Honesty: I've had a hard time re-assmiliating. I knew the reverse culture shock would be a doozy, but I'm finding that it's been catching up with me in all the ways I couldn't have, or wouldn't have, anticipated. There's sheer American volume; the noise I expected and braced myself for. The fierce dependence on cars wasn't terrifying to see as much as experience for myself. Yes, I can walk home from the dentist. The 3.6 miles (thanks for google mapping, hermano) weren't a challenge so much as knowing that that sort of un-LA behavior couldn't persist. Life has no time for it.
What gets my chèvre is this: [and pardon the stumbling articulation]
1. The unfair ease of it all. That I can understand every word spoken in every conversation at every moment. Ok, well not the lady speaking to her kids in Armenian at the car wash yesterday, but here I am privy to the chatter of quotidian life. Not only do I comprehend the newscaster's jokes; I comprehend precisely how unfunny they are. The two dudes setting up their computers next to me are discussing the finer points of the lady barista's body. There's no effort in communication. There's no struggle. There's no haze of active linguistic work. No screen, no process, no challenge. And that's normal. People attempting to express themselves to one another is a process sufficiently mysterious in itself; at least we have verbal language to help some of us try communication.
I spent ten months feeling like I was drowning in my own ignorance.
Objectively, I wasn't. My French wasn't great when I arrived, but it was grounded in knowledge I was too shy to use. I would certainly not call myself fluent now, but I can see the path to getting there is fraught with many fewer barriers than I'd thought that horrible night when I sat, mute, at my first apartment interview with Julien.
But when someone, kicking and screaming, becomes accustomed to the very visceral feeling of linguistic limit, of severely dampened communication skills, of the emotional bludgeon of not being able to say those things you know you want and need to... It's hard to come home and not only see and hear but understand that things can be different. And maybe should be. That perhaps that hardship was somehow unnecessary. Sure, it was productive, and very conducive to personal growth, but that pain and earthquake in self-confidence wasn't obligatory. That I must be masochistic to put myself in that situation to begin with, and must be legally insane to choose to do it again.
So it feels like cheating, this English ease. It feels a little wrong. Or a lot.
2. The lack of decent baguettes. I'm not kidding.
3. The lack of awkward in-your-face collisions with strangers. I know I joke a lot about French awkwardness, mostly due to my self-defensive urge to justify why I have such few French acquaintances. But in truth I love it. I love the discomfort of two people staring at each other from across a street (especially if I'm one of them and the other is an unreasonably attractive guy). I love asking my gruff breadlady for the same thing every week and receiving her glimpse of a smile and curt "bon weekend." Giving someone a death glare when they cut in front of me in the laundromat line. Watching two drunkards get in a fist fight about rising 1664 prices? Dog thievery? Someone peeing in the other's designated street corner? It's tense, it's sometimes gritty, and it's always real. People being forced to interact. Me being made to unzip the sleeping bag of myself and be present.
I walked home from Jones [aforementioned coffee shop], and despite me dawdling and spending an hour and five minutes to traverse the 3.4 miles, I counted six people who crossed my path. Six people not in cars who I physically passed. None of whom said hello to me - even the middle aged lady smirking in her sunglasses I said hello to first. I'll admit that I mostly walked through residential areas, and this jaunt was around between 2.00 and 3.00 pm, but WTF, mate??? I know people here work a hell of a lot more and French people are seemingly never trapped in an office and can therefore present themselves to you more frequently, and that Bordeaux is a much more solidly urban place, but holy hell. Six people in an hour? How is that life?
If I hadn't done it yesterday in a fit of ire, I'd bake cookies right now.
this is where I live. this is where I come from.
1 comment:
I wonder if the transition would have been any easier in Portland? LA life is so vastly different to European life in some obvious ways, and although Portland is definitely American, I do wonder if the things you've talked about here would be as startling or jarring.
Perhaps it's just as well, though. When you do return in a few weeks, you'll have many things to welcome you home, many things to celebrate about the redux of your French adventure.
I've said it before, but I admire your strength of character and I don't think you're crazy to put yourself, willingly, into an alien/ating situation like France is. I suspect that this may be the key to your success in searching for your life's answers, that you need another year to find some things out. I've no idea what those things are, and I'm glad it's not me who needs to do it because what you're prepared to do scares the shit out of me. Your embrace of the awkwardness and difficulty is truly inspirational.
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