10.01.03: Paris

Why are we devoting an issue of our quarterly magazine to an entire continent? To stop bickering within the group, of course! Some wanted to do more material on France (especially after our recent Wild Writing Women romp on the Cote d’Azur), others to contribute their tales from Switzerland, and hey, what about my Poland story? Europe it is.

It’s no wonder that many of our first foreign journeys were to this legendary land across the pond. In an area smaller than North America, Europe extends from the rocky coast of Ireland east to the Ural Mountains of Russia, from the fjords of Norway to the islands of Greece, offering an unfathomable array of people, cultures, geography, languages, climates, and cuisines—all the elements needed to create a traveller’s paradise. From the Victorian Grand Tour to today’s backpackers, “seeing the Continent” has become a rite of passage, a necessary step in the development of any truly cultured individual.

In spite of what the current U.S. administration may think, Old Europe has much to teach the United States. With a civilized history that extends back two thousand years, as opposed to America’s two hundred years, countries like Germany and France have already experienced the aging process to become mature nations. Just as the dowager has some lessons for the know-it-all teenager, we can visit the beautiful capitals of Europe and learn how to age gracefully as a nation.

Everywhere the WWW turned in France we were reminded of the wars fought on this ground—not some abstract land far away—by plaques, monuments, cemeteries and ceremonies. While Pam and I sat at a café in Bormes les Mimosas, a lovely bougainvillea-draped village in the south of France, a group of elderly gentlemen blended their baritones in a rousing, spontaneous song. Pam, who unlike me actually speaks French, investigated; she learned they were a regiment from World War II and they had liberated this town on that very day—June 14—over sixty years before. They return there every year to celebrate, and they also are celebrated. One diminutive gentleman in a dark suit, fez and pointed slippers had just arrived from his home in Morocco to share this occasion with the old war buddies.

For many of us Europe is the land of our ancestors, and we return here to find a missing piece of the puzzle, an attempt to better understand our own identities. We make a pilgrimage to the cottage in County Mayo or—as my husband just did, the row house in Flensburg—to gaze upon it, in the hopes that standing on the soil of our great, great grandparents will connect us to them in a way that’s physically impossible now that they’re gone.

The millions of Europeans who emigrated in search of a better life bequeathed to their progeny many of the cultural institutions that we take for granted on a daily basis, from our language to our criminal justice system. Today we aesthetes love to return to the old countries, to experience a bounty of art and architectural abundance like no place else in the world.

As I write this I’m in Paris, 6,000 miles from home. But through the magic of the Internet we have all contributed a cornucopia of goodies for this harvest issue: our columns, photos, and favorite writings on Europe, some of which appear here for the first time. We’ve added a few tips to make your trip as wonderful as ours.

The Wild Writing Women welcome hearing your response to our new magazine and hope you enjoy this journey with us!

— Cathleen Miller, Editorial Dominatrix (E.D.)