To be fair, I’m starting to think that it’s not Paris, it’s me. New York likes its women a bit neurotic. They’re encouraged to create a brainy, adorable, conflicted bustle around themselves—à la Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally or Diane Keaton in Annie Hall. Despite having nothing more serious than boy troubles, many of my friends in New York were spending more on therapy than on rent. That persona doesn’t fly in Paris. The French do like Woody Allen’s movies. But in real life, the ideal Parisian woman is calm, discreet, a bit remote, and extremely decisive.
