Before I begin today’s story—Jackie’s story—a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has already ordered a copy of our newly released book. Seeing our mother-daughter stories gathered together in one place, along with your positive feedback, has been such a joy.

With your help launching this colorful series—books teeming with photos and French—we will be able to reach readers who have yet to discover A Year in a French Life.

TODAY’S WORD: le plouf : splash; the “plop” sound of something falling into water

PRONUNCIATION: [ploof] (rhymes with “roof,” but shorter and softer)

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
Et puis — plouf ! — la goutte est tombée. And then — plouf! — the drop fell.

Plouf! By Jacqueline Espinasse

Do you know that in some places in the world—New York City, for example—we don’t say, “Have a good day”? We say, “Stay warm.” That’s exactly what my landlord told me before hanging up, after I’d explained that our apartment was leaking.

Last week, after Vinny left for his two-week shift on the tugboat, je n’ai eu que des emmerdes. It started when I woke up to the sound of water dripping in our bathroom. This old New York City building was crying. One of its pipes had frozen and burst during the snowstorm. My gut told me this would last a few days, so the garbage bin became the official drop-catcher. Ça va faire l’affaire pour l’instant.

Petit à petit, the situation grew scarier. The bedroom wall turned damp, drops started falling from the ceiling, so I moved to the couch to sleep. To keep the floor dry, I positioned cups exactly where the water was landing. Meanwhile, the bathroom leak settled into a steady rhythm—two drops per second, then three. Small bubbles formed along the wall. Some grew as big as a melon! C’est la catastrophe.

Luckily, one of my upstairs neighbors lent me her dehumidifier. She’s in her fifties and has lived in the building for over thirty years. “J’en ai vu des vertes et des pas mûres ici,” she said. I believed her.

The next morning, I dumped all the water I had collected overnight—thirty-five liters. It was so heavy I had to push my makeshift buckets toward the bathtub. On the worst night, the leak became so aggressive that I set alarms on my phone to wake up and empty the containers in shifts. 

Those middle-of-the-night alarms brought back another wake-up—a chilling réveil in Saint-Cyr-sur-Mer. Mom was tapping wildly on my shoulder. It was midnight, and our farmhouse was flooding again.

“Jackie, I need you to get up and help me!” 

I was so groggy, but Mom was in a panic. Dad and Max were away, so it was up to us to jump into action. We used towels, pans—whatever we could get our hands on to empty out all the water running through our house like a river. We were soaked. Our dogs were confused. C’était le déluge ! Mom was nervous it would reach the level of the electric outlets, and then what would happen? We didn’t want to find out!

“J’en ai marre,” I told my mom on the phone, an ocean away from home. She felt sorry for me. The sound of dripping water, she said, was once used as a form of Chinese water torture. No wonder I felt like I was losing my mind in that one-bedroom apartment.

So I decided to step outside to prendre l’air and run some errands. But walking around the city, I began noticing leaks everywhere—in subway stations, on street corners, from the edges of buildings. All I could see and hear were drops, drops, drops. In French, we say “plouf” to imitate the sound of water: “Je vais faire un plouf! Tu viens?” I’m going for a dip. Dad says whenever the weather is good for a swim. 

For a moment, I wish I were back in France and not drowning in gouttelettes!

Vinny made an emergency return from his ship and we harassed the landlord to the point of obnoxiousness. The plumbers showed up on Monday and fixed it in thirty minutes. 

I have to admit, the leak was the main course. The side dishes were the usual life rejections here and there: the start of a cough (le rhume creeping in), a missing moufle that actually ended up on an iron fence (thank you to that person who found my mitten! It’s very New York—strangers acting as a kind of human lost and found).  

Do you want to know the cherry on top of this story? Or as we say in French, la cerise sur le gâteau? Just this morning, after a red-eye home from sunny California, Vinny and I walked into the apartment at five a.m. and realized it was the same temperature inside as outside.

Yes, the heat is en panne.

Sniff.

Plouf!

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FRENCH VOCABULARY

Ça va faire l’affaire pour l’instant = That will do for now

que des emmerdes = nothing but troubles

petit à petit = little by little

la catastrophe = the disaster

J’en ai vu des vertes et des pas mûres ici = I’ve seen all kinds of things here

le réveil = the wake-up

le déluge = the deluge

J’en ai marre = I’ve had enough

prendre l’air = to get some fresh air

le plouf = the splash / the “plop” sound of something falling into water

Je vais faire un plouf ! Tu viens ? = I’m going for a dip! Are you coming?

les gouttelettes = the little droplets

le rhume = a cold

la moufle = the mitten

la cerise sur le gâteau = the cherry on top

en panne = broken / out of order

EDITS WELCOME
If you spot a typo, mistake, or ambiguity, thank you for letting me know at Kristin.espinasse@gmail.com

REMERCIEMENTS
Thank you to the following readers for your donation this past week to this journal!

Mike P.
Susan H.

Whether you’ve been reading for years or just stumbled upon this little corner of France, thank you for being here. These stories continue thanks to reader encouragement. If you’d like to help maintain this journal, here are a few simple ways:

🌿 Zelle – to Kristin.espinasse@gmail.com
🌿 PayPal – Click here
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Gift the book A Year in a French Life to a friend. It’s packed with colorful photos and vocabulary.

Jackie received a shipment of books. I will ask her to visit a local library to see if they will accept a copy. Please wish her luck positioning the book at nearby bookstores.

The covers for both Volume One and Volume Two were chosen by readers and feature scenes from our seaside town.

Marianne wrote: “Of course I ordered the book! I’m looking forward to reading it and viewing the pictures. The price is reasonable, especially with so much color…”

Thank you, Marianne — your encouragement means so much!

Marianne also asked a very good question: where is the clock at the Café de l’Horloge (the Clock Café)? I didn’t notice one either. I’ll be sure to ask when I stop by to drop off a copy for the owner.

Thank you, dear readers, for your reviews, for ordering copies, and for telling your friends about A Year in a French Life.