The first time I welcomed a Frenchman into my home, my Mom was a ball of nerves. Hosting an exchange student felt like something other families did, not ours. What if we weren’t “typically American” — i.e. normal — enough to properly represent our country in a cultural exchange?
I was 16, Joris 15.
By the time Joris arrived with his fellow students at Dulles International Airport, my mom had filled a stack of 4x6 index cards with conversation topics a good American host family should cover. We ate hamburgers for dinner and talked about Republicans, cheerleaders, and baseball. Mom felt reassured Joris would spend at last some of his visit touring DC with other kids, whose host moms were almost certainly doing a better job of selling the American dream.
Then a snowstorm hit, and I had to study for my IB exams, and we didn’t have a TV, and, with the vast majority of Joris’s tourist activities canceled for the week, I left him alone on the couch downstairs with the only French-language book I had on my bookshelf: a collection of erotic short stories d’origine Québecoise.
Somehow, my family was just charming enough to make an impression. And in the years since, Joris and I have gone from “correspondants” to odd-duck siblings — I lived with his family for a gap year just before college and attended the local high school. His mother bought me my first collection of livres de poche and taught me how to drive a stick shift; his father showed me the local vineyards and taught me the Art of Drinking Champagne.
When I moved back to Reims after an unexpectedly successful appearance on Find My First Love, it’s Maman and Papa who stepped in as my de-facto local in-laws.
Last week, I boarded a 6:25 PM flight in the direction of Charles de Gaulle. My journey was chock-full of the kind of banal anecdotes that always make me think of the David Sedaris essay Standing By. Air France advised us to arrive four hours early and we took off 20 minutes late; I caved and bought an overpriced box of See’s toffee in Terminal A; the woman in the seat just behind mine complained every time my seat back left its upright position and, at baggage claim, a young child with delayed-onset nausea vomited on the floor adjacent carousel 41.
It was one of those headaches that befall every airline passenger. A flight is delayed because of thunderstorms or backed-up traffic—or maybe it’s cancelled altogether. Maybe you board two hours late, or maybe you board on time, and spend the next two hours sitting on the runway. When it happens to you, it’s a national tragedy—why aren’t the papers reporting this, you wonder.
Only when it happens to someone else do you realize what a dull story it really is…
Still, I shared every dull detail with my French family when I arrived. Airport stories might not have a solid narrative arc and well-timed punch line, but after two and a half years of a global pandemic, I’m glad they’re back. They make for small talk when you’re just settling in, half-awake and jet lagged and in search of your more interesting self. They’re there in my back pocket whenever my French niece asks, for the hundredth time:
“Tata, tu peux me raconter une anecdote ?”
On Saturday, we gathered at the Chateau de Nesles to celebrate my French parents’ 52nd wedding anniversary and I spent a long afternoon trying to memorize a family tree that’s not mine — but, after 20 years in, may as well be — and the rest of the evening trying not to trip over cobblestone in high heels. I tried my hand in a jeu de palets breton against second cousins and perked up as Genevieve, a family friend in her early 90s, indulged me with firsthand stories about the German occupation. Whenever I couldn’t finish a plate during the multi-course dinner, I passed my plate over to Joris — my brother with the bottomless appetite who has no problem downing my riz de veau, camembert, and extra crevette.
At 3 AM, we got the last printed photo from the photomaton.
But maybe the most fun I’ve had was last Friday, when Joris and I escaped just the two of us in a Peugot 106 to go shopping at a local Decathlon. After a solid hour and a half playing with everything from roller skates to inflatable boats and camping gear, I convinced him to take me to Picard. I’d never been in the famous grocery store that only sells frozen food, so he filmed my entrance. We made it past the frozen frog legs and chocolate croissants to the rayon apéro. He apologized to the cashier up front for my out-of-place level of excitement and glee (je suis désolé, elle est américaine), as I carefully chose two boxes of frozen finger food to serve before dinner.
As we arranged my selections on a serving tray later that night, my hair still drenched from a late afternoon dip in the backyard pool, Joris tried to trick me by reading aloud from the box instructions:
“Afin de conserver la fraicheur de vos produits Picard, assurez-vous de les manger en état surgelé !”
Maybe 20 years ago it would have worked, but my French is too good for that.
Quote of the Week: “They know us at Comme des Garcons, so they let us use the bathroom, which is just off the sales floor. After it was unlocked by a staff member, I stepped in to pee and thought how odd it was that my idea of perfect happiness — and Amy’s too — involved being alone. Actually, I realized, this was my idea of it. Being with her, the two of us laughing and shopping together.” — David Sedaris on his sister, Amy Sedaris, in Happy-Go-Lucky
It takes a true master of words to make stories about airports tolerable. Same goes for comedians. I could read an entire book of Sedaris stories about airports.
This definitely trumps Emily in Paris!