She Didn't Want My Help. I Came Anyway.
Paris, Lyon, Provence, and the trip that reminded me why we keep showing up for each other.
My daughter had a plan.
Graduate from college a year early, because apparently COVID had reshuffled enough credits to make that possible, spend the next several months deep in LSAT prep and law school applications, and then reward herself with two months living like a local in Paris. Alone. No contacts. No itinerary. No French. Just a 22-year-old with a savings account she had built entirely on her own and a confidence level that, honestly, I both admired and found mildly terrifying.
Dan and I were completely fine with this. (We were sooo not fine with this.)
I did eventually convince her to find some kind of structured program, even if just for a few hours a week, something that would force her into a routine and, more importantly, into a room with other people. She found an intensive French language course that, in a miracle of timing, also included women-only housing. I exhaled for the first time in weeks.
She thrived, naturally. Because she always does.
A few weeks in, a friend offered her an apartment in southern Spain for the final stretch of her trip. Free. And just like that, she announced she was heading to Fuengirola.
That is when I made my move.
"I thought I would fly over and help you move," I said, as casually as I could manage.
"Mom! You forgot the point of me being independent and figuring things out on my own," she said.
I paused.
"Of course. I just thought we could make a few stops along the way. Southern France. Lyon. Maybe Provence. On mom's dime, obviously."
She reconsidered immediately. She is her mother's daughter.
Paris, through her eyes
I flew into Paris and she met me as the local she had become. She had her favorite streets, her coffee spots, her shortcuts. She had an entire city that was hers and she was ready to share it.
We started with a hands-on cooking class in a real Parisian's apartment, not a hotel kitchen, not a tourist experience, but someone's actual home, their pots, their wine, their recipes passed down in French. We cooked together, we laughed through the language barrier, and we ate every single thing we made.
The next morning we found ourselves at a Coco Chanel inspired purse-making workshop, which sounds indulgent and absolutely was. We sat side by side, chose our leathers, learned the stitching, and walked out with something we had made with our own hands. I still have mine. I will have it forever.
She took me on her locals tour through the streets she had claimed as her own over those weeks. Hidden courtyards. The bakery she went to every morning. The streets where, she told me, she had finally started to feel like she belonged somewhere new.
One afternoon we found a bench in the Palais Royale gardens and just sat. No agenda. No next thing on the list. Just the two of us in one of the most beautiful outdoor spaces in the world, reading, talking, watching Paris happen around us. That bench might be my favorite memory of the whole trip.
That evening, rooftop drinks as the Eiffel Tower lit up at sunset. Yes, it is as magical as it sounds. No, it never gets old.
South to Lyon and Provence
We took the train south the next day, because that is the thing about France. You can be in Paris in the morning and in the gastronomic capital of the world by afternoon. Lyon does not get enough credit. It is extraordinary. We did a food tour through the old district that genuinely ruined me for other food cities. If you have never been, put it on the list immediately.
From Lyon we continued south to Provence, where we rented bikes and spent an afternoon making our way through the market alleys and sun-drenched streets of Aix-en-Provence. Lavender. Golden light. Rosé, obviously. The kind of afternoon that slows time down.
And then I drove her to Fuengirola, a little beach town on the southern coast of Spain, and I left her there. Settled into a beautiful borrowed apartment, keys in hand, completely at home in a country that was not hers either.
I drove away knowing, without a single doubt, that she was going to be just fine.
She always was.
The part I want you to hear
I tell you this story not to make you feel like you need to fly to Paris to have a meaningful trip with your daughter, your mom, or your best friend. You do not. The Maine road trip we took the summer before she left for college, the one where we car karaoked every Disney song ever written and talked for hours and stopped for lobster rolls, that trip changed me just as much.
What matters is not the destination. It is the decision to go. To carve out the time before another season slips by and you realize you meant to do it but life got in the way again.
Mother's Day is next Sunday. And if someone in your life is about to ask what you want, I am giving you permission to tell the truth.
You want a trip.
I put together a free guide with ten mother-daughter destinations I would personally recommend, from a weekend in Charleston to a private villa in Casa de Campo to a glamping escape in the Smokies. Download below and share it shamelessly. Forward it to your daughter. Text it to your mom. Leave it open on the counter and see what happens.
And if one of them sparks something, I am here.
You bring the vision. I handle everything else.
Want to see the full itinerary that inspired this trip? Paris, Lyon, and Provence, day by day, every experience included.
Read the Paris to Provence itinerary here. And when you are ready, let's plan yours.
