By Anne Swardson

Walking in my Paris neighborhood, permitted during the coronavirus lockdown under very limited circumstances, has taken on a strange choreography. People passing each other swerve to the building side or the curb side to keep the required one meter (three feet) apart. Sometimes (I’ve done this myself) they even cross the street to keep distance. No eye contact, ever.

If someone doesn’t give way sufficiently, I turn my back to them and scuttle past, face averted. Children are given a wide berth. Where I live at least, people seem to be complying with the rules fairly well. Don’t go farther than two kilometers from home for exercise. Or, according to another interpretation, don’t go more than two kilometers total. This is not good for distance runners who had hoped to run in circles. A man in Toulouse reportedly ran an entire marathon on his 23-foot balcony the other day.

These runners, on the other hand, don’t seem to understand that social distance means from everyone, not just the people you aren’t running with.

And of course, you carry your attestation, the downloaded document on which you have checked the purpose of your trip, filled out your name and address, and signed and dated. Yesterday, I went out for a walk and grocery shop at the same time. Which box to check? I figured groceries were a better bet.

My walk, on what normally would have been a big shopping day, passed by rows of shuttered stores and restaurants. The saddest thing was the posters for concerts and exhibitions that either closed or will never happen. They are remnants of another time, like the balloons people put up to mark their child’s birthday party and forget to take down. This one in particular strikes a chord: It’s about people fleeing Paris ahead of the Nazi invasion.

 It didn’t run for long: The museum closed on March 14.

The increase in cases may be slowing a bit. It was 1,847 yesterday, compared with 1,617 the previous day and 1,861 Thursday. But it needs to start coming down to really flatten the curve. President Emmanuel Macron repeated in an interview in today’s Journal du Dimanche that “We are at war. It will last.” The National Assembly last night approved a law raising the fine for unauthorized outings to as much as €3,700 ($4,000) for repeated violations and giving the government more powers.

That could backfire. A poll in the JDD found that while 55% of respondents had confidence in how the government was handling the situation, 64% felt they weren’t getting the full story. If the authorities are going to crack down further, they need public trust.

Humor hasn’t gone away, though. This tweet uses the title of a popular travel guide to detail the hidden joys of your residence. “The kitchen and its fantastic drawers…There are treasures under your bed. Rediscover in the cracks of your couch the lost remote to your video player.”

More can be found under the hashtag #Restezchezvous (Stay at home). We take our joys where we can find them.

Yesterday, for instance, I was delighted to be able to walk into my local Monoprix grocery store without waiting in line because there were already so few people in the store. When I emerged, at least 20 were standing outside. Properly spaced, of course.

And today at the bakery, where only one person was permitted at a time, the server was wearing a mask. When the customer remarked at how wise that was, she said: “I only have it because a customer gave it to me this morning. The drugstore has been out of them for weeks.”