PEPE LEPEW MIGHT HAVE STUNK BUT SURELY IT WAS A LOVELY FRENCH PERFUME!

I was just a toddler. But I giggled every time I saw Pepe LePew trying to kiss a girl skunk. Such metaphors those cartoons invoked. I realize now. Isn't it the skunks who try to kiss alllll the girls? Just like Georgie Porgie, he probably made them all cry, too. But I was too little to know that then.

                       

Warner Brothers' cartoons always had those hidden sub-themes that enabled adults to watch and enjoy them too, just like the kids.

I grew up believing that girls, skunks or not, were supposed to act coy when a boy tried to kiss them. And that being French must be romantic. Funny how little children's minds work. They absorb everything.

Then, watching re-runs of the movie Gigi with my mother and hearing Maurice Chevalier sing "Thank Heaven For Little Girls" made me like Mr. Chevalier's French accent, and any mention of Paris.

You realize of course, the famous writer Colette actually wrote the story behind Gigi, right? I've always wanted to steal Colette's name! She died before I was ever born.

                                            Colette - The Famous French Writer

So began my love affair with Paris though at the age of three these notions were just  forming. I didn't realize I was falling in love. With a city I couldn't imagine. A country that drew my thoughts like a magnet.

From that time on, any mention of France or Paris made me obsessively search out any detail that my eyes or ears could find on what seemed like the most exotic, romantic place on Earth.

To hear the story of my longing to get to that famous city - and the answer to whether I finally realized my dream - READ MY BOOK I FELL FOR PARIS! On Kindle E-Books later this month.

    I   FELL FOR PARIS by COLEEN CLARK