The French government requires you to live in France for five years before applying for citizenship, and now I see why. Apparently, they know a little secret that us étrangers do not. After exactly five years of residency – on the dot! – if you live in France and are not French, you start to become unhinged. Becoming unhinged is perhaps the final step towards really settling in somewhere. Once your French friends have had a chance to see you at your worst, they can decide whether perhaps it’s in their best interest to shun you. If they do, then it’s back on you to decide whether you still want to live here, now that you’ve become a Local Character.
Exactly six days after our five-year mark I went slightly mad. It was last Tuesday. The Man of the House and I had our Zoom French lesson with the lovely Laure. We were practicing "orales," in preparation for taking the language exam required for citizenship. Lovely Laure, playing the role of the examinatrice, asked me to tell her about my family. Such a simple question! I said I grew up in California and my father was Polish and he was not like the other fathers, because he didn't do the regular American dad things like drink beer and watch sports. Instead, "il était calme" and "il était intellectuel." As for my mother, well. . .She died when I was 17, I said in English. Then I blanked out, even though I had plenty of other childhood stuff to talk about before my mom died. I could say that I ate hamburgers and swam in the piscine and had a dog, but I was rattled by my sudden sadness.
This wasn’t the part where I went slightly mad, but set the tone for what happened next.
At 11:00 the Zoom class ended but the MotH and I hadn't had breakfast yet. Every French person in the world has had breakfast by this time, but we just can’t get with the program. So, I was also hungry. (Keep that in mind, s’il vous plait.) Exactly one minute after class ended, there was a knock at the door. It was our friend Marc, holding two extra-large plastic shopping bags. They clearly contained something heavy.
I should stop here and say that when it comes to the social whirl around here, I’m always the last to know. The MotH is our family social director, but he’s not one for passing on essential information. Often, he fails to clue me in that, for example, we’re hosting a dinner for twelve the next day, or expected at a lunch down the rue in five minutes. Thus, I knew nothing about the upcoming grillade (barbecue) at our place, especially that the centerpiece of the meal would be grilled octopus.
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a devotee of all things aquatic, as a Southern Californian Pisces with a moon in Scorpio. I learned to swim before I learned to walk. My talisman is a shark tooth that I caught as it fell out of the mouth of a Caribbean reef shark during a scuba dive off the Bahamas. I have fallen down many a rabbit hole researching whether artificial gills will become a reality in my lifetime.
Furthermore, I am always banging on about not eating octopus. I’ve had more than one sublime interaction with a captivating octopus while diving. The only piece of art in our bedroom is a wire sculpture of an octopus given to me by the MotH for Christmas two years ago. And yes, of course, there is also “My Octopus Teacher.”
When I asked Marc what he had there, he opened one of the bags. I peeked inside and there was a gelatinous grey mass sort of sluggishly heaving itself around.
Oh my God, I said. Is she alive? Are they alive? Yes, said Marc, very fresh. But wait! I cried, Are they alive alive? Vivant vivant? Yes yes! he said. OH NO, I said, getting hysterical. They’re suffering! They’re suffering! They can’t be in a plastic shopping bags!
I called the MotH who was fiddling around with something outside in the garden. YOU HAVE TO COME KILL THESE POULPES!! (French for octopus. The franglais in our house is something else). I was shouting and crying and clutching my hair. Marc’s eyes started darting around. He chuckled nervously. OH MY GOD! I was keening now. PLEASE PLEASE get those out of my kitchen.
At that moment, another friend, Mathias, arrived smack in the middle of my meltdown.
Readers, I didn’t even bonjour him. That’s how far gone I was. Once you fail to bonjour a friend, you might as well leave the country.
I sobbed-shouted that I was going upstairs, and that when I came back down those poulpes had better be out of their misery and out of my kitchen.
Marc said, “Ah, Karine! Don’t worry! You can write about this!”
I said, in English, “DON’T WORRY! I AM!” before stomping upstairs.
In fairness to Marc, he probably doesn’t know about my devotion to all things aquatic, my astrological signs, my shark tooth talisman, my fascination with artificial gills, etc.
But the MotH should have know better. After Marc left, I marched back downstairs and we had a fight. He said he wasn’t thinking. He said being the social director can be very demanding. I said yes, but you know my official position on octopus! Meanwhile, we could practically hear the gossip ricocheting around the village — that American writer woman had a nervous breakdown over poulpe, which we all know is très délicieuse.
Marc and I avoided one another for the rest of the day, but the next night he joined us for dinner. We relived the incident, but I was already over it. We reflected upon the essential openness of Americans, our ability to express our emotions so freely. While the French might be able to learn something from us, it’s unlikely they would ever allow themselves to behave in such a ridiculous and undignified manner.
I realized then that I was worrying about nothing. It doesn’t matter whether I live here five years or fifty years, whether I shriek and cry, or simply go about my business. Just by virtue of being an American in France I will always be a Local Character.
The grillade is today, Saturday. Wish me luck.
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Congrats on your passage into Local Character, and in such colorful style!
Oh, this was delicious! First of all I'm a fellow octopus lover and will also not eat those dear beings. So funny, especially the line, "Once you fail to bonjour a friend, you might as well leave the country." Also so silly and true, "Ah, Karine, don't worry! You can write about this!" You -- "Don't worry! I am!" Also, I suspect that even before you crossed your apartment's French threshold, you were deigned to be a local character. Great post.