Introduction: Paris

So here I am, yet another American in Paris.

And here I am, yet another newbie blogger who thinks she has sooooo many important things to say that people will take time out of their days just to check and see if I've posted anything new.

heh heh

But yar, anyway, since my handwriting totally sucks and even the act of writing cramps up my hand so f* it, I'm starting a blog.

So I don't know who started the whole 'giving everyone nicknames' thing, but I totally love it and I'm going to continue tradition. Or maybe it's actually a law and people could sue me if I used their real names. Really? My friends sue me? Well now, they really wouldn't be much of a friend now, eh? And other people I gossip about here I won't care enough about to even tell them about this little diary. My nicknames will be mostly pretty obvious to those who actually know me, but some of you have such good ones I can't give them up and try to come up with something else. Whatevs, no be suings me.
(heh heh, no worries McMolo, I won't do lol-speak all the time!)

As far as further introduction goes, and introductions are usually way too boring so I'll keep this basic and short: I started my French obsession in 8th grade, when I met a tall, greasy, thin hottie homme from France, the exchange student at the local college where I was taking classes and playing in an orchestra. I still have no idea how we met, or how I got set up with one of his friends, an American student studying French at said college, for private lessons. But however it happened, it was fabulous: the girl taught me my basics and then some, most of which (even the more advanced turns of phrases and grammatical rules) I still remember to this day when I scramble to understand the rapid-fire flow of words coming from real-life French people.

High school and most of college passed in a bit of a blur...yes of course I learned lots of good French in all my classes but it's just not the same as actually trying out your skills with native speakers in the native land. So I hopped a plane to Aix-en-Provence, where I stayed for a semester and despite all my efforts to the contrary (hey, I was shy and only hung around fellow Americans from school, plus I didn't have TV, which I'm convinced is the KEY to learning a foreign language. LOL), managed to learn how to do a bit of speaking and lots of listening.

Years pass...
Enter Ageless, life in ruins and ready to run from the mess and head to gai Paris for New Year's 2009. Would I come and keep her company? Um, does the pope have wings? No, but I still hesitated not even point-two seconds before I shouted YES, not even really letting Ageless finish her sentence. Maybe she was going to say 'would you come over and water my plants while I'm gone' but she was stuck with me from then on. Pass two of the best weeks in the history of passing weeks in one of the greatest cities of the world, and then I was left wondering why the hell I wasn't actually living here. Went back to New York, to my own miserable hell-hole (mostly involving certain people at work), and began wondering idly (if obsessedly) about how I would move to Paris, IF I actually could...

One English Assistant application later (with help--ok they did it all--from fellow winos Killer, The PEK, and Funky Buddha), I waited anxiously for the results: would I be accepted, and if so, would I even go...maybe I could just stick it out at work, ignore the two devils making my life hell, and move up the publishing ladder...

The acceptance came, and I quietly sat in front of my computer, reading and re-reading the congratulatory email, going from completely frozen calm to hot and then cold and then I started tingling from the inside out...omg this is possible...omg I could leave behind this unhappiness for gai Paris...omg it doesn't pay very much, I'd have to find a second job...omg it's so expensive to move...omg am I crazy...omg I want to go...

You get the idea.

I knew all along I was going to go, but that didn't stop me from having serious doubts periodically throughout the process of "deciding." I went through the whole gamut: was I crazy? (well, duh.) Was this just another dash-out away from my real life I was so unhappy with? (erm, yes. I tend to up and leave about every two years.) Would it be worth it? (um....how is that even a question!) What the hell was I DOING with my life!!! (sorry, still can't answer that one...)

But then the plane ticket was purchased, my stuff was packed, I actually had my visa pasted into my passport, I had tried to un-tearfully say goodbye to the people I love best, then I was being driven to the airport, then I was boarding the plane, then I was walking through customs...my god, I was in Paris! Here I am, it feels "right," like all I've done up until this point in my life has been to lead me here. And I know how that sounds, (super fucking cheesy, is how it sounds) and I'm always so paranoid about jinxing things but I'm not afraid of that anymore...It's ok to say when things are good. And it's ok to say when things are bad...it's just ok.

Well, to make a short story long...heh heh.

--KK