Arid August

 A field of sunflowers short lived where they turn heads ...

 Lavender flowers lock aroma and flavour into fragrant seeds...

Oange angel trumpets sing above pungent yellow achillea yarrow

Golden light, heat, drought of France create an arid soil ...
which made it easy to lift not a good crop of potatoes.
Tomatoes, kale, carrots, clematis suffered!
Hopeless!  I'm glad that Spring wet weather made planting seeds too tricky!

Where are the flames of June?

Still a few weeks before midsummer,  and, still the woodburner brings warmth and cheerful light to a room indoors.
Rain......  media tells us of inondations in Paris... but equally here across the border... and even my own village the Rivers have risen and flooded roads, tracks, fields, houses, camping sites and more...
The River Anglin rose to a level flooding houses... and across the border, set back from the riverside chalets were awash with river water!  Le Gartempe burst its banks.

PHOTOS LATER

The flurry did not stay

About a week ago, with colder temperatures turning rain into a colder form, there was the first flurry of snow in my garden. I couldn't capture the fact that the large snowflakes were like giant white v shaped wasps coming into land or miniature white geese landing.  My imagination saw that as I stared into the white blur! This part of my rose and lavender had only a day or two before been weeded of grass growing in the wrong place!

Oh Gosh July

No time for The Mad Hatter.  No time. No time. I dally and am late on many things. Time slips by for that is what Time does. Time doesn't wait for Man or Woman.  Time flies so fast one is not aware, even when living in the moment, or forgetting or remembering the future and the past.   It whizzes faster than Light or Sound.  Now past the middle of the year are we, and in a canicule, a heatwave, which I just love at 35C in the shade at 4pm or so, if only I could be by water. But water is a precious commodity and today it has been reinstated without leaks but still there is more plumbing to do before the washing machine can be used.

Now almost midnight, before the passing of the day and night of the first of July it is 25C in my courtyard and indoors here by this hot machine, 28C.  Every now and then I walk in the full moon moonlight in my spacious garden where sweetpeas, roses and lavender bloom in the darkness, where if I was brave I would sleep in the hammock at night!

I am indeed grateful for water, space, air to breathe, gardens, my house, land and village AND THIS MY FRIEND who is helping 'my house' for reasons he has explained!  Why he should return to this sometimes difficult and unreasonable person is a mystery when I have made so many mistakes in life and have been so wretchedly unkind to some people.  Perhaps it shows me faith in humanity.   I have accepted his return despite the fact that he too made mistakes of a volatile nature; been my enemy as well as a friend.  In a way it shows me that perhaps there is forgiveness on each side.  Even so, I have been on guard and am learning not to let that, which is fear, affect me.  Fear must be cast aside. Maybe I have been wrong about many things for which I am sorry! Often I have been right and not praised myself enough.

Fortunately we have been able to turn on the water for showers and baths and have been able to wash up dishes with cold or warm water as one wishes out in the outhouse 

Who would wish to be a plumber with different copper pipes and fittings or different systems? In and out water! Awkward spaces. Soldering and parts that do not work! A lorry load of bits for every eventuality.

Patience is what I keep.   I watch and heed that Time is slipping by, but know I am not in control and do not care.   Summer slips by.  I do what I can. What would REALITY do?  This is THAT!  This is Now and I wait for Future when I can make decisions and choices.  I already know that my home is my chateau and like he says I am the Queen of my Maison and not just the Client!
I if i could Master Time I would be a rich woman!
I am going to take my time to plan this kitchen... behind me and ahead of me is Phase One and Two.
I have not much time for much else. This is my work! 

An evening sky boils

Falling asleep early evening after two glasses of Chardonnay, she raised her head to look west, grabbed a camera, rushed to the higher plain to overview the sky above the river, then cut down to the chateau by the back lanes but was too late to catch the magic.  There by the Chapel, several groups of people, obviously met in friendship, sharing relaxation and pleasure by the light and fire of a glorious setting sun.  Bird song trilled, smoke-laden smells of verdure filled the air between the stone walled maisons.  Spring arrives. She feels released from her prison. She wants it to last!  She has missed so much in her hibernation and recent illness, akin to being in a nunnery cell.  She has missed friendship and nature.

What will the days of the blackbird bring?

‘giorni della merla’ (days of the blackbird).

with thanks to rspb for image

Yesterday, my guest informed me of this story!
In Italy,  the days of the blackbird or 'i giorni della merla' are traditionally the coldest days of the year...29, 30, 31 January, sometimes including February 1st.  Folk-lore says that the colder those days the better Spring weather there will be!  Fascinating to learn something new, if true!
Here are three links for you to read if interested!

‘giorni della merla’ (days of the blackbird).

‘giorni della merla’ (days of the blackbird).

‘giorni della merla’ (days of the blackbird).

‘giorni della merla’ (days of the blackbird).

‘giorni della merla’ (days of the blackbird).

 http://www.italyheritage.com/traditions/january/29-30-31-merla-days.htm

 http://www.italymagazine.com/featured-story/days-blackbird-when-italy-coldest

‘giorni della merla’ (days of the blackbird).

 http://www.swide.com/art-culture/giorni-della-merla-history-of-the-italian-legend-of-the-three-days-of-the-blackbird/2015/01/29

Temperatures

I notice that Blog devices for measuring outdoor temperature are different...
so  e.g. was Preuilly really 8 degrees different from here just a while ago?
Today, my kitchen with no heating is colder than the great outdoors!!!!!!! WHY?
Is it that the stone house phenomenon?...
or that three of the doors link to rooms colder than my salon.. and is therefore reason to have two radiators in that room once I start to 'do up' my kitchen...
I am keeping shutters and curtains closed on the 'barn part of the property' rooms so it is only electric light during the day.  Hat, scarves, thermal underwear have become indoor fashion in the last week but not yet seven upper layers, nor yet the coat.
I am grateful for oak logs...even if I do have to carry them in and ecoem dspondent that the will need stacking again.
I am grateul for my wonderful bed which with four hot water bottles is cosy!
I am keeping buoyant... going for a walk now...to get the grey light!!!!!!!
Addendum:
Have been out for five hours and although the kitchen is still cold the Big Room is 21C (rising to 24C two hours later) and woodburner has been slumbering on three medium sized split logs so 'tis good! Winter fuel essential as is inner fuel. Within the hour of being invited for a walk with three kiddies and three other adults, I'd made:
1. mushroom soup with fish stock... a bit acidic so I melted Valençay cheese in it... nice...
2. mincemeat tart with shop bought sweet shortcrust pastry, jar of ancient supermarket mincemeat, sliced eating apples below strips of pastry to make lattice work... cobbled together like my granny's tarts....   Here it was:

One slice each was more than enough! Very sweet! 

A Full Moon - A Rosie Moon

02.30 ish
I awoke disturbed  ...  I snuggled down beneath the duvets, but unusually these days, I wished for a cup of tea.  Then memory set in!  I told myself that as there was no 'servant for the princess', I COULD get up, get cold, get a cup of tea, get a hot water bottle ... and then I saw the moon ... my Cancerian sign... A full moon with a star / planet nearby. Was it Jupiter planet or star Regulus?   It was quite warm in my courtyard ... about 9C ...
I wanted to sit outside with someone and chat, hold hands!
"Come outside ... it's a lovely moon out 'ere"...
so I took my camera and tried to shoot the moon!
It had a whole circle of light around it, but distant from it.  I've not seen the circle that far away before. Although I have seen full moons with smaller nearer circles. I think the circles are to do with refracted light and ice crystals.  By 5h30am the circle around the moon had decreased to a small halo.

I have a grand niece born a few weeks or months ago... she has been called Rosie Moon.
I don't know whether I will ever see her because her grandmother, who is my sister, stopped seeing me 20 years ago!!!!!!! This may be a celebration of having a grand-niece that I will never know.  I was deprived of being an aunt, likewise my niece and nephew were deprived of knowing me!    Nevertheless, I bought this little French Esprit number, 100% cotton, to send to the new person!  It's aged 9 months so it will fit eventually! When I visited Sri Lanka the moon rabbit was mentioned: it's Asian folklore. 

I was interrupted from my sleep by various thoughts and dreams about love and lovers and my children and grandchild!  Then the need for tea prompted:  the futile words "I miss him". These entered my head. I sobbed for only a few seconds before laughing out aloud!  A speedy recovery! It was an acknowledgement to accept that I DO miss all the lovely things we had together...but not the anger. Maybe Anger was part of the Passion and I didn't know! but no one should have had to listen to what I did.  I chose to stay despite desperation many times to escape from it, knowing not where I could go whilst all my possessions were in his house!  Maybe, being the difficult woman that I am, (isn't everyone difficult?), I pressed some triggers / buttons ... but I know I was not the cause, for I never asked for it and I was not to blame!
My father's anger towards my mother was more than enough in my life and I never expected to see that level of uncontrollable rage again! It was outright mental, emotional, physical abuse to my mother and indirectly very damaging to us kids. At least my dear friend didn't throw all and sundry through the air as did my father. As children, when saucepans came flying through the kitchen, we would scamper up to our rooms.  I would read. We would wait a long time or to the next day before it was time to venture downstairs to see the damage or to know if the storm was over.  One day I had to help collect cacti spines that had been embedded in the carpet...whhooosssh swiped from the window-sill with his wild moon madness!

I am thinking positively.  It is OK to miss someone. It is OK to mourn the loss of love. And indeed all that loss of friendship and support IS what I mourn!  He was a bestest friend.  It's OK to feel that!  It's OK to mourn the loss of Passion and Earthly, bodily functions that occur between people.  By feeling it, maybe it, the emotion deep within me, will heal!  BUT I THINK NOT. I accept it. I accept who I am!
I thought in the course of finding new passion and new friends, male and female, platonic and otherwise, going out into society, being busy with my life, it would decrease and so it has ... but here, alone though never lonely, tucked away in a village space that I love, there is a deep-down-hollow-place.
I am not ashamed to express this publicly.  It is not to shame anyone. I have thought hard and long about that. But I do believe in truth and so I have a vow to tell a truth when questioned or when the situation arises.  I'm not going to cause any level of deception. To avoid REALITY is a lie. It is not even attention seeking. I should really be writing the book ... The first words of the first pages always different, have often recently come to me when I am in the bath or lying horizontal. Then I arise and they disappear... so several starts have been finished! In the past many years I have often wondered why I can think whilst horizontal and then when I arise the words disappear.

LOSS ..... there it is..... in NEON lettering in my dream in March 2010 about 4 to 6 weeks before I bought my house, before he, I suspect, fearing that I was going to leave him, pushed me away first, to save his own fears of being rejected and abandoned, because I suppose that is what he had felt... history had bought us there... to that place in time...
I never ever meant to hurt him with my own anger about the world...
and I never wish to receive such anger ever again in my life! 
I remembered times when living together...times when he would regularly wake in the middle of the morning...   For some years it was because I thrashed about...but after he started to sleep by himself and when he lived solo again, I realised that I had been blamed for something that was not my fault despite the grains of truth.  Yes, I might have disturbed his quietude but as he had a pattern of waking early and still has, then it wasn't only me!

and so ... I REMEMBERED that on a few occasions when I couldn't sleep or we'd got something to talk about he would bring me tea in bed... and we would sit and hold hands together .. and for the first time in over 4 years I was thinking about the togetherness that tea and passion can bring... it was the last thing that really woke me up.
Before that, were other thoughts ... about being a surrogate grandma (rentagranny), about being a grandma that is not there with my own granddaughter, about the lack of communication she gives towards me when I am there though I have tried,  about how I try to support my own children when they don't seem to do what I need them to do to help themselves especially if I've stepped into help them.      So many thoughts... and many a moon madness... but I know that it is purely my struggle to make sense of my life... the past, present and the future, to make sense of who I am and why I need my friends around me and why I want to keep friends with my former lovers who have been truly worthy mentors and the bestest of friends who know me so well!  And yes, I have done my share of mooning over the men I have loved and still love!!!!!!!!!  It's my journey!

Storms

Last night I was thinking how absolutely terrifying for people experiencing,  for example, the Japanese tsunami (I was visualising January 2012) - to be in that wind with the sea and sounds and one's home floating to wherever and destiny disastrous ... knowing the frailty, and preciousness of life, in that very moment, moving towards certain death, dying or surviving, makes all other matters in life irrelevant and inconsequential....

Last night the wind whipped up at the start of the storm. The sheet lightning was not as ferocious as the night before but even so the éclairage was as bright as light from the sun and difficult to look at. I had to pull the shutters tight amidst the rain falling fast and furious.  I returned to bed and a clap of thunder immediately above my house made me swear aloud whilst my horizontal body jumped in the air in some form of death throe, but hey, mercifully, I am still alive.

The night before, the storm was also immediately overhead. Wide awake in fear, telling myself I was safe and secure, I wandered around my house, peeking through shutters, peering at the garden, amazed and overawed by the brightness of the electrical charge, the loudness of the thunder, the sound of the rain, which combined to make a storm of a kind that I have never before witnessed. I had previously disconnected the laptop from a power source.  I don't trust parafoudre sockets.  Then the  electricity was tripped, the lights went out and a huge clap of thunder caused me to scream..... and this from a person who likes thunderstorms! 

This morning all seemed ok in the courtyard though chairs and tables were blown over. But in the garden three fence panels were toppled ... this was on account of several factors:
a) a branch from the neighbour's old apple tree fell but as it was still attached to the trunk it dragged on the fence panel, pushing it over into my garden.
b)  two panels either side came down because the wobbly fence posts were never cemented properly into the ground.
c) In May a friend dug a hole to investigate why the posts were wobbly. The man did not return on two mornings as arranged to correct the poor workmanship.
d) My face and self-esteem were still injured and the ground became dry so we decided to leave the hole and the posts until the Autumn!

So the storm won.  I spent 9 hours collecting and returning my former partner and his tools to do the work, buying and returning extra fence posts which in the end we did not need, helped to dig two large holes, fill with concrete and put the fence panels back level vertically and horizontally.  The installer had not used enough screws,  used nails because he ran out of screws. Three other posts are still wobbly but we ran out of time and energy.  It was unbelievably humid and hot.  The treats were coffee and almond croissant, Salade Niçoise for lunch, afternoon tea and almond croissant (the best in this region are from Yzeures sur Creuse),  a happy me and a happy (I think) neighbour.  It all looks reasonably good again! And now the lawns need mowing!

Three panels down

This WAS the depth of the hole from Jenny Wren fencing company!

Garden Privacy maintained

Deeper holes and more cement for two posts

Don't you wish you were here....

Crossing hours ..... here in France it is almost half past midnight when in UK it is half an hour before midnight. Equally, I am sure, there is a full moon!
The temperature outside is 25C and indoors 26C.
We are in a heatwave. The definition of the French canicule in English is:

A heatwave is a period of intense heat during the summer.  It comes from the Latin 'canicula' meaning little bitch or dog... and so we get dog tired or dogged by the weather.   It usually occurs when the difference in temperatures between day and night is weakened for at least 72 consecutive hours.  The heat accumulates faster than it is discharged by  convection or radiation.  The temperature does not drop below 20 ° C at night, and reaches or exceeds 30 ° C during the day, especially since the phenomenon of a heatwave can lasts several days or weeks.

I remember the canicule in France in 2003.... I'd been to Carcassone and Cahors. The scenery was bizarre as all the trees suffering from drought were drained of the colour green. It was as if I was standing within a sepia photograph.
Personally, I love these temperatures. When it is consistently this hot and hotter I like to wake very early, do jobs, sleep a siesta after a light lunch, wake, do jobs or relax and enjoy the SUMMER.
It's healthy and good for vitamin D. However, one must drink plenty of liquid even if not thirsty, (and I don't mean alcohol) during the day to avoid dehydration and keep out of the intense sun to avoid heatstroke. Wear a hat!
I like to have plenty of showers or baths ... saving water in the bath and topping it up with hot water.  And I am ecologically minded. When there is a drought I pail the water into buckets for the plants!

Temperature Update:  8am 27C indoors 23C courtyard

Deserted Village at 6pm

Sunday hope 8pm

 Today deserted 6pm

Businesses are suffering as a result of the weather.

Good day Sunshine

At last the sun is shining and The Beatles sing whilst nightingales trill sweetly within earshot, as does the hoopoe. Neither can I see!!! I love them all!
Just had a lunch break after a second day for Spring cleaning bed linen, airing all duvets, ironing and making beds.
Today, welcome rays of real warmth, encourage me to throw open shuttered doors which are windows and clean inside and out. Have vacuumed rooms and damp wiped skirting boards where was just an indiscernible layer of dust. Have sorted clothing to sell on ebay (must learn!) and for a vide-grenier or Emmaus.  None of these tasks were on the list for today!! Progress is being made.
Yo, I have a warm glow! What a difference the sun makes! Good day Sunshine! Note the Emmaus acquisition!! Very French!

Yesterday

A storm brew up in the evening

after a chilly morning 

with an afternoon temperature recorded at 31C.

 A tempest so they said

in Bonneuil Matours, 

where two pianists played

Debussy: "La Mer" the third movement being  

The Dialogue of the Wind and the Sea

but still no rain where I live.

All about, the sky was different.

Whichever way one turned

the wind was blowing

fresh and warm.

A newly tumbled dessicated tree stood sadly in a field 

as the storm with thunder and lightning rumbled on its journey 

whilst a moon in its first quarter shone brightly.

Yesterday

Yesterday......
PART ONE
oh George, oh Paul, oh John, oh Ringo, oh The Beatles, oh how I used to weep between screams and smiles of joy, of sentiment, of being on the edge of a cliff of musical, magical, majestical mystery.
PART TWO
Yesterday ....... was a stormy day... in more ways than one.

Yesterday, I sat on a bench under the hands of horse chestnut trees, whilst rain penetrating through leaves dropped drips, one by one, onto my blue-grey rain mac and in my hair, as I sat and studied  lightning across a river valley, watching rain fall against the backdrop of trees. Birds stopped song and flight as rain fell and when the clouds abated, the feathered friends struck up their tunes and were seen to fly from place to place, for it was not yet 9 o'clock in the evening.

Yesterday, I sat under the leaves of conker trees and smelled the damp bark. I leaned against the tree and wished to hug the strength out of it.  I witnessed conkers lying on the ground from last Autumn.  I looked up into the canopy of green and felt protected.  My wistful melancholy whimpered at my soul like a French nightingale with all the joys and happinesses of Spring and Summer but solitariness seethed towards a wonderment about people and existence.

Yesterday, I sat wishing I had my camera, purse and tissues, for I had nothing except my self and what I wore. Then CLOCK. I see before me a Toyota MR2 sports car with a GB number plate... ah ha .. English people are here.  Ah ha, and what is this, as a Porsche Boxster S parks alongside it. "Bonsoir" le monsieur dit a moi. "Bon soir Monsieur" je dit.  "Hello".  He discusses the weather and who they are visiting and asks me something where I reveal a twist in the day but reveal nothing more than the wistfulness of a stormy day.  I ask if he has seen me before, for he is quite friendly! He offers to bring a glass of wine as he clutches his two bottles of red to the place he is going to.  Of course he never arrives. Why would anyone in a thunder storm want to return to a wet bench under trees with two glasses of red in his hand when he is the age of my son?
But oh, I dreamed that he would..for a person to talk to and not to talk about me... oh no... for as I have been told I am as mad as a biscuit and I am told that I dream fancifully.
There I am in a film set ... rather as Bathsheba in the storm. I see Troy with Fanny as the rainstorm flooded the earth and spoiled the crops and yet made characters strong to allow love to win through tragedy.    Oh such a fanciful imagination in search of company and more than that... normality.

PART THREE
Wishing to maintain privacy, just let me say that the following day I was feeling so good that after almost 3 hours of mowing grass, I walked far into countryside at a pace, descending and climbing a circuit of stone steps, lanes, streets and pavements about the village and its environs.  I courageously knocked on a door to see if I could discover this person to explain that I do not normally sit in rain and thunder storms. These English people were so kind and not at all phased...so French really... we showed interest, discussing all manner of things French and English, their lives and mine. They fed me a most amazing 3 course meal followed by coffee.  I hope I can return the conviviality.

PART FOUR

Yesterday... I was told by an English person that I look French...oh oh oh... MY MY MY! J’ai arrivé.
I do actually have ancestors who are from Nîmes et de Nantes. How good do I feel!!!!!!!!

Life is looking up!!!!!!!

Two hares loping

The rain is thrashing noisily down as I type....... now 21h42 and after 2 minutes it stops!!!!! (the pluviometer recorded 18mm of rain between then and the morning)

Earlier today I wrote:

I have never ever thought of using the expression “drunk with tiredness” but to day was such a day. I'd had only 33cl bottle of beer the previous evening to accompany a quarter of a salmon flan quiche and very simple salad.  So alcohol was not involved. When one lives alone one can do what one likes!!!!

Then later:

After almost 12 hours in bed I awoke at 9am and returned to bed an hour later, awoke after two hours sleep and returned to bed another 2 hours later then awoke at 5h30pm! I felt quite wobbly and drunk..... really weird ..... ashamed at the waste of a day so decided to drag the boots onto my feet, don the plastic lightweight mac and take an umbrella to walk, to split the mind of thought.  It was hard to start but I progressed along the chemins for two and a half hours (10.60km) without seeing a soul….. “just walk” was a message to myself.  I became quite hungry but told myself this was good for the stomach to yearn for food.  I planned the quickie meal I would cook.  I thought about what could happen if I were to ever just get up and walk south!  I need an ultra lightweight tent, an ultra lightweight bedroll and sleeping bag, simple clothing and boots.  Would I be brave enough to camp toute seule in wild France? Camp out means to erect the tent and sleep then to get up and walk.
Hm?
If I were to have stopped for every nightingale I'd heard I would never have got back home...

Two hares loping away before me, their false eyes on ears watch, follow I do not dare..
a broken heart for where I saw majestic deer in love last year, 
now the tiny patch of woodland coppiced almost bare.

Surrounded by fields with yellow scent of mustard oilseed flowers..
strategic passing of puddles where water flowed from low field levels
Spring is the sound of an automatic air gun popping to scare birds from crops.

Partridges and pheasants bustle busily across seemingly barren fields..
two French matted Baudet de Poitou asses exchange greetings across a fence.

Oh so good that it did not rain and cause me to become wet. 
Oh so proud that I can walk such a distance for nigh on 3 hours 
though sometimes not stay awake for such time in my own home!  

To gauge the rain fall

Between the downpours of the weekend I managed some walks to re-familiarise myself with village views, as since the cold spell I have become unfit!  Today, the sun shone, but still the rain gauge collected 30mm of rain in less than 5 hours and that was after I tipped out 8mm at lunchtime. To be fair there wasn't a lot of rain at the weekend though it felt like it!  Thunderstorms too.  However,  at 7h30 with clear blue skies I heard the sound that I had heard before, thought hot air balloon, but I never see it. There this morning as I open my gates it is rising above my roof...... I rush back into the house to find the camera by which time it has travelled into the distance.

Now, for some entymology.  I have to investigate how we arrive at the spelling of gauge, because gauging does look peculiar! It is Middle English for a standard measure from the Old French gauge (noun), gauger (verb), and a variant of Old Northern French jauge (noun), jauger (verb), of unknown origin! Voila!
France meteo predicts rain every day for at least the next 10 days!!!!!!! The lawns will be sky high if the grass does not dry.