Have Mother, Will Travel: A Mother and Daughter Discover Themselves, Each Other, and the World

by Claire Fontaine

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because you’re one of those people who gets moving when they’re excited about something.”

  “What’s the other kind?”

  “They’re more motivated to avoid what they don’t like, the negative.”

  “Huh, I never thought about it that way. Doesn’t seem like a fun way to live.”

  “It has its advantages; you have to be balanced. When you’re mostly future-focused you avoid the negative stuff. So you don’t learn from your past and tend to repeat your mistakes—or not see them at all.”

  “I do that sometimes. Not so often as you do, to be honest.”

  “That’s true. It’s one thing about me you should not emulate.”

  She yawns. “I think you’re not even aware how much you do it, Mom. It’s why you’ve started saying should all the time again. I should have done this or shouldn’t have done that. Used to drive Dad and me crazy.”

  “It used to drive me crazy.”

  So crazy, in fact, that I decided to count every time I said should or shouldn’t in one day, as a way to stop doing it. By noon I’d hit forty-seven, which was pretty sobering.

  I lean toward her bed to make sure she hears me before drifting off. “Mia, I’m really, really sorry if I didn’t seem like someone you could talk to the last couple of years. You don’t need to protect me or worry about me. Or worry that I’ll judge you.”

  It’s silent for a moment and I’m afraid she’s asleep, but then she says quietly, “I know. I think it was both of us. I’m really glad you had the crazy idea to take this trip. And I’m glad I’m coming to France with you.” She pauses and I hear her breath slowing.

  “Sweet dreams, Mia,” I murmur. I get out of bed quietly and, just as I used to do when she’d fallen asleep after our bedtime chats when she was little, I bend over and kiss her forehead softly.

  No matter how old you are, or what kind of relationship you have with your mother, she is the most significant woman in your life. We matter to our daughters more than we can imagine, whether or not they, or we, admit it or like it. As different as our personalities are, as open as I am in so many ways, I’m just like my mother in guarding my feelings. Mia doesn’t do it to the extent that I do, but she clearly does it, apparently sometimes without realizing it. Who we are as women finds its way into our daughters.

  Once they’re grown and we can’t tell them what to do, the only way we can influence them is by inspiring them. Which is also a part of why I didn’t share aspects of my life with her. Just as I wanted to continue to see her as the golden girl, my hero and inspiration, I wanted her to continue to see me that way, too. I don’t want Mia to see me and think I don’t want that to be me later in life, and then maybe go on to create what she fears. It’s what fears tend to do—they give you an unconscious blueprint to follow. What a burden to place on a daughter, what a sad legacy.

  I want her to see me the way I want to see myself again—as powerful and authentic, as a woman living by design instead of default. As willing to fight for myself the way I did for her when the going got rough. My sage pal Leah said it well shortly before we left: “Isn’t that what all women want, Claire? To be brave in their own lives?” We do, and as a mother I want it even more. So my life can be not a burden but a beacon for my daughter.

  After Romania, we had one exhausting but extremely interesting day in Amsterdam (like twenty-five points for asking a prostitute her rates interesting) and a final day in Toronto where we just did the scavenges we liked, which included the Shoe Museum and taking a misty ferry ride to one of the islands, at a normal pace. Our score didn’t land us in the top three, but we’ve raised several thousand dollars for charity and experienced the world and the people we share it with in ways we could never have imagined. We were welcomed everywhere we went, invited into homes and hearts, and have a more meaningful understanding of our nation’s impact on the world.

  We’ve also experienced ourselves and each other in ways we could never have imagined. Till now, Mia and I have been coasting on the closeness we had in the past, when we saw each other, and our roles, in a way we’ve both outgrown. This trip has shaken all of that loose, forced us to see and be with each other in new and unexpected ways. We’ve seen each other call upon inner resources neither of us knew we had, and we’ve had our nerves, wits, and stamina tested.

  I’ve had the priceless opportunity to observe Mia interacting with strangers without the benefit of language, to see what fascinates or repels her, what delights or frightens her, to see how she takes in the world, turns it over in her mind, and integrates it into her spirit.

  We experienced old patterns, new insights, and saw what was and wasn’t working in our relationship, even if we didn’t have the time to explore what would work better. Mostly, we learned to trust each other.

  Tomorrow the most amazing journey of our lives will come to an end. Thirteen teams played hard, creatively, and well, sometimes disagreed heartily, and always laughed heartily. Mia and I would do it again in a minute, but we’re ready to head home, where we’ll no doubt sleep for two days straight. Then we pack up again and head to Avignon, where we’ll have time to relax and reflect, to learn, grow, and to chart a new course for our lives and our relationship.

  Part II

  GATHERING

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Avignon

  French Lessons

  The name Avignon comes from the word avenio, which means “town of violent winds.” This city in the south of France is marked by a western wind, known locally as le mistral, that can reach sixty miles an hour. In winter, the wind is often biting and cold, and year-round it whistles and roars so loudly and unrelentingly that it was successfully used as an insanity defense in a murder trial.

  Le mistral is why the Provençal farmhouses that people love to renovate usually face south and have small windows, and why bell towers in villages throughout the countryside have open iron frameworks that allow the wind to blow through. It is also why, if you look at Van Gogh’s paintings of olive groves, the trees all bend to the same side, having grown in the wind’s direction.

  For centuries, artists flocked to Provence because the light there is literally unlike anywhere else in the world. When le mistral blows through, it takes with it the dust and particles normally found in the atmosphere, more deeply saturating colors and adding nuance.

  Most skies have a sense of depth—you’re aware of staring through air and clouds—but Avignon’s sky is such an intense cobalt that it feels opaque. It caps the region’s quaint villages and sunflower fields much the way the indigo-painted church domes of Provence cover the worshippers within.

  And Avignon is no stranger to worshippers; for most of the thirteenth century, the papacy resided there. As Christendom’s epicenter, Avignon ruled the medieval world, and the city’s wealth attracted pesky bands of troublemakers. The popes ordered the total fortification of the city and the creation of what remains Europe’s largest Gothic palace: the impenetrable Palais des Papes (the Popes’ Palace).

  Centuries later, it’s a sight virtually unchanged: a small city tightly encircled by a protective Dungeons and Dragons–esque stone wall, complete with watchtowers, crenulated battlements, and slits for archer’s arrows. True, honking cars are now heard instead of clopping horses, and a modern city with a hundred thousand people now surrounds the walled area. But intramuros (literally, “inside the walls”) little has changed since medieval times, and the population is a mere fifteen thousand.

  It is, however, about to increase by two.

  What we call a mother when we’re little—someone who knows everything, loves you unconditionally, banishes boo-boos and bad guys, entertains, educates, and scolds you—is called an angel once you’re grown-up. Everyone should have one. Ours is named Chrystelle.

  She even comes with a medieval town, a chic wardrobe in our same size, a chef, and a new swimming pool. And she’s waiting for us at the Avignon train station, wavin
g from le parking, wearing big Jackie O sunglasses, an olive linen military-style jacket, skinny jeans, and the Converse sneakers Frenchwomen love. The last time I saw her at this station, my train was pulling out and she was crying as she waved good-bye.

  Chrystelle has the carriage and style of any well-bred Frenchwoman but doesn’t look typically French, or typical anything. At almost six feet tall, she’s both commanding and delicate, with the perfect ivory skin, wide brow, and big hazel eyes of a Botticelli. She’s really quite beautiful, with the kind of fresh, open face artists treasure for its expressive qualities: she can ask entire questions with just a glance; when she smiles, which is often, her whole face smiles; and when her face clouds, you hope that whatever it is, you didn’t do it.

  Most of the time, however, she seems to channel Audrey Hepburn—fun-loving, witty, inquisitive, charming. She has that rare gift of making those she cares for feel not just loved but treasured. When Chrystelle says, I weel arrange somesing, you’re in like Flynn. I met her ten years ago while staying with friends, and we’ve remained close.

  Chrystelle adores Avignon; she’s lived in and around here all her life. “When you arrive een the airport of Paris, you see nussing, just a lot of corn. New York ees also not so pretty to arrive, just some buildings and messy things. Avignon, you arrive to find a queen. The thing of eet is this,” which is how she prefaces Somesing Important, “you don’t put a diamond just like that, pffft, on a desk, eet doesn’t look like anysing. Non, you must put eet in a beautiful box, with, ’ow you call that material, soft, like an aneemal?”

  “Velvet.”

  “Oui. And suddenly eet ees somesing very special. Every morning I drive over the bridge and there she ees, a jewel in her special container, with a gold reebbon on top.”

  The container being the fortified walls and the “gold reebbon on top” being the Popes’ Palace towering over the heart of the city. Chrystelle drives through a wall portal onto the main drag of Avignon, Rue de la République, Napoleon III’s sole raze-and-rebuild contribution here. Once medieval, it’s now a broad avenue of ornate, nineteenth-century buildings with wrought-iron balconies. It’s very Parisian-looking, down to the big fin de siècle brasseries shaded by the massive plane trees so beloved by the French.

  Chrystelle wedges into a minuscule parking space and we unload our luggage.

  “First I make you see some very nice things,” she announces, “and then I take you to the studio. Eet will be very easy to find your way, you weel see.”

  She weaves us through sidewalk tables full of tourists eating platters of oysters and anchoïade, an oily, garlicky dip for vegetables that’s very popular in the south. She and Mia chatter away in French, which has become incomprehensible to my jet-lagged self. Another ten minutes and English will be just as confusing.

  She then turns off the main drag into another world. A densely packed maze of tiny streets, filled with medieval churches, cathedrals, and mostly unpartitioned buildings, all of beige-gray stone. There are cafés, patisseries, galleries, shops, kebab “sandwicheries” with Algerians smoking and talking outside, gay bars, expensive restaurants. The first impression is of equal parts Portland grunge, West Hollywood eclectic, and un peu de Paris, plunked in a medieval stage set.

  The streets buzz with chic hipsters, working-class folks, well-dressed couples gay and straight, college kids in jeans with iPods, the requisite Frenchman with beret, cigarette, and baguette on a bicycle. A girl with matted dreadlocks leads a troop of mutts past a boulangerie whose storefront probably hasn’t changed in a hundred years: crusty, golden loaves framed by a dusty blue façade and window boxes overflowing with purple blooms. The façades mimic the people, alternately grimy or pristine. If Paris is the well-bred and manicured Lady, Avignon is the scrappy but endearing Tramp.

  Mia and I have assumed what will come to be called “the position”: two ducklings waddling single-file as fast as we can through the ridiculously narrow cobbled lanes (calling these “streets” is like naming your Chihuahua Hulk), praying not to become human graffiti. Sidewalks have become nonexistent or a mere ribbon of stone we’d call a curb, and cars seem to be the exact same width as the lanes; cars are actually touching my person. Being thin here isn’t a matter of vanity; it’s survival of the flattest.

  “You weel really like your area,” Chrystelle assures us cheerily. “You ’ave all you need right ’ere and the people are not snob. There are a lot of artists and eet ees très branché (“plugged in,” i.e., hip) at night.”

  She continues giving what is no doubt fascinating commentary about everything we’re passing, none of which registers, because more dangerous than the cars and walls are the cobbles. What in God’s name—and just about everything here was built in God’s name—would have them paving streets with stones the shape and size of a domed lunchbox?

  Chrystelle eventually stops before the cutest, cobbliest alley I’ve ever seen. I look around for a landmark, and I am not disappointed. Just behind her is a gigantic white metal box mounted on the corner of the building—a condom dispenser.

  “ ’Ere we are—you see, eet was very easy to find.”

  I’ll say. Nothing says “easy” like Feeling Extra! or Pleasure Max.

  We follow her into the L-shaped alley where Madame Oudin will meet us with the key. On the left is a row of attached seventeenth-century four-story stone buildings that curve around with the alley to where it opens onto another street. On the right is what makes Americans such cheap dates in these parts: a twenty-foot craggy medieval stone wall we’d take a dozen photos of. Behind it are towering plane trees that shade the entire alley.

  “This is such a great wall!” I say.

  “Yes, eet is a wall.” She shrugs. “You can look at eet all you like,” she points to the huge fourth-floor windows facing the wall. “The thing of eet ees this,” she says authoritatively, which is how the French say most things, by the way, “you will be away from the beeg street, so eet will be peaceful. And whenever you want to come ’ome, you just need to tell me. You ’ave a garden to relax, you can ’ave a swim, eet will be like a vacation for you.”

  ’Ome being her ’ouse, which I find just so touching.

  “After I take ’ome Antoine from school, I will be back to be sure you are bien installées (settled-in).”

  “You don’t have to do that, we’ll be fine,” Mia protests, because she doesn’t know Chrystelle well enough.

  The French love to raise the index finger when admonishing or advising and wag it in time to Non, non, non, said through lips pushed into a very Gallic pout. You know those beautiful fingers and toes in Michelangelo’s paintings? Long, slender, perfectly formed, turned up at the tip, the kind almost no one has in real life? Well, Chrystelle does, and when that lovely conductor’s baton of a finger snaps to, so do you.

  “Non, non, non,” le finger scolds, “I don’t just leave you on the street like this. I ’ave to be sure you ’ave all what you are supposed to up there.”

  Yeah, like sheets and towels, which I forgot to bring, and no place will be open to buy them. Even furnished places don’t always come with them here; they’re considered strictly personal items.

  “Are you going to remember the way here, Mia?” I ask after she leaves.

  “Bah-wee!” Mia assures me with a very Provençal-accented mais oui (but of course!).

  What that really meant, and she thinks I don’t know, is a carefree hell no! Before I can say anything, a motorcycle whips into the alley and parks. A très petite young woman in pointy-toed black boots and a tightly belted riding jacket hops off, takes off her helmet, and shakes her straight blond bob loose. I half-expect James Bond to show up next.

  “Vous êtes Madame et Mademoiselle Fontaine?” she asks. She has a bronze tan, a very pretty, heart-shaped face, and a smile that crinkles her green-gold eyes.

  “Oui?” we say, uncertain. “Madame Oudin was not able to come?”

  She looks at us funny. “I am Madame Oudin.”

&
nbsp; We’re so shocked that it takes a few seconds to respond. She was so formal in all our e-mails and calls, using Madame Oudin and Madame Fontaine for weeks, never a first name. Of course we assumed she was elderly.

  She’s just as shocked that we’d be expecting a prim senior. I explained that in America, it would have been first names, and no one young expects to be called madame, especially by someone old enough to be her mother, which I am.

  Madame Oudin does the Gallic lip pouf and brow raise. “Ooohlala, c’est beezarre, to use ze first name so queeck! Of course I am madame. One cannot say me mademoiselle at sirty!”

  I know I’ve found a kindred spirit, because we then launch into an academic discussion on language and social structure that would bore anyone else to death. She studied literature and is a language fanatic. We exchange mutual permission to use first names (hers is Isabelle) and agree to tutoyer with each other, which means using the informal tu for “you” instead of vous.

  We don’t know it yet, but we’ve gotten our first taste of the magic of Avignon—young, edgy, artsy, earthy—yet as full of history and formality as Versailles, with more than a soupçon of mystery and surprise.

  When in France, it’s imperative to understand the expression comme il faut. This translates loosely to “how it’s done,” and in France, there is a proper way to do everything. When to wear what, how to greet whom, what to say when, these all fall under the category of comme il faut. And because the French alone happen to know just what that way is, they see it as their sacred duty to civilize the rest of the world.

  True, for centuries France was the authority on fashion, food, art, and literature, and until 1918 French was the international language of diplomacy. Which explains why Victor Hugo wrote, “France, France, the world would be alone without you”; President Charles de Gaulle called France “the light of the world, its destiny to illuminate the universe”; and President François Mitterrand vowed that France will “light the path of mankind.”