So, you want to leave the U.S.?

Let us tell you all about it.

Hello! It’s Not Just You is a free weekly(ish) newsletter which I write from Paris, but not always about Paris. A warm welcome to all you new subscribers.

Below are some reflections on fleeing the U.S. or running to France, whichever way you want to look at it. And for some wisdom and expert insight on that topic, I’ve got an interview with author and journalist Lindsey Tramuta, who writes the most excellent New Paris Dispatch here on Substack, and has just published The Eater Guide to Paris.

And if you want to flee to Paris for just a week, join me and Glynnis MacNicol, author of “I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself”, for The Blue Hour, a life-changing(seriously) writing retreat this September.

As always, if you’re not already a subscriber, you can sign up here for free:

Let’s say you’re me, and you leave the United States for Paris because you don’t feel very American anymore. Or perhaps the problem is that the United States doesn’t feel so much like America anymore. Either way, Paris has been calling you back for decades, so after one particularly important birthday, you pack two bags and one dog and head to the airport.

Alas, immediately after arriving, you remember that the quickest way to feel American is to go to Europe. Leave the U.S., and your most distinguishing feature will probably be your Americanness (unless you’re one of those seamlessly bicultural people, and you know who you are).

This is not necessarily terrible, but, oh, the irony.

Even if I perfect my plus-que-parfait, and I never misgender a trashcan again, I’m stuck with the accent. It’s not fatal, but it’s permanent. I’ll spend the rest of my days announcing my not-Frenchness whenever I speak. To be fair, sometimes my shoes give me away before I even say a word. Also: if I wear a certain aggressively floral dress, waiters seem compelled to snatch the French menu out of my hands and give me the English one, just on principle.

Here I’m “that American writer,” or someone’s American friend, or “the américaine who always asks for salted butter with her breakfast.” At some point, if I’m lucky, I’ll graduate to that “old writer.”

After 30 years in the U.S., my Dad was still “that tall German guy,” though it was said with affection. More immigrant irony: when Dad visited his hometown, Berlin, his German had a slight American accent, and he didn’t get German slang or jokes anymore. He was forever betwixt and between cultures. Always both and neither.

This is what you sign up for when you change worlds.

In trying to explain this betwixt and betweenness to folks who ask me what it’s like to move to Paris on your own, I’m reminded of my favorite movie about Americans in Paris. It’s a surprisingly radical little film from 1961 called “Paris Blues,” and it’s about two American jazz musicians who’ve abandoned the U.S. for France, as many writers and artists did then. It’s not perfect, but it stars Sidney Poitier and Paul Newman, who are never a waste of time. Plus, there’s a glorious cameo by Louis Armstrong, and music by Duke Ellington.

Poitier is Eddie Cook, a thoughtful saxophonist who finds freedom in the beauty of Paris, far from segregation and racism in the United States. Newman is Ram Bowen, a moody trombone player drawn to the creative freedom of Paris’ legendary jazz scene. They fall in love with two American tourists played by Joanne Woodward (as Lilian) and Diahann Carroll (as Connie), and must choose between Paris and the U.S.

Eddie and Connie walk Paris talking about the civil rights movement in the U.S. Eddie waves his hand toward the Seine and tells Connie to stay for a while, see what it’s like to sit down for lunch somewhere without worrying about being clubbed for it: “You’ll wake up one day, look across the ocean and say, who needs it?” Connie argues that everyone needs their roots and pushes him to come home, be part of a changing nation. “Eddie, this is not your home. This is a place you’ve run to.” For Ram, it’s a simpler decision: an American life with Lilian or the artist’s life he’s built around music in Paris.

This is the eternal push and pull of emigration. The film’s opening scene captures the undeniable allure of bohemian Paris in the 1950s and early 1960s – gritty, rumpled, avant-garde, and integrated. Director Martin Ritt shows us a packed jazz club, the band plays, people dance, smoke furiously, make out in the aisles as waiters weave around them. And in a censor-busting move for 1961, we see interracial and same-sex couples in the crowd. Later, there’s a sizzling encounter between Newman and the sultry French actress, Barbara Laage, who plays the owner of the club. All they do is talk about how she’s preparing a chicken for dinner, and yet…

(Watch “Paris Blues” on YouTube.)

That’s the Paris we fall for – food, seduction, music, perfect eyeliner, and an unabashed indulgence in what is pleasurable and beautiful. The thing is, the myth, like all myths, is partly true. So it’s not surprising that kind of liberation appeals to so many of our tightly-wound American souls, marinated as we are in our founders’ Puritanical mores.

Lately, my conversations with restless or anxious American friends have gone from pied-a-terre-fantasy musings to real discussions about them leaving the U.S. I tell them what I know from living here now, and in my 20s, and share the name of my immigration lawyer, who says he’s been inundated with French visa queries, particularly from gay Americans who feel increasingly unwelcome at home.

I’m never sure what to say when people ask how difficult it is to integrate here in Paris. I don’t have a shred of regret about selling everything and coming here. I am at home here in ways I’ll save for another newsletter. But it was terrifying at first because there was no turning back. I knew I couldn’t afford to come back and restart life in New York once I left. (New York coop apartments are like the Mafia; once you’re out, you’re out.) But I’m not typical. Maybe no one is.

So, to get some informed insights and wisdom for those of you considering a move abroad, or are even considering considering it, I checked in with someone who has done some deep reporting on Americans in France.

Paris-based journalist and author Lindsey Tramuta writes The New Paris Dispatch newsletter, which is my go-to publication for Paris news and culture. Late last year, Lindsey began a fascinating series called “On Leaving America,” in which she interviews Americans who’ve settled in France. They discuss the highs and lows of living here, what they’ve discovered about themselves, and their best guidance on what to think about as you make your decision. Lindsey launched the series, presciently enough, just days after last fall’s presidential election. However, she’s long been intrigued by the reasons millions of Americans leave their home country.

“We read all these stories in America about people who have made their lives in the U.S., who have fled dictatorships and war-torn countries to come for this American dream, which I don't think exists anymore,” she says. “But we rarely explore the factors that push people away.”

Here are some of Lindsey’s thoughts on what attracted many of the Americans in her series to France, what she’s learned after 19 years in Paris, and her advice for anyone thinking about a move like this.

(You can listen to our entire conversation at the link below.)

Was there any common thread in what your interviewees were looking for?

Lindsey Tramuta: “What does come up is a sort of freedom. Now, that can mean different things for different people, but whether it's the freedom to reinvent yourself, the freedom to explore things with more encouragement, because this is not a society that says you need to be working 75-hours a week, and you need to be focused on making the most money possible. It could be freedom of movement and just the freedom to share ideas. I think there's really a diversity of thought that is quite powerful here.

Are we at risk of the same censorship and suppression [in France]? Potentially. You know, we have a billionaire, right-wing billionaire, Vincent Bolloré, who owns media companies that are going to try to dictate [news] in the way that Fox News has and other platforms have. But there is also something that the French have that the Americans don't, and that's this absolute rage that will take them to the streets at the drop of a hat.”

And on the difficulties of making this kind of a move?

“All of them acknowledge the complexity of the decision. The bureaucratic complexity as well. And it really is not for the faint of heart. I mean, the number of times people almost throw in the towel signals to you that you can't just make this decision on a whim. And there are people who do and who are like, ‘Oh, it didn't work out.’ Well, maybe it didn't work out because you didn't fully research how complicated it was going to be or how process-oriented it was going to be. And I would say, don't think that it's somehow easier for people who are going to the US. It's not. Or the UK.”

You ask your interviewees what lessons they’ve learned from living in France. How would you answer that question?

“Well, there are two things. One would be that taking yourself out of your familiar context is so huge, and having a different perspective on the world. Not only are you likely to hear other opinions, viewpoints, and histories related to a certain topic, [but] if you're in France, you're going to hear the French perspective on a relationship with other parts of Europe [rather] than the American perspective. And I think that has completely shaped me as an adult. It also helped me unlearn a lot of things – [such as] the idea that America is the shining beacon on a hill. Some people [un]learn that while being in the U.S. The reason I [un]learned it later was probably due to when I left. I left as a 20-year-old. If I had stayed and been part of America during all of the periods of social upheaval [that have happened] since I left, maybe that would be different. Maybe it would have happened sooner.

But the unlearning is so important because I think it really highlights the extent to which we can be brainwashed. Same thing happens in other cultures, of course. The version of history you're told about your country in school. And so that was both painful and welcome because I think it makes you a more critical thinker. It's made me a more critical thinker.

And what have I learned about living here in particular? It's the role that integrating via language changes everything. There are people who have lived here 30, 40 years and who can barely speak French. And if that somehow works for them and their ability to navigate life here, I'm amazed. But wow, I couldn't do that. I feel like it’s a moral obligation. I also find it so intellectually stimulating and emotionally broadening.

You tap into a part of yourself you didn't know existed because you can express yourself in another way with different words. And so I felt like it has just opened me up in ways I couldn't have imagined. When you're studying a language, you don't know that that's what's going to happen if you keep with it. And so I found it quite powerful.”

What advice do you have for those considering a move to France?

“I would say, remember that the beginning is always difficult. And so for those who have gotten the visa or are making the move, if you give up in a year, it's premature. There's like a sweet spot. Everyone goes through this year and a half, potentially, of severe discomfort, whether it's making friends, feeling like you're respected or heard, especially if the language is still complicated. That's gotten maybe a little bit easier because so many people speak English here now. But I would say give it time. And so you have to have kind of a thick skin.”

Check out all the wise advice on moving to France from Lindsey’s interviewees in the “On Leaving America” series here. AUDIO: You can listen to more of our conversation below. We discuss how political and social discord affect migration from the U.S. and cultural differences between France and the United States.

Related:

For more on the unique place France holds in the American imagination, check out this piece on Mastermind.

My Crazy Ex-Country

The Paris Review on “Paris Blues”

“Paris Blues,” the entire film free on YouTube.

“Paris Blues,” by Harold Flender The book on which the film was based—a much grittier look at bohemian Paris in the 50s, focused more on the Eddie Cook character.

When Making Art Means Leaving the United States: A new book expands the history of the Black Americans who nurtured their creativity overseas.

P.S. And just for illustrative purposes, here is the dog I took along with the suitcases.

Join me and Glynnis MacNicol, author of “I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself”, for The Blue Hour, a life-changing(seriously) writing retreat this September. The cossetted dog may make a guest appearance.