Here I sit with Ilee painting watercolors at the Brasserie de l’Ile St-Louis, a very famous classic Parisian cafe that is about a block from our apartment.  We are sitting outside listening to an old Frenchman, weathered and worn playing a soulful accordion.  It’s sound is haunting and familiar.  It is lightly showering giving the air a moist and fresh smell.  The passers-by are starting to don umbrellas to keep the mist away.  Ilee and I are seated outside but safely undercover and warmed by a cafe’ lait and a nice glass of red.  A perfect afternoon in Paris, so romantic. 

This morning after sleeping in too late we went to Musee’ d’Orsay and spent a couple of hours with the French Impressionist.  The d’Orsay is my favorite museum in Paris. It exudes an air of understated sophistication and beauty.  The art is some of the most famous in the world.  Many of my favorites live here and I loved sharing them with my daughter.  Van Gogh, Gauguin, Lautrec, Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoir, I could go on forever.   It is such an inspiring place, it makes you want to create.  

While I was at d’Orsay, I tried to checked in on Paul Gauguin, apparently he heard I was coming and left.  We had an argument last time I was in Paris.  If you look back through this blog’s archives you can read about this incident.  I was hoping we could make up….but no.   He and several of his impressionist buddies  are out touring the world while their home here at the d’Orsay is being remodeled.  Sounds like a good life…..even for a painting.  Maybe he and his buddies will come visit me in Chicago.  I hope he’s not holding a grudge. 

After lunch at a small sandwich stand we went back to the apartment, picked up our art supplies and headed here.  To this timeless cafe on the intersection of Rue Jean du Belley & Rue Saint-Louis en l’Ile.  La Brasserie de l’Ile St-Louis is everything you expect when you think of “classic French brasserie/cafe.” The old floors, the old tables, the old tin ceilings with years and years of paint, old everything – even a very imposing, antique espresso machine like the one you see in the Tolouse Lautrec paintings.  The Brasserie de l’Ile St-Louis is rumored to have been the location of a famous silver screen film.  Though I can’t seem to figure out which one.  It is very nostalgic and dreamy.   

 

Ilee's Masterpiece

I feel like I should know what was filmed here.   My youth was filled with hours watching the classics with my Mom.  I am likely more familiar with the films of Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart and Kathrine Hepburn than today’s stars.  I have memorized most of the Hitchcock classics.   As a teenager people would tell me I looked like Grace Kelly, I would imagine myself as her character’s of “Lisa” (the name fit too) in Hitchcock’s Rear Window or as ”Frances” in “To Catch A Thief” speeding in a convertible through the winding cliffs of the south of France. 

 

Grace Kelly in "To Catch A Thief"

I am absorbed in the ambiance of France, it’s like a familiar dream.  A little like my silver screen daydreams, for me there is no better place on earth.

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