Bretagne

I havent been able to write much this week! Its as I am without a computer here in Britany but as it turns out I find one tucked away in one of the many rooms of this rambling old house and I have snuck in for a little blog-sesh! I am here with an old French friend of my fathers, Marie-Christine, her side of their history I am hearing bit by bit along the way, like today, eating crepes by the sea with cider, before a long walk around the coast. Tales of their youth and India and Ex en Provence in the 70's when they were all young and free. It turns out to be a complete coincidence that they are here, not 3 hours away from Lynne's in Normandy, and perfectly timed as I wanted to give Lynne some space this week. I go back for the weekend for an annual farm-party, trying to steer clear of the fromage to wear the new dress. I had not expected to turn up in paradise and to be honest i do not know anything about this corner of the world, but a short train ride later and a little drive to the sea and I'm here, in a cosy big family home in a well to do holiday area. By well to do, its the Parisians that I recognise here as the same type who, in their holiday gear, gallavant around the countryside. Its very Palm Beach crowd actually, the sea-side style of stripes and straw and sandshoes is universal, or perhaps it originates here. None the less, I am surrounded by very stable old stone homes which dot a green and calm sea-side, rose bushes and the berry bush adorn the coast along with acorn trees and pine. The sea gives me no gust of salty air and the water smooth and lakey, unlike our oceans at home. The horizon is flat and dosent jiggle around uneven and choppy, and the sand is well behaved, if not sand then soft and granite coloured stones. Big skies and a temperate climate, all very agreeable and easy. Stony islands with isolated watch-towers and coast-side towns still very much boasting all the European refinement they do so well, these coasts are much more tame than mine! We have just watched an amazing flourescent sky descend behind the town and sillhouette the trees to that black shaddow known so well by the Romantic painters. It has been wonderful to re-connect with another lady-from-the-past and gather peices of myself as a child from her, details of my and dad's trip here in '98, and to get another perspetive on France and her people. We spent yesterday laying in the garden catching up, peeling hundreds of apples and sucking on fresh-picked figs, ready for a crumble. Anna, MC's daughter is bubbly and generous company and in between her juggling her three sandy and handsome children I gather more of their tale in the life of dad, and of their tale between here and Australia and a few of the pieces in between. Its been a lovely sea-side holiday of cooking and playing with children and walking coast-side! And I have just been called for dinner of local seafood so I must be off. We all wait in anticipation for news of my new neice/nephew and by the time I write again we will know!!