Ice cream moulds and market tales

19th-century ice cream moulds found at a local antique shop are pictured atop an antique traditional apron from Hanoi, a gift from my friend Gabrielle.

It's a market day in Paris and I'm always struck by the interesting array of characters practically everywhere I look. For instance, there's a woman - at least 85 years old - who totters around on high heels, wearing outfits designed for 20-something girls. Her shoulder-length hair is dyed bright orange-red and resembles cotton candy floss. My daughter once remarked that many of these old women have spent a lifetime wearing high heels and their feet simply can't adjust to wearing flat shoes.

Last Friday I went to the WH Smith bookshop on rue de Rivoli to get my monthly fix of American magazines. An elderly woman was sitting at a sidewalk cafe, drinking schnaps. She was wearing a leopard-print jumpsuit, high heels and had her hair piled on top of her head in a beehive. Dangling earrings, thick black eyeliner and bright red lipstick completed the femme fatale past-her-prime ensemble. I had to admire her nerve, if not her taste!

Many French women back from their August holidays in the sun are sporting extreme tans, their faces looking leathery and wrinkled, aging them at least 20 years. Haven't they heard of sunscreen? They work so hard to remain slim, yet their faces look old and splotchy. My dermatologist - a Frenchwoman with beautiful skin - is constantly ranting about these women's careless attitude about tanning.

Even the local young homeless guy - who looks perfectly healthy and capable of working - has a tan! Come to think of it, I didn't see him at his usual haunt beside the supermarket in August - he must have gone to the beach at Normandy or Deauville.

After nearly three weeks of cool rainy weather, it's turned unseasonably warm in Paris. Naturellement, most people are walking around in summer clothes. But a few fashion mavens - because the calendar says September, after all - are wearing short pleated skirts, sweaters, opaque tights and knee-high boots!

Meanwhile, everyone's having fun manuevering around the vast construction site, where an underground parking garage is being constructed beneath what once was a public park. As the site is across the street from three schools - and today was the first day back - traffic was backed up for blocks while harried traffic wardens tried to usher children across the street to waiting parents or nannies. And to think this madness will continue until 2008, when the garage is finally finished! C'est la vie en Paris!

Comments

[happytiler]

Incredible visuals, just loved that post. I noticed when I was in at the lake in Whistler, only a handful of people had dark tans, my brother being one of them. I think it goes along with the whole body building thing. People call my daughter a snow man in summer because her skin is so white. A sales lady at the Mac make-up counter complimented her by saying she has porcelain skin. So all that sunscreen I slathered on her as a child, worked I guess. My brother also teases her for being so white, she retorts by calling him a tanorexic….because at forty five he still bakes in the sun.He’ll be the male version of those little old ladies when he is eighty. Hopefully with better fashion sense and void the melanoma!

[Linda]

I love the molds-so cute. I'm going to keep my eyes peeled for something similar.

[Laura Young]

What a fun post! I remember when my sister-in-law had to demand my 80 year old mother give up her high heels. Now she's a Swede living north of Duluth, MN in a TINY little farming town. I can only imagine what she and her strawberry reddish hair would have become in Paris.
In another life she is surely leopard clad.

[Di]

I loved the images you wrote ... it was as if I had a small taste of Paris while sitting here (in the sunshine, remarkably enough) at my desk.

[Judy (and Finn & Sacha)]

Tara,
Everything you described is why my husband and I love France! We're just back after a week in the Champagne region and I swear I saw the same leopard jump-suited woman in Provins stealing appropriately small spoonfuls of rose flavored ice-cream from her nattily dressed husband (one never knows, it might have been her hubby, might have not! LOL)
We're going back next week to the Somme region, will check out the left-over leathery tans, if the weather is good that is! Maybe I'll get a sneaky sketch in or two! heh heh Vive la France!

BTW, leathery tans are also found here in Holland, especially after vacations * my mind boggles*, and someone should tell Wendy Richards on "Eastenders" to not re-new her tanning booth membership - OMG talk about leathery! I'm an "old" eccentric, but I've stayed out of the sun for years now!

P.S. The cats survived, although Finn seemed truly upset with us (we didn't bring him back any paté) and now we're off again. *big grin*

~ Judy

[Alexandra]

The things you must see find at local markets! I want to spend a week browsing through Parisian flea markets and antique shops tucked down cozy, cute alleys! About the sun, I think people look so beautiful pale. I'm also wondering why French women aren't more worried about skin cancer. Surely it must be common there too, yes?

[naturegirl]

Candy floss hair...I can picture it!
Only in Paris I suppose leopard prints allowed on the elderly..jikes!!Tsk tsk to the old leather skinned grannies!! Isn't people watching in Paris fun!! I enjoyed it with your descriptive writing!

[Papyrus]

Sorry forgot to say thanks for your comment and I did manage to get rid of all those extra copies blogger included. Yes, they do go a little crazy sometimes. Thanks anyway.

[Papyrus]

Ah yes, that really does sound like Paris; the eccentrics, the chaos and the atmosphere of it all. And your description really makes it come to life. Apart from that you have me really jealous: a WH Smith's shop within reach. Here if I ever ask if they have English newspapers, let alone magazines, I get fairly frowned upon. I did find an English bookshop in the quartier latin when we were in Paris as a family last year.

[Jessie]

mmmm....your observations make me crave an outdoor cafe or just somewhere to sit and watch all the eccentric people in the world. lovely. ;)

[Becca]

This was such fun to read-I almost felt as if I were people wathcing in the bookshop with you :)

We have a home in Naples, Florida, which is quite a resort town and home to some of the "old society" of Florida ("old" in the US being of course very different from "old" in Europe!) There are lots of elderly glamour queens there as well, tottering around on very high heels, with lots of makeup to hide the leathery skin from too many years in the Florida sun. It's fun to sit in a cafe downtown and watch them parade by, oftne with a little dog in tow.

As always, your slice of la vie parisienne was a bright spot in my day!

[rel]

Tara,
Reading your post, I was transported back 2 years to Paris when my wife and I went to visit our son for seven weeks. He lived in the 16th on rue jasmin, just off ave de mozart. Everyday I would encounter a delightful women of perhaps mid-seventies,dressed to the nines and walking her miniture poodle. I thought then and still believe; I want to live in France where you can be as young as you want for as long as you want. And your written painting of rue de rivoli was sublime.
Oh how I long to return and reside in France.
Thank you so much for this mini-trip.
rel

[Tammy]

Oh my! No need for pictures with those images stuck in my head :) I knew school traffic would make it even more of a nightmare :( XXOO

[pepek]

I love to visit you. Every time I come it's like taking a beautiful vacation, seeing things I never could! Thank you.

[Kim G.]

Ooohhh - I loved this post! I could see each person you described and they just looked so - well - French! :)

It's still quite warm here and I had to talk the daughter out of wearning her new jeans to school today. I warned her she'd be roasting on the bus ride home. Oh, what we girls will do for fashion until we learn better!

[kristen]

I love that WH Smith bookstore, always buy a book or few there when we've been in Paris. I'm ready for Fall even though 3 weeks ago, I was lamenting the end of summmer!

[rach]

So Autumn is coming over there as well as here, sigh! I love your descriptions on the over-glam older women there! Hopefully we will never be that way, only in private. Thanks for your comments on my blog.

[EmilyDeisroth]

I can totally relate. Today was the kids first day back..the weather was misearble and traffic compounded by a major construction zone all around the school..it took me 50 minutes to go 6 miles roundtrip!!!

Sorry no comments on fashion..we appear to be in a fashion-less state her in DC!! lots of blue and black.....I'm one to talk..I am currently sporting khaki and gray!

[Sophie]

Colorful triumphs of little Paris -
what a "smiley" post -
I LOVE those molds - i LOVE them-
they are such perfect designs!

I would love to spend a day in Paris
with you.

[Lisa]

OH how I love to people watch and you seem to have hit the jackpot! I used to play this game with my nieces...we'd all try to think what the persons name might be and a backstory.they'd say "oh look, here comes Frank and Hilda, they run a shop selling..." or whatever name & story they came up with. I have a feeling I may have stopped and asked these women if I could take their photo - looking so.....chic. Thank you for that very visual description.

[Richard]

My first visit to your blog.

Beautifully observed post ...

[egan]

I love your tales of Paris. It brings me back there to a couple years ago. Damn I miss that place. Un gros merci mon amie pour les histoires!

[Gabi]

Your descriptions are fabulous! I wish you'd take a few photos of these characters! I love to 'people-watch' also!
What a beautiful place you live in!!

[Willow Grace]

I love reading about your everyday Parisian days and the characters who surround you! You're writing is so vivid, I feel as if I'm walking along the rue with you, seeing these sites myself.

[Nina]

You made me laugh with your descriptions of all the eccentric (self confident people in Paris). The funny thing is, I could have been the girl with the high riding boots and pleated skirt. I was dressed for autumn and suddenly the sun started to shine.

may be somebody else where (in amsterdam) blogged about me...

Oh dear, the thought of that!???

Bises.

[Britt-Arnhild Lindland]

I love these ice cream moulds. How great it would be to make your own ice cream in these :-)

Charming description of a day in Paris. You have the eye for it!

[deirdre]

Great people watching! I could see each of these ladies, and while their taste sounds terrible I have to admire the determination to be what and who they want. As for the tans, I've never had one and it used to bother me, but now I'm glad to have this really white skin in my mid-forties.

[Deborah]

What a great snapshot of a day in Paris -- oooooh, how I love that city! I loved the description of the schnaps-drinking leopard-wearing woman ... wonderful!

[kamsin]

You have to wonder what exactly those elderly women see when they look in a mirror, or perhaps the problem is that their eyesight is failing and what they see before them is in fact a distant memory. Anyway, I aspire to be like the woman in Jenny Joseph's poem 'Warning' - http://members.tripod.com/~Labyrinth_3/page59.html
when I am old! And as for tanning - don't even get me started!

[Jos]

What a wonderful description of your city and the people in it! Got to love old women in high heels. I have a great aunt who does that very thing, and she's 90! Shrunk to 4 foot 8 without them, it only puts her up to just below 5 feet. And she wears matching skirt suits, to boot. I completely admire that.

[Rebekah]

Love the moulds, and the visions conjured of characters espousing their treasured uniqueness. I'm cautiously inspired. Maybe I'll wear ridiculously large earrings to my meeting today, along with the conservative jacket and trousers. And maybe orange lipstick! I need to practice being eccentric, which is what I aspire to being thought of in my dotage.

[wendy]

I hope to be a daring old lady...perhaps a little more subltle..but still daring! I love the ice cream molds..I am also facsinated with vintage chocolate molds..all the different animal shapes. I've never been to Paris... you make me feel like I've been to some of the specific spots...

[Paris Parfait]

As a Southerner, it was drilled into to my head not to wear white after Labour Day. Remember the movie Serial Mom in which the Kathleen Turner character stabs Patty Hearst for wearing white shoes after Labour Day? :) I've always hated white shoes (except for sneakers and tennis shoes). It's just a tradition, which doesn't really fit with our global warming weather and warm Septembers.

[jzr]

The last time I was in Paris I had a wonderful time watching people and women in particular with those spike heels. How do they walk?? But then lately, I've been watching more here at home and they are just as crazy here. Now that it's September the argument once again is whether or not it's appropriate to wear white!! PLEASE! Seems to me there is more important stuff to ponder!!

[berries]

ooh I love to people watch and it sounds like I would be in people watching heaven in france! chic woman dressing too young for their age? oh count me in! the balls those french woman have! ahh you're so right tara* for me nothing is uglier tho then a too dark tan...leather is right! xo

[tongue in cheek]

Oh the fashion plates of France, they look good in anything, leopard to the grocery store, faux fur to the dentist office, blazing red hair when they are 90! Though, my daughter tells me that boys her age are equally into fashion...they shave under their arms, shave their chest, have manicures and spend more time fixing their hair than she does! Their clothes are simply fantastic! In France you can check people out and not be consider rude for seeming to stare...or admire!