16 June 2008
Well! Have you seen what I've just seen? Alex has made an entry in his blog. Well, blow me down and pick me back up off the floor again, this is something of a miracle. And what an entry! When he gets going he certainly gets going. It's practically a tome. Between you and me and reading between the lines, though, I think he's been in at the biscuit tin again. There's certainly a slightly guilty edge to his soapbox admonishings. Yes, sir.
It can't be easy being an Ayurvedic teacher. In fact, any teacher of moral imperatives, where you are educating others about a 'right' or 'good' way to live. Quite naturally, others expect you to live up to the standards you preach. Which is fine as long as you do, but when normal human weakness rears its ugly head, as it will from time to time, you can find yourself in the fast lane of the intercity guilt highway. Whether you're a politician, a priest, a relationship counsellor or an Ayurvedic teacher, I imagine the pressure must sometimes be too much to bear. The gasket blows. The cork shoots out of the bottle and ricochets off the ceiling. The lava explodes with a rush of red into the night sky. And what starts off as a quick peek into the biscuit tin becomes, before you know it, a major raid on the chocolate supplies that puts you in bed with a sore tummy for a week. Tsk, poor Alex...
Of course I, being neither a preacher nor a teacher (except a bit of English to the kids at the local school but I don't think Head Shoulders Knees and Toes really counts as a lifestyle imperative), am blissfully unhindered by such ethical dilemmas. The biscuit tin is not my enemy. I have nothing to live up to (just as well because I don't think I'd get very far) so have no distance to fall. I can happily much my way through a Snickers bar at my desk and have no-one to answer to. Least of all my conscience. I am lucky to have been blessed with a fairly easy-going conscience. It is not an overly-harsh judge of human affairs. And it has long since given up on my own.
Yes, yes, of course I am a parent and thus have to teach my children the ways of the world. But to be honest, I would rather they witnessed happy, self-accepting role models with a few bad habits than ones who preached the Right Thing then guiltily ran off and did the opposite in secret. Because kids find out. They do. They may not realise they are taking in all that complex stuff, but they are. And it's what they see their parents do, not what they hear them say, that goes in and forms their ideas about life. It's an old child-rearing adage, but it's one I particularly like. (Mainly because it allows me to justify all the appalling things I say and do in front of the kids).
Now don't get me wrong, I am not fingering Alex here. He is a far more upright and admirable character than I will ever be. Even with his occasional raids of the biscuit tin. His musings just set me thinking, that's all. About how I think that accepting our human frailties as normal, natural and nothing to be afraid of, rather than evils to be battled and overcome, is the best way to teach those around us - students, children, those who look up to us for one reason or another - to be self-aware, joyful indivuals. Kindness to ourselves is the cornerstone of kindness to others. And anyway, unhealthy habits tend to fall away after a while if they're not stoked with fear and guilt. The best habit we can nurture is self-acceptance.
Now, anyone got a chair to help me down off my soapbox?
11 June 2008
OK, here's the deal. Alex reckons nobody reads my blog, or if they do nobody cares much for it. 'Well, how many emails have you actually had from readers?' he says in that wiggly-eyebrowed way of his. 'Well, none, but that's only because I don't have that facility,' I reply (somewhat defensively). 'Ha!' he says turning back to More Important Things as if some point has just been made. So the deal is: if anyone is out there, anyone, ANYONE, can you please send me a comment to that effect? That will teach he who never lifts finger to keypad to update his own blog. Ha.
10 June 2008
There is something truly satisfying about plunging your hands deep into the soil, messing about with seedling and weeds, and ensuring dirty, scraggy fingernails for days afterwards. Ever since we moved to France from our tenement flat in Glasgow over six years ago, I have entertained a vision of myself as a bit of an earth mother. The reality of course is something quite different. But part of me has always believed that underneath these pasty, pampered city fingers is a set of gnarled green ones waiting to burst out.
This has resulted in me trying - and failing - several times to get a garden of loveliness off the ground. In our last house, I planted a peach tree. Three months later every leaf was curled up and dying of fungal disease. I pruned back the blaze of raspberry plants the previous owners had lovingly cared for and left for us to enjoy. The stumps that remained after my enthusiastic going-over with the secateurs refused to sprout new shoots and never returned.
There aren't many things in life that I genuinely feel deep down I have a natural talent for without the results to back it up, but gardening is one of them. I feel an affinity with the soil. I love getting my hands dirty and working up an earthy sweat. I love the feeling of fiddly, knotted roots between my fingers and delicate green shoots in my hands. I love the green newness of a spring garden and I am truly fascinated by the science of planting, pruning, grafting and harvesting. And yet, time after time my enthuiastic efforts result in nothing more than a bed of weeds, dried-out stems that never survived the initial planting, and patchy grass which has to be reseeded the following season. Am I just deluding myself or is there really a frustrated 'paysanne' underneath that all-too-evident urban schtick?
Well, thanks to my friend France, I may just one of these days be able to reply 'yes'. France - bless her cotton socks not to mention her patience - is training me in the ways of the garden. Zen and the art of mulching. With her help, I am learning how to cut back a rose bush without cutting away every last inch of its will to live, sow seeds from scratch in little black plastic boxes instead of buying in ready-grown flowers with abundant blooms from the local garden centre, and bring failing plants back to life with a little love and care instead of ripping them out the soil and replacing them with a perfect shop-bought specimen. Today we tied back a couple of rose bushes that were threatening to poke someone's eyes out and planted some seedlings in place of a hydrangea I had unwittingly drowned when I failed to leave the stems above ground upon transplanting and unfangle the root ball.
Turns out - and this is interesting in a serendipitous kind of way - that France and I both started a blog at exactly the same time this year. Hers is mostly about gardening but also about her ex-husband (ouch), whereas mine, as you know - dear reader - is just a bit of a ramble about whatever happens to pop into my head at the time of writing. France manages to get photos on hers, whereas I do not. I am stuck with the same falling-off-the-edge-of-a-mountain shot of me in my green fleece which to be honest makes me feel a bit giddy every time I catch sight of it lurking at the foot of the page.
I liked the idea that she started her blog to get back at her ex who apparently cut her out of their joint gardening blog when they split up. I haven't read the juicy retaliatory stuff yet but it struck me as a very good idea for a book. You know - his blog complaining about her and hers bitching about him, shown side by side on the page. I realise it may be unpleasant for the couple concerned not to mention somewhat exploitative, but wouldn't it be fun to read??
Anyway, for the record, France's blog is http://lataraillettealn.vefblog.net (in French). If she doesn't go for the publishing idea, maybe I should dump Alex acrimoniously and go for it myself?
9 June 2008
I have been asked to compromise myself artistically. Oh yes. And I have refused. The other day, Alex - webmaster, teccie and my official in-house IT team - told me I should be making an effort to include key words in my blogs. Words that would enable our website to be better referenced on the www. 'Do you mean,' I said turning to him slowly, 'you want me to alter the truth of my words for commercial gain? Compromise my creative integrity to get a few more people in through Gardoussel's door? Prostitute myself to the pimp of consumerism? DO YOU?' The look on my face must have been bad, for he stuttered slightly as he started a defensive explanation of why actually that was a Very Good Idea. 'Well, no way' I said throwing my head back dramatically (the effect would have been better if I'd had long hair). 'I will not tailor what I tell My Public' - I was starting to feel a bit drama queen-ish by this time -
'simply to bring more people to our website and increase profitability. Let my words stand as they are. For that is me. I have spake.' Honestly, the cheek. As if I would deliberately slip in phrases like yoga courses, gites, writing holidays, Cevennes, south of France, Ayurveda and so on just to make sure our website came up on the first page of a web search. The idea is simply abhorrent. No. I have spoken. I have made my stand.
I am going on a school trip on Friday. Yup, I have been asked to accompany my daughter's class on an outing to a nearby village called les Plantiers. There will be a visit to a museum of water (as in about water, not actually submerged in water) then a picnic then some games and then home. Skye's teacher Pierre will be there too of course, and another parent if he can badger someone else into going. I'm very much looking forward to it. The last time I went on a school trip - with the exception of actually being a child myself and all the rose-tinted memories that elicits like cheese sandwiches with the crusts cut off, cans of coke (special treat), and trampling through gloriously muddy fields in wellies - was with Skye's old school in the last place we lived in France. Over the space of a 45-minute bus trip, I managed to teach every cherub the song 'Stop The Bus I Need a Wee-Wee' and how to throw soggies at the half that didn't sing loudest. Funnily enough, I was never asked along as a token Responible Adult again. I'm sure Pierre will be more understanding though.
27 May 2008
Thought I might as well put finger to keyboard while I have a slack day. Some days I don't stop from morning to night - mornings in the office, afternoons on the land is ideal - and by the time the kids get home from school and dinner is cleared away, I'm good for slumping on the sofa with a book or a DVD and not much else. Today, on the other hand, it's still pissing with rain after four consecutive days of downpour. And so with the normal afternoon bit taken out of the daily equation, I find myself deliciously at a bit of a loose end.
I like days like this. These are the days - I don't know about you - when the inbox pile, which has been not so much gathering dust as sweeping it up into buckets and stacking them in a corner, finally gets a good seeing-to. When the slip of paper with the name of a good Irish drum that someone recommended a while back, finally gets the same attention as the outstanding electricity bill. When the cobwebs finally get a dusting. When that niggling admin issue that you've been putting off for ages, because you know you'll be faced with a series of computerised menu options on the other end of the phone, get tackled with gusto. (Well OK, maybe not gusto, but something that's not going to involve a visit by The Samaritans at any rate.)
The drum is a case in point. A bodhran, it has been agreed, would be the perfect musical accompaniment to a song that the trio I sing with is due to perform at a small concert next month. (And I mean small: we're not very good, we're not very experienced, and we are certainly not 'a point' as the French say (pronounced 'ahh pwang'), ie polished.) It's a song by the late, great George Brassens - a man whose name invokes a great clutching of the French cultural heart, a figure held in the same kind of esteem for gallic heritage usually reserved for saints, public holidays, farming aid and strikes - the Gallic equivalent of Bob Dylan. Now, I don't know about the rest of Brassens' music - I know I should really make the effort to get acquainted with his stuff - but this one, Le Verger du Roi Louis, really is a bit of a dirge. Hangings, darkened skies, crowds of sorrowful people, the devil keeping a watchful eye on things,... it ain't no summer picnic, that's for sure. Anyway, it has been agreed that to set off the mood of the piece to its best advantage, a bodhran would be just the thing. Hence today's little research topic. And the blog, of course.
Other Fruitful Things To Do On a Rainy Day? Clean the toilet (at long last), update the website (following complex instructions pinned to my pinboard by my IT team, ie Alex), edit a long lesson that Alex has written for his Ayurveda correpondence course, chase up the DDE (planning department) about an application they promised to answer within three months five months ago...... why am I telling you this?? I think the rain has gotten in and fusted up the right hand side of my brain (the so-called creative hemisphere, yeah right.) Everything's turning to rot up there. Well, I did warn you right at the beginning that this blog might be a bit of a ramble. So here we are: standing at the dead end of a damp country road with only a keyboard and a question about a bodhran drum for company. I'm sorry about this. I must have dropped the directions. It's enough to drive you to call the Samaritans.
22 May 2008
Finally, oh finally, the house is back to normal again. For the past week, the front facade of our home has been being stripped of its old render and re-pointed. Which we are delighted with now it's finished. (Think rambling roses climbing languidly up the side of a sleepy stone-fronted Provencal farmhouse... now project yourself 6 months into the future: that's what I'm convinced it will look like once my trainee green-fingers have been at it for a season. Yeah, I know, as if.) Anyway, to cut a long and admittedly dull story mercifully short, the final result may be lovely, but if I'd known just how big a fug of dust we were going to have to live under while the works were being carried out, I may have had second thoughts. Despite sealing up the doors and windows with duct tape, when the sandblasting started our kitchen turned into a set from an 80s apocalyptic film - after the acocalypse. Ie when everything has gone to hell, collapsed, fallen in on itself, and you can't see a thing under the thick blanket of dust, grime and crumbling masonry.
Fortunately, I wasn't here at the time, having decided to take myself off to a dance workshop that weekend to get out of the way. In my absence, my very kind and hugely understanding (ie scared of my moods) mother-in-law Frances apparently gasped in horror at the mess, got out the detergent, the sponges and the mop (items I am not generally very familiar with at the best of times) and cleaned the lot up. How good was that? So while I was twirling twinkle-toes style round the parquet floor of an old silk mill being a bird (there was an animal theme going on), my mum-in-law was down on her hands and knees in my very grubby kitchen scrubbing for all she was worth. Now I don't know what I was in a previous life, but I must have done a lot of Very Good Things, I can tell you. Otherwise, why would I have it so cushy in this one?
Talking of the dance workshop, I really have to mention the phenomenal activity that is Five Rythms. It's a kind of freestyle dancing to a series of music based on the concept of there being five distinct rythms in music, and in ourselves. There's a whole theory, developed by Gabrielle Roth, about its therapeutic effects, none of which I'm very familiar with, never having read any of her books. But basically, aside from any personal development benefits, it's simply great fun. I have discovered a regular workshop which is held every few weeks in Nimes and in Ganges, and I am slowly diving in deep. You get to dance in any way you like - by yourself, with a partner, in a group - and just let yourself go completely. It's very different from dancing at a party or in a club because everyone is there to dance, and nothing else. I guess, having missed the rave culture by a few years as a younger thing, that this is maybe what it was about. (Minus the ecstasy, at any rate: there is no drinking or drug-taking in 5 Rythms). Dancing till you drop, till you're soaked to the skin in sweat, till you can no longer tell where your feet end and the floor begins, till you realise that this is all there is: a non-stop, fundamental beat, a creative rythm, that runs through everything, that drives and echoes every heartbeat of every living thing, that underpins the constant ebb and flow of the tides, the movements of the planets, of life itself, that moves you to be whatever you choose to be at any given moment, and drives you, always shifting, always changing, till you fall flat from exhaustion. Yup, I'm hooked.
13 May 2008
Is it only me, or have you noticed that Alex has been slacking in his blog commitments? Nothing since 8 April, I ask you! Yours truly on the other hand...
I have a bee in my bonnet. Here in France, litigy takes on a whole new importance in day-to-day life. Our daughter Gaia is due to go on a school outing on Friday. I believe a circus and a picnic are on the cards. Her teacher phoned me the other day telling me to make sure she had the relevent insurance. In France every child is required to be insured against 'responsabilite civile' in order to attend school, creche, or in fact anything which brings them into contact with other kids. This covers us, the parents, against any damage or injury she may wreak on other children while away from our care. That insurance I have; it is built into our home insurance policy. For this school trip, however, she also apparently needs 'assurance individuelle' to cover us for any injury she may do to herself. I phoned our insurance company to find out if she was covered. No, she wasn't. It would cost us 18 Euros to add it on.
Well, I don't know about you, but I feel this is overdoing it. I said to the woman from the insurance company, but why should I need to insure my own daughter against self-inflicted damage? She's five years old! If anything happens to her of her own doing, we'll cover it ourselves. 'Don't ask me', she said.
Now, in order to run a car, you need third-party insurance. First-person insurance, ie damage to yourself and your own car, are optional. Seems fair enough : the person you crash into needs to know their costs will be covered by your insurance in order that they be willing to take a chance on driving on the roads. How you manage your own costs are up to you. Insurance cover if you choose, your own pocket if you don't.
For some reason, however, the same does not apply to people. We are expected here in France to take out insurance not only for our own health (a legal and very expensive requirement in order for us to run our own business) but for anything our children may do to another child. And themselves!
Personally, I find this a touch paranoid. Not to mention insulting as a parent (to suggest that you wouldn't take your child's health into your own hands if they had an accident) and damaging to the whole idea of personal responsability. It encourages us to pass off responsability for our own actions. To the state, to insurance companies... 'or we'll sue!' It turns the concept of acting decently and fairly into a question of financial gain, not of duty. It's one of the most corruptive forces in today's society. If I was an conspiracy theorist, I would say it's all one big government attempt to turn us into non-thinking dummies ready to hand over responsablity for our actions to outside agencies instead of taking responsability for them ourselves. Luckily I'm not quite there yet. But I could be...
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I have decided not to send our daughter on her school trip. Basically, I'd only be taking out the insurance to cover this single annual outing (they only have one school excursion a year). So it's a financial issue. But it's also an ethical one. I just don't believe it's right to insist that any personal injury she might cause to herself should be covered by an insurance policy. We already have compulsory medical insurance for the whole family, which we would rather not take out but do in order to run our business. As her mother, I want to take responsability for her medical cover myself and I think I should be allowed to do so if I wish. Besides, she wasn't that keen on going anyway. So she's absolutely delighted that I feel so strongly about this issue that she's staying at home on Friday instead!
5 May 2008
WARNING: If you have no interest in donkeys, do not read today's entry. Go find yourself a good magazine instead.
I know, I know, I only clocked in yesterday and here I am again. Like a bad dream that keeps resurfacing throughout the day, hmm? I just had to tell you about our donkeys. I forgot clean about them yesterday.
Yes, we got ourselves two donkeys at the weekend. Frodo and Perle, a boy (castrated - ouch) and a girl (not - so baby donkeys always a possibility if we organise a fling for her) are of the Provencal breed (the grey ones with a dark cross across their shoulders, called the 'croix de St Andre'). At 5 and 7 years of age, they are old enough to be ridden (minimum 4 years so you don't damage their spine) but young enough to be lots of fun. So far they have allowed themselves to be led them around their paddock, having first almost certainly enjoyed a good donkey chortle at my attempts to fit a headcollar (so many straps, so few decent places to buckle them...). They have even been so good as to let us lead them out of their enclosure and round the meadow. Not to mention, this very evening, place two very excited children on their backs and carry them round the path that Alex has mowed through the wildflowers. Ahhh, a sight for sore eyes, I tell you. (Any eyes actually. Even perfectly healthy, non-myopic ones that have never had an infection, ever). So suffice to say, the donkeys are a big hit. And the best thing about them - other than the fact they mow lawns without the need for petrol or a cable, and they carry wood from forest to house -is that they virtually LOOK AFTER THEMSELVES.
I'm serious. They are the perfect pet. I didn't know this until the other day, and had fully prepared myself (not to mention the kids) for daily feeds, waters and various health checks as stated in my very serious and learned-sounding donkey book. But Franck, our donkeyman friend who has been looking after F and P for the past few weeks and has many donkeys of his own, says at this time of year they a) don't need hay (grass is best) b) don't need straw on an earthen stable floor (only necessary in winter), and c) don't need to be closed in at night (they prefer being able to wander around in the dark and share secret midnight feasts together.) Of course, we have a constant supply of running water for them, but that's it. A weekly brush-down and hoof check is the norm, says Franck. What pet could possibly be better than that?? Not that this will stop two besotted children from giving them daily goings-over in every possible way - the brushes, hoof picks and hay bales come out at any opportunity - but it is good to know that they're resilient creatures all the same. Not like their big flouncy cousins - the public school boys of the equine world: horses - who seem to need pampering, medical attention and specialised grooming at every turn to be healthy. Nah, give me a donkey any day.
Incidentally, at the risk of labouring my Namibia trip (see previous entry) just a little too much, did you know that a donkey is affectionately called a Kalahari Ferrari in Africa? Don't say you don't learn a thing or two on this blog, hah!
4 May 2008
It's been three weeks since my last confession - err, blog entry. That's a long time in blog world, I gather. But seeing as I'm new to all this, I'm banking on being able to get away with it. Not knowing the rules has gotten me far in French society ('ahhh, silly foreigner, bless...' I like to think they mutter behind concealed mouths in the village when I make yet another faux pas) so I'm hoping the same is true on planet blog.
Reason is, I'm just back from a rather spectacular trip to Namibia (the country north-west of South Africa that everybody has heard of but nobody knows where it is on the map). I was there last year for the first time and it fairly blew me away: vast, vast distances of completely untouched wilderness; Indian-spice colours all around; gentle, respectful people; exotic animals wandering to and fro with not a fence in sight; and supremely civilised customs such as sundowners - a wee drink imbibed on a local viewpoint overlooking the setting sun. This time I took Alex with me. (I felt that asking him to look after the kids for the second time in two years for a ten-day period was maybe stretching the terms and conditions of our marriage contract a bit far.) Luckily he enjoyed the whole experience as much as me. On one unforgettable occasion, we were having our sundowner on a pinnacle above miles of desert stretched out in front of us - Alex on guitar and me on red wine - when all of a sudden we noticed 14 giraffes grazing a couple of hundred yards in front of us. Neither of us had even spotted them. They must have been listening to the music and dazzled by the glinting of my rising and falling glass for 15 minutes before they swam into our focus, so well were they camouflaged. And no, it was not one too many tipples that was to blame. Actually.
13 April 2008
Watched a good film the night before last. 'Manipulations' in French ('The Contender' in English but I think the French title is better) is about an American female senator who becomes vice-president, and all the hypocricy, double standards and sexism that this draws out in her fellow politicans, and the wider public. A pithy, well-scripted and entertaining political drama that takes a well-placed swipe at gender inequality, political hypocricy and the our celebrity-obsessed culture. Made all the more memorable with a couple of brilliant twists towards the end.
Chickenpox is so-called, apparently, because in days gone by people thought the white-tipped pimples looked like chickpeas under the skin. Nothing to do with chickens. (Chickens don't get chickenpox and certainly don't transmit it). The Latin word for chickpeas is 'cicer' which is the original word from which chicken pox took its name. Interesting, huh? Hmmm, OK not for everyone maybe. Anyway, I always assumed it was because chickenpox made the sufferer look like a plucked chicken, but apparently not. The reason for this fascinating snippet of wikipedia knowledge is that both our kids have gone down with it this week. Itching and plucked chicken faces all round...
Talking of which, we have decided to get rid of our cockerel. It keeps running after our kids - and attacking me when I go to collect the eggs. Not that this bothers yours truly (I just chase him back growling don't-mess-with-me noises in a pathetic attempt to show him who's boss). But when our youngest was heard screaming from the chicken coop this afternoon, then spied two feet in front of the cockerel's beak sprinting at top speed from one side of the enclosure coop to the other, like something from a cartoon (I'm thinking Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd here), it was decided something had to be done. Which is OK because he doesn't have a name - you can't get rid of an animal who you've given a name. (With the notable exception of Mister Lady, a previous cockarel with the same failing who ended up in the local farmer's soup). So I phoned a friend with chickens and no children and explained the situation but she couldn't take him. Tomorrow I must find out if farmer Laget's wife fancies cooking up another casserole au poulet.
7 April 2008
OMG. I am blogging. That's it, it's all set up. I am writing and whatever I write - providing I get the paragraphs ended properly and manage to press 'Submit' - is going to come up on the website. Just like that. This is my first foray into the dark and mysterious world of blogging and I don't know what to make of it. I guess I'll find out as I go along. It feels OK so far. No worrying symptoms anyway.
Now - what to write about? Mmmm. So many possibilities. Should I keep it focussed and themed? Diary of a Brit in France (yawn - been done to death), Rural Living across the Channel (minority appeal?), Running a Business and Raising a Family (double yawn......), Life Accordingly to Sharon (a mite presumptious?), French Curiosities (sounds like an antiques shoppe).... Or should I just ramble through whatever happens to be on my mind that day? Hmmm. Sounds like a lot less work anyway. More suited to my laid-back (read 'lazy') disposition. OK, so that's that then. Welcome to Sharon's blog. Darned if I know what's round the corner. |
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