I pointed to a Barbie poster in the Paris Metro.

Me: I really want to go see this when we get home. Does either of you want to come along?

Munchkin: You’re joking, right?

Joy: Um . . . why?

Me: Greta Gerwig is a serious director, you know. It’s not going to be a toy tie-in. It’s probably a parody, or some kind of serious take. And I bet it’ll be really funny.

Joy: Even so. Have fun.

I will. And . . . it turns out I don’t have to wait ’til we’re back in the U.S., because the movie is shown in English with local-language subtitles! (I had feared it would be dubbed.) But I am going to hang in there until we’re in Spain, so that the subtitles will be an educational experience. I’m always trying to improve my Spanish, whereas my French is a relic I can’t be bothered to brush off, except for necessary interactions.

Edited to add: I have found a Barcelona movie theater that’s showing it in English; confirmed that the subtitles are in Castellano, i.e., Spanish, not Catalán (you never know); figured out transportation from/to the place we’re staying; and bought a ticket for Thursday night! Score!

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This week in Provence is the one time in our two-month trip that we have a car. We figured we’d want to go to small towns and other places a ways out from Arles, so we rented a car–that is, I did, as I’m the only driver. I had hopes for a little Fiat or Citroen, and ended up with a larger car than I needed, but one thing about it is very European: it’s a stick shift. I was taken aback when I got in the car, and for a split second wondered if I’d still know how to drive one after many years of an automatic, but of course I do. It’s like riding a bicycle. Not in terms of environmental impact, however; I bow to the munchkin in that regard, since she is biking everywhere. Anyway, I’m enjoying driving, and especially in beautiful and unfamiliar places, and especially shifting gears.

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Lest I have given the impression with recent posts that all the reading I’m doing is Serious, I have also been reading Commissario Guido Brunetti mysteries, by Donna Leon. They were recommended to me long ago, and I tried one then, but couldn’t get into it. Maybe I should have started with the first one. In any case, the apartment building we stayed in in Paris had a public shelf of books for the taking, and one was an English-language edition of one of them (not the first), so I decided to give them another go, and took the first one out of the library using Hoopla, which is how I’ve been doing most of my reading all summer. I could not put it down. Likewise the second, third, and the one from the building, which turns out to be the fourteenth. They are so good, and she has written so many! Yum.

In a perfect illustration of how impossible it is to characterize reading as leisure or work, I have also resumed the Wayfarers series by Becky Chambers. I had read The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet and A Closed and Common Orbit. Via the library / Hoopla / my cellphone, I just read Record of a Spaceborn Few, and am now reading the fourth and final book, The Galaxy, and the Ground Within. They are undoubtedly fun to read. They are also powerfully thought-provoking. Spaceborn Few, in particular, has one storyline that really resonates–the character has a job that’s a lot like a minister’s, and her difficulty being seen always in that role is one that will have most clergy nodding in rueful recognition. But all of them have a genius for creating worlds, species, relationships, and situations that shine a revealing light on our own. I’m so glad she is prolific, comparatively young, and still writing up a storm.

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So, in sabbatical reading:

Finished rereading Gilead, started rereading Lila, both by Marilynne Robinson.

As noted above, read Record of a Spaceborn Few and have started The Galaxy, and the Ground Within.

I had planned to read The Angel’s Game, by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, before going to Barcelona, its setting. However, my hold request hasn’t come through yet, and it’s probably just as well. Two books at a time are sufficient.