{"id":77600,"date":"2025-10-19T06:44:22","date_gmt":"2025-10-19T10:44:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/?p=77600"},"modified":"2026-06-24T10:29:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T14:29:21","slug":"words-of-my-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/les-mots-de-ma-vie\/","title":{"rendered":"Words of my life"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wp-block-group is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Mom<br>This hard-working woman from Gasp\u00e9sie who gave birth to me. She died fairly young in a terrible car crash. By some miracle, my three young kids who were in the car with her came out of it unscathed. In the morgue, I saw her body and had to identify her horribly disfigured face that was once beautiful. At the funeral, an aunt revealed a secret about my mother, and I finally understood why she had lived her whole life with a broken soul. As a young adult, the church and her family forbade her to marry the young Protestant she was passionately in love with. Misery ate away at her heart, troubled her mind and ravaged her body with eczema, which often laid siege to her hands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">DAD<br>This man of a few words, sadder than the autumn. He was crazy in love with my mom, and she didn\u2019t love him back. Every night after dinner, Dad would sit in his large armchair. He\u2019d open the turntable and listen to Mario Lanza sing \u201cO sole mio.\u201d All I have to do is think of Dad and I can see big tears rolling down his cheeks. Mom would yell; Dad would sob. It was a total mystery to me how babies were created.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">writing<br>In my youth, writing quickly became my ultimate consolation. In the small house in Caplan, I\u2019d take a few steps down to the basement, pull on a string and the light would flow. I\u2019d compose small sentences on the back of old calendars Mom kept for us. Words that rhymed with others, a four-line stanza, a short poem. I was discovering beauty and the power of words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">READING<br>My refuge and my greatest hobby! As a young college student, I read profusely about world history and the great classics, including the fantastic mythology of Ancient Greece and anything else that I\u2019d come across that was modern. I craved the poets: Baudelaire, Verlaine and Alfred de Vigny. Later, I devoted myself to recipe books and all the guides that revealed the art of succeeding in business. When I eventually reconnected with reading for the simple pleasure of it, I threw myself into biographies and went back to poetry and novels. I still have the habit of reading only one book at a time, and I never hesitate to drop a mediocre, disappointing or useless volume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WORDS<br>Elaborate words are like human beings, like gold nuggets to string together in lines. When I write, I always try to avoid rambling sentences, absurd adverbs, lazy words or rotten turnips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">COFFEE<br>Whether I\u2019m sitting at my kitchen table, at the office attending a meeting, at the restaurant with friends or lying down on my red couch with a book, you\u2019ll always notice a cup of coffee near me. It\u2019s as certain as the sunrise tomorrow! I take it with milk or cream and no sugar. This latter omission comes from my time as a restaurateur, when I didn\u2019t have time to prepare anything fancy. I savour this exquisite liquid in immoderate measure\u2013 at least six to eight times a day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">SUCCESS<br>My professional life really started with the primal need to survive and feed my kids. If I operated a restaurant, we\u2019d at least have something to eat. Success appeared in 1987, in a small 29-seat diner. I drew a wonderful, smiling sun. \u201cA real logo,\u201d like the wise ones say. A sun that now illuminates more than 125 franchised restaurants across this vast country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">GLASSES<br>I always loved creating my necklaces, bracelets and brooches. I did it because my budget didn\u2019t allow me to buy any, but also because I was creative and had the time to do it. I love dressing up in a lot of extravagant colours and to style my outfit in a single colour, from my socks and shirt to the occasional bandana, a watch and my pants. I dare to wear colour because it keeps me alive. You might even compare my wardrobe to a big set of 24 coloured pencils. I love glasses and I have some in almost every colour; retro frames I have found at flea markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">LOVE<br>The great unknown! I may have caught the eye of a few handsome men, but at 20, life had already broken me. With not a single breath of love between the two spouses, just like my poor mother. Once divorced, I no longer looked for love, but set my sights on success. I never had time for love while I worked to make my sun shine in more and more Canadian cities. Now an old lady, I\u2019m looking for a handsome poet who might recite a few agreeable lines before I fall asleep.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">PROVIDENCE<br>I\u2019ve always believed in \u201chelp from above,\u201d or more specifically, in a divine providence that guides me with a wise, steady and loving hand. Still today, riper than an apple in applesauce, I live, write and constantly try to ennoble each of my lines by offering a prayer and a word of thanks to the Great Manitou.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">AGING<br>Damned aging makes me think of the terrifying boogeyman of my childhood! It can undermine us and hound us through fear. \u201cGETTING OLD IS A REAL PAIN IN THE BUTT,\u201d said the renowned French writer Bernard Pivot, whom I dreamed of meeting. \u201cGetting old is depressing,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s unbearable, it\u2019s painful, it\u2019s horrible, it\u2019s dreadful, it\u2019s deadly! But I preferred \u201ca real pain in the butt\u201d because it\u2019s strong yet it doesn\u2019t sound sad. Aging is a real pain in the butt because we don\u2019t know when it started and we know even less when it will end.\u201d<br>Cora<br>\u2665\ufe0f<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Please send me the text.;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Please send me the text.;<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MomThis hard-working woman from Gasp\u00e9sie who gave birth to me. She died fairly young in a terrible car crash. By some miracle, my three young kids who were in the car with her came out of it unscathed. In the morgue, I saw her body and had to identify her horribly disfigured face that was once beautiful. At the funeral, an aunt revealed a secret about my mother, and I finally understood why she had lived her whole life with a broken soul. As a young adult, the church and her family forbade her to marry the young Protestant she was passionately in love with. Misery ate away at her heart, troubled her mind and ravaged her body with eczema, which often laid siege to her hands. DADThis man of a few words, sadder than the autumn. He was crazy in love with my mom, and she didn\u2019t love him back. Every night after dinner, Dad would sit in his large armchair. He\u2019d open the turntable and listen to Mario Lanza sing \u201cO sole mio.\u201d All I have to do is think of Dad and I can see big tears rolling down his cheeks. Mom would yell; Dad would sob. It was a total mystery to me how babies were created. writingIn my youth, writing quickly became my ultimate consolation. In the small house in Caplan, I\u2019d take a few steps down to the basement, pull on a string and the light would flow. I\u2019d compose small sentences on the back of old calendars Mom kept for us. Words that rhymed with others, a four-line stanza, a short poem. I was discovering beauty and the power of words. READINGMy refuge and my greatest hobby! As a young college student, I read profusely about world history and the great classics, including\u2026<\/p>","protected":false},"author":414,"featured_media":77604,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"Maman, papa, enfants\u2026 Mme Cora pr\u00e9sente les mots qui ont marqu\u00e9 sa vie et les personnes derri\u00e8re chacun d'eux.","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_seopress_news_disabled":"","_seopress_video_disabled":"","_seopress_video":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas_manual":[],"_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable_all":"","_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lettre-mme-cora"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/414"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chezcora.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77600"}],"curies":[{"name":"WP","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}