1995: On the day before turning 47, I am weak from a bout with knockwursts, but Erin and I stick to our plan to leave Freiburg so we can spend my birthday in Paris.
Knowing we’ll have to change trains in Strasbourg—with announcements we don’t understand, signs we can’t read, and stairs and tunnels between tracks—I insist to Erin that we check our bags. Erin thinks separating ourselves from our luggage is a terrible idea, especially since we didn’t pack a carry-on with essentials. I remind her that I am weak from a bout with knockwursts.
The clerk doesn’t speak English, but another traveler translates, I pay some money, we are unencumbered, and I feel proud of my traveling savvy.
The train is crowded, and we can’t find seats together. There’s an empty seat next to a friendly young French guy, and one next to a child. I feel too sick to deal with friendliness, and leave Erin with Pierre. I force a smile at the child—that’s all I have to say to him.
While Pierre and Erin talk and laugh, I have flashbacks to jealous days. The child stares and sees right through me. I get up and move back to the space between the cars, where a young man with a knapsack reads a book and sips coffee. My body collapses like a folding chair against the wall. My head throbs along with the thrumming of the train. Erin visits and asks why I moved. “I just didn’t want to watch you and Pierre laughing and exchanging life stories. I know you’re doing nothing wrong, it’s me, but my head feels like it is going to explode.” She shakes her head with her eyes and goes back to her Frenchman, but returns with two Tylenol.
The conductor enters the car, and I realize Erin has the tickets. I tell her I need mine, and she says, “Are you leaving me?” My mind can’t process humor, and I snap, “Just get me the damn ticket.”
At the Strasbourg station, we become a threesome, as Pierre, of course, is also going to Paris. Pierre negotiates the sprint to the transfer (which we would not have made with the luggage). Our new train is the Maurice Ravel—a good omen—and this time we have reserved seats, which means Pierre must retire to a lower class. Pierre says to Erin, “Maybe we can get together,” and I assume he means in Paris, but Erin tells me he said, “Maybe we can eat together,” and he meant on the train. “I don’t think so,” I say after Pierre departs.
We eventually go to the dining car—Erin doesn’t seek out Pierre—where we enjoy the food and the view. I am calming down and looking forward to getting to the hotel so I can crash and restore. I don’t tell Erin I actually thought I might die on the last train.
When we disembark at the Gare de l’Est, Erin goes to a payphone to check messages from work while I pick up the bags. The guy at the luggage counter looks at my ticket and says “Demain, demain.” I realize that I have shipped our suitcases, which contain all our clothes, 20 rolls of undeveloped film, and prescription medicines. My stomach whips up knockwurst flashbacks.
I join the line at Thomas Cook to get French francs, excavating my German money out of the scraps of paper and no-longer identifiable substances in my various pockets, so I won’t have to dig for it at the counter. I hold the cash in my hand as I approach the window. I feel a jolt, and the money is gone, a large man running with it—a perfectly executed handoff, only he is decidedly not on my team.
I chase him, like a dog after a car. I yell, “Police, police!”—thankful it’s the same in both languages—then “Arrêt that monsieur!” I am joined in pursuit by another man—a plainclothesman?—who instructs, “Stay here, I’ll get him!” He follows the thief into the Metro. Neither emerge, and I realize they are partners.
My cash is gone, our suitcases are MIA somewhere between Germany and France, and Erin is returning from her phone call with a big “we’re-in-Paris!” smile.
“I was mugged,” I tell her, going for sympathy on the mugging before fessing up about the bags. We go back to the Thomas Cook window, where I tell the clerk that I was robbed. He seems excited that I have returned: “I saw the whole thing. I can identify him if you go to the police. I’ve never seen anything like it!”
Is he in cahoots with them? Did he notice me on the line and signal his cohorts with a flick of his eyes? Will he describe someone who doesn’t look anything like the culprit? I imagine myself testifying in a French courtroom (“C'est l'homme qui m'a fait pauvre!”), and I decide not to go to the police.
Erin remains calm through it all and has enough cash for a cab to the hotel. In the taxi, I can’t find the luggage ticket—did it get mixed in with the money that was stolen? Will the thieves wear our clothes, develop our film, and consume our medicine (feeling better than they ever had, maybe even cured of their criminal impulses)? I excavate again through the crumpled papers and no-longer identifiable substances, and this time locate the baggage receipt, which I hold in a life-grip on its way into my wallet.
Using a credit card, we get francs at a money-exchange, and check into the hotel, where we tell François at the desk all about it.
François is sweet and comforting. We upgrade to a more expensive room, and Francois recommends a restaurant on Saint-Germain, which turns out to be an oasis of calm serving cassoulet and crème brûlé.
Next to us, a woman eats with her 12-year-old daughter. They haven’t seen each other in quite some time—the kid seems to be in boarding school—and their conversation is painfully polite, especially when the subject of “your father” is raised. The aroma of the food erases the aftertaste of the knockwurst. Our troubles are transfigured in the Paris café light: How can a poet complain about being down and out in Paris with the woman he loves and just the clothes on our backs—along with a credit card and a lovely hotel room on Rue Jacob.
The next day we return to the baggage claim at Gare de l’Est and get the bad news that the bags still aren’t there. We go to the main information room, where the clerk explains that it will probably take a few days, but he can’t check on the computer because it is Sunday.
I call American Express to see if they can help us with our medicine like they do on the commercials (“What will you do? What will you do?”). I am transferred to a medical expert, who tells me that yes, indeed, he can arrange to get our prescriptions transferred, but he may not have to, because French pharmacists have a lot more discretion than in the U.S. He gives me the address and phone number of a pharmacy on the Champs Elysees, and tells me to talk to Franc. “We’ve worked with him a lot.”
I call Franc, who tells me to “Come here and we will talk.” We take the Metro and walk along the Champs Elysees, looking for a quaint pharmacie with vintage elixirs in the window. I picture Franc as being hirsute and wise, able to diagnose us with a glance and select our medicines without being told.
Instead, we get to a modern little shop inside a beneath-street-level mall. I ask for “Frank” and the clerk smiles and says, “You mean Franc.” She points to a young, kind-looking man. I explain the situation to him and, without challenge, he sells us the pills. I tell him I need a razor and he shows me a Gillette Excel. Excited, I say, “That’s what I use in New York!” and he replies, “Yes? It is good?”
The next day, I return to the luggage claim area, where the clerk disappears with my claim ticket, emerges empty handed, and says, “Demain demain.” I go back to the main information desk and explain the situation to the same fellow who told me he couldn’t check on the computer because it is Sunday. Now, he is incredulous at the notion that his computer could possibly be of any use on any day for locating bags that originated in Germany.
We return each day, only to be told “Demain, demain.” Meanwhile our hotel closet is filling up with new clothes as François guides us to one fabulous meal after another. In shops we no longer ask ourselves, “Do we really need this?” Of course we do; we have nothing.
After a few more days of demains, I try one more time at the information desk. “I know I have to come back each day, but we have to reschedule our flight. Can you possibly guess how long it will take.”
He shrugs, smiles, and says—not unkindly—“I don’t know. One day? One year? Your life?”
The more demains the better.