Awhile back I wrote on my blog that if ever I were to write a book it would be about Parc Bagatelle.
Parc Bagatelle was nestled in a very chic area of Marseille, where mothers wore Prada, toted their newborns in cashmere. Sitting on the grass was taboo and instead of bringing toys for their children they carried their cigarettes and Louis Vitton bag. Yes, you might say Parc Bagatelle and I had very little in common, I felt like a bug in the world of hawks.
As I did not drive (How could I pass the driving test in French?) my only transport were my two feet and a stroller. (It amazed how the stroller could hold a one ton baby and eight of groceries, my arms were buffed.) Parc Bagatelle was the nearest place to our aparment for a baby who should have fresh air and a mother who needed interaction even if it meant only admiring others clothes, and trying to understand snippets of French conversations at the play ground.
As time went on, my routine remain the same. I went to Parc Bagatelle everyday at three. After Chelsea's nap, I would bundle her up, gather a few toys, a blanket, a book, some diapers, Petit Lu and off to Parc Bagatelle we would go. The other mothers I knew by their labels, their children by their French prenoms (names) that I barely could pronounce: Tristan, Aurelie, Celine, Guillaume, Kevin, Pauline…. In some small way it evened out since they could barely pronounce Chelsea's name. Her mother was labelled, "L' Americaine".
It was at Parc Bagatelle that I would meet Frances. I knew the moment I saw her that she wasn't French because she was:
- laying on the grass with her baby bouncing on her knees,
- wearing cutoffs,
- and blowing bubbles in the air.
I pushed Chelsea in her stroller right down to the middle of the parc were Frances was camped surrounded by a million brightly colored toys and said, "Your not French!?!"
Frances looked up at me with her starlight blue eyes, blew bubbles in my direction and said, "Either are you. Where are you from?"
I started to cry. It had been three months that I had heard a word in English.
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