. Over the past month I’ve gotten used to talking to new people- it seemed as though I met a handful of new people every day- and for as much as I was craving company and connection at the end of this Camino, on this night- in Paris- I just wanted to sit quietly and watch the sun set.

And so I did. The night was soft and quiet and I was tired and satisfied and full. Full of crêpes, full of happiness, full of the Camino and everything I got to experience in this past month. So, one more day in Paris- one last little bit of travel and exploration- and then time to go home.

Next Post: In the Footsteps of Monet and Hemingway

Returning to Paris, Returning to the Camino; (‘You Can’t Go Home Again’)

March 5, 2015

Have you ever gone back to a place that you loved and found that it had changed? Or that your experience of it was very different?

Two years ago I was planning my first return to France in over 10 years, and I was nervous about seeing Paris again. Paris had defined travel when I was in my early 20’s; it was the place I’d always wanted to go to, and the place I traveled to the most during my year abroad in college. I’d imagined that it was a beautiful, magical place, and my actual experience of it didn’t let me down: Paris did feel magical. Being there made me feel alive and so full of hope and possibility.

I was young, and I hadn’t traveled overseas before. I learned- in small doses- how to be brave in Paris, and it was something I didn’t even really think about because I was desperate to see as much of the city as I could. So I would set my alarm for 6am and wake up before the other students in my program. I’d wander through the streets with my camera in hand, then return to the hostel and join my friends for breakfast. I learned how to ride the metro, I learned how to find my way around cemeteries and museums, I learned how to drink coffee.

When I returned to Paris, on the eve of my 33rd birthday, the city felt different. The buildings still seemed to glow, Notre Dame was just as majestic as I’d always remembered, but something was off.

I still wandered through the streets, taking photos and drinking cafe cremes. Weaving through the tombstones of Pere Lachaise, I tracked down Oscar Wilde and Jim Morrison. I slept in the same hostel that I had when I was 20, I ate the same baguette breakfast. Climbing up the 400-odd stairs to the top of Notre Dame, I put my face up to the wire fence and looked out over the city.

This was still Paris: beautiful and enchanting and foreign.

The changes that I noticed? It wasn’t Paris that had changed, not really.

It was me.

Drinking my first cafe creme was probably the biggest tip-off. It’s difficult to explain how important cafe cremes were to my year in France, when I was a college student: I’d never really drank coffee regularly before, and I’d never made ‘sitting in a cafe and watching people and spending hours talking about life with my friends’ an everyday thing. As I moved through my twenties and looked back on my time in France, the cafe creme became symbolic. It was France, and it was travel, and it was me, at that time.

So when I returned to Paris and sat in the basement room of my hostel with my red breakfast tray spread out before me, a cup of creamy, hot coffee in my hands, I smiled before taking my first sip.

I took the first sip, and then I frowned. This was what I had been waiting for, all of these years? This was a cafe creme?

From 20 to 33, I’d changed. It wasn’t just about the coffee, although that was part of it. Back when I was 20, I didn’t know what a really good cup of coffee tasted like. And I suppose I didn’t know what the world tasted like, yet. I still haven’t traveled all that much, and there’s still so much more life I need to experience. But I’d grown in 13 years. I still have a somewhat childlike sense of wonder and innocence, but it’s very different than what I had at 20, when it defined so much of my life and how I saw the world.

Recognizing these changes, as I wandered through Paris, was a little unsettling. I walked through the city and wondered what I was looking for. I knew I wouldn’t be able to find the 20-year old girl who had been here that first time.

As the days passed I realized that these changes were okay. On my 33rd birthday I walked into a cafe that I’d remembered being in with my friends on that first trip to Paris. On that night, years ago, we’d crammed around a table on the terrace of the cafe, drinking hot chocolate and giggling about life.

On this night, I walked into the cafe and I asked for a table. I was seated outside, with a view of the Seine and the spires of Notre Dame. After ordering a glass of wine, the waiter complimented my French. I’d made several mistakes- fumbling over the word ‘boisson’ (which means ‘drink’)- and we laughed. I wasn’t self-conscious in the way that I used to be; my French was more rusty than ever, and yet, I was more confident about speaking than when I was 20.

I’m thinking about changes and how we experience the same place in different ways because of my upcoming Camino. I’m nervous about returning for a 2nd time, even though only a year separates my two pilgrimages, whereas over 10 years separated my visits to Paris. I haven’t changed all that much in the past year, and yet, I know that my second Camino will be very different from my first. Will my return to the Camino be like my return to Paris?

Will I be more confident? Will I relax a bit about my fears? Will I use the knowledge that I gained on my first trip and hit the ground running on my second? Will I be able to work on the lessons that I feel I was just beginning to learn as I ended my first pilgrimage?

Will I still love the walking? Will I still avoid blisters and still make some friends? Will I still love the cafe con leches??

I’d love to hear about your experiences of a place or an experience that you returned to- whether it was the Camino or something (somewhere) else. Were you disappointed? Did the return exceed your expectations? Will you continue to return again and again?

Paris at 20

Paris at 33