La Coquette

I will kind of miss a place where words like "truthiness" mean something

I leave for Paris in about an hour and all I can think about is the phone conversation I had with Jeanne the other day, in which it became all too apparent how vigilant my father and I were about speaking French together in these last few weeks (not very).

I told her some stories I’ve told my American friends a few times already, and as I cast about for the proper way to describe someone I know, someone who can only be described as “cute-ish” because that is the most academically ideal word for this person, I remembered how I feel when I’m speaking French: like I’m performing with a live band that I can’t hear.  Or maybe it’s like playing Pictionary blindfolded. 

You never know exactly how you’re coming off until you get a reaction, and sometimes even then it’s hard to tell.  Are they laughing because using “Je gere” for “I’m all over it” is surprisingly appropriate (and how funny coming from a foreigner!) or because it is totally, spectacularly inappropriate? 

Heady thoughts!  Leave me alone-- I’ve had four hours of sleep. 

Let’s look at some pictures of me saying goodbye to my Dad last night.  Try not to let my father’s enthusiasm jump out of the computer screen and suction your face off with its overwhelming zest.

Here’s another little guy I’ll miss.  But hey, I’m got my télé with three fuzzy channels in France to look forward to!

Like father like daughter

"There's a lot to do before you girls come home.  I need to repair the fanz."

"The fans?  It's December."

"So."

"It seems like fans wouldn't exactly be on the top of your list."

"No, the faaanz."

"Um."

"In the backyard.  Faaannnz."

"Oh, the fence."

"Yes, fanz, couldn't you understand me?"

"Yes, I could understand you perfectly.  I understood that you wanted to repair the FANS in the backyard and just wanted to know how far along you were on your bottle of Merlot."

Wool over eyes -- GONE

After last week's tutoring session with Christine, one of my English "pupils", we chatted about this European Constitution business a little, but mostly we chatted about her vacation plans.  The French are blessed with five weeks of holiday per year, three of which are typically used in the summertime.  Would this not be EVERYTHING you talked about if you were about to have 21 consecutive days without seeing your boss?  I thought so. 

Christine's 15-year-old daughter Candice, I learned, is at that age where she does her own thing.  In fact, she's having three separate vacations this summer:  one in Biarritz with friends, one at a camp in Corsica, and one with a host family in England.  Meanwhile, Christine tells me she and her husband might go visit her cousin.  Her cousin lives in the south of France and just bought a mobile home. 

"I sink it will not be a good one, this idea."
"Why’s that?"
"Jean-Pierre, he says we are too old."
"Too old for mobile homes?  Nah!  What you mean is too young."
"No, too old for camping."

According to Christine, there are no showers on these particular mobile homes.  (When I pressed, I determined it's probably more like a camping car. I'm still calling it a mobile home only because I'm from Florida and take every opportunity to say "MO-bye-ull.") Thus, they need to wash outdoors, in a communal-type setting, and this is the part Jean-Pierre takes issue with.   

"And what do you think, Christine?  Are you up for the showering?"
"Sure!  I think it would be funny!"  (She meant "fun."  The French sometimes do this with the "y."  As in, "Were you very drunky?")

I love Christine and really, how can you NOT love anyone who would describe showering outdoors as "funny"?  But the vacation plan?  Christine may or may not be going camping and her daughter gets three trips, one of which involves BIARRITZ?

You know, a certain someone in my family, the someone who grew up on a french farm, he used to suggest that to be born The American Child was quite the picnic of tomfoolery, as if no kids ANYWHERE else on earth ever did ANYTHING besides play with wooden toys and milk cows on their summer vacations. 

How could you Dad?  Shocking. 

Daughter of Daniel

This morning, reeling in caloric guilt from a weekend of my aunt's cooking, I went for a run in the village and back through the cornfields.  "Le petit tour," it's called 'round these parts.  It's funny being here, because anyone I pass, I'll say "Bonjour!  I am [Coquette], the daughter of Daniel," but they'll know exactly who I am before I open my mouth--the town has 200 citizens.  Why, it doesn't bother them one bit to keep track of Daniel and his little American family.

Taking a left at the big Jesus cross in the village center, I headed toward the cornfields.  It was just between Marthe and Bernard's vegetable garden and their horse pasture that a terrier mutt began chasing me.  And since I don't want to be known as, "Daniel's daughter, the one who swears at dogs in American," I said, "Arrête."

But with Marthe nearby in her cabbage, I was a little shy, and the whole thing lacked conviction.  By now, the dog was close enough to bite at my sneakers, so I turned around and hissed with intensity, "ARRÊTE."

I've mentioned before that my shouting in french, it isn't pretty.  This time, my "r" came out sounding like I was choking on mashed potatoes.

And what you need to know is that the dog stopped dead, cocking its head in the same wide-eyed, mouth-gaping way that french children often do when I part my lips and expel words.  It's a look that says, "Mommy, who is this alien, and what has she done to our pristine language?  My delicate french ears, THEY ARE BLEEDING."

It's called, Les Guêrets

Me, Mémé, Jeanne, Aimee, Lise, Claire, Jean, Pépé, Etienne. (Cousins not yet born--Jennifer and Louise)

The farm was:

• Light suppers--milk straight from the cow, with morsels of french bread, eaten like cereal from a bowl
• Outdoor lunches that lasted three hours
• "Summer reading" on the terrace swing during la sieste
• A heavy cloth napkin, your own, tucked into a wooden drawer for the next meal
• Climbing barn ladders
• The place my father was born
• The place my grandmother was born
• The place I visited every other summer of my childhood
• Cherry picking
• Wheelbarrow rides, pulled by a work pony
• "Telephone" with my nine cousins at the kids table
• Card games with the adults, Bouchon!, until bedtime
• Hearing our parents laughing and staying up late
• Summer of '89--Sleeping on the floor of the old nursery, the room where my father once slept
• Summer of '93--Graduating to a bed
• Making rounds to see relatives I could never remember, but who remembered me, squeezed me, and kissed me.  Wetly.
• Picnics; hiking to french marching songs, "Un Kilomètre à Pied"
• Sparklers on July 14th, instead of July 4th
• Waking up in the middle of the night to watch calves being born

Today, there's no kids table.  Today, we used paper napkins at lunch, not the country-style cloth ones (I loved the cloth ones).  Today the farm is still owned by my tonton Roger and tata Marie-Line, but someday soon, it will be run by my cousin Etienne (Jeanne's brother).  Today, I turned twenty-five at my father's (far-off-but-steadfast) home, Les Guêrets.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go climb a ladder and see some kittens.

Verbally Challenged

I like to think of my French language status as the verbal equivalent of “wheelchair restricted”--I may not enter gracefully into all environments, you might have to keep an eye out to ensure I don’t get hurt, take me to a party and I'm liable to illicit loud, hyper-enunciated talking from guests--Alooors, vous-venez D'OU?--and maybe some staring, but for all intents and purposes, I get around pretty well, thank you. 

Friday, I had an appointment to get my eyes tested.  I had to look up the word for ophthalmologist, call the ones in my area via the pages jaunes, find out who tests eyes the cheapest and make the appointment.  Then, when I was in the exam room and Docteur Besse covered my left eye, I said “Euh, Bay, Jay,” for E, B, G.  The phrases that I had to read were obviously in French, and the chit chat with the doctor as she drew up my prescription?  That was in French, too.  It’s not like I gave a dissertation or wrote a story for a French newspaper, but I have to celebrate the small things, like eye exams, because otherwise, why am I not in the US getting an MFA right now? 

To be honest, I’ve lived here one year and, that whole speaking in French thing?  It’s still really hard.  Sometimes I’m around other expatriates (expatriates who don’t even have any French in their blood, or a last name that ends in the “awhn” sound), and their accents are so much better than mine, and they throw around the subjunctive tense--a tense which DOESN'T EVEN EXIST IN ENGLISH--as if it were easy as pig latin. 

I want to say to these people, yes, fine, but can you express so much as I in a mere hand gesticulation?  Did you spend the summer of 1986 saying “AH ben dis DONC!” because you wanted to be just like your grandfather, Pépé?  When it comes to cheese, has your motto always been, the stinkier the better?  As a child, would you happily drink watered-down wine that was older than you were?  (Yes, they let children drink wine here, and have you seen how tame their college parties are?  MY FRENCH FRIENDS KNOW NOT THE MEANING OF THE FOLLOWING WORDS:  ICE BLOCK, KEG-STAND, POWER HOUR, ALCOHOL POISONING.)

I digress.  The point?  The point is, FRANCE IS IN MY BLOOD, you overachievers.  So step off with your perfect language skills and correcting my pronunciation of "Buttes Chaumont," before I smack you upside yo' head with that French in Action book.

Maybe this would be a good time to address why my own father, the man who got me into this whole mess, didn’t try to teach his daughters French.  He did.  He spoke it with us on the way to pre-school every morning.  And then he went and worked all day.  Little kids go to bed early.  Could we have learned French on the weekend and at nights?  There are countless families that make it work, but ours was set up so that we spent more time with our mother.  Our American mother who spoke no French. 

But I am here now, and while I may still be handicapped in the language department, I just took an eye exam in French, and that’s something neither my high school French teacher, nor I, nor my grandfather Constant Victor, may the man rest in peace, would ever have seen coming.  I’ve never said this to anyone before, because I know it's so very attractive to make proclamations about what one will do to one’s children (especially when "one" doesn't even have a boyfriend), but it’s my dream to teach my kids French someday. 

We may end up in Tupelo, Mississippi, the father may be from Spain, Denmark, or perhaps even Kentucky, but my God if I wont have 'em consuming stinky cheeses, watered-down wine, and the adventures of Tintin.  And they will like it.  Because Mommy likes it.  That’s how these things work, right Mom?

June 13, 1980

How to turn a naturalization ceremony into a photo op: 

Take one nice-looking man of French origin.  Make certain he is fresh from becoming an American citizen--preferably capture him in the courtroom just minutes after his oath-taking.  Plop a kid onto his shoulder (Any kid will do.  Here we've used a Baby Coquette on her one-month birthday).  For garnish, place the courtroom’s Stars and Stripes in the background.  The caption will read:  Asleep under the flag. 

See the picture in the paper two days later, just in time for Father’s Day.

Don't hate me because I'm French (well, French-ish).

My father and I laughed the entire elevator ride down, and we were still laughing as we stepped onto the palm tree-lined street outside Miami's French Consulate yesterday.  It was something Madame B had said during our visit: “You won’t be able to live in France for another six months at least.”  No matter that I am French By Birth, and that she had just handed me a certificate to prove it.  The issue was the passport and the carte d’identité.  “Entering the country without those items would be an act of bad faith,” she said.

I didn’t know if I should be laughing or crying.  It wasn’t that I considered following her advice for a second, (I'M STILL COMING BACK TO FRANCE IN FOUR DAYS, DON'T YOU WORRY) but, another six months.  That would make nearly two years since we’d begun the paperwork madness. 

My mother took a decisively positive stance--I had at least walked away with the certificate.  “Congratulations!” she said over the phone, “So, how are you going to celebrate?”

We had planned on driving straight home, but on second thought, my father proposed a detour by way of South Beach.  Stretching our legs would do us good, and the ocean always does seem a sharper bluer and the sand a brighter white on those crystalline, Florida-winter days. 

Still, it seemed a bit silly to celebrate.  The process was far from over, and what was the process anyway?  Claiming ownership to something that I already possessed by simply being born.  Nothing had been required of me.  Not even a test (except, perhaps, on my patience).

Then, we came across a Tastee-Delite ice cream vendor on the waterfront, which seemed just the perfect prize.  Nothing too serious, a minor treat for a minor victory, but still a little bit sweet. 

This is why.

I should have become an official French citizen yesterday.  I would have driven to the Miami Embassy with my father, and this time, after a year and a half of visiting les fonctionnaires, and after the gathering of birth certificates, and actes de mariages, and grandparents’ dental records (I exaggerate.  Hardly).  After the government-approved translations of all of the above,  apostilles included, and, oh yeah, being clucked and lip pursed without end--BELIEVE ME, WE ARE AWARE THAT RECORDING MY BIRTH IN THE LIVRE DE FAMILLE AS A CHILD WOULD HAVE SOLVED EVERYTHING--I would have left a French citizen.

Only, I’M A DUMBASS, because when I scheduled the Embassy appointment, I didn’t notice the tiny gray print saying “Martin Luther King Day, USA” in my en français Filofax. 

When I gave my father the date, he said, “You can’t have scheduled it for Monday, that’s a jour férie.”

My response was, “Mmm, Martin Luther King Day.  Interesting.  Well, they must only take French holidays!”

My father WHO IS NOT A DUMBASS phoned for verification.

“Oh, right, I’m not working Monday,” says our contact at the Embassy WHO IS THE BIGGEST DUMBASS OF US ALL. 

We are now scheduled for Thursday.

And, in case you’re curious, the US-residing fonctionnaires take all holidays, both French and American, which, I suppose has logic, but still.  This is why.   

A year and a half of paperwork.  Two days until I’m French.  Seven days until I’m back in France.  And counting. 

Nostalgia, 1983

My father and I in a vineyard in the Lot region, where his brother Bernard lives.