dual personalities

Did you read last week that the French superstar Johnny Hallyday died? Well, c’est vrai. I actually know who Johnny Hallyday was, because I had a French teacher in middle school (or thereabouts) who introduced our class to him.

Madame was, in our pre-teen view, an old crone who wore orthopedic shoes. My mother assured me that she had probably once been quite beautiful–ye gods, how could she tell? I remained unconvinced. When she brought in the Johnny Hallyday records and tried to tell us that he was the bees knees–zut alors! how we laughed!

Yes, we were idiots and proudly so.

Now I am the old crone in not-quite-orthopedic shoes and Johnny’s death serves as yet another reminder of how awful we girls were back in the early nineteen-seventies. I suppose it has always been thus–the young so intolerant of the old and so stubborn about listening to anything they have to say.

On the other hand, Madame was probably one of those teachers who said to me, “You don’t like me, do you, Katie?” and I had to lie and say, “What are you talking about? Of course, I like you! I love French class!”

Well, I looked Madame up on the internet and found her papers in the archive of Smith College. Check them out if you’re interested. (I am not.) I mean really.

I only feel bad that I no doubt embarrassed our mother. I’m sure she was horrified from time to time by the stories I related about school and the things that we laughed at. We laughed at everything. But I have to say in my defense, that although I had to take French for something like twelve years at my school, I never learned a thing. This was not all my fault. Sure, I can say, “Incroyable!” and sound like a native (wink wink) but that’s about all.

*Hell is other people”–Jean-Paul Sartre