I hate these days. When the sun's shining, and the air is dry and for no other reason, it's hard to breathe. The days are floating by now like those cotton-ball, soft breezy clouds over Haussmann's Paris in the 14th. It's not the brevity of our time here in the Old World that's choking my throat, slurring my words out in a soft mumble with no breath behind them. It's just asthma, I figure. That's what it feels like anyways, from everything I've ever heard on the subject. I never had asthma as a child, but then again, these lungs of mine aren't what they used to be back in days of AYSO and swim team. I've got a lot more spliffs to my name now and that's just one of those things you don't think about too much because the numbers'll make you dizzy, and you can almost feel the tar nestling in your insides. It's just something to take note of. Be weary. Let it be acknowledged, but don't stop living. Ever. Snags like this are a dime a dozen on our vacation turned feat of survival, and I'm just trying to suck all the life I can out of it. And out of my ever-dwindling bank account. So as we're walking from Marie's with a Carrefour baguette and Tucs and stolen Carrefour cheese and meats and Granini fruit juice, to a lovely park she told us about in the south of the city adorned with bronze statues on tall white columns, I suck again, inward, pull the air in through my nose and hard down with my diaphragm to fight against the close. Just another thing to fidget with, another road-block to bypass. No sweat. And now it's time for lunch in the green grass and a spliff and an epic tournament of gentlemen's hearts. Ah, summer in Paris. We play 'til the shade draws from the side tree grooves. It's a slow sun these days. Nico knows.
