La magie des mots

Something has happened to my French, and it’s because I’ve made a friend.

She is a retired doctor.  She’s travelled the world.  She has a tiny little dog called Charmeur.  And she loves words.  Words thrill her, as they do me.  I read her paragraphs from books that stir me, and she recites poetry with all the animation of a master story-teller, and we delight together in this magical, magical space called language.

It’s a space that we inhabit together while seated at the Grand Casino Cafe, so named for its proximity to what used to be a casino, but is now something else.  It’s a space that we inhabit together over tea, coffee, kir, water, chocolate.  It’s a space we inhabit through the careful completion of grammar exercises, the meticulous correction of essays, and the endless parroting of phonetics.  It’s a space we inhabit from 12:15 – 1:45 every day, and it is changing me.

When I am with my friend, French ceases to be a goal, an object, an obsession.  It is not a beast to be tamed or a skill to be mastered.  It is not a pathway to success, or an obstacle to surmount.  It is not an enemy.  It is not a tool.  It is not a cryptogram.  It is not a social club, not a point of inclusion or exclusion, not a currency to be traded for bread or comfort or status.  It is not an idea.  It is not a quest.  It is not a system.  It is not an exam.  It is not even, as I had thought, a vehicle.

French has become my friend.

It is not a perfect relationship.  There are provocations, evasions, misunderstandings. But there is also a growing sense of companionship. A sense that what I want to say is not completely out of reach; that understanding is something I can approach, if not master; that between the speaking and the listening, ideas can emerge, and they can be shaped and reshaped, and passed from hand to hand, through these slippery things called words.

How did a language become a friend? It was a person.  It was a person with a tiny little dog, who meets me every day at the Grand Casino Cafe for ninety minutes of pleasure, which we lovingly call travail.

I have made a friend –no, two– and I am now at ease.