October 2019 – tofranceandback.com

Simple statement, but some days, it just hits me in the face.

This morning I opened the French doors in our hotel room in the city of Le Puy en Velay, and saw the men at the cafe across the street drinking their expresso, smoking their cigarettes, reading Le Monde on quintessentially French cane chairs…listening to the delivery trucks bringing fresh produce from the nearby farms to the small restaurants…reading the French signs of directions to the 14th century Cathedrale down the street…et voilà! It strikes me all over again that we live in FRANCE.

In our apartment, we think English, speak English, read in English, and are Americans in our dress and mannerisms. (No matter how hard I try to ‘blend in’ with the locals, I just don’t quite look French. Maybe it’s the fair skin and freckles, you think?) I don’t eat with a knife in one hand and a fork in the other. But when we leave town…oh yes, this is truly FRANCE and we truly LIVE HERE. After two years, it’s still hard to grasp.

Two years this month! Unbelievable! The first year was just all struggle – and heart surgeries and bureaucracy and frustration. Year two was exploration, settling in, getting comfortable, making friends. And soon it will be the beginning of year three…and we’ll be like seniors in high school. You are still in high school, but you have one foot straddling the line of ‘what’s next’ and your next future you. We have already started to think about ‘when, where, how.’

Another adjustment – and I just started to be really comfortable with this one! And it may not be ‘year three.’ It may be ‘year two and a half….’ but maybe not! We can’t see in our crystal ball, so we’ll take it as it comes. Every day’s a winner.

And speaking of anniversaries, very happy 4th anniversaire de mariage to Robert and Leslie! Here’s to 76 more!!!! 🙂

So I’m writing one more blog today about this city, and then I’m off to find my own cafe to découvrir la France before it slips by….

A bientôt, mes amis!

Bisous,

Mindy

Today I will hike up a volcanic spit 270 ft. high on 268 uneven, small rough-hewn stairs to get to the top of a chapel build in the year 969. (My knees started to hurt just typing this. hahaha) Answer me this – how did “THEY” get the stones and building materials and yes, even a stained glass, up a needle-nosed mountain spike in 969? No calculators, no CAD designs. People were smart.

Aiguilhe, le Rocher et la Chapelle St-Michel. Quite a hike but worth the climb!

The tallest statue is the Virgin Mary and Christ-child, made out of melted bronze from the Russian cannons captured at the Battle of Sebastopol in the Crimean War, a gift from Napoleon III to the people of Le Puy en Velay.

Le rocher et la Chapelle St. Michel is a fascinating chapel that still has the frescoes painted on the walls of St. Michael throwing the devil into the pit. It is one of the beginning points of the pilgrimage journey of 1,000 miles to St. Jacques de Compostelle in Spain, the alleged burial site of the Biblical apostle St. James. People still walk the 1,000 miles today and come to Le Puy en Velay to have their walking sticks blessed before starting.

and the view from the top, on the way down…gotta love it!

And let’s talk about LACE! If you watch the first two minutes of this video of three sisters, aged 75-85, you will understand the complexity of this ‘lost art.’ (Common’, watch it – click here.) Their fingers fly like a shell game! There is actually still a vocational school of lace-making in Le Puy en Velay so that the art of bobbin lace-making is not lost – and a really interesting history about the whole evolution of French lace-making on this link – click here. It’s fascinating! Such a piece of culture and history … today I’m in search of ‘something lace’ to bring home!

And LEMON VERBENA! Who knew flowers could taste so good? Le Puy en Velay is well known internationally for producing and distilling Verveine du Velay, a liquor derived from lemon verbena grown in part by the Carmelite nuns nearby. The liquor also includes juniper berries and 30 other herbs and spices in a closely guarded secret recipe. The plants give it a distinctive beautiful green color and it is combined with Auvergne honey, sugar and cognac.

There was a small museum and teeny tiny samples were included. 🙂

The distillery in 1929 — and today, still operating across from our hotel, in 2019!

Green (the best known, with 55% alcohol),
Gold (a softer blend, 40%),
Extra (with added cognac and matured for two years, 40%)
La Petite (weaker, 18%).

Side Note – In my experiences in western Europe, history appears to be documented for what it is – not rewritten (i.e., hidden or laundered) because it was sordid or racist or inhumane. The stories – and monuments, statues, and art – tell the good, the bad, and the ugly. Statues of warriors, insurrectionists, and kings still stand as a testament of what really happened, regardless of the political intolerance and revisionist edits of today’s historians. We as a human race need to know what happened – where – and why, so that we can UNDERSTAND and OVERCOME. Rewriting our own US history distorts our understanding and prevents us from comprehending the circumstances in which events took place and just how far we’ve come or why our actions may have been necessary in context.

Ay-yi-yi, I’m getting off my soapbox now and heading outside! Ha ha, can’t help myself. 🙂