His and Hers Parigi: From Paris to Parenthood: Serendipity Knocks

[Note: I can't guarantee this, but I think this will be my last blog entry "from the archives." I think any future blogs from me will be about our current life in DC, and not about our Paris year.]

Some words are just great. Take serendipity, or "the making of fortunate discoveries by accident."

I will always associate the concept of "serendipity" with Paris. One very literal reason is that on Sara's and my engagement trip to Paris in 2005, we splurged and had a grotesquely overpriced drink at the renowned Hemingway Bar at the Ritz. The cocktail consists of one part calvados (French apple brandy), two parts apple juice, and seven parts champagne, with a sprig of mint. The cocktail is called a Serendipiti. [sic].

The other, bigger picture reason that I associate serendipity with Paris is that I can not imagine a more serendipitous city than Paris. "Stuff" just happens there, but not the bad stuff.

Frankly, this blog could have been called "His and Hers Serendipity," because many of our posts deal with the very fortunate and very accidental discoveries of our year in Paris. But on an even more micro level than we discussed in the blog, you can get a sense of the inherent serendipity of Paris through the tiny coincidences captured through my photography.

I've talked a bit in past blogs about my love of photography. Only one thing makes me as excited, happy, passionate, interested, proud, and maddened like photography. OK, maybe there's one other trigger for these same feelings, but I'm married to her...

So much of photography is being at the right place at the right time. It's all about location, location, location. It looks like I'll get a chance to exhibit my photos at Tryst coffeehouse here in Adams Morgan this fall, and I'm thinking of calling the exhibit "Fish in a Barrel: A Year of Paris Photography," just because Paris is just such a great place for serendipitous photography.

I'm including some of my favorite such photos here. I hope you like them.

Photography is a bit like fishing, in that you always remember "the one that got away." To crib a bit from Langston Hughes, what happens to the serendipity that got away? Well, it doesn't dry up like a raisin in the sun, it just irritates the royal crap out of you. One example is in this photo: just moments after I snapped this photo (does one still "snap" photos in the era where cameras no longer "snap"?), the model very clearly and deliberately gave me the finger. It would have made for a great photo, but frankly, she caught me so flatfooted that it never even occurred to me to take a picture.

Another example occurred while I was setting up this photo:
A guy walked onto the street and past the romantic couple. I was waiting for him to walk by me and out of the shot, so I could take the picture. But, unexpectedly, once he walked past the couple, he took a hard left, went under the scaffolding you see in the picture, and...proceeded to urinate. It would have been a great "tale of two cities"/"best of times, worst of times" photos, but frankly, at the time, I was just irritated him at holding up my taking a photo of the couple.