Lessons From the Kissing Booth

I didn't spend much time alone in Paris, which is unusual but not unpleasant. Somehow, though, in the Musee D'Orsay I found that I had lost my friends somewhere in the rooms behind me. Near the top the glass is shaded, with one small spot clear to see through to all the sculptures below. For the moment, at least, the hallway was empty, and I got that old see-through feelings, like the ghost of the museum. It's one of my favorite parts of traveling, the moments when you could be anywhere and so are instead nowhere, just existing in this space outside of your own life, like the awake version of waking up from a dream with no idea of who or where you are.

I thought about staying there, moving in, a little mouse in all that big train station. But then my phone shook with news of the location of my companions, and I remembered that the Impressionists are not necessarily the paintings I would want to live with forever. So I turned and found the escalator. Going clear is always more fun when you can start being seen again.