Francais, s'il vous plait

Dangit, I used to be so good at French. I used to be the star of my class. I read and wrote it incredibly well, then when I moved to France, I spoke it incredibly well. I didn't adapt to the culture so much, but I spoke dern good French.

When I moved to New Orleans, I got a job in tourist information. I got to speak French at least once a week, keeping everything moving. Having a co-worker who spoke fluently as well really helped - he and I would speak to each other mostly in French.

Then I moved to California, and now here, and ain't nobody speaks French. I'm still loosely in touch with the family I lived with in France. Every time they e-mail me, I can read everything they write to me just fine, but responding to them takes a good long while of floundering in Alta Vista's Babel Fish and a few drafts before I can send anything off.

The daughter of the family I stayed with (my host sister) sent me an e-mail several days ago announcing that she's expecting her second baby. I'm ecstatic for her and for the whole family, they're great people. I wanted to email her back with the following:

Well, that's fantastic! *Older son* will make a wonderful big brother, I'm sure. Here's to a happy, healthy baby! I can't wait to see the ultrasounds. You're braver than me; Ace is it! Love, Stacey

Can you believe it took me 20 minutes to e-mail that? Forget accents, hello American keyboard. *sigh* Part of it is the embarassment... I spent 4 months with these people, quite possibly the nicest family you could ever find, and they opened their home to someone who promised to use French for the rest of her life. They spent their own money to send me to a private Catholic school, not to mention housing me in their FAB villa blocks from the Mediterranean, hello. They took me to Nice, to Cannes, to Aix en Provence, to Avignon... basically all over the southeast of France, AND to Italy. They invested a lot of their own money (not only money from my exchange student program) and time and effort into me, and 10 years later, I can't even say something as simple as the above exchange.

But by George, I can still read it. I could probably hold a passable conversation. I thought about Sean Connery's name the other day and giggled at its French implications.

I would lovelovelove to take a few classes, just to get my tongue wrapped around the language again. Seriously though, who has the time? Once Drew gets home, it's all about making supper, eating, watching a little TV, cleaning up, and going to bed.

I dunno. Maybe I should just uproot us all and move to France. I know a flippin' sweet villa I can stay at for a while.