danielbaylis.ca

Dear Family and Friends,

It’s late on Sunday evening. I’m exhausted. I need a day off.

I know, I know… there shall be no sympathy extended towards my problems of western world-travelin’ privilege. But can you just play a little bit of violin music to accompany my hardships?

Some folks have mistakenly referred to my yearlong travel project as a ‘vacation’ – and to those people I cast the dirtiest of evil eyes. Yes this year is fun and exploratory. But it’s also a shitload of work, like breaking rocks n’ stuff.

This upcoming month will perhaps be my most challenging. I’ve nabbed the position of “Broadcast Liaison” for a theatre company at one of the world’s biggest festivals. Maybe you can guess it? It’s going to be a crazy month of 14-hour days; I’ve been thrown directly into the fire. And I’m going to tell you all about it, very soon.

But before we go forward, let’s go back.

The past week was busy with leaving the lovely worksite at Ruffepeyre, a quick one night’er in Toulouse, and then three days in Paris, primarily hanging out with Boris (who you may remember from my January posts in New Orleans).

It was delightful to be back in Paris. I have visited before, and checked off all the requisite ‘tourist’ destinations – Eiffel Tower, Le Louvre, Sacré-Cœur, Notre Dame – so I had no pressure to run about or do anything. So I biked around with the intelligent urban bike share program (Velib), dined by the river and sipping glasses of red wine at cozy bistros. Je suis presque parisienne.

But wait, I’m making it sound like a holiday. And didn’t I just complain that I was exhausted? Travel tends to discombobulate the mind.

I’ve been waiting ALL year to use the word ‘discombobulate.’

Well there was certainly some work in the mix. But I guess I prefer to paint lovely pictures of me cruising through the romantic streets of Paris on a bicycle, rather than the image of a smelly glazy-eyed blogger hunched over his computer. Tell me that’s what you want to read!

In reality, it’s been a mix of work and play. And that’s what life should be. N’est-ce pas?

With love from a secret new location,

xoxo

Daniel

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