Posted May 8
Saturday April 9, 2022. Rouyn-Noranda. In a small cafe, before heading back to Val-d’Or. There are no empty tables for Steve, my tour manager, and me. There are two small chairs on the edge of the window, on a shelf facing the street, where a couple in their seventies are having coffee. I tell myself that it is not ideal, but I am not capricious. I sit down next to the woman and smile at her. She looks at me with her delicate eyes that express my astonishment. ” Yes it’s me. Her husband told me he didn’t expect to see me this morning. I told him that I didn’t expect to see him this morning either.
“We don’t bother you anymore. »
“Well, let’s see, you don’t bother me. What is your name ? I ask them.
Her name is Ginette Ménard. He is Laurent Lessard. They betray the perception that one can have of a frail and slow elderly person. Both give off a sluggishness accelerated by excess energy and good health.
She tells me that she has worked all her life as a telephone operator at the Cégep de l’Abitibi. She loved her job, the young people, being a woman who made more money than her husband.
“It’s true that you made more money than me. And it didn’t bother me, ”exclaims Laurent, with bright blue eyes, following his wife’s remarks.
Laurent, 76, worked 45 years at Laiterie Dallaire, founded in 1932.
“I was making $35 a week, ma’am. »
“How did you live? I ask him, shouting a little too much.
“A pint of milk was 11 cents, bread 18 cents and the rent was $65 a month. »
I felt like I was watching a totally fictional period film. The more I listened and listened to their story, the more I felt like an extension of their life. I became the result of their time and their collective efforts.
Noting their particular joy of existing, I asked them spontaneously: “You must have had a nice retirement? »
“The machine that cleans food and produce had a manufacturing defect. Everything that was made (milk, yogurt, cheese) had been screwed up. We all lost our jobs and I fell into depression. »
I did not know that the men of his time could assume the word “depression”.
“I can’t invent any other words. I was down. I didn’t tell the others. I wasn’t ashamed, but I didn’t want to talk about it specifically. »
I saw Ginette’s eyes light up. As if it was his cue. His spotlight turned on, she advanced towards the front of the stage with a shaky confidence, but rehearsed, she grabbed her microphone very slowly and it was her moment.
“I got him out of there. I couldn’t stand seeing him on the sofa waiting for life to pass. I told him: swarm or rust. You’re coming with me to my line dancing lessons! »
Laurent begins to laugh, looks at his wife tenderly, takes her hand, kisses her and looks at me sincerely, saying to me: “Line dancing got me out of depression. Me, I hated dancing, but there were women, I was happy. »
And I confirm that he always was. These two humans gave Steve and me the pleasure of talking to each other for almost an hour and a half. We wanted to know everything. Their children, their grandchildren, health, the difference between generations, love, sex, everything I would have asked of a ghost from another era.
I felt the privilege I had of being able to listen to stories, real ones, which took place a few years before my existence. It touched me. I felt that taking time with them would give me energy to move forward in my own world.
“Are you in a residence for the elderly? I asked them without tact, without shame.
It was Laurent who took the lead.
“No, even if we failed. One day, a friend told us that she won a weekend in a residence. Like the lottery. Instead of earning money, she won a stay in a CHSLD. She gave it to us. We didn’t jump on it, but we wanted to know what it was. We liked it 15 minutes later, we thought we were still good together, alone. »
The generosity of these anecdotes left me moved. I thought it was nice of them to take the time to dissect their past, their failures, their joys. I was really touched.
Before leaving them, I asked them if I could take a photo with them to publish it. To show people who my new friends from Rouyn are.
“I’d rather send you a picture of us at 50.” That’s where I would have stopped everything in my physical transformation,” Ginette told me with a little shyness, but a lot of confidence.
I can’t contradict her or convince her. I wouldn’t want to break the fragile trust that I had just created with them.
We gave them a hug, thanked them and headed back to Val-d’Or, Steeve and me.
When I think of Laurent and Ginette, I tell myself that aging is the stage that comes after precious memories. We can just slide towards the end thinking that the beginning was majestic.
Thank you, Ginette and Laurent. You have done me a lot of good.