Birds in a Watery Grave

They’re all along the Seine, gleaming under the surface, these birds. Not finches, not girls of sixties English slang, but electric scooters. There are many more to splash down, I think, cast into the river by revelers or scooter vigilantes.

Perhaps they will become fresh-water reefs, hatcheries for fish or snags for fishermen. Perhaps they will become art, underwater Watts Towers. 

The Seine has survived worse. Floods, droughts, Marly’s diversion of her water to the fountains of Versailles, which at one time received a greater share of her beneficence than all of Paris. Let them eat cake, and wash it down with wine.

The lovely old river that gives the City of Light much of her allure and romance doesn’t deserve this latest assault. 

And neither do we, the happy, hapless daydreamers who stroll along her banks. It’s hard to let your mind drift to your lover or your novel when you’re in danger of being bashed to the ground by a speeding silent predator with the mass of a careless human.

Electric scooters from Bird, Lime and others have migrated to Paris. They’re more like locusts than cheerful swallows. When we were here a year ago, there were none. Now there are thousands. 

The city is busily considering regulations to control them; to force them off sidewalks and onto bicycle lanes, for instance. Where that means going in the streets with cars, I fear for the safety of the parents and children I see riding together, two to a scooter. They go as fast as bicycles. No one wears helmets.

I’m sure scooters could be good for the environment as carbon-free transportation. But from what I’ve seen, they are used less as an alternative to cars than for tourist joyrides. Like the family I saw today buzzing around the pyramids at the Louvre, weaving in and out of the crowds of people who were holding hands with their lovers and children, taking photos of the fountains and generally basking in the majesty and tranquility of the architecture of French emperors and I.M. Pei—and who certainly weren’t expecting to be buzzed by a scooter.

There is a place for wheeled sport, like bicycle lanes and skateboard parks. City sidewalks jammed with walking wanderers who just want to relax and enjoy the beauty of this amazing place, are not among them.

Keep Him High, Sell Him Again

Here’s how it happens. 

A teenager is a little wild and rebellious. Maybe her parents are too strict. Maybe they just don’t care that much. Or maybe they care a lot but don’t seem to be able to get their child back on track. The kid tries a little alcohol, a little weed, then harder stuff. The people he meets in the land of lost boys introduce him to helpful dealers who give him free samples of the good stuff. Pretty soon he’s a full-blown addict.

There follow the lies, the fights with family, the stealing, more lies, more fights, more stealing, and pretty soon the kid is on the street, either by choice or by eviction from a home that doesn’t understand, can’t understand, what happened to their little boy. 

He has to want to change, they say. He has to hit bottom.

But bottom is rock hard, and it hurts.

Even if the kid wants out, even if he goes into rehab, the permanent exits are guarded by his addict homies, his dealers and, as it turns out, even the recovery system. He becomes a body for the body brokers who sell him to the highest bidder in the detox-sober-living system. The fees for his recovery are collected from health insurance plans he has or ones the body brokers enroll him in. He lives in a sober living house that often isn’t sober at all. 

Keep him high, keep him addicted, sell him again, and again, until there’s nothing left to sell.

This is what addicts and their parents are fighting. Recovery is tough enough, but nearly impossible if the game is rigged. Like those milk bottles at the state fair. No one can ever knock them down. Still they keep trying. 

And still the barker puts the money in his pocket.