Instructors Interviews: How Did You Meet?

Christine and Christian (from Christine's side)

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It all started on November 27th, 1974.  We didn’t know it at that time, and it took us 37 years to realize it, but it was the anniversary of the Miraculous Medal (there must be something with the Miraculous Medal in our family! See Mattie's story). Mary was watching over us.

I was 18 ½.

My Senior Picture

I was just back to France from ten months in Indiana as an exchange student and my only thought was to go back. Sadly, my parents wanted me to be “reasonable” and to start some studies. I wasn’t in the least interested in studying, so I picked what seemed the least boring to me: art.  It was then decided that I would study art in Montpellier, France, where my aunt and uncle were willing to host me.

I moved in with them, in their basement, at the end of the Summer…
Time flew and it was already the end of November.

Wednesday morning November 27^th.
We had Wednesdays off, so I got up later that morning. For a reason I do not remember, I went upstairs and found myself face to face with my aunt. She started lecturing me about studying art without even visiting the city’s museums and art exhibitions. She knew there was a beautiful tapestry exhibition downtown and thought I should at least go and see it.

I understood she wanted me out, so I got on the bus and headed downtown.

I think I started by visiting a museum. I hate museums; I find them boring most of the time, and exhausting…  so I do not remember anything about it. I was just killing time. Then I decided to visit this tapestry exhibition my aunt had talked about. The tapestries were by Marc Saint Saëns (1903-1979). They were exhibited in the Opera’s gallery, Salle Molière, on the right side of the Opera (when you face it).

Montpellier's Opera

Entrance was free! There was no one but the keeper, a young man who was reading the Time Magazine! 

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All my thoughts being geared towards going back to the States, it struck me that he was reading the Time in English! He seemed nice, didn’t know anything about the tapestries, and was just keeping the gallery for the first –and only – time and from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. only. He had had no visitors at all. I was his first and only one! We talked a bit; I looked vaguely at the tapestries that I really didn’t care for!  

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I felt totally comfortable and safe with him, he didn’t look like a play boy at all with his huge thick glasses.

I was about to leave when he asked me if I wanted to come back at 6:00 to go to the university cafeteria with him... I said OK and went on to meet some of my school friends.

-->One of Saint Saëns' tapestries

It was dark already when I arrived back Salle Moliere. I felt a bit awkward, not being sure that he remembered inviting me, but there I was, and he seemed to remember! Together we went to the worst cafeteria in the whole town, but it really didn’t matter. Afterwards, he took me on a walking tour of Montpellier’s narrow medieval streets. I was a bit scared to be by myself in these dark streets with a total stranger, and excited at the same time that this older guy was actually paying attention to me! He walked the whole way holding his dark blue bike on the side. He was wearing a leather jacket that was kind of short for his long arms.  He had a charm about him, a casual and self-confident look that I found very attractive. Finally, he took me to the bus station for me to go back home and asked me what my name was! I told him my name was Christine and he told me he was Chrick, and that he was from Morocco! I remember being puzzled about this last statement, thinking that he didn’t look like a Moroccan! I was so ignorant, not even knowing that Morocco had been a French colony for a long time! 
As I got home, I was pretty excited inside and I remember telling my uncle I had met a really nice 22-year-old guy who would be a really cool big brother. We hadn’t even talked about seeing each other again, but my heart was happy and light! 

I've always wondered who in heaven was behind our meeting... Maybe Christian's mother who had died the previous year? It was so "improbable" that we ever met! Heaven opened up a short 2 hours window and it worked!
Since the first time I heard it when I was 15, this quote from François Mauriac, from the Académie Française, has always struck me, "We deserve all our meetings. They are granted to our destiny and have a meaning each of us must discover."