Train Ride

October 19th, 2011 0 comments

Yesterday I received a lovely email from Lisa Calloway, through our “Send Us A David Story” link. She’s given me permission to reprint it here.

Back in 1984, I was studying French in Quebec City. I had French roommates, who always had French TV on, the whole evening long. One evening, miraculously, they were out and I had the TV to myself. I watched Barbara Frum interview David French, and I was interested because he was from Newfoundland, as I am, and he wrote plays set in the province.

Just a few weeks later, we had a break from classes at Laval and I headed to Kitchener to visit a cousin. I took the train, and who was my seat mate from Montreal to Toronto, but none other than David French. We chatted most of the trip. I thought it was an amazing coincidence that I had only seen one Barbara Frum interview since I arrived in Quebec some months before, and here was the interviewee, sitting right next to me. It was great to let him know I recognized him.

I only ever encountered him once in my life, but due to the coincidence involved, I thought you might like to know.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *