Hold me closer, tiny dancer

I'm on this Elton John kick.  I can't stop listening to 'Tiny Dancer,' and I can't even tell you why.  I think it has something to do with comfort.  When I'm on the road, I seek out things that make me feel a little less foreign, a little more at home, whether it's my regimen of soft-boiled eggs and lavender earl grey tea for breakfast, or my arsenal of hand cream and shampoo/conditioner, wrapped and plastic-bagged for the trans-Atlantic flight.  I tend to sleep a lot, read a lot, and build myself into this little cocoon of normalcy that serves as a buffer between me and everything outside my studio apartment.  In this case, that would be the hostile weather, the French grocery store and its siren song of a cheese section, and French television.

Can we take a minute to talk about the cheese section?  As a latecomer to the non-dairy scene, I spent a lot of my childhood and young adulthood eating cheese.  Not any of that kraft singles bullshit, we're talking real cheese.  Edam.  Gouda.  Brie.  Stilton.  Gorgonzola.  Manchego.  Drunken goat.  Any kind of goat, really.  My mom makes eyes at the cheese man at Whole Foods.  I keep telling her, she just has to ask for a sample and they will give it to her, flirting or not.  All of this is to say it's really REALLY difficult to avoid dairy in France.  Just like it's really difficult to avoid baguettes.  I'm walking down the street, there are at least 15 people in every block holding a steaming hot baguette, and they have already ripped a piece off the end and are munching on it while walking.  Bread and cheese.  I could survive on bread and cheese, if my digestion would let me.

Which brings me back to comfort.  In the place of the goat cheese I wish to spread on anything and everything, I turn to things like Nutella.  Or, here in France, crunchy Nutella.  Yes, friends, such a thing exists.  It's so beautiful.  It's like that Ferrero Rocher chocolate thingie in a jar.  Nutella, bananas, lentil soup, baguettes, soft-boiled eggs, pasta and pesto.  Elton John.

Elton is a new development.  I had a brief but intense experience with the Elton John greatest hits box set when my friend Emily's car (oh Owen, how we miss you) broke down and I drove her to and from school for a week.  She had just purchased said box set and when it showed up in the mail (that's right, this was BEFORE iTunes and downloads), we loaded that puppy into my 6-CD changer and there it stayed for the whole week.  I had always enjoyed Elton from afar, but there he was, in my car and in my ears, just as she was in my car.  I want to say that was almost ten years ago.

So.  Before I get too comfortable, I'm gonna put on my running shoes and head to the gym.  As a person who almost never does things by halves, sloth is only one step past comfort.

Happy sloth day to you all.  Hold me closer, tiny dancer.