In matters of love, he cuts to the chase

A Frenchman with curls longer than mine spots me inside the Coffee Bean on Main Street and chases me for two blocks in Santa Monica because, after 10 years of living in Los Angeles, he has learned that destiny could use a little help. Steve Martin addressed this loveless-Angeleno phenomenon when he wrote in “L.A. Story”: “It’s not like New York where you meet people walking down the street. In L.A., you practically have to hit someone with your car.” Or, in the style of an open Frenchman, become an urban Forrest Gump, dashing through beach traffic and around window-shopping pedestrians, to make your point.

So, on a sunny September afternoon, in this car town of millions, where chance meetings are as rare as natural breasts, the Frenchman spins it this way: “We do not live in a village. If I don’t come running after you, we’d probably never see each other again.”

After three years -- and counting -- of the singles scene in Los Angeles, I can appreciate the romanticism in his foreign stride.

With so many people, of so many backgrounds, living in one city, why is finding a special someone so challenging? Does the smog cloud our judgment and block our hearts? If we are all in search of the One, shouldn’t a lot of “ones” have found each other by now?

I stop and listen to the Frenchman -- not because I am so interested, but because that’s what you do when a man comes running at you, full speed, yelling your name. (He overheard it at the coffee shop.) He tells me he’s a French teacher and offers to meet me sometime over coffee so we could practice our French together. I tell him I am taking a long break. Staring at my vanilla latte, he asks, “A break from coffee? You have one in your hand.”

“A break from men. Not just you, all of you.”

“Ah,” he says gently. “I understand. I have been through a lot of bad times with my ex-girlfriend. Can’t we be friends?”

Ay ay ay, the question that Harry and Sally debated for an entire movie but never quite answered. Instantly, the confrontational Cuban reporter in me demands: “Why do you want to be my friend?”

The Frenchman is baffled. In his country, people value and look forward to these gestures. But here, in Santa Monica, something is very wrong with the woman he thought was cute enough for an urban chase. He steps away but then comes back: “Your spirit and your smile moved me. I cannot explain these things. I just ran.”

I like his answer, so I tell him he can give me his number if he wants to. As he jots it down, he mumbles that he knows I will never use it.

Driving up the coast toward Malibu later that afternoon, I think about fate and choices. Is the road to love completely paved by destiny or do mere mortals play a hand by seizing or missing opportunities? In a town where those who are the best at pretending seem to have the most success, is finding genuine love impossible? As I get out of my car at Zuma Beach and see a couple cuddling on a blanket, I remember something else Steve Martin said about finding the love of your life in Los Angeles: “There is someone for everyone even if you need a pickax, a compass and night goggles to find them.”

Then I think of the Frenchman, and the natural course of love in countries where family and friendship are celebrated more than money, ambition or celebrity, places where meaningful connections between people are everything.

Maybe my Saturday afternoon sprinter was onto something. Maybe it does take a village.

*

Maria Elena Fernandez can be contacted at maria.elena.fernandez@latimes.com.