With or without a croissant

Last Sunday morning, I was in a small town in France called Rennes. The worst of the heatwave was over and I felt semi-cool for the first time in over a week. All I wanted to do was go outside in my new sundress I had picked up at a thrift store earlier in the week and walk in the streets, feeling the cool air on my skin. I asked my partner if she wanted to come with me and she was all in.

As we walked outside, the cool air did not disappoint. It was bliss. The streets were empty and most of the stores were closed because French people, I have learned, take great care in protecting their Sundays. Sundays are for slowing down, doing whatever is desired, and thoroughly enjoying. All without guilt. So much to learn from the French.

We wandered down old cobblestone streets, peered in shop windows, and marveled at the architecture (I marveled and my partner, who is French, marvelled at me, marveling). It was a lovely morning.

Down one of the streets we spotted a little line out of a building, so we headed that way to see what was getting people out of their houses on a Sunday morning. I should have known. It was a boulangerie, a French bakery. Rumor has it every neighborhood has to have at least one boulangerie open on Sundays.

We’d already had breakfast, but the smells coming out of the bakery were incredible. I decided right then and there to get a croissant. This was not a vegan bakery, mind you. This was a full-on butter, eggs, and milk bakery. But I didn’t care. I hadn’t had a regular croissant in nearly two decades and I was feeling it. I ordered my fluffy goodness, handed over the €1.40 and stepped back into the street, croissant in hand.

We continued to walk around the neighborhood as I enjoyed every last flaky, soft, buttery bite.

That’s the thing, isn’t it?

We can be whole-food plant-based eaters and have a croissant sometimes. 

In a world that is saturated with AI, fillers, botox, facelifts, filters, and reel upon reel of “perfect” people living “perfect” lives, and eating “perfect” food, take a minute and come back to reality.

Humans are messy, complicated, and full of paradox.

And that is a beautiful fucking thing.

Let’s lean into that. 

I want to celebrate your scars, your contradictions, your stretchmarks, your quirks, your wrinkles, your sun spots, your grey hair, the softness of your belly, your asymmetry.

I want AI and social media to take weekends off, and I want to go camping with you and hear all about what keeps you up at night, how you feel about death, the books that made the heaviness lift, and your most embarrassing moments. I want to laugh so hard our bellies ache, and I want to drink hot cocoa with you and sing horribly out of tune until we’re sleepy and the stars put us to bed.

I want more real and less reels.

I want you to eat a croissant if you want and not feel ashamed of it. I want to see myself in you and I want you to see yourself in me and I want you to think, “Damn, she’s weird and kind of fucked up too, I guess I’m not alone after all.” 

But we can’t do that if we hide who we are.

Be you, oh messy brilliant one. You are a magical gift.  

Molly