Why do anything at all?

FranceLife

Jan 21

Illustration of and from Des Filles à la Vanilles

“You are the largest size in the store.”

He wasn’t wrong, and he wasn’t rude. He was doing his job, as I had inquired about more sizes in a particular pair of pants. His directness and practical care about helping me find a few beautiful pieces in his little boutique made me love him more.

The French will tell you they are direct and honest, not rude, and, of course, as adapting French ways to our American life is the point of my Substack, I think we could learn a thing or two from them.

Different kinds of directness.

It’s not all just telling people straight up how it is. Like all good things, it’s more nuanced than that.

Last night, we had our first Zoom calls for the April trips to Paris. This is a chance for my guests to see each other’s faces, get to know each other, compare bucket list notes, and ask their initial questions.

I get to ask my questions too, the most important for me being WHY did you choose to come on this trip? I can promise you, in the 50-some-odd people I’ve asked that question to since I launched these trips a couple of years ago, no one has EVER said, “I don’t know.”

I mean, you gotta know.

In their case, they’ve chosen to travel to the other side of the world with “some lady they know from YouTube,” so by the time they get to my screen to talk, they’ve had practice answering this question, as their families have already pressed them on the issue greatly.

They come to my screen for this call with a decisive directness, and it’s the beginning step in the personal growth that happens every time you travel internationally.

So good for them. That’s one kind of directness.

Directness inspires.

My friend Céline is another kind. I met her a few years before I began having children. She was just starting her family and expecting her first, and we lived near each other for two of her three pregnancies. She, a French expat living in the Chicago suburbs, and I, a budding Francophile out of my mind happy to have discovered a significant group of French people in the area, many of whom became our friends. Céline was going to be a great mother. It was obvious. Her ideas on motherhood and raising her children were clearly well thought out, and nothing was going to be left to chance. To simply describe her parenting?

Intentional.

With no qualms, she shared her thoughts on her approach and technique, and it wasn’t under the cushy umbrella of “this is what’s best for us — you do you.” No, she just put it out there — take or leave it. It was her own Gospel, and I was welcome to be a grown-up and not be threatened by her approach. Church, a proper diet, time outdoors, jazz, no pacifiers, massive amounts of books, Montessori… she dropped her directness on these topics like a rapper on open mic night. Here are my rhymes, just listen along or find yourself singing them the next day, making them a bit of your own. Céline and I parted ways on pacifiers. I loved them, and so did my babies. And Montessori — I ended up homeschooling. But our moments together raising our small children with our personal convictions are fond, fond memories.

We lost Céline a few years back. Naturally, her children are incredible.

Céline knew herself, and that’s another kind of directness.

Directness challenges.

Sometimes in our lives, we encounter people who challenge us to just DO THE THING. It’s a particular kind of grace if we encounter this person while we are young and in our so-called formative years. I was the recipient of this kind of grace when Ms. Emily Middleton became my choir teacher in seventh grade.

Ms. Middleton rescued a small, intimidated little white girl with her directness. I loved her class. I love the music she selected, from what she called “negro spirituals” to compilations from Fame and the Gershwin brothers.

I desperately wanted to give it my all, but many of the other kids were in it for (what they thought would be) an easy A or a blow-off hour. Little did they know that with Emily Middleton at the helm, you weren’t blowing off nothing! She could see my 12-year-old’s desire probably more than I saw it myself.

Stunned — She gave me the solo for Fame.

Baby look at me and tell me what you see,
you ain’t seen the best of me yet,
give me time, I’ll make you forget the rest.
I got more in me, and you can set it free,
I can hold the world in my hand.
Don’t you know who I am?
Remember my name — FAME!

The irony of the words still blows my mind. You’ll see why.

Standing there with my multiple Swatch watches, pegged and stonewashed jeans, I must have eeked out that solo one afternoon in practice, because she stopped the song abruptly and hollered,

“Angie, why are you in this class?!”

And that stone-washed denim-clad girl took a deep breath and boldly answered back, “To sing, Ms. Middleton.”

And with all the confirmation I may ever need in my entire life, she answered back,
“Then sing!”

That woman changed my life with her directness. That was 38 years ago, and I’ve been giving my all to anything I put my hand to ever since.

Directness calls B.S.

When we are in a healthy relationship with someone, directness can hold us accountable. (Keep in mind, this entire segment falls directly under those keywords just now, HEALTHY RELATIONSHIP.)

We are creatures that choose the path of least resistance from our habits to our answers, and one of the great things about healthy relationships is that they are a safe space. It’s an amazing thing for someone who cares about you to essentially say, “That’s not good enough. I call B.S.”

My therapist does this. Yes, I have a therapist. Best decision of the last few years.

I got a therapist last year because, as I looked across the scope of my life, I thought, Oh boy, this could be a doozy.

I live in Door County, Wisconsin. An area of the country that has deep historical roots. Once inhabited by Native Americans and then visited by the fur-trapping French, it got its name from the waters up at the tip of our little peninsula. The waters of Green Bay and the Great Lake Michigan converge there, creating treacherous currents that have caused many a shipwreck. In fact, it’s said that in the 1600s, the Potowatomi Indians who lived on today’s Washington Island and mainland Winnebago Indians lost hundreds of warriors on this strait of water during an attack. They say that in their native tongue, the Native Americans began to refer to it as “Death’s Door.” When the French traders arrived, they experienced the same treacherous waters and adapted the name to Porte des Morts. Today, we call it Door County, and the waters are still crazy, and a simple ferry to the island up to the lavender farms on Washington Island can be quite a choppy adventure.

What does this have to do with my therapist?

Back to “this could be a doozy”.

I was looking at my life and saw peri-menopause coming as one current, my beautiful babies beginning to leave home as another current, my increasingly successful business ventures as another current, aging parents as another, my deep tendency to be nostalgic and prone to melancholy as another…

On the horizon, I could see my own treacherous waters that I wasn’t quite sure how I’d navigate.

And, well, let’s just say, I thought I’d better get ahead of it and get a therapist while the getting was good. I had no desire to go down with the ship.

Growing up, I wasn’t allowed to respond “I don’t know,” and I do my best to make that an unacceptable response from my own children; however, I’ve noticed there’s one place in my life where I’ll say those three stupid words. Yep — with my therapist. And if during a Saturday morning session, she presses me with a challenging question and I respond, “I don’t know,” she firmly says back, “Yes, you do.”

She calls B.S.

She’s a safe, healthy place and so she has permission to call B.S. and push back. That’s another kind of directness.

What does this have to do with the French?

Well, if I go back to David (Da-Veed) at the little boutique in Paris twenty years ago, and if I think about Céline, I can see that this stereotype of the French being a direct people can very much ring true. I can take those experiences and look back at my life and see how other people have shaped me, and I can see this running theme of directness and find deep respect in it.

This Substack is about living a French-inspired life from an American perspective. That doesn’t mean it’s all fluff like “all you need is red lipstick and to sit down when you eat.” It’s about considering aspects of French culture and breaking them down as an American, and fleshing them out to create our own story.

Sometimes we need to think about why we do what we do and be ready to give an answer — if not for “their” benefit, then for our own.

Why are you coming to France with me?

Why are you raising your children this way?

Why are you evading the question?

The art of directness has a place, and this is how it fits into my story. I’m glad you’re here.