Road to Elsewhere, Excerpt #22*: How Paris Dug Out from 500,000 Pounds of Manure (Every Day)

The City of Light is also the City of....um....Fragrances

THE SAINT-PLACIDE METRO STATION was nearest to my language school, in Paris. 

More Gallic irony, because that particular Métro entrance was anything but placid. The south-east orientation of the entrance tunnel, urged along by the transit snakes roaring through the darkness below, caused a ferocious headwind as I kite-winged down the staircase. But that was part of my exhilaration: A tempest of change, storm-tossing me forward!

The station was named for Saint Placid, who was rescued from drowning when Saint Benedict ordered Saint Maurus to run across the surface of a pond to rescue his brother. All three thereby qualified for beatification, which must have made them glad they hadn’t simply gone out for breakfast that morning, instead. 

This trio of saints had nothing on their brother Saint Augustine, of course, who worked hard at sinning, perhaps to up the juiciness factor for his own Confessions. If only I’d had that idea! I invoke him here as the patron saint of memoir, a French word t…