Otir - A French woman with amazing style

A couple of weeks ago, Neil, of Citizen of the Month's fame, in one of his many strokes of genius, organized The Great Interview Experiment. Neil has many many faithful readers, and this is how this project went: He was going to interview the very first commenter on the post in which he announced this project (V-Grrrl was "it," and you can read her interview by Neil here - you won't regret it!).

For a bit, I thought that I would pass on this one, but I noticed that Otir had joined the pack, and had inquired about the possibility of adding a French cohort to this project. I therefore volunteered to join that cohort. As a result, I was matched by Neil to interview Otir, to whom I sent my questions in French. Otir, however, did choose to respond in English, which was perfectly fine with me.

I do not recall when I began to read Otir's blog, or even how I connected to it - it might very well have been through Neil's blog. I know that I have now been reading her prose for probably about six months, and that I was totally blown away by the quality of her writing (note: her blog is written in French - she is a French expat who lives in the U.S., where she raises her two young sons alone, the oldest is autistic), and by her skillfulness at dealing with difficult topics or issues. I was, thus, delighted, to be the one to have been chosen by Neil to interview her.

I want to thank Neil for having, once more, managed to muster the talents of his internet friends to create such an interesting and fun-filled project. If you want to read more of the interviews that have already stemmed from The Great Interview Experiment, go here.

MY INTERVIEW OF OTIR:

1. From what I was able to discover on your blog, you have been keeping it faithfully for about two years (it seems that you started it bout February, 2006.) What led you to undertake such an adventure? What were you expecting or hoping to get from it? In what measure are you satisfied with it, and in what measure are you disappointed with it?

I started my blog on March 5, 2006 yes. I was starting to be a little tired of posting on dedicated boards (all about autism) and having a community of readers who were not particularly interested in me as a whole person, but only as a mother, a mother of young children or a mother of a child with autism. I was tired of sharing information, information and support to newly involved families, or simply delving constantly on autism with my community of friends also dealing with it.

I also belong to another group online where real life friendships developed. This discussion group allows me to be myself, but it is a discussion group, so a place where everybody brings their own views, stories and exchanges sometimes briskly about what we think on actual topics. This group is a closed community of French-speaking Jews, and sometimes it felt lonely, to be the only one living in the United States and seing things with a bi-cultural point of view (even if some of the members of the group may also have a bi-cultural point of view since they live in Israel and are nearly all French-born Jews).

I wanted a place where I could be myself, totally myself, speak of everything, not only the topics that were identified as the cement for a given group of participants. I had discovered blogs recently, and I was starting to marvel at some, and realized it could well be what I was looking for.

I was hoping to free my expression, to finally share about what is boiling inside me, my intense desire to help everyone change even slightly, and change their point of view, even if it were one inch or one millimeter towards acceptance, and maybe think twice about our human condition, our humanity. I was hoping to be able to recount the numerous experiences that I have accumulated through my nearly fifty years of existence now, as someone who has suffered from feeling different, and tried (successfully?) to overcome this feeling, and finally accepted herself for who she is.

I was certainly hoping that this would bring me solace and it has. In a way, this could be what can be somewhat disappointing: blogging has brought me a lot of rewards, but has also created some craving for always more! It is a very addictive activity and I was not looking for another addictive behavior in my life.

As for the hope that it would free me, it has yet to do it, that is probably why I am going to go on blogging. There is always more to share and more interested readers to touch. One day at a time.

2. Why, although you now live permanently in the United States, did you decide to blog in French?

Blogging in French was an easy decision: I started to use the Internet mostly to use the French language, which I was not using in my everyday life at all. Even my children don't speak French with me. Their father left us when they were too young to have mastered the language as a conversation tool, and it probably meant conflict more than anything else. Besides, my elder son does not speak per se. He could not care less using French, English or Ouzbek if asked to do so, because he does not have any conversation anyway.

Since I started blogging with the primary intention to allow myself to pour out my thoughts, I could not imagine doing so in English. To me, language modifies the way we think. I don't think the same in English, nor do I in French, or in any other language that I may be able to master. My emotions and my energy are in French. Writing in English would have certainly allowed my blog to touch more readers than it does now, since it is in French. But I like it this way, because through the course of my months of blogging, I realized that I had more to change in the French way of looking at things (from my point of view) than the contrary.

And my desire to influence English speakers on how the French way of thinking can improve their own understanding of the world, well, I still do it: in real life through my daily activities. I have remained very French, as my friends like to say, and they seem to be fascinated when I retell them (in English) the many ways the French culture has to be a great tool to analyze the world and see nuances that their pragmatic and explicit language does not always allow to sense.

3. Since I have just asked a question about language, are you conscious of the superior quality of your writing? Everytime I read your blog, I am absolutely blown away by your style, the fluidity and the poetic nature or your prose, your choice of words, your syntax – everything, indeed, makes me envious of the way you are able to write. If your answer to my question is “yes” (again the question is: “are you aware of the superior quality of your writing?" Please, answer honestly, no false modesty!), when and how did you become aware of it?

Well, well, well, Elisabeth ! How can I not blush at this question. Blush with pleasure and pride. And to be as honest as the medium can allow it, yes, I am aware, but at the same time I am a little ashamed as if having a gift (because it is a gift for me to have fluency in writing as you are describing it) was not something I truly deserved. I haven't gone to classes, I haven't studied writing, I haven't particularly worked on it and it comes quite naturally, I'd say. So I sometimes feel like a fraud.

I was not always aware of it. Although I have always had good grades in school and in college too, I never went into literature courses, and never tried to publish anything. I haven't been writing a lot since I was 12, but hid my writings most of the time, because I hated them. It was like if they were betraying me before I had even shown them to any reader. I lacked self-confidence beyond reason. I had been slapped on the wrist so many times for trying to go in the light, mostly because some close family members wanted or needed the light for themselves, and the highly dysfunctional balance that was necessary for us all to survive required me to be the ugly duckling – a role that I played for the sake of everyone. My mother wanted to do everything that her daughter was doing, so she tried to write a book even before I had a chance to do so myself. I felt that if I were to become an author myself before she did, it would be not only disrespectful, but hurtful and dangerous, so I ignored my talents as much as I could.

The Internet and starting a website has allowed me to reclaim my writing with pride. Now that I am a blogger, I realize that I can write. Maybe I will. I wish I had been able to know that I was capable earlier, because it would have been a nice venue to have a career in a field that I like, instead of failing at a lot of jobs that were boring me to death after a while. Not even mentioning not making a decent living.

I still have doubts though. It is very hard to obliterate years and years of self-deprecation. And sometimes I feel like I am writing in such a tortured (note: Otir added the French word alambiqué here, in parentheses) way that it is not easy or pleasant to read! And I become very envious of successful bloggers based on popularity criteria rather than talent.

4. You write regularly, and in a very moving but also incredibly lucid way, about the autism of one of your two sons. In fact, I discovered with great interest, while scouring your blog, tons of information on autism, and more specifically on your son’s diagnosis. How do you manage this daily reality, especially since you are raising your children alone?

This is one of the painful aspects of my daily life that I still do not dare bringing into my blog too much. Because it can sound very depressing, and maybe I don't have the humorous way to distance myself enough from the daily burden of raising a child with autism, and raising two children with no other parental support than a meagre monthly child support payment that their father deposits to my bank account, with no other personal involvement.

I also try to chase my resentment away. I feel like I have lots of very negative feelings because of the situation and I know that concentrating on the negative can only bring more of it. I wish I were capable of showing only positive aspects of my dealing with the given situation, but when I wake up in the morning, it takes me a tremendous effort to just go on. My only way to cope is to believe I can cope. So this is basically how I would say I manage. I believe. I believe that my sons are the best thing in this world, I believe that things don't happen randomly, I believe that I have something to improve in me to be able to truly face what is happening every day, even if every day is repeating what I had desperately hoped would not happen the day before, and that I had a chance to truly shine, instead of having to repeat the same tedious and sometimes disgusting tasks that are linked to my son's condition.

I spend a lot of time chasing negative thoughts that come to my mind at an incredible speed each and every day. It is taking a lot of energy. Unfortunately, I am sure this energy could have been used in great projects, and in a wonderful career that I am not able to claim. And I resent that a lot too. But people don't see a bitter person in me, on the contrary they praise my strength and always pleasant mood. I also feel like a fraud, because I cry inside painfully and wish I were telling it more often so that someone would come and take me in his or her arms and console me. Or clean up my room and cook for the kids. Or give me a million dollars, so that I can fix a lot of things in our lives. Then I realize that I can live with the dust and the mess in the house, that the kids like eating their fries and frozen waffles, and don't care about delicious soups, and that money can't buy the incredible love my two boys give me. So I go on for another day and am thankful.

I do have to manage a very high level of anxiety. I chose to do so without any medication. Every day I pray that I made the right choices. To be able to do this, I think I hide a lot more than what I would like to, given my passion for honesty and openness. This can be kind of isolating, but I compensate with the virtual world of blogs.

5. For a little while now, you have been writing posts that deal with the electoral campaing and the primary elections in the United States. Are you frustrated by the fact that you cannot vote in this country, of which, if I am not mistaken, you are not yet a citizen (do you plan on becoming one sometime in the future?) Do you follow French political life? Did you vote in the French presidential and legislative elections last spring?

As a matter of fact, I don't feel frustrated that I can't vote. I am not yet a citizen, you are right, it took me a lot of administrative trouble to only become a legal alien (because my former husband had very nicely tried to ban the three of us from getting our green cards, in a desperate attempt to have us deported as illegal immigrants), and the energy was wasted in it, enough for me to ponder before I decide to become a full American citizen. My younger son really wants to become a citizen, and it would be easier for him if I were one too, but it is not yet decided. Apart from voting, and helping my sons become citizens themselves, I see no reason to do so.

I voted in the French Presidential elections, but I am not allowed to vote in the legislatives, as a US resident (you have to reside in France to do so, same for the coming local elections). I am very passionate at following French politics. I also try to follow Israeli politic life as closely as I do for the American and French ones, although I nearly never discuss it on my blog, because it is a topic than brings only trolls and I have absolutely nobody to convince or educate. I discuss it within my discussion Jewish group and I feel safe and cozy there. Being Jewish is still something that is seen as a political statement when it is absolutely not!

Actually, I'd rather discuss the political issues from a Jewish point of view, if I could dedicate more time to explaining what I mean. Jewish ethics and views on political matters are very interesting. To go back to the current Presidential race, I see it as a wonderful opportunity to change something in America that has slowly gone completely lethargic (Note: Otir used here the expression “to fall into sidération - that term meaning a state in which a being is totally deprived of any emotions and unable to react to anything), and - in my opinion - has to reclaim its energy, optimism and ability to repair a broken world and do good things, instead of losing their souls in a terribly materialistic and selfish pursuit.


This was a delicious experience to be interviewed by you, Elisabeth, thanks for the stimulating questions you asked me. I chose to answer in English directly, because it was limiting me a little, otherwise I may have gone into very very lengthy developments, enough to write five or more chapters of a heavy book. I will certainly use your questions to create new blogposts, and I am sure Neil can also be crowned as the most inspiring blogger of the blogosphere with his ideas and capacities to implement them in such a pleasant way!