By Margaret Muench, SJCC ESL Retiree
It started back in 2006, when a group of American Francophiles, including Norma Welles, SJCC adjunct ESL instructor, met and decided to form an informal French conversation group. They called themselves le Café des Amis (Café of Friends) and started meeting regularly, once or twice a month. Soon, friend talked to friend, and the group began to grow. Other SJCC faculty started attending, including Virginia Scales, Ron Levesque and myself. Meetings took place in different homes, the host or hostess often providing snacks. The main requirement to join: the ability and willingness to speak only French during a two-hour conversation.
In the ensuing years members have come and gone: some moved away, some got too busy or lost interest, and, sadly, some passed away. But it turns out there are a lot of French-speakers out there, and new members joined. There are all kinds of reasons why folks knew French; many, like me, were French majors in college or spent time studying in France; some of us lived in France or other French-speaking countries for a time; some, like Ron Levesque, actually spoke French as their first language (This is something few people know about Ron! Yes, born and raised in northern Maine, near the French-Canadian border, his family spoke French at home when he was a boy.). One of our members is a retired opera singer and learned French to sing in the language; one was sent to live in France as a child by her diplomatic parents. A couple became French teachers. We love sharing our stories – but we talk about anything! Politics – I admit we do. Movies, our families, experiences – whatever a group of friends would normally talk about – that’s what we talk about. There is no homework, nothing to prepare – we just meet and talk.
And we eat. Our group now meets twice a month from 11:00-1:00 – lunch time! We still meet at different members’ homes, or sometimes at a park, and we have a potluck, each bringing something to share for lunch. And one person always brings champagne!
For me this have been a wonderful retirement activity. For many of us, learning and using French was an important part of our adventures in our younger years but got put on the back burner as we plowed through our working years, so this has been a wonderful way to reconnect to that youthful part of ourselves. And they say it helps the brain to keep active in another language (At least it’s worth a try!). And over time, as the years have passed, we have become quite close. There have been joys, and, as happens in a group of mostly retirement age, deep losses. But we have come together and cared for each other, and while we have the breath to speak and brains to think, we shall continue to get together and share our love of French. Mais oui! Ooh la la. Bonjour. Comme ci, comme ca. Merci. Voila! C’est si bon…
