nothing more to see here.

go here instead.

done, too. two. the sequel. etc.

Dear Internet People or Person Whose Face I Cannot Quite Imagine But Like To Pretend That You Are A Kindly Sort:

I've been feeling badly about my last post. Where I said I was all "done" and that I'm gonna "shut down this blog very soon" and blah blah blah. Which I am totally going to do. Or am totally doing.

But I'm not going to erase it. I have narcissistic tendencies.

And yes, I am moving to Vancouver (somebody asked me recently, in Real Life, if I was seriously moving), sometime in June. And that's been really weird, seeing people and talking about moving and hearing people say they are going to miss me.

Oh yeah, by the way, I'm totally drunk again as I'm writing this. Well, some of the drunk has worn off, but I probably shouldn't be near the internet right now. And that's kind of part of it. I went to an impromptu barbeque party tonight and I had a really good time. And I'm going to miss the people that were there.

And being there, at the party, reminded me of why I felt so stupid about that last post, because I referred to someone as an Asshole, and that was totally unfair. The truth is, I don't know the guy I referred to as an Asshole. We do small talk, him and I, we are a small talk relationship. I don't know him. (I know his genetics have contributed to producing 2 enormously beautiful little people, one of whom I happily goo-gooed and ga-gahed over as he grinned and drooled at me tonight. The same little dude I refrained from throwing at his mom when she mentioned, smirk-like, that I looked good with a baby. I love babies. I hate that loving babies as a 35 year old woman sans enfants is fraught with Extra Meaning, that's all. I also love puppies, but I've noticed that no one tells me how good I am with puppies or how 'natural' I look holding a puppy.)

I only knew that his wife had a scary look in her eye a few weeks ago, a look I am familiar with, a look of desperation and barely controlled panic, and I don't know their relationship, and it's not fair for me to write random bullshit about people and call them names when I'm kind of dealing with desperation and panic myself. (Although not in the last few days, which is a nice break, and I'm hoping it'll be a frequent trend, this 'happiness' and 'working on projects' and 'gettin er done'.) But desperation and panic are regular parts of life. Unfortunately. Fortunately?

Okay. Just wanted to make a public apology to people who will probably never read this anyway. I want to stop being an asshole, and unfairly judging people is what assholes do, so I'm going to stop that.

More self-conscious, trying-not-to-be-an-asshole stuff over at carriecarm.blogspot.com.

done.

yeah. this here blog is done. My epileptic attempts at learning French whilst living in Montreal are done. I am also hoping that my tendency to blab too much is done.

I am currently making http://carriecarm.blogspot.com my, uh, blog. So, you can go there, if you like. I'm hoping it will be a whole lot less "looooooooooooookit meeeeeeeeeeee i'm so saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad" but I fail often at goal-setting.

Actually, I am going to shut down this blog very soon. In a few days. Like a birthday present for myself. Self-preservation. Make it unavailable for viewing for anyone but me. I think it is probably dangerous to spew all this shit out into a void that rarely answers back. So yeah. I'm gonna shut this muther down soon. I'm just giving fair warning to you folks out there who are interested.

I just want to leave you with one last piece of unasked for advice.

Do not say to someone who is hardcore grieving (and yeppers, I'm, like, TOTALLY grieving, this last weekend has been a fucking disaster): "IF THERE IS ANYTHING I CAN DO, JUST LET ME KNOW."

I'm not going to let you know. I am embarrassed that I am such a wreck. I am ashamed that Everyone wants me to be okay and they like it when I smile and make jokes but: I can't even manage feeding myself (oh, I left out all the meat and the cheese and the mayonnaise last night? how funny. because I never did get around to making that sandwich in the first place, and now I have to throw all this food out AND the bread has dried out. good job.) so do you really expect me to pick up the phone and ask you to come over and watch me cry? Especially since you made it pretty clear that you are running out of patience with this whole "grieving" thing. Like, fuck. It's been almost 3 months, don't you think it's time to just buck up and get on with life?

Now. I'm guilty of this same thing. I said recently to a mom who is having a very hard time alone at home with her wee babes while her asshole of a husband is traveling to Very Important Business Meetings In Far Away Locations - I said to her: "Please call me anytime. I will hold the baby so you don't throw him out the window. I will play endless games of princess or whatever." But I know she's not going to call. I knew even as I was offering the help that I was offering the wrong kind of help, but..... can I please use the excuse that my head is not working right and it was all I could think to say? I meant it. I don't do empty promises. I have a feeling I will probably call her any day now and make a better offer of help. At least, I hope I will call her. I know how hard it is to ask for help.

In my internet hunting, I found this piece written by a woman whose son killed himself. It's got some good info. I think everyone should read it because I think that it is damn near impossible to predict who is suicidal and who is not. It can happen at any time, people. It could happen to someone you know. It could happen today, tomorrow, any time, to any one. Seriously. Any time. Any one. Someone might need your help to deal with this immensely horrible shit.

Okay, one last thing: please do not ask "Was he depressed?" I've had to suppress hysterical laughter on more than one occasion when asked that. Uh, no. Of course he wasn't depressed. People who commit suicide are often at their happiest. They end it all on a high note. Nope, no depression here. Sunshine and lollipops.

pimping out my bitch.

that guy that I live with, or usually live with, or have lived with more than I have lived with anyone else for the past oh, nine-ish years or so, well that guy fancies himself a moviemaker. Maker of movies. He's all mr. editor of digital video and whatnot. AND here is some stuff he has been working on. (go to the end of this blog post if you want to skip to the way cool documentary stuff.)This is not all he has been working on. His definitive work, French Panic, is not finished yet. Which is kind of funny that I've called it his definitive work, because it is unfinished. Agh.

I'm not making any sense because I AM TOTALLY HOSED AS I AM WRITING THIS. I just watched some hockey, where Montreal totally KICKED TORONTO'S ASS, and I'm feeling all "Montrealer" and "weepy" because I just had an unexpected night out with two of the people I am going to miss the most -- actually, my whole Saturday thus far has been an extravaganza of PEOPLE I REALLY LIKE AND AM GOING TO MISS TERRIBLY: Lora, Laura, Emmanuel, Lina, Jeremy.

Like I was saying, I was just hanging out at a lovely franco bar in my neighbourhood, watching the hockey game on the big screen, drinking beers that other people paid for, and I am feeling very Canadian, and very fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine.

Okay. So I mentioned earlier my fella's documentary film, French Panic, which he is not currently working on because I'm not learning French anymore, and it has a surprising dramatic twist thanks to my brother-in-law and his whole "I'm a gonna commit suicide and all" thing, and now I can't remember why I brought that up again. Maybe because it's 11 pm on a Saturday night and I haven't had anything to eat since 4 pm except for that row of cookies in the 3-rowed cookie package I bought yesterday and so my thinking is maybe just a little weeeeeeerd.

And I'm annoyed at my landlady because she left a message saying people would be over to look at my place on Sunday.....but that's kind of vague. For example, there is a big difference between 10 am Sunday and 3 pm Sunday. Especially since I've been known to stay up until 4 am to watch Miss Congeniality in its entirety. (Not one of Sandra Bullock's finest. I prefer The Net, if you want to get into bodies of work, or oeuvres, or whatever you call it. Career proof. Movies. I think Sandra Bullock could do better than a lot of the crap she's in.)

Okay. Pimping out my bitch. My bitch being the guy who edited these clips I'm about to describe.

Clip #1 features Levi Riven. Levi was also featured in the film Leaving the Fold, about Hassid/Hasid (I never know how to spell that) Jews who have left their way of life for something more secular. It's interesting. And you'll see the first comment after the film clip is from someone named Kat. I know Kat. She lives in New York and takes cool pictures. Here is where I would link to her website if she has one but apparently she doesn't have the same strong feelings about her photography abilities as I do.

Clip #2 features Dierry Jean. He's a boxer. He has a Haitian accent. Need I say more? I love boxing movies. Boxing is crazy. Punch punch punch, jab jab jab, brain damage brain damage, here's some piddling amount of money. Crazy.

Aw shit. I just actually clicked on the Dierry Jean link. It's the version without subtitles. That means if you don't understand French, you're shit out of luck. Boooooo, lack of subtitles, boooooooooooo.

feedburner = my nemesis.

Today was a good day. I spent minimal time on my computer this morning. I made coffee for a local artist dude and he drew a sketch explaining the machine he is currently constructing, which sounds really cool. I did an income-earning related task. I spent some time in the sun with my friend and her 3 month old baby (he has impressive farts. I was holding him while he was having a fart party and his entire body vibrated). I talked to my sister. I talked to my mom. I talked to random people in the neighbourhood. I heard from a friend I haven't seen in a while.

Then I looked at my blog. And noticed that the feedburner count (um, people/machines who subscribe to my, uh, blog feed, I think -- I'm not really clear on the technology) dropped from 35 to 22 within the space of a few hours, after holding steady at 34 for weeks. WEEKS. This could mean:

13 people were so disappointed to learn I'm moving to the west coast that they dumped me.
or
13 people were disappointed to learn that I engage in illegal activities.
or
13 people got tired of all this suicide mumbo jumbo/wailing heart on sleeve nonsense.
or
it means nothing.

Numbers, schmumbers. Maybe it's just another sign that I should dump all this number stuff - how many people landed on my blog today? How many pages did they look at? Am I, like, totally popular? What is 'popular'? Bleh. It seems strange to define my self-worth by random numbers associated with this thing. Not that I do that. But I do get a thrill (yes. a thrill. I'm all blueberry hill over here.) when I see that someone has spent some time clicking around, reading me me me me. And then I get the opposite of a thrill when SUDDENLY, THE NUMBER OF SUBSCRIBERS PLUMMETED ON FRENCH PANIC'S BLOG. SHE FELT, LIKE, TOTALLY SAD until she remembered that she didn't really understand how that whole feed thing works so why get all hung up on numbers and stuff.

P.S. My landlady just called and she has already had 20 calls from people interested in my apartment. One person wants to see the place tomorrow. The landlady was describing what this prospective tenant's job is and where s/he works "'Cause you know, it's important to get people in who have jobs, you know. People who can pay their rent."

Which I think is proof that I am magical. Because neither my fella nor I have had jobs since last summer. (Jobs that pay us money, that is. We work, just, um, yeah.) And, magically, our rent always gets paid. On time. Early, sometimes. Maybe it's not magic - maybe we are good at hustling. Maybe we are working hard at dispelling the myth that people without jobs are lazy and irresponsible and incapable of stuff. Maybe we have been working hard at oh, I dunno, saving our money so that we can take care of ourselves for a while when bad times hit? Or, maybe, employment insurance payments are a fucking godsend. Or, maybe, we have amazingly generous relatives.

Could be a combination of many of the aforementioned factors. Whatever. It's magic. Our rent gets paid by magic. Ta-da!

conversation with my landlord.

The scene: I have just been smoking a joint in the middle of the day and dancing around to some really loud, happy ska music - yes, hello, I am a stereotype - and my part of the conversation is overly cheerful and dare I say: chipper? My landlady is a Hassid (think: Orthodox Jewish Person) and has a lovely, stereotypical Jewish way of talking - loud, accented, right to the point.


Me: Hello?

Her: Hello. It's Mrs. --------.

Me: Oh! Hi Mrs. --------! I was just going to bring over the rent to your office. Is that okay?

Her: Okay. Good. And you're bringing the paper? The paper that says you're staying? [Most leases in Montreal start and end on July 1, aka Moving Day. If there are rental increases, the tenant must agree/disagree to the increase by April 1. Same for notice to vacate. 3 months notice. Yeesh.]

Me: Uh, no. Actually, there's been a change of plans and Husband and I are not going to be renewing the lease. I have the official notice; I'll bring that with the rent. [I had actually lied to her last week when she called and told her "It looks like we're staying!" And then after I hung up was a series of phone calls to a few loved ones that were all "holy shit I just lied to my landlord what's wrong with me" with responses like "what? I thought you had decided! Are you staying now? What's going on?" and "No no no, we're going. Just please remind me again why I'm moving and all of the good reasons because I'm having trouble here" (hyperventilate, tears, etc.) Thank you Jill for talking me down.]

Her: Oh. Where are you moving to?

Me: Vancouver.

Her: Oh - that's where your sister lives? [Mrs. ------ has been been made aware of our situation....there has been much going back and forth and weighing of pros and cons in the panic/pamplemousse household, and because we're all grief-stricken and crap here, we may have told some people a bit too early that we were thinking of moving.]

Me: Yesssss.

Her: Oh. How is she doing?

Me: Oh, she's doing...... she's fine. She's doing fine. [She's not, but it's easier to say "fine" then "quite horribly, actually". Pamplemousse, Mrs. -------, and I had an uncomfortable conversation a few weeks ago. Well, I dunno if SHE was uncomfortable, but pamplemousse was kind of panic-stricken at the direction the conversation was turning, and I found myself answering a lot of questions and dealing with statements I didn't feel comfortable with, like: "So, how did he do it?" and "Well, your sister will feel better soon. Maybe by next week she'll be ok."]

Her: What? Well if she's doing fine, why are you going?

Me: Well, I want to be closer to my family. My sister is out there, and it's closer to my parents, and Husband's..... [and we are both fond of mountains and the ocean and we actually like walking in the rain and the job situation looks better for both of us there and we'd been talking about moving there but just didn't expect it to be this soon and Husband has good friends out there and.....]

Her: Oh. Okay. Well [and then blah blah blah advertise blah blah I'll let you know when someone is going to come by to look at the place blah blah blah blah blah blahhhhhhh]

And then I hung up the phone and danced around some more and felt the proverbial weight fly off my shoulders because now it's done. It's official. I have to get my shit together and hide the porn and stop with the weed in the middle of the day and erase the frantic scribblings on the white board in the office and pick my underwear up off the floor and keep up appearances. And plan a cross-country move.

Now, I have to finish that joint and put some eyedrops in before dropping off the rent. Because that always fools people, you see. Eye drops.

you have a lot of time on your hands.

um. yes. yessssssssss.

I have a lot of time on my hands. This pithy observation was stated to me by one of my internet friends (yes kids, it's true. Even grumpy, angry ladies can make friends on the internet; I am living proof) after I sent her a ridiculously long email. I mean, this email was so long, that if I pounded out the same word count daily, I would have a book-length work in a matter of weeks. A tome. A rambling, incoherent, convoluted book-length work, but if a piece of droning crap like Gravity's Rainbow can be published, my drivel should make it into book form some day too.

I was thinking about throwing myself a party -- I have an oddly huge cache of gin in my cupboard, and thought it would be nice to share my gin collection with gin-loving folk while celebrating my one year anniversary of being officially unemployed. But then I realized I didn't have the sass required to mock myself by throwing a celebratory party. Because, to be truthful, this year has been really really hard. Like, totally. I'll admit to an idyllic summer, where I de-stressed after stopping working for a place I was ill-suited to be working for in the first place. But I won't admit to the days of that idyllic summer where I wouldn't eat or drink anything until 4 or 5 pm, wouldn't leave the house for a few days, wouldn't answer the phone. Nah, I won't cop to that, because then it sounds like I'm depressed or HAVE A PROBLEM or something, right?

I tried to volunteer at places. You know, keep active. Maybe get more opportunities to practice my French. Flex my French muscles, if you need a cliché. I applied to volunteer for a local film festival, but when I hadn't heard from them in four months, I figured I didn't make the cut. Until I received a mass email from them asking me to head down to (wherever) the very next day to stuff VIP bags.

Um..... and my stuffing of VIP bags gets me exactly what in return? I hear nothing for four months (no way to contact these dipshits to ask what the volunteer deal is, anyway -- hours worked = x number of movie passes, right? Or so I thought.) The whole point to volunteering at film festivals, for me, is not to bask in the camraderie of my fellow film enthusiasts. It's to get free shit, as in movie passes. I wanted to see movies, and I couldn't afford a festival pass, so..... volunteering, right? Clarity and ease of communication is important EVEN WITH VOLUNTEER POSITIONS. Are volunteers always treated like shit? I think I treated my volunteer staff too well. I even bought going away presents for them. Out of pocket. Because the department budget didn't allow for token gifts to volunteers. Yes. I AM A SUCKER.

The autumn brought another attempt at volunteering, at a local library. In case you don't know, the Montreal library system is totally fucked; each library is on their own, financially speaking. It's chaos. So you'd think a local library that runs on volunteer power would loooooove to have a trained up information professional to work for them, right? Right? RIGHT? Someone who is EAGER and WILLING to do some cataloguing. I filled out their fucking form, was polite and professional to the old lady who took my form, AND NEVER HEARD FROM THEM AGAIN. See, it's bad enough when you're looking for a job and getting rejected for paid positions - it's downright devastating when nobody even wants you for free. For freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

Eventually, I found a place that happily accepted my experience and abilities. Except volunteering at that place also gave me a clear demonstration of how difficult it is to find a good job, en anglais, in Montreal. And you know, volunteering can only get you so far, intellectually speaking. You put in a few hours, but to really be able to help, to be able to use my brain, I would have to get to know the collection. Spend more than 4 hours a week there. Invest some TIME. But you know, and they know, that as soon as you get a paid position, you will leave them, so is it really worth it to train me up on various systems and whatnot?

It was the winter of my discontent, let me tell you what.

And then that guy my sister has been in love with for 14 years killed himself on the same day my last EI cheque arrived. HUZZAH!

And then after a month of 24 hour a day widow-sitting, I return home to.....no job. No prospects. Business plans in disarray. Even my clients for my half-assed business venture don't return my phone calls these days.

Oh yeah, there are my projects for self-employment that I've been yabbering about for a year and a half now. Those business plans I've sketched out. Budgets I've attempted to work out. Graphic designers I've attempted to hire who put me on their back burner. Graphic designers I have hired who come up with shit for me and tell me they don't understand what I'm asking for -- which is another kind of self-esteem blow because I fancy myself a writer and yet I am unable to communicate what I want, and am ignored by people who said they'd do work for me. AAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

And really, if I am really so gung-ho on Being an Entrepreneur and Starting My Own Business, shouldn't I have done it by now? Because that's the other thing I need to face: I SUCK at self-motivation, and I don't think I actually want to DO this 'roving contract archivist' bullshit plan I had. I think I want to write, but baby, I do not deal well with rejection, and that's what creative shit is all about, right? Being rejected. And then the paranoia creeps in, as being rejected starts to make me think there is a conspiracy out there. Or that there is something so incredibly, inherently, horribly flawed inside of me that it cannot even be named. I want to know WHY I can't get interviews. I want to know what's wrong with me. I want to know why people don't even want me on a volunteer basis.

I've been noting the jobs that the people I graduated from library school have now. One of my friends is earning $20 000 more a year than what I was making at my last job. She's on committees and stuff. She's very busy. It seems stressful. But she's making a name for herself in her professional community and I am sitting here with too much time on my hands. She puts up with stupid committee bullshit, whereas I lose patience and eventually quit those committees. She recently pointed out to me that even though we have the same birthday, she will still always 'be older' or 'more responsible' or something like that because she has children and I don't. I think she was joking - I remember laughing because I'm good at remembering social cues, sometimes - but. well. yeah. I am surrounded by people who are passionate about their jobs/careers/whatever and doing the right things professionally speaking and making babies and MOVING FORWARD in their lives and their careers, while I feel like I am rolling downhill, backwards, no brakes -- and with too much time on my hands.

I AM FALLING APART HERE, PEOPLE.

And no, I am not asking for advice. Please don't give me any.

"Go get your resume checked by a professional." It's in progress, dear reader.

"Write out a schedule, or a list of tasks to do. It will give you a sense of completion once you cross those things off." This is the same fucked up logic I've been told about paying for classes, or declaring something publicly. "If you pay for classes, you HAVE to go to them." "If you let people know about something, you don't want to lose face and fail, do you?" Huh. Actually, I know that in the long run, most people don't give a shit about other people. A lot of people revel in others failures. My living room and kitchen is covered in lists. And my desk. My couch is my new desk because my real desk is covered in papers and books I don't want to deal with right now. I MAKE LISTS ALL THE TIME. But I don't actually follow them. I don't get a sense of satisfaction when I cross something off my list. I thought I would feel better after sending off the book review I have been meaning to do since November, but, well, nope. Just that steady empty non-feeling that seems to have rooted itself permanently in my psyche.

"Get out of the house, go for a walk." And yes, it's true. I do feel better when out of the house. I have even sought comfort in hipster cafés - and found comfort, surrounded by skinny jeans and boys with earnestly ripped sweaters and chunky eyewear. But leaving the house means I have to return to the house, and be confronted yet again with tasks undone.

"One thing at a time." Yes. I finished a book review this morning. I'm about to send my resume out to another potential employer. I have full intentions of getting out of my bathrobe, putting some caffeine inside of me, possibly even some food, and doing some laundry. Also on the list: pay rent, give notice that we will not be renewing our lease.

Because that's another thing. We're moving. To Vancouver. Where I will spend the summer looking for a job AND a place to live (already have a sweet sublet in Kitsilano, thank you sister for having a friend who lives & works elsewhere for 3 months of the year), and that means that I definitely won't have too much time on my hands. I won't have enough time on my hands. So my lollygagging and procrastination is being forced to come to an end, and I'm mourning that, in a way.

Mourn mourn mourn. Mourning the death of H. Mourning the death of a huge chunk of my sister's soul. I am leaving my home -- to make a new home, in a new city, and yes, there is something wonderful and exciting about that -- but I thought that if I was moving to a new city, it would be because me or my fella had an actual job to go to, not because somebody died. But that death facilitated a swift rearrangement of personal priorities, and I'm going to honour that. I'm leaving some great friends. I'm leaving a fantastic neighbourhood. Some of my friends have some very cool children that I won't get to see grow up, and chances are that though I will be missed, the "missing" will become stale, correspondence will go unanswered, we'll all "move on" with our lives, and that will be that.

So yeah, I'm not looking for advice. I am merely wailing into the internet void. Feeling incredibly lonely and detached these days, so I'm resorting to howling through 1s and 0s. I'll get over it. I'll get shit done. I'll probably regret writing this and various other blog entries and erase them, as it's not like I'm hiding myself very well and some clever future employer will find this blog and read it and be horrified at my tendency to overshare. I'll give the landlord the notice she requires. I'll get some exercise. I will eat more vegetables than waffles. I will continue to make social plans with people and I'll continue to try and act cheerful around them because nobody likes a sad sack. And indeed, people pull away from sad sacks in fear and disgust. I've done it. People have done it to me. So I'm trying very hard to not be a sad sack.

But I'm not going to finish all that gin on my own. That would be.... dangerous. Right?

Mail-art call: birthday card project.

I do not want much of a present, anyway, this year.
After all I am alive only by accident.
-- from "A Birthday Present" by Sylvia Plath

O Sylvia. Dear sweet dead Sylvia. While I agree that life is largely accidental, I share a different opinion on the receiving of gifts.

I want something substantial this year. I want attention, dammit.

Many sorrows and dismal throes,
Many forms of fish, bird and beast,
Brought forth an infant form
Where was a worm before.
-- from "The Book of Urizen" (Chapter VI) by William Blake

Life is suffering. This is what Buddha tells us. To be born is to suffer.

However, to be born is also to celebrate. Each year of being alive is a brave, grand thing.

My birthday is in April. Help me celebrate my birthday; I'll help you celebrate yours.

Send me a birthday card or postcard. Include your date of birth and return address to receive a card or postcard for your birthday.

(If you want to send a present, I collect fortune cookie fortunes and public transportation tickets -- old bus passes, metro tickets, transfers, etc.)

Please send by April 30, 2009.
Size: Not much larger than 13 x 18 cm (5 x 7 inches)
Postal cards and art envelopes only, please.
There will be no jury and no returns, and all cards will be exhibited online at http://carriecarm.blogspot.com with your name and a link to your website, if you so choose.

Send your post/cards on or before April 30 to:

Carrie Carm
48041 RPO Bernard
Montreal, QC H2V 4S8
Canada

Thank you.

So, how's that whole 'learning French' thing going for you?

Oh, thanks so much for asking. How thoughtful of you to ask after me.

It's not going well at all.

I dropped my class two months ago, the day after my sister's husband killed himself.

The morning I dropped out, I practiced what to say. I was practicing while in the shower. I was also crying while practicing -- that was the whole point of the practicing, to get to a point where I could say something coherent, without bursting into tears. Some things are hard to say out loud, no matter what language you're using, or how comfortable you are with that language.

I didn't want to use se suicider, or tuer (to kill). Too many details -- I hadn't sorted it out in my brain yet, and the school only needed to know that someone had died and I had to leave my classes.

This was my big opening sentence: "Hier, mon beau-frère est décedé, et je dois partir à Vancouver."
Translation: "My brother-in-law died yesterday, and I must leave for Vancouver."

I spoke these words to the secretary at the office. Her eyes got soft. She said she was sorry to hear that. But that I must speak to the director of the program. For paperwork purposes, of course.

I went down the hall to the director's office. I smiled and apologized for interrupting her. I tried to speak my sentence to her. My big reveal.

She corrected my pronunciation.

I was telling her that my brother-in-law was dead and I had to fly fly fly across the country, and she corrected my pronunciation.

décedé = died
decidé = decided

You see the similarities. The subtleties of accents. But. Context. CONTEXT helps.

I guess I was saying "Yesterday, my brother-in-law decided...."

Or.

Maybe I did say décedé correctly. Maybe I didn't say decidé instead. The immediate interruption and condescending correction of my apparently appalling use of the French language kinda shook me.

I was so confused.

WHY is she correcting my speech while I'm telling her this terrible thing? I got more shaky and stuttery. I explained that la femme dans la bureau told me I should talk to her. She corrected even that, interrupting me to say: "la secrétaire".

Sometimes, in English, the language I am most comfortable expressing myself, sometimes I forget words. I could see myself saying "the woman in the office" instead of the word "secretary". I could see people around me understanding who I'm talking about. But only an asshole would interrupt me and say "secretary" like I'm, well --- I was going to say like a retard. But mentally handicapped people shouldn't be spoken to and treated like they are stupid. Because they're not.

She spoke to me in a manner to which I have become accustomed. Living in Montreal has meant that I've become used to being treated like shit. (Not that everyone is an asshole, not AT ALL. I've had many pleasant encounters with strangers in French. But the bad ones seem to stick with a sturdier emotional glue.)

I get constant interruptions from others when I am trying to stutter out a sentence. I have had my pronunciation corrected by strangers. I have been laughed at in stores and by government representatives. I have had the person I am speaking to immediately switch to English when they detect that I am having problems. I have been in customer service situations where the other person just stops talking to me and won't answer my questions.

So the fact that while I was trying to tell someone that there had been a death in my family, she was busy trying to 'improve' my ability to speak the French language -- this was not really a surprise to me. Not really. It was not a surprise, but it was devastating nonetheless.

I have spent an unhealthy amount of time in the past two months going over that little scene in her office, desperately wishing for a time machine so that I could go back and bark out the French equivalent of:

My sister's husband just killed himself.
I have to leave classes. I don't know when I'll be back.
Can I do the exams at the end of February to get into Level 3.

I also wish for a time machine so that I could go back and not do the smiling, friendly, keeping-it-together act. Instead, I would allow the tears to flow freely, I would walk into her office with my face covered in snot and saltwater, I would blubber, I would shake, I would wail. I would not even attempt to talk to her in French. I would be hysterical. I would give her an interesting, tragic scene she could talk about with friends, family and colleagues.

I think I might have gotten more sympathy if I hadn't been concentrating so hard on keeping myself together. At least a fucking "I'm sorry for your loss." Instead of a speech on how important it is to master at least the first 3 levels of French and how it would be impossible for me to not get lost if I was to go into Level 3. But the whole experience fucked with my head -- did she say she was sorry? Did I miss it because I miss a lot of what people say to me in French? Why do I even care if some grumpy middle-aged lady isn't capable of muttering various social niceties or showing sympathy?

So instead of sitting in a classroom for 4 hours a day, I have been trying to watch dubbed versions of C.H.I.P.S. and La femme bionique. But it's not really working. I don't really concentrate. I just wait for the parts where Lindsay Wagner does her slow motion running with that "ch-ch-ch" soundtrack, and then I do the slow-motion running along with her and change the channel. That's fun. And C.H.I.P.S. will never be the same once my husband dude pointed out that the shots of the cops on their motorbikes are weird because clearly they are being hauled around on a trailer.

Some guy on the street handed me a coupon for a new hair salon in my neighbourhood. I tried to joke with him about getting my hair done (dreadlocks seem to inspire horror in some hair professionals) but I had NO idea what he was saying to me. So I ran away, in slow motion, à la femme bionique.

everyone's a winner baby that's no lie.

Okay. Maybe that is a lie. But I am. Or was. I was a winner. I won something. Last summer/fall I went online contest crazy and entered damn near every contest I could find. But I didn't win anything. Until now.

All the way back in January, I won a painting from the nice folks over at DiPoe. They held onto my blondified work of art until I got back from Vancouver; it arrived in the mail....last week? The week before? Right now it is sitting on top of a pile of pamplemousse's photographic prints. Art likes art.

It was well packaged and wrapped in plastic. Actually, it's still wrapped in plastic, and it's a damn good thing that it is because pamplemousse dumped an ashtray on it the other day (accidentally, of course. or so he tells me.). It will find its way onto a wall sometime soon. I can be quite slow about these things. But in the meantime, I will be more careful about the contents of ashtrays and their proximity to destroyable things.

Thank you kind DiPoe artist people. I am very pleased to have won a real, live work of art.

I found out about the DiPoe contest via another blog I like to look at/read: Oh Honestly Erin. She is funny. And she writes cool stories to go with her paintings. And she makes cool photographs. She's having a contest right now, at this very moment - she's giving away a bathroom plaque. Of course, I want to win it, and I hope I do, but maybe you would like to win it too.