Farewell My French Love Read online

  Jane is sitting at one of many outdoor tables, where large umbrellas shade her from the late afternoon sun. ‘What are you going to drink?’ I ask as I join her.

  ‘I’m not having anything. I think I’ll go back to the hotel,’ she says.

  ‘But it’s not even six o’clock, what about dinner? I thought we might eat here,’ I say in a voice quivering with disbelief. ‘It is exquisite with lovely old French chandeliers.’ I’m stunned. Our first evening in Provence will be a bitter disappointment for me! I will be eating alone. Whatever can I say to convince her to stay and dine with me in this authentic provincial setting?

  ‘The tables are set with linen and there’s such a pretty floral arrangement on a wine barrel.’ Her stance is unbelievable and I’m a tad alarmed. Jane is not sick and she seemed to be having a jolly good time in the store. Yet, I’m wondering if she doesn’t want to eat with me tonight because of an altercation in the tapas restaurant last night. Why not a drink for goodness sake! Surely she is getting hungry. After all, lunch was a shared baguette. Oh, and an apple each.

  ‘Jane, I don’t want to return to the hotel now; we’ve only just got here,’ I state, glancing at my watch showing it’s only 5.40 pm. ‘It’s our first evening in Provence; you’ve never been here before.’

  ‘It looks very lovely, but honestly Nadine, I’m not hungry.’ And she repeats that she wants to return to the hotel.

  ‘Do you mind if I have dinner here? It’s the kind of place Oli would find for us.’

  ‘No, I’m happy for you to find somewhere that pleases you.’

  Except that I’m not pleased at all. Actually, I am furious. It is unthinkable to miss a meal in France. And this is my first dinner in France since Oli and I shared our last dinner together in Paris three years ago. I don’t know that I will be able to dine alone without weeping.

  As she walks away, I return inside and make a booking for one for dinner. My disappointment is exacerbated by the crisp manner of the French waitress who tells me curtly that I must wait for another twenty minutes until 6 pm. So I order a white wine and return to the outdoor area where I sit alone and sip and brood.

  Being alone is the widow’s lot and I must get used to it. Life does go on; I’m proving that. I’m no longer too frozen with fear to even answer the telephone. But my life is like railway tracks—sadness and new experiences mutually exist for me. It seems I cannot have one without the other.

  I have plenty of time to wallow in thought. Well-meaning friends gave me brochures about grief, which named so many steps to recovery. I didn’t want to be looking for ‘anger’ or that final stage of ‘acceptance’. I grasped my own truth. That my husband deserved a long period of mourning, or grieving, and I thought, intellectually, that this may take two years. Here I am at the sixteen-month mark and still having emotional breakdowns like a few days ago. I understand acceptance only too well, having to accept the reality of Olivier’s death sentence while he was still alive. After he died, it seemed natural for me to devise ways to keep him with me. I imagined him in the car while driving; I wrote him little letters at night and over the dinner table, I would tell him things. It was another kind of loss when these habits naturally faded. I had no choice. That first Christmas the whole family descended upon Belair for days and the noisiness and busyness of bed-making, gift-giving, the play of grandchildren and wining and dining together, blotted out my sorrow for a time. And there’s no denying it, I felt ‘a little better’. I did enjoy the new baby and the grandchildren filling my house with their banter. But nothing lasted. When the house was emptied once more, that dead flatness of grief returned. I told myself seven months was too soon to recover.

  My experiences and my readings of other people facing enormous grief, like C.S. Lewis and A.S. Byatt, fit my own reality. I won’t ‘get over’ Olivier. He is my silent companion as I walk through life. I have enjoyed today with Jane, but every experience is still referred back to the memory bank in my head of our seven years travelling France together and our married life in Australia.

  If someone asked me about the experience of grief following the loss of a loved one, I would say it is like a wild animal in your head. Overwhelming. Uncontrollable emotions. Sadness lingers day and night, and, perhaps where I am now—lingering longing for one’s beloved.

  Each of us has a unique experience depending on the level of attachment and commitment. I cannot imagine what it must be like to lose a child of any age.

  My aim now is number ten of the grief pamphlet Olivier and I were given when we first registered him for palliative care. It says that nothing will ever be the same, yet somehow you must go on and find meaning in a new path. Healing and personal growth may become a result of the suffering I have endured. And I hope my journey with Jane will help me heal.

  I snap out of my thoughts and take a table in the restaurant. Promptly, the waitress with the stony expression asks for my à la carte order, and explains without emotion that dessert is a smorgasbord, gesticulating to a central display. Un garçon is placing tortes and gateaux alongside a tray of mousse cups. ‘You will have an excellent choice of eight different desserts,’ she tells me.

  Suddenly I’m relieved Jane has gone and I’m already salivating on the sweetness to come.

  Oli and I shared an abiding love of food and wine. He taught me so much about food culture in France and over our years together, I learnt to cook most of the well-known nouvelle cuisine dishes. Each dining table I ever sat at over those annual holidays in this glorious country, the diners would discuss all aspects of the food we devoured. At home, our own dinner table conversation revolved around the food we prepared: its method of cooking, cut of the beast, herbs used, types of sauces, and so on. I was never bored by food talk and became a proficient cook. It’s the sharing and learning about food and wine which is so much a part of the French psyche. This is a country where schools have chefs for midday meals. So, it’s difficult for me to not have someone to share tonight’s dinner.

  The pork and prune dish I select is a delight, but my real joy is the desserts. One must be restrained, of course, so I indulge in only three slivers of delicious gateaux. I devour the chocolate torte first, counting five thin layers of sponge cake gummed together with jam and cream. Ah, this is my fill for the next three days … until I get to Paris.

  I hadn’t thought about my lone walk back to the hotel and as I trudge in the gathering darkness down Rue de la République, I’m gripped by unease. It is only 8.35 pm, but unlike Australia in summer, the night is closing in. I hurry down the deserted side-street, past the cemetery, under the bridge and beyond the kindergarten.

  I walk as fast as my ankle will allow for it is aching from the brisk half-hour walk. Had we really walked that far this afternoon? The sky is black as pitch by the time I enter the hotel. Relieved, but flustered and sweaty from tension, I notice the hotel clock reads 9.05 pm.

  In our room, Jane is reading in her bed. ‘Hello darling, how was your dinner?’

  ‘Lovely food, but few people. Probably only four other couples,’ I report. ‘There was a mother and daughter sitting close by and I wish I could have understood them: I think it was the mother’s birthday as she received a gift.’ I pause before adding, ‘That’s the problem in a restaurant in France; people speak in low voices, not like us in Australia.’ I smile remembering our loud argument in Barcelona.

  ‘I’m taking a shower,’ I say. ‘I had no idea we’d walked so far this afternoon. I’m pooped.’

  I shampoo my hair, which also washes away anxiety. Refreshed, and dressed in my pyjamas, I’m still drying my hair when I return to the bedroom. And bang! My sore ankle shrieks in pain as I trip on Jane’s suitcase and stumble into the room.

  ‘What is that suitcase doing halfway into the room?’ I exclaim.

  ‘You should look where you are going,’ she retorts.

  Ruffled further by her words I snap back. ‘Have you by any chance noticed that I have been limping all around Barcelona with
a very sore ankle?’ My fierce tone has as much to do with fatigue as rage at her carelessness.

  Whatever the explanation, I bend down and shove the suitcase back into the wall heater. And then for good measure, bang it sideways into the lounge chair, stating witheringly ‘How about a sorry?’

  When none is forthcoming I add for good measure ‘Now it’s out of the doorway!’

  Silence hangs like an ugly cloud over the room. I sit in the lounge chair and continue drying my hair with the towel for ten minutes before I pick up my own book—a volume of six novels by the famous French author Colette. Jane says nothing, but out the corner of my eye I see her put her book down, switch off her light and disappear under the covers.

  Later I put myself to bed and neither of us says goodnight. I can’t bring myself to apply my mother’s message of a lifetime ‘Never let the sun go down on your wrath.’ Even though I fear our friendship is going belly up. And on our first day in France, for goodness sake! Sleep doesn’t come for hours.

  We had established a good morning routine in Barcelona. Jane rises early, uses the bathroom and goes to breakfast while I have a lazier start, meditating for half an hour before joining her, by which time Jane has finished eating and is enjoying her cup of tea. So there is nothing unusual this morning about her disappearing downstairs before I get up.

  When I enter the dining room she is avidly reading the daily International Herald Tribune.

  ‘Good morning,’ I announce and she responds in like manner, but I notice she has dropped the ‘darling’.

  I cannot let our serious altercation last night worry me because I expect this moment of angst to pass as it did when Oli and I had a disagreement (usually over a roadmap!). Anyway, I am a tad nervous about today’s challenge. I am going to drive back to St Remy de Provence and it will be a highlight of my holiday. St Remy is the one place in France where I feel at home. Each time I have stayed there, I have driven around to a number of provincial villages by myself whenever I got bored staying with Olivier’s mother in her tiny unit. I have gained confidence behind the wheel of a car in France.

  On our way to pick up the hire car, I ask the taxi driver in humble French the best way to St Remy. I gather the gist of his rapid speech with the word pont (bridge) and the phrase ‘vous tournez à gauche’. You turn left. To understand a native-speaking French person is the one thing I hope to achieve from my lessons in Paris. So I ask would he be good enough to draw us a map.

  ‘C’est facile, Madame,’ he says reassuringly. ‘Sur le pont vous tournez à gauche.’ Over the bridge you turn left.

  ‘Où est le pont?’ Where is the bridge?

  ‘Là, Madame,’ he says, pointing to a large bridge over the River Rhône on our right. And then, as we draw closer to the bridge, he turns left suddenly and winds his way through an industrial estate, until we see the bright Avis sign.

  ‘You are lucky,’ says the Avis assistant, whose name is Sylvie. ‘You have been upgraded to a very nice car.’

  After signing papers, Sylvie ushers us outside again. A young man is pulling up in a late model silver Mercedes Benz.

  ‘Is this for us?’ I ask incredulously.

  The assistant, now dangling the keys, answers with a polite ‘Bien sûr Madame’.

  The shiny vehicle is idling. We had requested a modest, middle-of-the-range four-cylinder French vehicle. I’ve never driven such a fabulous luxury car.

  ‘Oh, my goodness a Mercedes Benz,’ I gasp and grab the startled woman, giving her an impulsive hug. ‘It’s wonderful! Such a treat!’ The poor woman, being French and unaccustomed to such physical expressions of delight, has no option but to succumb as I pull her into my chest.

  Then, gaining her composure, she shakes herself free. She lets a little show of pleasure slip from her lips as they curl slightly revealing that she is pleased to cause such joy for this eccentric Australian.

  I give Jane a more measured hug, not sure of her reaction. ‘We’re going to have such fun,’ I say.

  Hers is a wan smile.

  ‘Can we check if I’m insured as a passenger?’ she asks Sylvie.

  ‘Only the driver is insured, Madame,’ she responds.

  More paperwork, cash changes hands and soon Sylvie is explaining the controls of this automatic machine with its black leather seats, glass roof and timber trim.

  ‘I think I will treat this as if it is bone china,’ I quip as we strap ourselves in and take off.

  We get about fifty metres, as far as the roundabout when we discover we have no GPS. I turn the car around and soon a portable GPS is sitting on the dashboard. Again we reach the roundabout, when Jane says, ‘She is not speaking … we only have the map image … she should be telling us what to do.’ We return.

  Soon we have a voice and an image and we hear a perfect English accent tell me to take the second turn at the roundabout.

  Why didn’t I listen? I’m furious with myself for not doing what I was told. But, what is so frustrating is that I find myself on a road back to the walled city. We are locked in by a median strip between us and the lane going in the other direction to St Remy.

  ‘You took the first turn instead of the second one,’ says Jane, remarkably calm.

  I know exactly the mistake I have made and I also know that I must about-turn as soon as possible. I notice a cut in the curb creating an access laneway through the median strip, but the shrubs have restricted vision until we are almost upon it. I brake.

  Jane screams ‘a truck!’ in synergy with a shattering blast of a klaxon horn in my ear. ‘You’ll get us killed Nadine!’ shrieks my frantic friend, who is probably glaring at me. I glance into the rear-vision mirror to see the large grill of a huge truck upon us. I do not look at her. I’m too busy in the access laneway trying to sneak into a constant stream of traffic going out of Avignon. Jane’s scream, the truck’s honking and taking the wrong turn-off have unnerved me.

  At least this is the best reason for missing the next clue. I’m so chuffed turning onto the bridge that I forget to turn left.

  By now Jane has switched off the GPS with its incessant instruction to ‘take the second turn at the roundabout’.

  Soon we’re on the open road and I’m relaxed and beginning to enjoy the experience. How clever am I given that the steering wheel is on the left-hand side of the car and that I’m driving this dream machine on the right-hand side of the road, the opposite to Australian road rules.

  Three years have passed since I merrily drove around St Remy environs, but so much has happened to strip me of my confidence. So I emailed Dominique to remind me of the basic road rules in France. His response was a simple, ‘Sit your bum on the middle line on the right and don’t budge.’ Which is what I’m doing now. But suddenly there is a piercing shriek from my right and Jane has her hands to her face. ‘You’re too far over!’ she screams. ‘Move over, move over!’

  ‘Which way?’

  ‘You’re about to run off the road!’

  I explain Dominique’s road rules and that I have lined up the edge of the wiper with the white line and I cannot get any closer or I will be on the other side. ‘We will have a head-on accident,’ I explain.

  She’s quiet for five minutes when she lets out a scream that could shatter glass. ‘There’s a ditch here and you’re going to end up in it if you don’t move over!’

  If it only happened twice I wouldn’t be in the state I’m in now, but she continues with varying scales of shrieking. Hell! There’s a shrew in the car and I’m wondering whatever happened to cool, independent Jane. Where is that courageous long-time friend who travelled India by herself for six weeks after a relationship breakup? She, who piled her clothes into the back of her car, placed her Melbourne home in Fitzroy on the market and drove all the way to Sydney to live alone, landing a plum job with a New South Wales government department. How awesome to uproot her life like that!

  However, surely she has lost her nerve. I know that I’m holding the steering wheel as steady as the c
lock’s hour hand; I’m not veering left or right. I feel in control of the wheel. I was enjoying the drive.

  ‘If you continue to scream at me I’ll get very nervous and have an accident,’ I say. I’m remarkably calm and every fibre in my body has warned me against losing my temper and yelling back.

  At this cool, calm response, Jane laughs. ‘Nadine, I didn’t know you could be so calm. You aren’t a bit nervous, are you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, I’m a nervous passenger and I will let you in on a secret. I choose not to sit in the front with Peter because his driving makes me nervous. I sit in the back.’

  Now she tells me! ‘Oh, I have a solution. If you yell again, I will make you sit in the back.’

  And she laughs in her warm way.

  Silence reigns perhaps ten minutes when she yells again in terror: ‘You are too close again. If you don’t keep away from the side of the road I’m going to get out and walk!’

  At this baseless threat I roar with laughter. It is one of those belly laughs which sweep away anxiety. But a new problem has arisen.

  During all this carry-on, we haven’t seen one sign to St Remy. This is worrying because there are about six roads into the town and over the years staying there I have managed to take each of them to Les Baux, to Glanum and to Arles, but not Avignon.

  ‘I think we are lost, Jane. That last sign was to Arles. I reckon we have somehow missed St Remy.’

  We drive on another few minutes until we reach the village of Graveson and on the outskirts I spot a cave (wine shop). I pull over and stop.

  ‘Wait here!’ I command.

  There are two people in the store, a saleswoman and a customer—an older man dressed in overalls, who has bought a box of wine.

  ‘Excusez-moi Madame, je suis perdue,’ I say, knowing it is the habit of French people to pretend they don’t speak English. (Excuse me, Madame, I am lost.) I surely need their help so I add, ‘Je cherche St Remy de Provence.’