Or, flâner. That’s usually associated with walking, but my loitering is done standing still, camera to hand. Lately I’ve started longing for my pre-2007 photographs, most of all for the experience of making them. Looking back it seems those were about endless walks, wanderings around the city, shooting everything and anything. Last friday I made my way purposefully, first across town from Gare du Nord to the fifth, then from Rue Mouffetard to the Marais where I was to meet M., to conclude business with her. I had some time to kill and I wanted to be punctual for her, so I waited around the corner from her on Rue des Rosiers, opposite Chez Marianne. There was rain, and rain brings the gift of perception of space, just like that. I was listening for people passing by, which was easy too: their footsteps echoed against the facades. And I did my shooting like in the past. Randomly, for the joy of capturing, with a sense of complete abandon.
I believe the Marais is still advertised as being a jewish area. Nowadays that’s no longer entirely true: although there still are bookshops and convenience stores and bakers at the Pletzl, most of the Marais is now gay territory, although a number of synagogues and a talmud torah are still there. M. has an apartment there, because her husband, E., inherited the house from his parents who came to live there in the 1920s. Now M. is moving to Israel and we are half leasing, half buying the apartment from her. Lucky, incredibly lucky. She has a tenant at the moment, and it will be one year before we can use it (protection of tenants being enshrined in French law). And that was my day. While drinking tea with M. she told me how she had lost her father and held her first grand child, all within a week’s time. That was eight years ago. I do remember it, because at that time we were organizing many events together. M. wears a tallith in an incredibly stylish way. She couldn’t wait to get away, had been planning her move to Jerusalem just like D. and I had been discussing semi-moving to Paris.
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I love the walk from Mouffe to the Marais. Never walked to or from Gare du Nord — how long does trat take?
i don’t know, I always take the 38 bus, get off at beaubourg and walk from there. but from from rue mouffetard to the marais is nice, across île st louis, and IMA is en route of course.
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[...] afternoon, from Gare du Nord to the fifth, then from Rue Mouffetard to the Marais. He writes of loitering (flâner): I waited around the corner … on Rue des Rosiers, opposite Chez Marianne. There was [...]