1st August 2010 – Racing the storm

We slept long that night, and I arose to find that Xavier and Michelle were preparing to leave for Nozières, where the final fair of my WWOOFing time was to take place. It seemed strangely fitting that my last day in the area should be spent where my first day had been. That day with Caleb at the school seemed such a long time ago, and I couldn’t believe how much I’d managed to fit into the past five weeks. We agreed that the two farmers would go ahead to the fair, and that we three girls would walk there later once we had woken up properly. I had walked to Nozières on my own the previous weekend, so I knew the way. It would take us about an hour. We tramped up a hill through a forest and past a farm where donkeys brayed at us, searching for affection and a rub on the nose. Further on a flash of brown caught my eye, and the others must have seen it at the same moment, because we froze as one; a svelte doe was staring at us from between the trees, half-camouflaged beside the beige bark. We played the staring game, until one of us blinked and she, startled by the movement, disappeared on the swiftest of hooves. Up onto the hilltop then, we followed the contours around, intrepid explorers in sunhats and dresses. 

The Fête des Framboises – raspberry fair – was a little bit of a letdown. There wasn’t much going on. There were the usual market stalls, and there was a larger than usual jumble sale. I was amazed by how quickly the exciting had become the mundane; four weeks ago I would never have looked on any market stall as usual. But the locals were aware that a storm was coming and kept their visits brief. We, on the other hand, were blissfully unaware so we spent a couple of hours wandering around and then sitting and watching Michelle and Xavier, analysing them as they sold their crêpes and jams. Kira laughed, shaking her head at this improbable pair.

It was true that it was an odd coupling, but it was equally undeniable that they were happy together and right for each other. We laughed about Xavier’s catchphrases. He was fond of saying to us while we worked in the Jammery que vous êtes sages, que vous êtes sages: how good you are, how good you are! If one of us had done something well, he would exclaim quelle tête: what a head! And, my favourite, if he was stressed, he would tell us he was pas de mauvais humeur, seulement bizarre: not in a bad mood, just strange.  We also discussed how much we admired them for living their dreams as they stood there, side by side with their jams and pancakes and pottery. It made me think in turn of my own parents standing side by side at their own market stall, and how much I respected Helen for having had the courage to give up her steady job to become a craft fair stallholder spending her days making felt, and Jon for supporting her unequivocally. It also made me think how I would like to find out more about my parents when I returned home, about their lives before me.

It was on the way back that we saw the storm coming. I think we all knew it was too late, that the outcome of our walk was inevitable. But we decided to try. We raced the storm. At the most exposed crest of the hill, the storm won. Hail beat down from the heavens and battered our uncovered skin, bruising our suntans and melting into freezing rivulets in our hair. The wind blew around us in a gale, whipping up our skirts and stealing away with our sun-hats, making us run and clasp at the strange new straw birds. Rain drenched us from head to foot, and I was aware that my turquoise dress had turned improbably see-through, the dark circles of my nipples clearly visible through the fabric. Not that there were any other mad people outside but Kira and Josefien, and they were too intent on reaching the farm to notice anything so trivial. Besides, if they had noticed they would just have laughed.

Back at the house, finally, we put on a brew of chai tea to boil: cinnamon sticks, cloves, fresh ginger, cardamom pods, water, sugar and a splash of milk. The thunderstorm rumbled around the valley and the rain came down and down and down and down. We were shivering as we towelled off our dripping hair, eagerly anticipating our hot bowls of tea. The infusion seemed to take the longest time to boil. A crack of thunder close by made us jump, and Bali skittered around our feet. At home in a thunderstorm we would traditionally eat chocolate biscuits. It was probably the only way my parents could distract the tiny versions of Emily and me from our fear of the loud explosions of the snapping sky. There were no chocolate biscuits in the kitchen in Fontsoleil, but there was chocolate in abundance. We raided Michelle’s secret supplies. We were sure that she wouldn’t mind. When she got back, equally cold and wet, it was true that she didn’t mind. She joined in. 

It was time to leave. I resolved to tell my dentist nothing about my three weeks at Fontsoleil, as I suspected that I had consumed rather more sugar that month than was advisable for anybody. Michelle had been very generous, and I was leaving with five pots of the jam I had made tucked safely into my rucksack. Apparently my size seven ankles had exactly the same diameter as a large jar of jam, because my walking boots made brilliant jam-caddies. So, with jam in my shoes, I dug my heels in to the life I had shared for three weeks. I was bramble-scratched and cat-scratched and I didn’t want to leave Lamastre, tucked away in the valley of forests. I didn’t want to leave the friends I had made. Anne-Marie had asked me the previous week at market if I wasn’t bored of ardèchois life yet. Not at all. On the contrary, the longer I had stayed, the more excited about life I had become.  My only balm against moving on was the prospect of a proper toilet.