eckst**ns in paris

"I have slept one hour the last two days." Owen Eckstein. 

"That shit cray." (JAY-Z and Kanye West)

Bon jour! There really is no way to get to Europe without enduring the general misery of a sleepless, transatlantic flight. We took the British Airways direct to London overnight, the same flight as our friends, the Blanchards. As I posted on Facebook on Tuesday, the Blanchards, who were on their way to a Baltic cruise, had three carry-on bags and, they claimed, one checked bag. The Ecksteins, by contrast, were sweating out whether any of our four checked-bags would be under "heavy bag" weigh limit. Put another way, the family that effectively had to unpack only one time was traveling light and the one on the front end of a nine-city tour have packed really well for a cruise.

The flight itself was as expected -- human beings crammed into a flying metal tube like sardines. The 5-foot teenage soccer player in front of me made sure to tilt her seat back as far as it could go, just to take away that last precious inch that may have otherwise allowed me to sleep on the tray table. As it was, I sat up, falling in and out of a very light haze, with a cray 13-year old boy resting his head on my shoulder, doing the same. In between moments of actual sleep, I was able to see two very good, very different movies -- Captain Marvel and If Beale Street Could Talk.

Our flat in Paris is in the 14th Arrondissment, just over the line from the 6th. It is nice, but a bit small for four adult-sized persons. We did not get here until close to 10 last night, so we unpacked and went straight to bed. The cramped quarters and botched body clocks proved problematic, as Owen came in at 2am to tell us he was unable to sleep. He apparently did not fall back asleep, instead, spending the next several hours watching game three of the NBA Finals.

Awoken, Owen had dragged me down with him. After listening to the Yankees bullpen implode in Toronto, I decided to give up on getting any sleep and headed out for an early morning run. Traffic was minimal and I saw only a couple other runners. It is overcast here today, so I did not catch the rising sun hitting the majestic sights of Paris, but the morning still created some great light. Unfortunately, my iPhone photography skills do not do it justice.  [Editor's note: after writing this, both Owen and I fell asleep for four hours, and just got up to make our tour of the Marais.]

By happenstance, our first day in France is on the 75th Anniversary of the D-Day invasion at Normandy, less than 200 miles from Paris. I can barely fathom the courage and sacrifice of the American, British, and Canadian and other Allied forces as they went headlong into heavy fire, parachuting though high winds or jumping out of a landing craft. By June 1944, the Allies had pushed back the Nazis substantially and it was just a matter of time before the war was over. The bold acts of heroism on D-Day hastened that end saving millions of lives in the process.