La Fashion Victime

This Mommy Profile was inspired by my mommy neighbor, the Logo Lolita.

Maman du Jour: La Fashion Victime

Natural habitat: American mom living in London, but gave up her 6-bedroom Mayfair digs to follow her banker husband running from the recession. Refers to self as “economic refugee”.

Hangouts: Starbucks, La Durée, and outdated Parisian hot spots from her junior year abroad.

Uniform: Blinged-out designer billboard. Handbag by Prada, sunglasses by Gucci, jeans by Dolce & Gabbana, ballerina flats by Chanel, T-shirt by Dior and underwear by La Perla. Pretension by fear of looking like an American soccer mom.

How to spot her: Besides the ginormous diamond solitaire ring and studs, necklace and tennis bracelet, she's got buttery blond hair, a personal-trainer toned bod, and at least 4 prominent designer logos visible at any given time. Oh, and don't forget the diamond encrusted Bulgari watch for Monday, Cartier Ballon Bleu for Tuesday,  Dior for Wednesday, diamond encrusted Rolex for Thursday. Rotate.

Raison d’Etre: See and be seen.

Profession: Trophy wife.

Vacations: Palm Beach (a swank second home complete with year-round staff), and whatever hotspot is de riguer for keeping up with Monsieur et Madame Dupont (Capri, South Africa, Croatia...).

Children’s names: Boys – Philip Bowden Walker V (nickname: Trey), William, Alexander; Girls– Lulu, Eleanor, Isabel

Lifestyles of the Bitch and Famous

Bitches? Oui!

Famous? Slightly.

Last Wednesday was my monthly night out with a group of mommy friends. It's called Dinner Club. We're all English speakers and mostly American. Every month we try a trendy restaurant in one of Paris's twenty arrondissements.

Out of the ten women who are there, I like half of them. The other half just entertain me (and unknowingly provide blog fodder). Some of these women are married to slightly famous French men. Their professions consist of an acting agent, a philosopher, a Minister of Something in Daddy (oops, I mean President) Sarkozy's government, cousin to the Duke of Paris, and a scion of French banking royalty.

Sometimes these moms can get très très bitchy. For instance, as we were discussing the approaching school holidays which started in Paris on Monday, one mommy decided to start a round-table discussion about who's vacationing where and with what staff. The conversation went like this:

NYC Mom: We're going to Morocco for 2 weeks. I've hired a chef to cook authentic Moroccan dishes for us.

London Mom: I've rented a house in Florida and the nanny's coming with us for 2 weeks.

Boston Mom: Me too! My nanny is only coming for a week. (Insert collective gasp from the moms).

Chicago Mom: Oh that's too bad she's only available for a week. How ever are you going to manage?

Boston Mom: I don't even want to think about it. Dear Husband is in China so I am completely on my own with the kids!

La Mom: Well, I'm staying in Paris and taking Big Fry to museum exhibits, kid's workshops, the Cité des Sciences, the circus, out for hot chocolate at Angelina, a tea party at La Durée, and the Jardin d'Acclimatation. (Insert collective look of pity from the other moms)

London Mom: How lovely! But, you should be taking the kids on vacation to the US. That's what everybody does during the school hols.

(Sidebar: Well, that's news to me! This is my first school vacation to deal with. I thought I was being super-mom by scheduling a ton of activities for Big Fry and making sure we spend quality time together actually doing things TOGETHER. Now I have to worry about 2 week school vacations every 2 months and plan accordingly because that's what you do in the posh 16th arrondissement? Uh, don't think that's gonna happen!)

So I replied with the first thing that came to my mind:

La Mom: Seems like vacations are necessities for you. I consider them luxuries Madame Lifestyles of the Bitch and Famous.

(London Mom didn't speak to me for the rest of the night).

Cheers!

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Starf***s...Oops, I Mean Starbucks

Here's a new French word for the day: Adultère.

Definition (courtesy of the French LaRousse dictionary): adj. viole la fidélité conjugale, or, violating conjugal fidelity.

Eh oui, you guessed it, our word for the day is adultery, which is a very befitting word when you live in France!

This morning I was all the way over in the 6th arrondissement antique shopping when I took a mommy time-out at Starbucks. As I was deep into reading The New York Times, I spied one of my mommy friends from the park having what looked to be a very flirty rendez-vous with someone who's not her husband. Ssshhh!

So what was mommy friend doing having coffee with another man all the way over in the 6th? Honestly, I really don't care. It's her business, but of course I'm a tad bit intrigued. I've met her husband at the park before, and let's just say, I wouldn't invite him over for dinner because he brings nothing to the park, therefore, I assume he wouldn't bring much to the table to talk about either. He's French and a bit stiff. In fact, a Frenchy would say he needs to "peter un coup" or rip one and loosen up a bit.

Mommy friend lives in the 17th arrondissement so she had to cross the Seine river to get to this out of the way Starbucks. Mystery man must make good coffee for her to leave the nice little bubble that is the 17th- plus there are lots of perfectly nice cafés there too. Hmmm.

I'm not accusing her of cheating, but, well, as the Urban Dictionary states, eye f*** :"When you and someone else are looking at each other like you want to ... " well... that's how they were looking at each other!

(Sidebar: La Mom DOES NOT recommend having a secret rendez-vous at Starbucks in this city if you are American. You are bound to run into someone you know because we all hang out there. Duh!)

She didn't see me and when they left Starf***s; sorry, Starbucks, I made sure my head was well hidden behind the newspaper. Her secret is safe with me - well sort of, since I've now shared it with you!

She Got Two Teef

Thank goodness Big Fry knows who he speaks English or French with otherwise Thursday afternoon could have been very embarrassing for moi!

We arrived at Big Fry's school and as we were waiting for the gates to open I struck up a conversation with the grandmotherly looking nanny of one of the boys. Big Fry starts staring at her face and then asks me loudly, "Mommy, why the lady got two teef (teeth)? She got two teef (teeth) like Small Fry."

Assuming the lady spoke only French, I broke out into a cold sweat anyway hoping she didn't understand what my son just said. Whew! Gotta be careful because you just never know who speaks English in this town. A lot of people do when you think they don't. For example...

A few days before Big Fry started his new Catholic school, I was there to buy him an art smock. One woman was trying to sell smocks to at least 50 parents. It was one big clusterf***.
(Sidebar: I love this word! It makes me feel so much lighter after I use it. In fact, if you ask me what word describes this stage in my life I'd have to say that word does. I can't go to the potty without the French Fries following me like they are missing a party in there and I can't take a shower without them peeping in on me either).

So I muttered under my breath, "What a clusterf***" (I know, I know, La MOM should go straight to the naughty corner for using this naughty word in a Catholic school). The dad next to me said, "Oh, so you're American too."

How embarrassing! I learned my lesson though.