PENDLETON —  Although generations may have thrived on the alliteration, the expression “pen pal” given to a by-mail regular and sometimes foreign correspondence may not illustrate the depth of the potential relationship.

The word “pal” can seem superficial or anemic.

Such is the situation of Laura Gauthier, who works for the city of Pendleton Finance Department, and Lydie Chemin, from Randens, France, a village of about 100 in a mountainous area northeast of Grenoble.

When their correspondence began 35 years ago, Chemin lived in Chambéry, just west of Randens.

“I grew up in Hood River and I took French in my junior and senior high school years,” Gauthier said.

She explained her teacher would take the senior class periodically on a tour of France, where Gauthier’s teacher met a local teacher of English.

“They decided to correspond between each of the classes,” Gauthier said. “There was a writing assignment and she was going to pick the best five letters to send to the class over in France, and then we would have five people to receive one of their letters. I happened to be one of those.”

This process had Gauthier paired up with Chemin.

Students exchange letters

“I would send things in English to her and she’d send things in French to me,” Gauthier said.

“I remember her beautiful handwriting on school paper and her envelopes covered with magnificent stamps I have carefully preserved,” Chemin wrote from France about her correspondence with Gauthier. “One day she even sent me a cassette with her favorite songs and a recorded message, other times it was photos of her and her family, of her vacations, of her first car.”

“She just turned 50 in December, and I am 52,” Gauthier said.

The correspondence has been continuous except for a brief period around 2001 when Gauthier moved.

“It was heartbreaking,” Gauthier said. “I thought about her all the time anyway, and when I moved to Pendleton in 2005 we picked up like we never missed a beat.”

“For me, who lived in a very small remote village, she alone represented the great American spaces that I dreamed of discovering, the TV series or American films that I adored,” Chemin wrote. “Life wanted us to lose sight of each other for a few years, but she remained in my heart a bit like an imaginary friend, my dearest friend.”

“We corresponded of what our daily lives were like, or what was going on at the time,” Gauthier said. “When it came to the holidays, which were different between her and me, we had different families and different calendars. They don’t celebrate Mother’s Day until two weeks later than we do. I had to explain about Thanksgiving, and then they have what is called Carnival. But Christmas was easy.”

Gauthier said the life details Chemin shared with her could be anything from her father dying to her getting married to her having two sons.

“With me it was having my dad pass away, and then I had a son, and my career in retail,” Gauthier said. “So they moved me around a lot and I was telling her wherever I was going.”

Husband conspires in meeting

Chemin’s husband, Christophe, conspired with Gauthier for a surprise meeting when the French couple visited New York City over the American Mother’s Day weekend.

“She had no idea this was going on,” Gauthier said.

Finally the news was broken when Gauthier sent her French friend a “this is your life” video in which she announced she would join the couple for their New York visit.

“Her husband said she was bawling,” Gauthier said. “She had thought this was just to be her birthday celebration.”

Gauthier said she made sure to register herself and her son, Silas, at the same hotel where Lydie and Christophe would be staying.

“On May 12 I found myself in a hotel lobby a few blocks from Times Square, waiting for her arrival, feeling both excited and anxious,” Chemin wrote, “because even though we had known each other for a long time, there was the risk we would not get along ‘in real life.'”

“When I arrived, I was just outside the door,” Gauthier said. “I hadn’t even gone into the hotel yet, and she was right there at the door. And we hugged, and hugged and hugged. We were so happy to see each other after corresponding for 35 years.”

“When she entered the hotel, all my fears disappeared and we fell into each other’s arms, crying,” Chemin said. “It was unreal. I can’t describe what I felt. It was a dream come true. My husband and son were spectators, but we were alone in the world.”

Gauthier said it’s a very different experience to meet physically, “because you have emotions, and you’re actually touching somebody. Do you ever have an experience of seeing the years flash by? We were just thinking of all the years that have gone through between us and what we’ve shared, the highs and lows and everything. It’s like being in a bubble.”

NYC tour begins

Gauthier said the tour of Manhattan tour started after that lengthy hug.

“We went everywhere,” she said. “We went on a double-decker bus and there were stops that you could make all over the place. We were taking in all of the ambience and it was just crazy, but it was fun. We were holding hands throughout. We didn’t care. We were just so happy to be together.”

Gauthier said the two families went to see “Back to the Future: The Musical” on Broadway. The 1985 film was the first tool for helping Chemin learn English.

Gauthier said they met the actors and got autographs. The families also visited Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville, Radio City Music Hall, went out to see the Statue of Liberty and other sights.

“We only had so many days,” Gauthier said. “We were trying to hit all the spots we could.”

Gauthier said Chemin commented New York City, is much bigger than Paris.

Gauthier said a lot of time was spent with the two friends going over their history of correspondence.

“You start out thinking you’re just going to communicate, and then you get to know people,” Gauthier said. “You get to know the other person, and they get to know you. You start giving them more information and it’s like you’re growing together.”

The two are more than “just friends.”

“She calls me her foreign sister,” Gauthier said.

She also said she promised Chemin to visit her in France, “but we’re not going to wait another 35 years to see each other.”