Broody Much?

When I finally got to Scotland, one of the first things I wanted to do was to meet Indigo's five and a half month old baby boy. Indigo, my best friend from university, gave birth at the end of April and I just missed meeting the wee one by a month and a half (the last time I'd been home was early March) and so after all those months of insisting Indigo send me photo after photo, I finally got to meet him for the first time. And I fell head over heels in love.




It's funny to think that one of my friends has actually got one of these things. Seeing Indigo with her son and watching how she glowed with pride and love for him was one of those moments where the fact that you're not a child anymore just hits you. Bam! Just like that. Almost as though you've been walking through the transition between childhood and adulthood with your eyes shut and one day open them to find that you're not 12 anymore, you're all grown up.





I played with him, I tickled him, I made stupid faces at him and spoke to him in that high-pitched coochy-coochy-coo voice reserved only for babies ears. (As a side-note, isn't it funny that when there's a baby around, people get away with doing the silliest faces and voices and blowing raspberries and making fart sounds and such? You would never get away with doing those sorts of things to an adult, would you? I love it!) I couldn't get enough of his cuteness, even when he started making funny noises and put on an "I'm doing a poo right now" face, I still loved him. The little scamp!





Even though at times he just kind of looked at me as though he was thinking "who the hell are you and what am I doing sitting on your lap?!"

Babies. You gotta love them.

Road Trip

Coming back after a holiday in Scotland, I always feel the need for another holiday. FP and I did so much in the two weeks that we were staying at my parent's house in the North of Glasgow that there was not one single day where we actually got to relax as such. By the end of the holiday we were so exhausted that we were going to bed at 10pm and stressing over the idea of having to drive 10 hours back to France (did I mention we came by car and boat?). But still, we made it back home in one peice in the end and only fell asleep at the wheel twice (just kidding, mum!).



On the boat to Portsmouth


After 2 hours of driving in France, 6 hours on the boat, a lovely sleep in Southampton's Premier Inn Hotel and then 8 hours of driving, we arrived at my parent's house. We then had a wee party with these wonderful people:



My brother and his girlfriend



My lovely wee mum



And my wonderful dad.

It was exhilarating and surreal to be there with them. When you come by plane, you step on in one country and step off in another. It's fast and you're in no doubt that you've arrived. But when we came by car we passed through all of England and then part of Scotland before we got to our final destination and it was so long and gradual that when we did finally arrive, neither of us were quite sure how we had got there.

That first night passed by in a gush of heady, wonderful moments, all of us talking the hind legs off a donkey and enjoying each other's company after realising that we were finally all together as a family for the first time in seven months. It was awesome.

Absent

Please excuse my disappearing act, folks! FP and I are in Scotland having a blast, catching up with all our special people who live over this way and making the most of our time here. We're also using this holiday to get a move on with the wedding plans, (FP has bought his kilt and I have bought my dress! Oh the excitement!) which is more fun than I could ever imagine. Roll on next June!

Baw Bag

I believe that the act of long queuing brings out the wild animal in many people. They push and shove and cheat and skip the line. By the time they arrive at the front of the queue they don't want to wait a moment longer and sometimes, as a cashier at the Chateau, you find yourself with two different people waving money in your face, saying 'I was first', 'no, I was'. It would be quite comical if it wasn't so pathetic.

Anyway, this is what I was faced with on one particular day at work: an older French woman with a group of five old fogies behind her, and a younger American woman with a protruding pregnant belly looking rather pissed off but about to give up. I had seen the French woman come from behind the queue and right up to the front - she'd blatantly skipped the line - and the poor American girl had been patiently waiting in the queue next to her husband. She had a right to look pissed off.

I turned to the French woman and said, "I'm sorry Madame, but they were first." She shot me a vitriolic grimace and clung onto the edge of the cash desk with such force that the tips of her fingers turned white, waiting to pounce before the next person in the queue could get in.

After serving the younger woman, the group of oldies pushed themselves closer to the ticket booth and I had a 100 euro note shoved in my face.

"Six tickets." The woman snapped, throwing me a scathing glance. No hello, no please, no nothing. I swallowed my desire to say 'and what's the magic word?'

"Wait, wait," her friend pushed her way to the front. "We get in for free, no? We're all retired."

"I'm afraid not, Madame." I replied. "There are no reductions for senior citizens."

"There are at the Louvre." One of them said.

"Yes, well...This is Versailles."

They all shook their heads and exchanged mumblings about how unfair that was.

"What about teachers?" Another one of them asked. "I have my education card."

It was becoming obvious that they were the type of people who would try to find a get-in-for-free card from every angle. "Teachers don't pay to enter the palace, but the card has to be the National Education 2009 card." I explained.

"But I'm retired!" She cried. "My card's from 2005!"

Well then you're no longer a teacher, I wanted to say. But I held my tongue. "I'm sorry, the ticket controllers will only let you enter for free if you have the correct card. Now, what kind of tickets would you like to buy?"

"What about diplomates? Do they get in for free?" One of the women asked. The thing was, I was a bit stuck now. I didn't know this word. Had never heard of it. (Even though, shamefully, my mum tells me it's the same word in English...)I looked to my left, preparing to ask my colleague if this 'diplomate' thing had free entry or not, but she was busy. I looked to my right where my other colleague was also terribly busy. Uh-oh. Not wanting to disturb them, it appeared I was well and truly stuck. And so, taking a chance, I said, "Umm, a diplomate?"

Now, normally, a nice person would try to find another word to describe what it was, but the woman rolled her eyes and said, "What? You don't know what it is?"

Embarrassed, I shook my head. "No..."

"Are you an idiot?" She asked, here eyes open wide in disbelief. "It's a career."

I could feel my cheeks turning red, the skin prickling with the heat. The woman turned to her friends and said "She doesn't even know what a diplomate is! I wish they wouldn't employ these damn foreigners. Do they only employ idiots here or are we just unlucky to have gotten stuck with this imbécile?"

And at that, I felt the adrenalin of anger fill my body. I was so angry at her disgusting, arrogant behaviour that something took over the normally scared-of-confrontation me.

"Excuse me Madame! But there's no need to be so impolite just because I'm a foreigner. No, I'm not French and I'm sorry that it offends you so much, but that's your problem more than it is mine. I don't know what a diplomate is, I don't actually know the entire French dictionary off by heart. Now, if you don't want to deal with a foreigner then I suggest you get in the queues either to your left or to your right. Both of my colleagues are French which should be more to your liking. Who's next, please?"

But the woman didn't move. For a moment I thought I had managed to silence her, to make her feel bad for her arrogance. For a split second I was sure I saw something like shame pass over her face. But instead of an apology or her getting out of the way, she came closer to the counter. "I shall speak Eenglish, zen." She said in English with a crappy accent. The woman refused to budge!

I sighed. "Oh, so you speak English, do you?"

"Yez I speak Eenglish very well. Per'aps we can get zee ticketz faster zan when we speak in French."

I hated this woman and I didn't even know her. I closed my fists and pressed tiny half moon nail indentations into my palms. It was all I could do not to just fly for her.

"Give me two seconds then please." I said and closed my glass window that separates us. I left my seat and crouched down beside my colleague and, whispering in her ear, asked her if diplomates were free. "Nope," she whispered back. "They just think they are. They're all connards."

Stiffling laughter, I went back to my post and opened the window again, a big, fake smile on my face. "Sorry about that. I just learned what a diplomate is. Where I come from it's called a baw bag*."

"A baw bag?" She asked.

"Yes." I said matter-of-factedly.

"And are zee baw bagz free in zee palace? My huzband is a baw bag."

"No, Madame, Baw bags are not free." I handed over six tickets and her change. "Bye bye now."

It may have been immature, but it sure felt good.


*baw bag - Scottish for ball bag. Literally scrotum. Used as an insult 'given to one who is annoying, useless or just plain stupid.'

Trou du cul

While FP and I had been in La Rochelle, FP's parents had, very kindly, been keeping the cat at their house. The day I arrived to pick him up, Mr FP told me he was glad to get rid of him.

"Ah bon?!" I asked, wondering what Ollie could have done to upset him so.

"Oui," Mr FP nodded. "He's won the award for being the biggest trou du cul."

Oh-oh. Ollie, admittedly, is not a well behaved cat. He tips over vases full of flowers, paws your face when you're sleeping, climbs up christmas trees, claws his way up your jeans, and sits in the middle of house plants, but, up until now, our friends and family who have been affected by his petty crimes have managed to laugh it off. Because he's cute and furry. He must have done something pretty naughty to have been awarded the biggest asshole award from my soon-to-be father-in-law.

"What did he do?" I asked, scared to hear the response.

"Oh, nothing. Just insisted on sleeping on my head all night with his tail wrapped around my chin. I felt like I was wearing a Davy Crockett hat."

I laughed. "It could have been worse. At least he did sleep in the night instead of meowing at the door."

"True." Mr FP agreed. "But I took the liberty of awarding him the biggest trou du cul medal."

I looked at him, not quite getting it. Mr FP called for Ollie and before I saw him, I heard the little jingle jangle of the bell on his collar.

And when he came galloping towards me and I saw what Mr FP had made him, I laughed and laughed and laughed.

La Rochelle

FP and I have just come back from the most wonderful long weekend spent in La Rochelle. La Rochelle! The town where it all began for me. The place where all my French adventures were born.

I've forever been enchanted by La Rochelle with it's many winding little roads and nooks and crannies. I used to love to set out on a stroll on a Sunday afternoon, not having the slightest clue where I might end up, to discover small, out-of-the-way antique shops or a public garden, so quiet that one might be forgiven for thinking it's private.

FP was good enough to visit my old haunts with me. My old apartment, favourite restaurants, secluded beaches and Le Vieux Port. He makes a lovely travel partner, so he does.

(I apologise for my repetition to those of you who have already seen these photos on Facebook!)









We ate and drank spectacularly well.










Standing outside number 21. My old apartment.








We spent a fabulous morning on the Ile de Ré. We had planned on hiring a scooter and buzzing around the island carefree with the wind blowing through our hair. But unfortunately, there were no scooters left at the hire cycle shop and we found ourselves stranded, not knowing quite what to do with ourselves. So we went to the beach and had a look at the rockpools with their hermit crabs and shrimp. I was bewitched by the amount of living creatures you can find under one little rock.



A thoroughly crackin' wee holiday.

How I met FP (part 2)

In June 2006, I had to go back to Scotland. I wondered how things would work out with Toad and I, whether he even wanted to give a long distance relationship a go or not. Over time there seemed to be a power shift in our relationship. In the beginning, I was reluctant to be with him. He did all of the chasing. Sent me flowers. Turned up on my doorstep as a surprise. Paid for a train ticket for me to come and see him in Paris. At the beginning I seemed to have all the power: I felt as though he was putting all his effort into getting me to be his girl. And so, at some point, I gave in.

But once we became official, the tables turned. I came over all needy. I felt like I had to work hard just to keep his eyes from roaming, had to almost remind him that I existed. It was as though I was smitten and he didn't give a damn. The chase was over, he had me and now, like a cat who walks away from their half dead prey, he was bored. Suddenly, he had the upper hand in our relationship and I would do anything just to keep him.

Toad did make an effort when I moved back to Scotland. Albeit a small one. He phoned me almost every night. He even managed to make a trip over to see me, but it was the strangest thing. I came to meet him at Glasgow Train Station and we got on the coach to go back to Edinburgh. We'd just been reunited after not seeing each other for a few weeks, maybe a month even, and we were supposed to be in a loving relationship. So why, as soon as we got on the coach, did he put his Ipod on full blast and put both buds into his ears? I sat there, desperately and pathetically hoping he was just tired after the travelling and I held onto his hand until he took it away and snapped at me, telling me I was making him too hot. He ignored me for the rest of the journey.

Since I'd moved back to Scotland, Anthony and I had been sending each other emails. He was so adorable, and his English, although still bad, was improving slowly but surely (my French was not, however). He had just moved to Germany in order to do an apprenticeship. We talked a lot about our respective relationships, about how he was scared Allie would cheat on him while he was away. She'd done it before, he said. They'd been together for 6 years, they were high school sweethearts and I couldn't get over the fact that they'd been together for so many years. To me, at the time, 6 years felt like forever. I felt like if a couple were together for 6 years then they were probably going to work out ok.

One evening, while Toad was staying, he was watching the TV while I was on the internet, bored and fed up of watching football. Anthony was online and we were chatting through the instant messenger. At some point during our conversation things turned serious and he said 'Linsey, what would you do if you were tempted to give it all up and be with someone else?'

I could read a million things into just that one question. My heart skipped a beat. What was I to say? I looked over at Toad, laid out on my sofa, a beer in one hand and the other hand scratching his balls as he watched the football. And then I thought of Allie. She was a nice girl, we were friends and from what I could tell, she loved Anthony. They had been together 6 years, they were obviously supposed to be together.

'I would look at the person I was with and think of what I might lose if I gave into my temptations.' I replied. Sighed. Closed my laptop and walked over to Toad. 'You're in the way,' he waved me out of his vision. 'I can't see the football.'

***

It was about that point when I realised that Anthony and I could be dangerous for one another. I didn't know if I was in love with Toad, but I didn't want to just give up either. I'd been jumping from boyfriend to boyfriend since I was 17, I'd introduced Toad to my friends and family. I didn't want to let them all down. I didn't want them to say 'oh surprise, surprise, Linsey has split up with yet another boyfriend.' I didn't want to keep doing that. I so wanted to be in a long term, loving relationship, I so wanted to be with The One. I had convinced myself, forced myself to believe that Toad was that person. Because Toad was the one who was in my apartment and in my life at that point. It was easier to believe it was him.

After that, I got too busy at uni to communicate with Anthony online much. Or that was my excuse. Sometimes I checked my emails to find he had sent messages saying he hoped I was ok and that he missed talking to me. I missed him too, but I didn't want to cause trouble between him and Allie and I really needed to concentrate on my relationship with Toad if I wanted it to work out. But one day, while checking my inbox, I saw an email from him that seemed different. The words in the subject box startled me : 'She did it'. Those three words seemed so heavy. As though all of Anthony's emotions had been poured into that one sentence. I opened it up and began to read.

Coucou Linsey, Cela fait longtemps que je ne t'ai pas vu sur l'internet...J'espere que tu vas un jour lire ce mail et me repondre. Voila je voulais te dire que Allie et moi c'est finis...et oui elle m'as trompé avec un mec...Je souhaiterai tellement t'en parler. Bon, je t'embrasse. I MISS YOU SO MUCH.

I stared at the flickering screen and tried hard to make sense of this email he had sent. My French - even after a year in La Rochelle - was still not up to scratch. I knew he was saying he hadn't seen me on the internet for a long time and that he hoped that one day I would read that email and reply to him. I understood that Allie and him were finished. And I supposed, although I'd never come across this word before, that trompé meant she had cheated on him. And all the while I had distanced myself from him, practically ignored him. I felt awful.

My heart broke for him. How could she do that to him? How could anyone do that to Anthony? He was so sweet and adorabley funny and gorgeous and - I was outraged. All of a sudden I had all these feelings that were floating to the surface of my gut - no, not floating, more like bubbling. I had so many feelings all at the one time that I didn't know which feelings they were. One was anger, that was for sure. Another was sorrow. I felt so, so sad for him. I didn't want him to hurt. I knew what it was like to be cheated on, I didn't want him to feel that way. It hurt me to think that he was hurting. I wanted to be there with him, to take him in my arms and hold him against me, to protect him.

Protective. That was another one of those feelings. I felt protective of him.

And love.

Oh God.

I loved him.

***

Anthony and I started talking more often through emails and instant messenger again. We didn't really talk much about Allie anymore. Mostly we spoke about our hopes and dreams for the future and we found that a lot of them, we had in common. I loved waking up to a new email message from him every day. Sometimes they would be hilarious :

Hello linsey, Your mission today is to record my email (that i refund the password.. lol) and to feel free with it. As i can answer yet to your sms, i can answer to email. Even if one of your team or you are captured, the nation tell to everyone that they dont know you. This message must be deleted quickly, if not the worldwide can exploise. Stop. Anthony from a far German nation...

(I have no idea what that one meant but it makes me laugh SO MUCH even now and I think that's what he wanted.)

And sometimes they would be just plain sweet :

Do you will stay my Scottish friend Lins? I'm addicted I can't stay 24 hours without having news of you! I'm annoying boy but you know you are special for me isn't it?

Our relationship was becoming stronger and stronger and I was opening up more and more with Anthony. In him I had found a really good friend. Someone I could really talk to. Although saying that, I hadn't yet told him that I had some unexplained illness that was getting worse and worse. I suppose the fact that him not knowing about it meant that I could pretend it didn't exist.

I did tell him, eventually. Because it got to the point where I wanted to. I wanted to tell him that I was scared. I kind of felt that he would understand. I blurted it out to him while we were chatting on the internet and it all came tumbling out at once, not at all the way I'd planned it. Afterward, when the shock had subsided, I explained everything that I knew, didn't leave anything out. And he cried. But he still understood. Maybe more than anyone else ever understood.
The next morning I received this email:

Hey my tresor,

yesterday night, when i have smoked my last cigarette, i have watched the sky and ask to God if he could turn his face toward Scotland, toward you.. I have asked him that he can stop help me now but he must help someone i love. And guess what? i think he answers me this night cause he gives me your pretty face smiling on my dream! i have seen you smiling! my little finger tell me that is a premonitory dream!! :-)

for anyway, dont forget my mind is with you and i wish help you go pass through this difficult moment...

I am on msn tonight from 18h30 to maybe late.... so if you need...
be strong honey....

He understood.

***

It occurred to me that I was talking to Anthony more than I was talking to Toad. In fact, I realised that Toad hadn't called me for over a week. Hadn't sent me an sms message. Hadn't even sent me an email. That wasn't right...How could that be? We were supposed to be in a relationship. Unless it was over and he just hadn't told me...

It was over. He just hadn't told me. Hadn't had the guts to. I called him. Texted him. Emailed him and finally, a day later, I got an email in response. It was over. He just didn't feel right. He'd been with his ex. He'd been with a new girl he'd met on the internet. He'd been everywhere, evidently he'd been too busy being with other girls to let me know we were finished. I was livid. As I read the email I burst into tears. Was I sad that he didn't want to be with me? Or was I sad that I had to tell my friends and family yet again that I had another failed relationship under my belt? It was neither of the two. I wasn't sad. I was humiliated. They were tears of humiliation. I was humiliated that he didn't want to be with me and I was humiliated because I had to tell my friends and family that it hadn't worked out.

And then I picked up the phone and called the one person who I knew would be able to calm me down. Anthony.

It was his birthday. The 27^th August 2006. He picked up the phone tentatively and I heard his voice for the first time since we'd seen each other at the party months ago.

He says it was the best birthday present he had ever had.

***

Two days later, Anthony told me he loved me for the first time. Said he always had. From the moment he first met me.

And that's where life began...

How I met FP (part 1)

When people ask how FP and I met, I always find myself debating over whether I should give them the potted version or the longer version. The potted version is generally reserved for strangers or those who are evidently uninterested in hearing the longer and slightly complicated version and it goes something like this: I spent a year in France as part of my studies and met FP through a friend of a friend while I was there.

The longer version, however, is really nothing at all like the potted version. In fact, the potted version isn't even very close to the truth, if I really think about it. The longer version is slightly more complicated than the potted version, but it's my favourite. This one goes something like this...

In the summer of 2005, I was due to move to France for 12 months as part of my university studies. Having chosen my uni course almost solely because the third year would be spent studying abroad (I know it's a terrible reason to choose a career path, but in my defence I was only 17 and all I really wanted was to live in France), I was really looking forward to it, couldn't wait to get out there to start a new life in a foreign country. It felt so exotic, so exciting, so adventurous. My one reservation was that despite the fact that French was my major, I was slightly worried about how I was going to cope and I'll tell you for why: My French was horrible. Really rather bad. All I really knew was business French and I was quite sure that the majority of the French population did not speak in business French. I mean, if you were French and you came to Scotland knowing only business English you would probably get beaten up. So, in preparation of moving abroad, I decided to find some Frenchies on the internet who might like to help me practice my terrible French on them.

And that was how I came across Toad (this name is appropriate because he turned out to be a toad in the end. You'll see...). A French guy who lived 'near Paris'. We exchanged light banter on MSN for a few months before I moved to France, although I can't say it ever improved my knowledge of the language, but I was trying and he seemed nice enough so we stayed in contact.

But fast forward a few months until October 2005. I should probably mention that I had a boyfriend waiting for me back home in Edinburgh, and Toad had a live-in girlfriend who he was on the verge of splitting up with. Which was not cool because things had changed at some point between Toad and I, we were chatting online often and the topics of conversation had become more and more personal. It seemed we were no longer trying to improve my French. Perhaps we'd given up, or perhaps we quite enjoyed flirting with each other from afar but after a while, he decided to visit La Rochelle, the town where I was staying. So along he came and I will spare you the details, but it just so happened that over the weeks that were to follow, we ended up becoming an item.

Now, later on, by the beginning of 2006, I'd managed to make things official between Toad and I. There was no longer a Scottish boyfriend in the picture and I was officially invited to meet Toad's friends at his apartment. This was something of a milestone for me, since it had taken him long enough to want to introduce me to his friends, I had begun to think he was ashamed. Which is quite possible because it was at this point when my skin started to erupt into strange, unexplainable lesions and I probably did look a bit like the elephant man. But anyway, I digress. I was invited to meet his best friend Allie and her boyfriend at Toad's apartment. Yes, said best friend was a girl. I was not best pleased, at the time, but it turned out to be a blessing in disguise actually...

We were in Toad's apartment - Toad, my flatmate and friend Béa (who had come along for the ride) and me. There was a knock at the door and in came a tall brunette - Allie, I assumed - and behind her was this cute guy. This handsome, adorable, smiley, polite guy. Nervously I introduced myself to Allie with my shaky French and turned to her boyfriend, Anthony, who gave me la bise and sat down beside me. I had come over all hot and flustered and embarrassed, although I couldn't quite put my finger on why. I just knew then that I seemed to really love French boys.

Now, Allie was a really nice girl, it turned out. I didn't seem to have much to worry about between her and Toad, the relationship definitely came across as merely platonic. And as for Anthony, well he and I got on like a house on fire that night. He made an effort to speak English with Béa and me (even though his English was as bad as our French) and appeared really interested in what we had to say. He had this piercing on the top of his ear and he wore a ring through it, a really small silver ring. It made me think that he must have a rebellious side to him and I liked that. It intrigued me. I wanted to get to know more about his rebellious side.

He played in a band, I learned. I asked him to teach me my favourite song on the guitar: Green Day's Wake Me Up When September Ends. He perched on the arm of the sofa and placed my fingertips on the right frets and when he touched my fingers, I felt like electricity was buzzing up and down my arms. Allie is a really lucky girl, I remember thinking.

A couple of nights after I had met Allie and her boyfriend, I turned on my computer to find I had a friend request from Anthony on MSN. I squealed with delight as I shared my news with Béa, who had found him just as intruiging as I had. I clicked 'Yes' and realised that he was online at that precise moment.

Hey, he said.

Hey, I replied, all of a sudden shy.

Was it ok to add you on MSN? He asked in his funny English. I thought maybe we could chat.

Sure, I said. And so we did chat. We chatted online for two months until the next time we saw one another back at Toad's apartment in April.

This time, things were different. Anthony and I spent most of the night talking to one another. Béa hadn't come and Toad was busy entertaining people and - God he had invited a load of boring old eejits. All very academic people who made me feel stupid. The good thing about Anthony was that he was clearly intelligent but he didn't make me full stupid. He didn't have to rub his intelligence in people's faces. We sat in the corner of the room just chatting and laughing, talking about everything and nothing all at the same time. He must have noticed the lesion that was just beginning to show on my face. Must have seen that my skin wasn't quite right. But if he did he didn't make it obvious. And whats more is that when we were talking together just the two of us, he made me forget about it altogether.

That was the night he made me a Scoobidoo helicopter and that was also the night I realised that I don't like French boys, I just rather liked Anthony.

But I was with Toad. And he was with Allie.

And he loved Allie.

***

As you can see the long version is rather long so I'm splitting it up into seperate posts. I have a load of ironing to do so I shall continue tomorrow! Night blogosphere!