I poke you.

Well, here I am once again in the bus station. It's only 11:13 and my bus doesn't leave 'till 12:45, but I had to check out of the hostel at 11, so there wasn't much else to do. Besides, the gare d'autocars is much less creepy than the station de métro, so it's got that going for it. I was so happy to have the room at the hostel to myself last night, but much to my annoyance, three girls checked in at about 7 this morning, not caring that I was trying to sleep, talking and laughing, crinkling bags, turning on lights, running hair dryers... I wanted to punch them all. So I'm a bit grumpy for having gotten a small amount of sleep, but I'll try to survive. Why?  Because it's Bruno Day!

That's right, people: in about eight-and-a-half hours from now, little Ashlee is going to be seeing her favorite singer of all time perform after only one year, three months, and nineteen days. Last time I had to wait nearly five years. I truly can't believe how lucky I've been, to be able to come to Québec, to visit schools, to see friends, and just to exist here in this place I've come to love so much. And if I'd never discovered Bruno, none of this would ever have happened. I wouldn't even be studying French without him. I guess it's fitting that I'm seeing him on Thanksgiving, since I am so incredibly, immeasurably grateful for everything he and his music have brought to my life.

Later...

I'm here. Holy crap, guys, I'm here. I am currently sitting in the lobby of la Maison des arts in Drummondville. No one is here but me, but I'm also an hour early since I was afraid of getting here on time, even though I called a taxi. Speaking of which, the driver was very nice. He asked if I was from here, and when I said no, that I was from the U.S., he seemed really surprised, and was like, "Well, your French is very good!" Words cannot express how happy that made me, especially after being so self-conscious recently. He was very nice, and seemed quite amused by the fact that an American loved Bruno Pelletier so much.

7:18 - people are arriving. So far I'm the youngest. My mouth has gone strangely dry. I have also learned that photos are not allowed. Phooey.

7:21 - I feel. So. Young.

Later...

I am now sitting at the Montréal airport, about 45 minutes before my flight to Toronto.  Before I chronicle the events of this morning, I must finish the events of last night!!

So the wonderful Madeleine, my friend and Bruno's webmaster, arrived not long after I posted that last update.  It was my first time meeting her in person after a few years' correspondence by email, so it was really cool!  We talked, mostly about Bruno, while we waited for showtime to approach.  Once it did, we split up to our different doors, as she was sitting on the left side and mine was more towards the right, in the very front.  Upon sitting down, I was immediately amazed by how close I was.  Like, seriously, seriously close.  I wish I could have taken pictures.

At 8pm, the lights went out, illuminated only on the clapboard sitting on a director's chair in the center of the stage.  Then, just like that, Bruno and Guy were there!  Bruno clacked the clapboard and said, "Take One," and the show began with a piano solo from Guy, before Bruno continued with La maison sous les arbres.  I wish I could remember the exact order of the songs, but I don’t.  I know he songs outside of the new album, such as a medley of Over the Rainbow and What a Wonderful World, Coriace, J’ai posé des pierres, La manic, Le temps des cathédrales, Let It Be, The Color Purple, and New York State of Mind.  There might’ve been others, but my memory is like Swiss cheese as you all know.  He did do all of the songs from the new album, though, my favorite being Lovesong, which he sang as an encore.

One of the first few songs he did was La manic, and as y’all know, he has the audience sing with him at certain parts.  The beginning goes, “Si tu savais comme on s’ennuie à la Manic / Tu m’écrirais bien plus souvent à la Manicouagan,” and has the audience sing the last part three words.  The audience knows it’s coming, so people rarely have any difficulty, especially since everyone knows the song.  Then, at the end, he repeats the line, except the line “à la Manicouagan” goes up on the last syllable.  And though everyone knows it’s coming, people often have difficulty jumping so many notes.  So when he did it this time, I kid you not, every single person dropped out except for me and one other person sustaining that note, at which point Bruno said something along the lines of “Thanks to the two people who sang that.”  I about died, knowing he heard me.  He might not have known it was me, but it was still cool regardless.  The woman next to me seemed to think it was the coolest thing ever that Bruno heard me.  During the intermission when Mad came over to talk to me, I told her that he had been talking about me, and she was like, “Yeah, it was me, too.”  I do think we quite rock.

It went by so quickly.  I checked my watch once during the show just becaue I was afraid of it ending, and an hour had already passed when it only felt like fifteen minutes.  During the intermission, I went out to get a bottle of water, and while I was standing there, a blond woman walked by me to the bar.  I watched her for a moment, my thought process being something along the lines of, “That’s Johanne Blouin.  Is that Johanne?  That’s totally Johanne.  Should I say anything?  No, I’m too scared.”  Johanne Blouin, dear readers, is one of the coaches of Un air de famille and a good fan of Bruno’s.  Though I’d seen her last Sunday at the taping, it seemed to insane to see her there in Drummondville.  Later, when I mentioned it to Madeleine, she confirmed my suspicions and said that yes, it was Johanne.

The second act started off strong with La complainte à mon frère, one of my favorites, a short song that really packs a punch.  For some of the songs Bruno used the recording of the symphonic version, as well as Guy playing on the piano, and he did so for that song, and my God.  The power that man has.  I’ve been to four Bruno shows now—two in October of 2009, one in August of 2013, and now one in November of 2014, and I can honestly say this one was the best in terms of performance.  He and Guy absolutely blew me away.  Everything from the sound, to the props, to the lighting was perfect.

After the show, which ended far too soon, I was greeted with the music of Sarah McLachlan’s song, Fallen, which I love, so I singingly (yes, it’s a word) walked over to where Mad waited off to the side, and together we walked up to the lobby.  She had already told/assured me that Bruno does meet and take photos with fans afterwards.  Most people left, but there was already a small line forming in front of two tables.  She told me that she would wait with me, but that when Bruno came out, she would go off to the side and take pictures since she didn’t intend to take any photos with him and Guy or anything.  Not too long later, maybe 10 minutes max., we heard a woman squeal, at which point Mad pronounced, “He’s here.”  Sure enough, he and Guy rounded the corner a moment later.  Despite my desperate pleading for her to stay in case I fainted, Mad went off to the side, leaving me alone.  I caught her eye at some point and frantically mouthed, “I can’t breeeeathe,” to which she just laughed at me and took a picture.

A couple minutes later, we hear a woman singing, “Un air, un air, un air de famille,” which is the cheesy-yet-cute theme song of aforementioned show.  Johanne appeared in the lobby, grinning as she sang the song, and a bunch of us were like, “Woo!” because we obviously recognized her and thought she was the coolest person ever.  Which she totally is.  She said goodnight to Bruno and everyone and departed.

People took turns talking to Guy and Bruno separately.  The way the line turned out, I got to Guy first while Bruno was talking to someone else.  I managed to sputter, “Vous étiez incroyable,” for which Guy thanked me.  I handed him the booklet of the piano-voix version of Musique et cinéma which Mad had gotten signed by Bruno for a bunch of fans a while back, so I wanted to complete my collection.  Guy signed with an awesome treble cleft, staff, and notes, plus three x’s, which I thought was the coolest thing, and told him so.  I thanked him, and suddenly I was startled by—

“Ashlee!”

Bruno’s proclamation about made me fall over.  It wasn’t an “Ashlee!” of surprise, but more of an “Ashlee! You’ve tweeted me a million times over the past couple weeks saying you’d be here, and now you’re here!”  Seriously, I had honestly been afraid that he wouldn’t recognize and/or remember me, despite my tweets.  Lauren and Kat were certain that he would, but when do I ever listen to them?  Luckily I didn’t take any time to recover at all, and quickly replied with a “Bruno!” in the exact same tone, which he seemed to find amusing.

Obviously exact words are been fuzzy to me, but I sidled over to his table, and he asked me how I was and if I liked the show.  I replied that I was fabulous and that the show had been absolutely incredible.  He signed the picture I had brought that the two of us took together last summer and spelled my name right.

[Let me just take a break to say how big of a deal this is.  There are people I have known for years who cannot spell my name.  Professors, friends, even family members.  My biggest pet peeve is people spelling my name Ashley when I know they know how it’s actually spelled.  There are professors I’ve had for three years who spell my name incorrectly constantly, who reply to my e-mails and, despite the fact that I signed off with my full name, spell it incorrectly.  It feels like such a basic thing for someone to do, to make sure someone’s name is spelled correctly.  It makes me feel like I don’t matter when they’re in such a hurry that they write to me as Ashley when they have had me in very small class sizes repeatedly for three years.  So for Bruno, someone I have only met in person three times before, someone who meets so many people every night after his shows, to not only remember my name but remember that it’s spelled Ashlee meant the world to me.]

Now we continue.  The woman beside me had finished talking to Guy, but Bruno kept talking to me.  Talk about fuzzies.  I had thought it was over, but he kept me there by continuing our conversation.  He asked if I was vacationing in Québec, so I told him that I’d been there for a week for Thanksgiving but was leaving the next day after visiting universities, as I hoped to attend school there, and he mentioned that the weather is a lot colder there, to which I definitely agreed.  I apologized for speaking in English, saying that I should be speaking French, but he replied, “It’s okay, I need to practice my English.” So I said, “Oh.  Well, then I am here for you.”  He thanked me for coming to the show, said he was glad I enjoyed it, and then I stumbled back to Mad—literally stumbled; the woman next to her thought I was going to fall.

I gushed to Mad that he had spelled my name correctly, that he had remembered me, and was all around pretty squealy.  She just laughed at me, which I totally respect.  A little while later, Bruno finally noticed Mad, and was like, “You’re here!” and pointed at her.  Despite her being in the second row and her having been standing there the whole time he hadn’t seen her until that point.

A few minutes later, it was time for pictures.  Mad agreed to take a picture with us with my camera, so I gave it to her and showed her how it operated, and got in line.  What I found funny was that, as soon as Bruno realized Mad was there, he immediately clocked her into her webmaster duties and told people she could help take pictures if necessary, to which she generously obliged.  When it was almost my turn, Bruno was approached by people he clearly knew well, so he was distracted by them and talking to them, which was totally okay.  I knew he wouldn’t leave without making sure everyone got a picture, so I didn’t mind waiting and/or staring.  Then, when it was about to be my turn, a Korean fan around my age approached Guy and asked for a picture and an autograph while Bruno was still taking to the other people.  Then, when they left so other people could talk to Bruno, the aforementioned fan grabbed Bruno for the same thing—autographs and selfies.  Then, finally, it was my turn.

“You want a picture, Ashlee?” Bruno said, or something like it, to which I replied with a “Yes please!”   I even think he said (I think it was him who said it) “Get over here!” and put his arm around me.  Guy was talking to that same fan, so Mad took a picture of just the two of us first.  Then Mad and Bruno called Guy over, so I was sandwiched in between the two of them.  Mad lowered the camera and asked, “Did it work?” I paused and said, “. . . I don’t know.  You tell me,” and Guy said, “That’s supposed to be your job.”  So Mad took another photo (yay for three pictures) and then I thanked Bruno and Guy profusely before stepping away.

But wait!  It’s not over yet!  Madeleine and I hung around so Bruno could come over and talk to her.  Just as he was about to do so, he was approached by the Korean fan for another selfie.  It was cute—she was so incredibly smitten with and star struck by him (not saying I wasn’t), and Bruno clearly wasn’t used to it.  So he came over to Mad and me saying, “Oh, my God, it’s Bruno Pelletier!  I poked Bruno Pelletier!  I poke you!” which I found absolutely hilarious.  I actually reached over and poked him in the arm and said, “Oh, my God!  I poked Bruno Pelletier!”  Teehee.

Bruno said something extremely rapidly in French to Mad, and I have no idea what it was, so we’ll just moved on.  He looked from me to her and said something like, “You’re with Ashlee?  You two are here together?” Mad said she was driving me back to my hotel, so he said, “You’re driving her back to her hotel?  Where are you staying?”  I told him the Comfort Inn.   This exchange went something like this:

Me: “I took a bus in this morning from Montréal.”

Bruno: “Oh, okay.”

Me: “Just for you.”

Bruno: *laugh* “Well, thank you.”

Me: “You’re welcome.”

Bruno then laughed again—I made him laugh oh my gooood—and said he had to go.

Bruno: “I gotta go.” *pokes Mad* “I poke you.” *pokes me* “I poke you.”

I about died.  Bruno poked me, ladies and gentlemen.  We said goodnight, thanked him once more, and we were off.  While we were in the little area between the two main doors and Mad was putting her coat on, we watched Bruno head up a couple of stairs and then remerge a couple seconds later, look around, examine something on the wall, and then look towards the staff members.

Me: “Is Bruno lost?”

Mad: “I think so.”

Me: “Yeah, Bruno’s totally lost.”

A few seconds later, though, he found his way and disappeared.  Before the show, Madeleine had very, very graciously agreed to take me back to my hotel since it would be a forty-minute walk and I didn’t have a way of calling a taxi outside my hotel.  I could have ordered one ahead of time, but I’d had no idea what time we’d be done.  After pointing her in the wrong direction since my iPad confused me, we finally got on the right track toward rue Hains (which we both called rue Hein?).  When we got to the hotel, I thanked her profusely for everything she’d done for me and has done for me in the past, said I was glad to have been able to meet her, and said goodnight.

I’m finishing up this post from the Toronto airport.  But my God, what an incredible evening that was.