There is not only the Montreal Expos that make me a sentimental guy. I am proud to be a Quebecer and a Canadian (in that order, by the way) and want my girls to speak French at all costs. I struggle a lot with that. I really try to not make a big deal out of it, yet, when Catherine does not try to speak French because "It's too hard" I get angry...I also want to give up. After all, why would my girls really need French? French is probably the 4th language in the U.S. (if that). No one here really speaks French and when I mention it, it seems like people say "that's nice", "that's really good" but I always feel they are just trying to be nice.
I speak Quebecois, not French, which also limits our contacts in French around here...French from France is like English from England...it's the same...but not the same. I don't mean it disrespectfully but a hockey puck is "la puck" in Quebec, not "le palet"...And this joke is only funny if you are From Quebec. My girls seem to understand but they do not speak it all that much (OK, the seven month old does not say any words yet), and that makes me sad. I feel I am failing my family, my roots, myself...I don't quite know why. I mean I try right? Is that enough?
Well for me it's not...does it makes me too sentimental for my home country? Am I too nutty? I already have plans to send my girls to a French-Canadian immersion program. IS it worth it? Sometimes I wonder. I feel like I am the only one who cares. I'll give credit to my wife, who encourages me to continue but when visiting Quebec, even my French relatives "practice" their English with my girls. I understand why they do it, but it bothers me...and yet I know why they do it. And I never know how to react. Should I get mad at them for their effort? OR should I just let it go? Last time, I just let it go because I am sick of fighting. And I want to be good. I just don't know if this is romanticizing where I am from or is it a very important issue I should fight for...I just want to do what's best for my girls.
And on another subject, I so wish I could be in Montreal with the Bs-Habs rivalry hitting new heights. A lot of people just switch to their local team when they move but I just cannot turn my back on "Le Canadien". For the records, Chara should have had a 2-3 game suspension with a fine. And I will be Canadiens fan forever...because I am loyal. Which brings me to another point: is loyalty and sentimentality so related that it is one and the same? I don't know if I can deliberate it here on my own blog but I'll take a stab at it and you let me know your thoughts.
I think loyalty comes from some sentimentality. Sentimentality makes you feel "warm and fuzzy", where loyalty fills you with pride...but I think sentimentality may be related to pride also...and it makes you feel like "you owe" whoever you are loyal to something. I think sometimes that where I work is related to both loyalty and sentimentality...So are most of my family and friends...How do we separate both? I really don't know. All I know is I have both and sometimes confuse both of them. Maybe, what I have is a confusion of the English language and I should stick with French just based on loyalty...or is it pride...or sentimentality...Oh well!
Friday, March 11, 2011
Thursday, March 3, 2011
I am a sentimental person....(part 1)
So I have been having a tough time lately. Don't worry, it's not that bad...but I am sadder than usual in the past few weeks. Three recent events have made me sentimental about the past and what has been loss.
The first event: Major League Baseball's Spring Training started a couple of weeks ago. It made me think of all the years I would look at the Grapefruit League schedule and the roster of the people in camp for the Montreal Expos. It was always fun as you never knew who would emerge as a potential superstar. I did that with a sick pleasure since the early 90s. That's when the whole "yearly fire sale" would take place on the Expos roster...yet they kept on producing emerging superstar after emerging superstar. From Grissom, to Walker, to Pedro, to Vidro, to Vlad, they always found a way to make the team exciting.
The second event: Duke Snider passed away last week. I know real baseball fans know him more as a great player on the Brooklyn/L.A. Dodgers but for me, he was one of the best announcers of all time. I would enjoy listening to him and Dave Van Horne on CFCF 600 Montreal do the play by play. I think about them as the best tandem of Expos announcers in history, although, there is something to be said for Rodger Brulotte and Jacques Doucette but I digress...Anyway Duke, to me, was the voice of the Expos.
The final event: the passport pictures I took were rejected and I need to do them yet again. The last time this happened, I was stuck in this country and not able to go see the last game of the Montreal Expos and the Olympic stadium. My grandmother was also sick then and there was a chance I might never see her alive again(luckily, I got to see her several times before she passed in 2006). I was so sad listening to the radio broadcast in French and English from my home here in the USA.
What does this have to do with sentimentality? I am fiercely loyal and always try to remember where I came from, including my heritage and my original home. Montreal is still my hometown, even if I have been gone for 12+ years. I think about it every single day of my life and all the things I miss about it. I read the Internet news, I try to listen to radio broadcasts on Sirius in French, and I am teaching my daughters to speak French, even though it is at times very tough because I am the only one who makes this effort daily. In some ways, it would make more sense to teach them Spanish but I want them to remember where they come from.
I have this guilt that takes a hold of me sometimes that is frightening. Why do I worry so much about keeping my native tongue alive? Why do I still feel sadness and pain when I think of the Montreal Expos? Why do I miss my friends and family in Quebec to the point that I feel guilty and worry that I will never make it "home" again? My home, after all, is here in the US, as my daughters and my wife all live here. I do consider this home but this is so... different...sometimes I just feel like I don't fit it...(To be continued)
The first event: Major League Baseball's Spring Training started a couple of weeks ago. It made me think of all the years I would look at the Grapefruit League schedule and the roster of the people in camp for the Montreal Expos. It was always fun as you never knew who would emerge as a potential superstar. I did that with a sick pleasure since the early 90s. That's when the whole "yearly fire sale" would take place on the Expos roster...yet they kept on producing emerging superstar after emerging superstar. From Grissom, to Walker, to Pedro, to Vidro, to Vlad, they always found a way to make the team exciting.
The second event: Duke Snider passed away last week. I know real baseball fans know him more as a great player on the Brooklyn/L.A. Dodgers but for me, he was one of the best announcers of all time. I would enjoy listening to him and Dave Van Horne on CFCF 600 Montreal do the play by play. I think about them as the best tandem of Expos announcers in history, although, there is something to be said for Rodger Brulotte and Jacques Doucette but I digress...Anyway Duke, to me, was the voice of the Expos.
The final event: the passport pictures I took were rejected and I need to do them yet again. The last time this happened, I was stuck in this country and not able to go see the last game of the Montreal Expos and the Olympic stadium. My grandmother was also sick then and there was a chance I might never see her alive again(luckily, I got to see her several times before she passed in 2006). I was so sad listening to the radio broadcast in French and English from my home here in the USA.
What does this have to do with sentimentality? I am fiercely loyal and always try to remember where I came from, including my heritage and my original home. Montreal is still my hometown, even if I have been gone for 12+ years. I think about it every single day of my life and all the things I miss about it. I read the Internet news, I try to listen to radio broadcasts on Sirius in French, and I am teaching my daughters to speak French, even though it is at times very tough because I am the only one who makes this effort daily. In some ways, it would make more sense to teach them Spanish but I want them to remember where they come from.
I have this guilt that takes a hold of me sometimes that is frightening. Why do I worry so much about keeping my native tongue alive? Why do I still feel sadness and pain when I think of the Montreal Expos? Why do I miss my friends and family in Quebec to the point that I feel guilty and worry that I will never make it "home" again? My home, after all, is here in the US, as my daughters and my wife all live here. I do consider this home but this is so... different...sometimes I just feel like I don't fit it...(To be continued)
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