And Life Rolls Along…

We’ve been here in sunny Provence for three weeks now. We’ve settled into the daily rhythms of life.  We take walks in the neighborhood and to the beach; we do our shopping at the local supermarket and on Friday mornings, at the open-air market in the public square; we sit at a café en plein air with a pression (draft beer or a pastis(Pernod over ice cubes with splashes of water). We  have long conversations with friends over dinner that last until midnight, or casual conversations with strangers we meet as we amble about. We’ve enjoyed just be-ing.  Life is good.

Our week began with a trip to Juan-les-Pins to visit our “adopted” French grandchildren, Justine and Louis. Justine spent three weeks with us in South Bend last summer.  She and

Louis were spending spring break with their uncle in the warmer Mediterranean sun.  It was good to see them because we won’t be visiting Verzenay, a small town near Reims, where their parents own a champagne vineyard.   On Saturday, we lunched on our patio for the first time with Laure, the daughter of one of our friends, over a large mixed salad (bread, cheese and wine, de rigueur, of course), followed by a bowl of vanilla ice cream topped with fresh strawberries.  Later, we took a bus and then hiked up a fairly steep hill for one and half kilometers for a guided tour of a nineteenth-century mine, Cap Garonne.  On the way, we stopped several times to admire the vegetation that lined the road. Melanie was particularly interested in the  cork trees, chêne liège, where the bark was cut and sometimes burned.  It was also fascinating to see the regrowth of the bark. Now every time I uncork a bottle of wine, I’ll remember this steep climb on the way to the mine.

On Sunday afternoon, we walked down the hill with our friend, Martine, to see a marvelous film, Le Médecin de Campagne, starring François Cluzet and Marianne Denincourt.  The film chronicles the harsh realities of life as a country doctor.  The acting and cinematography were excellent, though at times, the sound quality coupled with the rapid elocution of the dialogue made the French at times difficult to understand for non-native speakers.  Admittedly, I sometimes do not understand everything spoken in English language films.

Dinners with friends have been a common theme in my blogs and this week we have entertained and been fêted in turn. Faculty friends at the university who have been to IUSB as exchange professors treated us to dinner  at Le Mayol, a restaurant at the old port in Toulon.

Xavier, Marie, Giles, Emmeline, Alfred, Axelle, Melanie

And the next evening we had a new dining experience, a raclette, at Marie-Hélène’s home with other invitees.  In the center of the table was a large pancake shaped cooking device, hollow in the middle where several miniature wrought iron trays were nestled, one for each guest.  Charcuterie, topped with cheese, is placed in the middle of the raclette to melt the cheese. The meal reminded me of a seventies fondue party.  And the very next evening we invited Martine, our friend and landlady, and Christian and MariThé, for a meal of broiled cauliflower seasoned with zaa’tar as an appetizer, followed by a meal of New Orleans trout amandine and stuffed eggplant.  Each evening there was conversation about a sundry of topics, but American politics dominated the discussion.

Eating delicious food was not our only pastime of the week.  We went dancing at l’Italienne, a popular dance spot for gray-haired youngsters like us. On Sunday and Tuesday afternoons, there is dancing from 3-7pm.  We arrived at 4 and stayed until closing at 7.  Two singers, a male and a female, and an  accordion player supplemented the canned orchestration.  The female singer’s resonant, sultry  voice  added deeper meaning to the Latin love songs.   Most of the music was tangos, Viennese waltzes, Paso Dobles, swing, and lots of rumbas with an occasional cha-cha.  We had difficulty finding a rhythm to dance a foxtrot or a slower tempo waltz that the French call the Boston.  But that did not hamper us from having a wonderful afternoon of dancing.  Unlike the style of dancing at our dance club, Dan O’Day’s, where dancers flow across the room with wide arms  and broad steps, the dancers here remain in a close embrace, moving in smaller steps  rhythmically across the floor.

As we were leaving, an elderly gentleman spoke to us in a heavy Provençal accent that we did not grasp right away.  With a tinge of sadness , he said that all good things must come to an end, to which he followed with a broad smile, “Dancing is great because during these several hours there  are no arguments.”  We all laughed and nodded in agreement.  Once outside the dance hall, another gentleman, perhaps closer to our age, asked me if I was a compatriot from the islands, a question I’m often asked.  When I responded that I was from Louisiana, he thought I said Guyana, to which he retorted was not very far away.  But once I corrected him, he asked specifically where in Louisiana.  That I was from New Orleans prompted him to tell us how much the French love jazz (he mentioned specifically Sidney Bechet) and how the French fought against racism.  Sadly, racism continues, he said, even with the election of President Obama.With that last remark, he crossed the street to the bus stop, and we continued on to our car.

Exchanges like these are another way for us integrate into life here.  Our apartment on the sloping side of a hill facing the Mediterranean is cozy with adequate space to entertain and receive friends.  We have television but we rarely turn it on.  Even in the States our tv is silent.

Our “home” in Provence

Thanks to the marvels of technology, we do remain connected to current events. Through the NY Times, the Washington Post and the Chicago Tribune, the Daily Kos and other media, the circus of presidential politics is within reach of our computer’s keyboard.

Yesterday, Martine, MariThé and Christian took us on a lovely drive through the countryside, on ascending winding hills with very sharp turns, to the village of Collobrières where we visited a reconstructed twelfth century monastery, La Chartreuse de la Verne.  Today, there are only twenty-eight cloistered nuns who live in the monastery.  For a moment, we stood outside and gazed across the forest of chestnut trees and imagined this isolated spot many centuries ago as a haven of prayer for the monks  who lived and worked there, and now nuns do the same.

Tomorrow, we leave for Corsica and when we return after a nine-day stay, only three weeks will remain.  I could stay here an additional two months. As much as I am thoroughly American, I feel equally connected to the French (a topic that I will explore in another blog).