PS I have a nephew!

I leave the wonderful comforts of Normandy today, and went for a nice early morning stroll to breath the fresh country air before I depart. The fog was lifting off the ground, the sun coming in, the frost on the apples shimmering like decorations and the swallows doing their loops and figure 8's, and I will miss it here.
I have been completely spoiled here, my senses satisfied in ways only the French country side can deliver. Hence, it has been complete in its perfection, a perfect amount of time and balance of weather, of quiet time, forest walks and then social events. I leave in gratitude and pleasure, knowing I have shared with Le Perche all the glorious exchanges of the season and enjoyed all her earthly delights..

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!!

Today, We did get out of the house despite the rain. The weather put a moist and dark mood on the landscape and we just returned from a between-shower stroll through paths, winding between fatcow farm plots, blackberry strewn and droplet sharing acorn trees. Strolling through the graveyard, a heavy sky above, and a dusk silence so deep that when the church bell struck 9 we jumped in our boots.

Visited a charming old retiree couple in their restored French home today, and their visiting children. Drank wine fire-side with the windows streaming rain and discussed Indian politics and the way of the future, then ate a full and varied meal accompanied by wine and cheese and bread and then fruit salad and ice cream and then coffee and then sweets and then a stroll around the house, full bellied! This place has made me consistently full-bellied! Not surprised if i leave twice the size, despite walking each day, how can I refuse all this wonderful fresh produce and crunchy local bread and melty cheeses?!

Oh, my.

Its happened. I dreamed endlessly of homely comfort in India, of having a kitchen of my own to prepare wholesome meals, to prepare tea at whim, to pull vegies from the ground and make a soup! And now i have been sucked into a beautifully scenic and comfortable vortex, my body completely forgetting that in fact, I am traveling and living from a bag, and no I am not at home.

Woke this morning in the light-drenched attic room and read European fables and folk stories for a few hours listening to a morning storm, thunder which rattles with an echo unlike storms of Australia. Lost deep in faerytales I pondered whether i need get up at all? Oh, to get up and prepare fresh figs and raspberries for breakfast while watching the town and reading the news? To have a day spread ahead of me with a few options of Rest, to Write or Draw, to Read, Walk, Stroll, or perhaps spend more time in the kitchen, cooking the produce that appears in a constant stream from friends and gardens, (we now have a whole new over-sized zuchini to deal with). The living space is a cycle of cook, clean, cook, clean, rest, cook, eat, play music, eat, tea, rest, chat away.

I think I have to get on the road so as to not get too cosy here!!

Never Leaving