Memories of school lunches came rushing back to me as I was thinking up what would be the quintessential American snack to share with a bunch of French teenagers. I have been meeting on Saturday mornings at the village library with a gang to play around with English. We sing silly songs, read baby books to each other, act out charades, and laugh at each others drawings for Pictionary. We play like we are in kindergarten. And just like kindergarten the most anticipated activity of the morning is snack time.

For our first snack time I whipped up several peanut butter and strawberry jelly sandwiches. I cut them into fourths because that is how I like them and because there was a good chance that no one would eat them.

Before snack was passed out I pulled apart one of the little quarters —

“Whoah.The jelly is spread with the peanut butter?” 

“Eeewww.

These kids have already acquired a certain snobbishness and disdain for American junk food from media and family.

They reluctantly took their snack, looked at each other, kind of held their noses, and nibbled. The sound of yum went around the group. 

“That’s good.” 

They were surprised by how they liked this often heard of, never tasted, combination. Even the librarian couldn’t resist coming over and trying one.

As they gobbled up everything on the plate we talked about lunch time in an American elementary school. Lunch boxes, leaky thermoses, milk cartons, cafeteria lines, cafeteria food (if you wanted it), sitting with friends and recess.

You have to understand that no one brings their own lunch to school in France. Every day the students sit down to a hot meal. There is a starter (cabbage and tomato salad) They have a meat and a vegetable (veal marinated with mushrooms, broccoli). Followed by bread and cheese (camembert). Then there is a dessert (kiwi). The only thing to drink is water. Lunch is the main meal of the day for the students. When they get home they will have a little snack and then a light dinner. The thought of only having a sandwich for lunch is confusing. I have spoken with students that spent time in the States and they say the hardest part of their experience wasn’t the language, but getting used to quick, cold lunches. They always felt like they were starving - until dinner which left them too full to sleep.

After their big lunch French students do what all children want to do at school, they run out to recess to play.

So even though it’s a bit early on Saturday morning the teenagers and I have our snack and play around with the sound and feel of English. A childish song animates the room with action words and silliness.

It has been fun to see this group be willing to take risk in speaking a language of which they have little or no command. To risk looking foolish and realizing there is nothing wrong with foolish if it is helping you make progress. How the heck else would we have made it through kindergarten? Plus your friends liked it when you made them laugh. They still do.

         

Liberty Leads the People Eugène Delacroix

_______________________________________________

Living in the land of duck and goose fat it would seem perfectly appropriate to say I was on a wild goose chase, but in fact I was on a wild rooster chase because I was chasing Emmanuel Macron, France’s president. Or, as the French would call him, le coq gaulois.

The French like their national symbols. The flag (blue white red), their national anthem La Marseillaise, the moto Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, Bastille Day, the Gallic Rooster and Marianne. 

Now you are asking who is Marianne? Marianne is the personification of France - she represents the values of the Republic: liberty, equality, fraternity and reason. Marianne was created for the French Republic after the French Revolution. She symbolizes opposition to monarchy and is the champion of freedom and democracy against all forms of oppression. Her idealized portrayal as the Goddess of Liberty is displayed in government places and appears on coins and postage stamps. The inspiration for Marianne came from a dramatic painting by Delacroix.  In it Marianne is heroically leading a charge over the barricades of Paris.  Bare-bossomed.  Go figure. 

Stamps are what set me off on this Gallic Rooster chase. Turns out that the only stamp factory in France is here in the suburbs of our closest city, Perigueux. A billion stamps are printed a year. There are four hundred employees, twelve of which are expert engravers.

Reading the Sunday paper I noticed a tiny article saying that President Macron would be in Perigueux on Tuesday. He was making this brief appearance to inaugurate a new stamp featuring Marianne. One is created every five year to correspond with the quinquennat (five year term) of French presidents. This is President Macron’s second Marianne. 

I remember when he was here back in 2018 to inaugurate his first Marianne. On that visit people lined the streets and Macron shook hands and and answered questions from the crowd. 

He was to arrive at 11:50 and leave at around 3:30. So off I went that Tuesday morning on a wild rooster chase trying to see Monsieur le president de la France, Emmanuel Macron. I knew I wouldn’t meet him, I knew I wouldn’t even get close to him, but then one just never knows.. It would be fun to join the crowd of onlookers and maybe see that warm smile of his. Feeling ridiculous and yet hopeful I headed off.

As I neared the neighborhood of the stamp factory there were police everywhere. I nervously rolled down my window to ask a machine-gun armed policeman if one could approach on foot. “Non madame, pas aujourd’hui.”  I drove around the entire industrial area looking to see if there were any other people. Not a person to be seen. Only national police on every corner.

I finally parked a couple of blocks away and braved walking past one corner of police - no one said anything. At the next corner I could just see the main entrance to the stamp factory. Five glaring policemen made it clear that I wasn’t to go any further. I wanted to ask what the plan was, but was afraid of being shooed away. 

President Macron went in, met with the printers and engravers, was presented the original drawing by the artist, then headed off to have lunch with forty local politicos. Live internet coverage (who knew…) showed he left at 3:15. I could have stayed home and seen more of the event. But then there had been that tiny chance….

I never even got a plume feather on my wild rooster chase, but the French postal system got my support when I bought a book of those green stamps. Turns out no one was rushing out to collect them - the woman at the counter had to go out back to get the stamps. No one had asked for the latest Marianne yet.

Oddly, it seems I could be the most patriotic person in France.

         

The most obvious ‘event’ is the simple activity of living in the midst of history.  Everyday we go about our everyday life in a movie set: castles, shopping at village markets and boutiques hidden along Renaissance streets, wine tastings, hikes along ancient pathways, warm baguettes on the corner.

There are annual events noted on the calendar. Garden fairs in spectacular village settings, antiques fairs in city squares, Christmas markets in medieval halls, and spring open house days to visit private gardens, mid-summer open house days to visit private castles.

But the extra spice added to our quiet life are the unexpected and often quirky local events. Here’s a few highlights from 2023:

In early spring we took a chance and attended a “local” opera production. We got a little bit dress up (opera is opera) and headed out with low expectations. We weren’t the only ones dressed up!  Entering the concrete foyer we noted velvet coats and suit jackets, lipstick and silk scarves. Outside the weather was grey and wet, but inside there was a warm, happy buzz in the air. Once the lights went down and spotlights hit the stage we were lost in the land of Traviata. Turns out there is a treasure trove of hidden talent in the area and enough enthusiasm to attract professionals to raise the bar. An unexpected night at the opera that was not at all quirky - except for being in a concrete basketball arena.

In July THE Tour de France came whizzing right smack dab up the center of our small village! This had given us something to talk about for months and now the BIG day was here. We staked out the best viewing place, grabbed memorabilia from free swag tables and hung around for hours in anticipation of the riders. Then things started to happen. Swag trucks whipped through the village throwing out silly toys and snacks. Followed by zooming, honking security. The riders are coming! When the TV helicopters swooped and hovered overhead we knew the peloton was really close. Swish, the riders were sweeping past in a powerful gust of wind —and they were gone. Hours of waiting for seconds of thrill. A good time was had by all  (even those cynics that thought it was pointless to sit around waiting and visiting for all those hours) were caught up by the unexpected and quirky energy surrounding 176 absolutely crazy professional bikers.

Then on a very hot August night there was another opera. This one was in the courtyard of our very own chateau. We reserved tickets (shockingly it was selling out), got a little bit dressed up and walked up through the village. The scene was set up under one of the tallest castle towers in France, swallows swooped over the stage and the audience sat nestled under the sun-kissed walls of the Renaissance chateau. There were four singers and one narrator. The singers were quite good. The narrator kept falling asleep. The magic of the evening was unexpected and the production just as quirky as expected.

As the season changed along with our wardrobes I headed into Perigueux for a fashion show. I’m not kidding. It was an honest to goodness beautifully presented fashion show. Three models sashayed to spunky music, an MC gave details of each outfit and dressed up women in the audience took notes on items that caught their eye. Who knew there were so many chic women hiding in our middle of nowhere. The evening was hot and the boutique doors were open. Light from the shop spilled out onto the sidewalk along with the hip swinging, sashaying music. A little girl drawn in by curiosity appeared in the rays of light, eventually she crept directly in the doorway, then she relaxed and sat down. She was entranced by the scene. I was entranced by this vignette of curiosity leading to bravery. It was a beautiful evening with unexpected glamor and a sweetly quirky childish, twist. (The little girl’s parents were just next door at an outdoor café.)

We were up bright and early the next morning and off to a World Cup Rugby match in Bordeaux - Fiji vs Georgia. We joined forty thousand large, t-shirted rugby fans streaming into the cathedral-like stadium. The stadium was a bonus architectural adventure, but there was more to come - there was the rugby - a first for us. The almost genteel ambiance of the eloquently designed stadium was quite unexpected and the game of rugby is insanely quirky.

The year is wrapping up in a blur of too much fun. I haven’t even mentioned the day trips to Paris to see art and soak up city noise and energy and day trips to Bordeaux for antique fairs, window shopping and wine tastings.

There are still a few weeks left in the year - I’m curious to see what unexpected, quirky events drop into our laps.

         

When we bought this property thirteen years ago this part of the property, about two-thirds the size of a football field, was an abandoned vegetable garden held in by tumbling down walls. The edges of the field were curved up, creating a bowl. At the end of the bowl was a mess of tumbled down sheds and years of emptied wine bottles and oyster shells. Tom couldn’t have been happier with all that mess. Before him was a dream project, a blank canvas. Here was an excuse to ride around on his tractor for hours on end, moving out trailer loads of debris, and scraping and leveling out what would become a flat lawn. On Sundays when you can’t make noise (especially repetitive tractor noise) in France we’d head off to garden fairs. While other shoppers focused on gaudy roses and brightly colored annuals Tom scooped up tiny, weird conifers and every weedy columnar tree available. For quite a bit of time there were a lot of potted trees accumulating out by the studio waiting to be planted.

There were afternoons when Tom got off the tractor seat to go collect hornbeam seedlings from a friend’s forest. Hornbeam seedlings root quickly and as a hedge they are easy to trim and shape. Stepping off the spacing for his envisioned design he planted out these dozens of puny little trees. The first layer on a well prepared canvas. Seemingly overnight a hornbeam wall with a little doorway separated the lawn from the end of the garden.

With the first layers of the canvas brushed on Tom could start to add structure and texture. All those large potted trees started to find their permanent homes. Each tree added its own particular personality and presence to the composition.

The composition was good, it was sweet.

Then somewhere over the last ten years those trees really took off.

It was good that Tom slowed us down on that summer afternoon and said we’d be entering the Hall of Giants. We paid attention, looked up, and realized he wasn’t kidding. Walking through those columnar trees you feel the weight of them, the elegance of them. You feel small under them. They are powerful yet welcoming. Imposing yet graceful, stately and grand. Giants.

Walk through the gateway into the next room and everything changes. In here it is the small that have a large and powerful presence. You have entered the bonsai garden. Visitors go quiet. Friends who have been here before say, “I told you.” Tom glows with the satisfaction that he has created an emotional tableau.

Thank goodness for that blank slate, ten years of vision and hard work, and now the time to enjoy his friends, the welcoming Giants guarding over the magical bonsai garden.

         

At first glance this seemed like an impossible undertaking here in our middle of no where part of France. Some international “ringers” were to be brought in for a few roles but the bulk of the opera is produced and put on by local students and amateurs. Local students and amateurs?  Where were they going to climb out of the woodwork? Schools in France do not offer extra curricular activities like music, chorus, football, chess, etc., so there are not a lot of young classical musicians or singers. The few amateur choruses are spread out all over the region.  However it turns out that there are a lot of talented folks with the courage, the time, and the drive to pull off a major opera production. They just need the opportunity presented to them.

Cholé Meyzie, a music teacher and conductor in nearby Thiviers, is both the instigator of this project and the conductor of the orchestra. Through her national contacts she is able to bring together professionals and advanced amateurs, both on the stage and in the orchestra. 

There is a mix of fifty local musicians. Some are students in the regional Conservatoire. The youngest is 11 years old. His ambition is to play music for fun and to become a doctor. Then there is Nicolas, a clarinetist that is a plumber during the week. His dog Ulk is the mascot dog along with another dog, Gustave, hiding under the chair of a trumpeter.

The seventy member choir directed by Gersende Michel is composed of several vocal ensembles. There are teachers, surgeons (including a former chorist in Paris), and computer geeks. Learning to sing while dancing was hard for this ensemble, but learning the text in Italian was an even bigger challenge. The nine professionals arrived in early March. One of which, 29 year old Mathys, actually lives in the area. He was thrilled to be able to practice and perform and then go home to his own bed.

For this grand production the need didn’t stop at singers and musicians. The costumes were produced at the high school Léonard-de-Vinci in Périgueux. The sets were constructed by apprentice students from Thiviers and Chardeuil. 

All this pulled off with everyone coming together on weekends and school holidays so they could maximize time and decrease travel. The schedule was especially helpful to students that were preparing for their final exams.

Finally the big day arrived. We drove the 40 minutes to the other side of Perigueux where the concert hall The Palio is located. Not at all your beautiful opera house The Palio looks like a modern concrete bunker. You enter in to more concrete and imposing metal staircases. My hopes of an elegant outing were sinking. We entered the “concert” hall (mainly a place for pop music concerts for young wild things), more concrete, stadium style seating and erector set lighting looming overhead. Maybe we would leave at intermission after all….

The lights went out, the orchestra tuned up, the conductor took her place and they were off. Immediately we fell into the magnificence of the music, followed by the energy of the chorus and the strength of the principal singers voices. We really were at the opera! 

The Labopéra Périgord -Dordogne completely succeeded. We spent a magical time in the drama of Italian opera in our middle of nowhere part of France. Here we discovered that there are oh so many people that can come out of the woodwork. We are already looking forward to the next collaborative effort.

         

Thursday mornings I meet up with a group of women that walk. We walk the hills and dales, forest and river banks of our small corner of the Perigord Vert. Each week Sara, our clever leader, plots out a circuit and off we go like spunky puppies. We jabber away, getting ahead, getting behind, stopping every now and then to be sure we are heading in the right direction. Public pathways spiderweb all of France and have done so forever. You could walk from here to any corner of France if you wanted to by following yellow-topped sign posts. Sara doesn’t stick to just the sign posted trails. She has a talent for connecting pathways and country lanes to create her own circuits. Every week is a different walk and yet every now and then we may be crossing where we have been before. Our territory is small, but there’s something new to see, or maybe be seen differently, on every walk.

One day I stopped jabbering enough to notice a bright green badge, the Chemin Harrison Barker, just under one of the yellow markers.

The pilgrimage path of Saint-Jacques-de Compostelle passes through this area, but who is this Harrison Barker and why is there a pathway named for him?

Like so many of my questions about life in the Dordogne the answer soon appeared in the local newspaper, the SudOuest. I found an article about a recently republished book by an Englishman named Edward Harrison Barker. Harrison was accomplished in geography, geology, botany and had a penchant for writing and wandering in south-western France. 

Turns out H. Barker walked right past my house here in Bourdeilles — in 1893.  

His travel journal, titled Two Summers in Guyenne - Journal of a Voyage Along the Dordogne, was originally published in London in 1894.  Long out of print, it was recently rediscovered and republished by local history buffs. What I love about this narrative is that his experiences from 1893 are so similar to the sights and emotions that I experience walking in our amazing Perigord Vert now in 2023. 

Here is a sketch of what Barker has to say in the chapter Perigueux to Riberac. (we are only joining him as far as Bourdeilles)

Leaving behind the city of Perigueux I head up dusty farm roads towards the nearby tiny city of Brantôme. The first views of Brantôme are from above and I am struck by the verdant green river valley where it seems springtime is eternal. It’s as if the little village is charmed by the grace and elegance of its poetic and romantic setting. Following a gentle descent I arrive on the edges of this small city. The road passes along the banks of the Dronne River gurgling under the ancient Abbey and through the medieval village. I take a moment to admire the abbey from the dog-leg bridge, a thing of fantasy with a fanciful turreted Renaissance pavilion at its entry. It feels like Shakespearean characters could appear dressed of old and telling tales of love. Time here has stopped in the 1500’s. Where I am standing has nothing to do with the 19th century. At dinner today I met an eccentric man that showed me his farm of pheasants. Except it is not a proper farm. The pheasants are nesting and wandering in every room of his old and grand house. As the moon rises we go down the road to see the largest and best preserved dolmen I’ve seen in southern France. It’s with a bit of reluctance that the next morning I left the charms of Brantome to head downstream along the valley of the Dronne River. The road passes under the shadows of impressive rock cliffs carved out by the river. Suddenly there in the distance appears a massive, dark tower. Here is the village of Bourdeilles. One of the best examples of feudalism in the Perigord as well as one of the most picturesque because of the strong contrast of the somber tower to the cool, peaceful beauty of the green valley below. There is an elegant promenade lined with shade trees where villagers can walk and visit. The formalness seems a bit strange as the village has clearly seen better days and they are down to about 1000 inhabitants and houses are shuttered and empty. I continued down through the village passing past the miller’s houses and over the charming, heavy gothic bridge. I love how many of the bridges in the region have one angular side to decrease resistance during a flood. Continuing down river I can see the defensive towers of the grand house Étourneau. The view on the valley opens up and the fields are filled with the joy and the light of summer. 

This is a dolman.

sunrise on the tower

le manoir d'Étourneau

Now it’s time to head off and take a walk through the beauty of spring being offered up today.

Edward Harrison Barker. Deux étés en Guyenne  Journal de voyage au fil de la Dordogne 1892- 1893.  published by FANLAC

         

A unique local style of slipper, the pantoufle Charentaises was created in our region in the 1600’s. At the time the local economy was predominately agricultural. Farms were small and folks scraped out a simple living. Hamlets were close together so resources could be shared. Nothing was ever allowed to go to waste. The idea for making slippers took off when someone came up with the idea to use off-cuts from military uniforms, the waste from local paper mills, and a locally made felt used as liners for wooden clogs. Everyone wore clogs and these thick fabric inserts were a godsend. Small attic workshops grew into a thriving industry. By the early 1800’s around 20,000 people were employed in making slippers that were shipped out all across France.  With a steady income from dependable jobs, folks had money to build homes and support local businesses. Store keepers built apartments above their thriving shops, factory workers built new housing at the entrances to the villages and the nearby farmers improved their properties. Bourdeilles is a good example of this population and housing boom - the population of Bourdeilles was around 4,000 by the mid-1800’s. Village streets were lively with grocers, butchers, bakeries, bicycle shops, barrel makers, etc. Everyone clomped around in their wooden clogs and everyone had at least two pairs of pantoufle Charatiases, one for for the work day and one for evenings in front of the fireplace.  At the end of those busy days villagers swept up the front stoop and closed up freshly painted shutters.

But time and styles moved on and the lumpy, brown, plaid design of the Charentaises didn’t change a bit. Desperate when folks stopped wearing wooden clogs, creative thinkers added a rubber sole to the felted slippers. For now, the industry held on. The footwear that was so comforting in front of the fireplace was now— thanks to the rubber soles—sturdy enough go outside to collect wood, feed the chickens or pop into the grocery. And more! The iconic slippers were favored in stately homes to reduce the sound of servants’ footsteps. They were reputed to be the preferred shoes of jewelers at their bench, the coarse fabric collecting any gold or gem fragments. 

But stately homes came on hard times and the younger generation didn’t want to be caught dead in Grandpa’s ugly pantoufle Charentaises. Slipper sales dropped to nearly nothing. One by one local factories closed. Young folks moved away, houses were left empty when the grandparents moved out. The shutters along main street stayed closed and unpainted. The street sweeper drank a wee bit too much and disappeared. The population of Bourdeilles dropped to around 500 tired souls. 

However there has always been a few die hard supporters of the homely Charentaises. These stubborn businesses struggled to get away from the image of frumpy and plaid and yet keep the classic style of the slipper —“they are not sad our slippers! They can be happy!” 

In 2005 the governor of the region organized a design competition at the top Paris design schools. One hundred and seventy six snappy pairs of slippers were presented during Paris fashion week followed by a runway show at the Eiffel Tower.  Fashionistas started to take notice. Folks wanted in on the campy, nostalgic, made-in-France heritage. Nowadays brightly colored slippers are lined up right next to the traditional plaid (because Grandpa still wants his low-key, wear all day footwear). In 2006 the local slipper was granted regional protection from the National Industrial Property Institute. It is just the eighth time this prestigious French protection has been awarded. Two other items from the Nouvelle Aquitaine that have been awarded the same regional protection are Limoges porcelain and Aubusson tapestries. Being on the list guarantees that only the slippers made in a fixed geographic area, and to certain standards, can use the name pantoufle Charentaise. The industry is climbing back with about 200 people fabricating slippers in the region. And like Grandpa’s slippers that cling to the essential basics of their heritage, our small villages are coming back into style with younger families. Shutters are once again opening and closing with the rhythm of the day. Struggles with the vagaries of history continue for a small village, but for now there is a lively independent soul trying to take hold.

         

Our narrow, potholed, grungy main street is going to be swept through by Le Tour de France. 

The Tour!

It’s hard to explain my wild enthusiasm for this event normally experienced from my armchair. I am bubbling over with excitement that for an afternoon our elegant and history filled region is going to be the focus of attention of the entire world. I’ve even discovered the count down clock on the official Tour site. Today the start is 173 days 14hours 8 minutes and 10 seconds away.

For years I’ve spent July afternoons watching the Tour on television in the cool comfort of home. I’ve wasted hours cheering for those crazy young men beating themselves up, holding my breath as they scream down insane mountain lanes and hoping they keep their legs pumping as they struggle up even steeper mountain peeks. I dream of visiting the incredibly diverse countryside artistically revealed by the television crews. 

This July 8th I’ll be live in person cheering and partying along the route of stage 8 Libourne - Limoges  201 KM.

It has been thirty three years since the peloton raced up the main street of Bourdeilles. Friends tell me of sitting at their grandmother’s tables impatiently getting through lunch hoping not to miss the big event. These old timers remember hearing cheers, jumping up from the lunch table and running out the front door. The cheering swept up the street, a flash of colors zipped by within arms reach, and swoosh the riders were gone. Folks turned to look at each other on the narrow sidewalk wondering if they had really seen anything  - there was nothing but dust settling. One friend say she thinks she spotted the yellow jersey, maybe.

No one has started to plan yet, but with warmer weather we’ll start to plot how to create some roadside eye-catching thing to draw an extra nanosecond of attention to our impressive medieval chateau and its 40-meter tower perched over the Dronne River. The helicopter and the history announcer will appreciate our help in showing off France.

Our small village anticipation will last for months, but the helicopters and the riders will pass in the blink of an eye. You can be sure that most, well lots, of Bourdeilles 500-some citizens will be looking for the swag and letting go of some big small town cheers.

         

As we seem to do quite often, we’d taken a wrong turn. The country lane was narrow and twisty with no place to turn around. Suddenly I yelped, “look look!” and Tom was looking, but also driving. It seemed we’d more than made a wrong turn, we’d fallen down a rabbit hole and tumbled out into a fantasy realm. You couldn’t miss the imposingly magisterial building spread out before us. Someone with extravagant schemes and dreams had been here before us. 

Back in Bourdeilles a couple of friends told me childhood memories of Sunday drives to picnic on the abandoned yet still decorated grounds of the mystery chateau. They’d race each other up and down the shady pathways and play hide and seek around the feet of the statues in the arches of the grand colonnade. This was the 1960’s and gods and goddess still stood proudly on their pedestals.

A year or two later I visited the abandoned property. We could only press our faces up against the broken window panes to glimpse blue tiles covering walls two stories high. Streaks of sunshine passed through enormous doorways that led into grand rooms we could not see. The dilapidated chateau looked like a stack of legos that would collapse if you sneezed. One could no longer play hide and seek along the grand colonnade, the statues had all disappeared.

Soon after that visit I started seeing articles in the local newspaper. A group of local citizens had taken on the gargantuan project of restoring the place. I guess impossible dreams are contagious. 

But, let’s start over. 

This sweep of land has been occupied by some sort of home since the early 1500’s. In 1892 the original building was torn down and a fanciful, turreted castle was built in the Troubadour style.

In 1924 two brothers bought the property for 80,000 French francs - about $12,000. Having bought the property at a bargain price they proceeded to pour their fortunes into constructing their dream -  to build a modern day Versailles. 

Who were these two ambitious, obsessed young men with such a passion for beautiful things? Having survived a car accident that killed their older brother, the two younger brothers, Raymond and Alphonse, were knitted together for the rest of their lives. Raymond was noted for his eloquent oratory and his writing. Alphonse was a medical student who saw himself as an architect.

Someone suggested that Raymond could make a very good living in politics in the newly prospering Charente region. He followed this advice heading south from his family home in the Loire valley. He was introduced to the humble chateau of La Mercerie and immediately purchased it. He went to “work” in politics and was elected to the National Assembly where he participated  from 1958 - 1978. 

Meanwhile Alphonse quit his medical studies to join his brother in dreaming up ways to improve the chateau. He began designing buildings and over seeing the monumental work. Local stone cutters and artisans were employed full time working right on location. While some workers updated the Troubadour Chateau others were constructing the 220 meter long grand facade. 

Raymond loved traveling and discovering artist and antiques wherever he went. The blue tile “paintings”  are Azulejos commissioned from Portugal. Returning from a trip to Italy he brought back a painter and a sculpture to realize even more of Alphonses’ dreams. They wanted to commission their own masterpieces for their chateau. Original paintings and sculptures completed the impressive centerpiece of the chateau, a replica of The Hall of Mirrors of Versailles.

By 1975 all the monies had run out. All work came to a complete stop. Alphonse died in 1983. Raymond still an honorary parliamentarian died at the age of 85. Having no heirs he decided to leave the property to the daughter of his gardener, but, the young woman died in a car accident. He then tried to give the property to the French government, they declined the offer. He then tried to leave it to the city of Angouleme - they also said no thanks ( but they did take 5,000 books from the library).

In the end everything that could be carried away was auctioned off in 1987. The abandoned property loomed over the valley like a phantom ship until 2011 when the property was bought by the local commune. Work started right away to save the crumbling monster. If only the two brothers could see the love and care being given to their extravagant and impossible dream.

Tom and I drove back over the other day to see what we could see. The chateau is all cleaned up, the walls sturdy and the windows glistening. It turns out the blue tiles are magnificent scenes of ocean storms, bucolic farmyards and romantic interludes. The arches of the grand colonnade are still empty, but it is easy to dream that they too will one day be full of gods and goddesses with children picnicking at their feet.

         

My simple list of basic observations made me think of the phrase “everything I really need to know I learned in kindergarten” - I know that isn’t really the exact quote but this is how it is in my brain.

Instead of being a young kindergartener soaking up life I’m now an old dog learning new tricks. That kindergarten child was playing with a bunch of rambunctious friends. This old timer is standing quietly in lines with well-practiced French folks. My observations have revealed a lot about how to best experience the French culture.

1.  The best foods are where there is a long line. And you always want the best.

2.  You will have to wait patiently for your turn to get the best.

3.  You better look for the end of the line because you will not be allowed to cut in.

4.  Listen to the conversations swirling around you, one day you will realize you are understanding the sing song of the locals.

5.  Observe how folks are dressed and what kind of basket they carry - better than any fashion magazine.

6.  Notice what others are buying and try it too.

7.  Be brave and ask questions about what you don’t know - how to cook something, why that cheese, what goes with that?

8.  People love to help, and they love to laugh at my accent and the simple things I don’t know. 

9.  Folks are generous.

10. Say hello. Say good bye.

11. Once you are at the head of the line you are queen for a moment.

12. Don’t touch things without first asking.

13. You may have to listen to others as they tell their life story before you get served. You cannot rush this.

14. Every vendor is extremely proud of what they have brought to the market. They will take time to explain anything you want to know. No-one standing behind you will say a thing.  They already know the rules.

15. The locals are thinking of you as a kindergartener.

16. LOOK. This was the first word in the first book of the Dick and Jane series.  For getting to the heart of the French culture, it is as important to this old learner as it was to the kid learning the ropes in kindergarten.

        

Going through the catalog of private historical homes to be open during Les Journees de Patrimonies (National open house of historical sights) I noticed that several chateau nearby would be open to the public and were noted for being former vineyards. It was the first time I realized there might be a lot in common with our two local fairytale homes. So we set off in search of a little wine history. We struck gold when we were greeted at each house by owners eager to talk about their family’s history and the rise and fall of regional vineyards. One owner greeted us in his pink trousers and fancy shoes. The other owner met us in his paint splattered cut-off blue jeans shorts and I’m not even sure what shoes.

The first thing to remember is that these are not the old, defensive chateaux of the 16th century One Hyndred Years war.  These chateau were constructed at the same time that the young American colonies were questioning their relationship with England. 

You will remember from last week’s story that these chateau were built on large farming properties that already existed. Estates that had agricultural wealth, but were living with out-dated conveniences. A famine in the north was driving skilled and unskilled labor to the south of France where they would find work on these prosperous southern farms.

Down went the old farms with small windows, smokey fireplaces, steep pitched Perigordine roofs, muddy courtyards, a pigsty attached to the house, and stinky barns sometimes under the house.

There would be a sense of grandeur in the new homes, but the farmers made one thing clear to the architects and builders— everything had to function as a working farm. Everything on the property would function for livestock, machinery, wine production, housing for workers and ostentatious comfort for the landowner. Once the plans were approved, hungry builders would get to work - and earn the food they so desperately needed. These grand estates were up and humming.

There are big gaps in the history of these chateau. Here are some tidbits passed on in the family lore-

Architectural tidbits:

On the Chateau de la Vassaldie the beautiful balustrade is actually there for functionality - fancy gutters diverting rainwater down to two cistern pools at the entrance to the courtyard. Not a drop of water was wasted in this dry region. Water was imperative for livestock, cleaning, and in particular for washing out the barrels used in wine production. There was a separate well for human consumption. The chateaux themselves had modern conveniences, big light filled rooms, well-drawing fireplaces, sweeping staircases that showed off prosperity and power, and mansard roofs that showed their sophisticated Parisian taste.

Stone walls were built to hide green houses and experiments on vines from the other local vineyards. Everyone was looking for an advantage in the best grape for the best wine. 

Household tidbits:

During the tumultuos times of the French Revolution, the wealthy chateuax were subject to the republican rage of the local pesantry. The locals were told to go out and destroy all symbols of Royalty. This included anything that displayed a fleur de lys or a family’s coat of arms. Pigeonniers (Where they kept the pigeons) were targetted as displays of royal-like wealth. The villagers marched out and began their destruction. They managed to pull off and smash the coat of arms that was above the front door. There wasn’t a pigeonnier and the only flour de lys were on the weathervanes* way too high for any local lad. Finally, the owner screwed up the courage to confront the angry mob and offered them a visit to his wine cellar for a drink or two of wine. The locals were a frugal bunch and not used to destroying things so they were easily distracted and gladly accepted the wine and then headed back home. The coat of arms was never replaced because no one has any idea what might have been up there - that blank space is left as evidence of the passing of history.

Several times the house was passed on to the female side of the family. One male owner gambled away the house. It was his sister who said “This is not possible.We are an old family and can’t loose this heritage.” She bought the propriety back from the lawyers and the lineage continued on her side.

In the 1800’s with the wine business booming there was money to modernize the too big, too drafty chateau. Increased wealth allowed for a change in taste and comforts. The already out of date decorative tile was covered up, drafty rooms were covered in dark wood to cozy them up. Fireplaces disappeared behind wooden panels and modern heating was put in.

The current owner’s grandfather died from drinking poisoned well water. He left behind a widow and two children. She did two good things: she raised the children well and she did nothing to the house. When the current owner was born in 1961 there was no water at the house. Water was brought in in 1962.

This reminded him to tell us another story - this house was literally on the road of demarcation between German occupied France and Free France. The Germans commandeered the house - for one day. They were disgusted that the house had no water and no electricity. 

Another of the chateau was bought back after it was taken over by the French government during the French Revolution - the Royalist family had to flee to Germany and when they returned they were made to buy back their property. Many years later the current owner’s grandfather was an engineer and had the great idea to add some wings to the house, a little family chapel and English style gardens. New fangled ideas that changed the character of the house.The current owner slowly replacing windows for an authentic look. 

In the little chapel one old ancestor was laid out for burial, when her grieving son arrived she sat bolt upright scaring the both of them. She had the family promise that the next time she died they would slice an ankle to see if she twitched and she was not to be buried for eight days. She died at 100, fourteen years after her “first death.”

These grand homes would have been full of laughter, intrigue, heartache and love.

Then disaster struck. The phylloxera blight wiped out all the vines. Pretty much over night everything was lost. There was a scramble to convert to other agriculture. The problem is that the local soil was very good for wine production, but the things that made it good for growing grapes made it a poor source of nutrients in wheat or other crops. The nutritional value of our local wheat is 13% less than other regions. Today’s land prices bear this out: a hectare of land here is about 4000 euros. In Brittany you get 15,000 euros. And a hectare in Belgium goes for 50,000 euros. 

All the vinyard machinery was sold off. The barrels, presses, lifts - anything that could be sold in order to pay for new types of equipment. The government offered very little aid to this area. Eventually even the interiors of the houses were sold off. Entire paneled rooms, iron forged stair railings, shutters, garden balustrades, anything that could be pulled off and sold. The idea of selling off your home’s decorations used to make me angry, but now I have better insight into the dire straights these farms found themselves in.

The two chateaux in Bourdeilles were not open to the public. But based on the history of the grapevines their fates would have been similar. There are several other properties in the region that I am just now hearing whispers of. I’ll have to try to visit them on next year’s adventure.

 *A bit more on the weather vanes, called pirouettes is French. They are three meters tall and “carved” out of one metal rod peeled like a banana and the details cut into the tips. When the roof was redone ten years ago the roofer exclaimed he’d never seen such fine metal work - a thing of the past.

        

The Romans were eventually driven out by the Saracens, but many of the good things in life that had bee introduced lingered in the fields and farms of the region.

Jump forward to the 1700’s and this region is sprinkled with the fruits of the days of the Roman occupation. There are large swaths of cultivated land with elegant homes that rival those of Bordeaux and Champagne. Even Bourdeilles has two thriving vineyards.

Here is the story of the rise and fall of these grand properties.

Roughly between 1700 and 1709 the northern regions of France were locked in a mini ice-age. A third of the population of Paris starved to death. Folks that could escape to the south did - on foot. They arrived in these southern parts hungry and desperate. On one hand they had nothing. But in a way they also had everything. They were architects, stone masons, glass blowers, ditch diggers, harness makers, lots of things that were very useful to a prospering farming community.

In the early 18th century the Dordogne was rich in farms, but lacking in sophistication. Rich farmers were still living in homes with conveniences, or lack of them, from the 16th and 17th centuries. The hungry, talented Northerners lined up at their doors and offered whatever skill they could share in exchange for food and a roof. Bartering was not uncommon as this was before the time of salaries. With the farming business booming the local barons took advantage of this talented labor to construct modern homes that would show off their stature. In these hinter lands, great mansions sprung up in styles that were better known in Paris or the Loire Valley. 

These glory days were short lived.

In 1827 the first railway line opened in France. Then a second line was completed in 1832. Both of these lines were well to the east of the vineyards around Bourdeilles and the Dordogne, who were still shipping their wine by oxen carts. Also south eastern wines were preferred for their higher alcohol content. Local wines that had been receiving gold medals quickly fell out of popularity.

And yet things could and did get worse. 

Around 1850 Victorian botanist introduced American grape vines to Europe. These vines were infected with phylloxera - a mildew carried by a tiny louse insect. No problem in the New World as their vines were resistant, but the Old World vines were almost instantly decimated. Some estimates hold that as much as 80% of all European vineyards were destroyed. Our local area was entirely wiped out. Infected plantations were pulled up and burned in an effort to keep the devastation from spreading. These efforts were futile. The large swaths of vineyards turned to barren, rolling countryside.

Eventually two major solutions emerged: grafting cuttings onto resistant rootstock and hybridization - both solutions based on using American rootstock.

The government doled out monies to replant Bordeaux, St Emillion, Bergerac, just up to about 50 kilometers from Bourdeilles. Then the monies ran out. There would be no subsidies for these eastern edges of the Bordeaux region.

Farmers were forced to completely switch their crops. The rolling fields were turned over to corn, wheat, and sunflowers.

The grand houses would quickly loose their luster, but that is the story for next week.

        

To be honest I’ve been asking myself the same question.

There has been plenty going on: traveling to the States, gardening, biking, chauffeuring, helping out a little family. I’ve been keeping busy, but not with the same engagement that keeps me connected to life in our small village.

Re-engaging got a little push the other day when I was asked to help with making sandwiches for the village “vide de grenier” -  literally a day to empty one’s attic. This the French version of a yard sale, but here the entire village is out in the same place on the same day. It’s a very social event. Instead of selling junk from our attic, I was going to help the festival committee that provides coffee, sandwiches and drinks, including beer and, of course, wine.

At 8:30 I was still poking around in my pajamas. I wasn’t too enthusiastic about heading out. Lately a certain cloud of apathy has set in and I just wanted to stay put in my bubble. But, I had said I’d help and I know they are always short-handed. I threw on a happy shirt, laced up comfortable shoes and pointed my feet up the hill. 

The morning sky was beautiful and expansive. The sun glowed around the medieval buildings and the river sparkled under the arched bridge. I was slipping into my French village.

You would have thought nothing was going on in the village. It was so quiet. But as I rounded the churchyard onto the promenade the world was bustling. The food stand was already set up and the gang I was going to work with was already bickering about how to arrange the work tables. I said good morning and stood back to watch how things organize themselves.

Bickering being the building blocks of French volunteer work, things finally started to fall in place. I was assigned to slice open the baguette halves. Work came to a screeching halt when one of the boss ladies noticed that some halves were much longer than others. (Not my fault. I was only slicing them open!) They worried that the difference in size was going to cause trouble later on. We had to stop and sort the long from the short.  And then later sell them all at the same price anyway! I quietly listened and did as I was told. What a joy to realize that unlike years ago I now understood right away what is going on and what is being said. I could feel  the pride rising in my bones.

As things got rolling along I was able to add a few little comments, ask some general questions and answer some uncharacteristically personal questions ( the French feel it is impolite to ask personal questions - this makes it mighty hard to have a conversation - and remain polite)

There was talk of children starting back to school, how the school cafeteria was doing. We talked about how vegetarian meals are being or not being accepted by the students. They explained to me that no student ever brings lunch from home. Even on field trip days the cafeteria has to produce bag lunches for everyone. It’s amazing to hear some of the four course menus the children are offered. Today was the first time I heard that there is a rotation of 10 types of cheeses to cultivate the children's pallets. And on and on we went with womanly gossip about husbands and grand children and aging.

By 2:00 all the sandwiches were sold. The bar was going to stay open but I was worn out. I headed back down the hill feeling tired, but happily mindful how I love making the effort to be a part of this small village. 

        

When we moved to France I quickly noted that stinging nettle is everywhere. But, here it is not just along the roads and riverbanks, it’s in magazine articles, on the shelves at the organic stores, and in my neighbor’s plant gathering baskets.

As an invasive weed it still has a bad reputation. If you weed it comes back even stronger. If you crush it it stings. If you just let it go it takes over. However, here in France there is a lot of positive press about the almost magical virtues stored up in this one powerhouse herb.

Wandering the nearby nettle congested fields you come home with a basket full of nutritious greens loaded with—

Vitamins: A, C, and K

Minerals: calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, and sodium

Fats: linoleum acid, linolenic acid, palmitic acid, stearic acid, and oleic acid.

It’s free for the picking from spring until the end of summer. Some folks have learned the trick of stripping the leaves so they don’t sting. I haven’t mastered that move so I use gloves. Pick the top four to six leaves, wash in a basin of water with a drop or two of vinegar, and use right after picking as the leaves oxidize quickly. You can even plant it in a pot on your patio if you aren’t surrounded by it like we are.

In the kitchen you can cook up pesto, tarts, quiche, bruschetta, tea, caramel, or simply sautéed greens. In nutrition, 200 grams of stinging nettle can replace a steak. There’s a local cheese maker that has a nettle flavored cheese.

You can even chew the leaves raw if you roll them around between your fingers first. Three to four leaves have as much nutrients as an energy bar. Quite the handy snack while taking a hike.

I have read that you should consume nettle in moderation. Seems you can get too much of a good thing.

There’s more! Let’s move out of the kitchen and into the medicine cabinet. Nettles contain histamines. The plants begin to emerge in the springtime, at the same time many allergens are getting blown around. Nature works like that. It is a detox that also facilitates digestion and decreases water retention. It’s an anti-inflammatory that helps reduce arthritis and rheumatism (if you are willing to be stung). You can concoct pastes to strengthen your hair. reduce acne and eczema. Or brew up a detox to perk up your body for summer. The dried leaves make a tasty and healthy tea to keep you tuned up all year long. 

Tucked in the way back corner of their gardens my neighbors all have an atrociously stinking garbage can full of liquid gold. This is a macerating mix of nettle leaves and water. They swear it is the only fertilizer worth using even if you do have to hold your nose to apply it.

In Tom’s current murder mystery the detective looks for patches of stinging nettle to locate the body.

Who knew that something that could make you cry and tingle miserably could be so magically helpful?!

Here are a couple of “recipes” I enjoyed from recent magazine articles:

A Michelin star soup recipe from Philippe Hardy of the restaurant Le Mascaret -

300 g young leaves

1 liter water

1 garlic clove

2 potatoes 

salt

Cook together until the potatoes are soft

Add a nutshell of butter

parsley and mint

blend and adjust seasoning

—-Yep - so simple and yet a Michelin star!

Home brewed fertilizer -

Macerate 500 grams of nettle leaves in 5 liters of water.

Cover and stir every other day.

After 10 days filter the liquid through a sieve. 

Store where the smell doesn’t bother you.

Dilute with 9 times the water when watering plants.

Better than the hairdresser’s goo - 

mix 2 grams of dried nettle in 95 ml of neutral wash

add 15 drops of citrus essential oil 

Mix and store in a sealed container

Use as a rinse for strong, glossy hair

        

God wished to sprinkle some castles around the country of France. He headed out with a heavy sack, taking flight, and, like sowing wheat he tossed out a fist full of castles.

He had already traveled many provinces when he arrived in the Périgord. He shook his weary shoulders and pulled off the enormous rucksack.

One could see that the sack was worn out. There was a gaping hole letting towers, drawbridges, and spiral staircases tumble out. Before starting back up the road to Paradise to refill his rucksack with ramparts and arrowslits the Eternal Father shook out the bottom of his sack onto the rocky outcropping of the rivers Dordogne, Vézère, Dronne and  Auvézère.

He threw out so many that no other country is as rich in fortresses, chateaux and manor homes.*

Here in Bourdeilles we take for granted the everyday fact of living under a medieval castle and a Renaissance palace. But, there are off-limits places that drive us crazy with curiosity. We are tortured by those imposing monsters perched on overhanging outcroppings, the silent rooflines hovering just out of sight at the end of long driveways, or the enormous mysteries that we stumble upon walking in nearby woods.

Soon we’ll be able to scratch that curious itch. The formidable gates of many of the most important properties in our tiny, but mighty, corner of France will be opened to the public during La Fête des Chateaux.  For three weeks we will be welcomed in to marvel at the Dordogne’s impressive architectural heritage. Each property will share its own enticement; superb examples of medieval and Renaissance architecture, secret gardens, an evening of jazz under the stars, tea in the shade of an ancient Cedar of Lebanon, or a visit with local artisans invited to share their contemporary visions of French heritage. 

Forty-eight of those grand properties will be open right here in our tiny conner of the Perigord Vert.** It’s hard to  choose what and when to visit with such a wealth of options. There are castles in ruins, castles in their juice, (the french expression for a property not updated since the 1930’s), castles lived in by generations of the same family, castles lived in because someone had the courage and resources to revive a fading beauty, and castles converted to hotels and restaurants. All forty-eight of these visits are within thirty minutes of my humble abode. (The American size equivalent of the Perigord Vert would be a small county.)

We will not be allowed inside all of these private homes, but just passing through the gate, walking up the long driveway and standing at the foot of the entry steps is awe inspiring. It’s enough just to wander along the balustrades and to stand on that high perch that we have driven under so many times.

The owners are almost always there and might give us a brief tour or they might just be near the exit and give us a warm smile as we stammer words of thanks. How do I know they are the owners? There is just a certain look that us country folk don’t quite match. For the men it’s the shoes, for the women it’s the haircut. They ooze casual, simple grace and perhaps a little bit of wealth. 

This is the sort of off the beaten path adventure that should be on everyone’s travel list. Enjoy this quiet corner of France and for a few days fall under the spell of history stopped and steeped in time. Spend the night in one of the properties! Enjoy dinner in another. We are in the middle of nowhere, but what a magical nowhere.

• *Jean Secret, Le Perigord, chateaux, manors et gentilhommieres, Tallandier 1966
• **the Dordogne is made up of four sub-departments - Perigord Vert, Perigord Blanc, Perigord Noir and Perigord Pourpre (green for the agriculture, white for the stone, black for the truffles and purple for the grapes.)
• photos are from 2021 visits to Chateau de Connezac and Chateau d'Aucors
• chateauxenfete.com

        

I don’t envy these vendors that are faithfully here every Friday all year long. This core group is not big, but they are committed to their role in the life of the Brantome market. Rain or shine, freezing cold temperatures or bitter blowing wind they are ready for customers by eight o’clock and hang on until the stroke of noon.

On these cold, often dreary, mornings they rely on a slow, but steady flow of equally dedicated regular shoppers. This is the season when we take the time to get to know each other. With no line behind me I ask the fromagier about the cheese process, I ask the honey lady how the beehives are surviving the winter, I hear about children, grandchildren and dreams of retirement. Laughter floats on the cold air.

Over the years I’ve worked out a shopping loop based on the weight of the items I will purchase. There is always the chance that things will have to be rearranged if some fragile delicacy unexpectedly shows up- chanterelles, blueberries, walnut cakes. This time of year there isn’t much chance of the unexpected. Maybe in the next week or so I’ll be surprised by asparagus or spring radishes.

Here’s pretty much my routine:

Two fresh trout fit perfectly at the bottom of my basket. Did you know that trout only get as big as the pool they are kept in? I don’t know what size Mr Trout’s pond is, but each trout sold measures almost exactly 30 cm.

The singing tomato man only has onions and garlic for now. He sings for them, too, so I’ll pick some up. 

We’re pretty much sick of kale, cabbage and rutabagas, but if we are going to eat local they’ll have to do for a bit longer. Thank goodness one can buy half of a cabbage and pumpkin can be bought by the slice. A couple of rutabagas will do for the week. All year there are three vendors working at this stand, but for now two of them are just along to help unload and load. They spend the rest of the morning visiting with their Friday friends.

Funny how I never tire of the homemade madeleines  They are little seashell shaped pound cakes. The baker knows I’ll pout if he’s sold out of these gems, but I’ll be willing to substitute a croissant or pain au raisin if I’ve arrived too late. Not missing out on the madeleines is what gets me out of bed early on market day.

Crossing over to the other side of the market I’ll decide if there is enough honey in the cupboard. I’ve tasted the sunflower, locust flower, and forest honeys, but my favorite is the flavor of the wildflower fields, a hint of summer to come. Mrs Honey and I always chat about her two adorable girls. Sometimes during school vacations the girls come along to help and I can keep an eye on their growing up. 

I save a lot of time when there are only one or two people in line to buy homemade dumplings and samosas from Jean Baptist. Summer mornings there will be at least six or seven people patiently waiting to be served. I know he prefers the hustle of a busy morning. Hustle or not he is always smiling and we find little tidbits to talk about while he calmly wraps up my order.

If there is a line at Jean Baptist’s I’ll go first to the stall with my favorite cheese. I hate to confess this, but I usually bypass the goats cheese from over the hill and the goats cheese from up the road in favor of the sheep cheese from I don’t know where. We talk about the herbs they use to flavor the cheese, the age of the cheeses, how many animals they milk, but I have never bothered to ask where the farm is. I’ll have to remember to look at their banner next Friday. 

I always stop for a visit with Kay the Irish potter. We could chatter for hours, but she’s popular and I have to share her with other shoppers that enjoy her and her happy pottery. 

The last stop is the Flower Lady’s stand. There is no better way to brighten a grey day than topping off my shopping with a colorful bouquet or a couple of pots of cheery primroses.  

Tossing my damp hat in the back seat along with my overflowing market basket, my toes and fingers glad for the blast of heat, I thank goodness for my morning out with this dedicated core of vendors.  We cannot take for granted this quintessential image of French life.

        

Here is Victoire’s entry for La vie avec les autres (living with others) from the January chapter-

Listen to the silence of winter. During the month of January we can learn to listen to the respiration of sleeping nature. Listening is a type of meditation, emptying ourselves, letting ourselves be filled with the serenity and the energy indispensable for living with enthusiasm and hope.

I detest noise, the racket of radios and televisions in the building; the often empty babble of the news, loud music in stores and restaurants, even the most “chic”. I do not like that blanketing fog of noise. 

In order to respect others and your neighbors, make the effort to make the least amount of noise possible. Lower the sound of your radio, record player and television. If you love to listen to music like you are at a concert, wear head phones. Do the same for late night television shows. Take your bath at “normal “ hours, remember that the insulation in certain old buildings leaves something to be desired.

On the other hand, pay attention to commonplace noises - to the breath of the household, the lively expressions of your family’s daily life. Savor the murmurs of the city as it wakes up and the sunset in the countryside when the evening bells sound and the cows come home; the swoosh of starlings swirling into the tops of trees to roost; the explosion of energy as school children escape to recess;  the joyful laughter of children at any moment and the crazy laughter of adults at the theatre. I love the cacophony emanating from the orchestra pit as musicians tune up and then burst into a few practice measures; the whisperings of a mountain village: muffled footsteps in the snow, the gurgling of a fountain, the swish of a sled or skies; the first cry of a newborn baby; the clatter of awaited footsteps on the staircase, the familiar creaking of an old door worn out by time; the long and silky murmurs of bicycles passing by…

I especially like silence when I find myself alone. In looking for silence one finds the beauty of life.

These are Victoire’s sounds, but I can envision all of them. They remind me to stop and listen to the small quiet noises, or the big raucous noises, in my life. I know full well that we do not all have the luxury of slowing down to listen to what is surrounding us and that even if we did the noise might be too terrifying to allow in. But I do know that the underlying theme of slowing down, listening to what is there, listing to who is there, will help me find peace within myself and hopefully the strength and courage to work for the peace of others.

At the moment I am living a life of great privilege to choose what I listen to. This is my small prayer for all of the displaced frightened people of the world that are finding it impossible to listen to the terrible things around them. I pray they may find small things to hold onto so as to hold onto their humanity.

A Gentleman in Moscow - by Amor Towles  

beautiful, sweet and provides some insights to Russian history

Another read that I'm mentioning just because I read everything to do with expats exploring France:

Chasing Matisse A Year in France Living My Dream - by James Morgan

a book project to explore where Matisse practiced his art and the author trying to discover himself...

        

The premise was pretty basic, knit hundreds of scarves, stitch them together to make one big shawl, and then hang the shawl from the 11th century bell tower of Brantome. Well, basic in a kind of heroic sense. This was to be a visual display of sharing, hope, and determination. They had no idea how much determination it was going to take. They also had no idea how far flung throughout all of France the desire to participate would spread. But, this was March of 2021 and as the lead organizer said, “Above all we have to believe. We have need of this type of challenge, especially at this moment, to get ourselves out of this covid morass.”

The Telethon was not until the first weekend in December so there was plenty of time to get things done. Or was there? With no exact plan they rolled out the threads for the project one determined step at a time. 

One of the organizers, the director of the local retirement home, knew just where to find a lot of willing knitters. These were folks confined to home. Even if they wanted to they wouldn’t be able to participate in the fundraising walk. But they were more than ready to help out by contributing with their hands.

Now those hands needed supplies. This rainbow of joy was going to require a lot of yarn. Six specific colors to match the colors of the Telethon. Yarn and other supplies were going to require money. The organizers doggedly knocked on doors asking for money - it wasn’t until around the first of June that a sponsor was found to pay for the 2880 skeins of colorful wool. Several months lost, but in their determined minds the project was still do-able.

And they were off! The clacking of knitting needles could be heard throughout the region. Word got out to other retirement homes and this crazy idea caught on like wildfire. By early September 90 retirement homes from almost every region of France had contributed scarves. Five hundred seventy-, eighty-, and ninety-year-olds and even one lady of 100 participated. Each product of their labors of joy, sharing and solidarity measured 25 cm wide and 1.5 meters long.

With a tiny office space stacked to it’s limit it was time to find room to spread out so the individual scarves could be stitched together - all 1200 of them! This time the organizers went knocking on doors looking for a work space. Word got around and someone offered the long and empty village hall in St Crepin. It was late October and the knitting changed to stitching.  Day after day they met, sewing all those individual scarves into the one long, long, long shawl.  By early December they had before them one great big colorful mass of scarf.

While that group stitched another one was meeting with the region’s Climbing Rescue Team to coordinate how to get the 150 kilos (about 300 lbs. !) of shawl onto the shoulders of the bell tower. The plan was to roll the knitting onto a spool, attach ropes to the corners, and with the aid of a motorized wench, climbers in the bell tower would pull the shawl up. Voila! What could be more straightforward?

Meticulously rolling up the slithery knitting, three meters wide and sixty meters long, took hours of patience. They were determined there be no snags or hitches for the climbers.

The big day was the Wednesday just before the Saturday Telethon. The operation was set for 8h30.

In an ideal world, that Wednesday morning would be bright and sunny, but as I set off it was drizzling, dark and chilly. I arrived at the appointed hour, but all I saw was a mysterious plastic-wrapped log sitting quietly in the church courtyard and three emergency trucks parked nearby. There was not a person to be seen. I went over to the cafe across the bridge and sat where I could keep an eye on things. At 9:15 there was still no sign of anyone. I was contemplating going home, but I was determined to see how this all spooled out. Finally two women came marching along followed by a gang of men clad in clanking, heavy, red jackets. I overheard a brief “here we go” and the men sprang into action.  The sides of the trucks opened to reveal spools of organized rope and climbing gear. It was now 10:00. The drizzle was turning into steady rain.

Ropes were unspooled, climbers climbed the 120 steps of the bell tower, shouts went back and forth from the ground crew to the tower crew and with the climbers secured in the position ropes began to fly from the high arches of the tower. … it was now 11:00.

The go ahead was given for the ladies to cut the protective plastic off their treasure. What they revealed was amazing. Bright colors glowed in the grayness. Oohs and ahhs escaped from the small crowd that was gathering. The moment had come to dress the bell tower in bright warm colors. A demonstration of how determination and good will can create something bigger than the individual parts. 

Heavy carabiners were attached to one corner of the knitting.  There was yelling and walkie-talkies chirping and the groan of a powerful wench. The shawl and the ropes started ascending. The little crowd let out a happy cheer. But, then there was a catch, a hesitation and everything dropped. The crowd groaned. The long wool shawl puddled at the foot of the bell tower. There was some fiddling with the hooks and ropes, some more yelling back and forth. The wench started up and again the long colorful serpent was slithering it’s way up the side of the bell tower. Everyone was holding their breath. Again without warning the colors melted down and pooled at the foot of the tower. The knitting could not pull up its own weight. To make matters worse the shawl was getting heavier from the steady rain soaking into the wool.

At 12:00 the bells were going to start ringing and anyone up there was going to have to scurry down before that happened. There had to be a way to get this done. It might mean coming up with a compromise, but if that is what it takes that’s what we’ll do. Let’s just get to it. It was 11:45 when the ladies started pulling out scissors.

To decease the weight they had decided to cut the shawl in half, but there was still the problem that the stitching was not strong enough. Word had spread to the nearby shops that things were not going according to plan. The butcher contributed extra strong “thread” used for sausages and someone else offered fine metal wire. Busy hands restitched while the mid-day bells tolled. By now the sun had come out and quite a crowd had gathered to cheer on the workers. This time when the men in the tower lifted the two halves of the shawl they rose up smoothly and fell into place without a hitch.

There were tears and cheers of joy when all of the corners were secured and the gray bell tower was snuggled into an elegant, glorious rainbow of colors and joy. 

The fundraiser was a grand success. Hundreds of people from throughout the region came to Brantome to participate in the walk. They raised 11,000 euros. For a week the shawl gleamed in the bright winter sun. When it was taken down the lovingly made scarves were sent to charitable organizations throughout France. 

What had started as a somewhat hare-brained idea had been pulled off with a few hitches and a lot of determination and love.

        

Yes, you read that correctly— it’s the twenty first century and we still do not have individual addresses. Quaint, but not very efficient or safe.

Until the last couple of years rural France has remained free of street names or house numbers. If you are lucky your house has a long established name otherwise houses are grouped together by sections of the village. Mail and other deliveries are addressed to a neighborhood with descriptive name like The Rocks, The Three Frogs, The School Yard, The Place of the Gravel Pit, the Village, the False Village.  There might be three houses in your address group or twenty.  Currently our address is La Croix St Marc (the Cross of Saint Marc). There are five houses in this grouping, but we don’t know if we are house number one or two or three because there are no house numbers. 

Here’s a tale from 2003, when we first bought a house in the village. We came for visits of a few weeks several times a year. Didier, the mailman, had been carrying an envelope around in his sack for a few days trying to figure out who this envelope with an American postmark belonged to. He finally decided the best thing to do was to drop this American letter off at the home of the only Americans he knew - our friends on the outskirts of town. They then kindly delivered the mail to us. From then on our “address” was “The Other Americans”.

We learned that it is important to stop into town hall, introduce yourself, and describe where you live. Actually, it is even more important to introduce oneself at the bakery where the mail carrier hears about all the important village changes.

About ten years ago Didier had the nerve to retire with a full pension at the mandatory age of 55. Ever since, the mail has been delivered by a revolving door of postal workers. Mail delivery has become a little random. Figuring out where is where and who is who all depends on the perseverance of the latest carrier.

Even though DHL, FedEx, and UPS have been hopelessly hoping street names will become a reality, making their job more efficient, in the end the change will come because it is an issue of safety and security.

There is a terrible story of the day our wonderful baker died. His tractor fell on him. His wife called the rescue squad and gave the location of the house— “the road to Mareuil.” The sirens were heard going up and down, up and down the road. Finally a neighbor that had been helping out up at the scene of the accident went down to the main road to wave the emergency vehicle in the right direction. Because of the lack of a simple street number the emergency crew arrived too late to save him. I’ve been slightly panicked ever since.

Now, police, ambulances and firefighters will be able to use GPS to get to where the emergency is. Welcome to the 21st century!

There have been some bumps in the road to getting street names in place. First the mayor had to get the town through the ridiculous suggestions: Pink School Street, Top Hat Lane, Sister Sue’s Corner. Then there were proposals of people’s names.  One or two were even famous beyond the neighborhood they lived in.

Finally in mid-December a letter arrived in our mailbox stating we were soon to have a new address. 2110 Riverside Drive  (in French: 2110 Routes des Bords de Dronne) Yippee! In big bold letters it said- don’t use it yet as there is still one more vote to be taken…

Not everyone will be happy with their appointed address. There will be howling and reluctance. Folks will ask where does 2930 come from when there are only 4 houses in my lane? (It’s a 911 thing) Who the heck was Pierre de Rockford?  There’s going to be some catch up explaining to do.

Tom can’t wait for the official change day because it means he wont have to wait by the phone all day waiting to give directions for delivery of art materials. I’ll sleep better knowing that if I hear a siren in the night the driver knows just where to go. There are still plenty of other quaint things to life here in our small, kind of backward, village, that we hope don’t change.  But having a calculated address is one time where catching up with the twenty first century is a good thing.

        

I glanced up and saw that this load of lumber was different. Two enormous trunks were sticking out way longer than usual and there was only room for a few trunks tucked around them. I noticed that the butt ends of the overhanging trunks were splashed with red spray paint. Perhaps this was a warning not to tailgate. Watching the big rig navigate the left turn out of the village I realized that the red paint spelled out something. It said, “Notre Dame de Paris.”  These were no ordinary great trunks. These ancient behemoths were bound for glory. Alone on our poorly paved road, I was witness to part of the spectacular effort to restore Notre Dame Cathedral!  In this backwater region Paris always seems so far way. That day day it was here. My angry fist shaking turned into my waving and blowing kisses in hopes that the driver might notice me. Instead he shifted up a gear and headed on down the road to the Delord sawmill, the largest sawmill in the region. I ran home to grab Tom and to follow that truck!

Tom wasn’t home. 

I realized he was back when I heard a curious whooshing sound coming from the driveway. It was the sound of gravel being dumped out of a truck. There between the car and the street was a hill of gravel. Frustrated I almost didn’t tell Tom my story, but I did. As excited as I was to see those big babies he flew into action. Before I could believe it Tom had cleared the gravel and said “Let’s go”.

My insides were all a twitter as we drove a couple of villages over to the sawmill. We’d been here before and knew it is a huge operation, that they are safety conscience and that we couldn’t just wander around. I hopped out of the car and was scanning the lumber yard when a young truck driver asked what I was up to. I explained that we were chasing a truck carrying Notre Dame de Paris tree trunks. He said yep that was his load. But where was it? He said go check in at the office.

The office was warm and beautifully decorated. Not at all what I expected of a lumber operation. An elegant woman appeared and asked how she could help me. In french garbled by adrenaline, I stammered out that I had just seen a truck load of tree trunks and that two of them had said Notre Dame de Paris and that I had to see them. She patiently listened, thought for a moment and said no. The owner was out and no one had the time for this sort of interruption. Tongue tied, I tried my best disappointed pout, but even this didn't get me anywhere.

I thanked the elegant woman for at least hearing me out and sadly headed back up the football field sized parking lot. It’s a working lumber yard, there are a lot of machines running, whining, screeching and yet above all of that I was stopped in my tracks as I heard a wolf call. A piercing two fingers in the mouth whistle. Out of a tiny back office window was the elegant woman waving me back. Let me just tell you the entire adventure was worth it just to know that a tiny, beautiful french woman knew how to wolf whistle. Turns out she is the owner's daughter and has found this whistle a useful skill in a world of men and noise. Honestly it’s about as un-French as, as, well as I don’t know what.

She had taken pity on me and recruited a manager to come out and escort us around the yard. We stood outside the office and he explained some background to the lumber. Where the trunks were coming from, where they would be used, why Delord had them. Finally we headed off across the parking lot to look at some trunks. We walked out to two freshly cut timbers. Their long straight length was like nothing you have ever seen or could imagine without standing right there next to them. Smooth as silk and emanating that wonderful smell of fresh cut wood. Oak wood. Here were two Goliath's destined to restore the greatest cathedral in France. We talked about the heritage of the lumber and what more had to be done. We kept walking and talking the entire length of those timbers. Finally we came to their far end. I turned to look back down the length of them and there on the butt end were those splashes of red. Notre Dame de Paris. The top of the N had been squared off and the bottom of the S had been milled away. Here were my two trees bound for glory.

I can’t imagine that they had unloaded, positioned the logs on the mill and milled the logs that I had only a bit ago seen winding through Bourdeilles. Even with the lost time lost for gravel removal. That no longer mattered. I was caressing, breathing in, sitting on Monsters. These once tiny seedlings are now destined to support the roof of one of the wonders of the world. Notre Dame de Paris.

A note on how these logs will be used in the reconstruction.

The raging fire destroyed the timbers that held up Notre Dame’s roof.  This support system is called The Forest.  To rebuild it, the largest members will require 200 trees like the two we saw at the Delord sawmill.They will measure a straight 15 meters (50 feet). These trees will be at least 150 years old.  Additionally, the rebuilding will require 80 trees that are 20 meters (66 feet!) long.  These trees will be at least 200 years old.  Throughout France the search is on.  So far all of the trees have been donated by the various landowners.   

Im the original plan, two years of drying time would be required before the lumber could be used. A historian stepped up and pointed out that the original construction used logs that were floated down the Seine.  The new strategy is to saturate the lumber with six months under a shower of water.