Today would have been the anniversary of my engagement and I am surprisingly not as melancholy as I was anticipating to be. This day had been lurking for a few weeks and when I received an e-mail from an old friend from L.A wanting to know if I was available for drinks that night, I jumped to the occasion. This night was going to need more strength than newly made friends and internet dating to get me through it. Nothing distracts the emptiness of a broken heart like an old friend passing through town.
I met Courtney almost 10 years ago when we working as extras in L.A. You can see some of our finest work in hit television shows like The O.C, Scrubs as well as the film Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Our work as background artists took our lives in different directions but when we get together, we always look back fondly on our hardworking days of walking across the street behind Hollywood's elite or blending in as locker slamming high school students in teen dramas.
Courtney was passing through Paris and only had a few hours to spare because she had a train to catch to Brussels. Due to our time constraint, she met me at my office in the 16th where we would look for something local. In this area, finding a place that is reasonably priced and somewhat interesting to take her to would be a task in itself leaving the restaurant in the modern art museum, Palais de Tokyo the only option. A place I love, a place where I once met Catherine Deneuve, unfortunately, also a place where Monsieur Flaneur and I had our first date. Damn him for always creeping in.
I opted not to tell Courtney my personal history with the restaurant, put my soap opera aside and take her to a cool spot in an otherwise quiet part of town. We arrived and as it turned out there was an open bar art opening happening which attracted a colorful mix of art snobs and fashion folk who suddenly became invisible to us once the delightful image of trays of champagne and cheese niblets were dancing around in our line of vision. Courtney and I simultaneously plucked a glass from a near-by server, clinked our glasses to our good luck before making a bee-line for the photo booth that was tucked away in the corner of the room. You can't hide a photo booth from me and Courtney. Back in our L.A days, we used to frequent the Echo Park dive, The Short Stop where they had a vintage photo booth. We felt it was only right to take photos of us 10 years older, more jaded, definitely more tired looking and in Paris. I shudder to think what the comparison would look like with the photo strips side by side.
We ended up not seeing any part of the exposition that was held in the galleries because we got caught talking some entertaining guys from Germany who were making us laugh and kept filling our glasses and before we knew it, we had to rush Courtney to Gare de Nord to catch the train that she ended up missing.
Today was the perfect day to spend it with someone from the past, someone I have had shared many laughs with and could reminisce about the old days of working on movie sets. I came home feeling more nostalgic for my days in Los Angeles and a bit drunk from the champagne but was relieved that I survived a day that I had been dreading for some time now.
Palais de Tokyo
13, Avenue du Président Wilson
75016 Paris