Can European café culture cure America?

Of all the smallish towns I have stayed in along France’s Rhône Valley, Tournon-sur-Rhône is my least favourite. It’s a loud town with an old expressway, Route Nationale 86, running through it.

Yet even in Tournon, on a boring Wednesday afternoon, there was an active social scene, a communal sense of needing to be, if not directly with other people, then at least near them. At one local café, friends, colleagues, couples, families came and went. Those who arrived alone, mostly older regulars, came to sit, watch the world and chat with waiters and fellow patrons. They were alone in name only. Each had their place, as I later found out when I realised I’d taken the corner seat of one regular. I offered to switch, but they declined with a smile, muttering something I hoped translated as “I may be set in my ways, but I’m not THAT set”.