The postman always rings until you answer the damn door

Sometimes- not often- but sometimes, I am so thankful for the ability to reach into my bag of american accent and toss a few greasy morsels at unsuspecting French solicitors.

My most recent chance came Thursday night, as I was diligently dissecting some scholarly articles on J.R. Tolkien. It was around 18h, and upon returning to the apartment, I had removed any pretense of togetherness or "yes I did leave the comforts of our down comforter today, merci beaucoup."

As one is wont on icy evenings spent reading at home, I was comfortably sporting charcoal gray sweats, 5 sizes too large and tapered at the ankle, creating a billow-at-the-bum-effect, a nearly transparent undershirt that I have owned for approximately 15 years and whose seams are valiantly but unsuccessfully holding on for dear life, a pair of multi-colored knit stockings/slippers fortified with leather padding for the soles, and an old polar fleece the color of a polluted river and covered in magenta-colored terry lint from a recent washing with a new towel.

Thus was I draped when the doorbell to our apartment rang suddenly, yanking me out of my hobbit reverie. Now, the extraordinariness of this event lies in the simple fact that entrance to our apartment building requires a code and a pair of sturdy legs - we live in a 5th floor walk-up - and an audacity to show up uninvited not characteristic of our French friends or neighbors. Rifling through my mental date-book and finding no such previously set visit or date, I sat paralyzed, dumbfounded, and not a little suspicious. Do French kids knock and run like back home? Perhaps somebody rang the wrong door? Was it our guardienne, come to chew me out again for putting cardboard in the recycle bin, even though it's clearly marked as acceptable on the lid?

My internal interrogation was interrupted by another firm ring. I began to wonder if in choosing to ignore the persistent ringer, I wouldn't stir up some unnecessary animosity between myself and the mysterious person now holding office outside my door. And what if it was a well-meaning neighbor, coming to tell us that our arrondissement was being attacked by aliens, or worse yet, firefighters on strike?

Hand-combing my hair out of my face and stifling my paranoia, I made my way to the door and slowly pulled it open. Before me stood a dark-haired, dark-eyed middle-aged man of medium height and build, holding what appeared to be a stack of notebooks. Further staring revealed a yellow rectangle emblazoned across his chest with the familiar logo of La Poste.

"Bonjour," I asserted, pulling my polar tech closed.

"Bonsoir, Madame. Would you be interested in purchasing an annual post office calendar this evening?" he inquired with as much enthusiasm as a lamp.

Regretting not having taken advantage of the peephole, I furrowed my brows and took an indulgent pause, hoping my inappropriate silence would persuade him to abandon his cause. Then a better tactic came to mind and, feigning incomprehension, I opted for the golden fake-out route.

"Excusez-moi," I stuttered with the most exaggerated, obvious American accent I could muster on demand, "Je ne comprends pas."

The postal worker eyed me like I had just belched or scratched my pits and repeated his first sales line slowly and with a lilted enunciation that one uses with toddlers and the hard of hearing.

"Ummmmm," I riposted dully, "Vous vendez?"

"Euh, oui, Madame," he replied, looking sightly bemused.

"Oh... je ne sais pas," I gestured to my empty pockets and continued with the finesse of a sailor, "je ne peux pas."

Not surprisingly, he accepted that pathetic display of verb conjugation and wished me a good evening with a pitying, wan smile.

Why I didn't just politely decline the calendar, you ask? Part of me suspected that by blatantly refusing to donate to the Post Office fund, I would be eternally plaguing our mail with late deliveries, missing packages, customs hassles, and general abuse, similar to the forgotten trash pick-ups that follow a paltry tip to the garbage collectors in the U.S. But another part of me- and I am not proud to admit this- was just being lazy. I'd had a long day and I really didn't want to have to hoola hoop my way through the formalities, the proprieties, the grammatical tricks of justing saying no to a sales pitch, especially in French, and especially the way I was dressed.

Guess I didn't really score one for the 'ricain side, did I?