Hot Chocolate.
That was the caption I had in mind when I took this photo in Paris. Sometimes one word — or two — is enough. The image does the rest.
There's a particular pleasure to sitting in a Parisian cafe with nothing urgent to do. The city moves around you and you are simply a stationary point in it. The tourists rush past with their guidebooks (you can see one in my photo — Paris Tourism, Paris Travel Kit), and you are the one who is not rushing.
Hot Chocolate in Paris — sometimes slowing down is the most productive thing you can do.
I had been going non-stop for weeks before this trip. Projects, deadlines, the noise of a full schedule. Paris was the pause I didn't know I needed.
The hot chocolate arrived in a small silver pitcher with another pitcher of warm milk alongside it. There is a ceremony to it that you don't get from a paper cup — you pour, you mix, you wait a moment. It forces you to be present.
I shot this in black and white, which felt right. The silver of the pitchers, the white of the cup, the texture of the doily — the absence of colour focuses you on form. I didn't plan the Paris Tourism guide being in frame. But I'm glad it was. It's evidence of where I was, evidence I existed in that moment in that city.
I spent the rest of the afternoon doing nothing in particular. It was perfect.