So there I was a year and a half ago with a brand-new (used) dog, a circumstance that came about in part due to my desire to drag my ass away from my computer a few times a day and stave off full-body atrophy. You know.

But after three months of glorious, invigorating walks with my new little buddy on the oh-so-picturesque and lumpy-as-hell cobblestones of Paris, I found myself in the doctor’s office because my right foot didn’t bend anymore and it hurt so much I couldn’t stand the weight of my blanket on it. I got x-rays and a diagnosis:

I’ve limped along in denial on considerably less vigorous dog walks for the last year or so and watched helplessly as my favorite shoes and boots, two by two, gradually wound up in the no fucking way pile… I can’t tell you how much this sucks.

It all really hit me last month when there was this fancy conference (attended mostly by women, mostly in high to very high heels, from half the Fortune 500 and all of the CAC 40, the French equivalent), where I worked as a conference reporter. The dress code was “business/creative casual,” and I had to go buy shoes because all my hot business/dress shoes are in the NFW pile. I ended up with this shoe more or less, but with a leather button instead of the silver thingy. The least frumpy I could find and wear with relatively little pain:

The brand name of these shoes? Dorking. Yeah, I know, salt in the wound. But I kinda like their logo… And I can do the sexy schoolmarm thing.

Have I mentioned I live in Paris where if you wear tennis shoes (other than the decorative kind) eyebrows rise and nostrils flare as you pass? Have I mentioned I really, really don’t like flats? Ballet flats, the Parisian ingénue standard, are fine for the 30-and-under, which I’m obviously not, or I wouldn’t be having this particular conversation with myself.

Dorky shoe shopping was the straw that got me to the podiatrist this week, where I got the final answer: “You’ll never wear high heels again, honey” (only in French). I honestly teared up. Seriously.

She said this condition was either the result of a foot trauma (nope) or a number of “micro-traumas.” Since I have it in both feet, I’m thinking every hour (and there were thousands) between the age of 16 and 20 when I stood, walked and danced on five- or six-inch stilettos, micro-traumas were occurring. I asked her if there was a brand of shoes that was even a little sexy that I could still wear. She said she had no particular brand to recommend, sexy or otherwise, though she did have a Mephisto catalog on her desk (frumpalicious). When she recommended thick soles, I suddenly felt myself aging at the rate of hundreds of years per second, like Katherine Deneuve at the end of The Hunger. Then my podiatrist described a surgery (last resort, I’m not there yet) where they fuse that nasty painful joint (at a slight angle, not flat, so you can pretend your foot still bends) when the pain gets unbearable and can’t be treated with painkillers and having some goo injected into the joint. She just looked confused when I asked her if they could fuse my joint at a Barbie-foot angle…

About now the feminist outrage, if you have any, has probably bubbled to the surface and you can’t wait to get to the end of this so you can leave a comment about how we’ve all been screwed over. Trust me, I’m with you. I know all the things you want to say and agree and understand — intellectually. And I am now painfully aware of what heels did to me, and I suppose I should blame society for making me think I look hot in high heels. But I do. Did. I’m the product of my conditioning. So shoot me. I’m fighting other battles, but if this is one of yours, Bad Shoes and the Women Who Love Them looks like a good read. I may get it myself, though I’m beyond salvation. This book is what I found when I googled the keywords sexy shoes bad feet.

If you’re in Paris and a size 8.5 (39), I’ll invite you over to pillage the NFW pile. But I’m having those black suede pumps I got in 1987 (and have kept practically pristine because they are perfection) bronzed. Too many good memories…

At least I can still wear my red cowboy boots.

So there I was a year and a half ago with a brand-new (used) dog, a circumstance that came about in part due to my desire to drag my ass away from my computer a few times a day and stave off full-body atrophy. You know. But after three months of glorious, invigorating walks with my new little buddy on the oh-so-picturesque and lumpy-as-hell cobblestones of Paris, I found myself in the doctor's office because my right foot didn't bend anymore and it hurt so much I couldn't stand the weight of my blanket on it. I got x-rays and a diagnosis: I've limped along in denial on considerably less vigorous dog walks for the last year or so and watched helplessly as my favorite shoes and boots, two by two, gradually wound up in the no fucking way pile... I can't tell you how much this sucks. It all really hit me last month when there was this fancy conference (attended mostly by women, mostly in high to very high heels, from half the Fortune 500 and all of the CAC 40, the French equivalent), where I worked

For the first time since I got here over four years ago, I waited 15 months before going home back to California for a visit. It was too long; a year’s about my limit, I discovered. Living in France can be exhausting after a while. It’s like attending an interminable lecture on some abstruse topic, while living in America is more like watching a Gilligan’s Island rerun…

Sometimes I need a break, and I crave the relative — and objective — simplicity of America, that all-American “That sucks, let’s get a beer, you like my new Spiderman t-shirt?” way of being. (The French version is “That sucks, let’s discuss what every philosopher in history has said on the subject and what happened in WWII and why capitalism is the root of all evil.”)

Plus I was really homesick. The homesickness starts to kick in around November, of course, and I usually plan my trip for February or March, when I’ve had just about all I can take of winter and Mexican food deprivation, and I can’t go without seeing my family, especially my son, any longer.

Every year I go there expecting my homesickness to be assuaged. My annual pilgrimage did the trick at first, but with time the treatment has become less and less effective. I would find myself coming back to France still homesick, thinking it was because I hadn’t stayed in California long enough. This year, though, standing outside, alone and barefooted in the California sun, I was astonished to realize that I was feeling homesick even though I was “home.”

Which is when I figured out what was wrong.

What I’ve taken for homesickness is actually nostalgia. (I know, duh, but sometimes the obvious escapes you.) And that can’t be treated. I’m homesick not for a place, but for states of mind I’ll never be in again. I’ve changed. I’ve been looking at America from the outside in for too long. That home is gone. When you leave, the place you knew ceases to exist.

I was ragging about France in some post a while ago and a (francophile) friend said in the comments “No whining allowed, you live in Paris!” This is the Paris he meant, of course, a place as mythical to him as California has become to me, the Paris I moved to over four years ago:

Of course, Paris doesn’t look quite like this to me anymore either… That’s gone forever too. When you go somewhere, the place you imagined ceases to exist. And I don’t know if Paris will ever feel like home the way home once felt. I got here late in life. Bizarre. I guess that makes me homeless. A little scary.

While in California I ate tacos, had a decent margarita (no better, unfortunately), hit my old shopping spots for cheaper Levis and things I can’t get here, hugged my people over and over. That was good.

I needed hand lotion. By chance (or more likely driven by my unconscious), I grabbed a tiny tube of Jergen’s at a giant American pharmacy. It was about the only lotion in America when I was a kid, and I hadn’t used it in decades. I remember hoping, as I reached for it, that they hadn’t changed the scent: my mother smelled like Jergens my entire early childhood. Back at her place, I rubbed it all over my arms and buried my nose in the crook of my elbow. It smelled the same to me, as far as I could tell. That moment was about as close as I got to feeling like I was home. It was a primal thing. Maybe I’ll just have to carry some Jergen’s around with me for the rest of my life…

So I don’t know what home is. Maybe I’ll just make my physical home a shrine to the feel and feelings of my concept of home. It’ll look something like this, but more specifically Mexico and France and Hawaii and California flavored. Ultimately, I guess, if  home exists, it’s in me and I am it.

…my house will speak for me. My house will tell them I am warm and rich. The house will tell them inside of me there are these rooms of flesh and Chinese lacquer, sea greens to walk through, inside of me there are lighted candles, live fires, shadows, spaces, open doors, shelters and air currents. Inside of me there is color and warmth.

My house will speak for me.

Anaïs Nin, Children of the Albatross

For the first time since I got here over four years ago, I waited 15 months before going home back to California for a visit. It was too long; a year's about my limit, I discovered. Living in France can be exhausting after a while. It's like attending an interminable lecture on some abstruse topic, while living in America is more like watching a Gilligan's Island rerun... Sometimes I need a break, and I crave the relative -- and objective -- simplicity of America, that all-American "That sucks, let's get a beer, you like my new Spiderman t-shirt?" way of being. (The French version is "That sucks, let's discuss what every philosopher in history has said on the subject and what happened in WWII and why capitalism is the root of all evil.") Plus I was really homesick. The homesickness starts to kick in around November, of course, and I usually plan my trip for February or March, when I've had just about all I can take of winter and Mexican food deprivation, and I can't go without seeing my family, especial

There I was, tripping merrily along between the Centre Pompidou and the Hôtel de Ville on the rue du Renard (Not really. That’s the Hollywood version. I was struggling through pedestrian traffic doing the usual “sudden stop wait sidestep sigh” on the unbearably crowded sidewalk, just trying to get the hell home), returning from coffee with a friend at the Café Beaubourg…

…when I saw this in a tacky souvenir shop:

First thought: Going for that American tourist dollar. Second thought: Even little souvenir vendors in Paris know America’s full of religious extremists. Third thought: How fucking embarrassing. Fourth thought: Cool shirt, though. Fifth thought: Today’s Jesus wouldn’t love Paris. They show boobs on TV here. Sixth thought: Wonder how many they’ve sold? Seventh thought: Will the godlies go for it or think it’s blasphemy? Eighth thought: Probably a bit of both. Ninth thought: Bold and cynical marketing move.

All this happened in like two strides. My brain’s all fast like that. I walked about 50 feet past it and did a U-turn and went back for the pic. Then I continued on home.

But I kept thinking about the shirt. Like what was up with thought number four? “WTF?” I asked myself. I’m a card-carrying atheist! I hate what all this religious nonsense has done to America! I hate that people there don’t think anymore. I’m appalled and embarrassed that 83% of them think there’s a God who answers their prayers and that only 4 1/2% of them oppose a national prayer day…

“WTF?” I repeatedly repeated to myself. I concluded eventually that it was the graphics. I dig 70s retro to begin with. And that font in the context of the Jesus image reminded me of a time, back when I was a kid, when Jesus Freaks seemed jolly and benign, tossing praise-the-lords around if somebody farted or said his hamburger was good. (Seriously. There were quite a few of them in my family. My childhood Thanksgivings were praise-the-lord hell.)

It was the mid-70s, the flower children were fading, and all they seem to have held on to was Jesus, whom they’d embraced in their make-love-not-war days because he was so laid back and non-judgemental and turned water into wine and hung out with a hooker for chrissakes, so he must be cool.

But as time passed and Jesus got old and crabby, he started getting downright mean. Today’s Jesus (thought number 5) hates hookers and homos and democrats and the meek and the peacemakers and almost everybody, in fact. No way he’d share his five loaves and two fishes with the multitude now! He doesn’t want his tax dollars paying for the multitude’s medical care either! Fuck everybody!

I’d be really surprised if today’s Jesus loved Paris.

Anyway. Two days later, I went back out of curiosity. I wanted to ask the shop owner about the shirt. Who bought it, if anybody. Whose idea it was. What was the thinking behind it. Stuff like that. I went in, found it on the shelf, and said to the young (30-ish), Arab-looking man in the store that I wanted to try it on. He looked over to his two buddies, nodded and smiled, beaming with pride, his body language saying “See?” He then proudly said to me “It’s my design.” I complimented him on it, saying “It’s cool, I really like the graphic design.” He said “I’m not a Christian, but Jesus is cool.” I said, “Yeah, like Gandhi.” He said, “Hey, you’ve given me an idea for my next shirt!” He then said “I just did it for fun.” This latter remark kind of stopped me from asking if he had made it with American tourists in mind. I don’t think there’s much doubt about that, though.

He showed me another design of his, a t-shirt that said “I am Paris,” explaining that it was because of Johnny Cash, who always said “I am Johnny Cash” when he got on stage. I’ll take his word for it. It was a nice-looking shirt too. I said, “So you’re a designer,” which he denied with modesty, but I insisted that he was. I was sincere. The guy has an eye.

I bought the t-shirt. The fabric is quite thin and it’s tight. My blasphemous boobs in my blasphemous red lace push-up bra will look really good under it.

As I walked home, I reflected on this man who has an obvious creative bent, an obviously kind heart, and a bit of business instinct, whose options are limited by his circumstances. Today’s Jesus would probably hate him.

There I was, tripping merrily along between the Centre Pompidou and the Hôtel de Ville on the rue du Renard (Not really. That's the Hollywood version. I was struggling through pedestrian traffic doing the usual "sudden stop wait sidestep sigh" on the unbearably crowded sidewalk, just trying to get the hell home), returning from coffee with a friend at the Café Beaubourg... ...when I saw this in a tacky souvenir shop: First thought: Going for that American tourist dollar. Second thought: Even little souvenir vendors in Paris know America's full of religious extremists. Third thought: How fucking embarrassing. Fourth thought: Cool shirt, though. Fifth thought: Today's Jesus wouldn't love Paris. They show boobs on TV here. Sixth thought: Wonder how many they've sold? Seventh thought: Will the godlies go for it or think it's blasphemy? Eighth thought: Probably a bit of both. Ninth thought: Bold and cynical marketing move. All this happened in like two strides. My brain's all fast like that. I walke