" To sit outside a Paris cafe at breakfast is to observe the city as it wipes the sleep from its eyes: the soft clink of a cup and saucer, the turning of newspaper pages, the passerby with a cigarette who asks for a light, and me at my little round table, nibbling a speculoos, sipping my cafe creme. "

― Stephanie Rosenbloom , Alone Time: Four Seasons, Four Cities, and the Pleasures of Solitude