Apparently at some, presumably Left Bank Parisian dinner parties, it is the height of rudeness to ask someone what they do. People talk rather about politics, and religion, and interesting movies, and everyone goes home feeling revived and invigorated after such a bracing dousing in the lives of others.
I suppose the French, always the leaders in this sort of thing, have realized that talking about other people’s jobs is tiresome. Equally, discovering that someone is a corporate lawyer really tells one very little about who that person actually is, apart from rich. (Which is, in itself, useful, but tricky to capitalize on at a dinner party).
It is for this reason (as well as a blinding and all-consuming lack of interest in other people) that I never ask people what they do. At an event last night, I noticed that other people still do. The trouble for me, I have realized, is that I can’t think in broad strokes. ‘An attention to detail,’ I pointed out to my little sister. ‘Is a wonderful thing.’ ‘No one cares what you had for breakfast,’ she replied, proving once again that she shouldn’t be allowed out to meet new people.
‘What do you do?’ someone asked me yesterday. I paused, but mostly because I was scanning the room quickly to check if my little sister was in earshot. ‘Well,’ I began happily. ‘There wasn’t any milk, so I had a cup of peppermint tea…’
Politics, religion and breakfast. Sometimes it’s quite tricky to be such a Left Bank darling.
I have a much better Jarvis Cocker story, although I very much like that hers puts her coming out of Greggs. Imagine that day- a sausage roll and Jarvis Cocker. Fantastic. My Jarvis Cocker story is somewhat different. I am in Paris, at a bar which is either tremendously cool or utterly horrible. I am trying to decide when I see Jarvis Cocker leaning against the bar. ‘Oh my goodness look it’s Jarvis Cocker!’ I shout indiscreetly to my friends. ‘What?’ ‘Yes, look, by the bar. Next to those drunk girls, but I don’t think he’s with them. I can’t believe it!’ My friends are excited, but in a more discreet fashion. In fact one of them tells me to be quieter, because he’s looking at us. Which is clearly ridiculous, given my shy reticence, so I ignore her robustly. ‘I’m going to go talk to him,’ I announce. ‘Oh God please don’t.’ ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ I say, ‘But he’s married. It’s all going to be very innocent.’ ‘That wasn’t what I was thinking at all,’ she grumbles, but I have already walked away.
unfashionablylost 