Erik Krenz
By Bethany Olson
I enjoy telling the story of how I met the boy named George, with the chocolate eyes and the long French surname, Arceneaux. I felt so clever for knowing how to pronounce it. The soft “c” like “s” and “eaux” like water.
We were both Residential Advisors (RAs) during our junior year in college. Our staff members all became fast friends and while I loved everyone, I liked him the best. He claimed he didn’t know how to flirt, but believe me when I tell you that he could flirt with me. And he did. A lot.
That first week when we were all moving in, I marched up to his door one evening and interrogated him. “You’re from Louisiana?” I asked. “I’ve always wanted to move there. I love the South.” By nature a shy introvert, my own boldness caught me off guard. Something was pushing me to get to know him. To his credit, he was sweet and easy to talk to. I would be bold again two months later when I texted him: “George—will you ask me to lunch on Thursday?”
My boldness vanished three weeks before Christmas when he asked me out officially, and we sat bug-eyed and staring at each other over lunch—a Thursday routine. Later, I texted my mother, “We’re dating.” She cackled and saved the text.
That summer I joined his family in North Carolina for the 4th of July. I had never met any of the other Arceneaux’s before and was understandably nervous. During the day we hiked mountain trails and walked into town, picking sweet blackberries from the brambles alongside the road. At night we played with sparklers and watched fireworks and stole sweet kisses on the back porch swing.
Over dinner one night—momma’s crawfish étouffée—I succeeded in accomplishing one challenge that had so far eluded me. “Why won’t you have a conversation in French with me?” He had studied French at his private high school in Louisiana; I was 3 years into my French major. At the table with his Louisiana-born, also French-speaking parents, he glared at me with mutinously chocolate eyes and muttered a short sentence. I was delighted.
He has since taken to sending text messages and hiding little notes written in a language we both speak: Je t’aime.
And I continue to be delighted by the boy with the chocolate eyes and the long French name.
Bethany Olson received her B.A. in French and Environmental Studies from St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN. Bethany relocated to Mobile, AL after graduation to serve as an AmeriCorps VISTA member, and is currently employed full-time as Programs Assistant. Following the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill of 2010, she contributes to the organization’s efforts to advocate for restoration of the Gulf Coast, particularly Coastal Alabama. She is employed by Mobile Baykeeper, a small environmental non-profit organization located in Mobile, Alabama, dedicated to protecting the health, beauty and heritage of the Mobile Bay Watershed and Alabama’s coastal ecosystems and communities. Bethany hopes one day to run her own nonprofit organization. In her free time, Bethany loves to cook and bake, craft, write and garden.
You may also enjoy A Woman’s Paris® post, McLain’s “Paris Wife” will have you head over heels for the Hemingways. Bethany Olson was drawn to McLain’s writing, detailed and thoughtful, that artfully captures Hadley’s voice and Ernest’s character in McLain’s fictionalized rendering of Hadley and Ernest’s relationship and their life in Paris. As did Hadley, Bethany found herself falling for for Ernest Hemingway, drawn to his exuberance, quick wit, and verve for life. Included are vimeos featuring interviews with Paula McLain by WHSmithDirect and BookLounge.
Lock your love on the Pont des Arts, by Parisienne Abby Rodgers writes of a unique bridge in Paris plaastered with padlocks inscribed with initial and profusions of love. Stroll by the Siene and fall in love.
Fiction: The Last Passage, by award-winning Moroccan writer Hachim Sbaa whose fictional writing looks at the life of an elderly woman as she is lives life by herself and tries to figure out what truly matters and how she can fill her time and what is left of her life.
Oh, so French! Crossing to the other side. Paris-based writer Shari Leslie Segall shares her observations of becoming a little bit French and writes: “To a greater or lesser degree, whether you expected to or not, one day you realize that you’re crossing to the other side.” She offers a very incomplete list of how you know when you’ve arrived. (First published in FUSAC.FR July 5, 2013.)
Still, “Mastering the Art of French Cooking.” Bon appétit, Julia! The book, Julie & Julia, writes Bethany Olson, is narrated by a vivacious, hysterical, brutally honest woman who is saddled with an unfulfilling job and is desperate for a new project. Powell decides to cook her way through Julia Child’s famed cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Including recipes for Pralin, (caramelized almonds), Les Truffes aux Chocolat, (chocoalte candies in the form of truffles), and Couques, (tongue-shaped caramelized cookies made from puff pastry dough), from Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I and Volume II.
Text copyright ©2013 Bethany Olson. All rights reserved.
Illustration copyright ©2012 Barbara Redmond. All rights reserved.
barbara@awomansparis.com