Now, despite setting up a French account before leaving, there was a daily limit on the card, which we hadn’t been aware of. At just before 11.50, Stuart went to pay for all our purchases on the card and it was declined. The owner suggested going to the bank to get the difference. Now, keep in mind that in France absolutely everything (except restaurants) shuts for the two-hour lunch break, so we ran madly down the road to the bank. The first bank we came across wasn’t ours, so we kept frantically running. I yelled at Stuart to run and told him I’d catch up, as he could run faster. If we didn’t get there just before twelve, we’d have to wait around for two hours — and we had a huge list of things to do, not least of all buying an air mattress so we had something to sleep on that night.
We finally flung ourselves, panting, into the bank at five minutes to midday, gasped our request to the ever-immaculate single teller and showed her our whitegoods receipt. Stuart couldn’t withdraw cash from the machine, either, as we were over our daily limit. The bank manager, who only had a few words of English — and, keep in mind, her sacrosanct lunch break was about to start — rapidly set up a special one-day-only account and in just a few minutes we had a huge stack of cash. We resumed madly running back down the street to pay for all our whitegoods. It was now 12.10: well and truly the French lunch hour. The shop owner had all his shutters down and was waiting impatiently. Stuart rapidly counted all the money out and we too sought somewhere for lunch (and to recover).
The speed at which we were accomplishing things never fully registered for me, because it was always time to move on to the next item on the daily list. Oh, the lists. Our lives seemed to be consumed by them.
Thank goodness for the civilised French lunch hour (or two) that gave us time to catch our breath in the heat of the searing summer’s day. It was always such a luxury to have a glass of rosé and linger for a while over a delicious steak and pommes frites while also recovering from once again spending so much money! Next on the agenda were two bricolage trips — not my favourite places, even in France — and the buying started again. Stepladder, paintbrushes, tools, paint, all chosen quite at random (bearing in mind that we had just painted in Australia and bought five samples of white to choose the right tone). Very fortunately, the white turned out to be perfect. Everything was harder because, of course, all the labels were in French. As always, I used a lot of miming to indicate what we needed, including that the walls had to be cleaned before painting. Equipped with the French equivalent of sugar soap, once again my sense of the dramatic seemed to do the trick.
Two bricolages later and it was the supermarché for essential supplies and an air mattress for the next few nights. The first purchases of bread, ham and cheese — prosaic words that set the tastebuds fluttering when recited in French: pain, jambon and fromage. We finally staggered into our house for our first night at five o’clock. By then it was about thirty-six degrees. Instead of simply relaxing with a beer after the long, exhausting and eventful day, we had to start cleaning — the house has been empty for a long time. Stuart tackled the bathroom and toilet, which I was extremely grateful for. It would be a long, long time before I got used to the French style of toilette. Meanwhile, in the searing heat at the end of a shattering day, I madly vacuumed, sucking up strands of cobwebs.
It was the time of day when the French had wound down and were wending their way down the lanes to their maisons and apéritifs. Yet the first sign of the morning’s horror was already evident as there seemed to be rather a lot of traffic for the early evening and impending sacred dinner hour.
After a hasty breakfast in our new home that seemed more like a camping expedition, I launched into all the work. First, I ripped down the ugly wooden fence on the front porch that served no purpose at all, and swept up all the piles of dead winter leaves. The abundance of dead leaves and weeds growing in the cracks in the stone steps leading to the front door all added to the air of neglect. An immediate improvement. Now, we weren’t novices at renovating. We had ten years of renovating and a few other houses under our belt, and were actually very pleased with our organisation and preparation. We had all the tools and bricolage purchases on hand to get underway on the very first day. That seemed quite impressive in itself to achieve at home, let alone in a foreign country.
We decide to start with the bedroom, so we could have a restful space to collapse in every night and shut the door literally on the dust and mess and reality of renovating. Keeping in mind that we simply didn’t have the luxury of much time at all, in fact a mere three weeks, we decide to take a short cut. After all, we had painted over wallpaper in our terrace house in Newtown and it was a huge success. No-one could even tell there was wallpaper under the paint. This was not the case with French wallpaper, however. As soon as we painted it, the paper started to bubble under the paint in huge, unsightly blobs. We were, however, fully committed at this stage and somehow hoped that as it dried it would improve. This did not happen. Neither did we have any wallpaper stripper, so we had to continue and more than doubled our work as, after the paint was on, we had to strip it all off by hand. Meanwhile, the trucks thundered past incessantly …
We kept working furiously in the heat, mindful that our friends Brigitte and Erick were soon to arrive. Yet again, thanks to the internet, we had made arrangements with them to buy us a bed and deliver it to us once we arrived. We just couldn’t stop; we were so determined to get the bedroom painted and move on as rapidly as possible to the rest of the house. Time is short was the mantra of the day — and every day. Of course, we weren’t ready and Brigitte was horrified to find us in our renovating clothes; they arrived during the sacred French lunch hour! That was the first time, and there were many more in the next few weeks, when we could get ready, pull on decent clothes and transform ourselves in literally two minutes. In fact, we got it down to an art form, usually with a shower as well, but always in record time. I even managed to throw on some make-up to try and look more presentable to the world, bearing in mind it was a ‘French’ world.
We had carefully planned where we should have lunch with Brigitte and Erick as we were very conscious that Brigitte used to be a chef and had her own restaurant. The village restaurant was only a minute’s walk away — one of the reasons we chose our house, in fact — but the food was not quite the Michelin fare we were hoping to treat our friends to. We had planned to go to Martel, a mere seven minutes’ drive away, but Brigitte was alarmed at the thought. After all, it was now almost one and nearly an hour into the precious lunch period. So, the village restaurant it was.
It turned out to be a brilliant decision for a number of reasons. There were a few workers inside eating, but the four of us were the only ones sitting outside. The food was fine, but what we realised afterwards was that, by going there with French friends, our standing in the village probably increased enormously. George Arnal, the owner, enquired through Brigitte and Erick whether we needed a gardener. Well, we were desperate to have the grass cut and, voilà, he was able to give us Christian’s details. However, the coup de grâce was — and this was only revealed by chance as we are leaving — that the unusually high volume of traffic was because of roadworks on the main road to Paris; all the traffic was being diverted! I could have wept for joy. How momentous life decisions can hinge on the slightest chance. If it had not come up as we were about to say au revoir, our ultimate decision, and the following years and chapters in our lives, might have all been vastly different. There was no other way we could have known or found out about the roadworks.
There was another vital piece of information, too. Every day except for Mondays, a bread van arrives at the restaurant at 7.30 am. This was the other main thing we needed, as each trip to the shops meant time away from work on the house. However, even though we consumed vast quantities of pain, including just plain bread for dinner some nights — no fromage, no pâté, just plain bread (well, there was some wine at least), as we are simply working so hard — I never did get to the bread van. I was up
early every day to work, and yet the only time I ever thought of racing down the road in my renovating clothes was, of course, on Mondays. Next year.
The fact that our petite maison was right on the road turned out to be one of its best features, as the road carried new friends to us. For the three weeks we were there, as we didn’t have a table or chairs, we ate all our meals on the front steps. In fact, even when we did get furniture, we had become so accustomed to eating our meals and having a glass of wine on our petite steps that we continued to sit there anyway. It meant that we saw everyone driving past and I waved to absolutely everyone, conscious that it was a small village and I wanted very much to be a part of it. George, the restaurant owner, started to slow down on our corner and looked out for me, as I would usually be having breakfast at that point. He would wave and call out, ‘Ça va?’ It was one of the few expressions I knew I could reply to. I later found out that he had recently lost his wife and went every morning to visit her grave as well as check on his land. What is special was that I also found out he is not usually so friendly, so that made me even more inclined to look out for him. Goodness knows what he really thought of me as I would have just fallen out of bed, pulled on my work clothes and grabbed my breakfast. There was no time for the vanity of looking in a mirror or even brushing my hair. I knew that I was utterly lacking in style, but I felt compelled to start working as soon as possible.
More new friends. We were working from sun-up to sundown, and our daily rhythm was constructed around endless lists. Lists of what to buy and what tasks each of us were going to tackle every day. I only wish that I’d kept all those endless lists as they were a record of our daily life. Yet, in the midst of often sixteen-hour days — and often I didn’t go anywhere at all — we started to make friends. When I look back, it’s strange as I was so focused on seeing our little farmhouse for the first time that I hadn’t even thought about the village or the people we may possibly meet. Strange for me, too, as usually that is something I would give a lot of thought to. It was a truly unexpected bonus not only to have met the people in the village, but also to have made friends. And not merely friends, but true friends who we had an instant connection with. After a mere three weeks, they quickly became a part of what would be the joy of returning each year to our house in the village.
I have to add here that having a house in France, on the other side of the world, is the stuff of dreams. It is all very surreal. I’ve been there and worked on the house, yet when I’m back in Australia it seems very much a dream. It is not the sort of thing that ordinary people do, and yet here we were, now no longer ordinary.
Meeting Jean-Claude
I don’t remember how early on it was that we met Jean-Claude; however, as soon as we did, he was a part of the tapestry of our life every single day. He was our new ‘best friend’ and was like a fairy godfather and knight in shining armour all rolled into one. And yet I was so very close to not meeting him. What I do remember is dashing out the front — maybe to shake a paintbrush — and seeing a distinctive figure striding up the road. I was so utterly focused on renovating every possible moment that I didn’t even pause to smile or say, ‘Bonjour.’ No, I dashed back in to keep working. Yet something propelled me to almost immediately go back out the side door to greet him. I am so grateful that I did and I think my first words were, ‘Oh, you speak English!’ I invited him to see our house and all our work, and that turned out to be the start of his daily visits, sometimes up to three or four times a day. He took an avid interest in all that we were doing, and what was magnificent was that he would go away and reflect on many of the things we were doing and come back to share his advice and knowledge. He even went to the extent of looking up on the internet what things needed further checking.
One of the many favours that Jean-Claude did for us was to come up with the perfect name for our barn, La Forge. He told us that there used to be blacksmiths in the area and that it would be just right. We thought we had also come up with perfect name for our house: Pied de la Croix, named after the man we bought it from. So, we were very surprised to discover that, just near our house, there were signs to other houses with the very same name! And indeed, nearby was a little iron cross in the grass with Pied De La Croix engraved upon it. We had even checked whether it was acceptable, according to French custom, to have this name, so we were also disappointed and confused not to have a unique name. Our intention had been to honour the previous owners and name the house after them, as well as to retain its sense of history. As always, with our myriad of questions, it was back to Jean-Claude for an explanation.
We discovered it was, in fact, an extraordinary coincidence, for not only was it the name of the previous owner of our house but it also means ‘the foot of the cross’. Despite other maisons in our village sharing our carefully chosen name, we decided to keep the link to our petite maison’s past. So, now, the house and the barn would each have a name. Jean-Claude told us in an email later that
Regarding la forge, there were several in the village since horses had to be attended to and Mr Dal’s house was a relay for postilions and carriages. The house next to yours was indeed a forge and café in old times since the two went together for people thirsty from travel in sun, heat or cold, dust, and the fire of the forge!
Monsieur Dal was the man we bought our petite maison from. The original owners were de la Croix. You can see their name carved into the golden stone outside the heavy barn doors. Another layer of history and meaning.
Pied de la Croix is the small district where our house is, as opposed to the bourg (city centre) where Jean-Claude and Françoise’s house, Le Vieux Prieuré, is. There is a cross by the ex forge, and the cross sort of dominates a small area, hence the appellation ‘pied de la croix’. It makes it sound like a large town when, in fact, it is a small village of only about 300 people. Le Vieux Prieuré, or the old priory, is most definitely not in a city centre! Our village doesn’t even have a single shop any longer. However, the room that is right on the street of Le Vieux Prieuré was originally a shop. It is the only part of Le Vieux Prieuré you can glimpse, as the rest is hidden behind high stone walls; outside is a bell you can pull to announce your arrival. It is now Françoise’s guest room and the place she chooses to iron, for, hidden behind her lace curtains, she can keep an eye on all the comings and goings in our village.
La Forge
Did I mention the barn? Now, the barn is a mere four metres from our house and yet it took us five days — yes, five whole days — before we had time to venture in and explore it. We certainly intended to every single day but time always overtook us. That was despite getting up very early and staying up far, far later than I absolutely ever do at home. The house got under my skin in a way that I could never have possibly anticipated. It was like no other renovation we had undertaken before. Likewise, it was two whole weeks before we finally managed to walk around our village. It seems ridiculous in retrospect, but time was always rapidly ebbing.
The barn. How can I describe it? It is huge and needs lots and lots of work to make it into a home. That will also require lots and lots of money and, for now, and a long time to come, it remains in the category of dreams. However, knowing Stuart’s passion for projects, I’m sure that one day the conversion will also become a reality. However, what was fascinating, upon seeing it for the first time, was that I could see exactly how it could be transformed into an absolutely stunning space. Equally fascinating was how the vision just came to me, considering I had never been into a single French barn in my life, let alone one that had been converted. Even before we could contemplate at what point the conversion would ever take place, it seemed to take on a life of its own. Before we knew it, the barn already had a name, La Forge. As with so many of the things we discovered about both our new home and village, Jean-Claude brought it all to life for us. We also found out the owners of our petite maison made their money from the elusive truffles. What a pity there are no longer any left for us to make our fortu
ne.
Back to the road and how it turned out to be such a stroke of good fortune and the source of our wonderful new friends. A few days after meeting Jean-Claude, a car pulled up in the front of our little house. It was Jean-Claude and his delightful wife, Françoise. When we met Françoise, it was like two guardian angels swooped down and ‘rescued’ us. I will always remember the first time we met her, as they arrived to whisk us off for a much-needed respite to their fairytale house. It was like being in a children’s book, especially the tour of their enchanting home. When I first met Françoise I flung myself into her arms. Her face is one of the kindest and friendliest I have ever known. I must have innately sensed her wonderful, warm spirit; now that I have come to know her even better, I was right to instinctively allow myself to be enfolded in her affectionate embrace.
Though just a few minutes from our house, we went with them since they were already in their car. While Le Vieux Prieuré is right on the main road, the garage is at the back of their property. This meant walking across the sweeping expanse of perfectly mown grass to arrive at the rear of their home. Françoise led me through an arbour, cunningly placed to reveal their pool and beautiful surrounds as you walk through. I’m sure I gasped aloud — it was just like a luxury resort. We then entered their house on the lower level; there are seven levels in all. It was one of those magical and privileged experiences that rarely, if ever, arise in your life. We could have spent years going to France without ever receiving an invitation into someone’s home, let alone one as magical as this. Then we ascended the wide, sweeping stone stairs with stained-glass windows perfectly placed so that shards of light glow upon the centuries-old stone. The tower was built in the thirteenth century, and the small window was to watch for invaders. It comes complete with a trapdoor. I felt a close sense of the past and heard echoes of the invaders appearing in the distance.
Our House is Not in Paris Page 4