You have to have read the previous posting.
It is almost 21h, that is 9pm, new time, Spring time.
I just wandered outside with the rain spitting as it does in this region and down at the woodland at the end of the field which is the garden at Village de Vaux can be heard the nightingale preparing her speech and not yet in full song. I am in love. She or he who is so enchanting must surely fill hearts... but not of those who cannot hear.
To be unable to hear would be terrible. It would be worth the hearing aid.
Listen to this.
Read this.
Hark! that's the nightingale,
Telling the self-same tale
Her song told when this ancient earth was young:
So echoes answered when her song was sung
In the first wooded vale.
- Christina Georgina Rossetti, Twilight Calm
Thank you Spring. Thank you March.
Sunday, 27 March 2011
The Spring moves forward as the clock changes time
Now the rain is sprinkling the land after days of glorious sunshine. Dry weather and warmth started their promise for a summer to celebrate life.
The daffodils in my new garden at Angles sur L'Anglin have had to be watered three times a day to prevent them lying prostrate on the ground in the heat and drought, but at Village de Vaux they do not appear to need extra water. Tulips are coming into bloom. Cowslips (les coucous) have been in flower for over a week. The cherry and plum trees blossom, but are almost finished. The bees have been about their work. I made a herb garden from the bonfire ashes. It’s a kind of raised bed with recycled wood to create an edge. Boxwood plants surround the edge and it is intended to be a sensory garden. There are no grand plans just an impulse to create something interesting. Elsewhere flower seeds have been scattered and plants transplanted and there is more to do. There is always more to do. It must be a pleasure rather than a chore.
Before Christmas I purchased several shrubs. Now they stand in a row intending a hedge between neighbouring gardens. The black redstart and the robin vie with each other for worms revealed in the earth. Digging 12 deep holes, filling with compost and then the shrubs was hard so I have given up for the moment on putting down textile fabric. Logistics and energy went out of my head.
My French neighbour who rarely has conversation came to the boundary to ask questions about what was this and what was I going to do with that, then asked me round for coffee but we had tea and proceeded to ask even more questions about the house, telling me her viewpoint on what needed to be done and how she would do it, and what the price should have been. Hm… I did retaliate with questions so admit that I tried to deflect the interrogation away from my private life. Did I understand her French correctly? Hm… She thinks I should not have lavender in my herb garden because lavender is huge. It can be true of course, but also there are some pretty dwarf-type varieties of lavender and I do like French lavender flowers.
The first lizard of the year was seen on Thursday and on Friday the reinettes (small green tree frogs) began to chuckle to each other. Every day I open the window and wait with bated breath to hear the cuckoos and nightingales that abound the rear of Village de Vaux and create magic in my life with their incessant song. This morning I am rewarded with the call of the Cuckoo in the woodland at the end of the field. I hear it, but it takes several seconds to register …aha, there she is! Now I await the Nightingales, which are private and hide themselves from view. They lure with their captivating, enchanting song. The house martins and swallows arrived about a week ago screeching and squealing as also fighter planes flew overhead. Turtledoves romantically canoodle and repeat their cooing. Pheasants, or partridges more likely, are chook-chooking in the field beyond the grape vines, hidden from my view.
Loirets or maybe the glis glis (edible dormouse) called “bandits” are in the combles. As there is no accessible attic we will have to remove the roof tiles to check on what is happening up there. I lie in bed with a fly swat and bang the ceiling and walls at the least sound of entry or exit of the little darlings! They woke me up the other night with a swishing and swirling as if a train was arriving or as if a waterfall had appeared. I think they are mating! So sweet looking but a nuisance.
Blogging has taken a bit of a step backwards as I am pretty exhausted with manual labour but Captain Sensible has been able to make progress on my new house….little by little......we will arrive.
I oscillate between hope and despair, of pessimism and optimism: I realise that dreams are made to be broken if ever they get created.
Yet, walking along the lane of life in France I am transported into WONDERLAND.
I am trying to play the piano more frequently. Yesterday, it was just one note, one particular note, Db in its melodic and harmonic context, that reduced me to sobs of tears. Chopin does that. On other days a sequence of notes and their harmonies ill have created heart-wrenching pain but I never know when it is going to happen if indeed it does. Sometimes I am afraid to play because I don't want to cry when I play. Sometimes I play and create pure inner smiling pleasure. Music can make me dance with joy, it makes me move, it gives me joy, it makes me as happy as a canary in a cage as well as an emotional wreck. It has been too long insufficient in my life.
Sunday, 20 March 2011
Inspiration in the kitchen with Salmon and Rosti potatoes
January 13th 2011
I felt inspired to cook something interesting and different as I had offered to cook for tonight. I just love cooking salmon. It is so simple and usually so delicious that it needs very little to accompany it.
I peeled the last of the unsuccessful 'tiny' potatoes of the Charlotte variety. They have lasted to now so how is that unsuccessful? Because they are small and we have had an abundance of small potatoes and I am the only one who is willing to peel them. They have not always needed to be peeled but they are fast throwing out shoots. Several ideas in my head amounted to opening up the very nearly vegetarian cookbook, one of those Australian cookbooks that are so marvellous, and I espied a meal we enjoy.
Rosti Charlotte potatoes, Fresh Tail Cut of Salmon, Creme Fraîche mixed with cream, wasabi, seasoning, lemon juice and tarragon, plus well-washed mâche which is like watercress and is a healthy eating food, of which we buy from our charming village 'producteur'.
There was half a bottle of delicious refrigerated Cremant de Loire opened but well-recorked, with less of a fizz but stillaplenty to accompany this January evening meal folowing a day of shopping for flooring materials and realsing that the January sales have started!
I felt inspired to cook something interesting and different as I had offered to cook for tonight. I just love cooking salmon. It is so simple and usually so delicious that it needs very little to accompany it.
I peeled the last of the unsuccessful 'tiny' potatoes of the Charlotte variety. They have lasted to now so how is that unsuccessful? Because they are small and we have had an abundance of small potatoes and I am the only one who is willing to peel them. They have not always needed to be peeled but they are fast throwing out shoots. Several ideas in my head amounted to opening up the very nearly vegetarian cookbook, one of those Australian cookbooks that are so marvellous, and I espied a meal we enjoy.
Rosti Charlotte potatoes, Fresh Tail Cut of Salmon, Creme Fraîche mixed with cream, wasabi, seasoning, lemon juice and tarragon, plus well-washed mâche which is like watercress and is a healthy eating food, of which we buy from our charming village 'producteur'.
There was half a bottle of delicious refrigerated Cremant de Loire opened but well-recorked, with less of a fizz but stillaplenty to accompany this January evening meal folowing a day of shopping for flooring materials and realsing that the January sales have started!
Wednesday, 2 March 2011
Age knows no Mercy
When you get to my age and read about the death of a particular woman from when 'Times have been a changing', and from when Times long ago produced male musical heroes who made one girlishly hysterical, one knows one is on the long long climb downhill!!
Suze-Rotolo was 67 and I have that Freewheelin' LP and it's cover somewhere I'm sure.
They were in love. Then listen to This
March begins but yesterday was not a good start!
My mother's been in hospital unexpectedly with bronchial problems and I hear again of more acquaintances and friends who have cancer. Life isn't easy. I weep too much as it is.
My car needs a lot of money to be repaired. My heart has been pounding as to what decision to make. Should I let it limp to death and abandon it for another that I know not so well.... or give it a kiss of kindness and hope it WILL be kind to me and see me through for another few months or even a year, until I can get it together to buy a newer model!
Good news on the house front with thanks to Captain Sensible ..... a floor is being laid and rooms have the sign of being loved and are keen to be lived in having been unlived in for almost two years. I DO SO HOPE to get my brain and life in gear to write that other blog.
Spring HAS to give way to NEW LIFE even though the bitter cold of today has said goodbye to the FALSE HOPE of the February warm weather.
March must hurry forwards to April and Easter and a time when a woodburner will not be required.
Suze-Rotolo was 67 and I have that Freewheelin' LP and it's cover somewhere I'm sure.
They were in love. Then listen to This
March begins but yesterday was not a good start!
My mother's been in hospital unexpectedly with bronchial problems and I hear again of more acquaintances and friends who have cancer. Life isn't easy. I weep too much as it is.
My car needs a lot of money to be repaired. My heart has been pounding as to what decision to make. Should I let it limp to death and abandon it for another that I know not so well.... or give it a kiss of kindness and hope it WILL be kind to me and see me through for another few months or even a year, until I can get it together to buy a newer model!
Good news on the house front with thanks to Captain Sensible ..... a floor is being laid and rooms have the sign of being loved and are keen to be lived in having been unlived in for almost two years. I DO SO HOPE to get my brain and life in gear to write that other blog.
Spring HAS to give way to NEW LIFE even though the bitter cold of today has said goodbye to the FALSE HOPE of the February warm weather.
March must hurry forwards to April and Easter and a time when a woodburner will not be required.
Saturday, 5 February 2011
Be still and know
Signs of Spring advance.
Tonight, be still and know.
I stood outside leaning on the oak support of the porch
(which in England or in India would be called a verandah),
langourously looking
at the whispery-grey branches of a bare plum tree,
where in just a few months,
will be adorned white petals
and the hummmmmm of beeeeeees
and after that small red-baubled jewels
will entice one to make jam or tarts.
I stood
heart full
looking at different light in clouds of night
knowing that Spring is coming.
I stood and stared and tried to find peace in my heart.
Be still.
February is such a lovely time of year when one can stand,
feel privileged to witness the rise of temperature
to appreciate the suspense of Springtime
whilst watching a world of stars in space,
scudded by moonlight behind clouds;
to know the unseen gentle brush of breeze against a background
of a seemingly, apparently empty world
yet which is full,
repeating itself year on year,
since a time before we have ever known.
This place is special.
It bares the bones of life and France.
No roaring sound of machine or man.
Emptiness.
Sheer emptiness
full of flora and fauna.
Alone in France?
Never!
Always an animal or person or stone or tree
to reveal a truth
or a smell
to haunt the mind.
It has taken so much time for me to learn it,
to know it,
to believe in it
and
yet
it drives me wild at other times to be without people.
Be still and know.
It drives me wild to oftentimes hear the silence that is not silent.
Sound is always here.
The rustle or more of the wind,
The trickle or pelt of the rain.
A vehicle moving in the distance,
A tractor passing by,
The tick of a clock,
The cough of a sheep or poney.
My cough.
My cry.
The loiret close by.
Big Feet purring likes to know
I am here.
I stood outside and hung the washing on the line.
Be still and know.
Tonight, be still and know.
I stood outside leaning on the oak support of the porch
(which in England or in India would be called a verandah),
langourously looking
at the whispery-grey branches of a bare plum tree,
where in just a few months,
will be adorned white petals
and the hummmmmm of beeeeeees
and after that small red-baubled jewels
will entice one to make jam or tarts.
I stood
heart full
looking at different light in clouds of night
knowing that Spring is coming.
I stood and stared and tried to find peace in my heart.
Be still.
February is such a lovely time of year when one can stand,
feel privileged to witness the rise of temperature
to appreciate the suspense of Springtime
whilst watching a world of stars in space,
scudded by moonlight behind clouds;
to know the unseen gentle brush of breeze against a background
of a seemingly, apparently empty world
yet which is full,
repeating itself year on year,
since a time before we have ever known.
This place is special.
It bares the bones of life and France.
No roaring sound of machine or man.
Emptiness.
Sheer emptiness
full of flora and fauna.
Alone in France?
Never!
Always an animal or person or stone or tree
to reveal a truth
or a smell
to haunt the mind.
It has taken so much time for me to learn it,
to know it,
to believe in it
and
yet
it drives me wild at other times to be without people.
Be still and know.
It drives me wild to oftentimes hear the silence that is not silent.
Sound is always here.
The rustle or more of the wind,
The trickle or pelt of the rain.
A vehicle moving in the distance,
A tractor passing by,
The tick of a clock,
The cough of a sheep or poney.
My cough.
My cry.
The loiret close by.
Big Feet purring likes to know
I am here.
I stood outside and hung the washing on the line.
Be still and know.
Thursday, 13 January 2011
Thursday, 6 January 2011
Epiphany cakes for kings and frangipane lovers
At 10 euros for the cake which serves 8 not greedy people, I reckon it is good value with our cup of Blue Lady Grey tea which I mixed with a little Green tea (unspecified) and some dried Rosehip berries from Spain.
So we chatted. I explained my amusement of making her laugh by adding decorations (feves,that is beans or figurines from previous affairs with foody delicacies!) .......a plastic fir tree from 2010 Buche du Noel, an unexpected guest or lonely shepherd, the angel keeping guard over the baby for now the Kings had departed to wish us all a Bonne Année. What a pleasure that she should receive the feve... a little frog.. Perhaps her Prince will come!
We shared gifts. I think I prefer this day to Noel and its Eve and New Year's Day and its Eve. For me it has more meaning with the coming, and going of the wise men, Balthazar, Caspar and Melchior. I feel a new tradition occurring and pourquoi pas? We are in France-home of the Good Food Appreciation Society.
And today what joy .. my daughter's Christmas Gift arrived. It was posted on 8th December and we feared it had been lost but here it is with so many little things in it that I shall open them little by little. She's always so very very good at choosing exactly the right gift!
Monday, 3 January 2011
Never have we seen a vertical rainbow
Is it an omen? As a rainbow it must be good. On the way home from work we were astounded to see near the setting sun a vertical rainbow. The sky was blue with large long clouds reaching out like fingers beckoning to us and skudding across the sky as if to make an escape. As they reached their end they would wisp upwards like meringue being whisked into peaks. We've witnessed a great many aeroplane trails in the sky, both this morning and this evening. The sunrise was so beautiful as it lifted itself over the mist laden paysage.
My internet research has led me to facts that I never knew before! This article is about photography.
Sunset Rainbows are special for three reasons.
(1) The sun's rays are nearly horizontal, so the top of the rainbow will be high in the sky. A sunset rainbow is the widest arc you'll ever see from the ground. Almost half of the full-circle rainbow can become visible.... This means the ends of the arc are nearly vertical as they intersect the horizon. Sometimes only the end segment of the rainbow appears, and if you see a photo of a vertical rainbow at the horizon, you'll know it was made at sunset (or sunrise). With a little geometry work and a sun angle chart, you can tell time using a rainbow at the horizon.
(2) At sunset, the sunlight contains more red hues and less blue (because of atmospheric scattering). This will affect the appearance of the rainbow by emphasizing the red bands and muting the blue bands. The same red tint will apply to anything on the ground illuminated by the sunset. The effect can be quite dramatic.
(3) If you're lucky, you can get a rainbow against sunset clouds. This phenomenon is gorgeous to behold, but photos seem to be few. Be sure to turn around next time you're photographing a sunset, and see if the sky behind holds anything interesting.
With grateful thanks to Photocentric
My internet research has led me to facts that I never knew before! This article is about photography.
Sunset Rainbows are special for three reasons.
(1) The sun's rays are nearly horizontal, so the top of the rainbow will be high in the sky. A sunset rainbow is the widest arc you'll ever see from the ground. Almost half of the full-circle rainbow can become visible.... This means the ends of the arc are nearly vertical as they intersect the horizon. Sometimes only the end segment of the rainbow appears, and if you see a photo of a vertical rainbow at the horizon, you'll know it was made at sunset (or sunrise). With a little geometry work and a sun angle chart, you can tell time using a rainbow at the horizon.
 |  Ireland Sunset Rainbow near The Cliffs of Moher (photo by Shannon Field) |
(3) If you're lucky, you can get a rainbow against sunset clouds. This phenomenon is gorgeous to behold, but photos seem to be few. Be sure to turn around next time you're photographing a sunset, and see if the sky behind holds anything interesting.
With grateful thanks to Photocentric
Sunday, 2 January 2011
Noises in the Night from not the Stone Martian but the Stone Marten
Awoken again, but this time as the alarm went off, with a screeching noise coming from the attic above the stairwell. I went to the landing where Big Feet was looking with interest at the ceiling. Captain Sensible got the fly whisk and banged about on all the upper floor ceilings. The noise had ceased by then.
I have suspected for over a year we have a stone marten in the roof. At first I was quite spooked and used to lose sleep but I have now got used to it! It crawls in at night knocking the roof-tiles about!
Evidently we need mothballs to dissuade it of co-habitating in the space that we can't access. They don't like noise, though they van make a lot themselves... so leaving a radio on at night is supposed to deter them! Little critter... but don't they look cute?
I have suspected for over a year we have a stone marten in the roof. At first I was quite spooked and used to lose sleep but I have now got used to it! It crawls in at night knocking the roof-tiles about!
Evidently we need mothballs to dissuade it of co-habitating in the space that we can't access. They don't like noise, though they van make a lot themselves... so leaving a radio on at night is supposed to deter them! Little critter... but don't they look cute?
has a very good description of both
I have often seen the latter in wooded areas. I hope he does not mind me promoting his website here.Listen here to the sound I heard this morning.
For those who have not yet twigged... if you hover the mouse over the highlighted areas that are then underlined and click you can go to the next site. Make sure you return here!
For those who have not yet twigged... if you hover the mouse over the highlighted areas that are then underlined and click you can go to the next site. Make sure you return here!
Saturday, 1 January 2011
Best Wishes for the New Year
This is a scene that is no more.
The second photo is of the same place by the River Anglin where now poplar trees have been razed.
I am sure regeneration will occur but to see devastation was yet another sad blow to the year 2010.
OUT OF CHAOS WILL COME ORDER
SO THAT BEAUTY WILL EMERGE
FOR WHEREVER THERE IS HOPE THERE IS ALWAYS NEW LIFE
MANY THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO IN THE MAGDALENIAN AGE
DIFFERENT TREES PROVIDED SHELTER
IN JUST A FEW YEARS TIME NEW PEOPLE
WILL EXPERIENCE THE SHADE OF YOUNG TREES.
THAT'S LIFE
WHOEVER YOU ARE AND WHEREVER YOU MAY BE
WE WISH YOU WELL FOR TODAY
AND FOR ALL THE DAYS AND MORROWS OF 2011
LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOUR AS YOU LOVE YOURSELF
with all best wishes for a
H A PP Y N E W Y E A R
much love from SweetpeainFrance
and Captain Sensible
at VillagedeVaux
