Essays/Stories | France Revisited

Turkish filbert leaf, nut, catkin.

A Disturbing Thing Happened on My Street

By Gary Lee Kraut

One day you’re walking down your street on your way home, taking in a view that you’ve seen a thousand, no, ten thousand times, when a disturbing thing happens: there among the ever-so-familiar surroundings of sidewalks and buildings, streetlamps and awnings, shade, trunks, and leaves, something seems off.

It’s just a small detail, a spiny husk fallen from the tree, for example, but when you bend down for a closer look you realize that you never knew the tree in your street bore such fruit.


Dunkin’ Donuts in New Jersey and That Cute Little Café in the Loire Valley Travelers more spiritual than I sometimes say that “it’s all about the journey,” but I disagree. I think it’s all about the people, the place, and me/you among and within them. It’s about being local. Travel local while you can and save “the journey” for when you’re reflecting on things back home. That’s what I say–or at least that’s what I find myself thinking this afternoon in Dunkin’ Donuts in West Trenton, New Jersey. Read More	April 2009
On Being The Press New Year’s Eve—I've been visiting my mother in New Jersey. The other day I invited her to come with me to visit the Philadelphia Art Museum and the city’s Rodin Museum. She was ironing at the time, preparing her bags for winter in Florida. Read More	January 2009
Post-Election Haircut in Paris The day after the election I went to get a haircut. There were no other customers in the shop, odd for a Saturday morning. The barber motioned to one of the chairs. He invited me to put my arms through the barber cape. We discussed clipper blades. Then he went to work. The radio was on. The voice on the radio, speaking Arabic, said “Obama” or “Barack Obama” every five words. The barber was of North African origin—Algerian, I assumed. Neither of us spoke for several minutes. Then he asked me how work was going. Read More	November 2008
Of Cats and Friends Travel writing can be solitary work, but a travel writer with a cat needs friends. I used to leave my cat Moumoon with Isabelle, but whenever I returned to Paris her daughter would cry that I was stealing her cat. Corrine would be willing, but she doesn’t care for cats; once or twice she did keep Moumoon, but waking up to his steely stare from the head of the bed creeps her out. Jean-François would be willing, too, but he creeps Moumoon out since Moumoon associates Jean-François, who also happens to be his vet, with needles and pain. Read More	October 2008
Still Life with Eiffel Tower My friend Monique is tall, thin, recently single, and recently blonde. She’s invited me to a play at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, 8:30 curtain. We’ve met first for a quick dinner at Chez Francis, the ever-decent brasserie at Place de l’Alma. We have a window table with a large view punctuated bright in the distance by the Eiffel Tower. “So why wouldn’t you give him a second chance?” I ask. Read More	August 2008
Bomb Threat on the TGV I was on the train to La Rochelle, an old port town midway down France’s Atlantic coast, where I would spend 24 hours researching an article before going to a new year’s eve celebration in the Vendée countryside. I shared a 4-seat section with a laid-back couple and their joyful, fidgety 3-year-old girl. I had a window seat, riding backwards. Read More	August 2008