French Things I Refuse To Get Over, Part Deux

Picture, for a moment, a skinless peach. It's awful.

The moment I hit “publish” on my first “Things I Refuse To Get Over” post back in the fall, I realized I had forgotten to add some of the most important France non-negotiables to my list. In fact, a few of the heavy hitters that plague me daily had completely escaped my mind. I know this because my Paris friend chat blew up with a “hey what about…” and I realized that either my post-post-partum brain fog or my pre-peri-menopause brain fog had struck again.

Luckily, I have a chance to bring those momentarily forgotten qualms to light. In last month’s Franchement Monthly, you all voted that my next post should be a redux of things I refuse to get over. This is good news because complaining makes for quick writing, and I already have an ongoing list in my Notes app.

NOW, let’s get real(er) for a sec. It does feel a touch ungrateful to complain about the line etiquette of my adopted country when the human rights everything of my actual country is a shambles. More than a touch ungrateful; it was actually hard to write such trivialities after reading about the recent (unconstitutional) deportations going on back home, for example. But I am continuing to assume you all are of clever stock and take it as a given that I know this, and that we are all having a little moment of brevity here to laugh so that we don’t cry. If you want to forget your woes for five minutes to joke about rising baguette prices, come here. If you want to see the erosion of critical thought, human decency, and the truths we held to be certain, look literally everywhere else (and sometimes also here).

Now let’s talk about cold butts.

The (Lack Of) Shower Doors

I have no idea whose shower this is or why I have a photo of it on my phone, but it’s a perfect specimen of a French shower: doorless.

My husband dropped and broke our shower head somehow. Actually, we know how: it’s detachable and he was using it to shower himself the French way (elephant bath), not the American way (standing under the water and rotating). So now the busted shower head is spraying 1/3 of its water at a perfect right angle out of the shower, creating puddles—nay—lakes in the bathroom. Why don’t we just close the shower door or slide shut the shower curtain to block the wayward stream? Good question! We can’t close the shower door because we live in France, so there isn’t one.

This particular feature of France was the inspiration for the original post, and is the most important unimportant thing that I refuse to get over. I think about it every day—or evening, rather—when I suffer yet another disappointing shower that never gets hot enough, sprays water everywhere, steams up half the house because I have no shower door. (I have no bathroom door either, but that’s for another diatribe.)

I will never be okay with the lack of shower doors in this country, and you shouldn’t be either. I will never get used to my butt always being cold, my bathroom floors always puddled with water because someone thought it looked chic to not finish building the shower.

With authentic curiosity, I posted a question to Instagram asking my French friends and acquaintances to enlighten me because, try as I might, I was unable to fathom why anyone would choose this design.

I got some very useful intel from French folks and folks from other European countries. Some said that the open shower gave a very stylish, spa-like vibe. Others said it made small spaces feel less claustrophobic and cramped. Others said it was one less thing to keep clean, critical given the chalky hard water of Paris. Some said shower curtains were moldy and gross, which I agree with, but that’s why I clean and replace mine at regular intervals—problem solved.

While the responses all brought up extremely valid points, none of them were strong enough to counterbalance how annoying it is to try to wash my hair without getting water across the room, how unsatisfying it is to always feel cold in the shower, as no heat will accumulate. I thereby render this design choice an abomination to be disdained by all. It’s the cottage cheese ceilings of showers, and it’s our job to shun them out of existence.

Line Etiquette

If you’re French, you may not know anything about this line. If you’re not French, you definitely know all about this line.

I never thought about standing in line as a skill until literally the first day I arrived in France. I was waiting outside a post office and was struck by what was happening and not happening with this line. People kept approaching, checking to see if they could somehow bypass the line—fair enough, maybe the line was for making copies, and all you need to do is send a letter. Then they’d accept their fate and take their place in the growing line. As this line grew, it did not bend to adopt the shape of the building or to clear the walkway for pedestrians who needed to pass. Nor did the line curve when it became so long that it was now extending into the street. Nope, it just kept jutting straight out from its origin like an awkward asparagus shooting out of the ground. (If you’ve ever seen an asparagus in the wild, you know what I mean. It’s just not right.)

After seeing this line “etiquette” enough over time, I realized that line best practices are quite cultural. I’ve heard that the Brits are particularly fastidious about line etiquette (An English mom at Disneyland once tried to accuse me of cutting when I was simply catching up to my party that was a few places ahead of her; relax, mum). I’d say Americans are pretty common-sense about lines: we operate from a standard set of rules, we keep it clean, we remain vigilant, and if someone breaks the rules, they will be publicly shamed and potentially imprisoned for transgressions against their fellow man.

But in France, it feels like each time someone stands in a line, they’re doing it for the first time. Do I stand here? Do I stand too close to the person in front of me or not close enough? Do I talk to my line partner and forget to advance the line when it’s my turn, sometimes missing my turn to go, or allowing for new line tributaries to open in the space I’ve created? Do I simply cut the line because I’m in a hurry, unlike everyone else? With no standard set of line rules, everything is possible every day, which is ironic in a land of “pas possible.”

Now that I’m aware that this is how lines are done in France, I can try to emotionally prepare myself for the line transgressions I’ll witness at Monoprix or La Poste. But to be honest, I still get riled up every time, and it’s sending my cortisol levels out of whack.

Now that I think of it, you know where there’s a really good, orderly line? Outside the Prefecture de Police at 8 am when it opens. Real ones know why.

Peeling Everything

In my vegetable-related life in America, I would maybe have the need to peel a vegetable once a year: potatoes for Thanksgiving. Sometimes you can even make your mashed potatoes the rustic way and just leave those skins in there. But in France, it seems to me that everything is peeled, whether it should be or not, and I’ve decided to remain opposed to much of this peeling out of respect for myself and for the integrity of the produce.

Picture yourself in a lush, sunny garden, mid-July, about to eat the most beautiful, juicy peach you’ve ever seen in your life. Imagine the soft, fuzzy skin, pierced by your first bite, juice running everywhere as you chomp and chomp with glee. That’s how a peach should be enjoyed.

Now imagine, instead, a naked peach, peeled entirely of its skin, glistening in the sunlight awkwardly. It’s almost embarrassing to see a peach this way, without its fuzzy sweater to hold it together, protecting that vulnerable fruit from the elements. No contrast, no nuance, just exposed bright orange flesh. How do you even hold a peach if it has no skin? It constantly slips from your fingers, you have nowhere to grip. Too much juice, all meat, and no container. Meanwhile, the slightly bitter skin lies in a pile on the table.

Yes, I have seen a peeled peach be eaten in this way. I have watched friends peel zucchinis before cooking them, the resulting green, seedy matter falling apart with no skin to hold the vegetable together. I’ve seen delicious roast potatoes be dissected daintily during dinner, the crisp skin left in a pile next to the plate.

Par contre, my in-laws tease me for running from the lunch table to wash my peach under the hose so I can enjoy it with the skin. “Mais Shelby, les pesticides!” they counsel. I tell them that the pesticides I’ve eaten my whole life in the US are far worse than what this peach has ever seen. Also, it tastes better with the skin, looks better, feels better. This goes for all vegetables, out of respect for whom, I shall not peel.

That said, and no matter what Queen Ina Garten says in her superb memoir, carrots should be peeled and not only scrubbed. I will allow the removal of carrot skins, but that’s it! Leave the rest of the produce alone.

Choc Thermique

A friend of mine has been studying up on the “code,” the French driving manual, so she can eventually take her driving test. She showed me a passage wherein the driving rule book itself actually provides a guideline for how much to cool (or not) your car. The guideline is that the AC should not be set more than five degrees cooler than the exterior temperature. Now, even I can acquiesce that this is sensible, it is green, it is wise, so why did my friend and I descend into a rant fest when we read it?

Let’s follow the logic. This 5-degree conseil is just fine for a nice spring day. But let’s say you’re driving in July and it’s 33C out, aka 91F for my Americans. 91 is pretty common all over the world for a hot summer day. If we were to follow the French guideline, we would be allowed to cool ourselves down to a whopping 28C or 82F, just cool enough to avoid a medical emergency while still being extremely uncomfortable.

I appreciate the impulse to not want to waste energy, to mitigate the very emissions that are making our summers so hot. But the fact that this advice even takes up space in the guidelines or space in the minds of drivers really sent me.

There is a lot of talk in France about “choc thermique,” or thermal shock that comes from an extreme change in temperatures. I’ve spoken with many a French person who is worried about choc thermique, much as I once was very concerned about threats like quicksand or the Bermuda Triangle. Unlike these last two phenomenons, thermal shock is a real thing; I googled for about 2 minutes to make sure. But the temperature difference required for such shock just does not exist in France, a place devoid of air conditioning, ice, and even ceiling fans. You’d have to go from your responsibly air-conditioned (extremely hot) car to a Picard freezer to potentially even get close to the conditions required for choc thermique, and even then I think the choc would just be at how comfortable the cool feels.

That said, I admit that I am getting used to being around less AC. Oh yes, there are hellish days, but on the regular, I can be much more comfortable in a swampy, room-temp, slightly too hot setting than I once could. However, this doesn’t mean I’ll ever admit that casual thermal shock is a threat to any of us. Crank the AC; I only have one life to live, and I’m living it at 72F or less.

And So…

If you find yourself saying, “Wow, Shelby, complaining over la clim, line etiquette, and shower doors, get a life,” you’re exactly right. I miss a nice, taut, predictable post office line, but not enough to move back home, ya know?

I read a report yesterday stating that the US had deported three children who were American citizens, at least one of whom was a 4-year-old boy undergoing cancer treatment. And that was just the headline for yesterday; it seems like there is something equally atrocious happening each and every day, so much so that it’s hard to keep track of (I’m assuming that’s the point). I’m not saying France is perfect by any means; while I report on the silly problems, there are enough real ones affecting people here, too. But, I have to say that while I wince every time the car AC is adjusted to be within five degrees of the external temperature, I am still extremely grateful to live here.

And I’m not just saying that in case anyone handling my citizenship request is reading this.