After falling for a French exchange student, a writer decides to move to Paris — but finds that his backup plan holds the key to his true calling
by Jim Dodson | illustration by Gerry O’Neill

September may be the ultimate month of change. 

As summer’s lease runs out, the garden fades. The days become noticeably shorter and sometimes even cooler, hinting at autumn on the doorstep. After Labor Day, summer’s farewell gig, the days bring new schedules and an accelerated pace of life.

Just down the street, a dear neighbor’s firstborn is settling into her dorm at Pennsylvania State University. Her mom admits to having tender emotions over this rite of passage.

I know the feeling well. I remember driving my children to their respective universities in Vermont and North Carolina, sharing stories with their mother about their growing up on the way. We marveled that time had passed so quickly. Without question, dropping my kids off at college was a ritual of parting that stirred both pride and emotion.    

On a funnier note, September’s arrival reminds me of my own unexpected journey to East Carolina University half a century ago. On a blazing afternoon, my folks dropped me off at Aycock dorm, now Legacy Hall, with my bicycle, a new window fan and $50 for the university food plan.

Not surprisingly, my mom hugged and kissed me, and wiped away a tiny tear. My dad merely smiled and wished me good luck. He also looked visibly relieved.

“You made the right decision, son,” he said. “I think you’ll really enjoy it here.”  

The previous winter, you see, I fell hard for a beautiful French exchange student at my high school named Francoise Roux. During the last few weeks before she headed home to France, we had a two-week courtship that included long walks and deep conversations about life, love and the future.

I was too nervous to kiss her. Instead, on the last night before she flew away, sitting together by a lake in a park, I played her a traditional French lullaby on my guitar, an ancient song her father sang to her when she was little. During the drive back to her host’s residence, we even discussed the crazy idea that, when I graduated in the spring, I might forego college in America for the time being in favor of finding a newspaper job in France so we could stay together.

As we said goodbye under the porch light, she leaned forward and gave me our first — and last — kiss.  

It was a sweet but improbable dream. Yet, having won Greensboro’s annual O. Henry Writing Award the previous spring — and having consumed far too much Ernest Hemingway for my own good — I decided to skip applying to college and seek a job in Paris. Touting my “major” writing award and one full summer internship at my hometown newspaper, I brazenly applied for a job as a stringer for the International Herald Tribune’s Paris bureau.  

Amazingly, I never heard back from the famous newspaper. 

Come mid-May, still waiting for a reply, I was having lunch with my dad at his favorite deli when he casually wondered why “we” hadn’t yet heard from the four colleges I’d applied to for admission.

“Actually, Dad,” I said, “I didn’t apply to them. I have a better plan in mind.”

I sketched out my grand scheme to spend a year working in Paris, where I would cover important news stories and gain valuable life experience in the City of Lights — the same city Hemingway fell in love with during the last days of World War II. I mentioned that I was waiting for a job offer from the International Herald Tribune.

He listened politely and smiled. At least he didn’t laugh out loud. He was an ad man with a poet’s heart.  

“This wouldn’t have anything to do with a certain pretty French girl named Francoise, would it?”

“Not really,” I said. “Well, a little bit.”

He nodded, evidently understanding. “Unfortunately, you will have to get a draft number this September. And if you get a low number and aren’t in a college somewhere, you might well be drafted. That will break your mother’s heart. How about this idea?”

He suggested that I simply get admitted to a college somewhere — anywhere — until we could see how things panned out with the draft. There were rumors that Nixon might soon end it. Until then, a college deferment would keep me from going to Vietnam.

Reluctantly, I took his advice and applied to several top universities. None had room for me, though UNC-Chapel Hill said I could apply for the spring term. Too late to be of use.

On a lark at the end of May, my buddy Virgil Hudson said he was going down to East Carolina University for an orientation weekend and invited me to tag along. I’d never been east of Raleigh.

On our way into Greenville that beautiful spring afternoon, we passed the Kappa Alpha fraternity house, where a lively keg party was happening on the lawn. I’d never seen more beautiful girls in my life. Young love, as sages warn, is both fickle and fleeting.

“Hey, Virge,” I said, “could you drop me off at the admissions office?” 

The office was about to close, but the kind admissions director allowed me to phone my guidance counselor back home and have my transcripts faxed. I filled out the form and paid the $30 admission fee on the spot.

By some miracle I still can’t fathom, ECU took me in. 

The first thing I did on the September morning before classes got underway was get on my bike and ride due east toward New Bern. As a son of the western hills, I simply wanted to see what this new, green countryside looked like. 

The land was flat as a pancake, and the old highway wound through beautiful farm fields and dense pine forests. A couple of hours later, I stopped at a roadside produce stand to buy a peach and had a nice conversation with an older farming couple who’d been married since the Great Depression.  

I had no idea how far I’d pedaled. “Why, sonny, you only have 10 more miles to New Bern,” the old gent told me with a soft cackle. I got back to my dorm room after dusk — having fallen in a different sort of love.

There was something about this vast, green land with its rich, black soil and friendly people that quietly took hold of my heart. 

My freshman year turned out to be a joy. My professors were terrific, and my new friend and future roommate was a lanky country kid from Watts Crossroads, wherever the hell that was. His name was Hugh Kluttz. 

We are best friends to this day.

Having “gone east and fallen in love,” as my mother liked to tell her chums at church, I became features editor of the school newspaper — artfully named The Fountainhead — where I wrote a silly column that undoubtedly shaped my writing life.

In 2002, upon being named Outstanding Alumni for my books and journalism career, I confessed to an audience of old friends and university bigwigs that “going east and becoming an accidental Pirate turned out to be the smartest move of my young life — one I indirectly owe to a beautiful French exchange student I never saw again.”

Funny how life surprises us. A few years ago, out of the blue, I received a charming email from Francoise Roux, wondering if I was the same “romantic boy who once played me a lullaby on his guitar?”

We’ve exchanged many emails since then, sharing how our lives have gone along since that first and last kiss under the porch light. Francoise is a devoted grandmother and I’m about to become a grandfather for the first time around Christmas. Soon enough, I’ll be playing that old French lullaby to a new baby girl, marveling alongside my daughter and her partner as they embark on their own, uncharted journey. 

This article originally appeared in the September 2025 issue of WALTER magazine.