In defence of abandoning your dreams

God forbid a girl talk a lot of delulu.

This was supposed to be a letter from Paris.

Instead, it’s a confession: I was nervous about logging in to Substack today.

I knew I’d have to face the remains of a dream I promised myself (and one that I’d also promised, loudly, to everyone I know). I suppose I have a bit of explaining to do. Here goes.

I quit writing this year to focus on Paris—or rather, because one of my oldest friends handed me the opportunity.

I first met Alejandra in 2010 at a party in Walt Disney World, Orlando (another story for another time). A year later, we were sharing an apartment just off the Champs-Élysées. We kept in touch over the years, but a Mexico City—Glasgow long-distance friendship isn’t the easiest to maintain. So when Alejandra told me she was visiting Europe for her sister’s wedding, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to catch-up for a few days. Last Autumn, almost 15 years after our time as flatmates, we found ourselves walking those same boulevards again, wondering if it was possible to relive the magic.

Just a few months later, Alejandra was offered a work placement for three months in, you guessed it, Paris. Wish-a-pont-des-arts indeed.

‘You NEED to come visit’

‘I think I could actually just like, come?’

I’m a big millennial cliche. Remote worker, childfree, spoiled dog. Really, nothing to *stop* me working abroad for three months. Sure, it was a lot to organise, and an eye-watering sum to save in such a short time. But to use another cliche- it’s Paris. You gotta go.

After first getting the news, I spent all my spare time selling on Vinted, trying to earn some extra money on top of my full-time job, and dealing with the admin of moving to Europe with my dog in a post-Brexit administrative hellscape. I figured I could let writing slip because when I got there, I’d be so inspired and have so much to write about. I’d spend my days sipping espresso, writing the next great modern classic in a notepad, returning home to send my subscribers a ‘French dispatch’ - a love letter from a fabulous life.

But then I just didn’t.

I didn’t write at all.

Not so much as a postcard.

I felt a creeping guilt. I turned off paid and donated my previous ‘earnings’ to Médecins Sans Frontières and the UN World Food Program.

And then I forgave myself.

A beautiful life is a prize. Some things can increase your odds of winning, but so much is down to chance. I’d been given a second chance to live one of the most wonderful seasons of my life. Paris in the Spring. I could write about it during the winter in Glasgow.

Even on its worst days, Paris presents you with a thousand little distractions. The crunch of a fresh croissant, the clink of tiny espresso cups, the citrus-sweet haze of someone else's perfume as they pass by. You could bring your laptop, but it would be impossible to resist watching the waiter flirt and kiss the air near a young American tourist. To bear witness to her lifelong memory of how the Frenchman charmed her over a basket of warm baguette.

And that’s if you have time. There’s a running joke that everything in Paris has a DJ set. The vintage pop-up, the techno protest, Joe and Juice. Every night, every weekend, the city is beating. And it’s inviting you to dance. Every night, the Eiffel Tower glitters and the sun ripples its last beams on the Seine. It’s a performance that never gets less wondrous. The beauty of Paris isn’t in seeing or doing it all, but in simply getting caught up. Being jostled along your day like it's Carnival, by strangers, food, drinks, music, and rain. The knowing look between people who know the city well that says, every day, in every way, Paris will surprise you.

You probably have friends like me, or perhaps you are one yourself.

Dreamers.

Relentless optimists.

The people who have new ideas every week and think every one of them is going to work out. The haters will say they talk a lot and don’t have what it takes to follow through.

But I think it's an excellent quality to have.

In the book Range, David Epstein discusses the distinct advantage of being a generalist. Why it pays to try many different things, to learn, to get good, and then to say ‘this isn’t really for me’. It builds diversity of character, strengthens the bones of every skill, and detaches occupation from identity.

It’s also served me well to snap at opportunities, say yes, and then bend the world to my will. There’s no one more determined than a childless millennial woman who knows what she wants. There’s a certain grit that comes with doing things that are both unnecessary and uncomfortable.

I used to believe that ambition needed proof: the 5 am wake-up, the deadline, the essay. But lately, I’m learning there’s a different kind of success in showing up fully to your life. In drinking French wine and kissing strangers on the cheek.

At midnight on a Tuesday.

With one of your oldest friends.

In a city built for dreamers.