Un francophile est né

Jim Withers

As memorable as it was to go trekking in Nepal, ride a camel in Morocco or amble along the Great Wall of China, no trip has had a greater effect on me than one I took in the summer of ’65. And it only involved a round-trip train journey between Georgian Bay and Montréal.

I was part of a summer student exchange, pairing French speakers from Québec with anglophones from across the country, and it was my first real trip on my own. (That’s a callow 17-year-old me on the left in the photo, which appeared 60 years ago on July 30 in the Midland Free Press alongside a story about our experiences. With me are Québec visitors Joanne and Florent, and host Beverley.)

I spent two weeks with Florent, his parents and many of his dozen siblings. They lived on a long, narrow farm leading to the banks of the St. Lawrence, a vestige of New France’s seigneurial system of land ownership.

Memories include the day we accompanied Florent’s father and brothers as they transported horses and cattle on a barge to a treeless islet, where the animals could graze all summer. There was also the time, while sporting boxing gloves, Florent and I sparred in front of his house. This wasn’t Ali versus Chuvalo, but more like Charlie Chaplin against Don Knotts – a fight characterized more by laughter than actual punching. No black eyes resulted and no teeth were lost.

The highlight, though, was getting to know Florent’s affable family, my first foray into a world where people lived in a language other than my own.

Despite the frustrations that came from having only three years of bare-bones high school French, I tried mightily to understand what my hosts were saying and to be understood. I was still years away from appreciating the beauty of the language coming from the pens of Proust and Baudelaire, and the voices of Françoise Hardy and Édith Piaf, but I knew this was a world I wanted to be part of. It filled some inherent need. I can’t recall why I’d signed up for the trip, but it was here in ’65 – on the southern shores of the St. Lawrence, with the enticing lights of Montréal glimmering in the background – that I became an incurable francophile.

Florent accompanied me back to Wyebridge, Ont. (pop. 132), to stay two weeks with me and my family. Activities included days at the beach, go-cart racing, a boat cruise and a side trip to Niagara Falls. Perhaps the most fun, for Florent at least, was charming the local girls with his heavy Québécois accent. With microphone in hand and an oversized tape recorder, he pretended to be a solemn-faced newsman, breathlessly interviewing his young female admirers:

“WHAT … do you DO … when you’re ALONE?”

Giggle, giggle, giggle. …

“You don’ LAUGH, I ’ope!”

Giggle, giggle, giggle. …

I didn’t have that effect on the girls in Québec.

In the Midland Free Press – where seven years later I’d begin my newspaper career – Florent was quoted as saying his Ontario hosts were extremely warm and helpful, while I was misquoted as saying I found the Québécois to be “quite reserved.”

***

Florent and I would get together again a couple of years later when he had a job at Expo 67, and he spirited me into pavilions without me having to wait in long lines.

Years passed and we lost touch. I worked across the country as a reporter and editor. My interest in French never waned and so, I suppose, it was inevitable that I would end up in Montréal in 1984, employed as an editor at The Gazette.

Over the subsequent four decades, my French seemed to hit a plateau. Sure, sometimes after consuming a couple of alcoholic beverages, I deluded myself into thinking it wasn’t half bad, but in reality my French remains a homely, lumbering, stumbling beast. And that’s despite my having taken language courses in Nice, France; Lausanne, Switzerland; and Jonquière, Québec; plus having a couple of francophone girlfriends while living in a French milieu.

Still, like a beloved pet, I take my French out for daily walks, and my bilingual francophone neighbours indulge me. After all this time in Montréal, I can’t imagine living anywhere where I can’t hear and speak French. J’y suis, j’y reste.

In 1997, I wrote, and took photos for, a two-and-a-half-page spread in The Gazette about the valiant efforts of the francophone community in southern Georgian Bay to resist the overwhelming pressures to assimilate, and keep their long-time French identity alive. It was a labour of love.

One day in 2012, while feeling nostalgic about my long-ago student-exchange summer, I looked up Florent. We talked on the phone, bringing each other up to date on how our lives had unfolded, and agreed to get together.

Standing amid the tourists and street performers one evening in Old Montréal’s Place Jacques-Cartier, I felt like someone on a blind date. With the passage of time, would we recognize each other? Would Florent turn out to be bald and with a paunch? I admit I hoped he’d aged at least as much as I had.

I’d only been at Nelson’s Column for about a minute when a little old guy approached me. It wasn’t his appearance – a full head of white hair, a tanned and deeply lined face – that caused me to think it might be Florent. It was my sudden recollection that Florent wasn’t very tall.

“Florent?”

We shook hands and fumbled around with all the usual pleasantries, “Comment ça va?” etc. What do you say to someone you haven’t seen in nearly half a century? It took a while to get a conversation rolling, and I was at a slight disadvantage because Florent showed no inclination to speak English.

He reminded me of how, when he was staying at my place, his English would cause me to howl with laughter while we were lying in bed. “On disait des niaiseries.” I’d forgotten about us having to share a bed. At his home, I had my own bedroom. I recounted how his accent turned him into a rock star with English-speaking girls.

We showed each other photos we’d brought along, and I was disappointed that he hadn't included one of his sister Diane, with whom I was secretly smitten.

The tall ships festival was on in the Old Port, and while we made our way over to view the multi-masted vessels, Florent told me about how he’d worked aboard such a ship sailing up and down the St. Lawrence for three summers. He told me about spending 1972 travelling around Europe, and about his career teaching psychology at a Cégep. He told me about falling in love with Brazil and a beautiful Brazilian. They were married for 10 years, and he showed me her picture. She still lives in Montréal and had children with someone else. He told me about a more recent long-term relationship coming to an end. There was a sadness there.

 Florent gave me a ride home in his car, but declined to come in.

“Next time,” he said.

We left it open as to when we’d next meet, but I somehow knew that this was a one-off. Life’s like that.

***

Five years later, out of the blue, I received a message in French on social media from someone named Murielle.

Florent had died.

Murielle and Florent had met on an online dating site. He’d been a heavy smoker and never went to a doctor, she said. He died in his sleep from a heart attack. When I expressed my condolences, Murielle said, “I know you meant a lot to Florent; he often spoke about you.

“You should hold onto those happy memories of him and that wonderful experience in 1965.”

I do, Murielle. I do.