It’s 5 a.m., and I’ve been wide awake since 3.
I guess I forgot how much insomnia lends itself to crazy thinking. When you’re sitting in bed and staring at the ceiling for hours, how the most random and bizarre thoughts pass through your head.
I got to thinking a lot about France tonight. I’ve been thinking about Paris quite a bit in general - will I move? (there is a possibility). It’s funny how it’s been two years since I’ve lived in Paris. I think I probably had a very different study abroad experience than other students. It doesn’t feel like a throwaway/one time only period of my life. It made me feel very connected to the city - the second half of the year I was working for an anglophone magazine, scouting new boutiques and scouring the city for newsworthy cultural events, fashion, etc to report on.
I lingered on one memory that I’m sure isn’t helping me get back to sleep because it makes me so angry. It took place in the kitchen of my host family’s apartment. I was sipping my second glass of port as I helped Salome, the eldest daughter, make dinner. She was 27 (uhm yeah…and living at home. You can see how awesome she already is), and was attempting to start a jewelry business. It was early in the year, and we were just getting to know each other. She had asked me what I studied and what I hoped to do after college.
I told her I thought maybe I would write for women’s magazines. I used this answer only because it was the easiest thing to say in French, and something I could possibly do, as the experience I already had (writing for DailyCandy) would probably allow me to land some type of edit assistant job after school.
When I told her this, she laughed in my face. “Are you serious? You want to write shitty crap for publications that make society a horrible place?”
While I saw her point, and even shared that view to a certain extent, I was incensed. How fucking rude, to put down my goals so readily. And moreover, this wasn’t just another lofty French viewpoint. She knew my French wasn’t good enough at that point to really defend myself from an intellectual standpoint. We got off on the wrong foot, and she continued to shit on my parade for the rest of the year.
So tonight, while tossing and turning, I imagined what it might be like, now that I technically do write for a women’s magazine and my French is close to fluent, to talk to her. I imagined I had just moved back to Paris, and was having lunch and catching up with my old host family and telling them about Cosmo. And how this time I would be prepared.
Oui, je comprends l’argument que les magazines de mode et les magazines féminins ne sont pas de publications féministes. Mais, au même moment, je me sens tirer dans les deux sens – quand j’ai commencé à travailler chez Cosmo, je ne le lisais pas, et il me semblait qu’il n’était pas une bonne représentation de la femme. Mais, après plusieurs mois, je voyais que, comme le magazine le plus vendu aux Etats-Unis, que c’était une moyenne incroyable pour communiquer avec des femmes. Moi, j’ai eu une opportunité extraordinaire en écrivant ce blog – depuis ce temps-là, des centaines de milliers de personnes ont vu mes écrits. J’ai eu des lettres des filles et des femmes qui m’ont dit, « Léo, c’est à cause de toi que j’ai du courage pour faire des choses que je n’ai jamais fait… » Et ça, c’est incroyable et génial.
