It is the time in France for grapes to be picked, loaded into slow tractors that you often end behind of when driving, and taken to the closest wine co-op for processing. Our neighbors have plots of vines and I was hoping to help cut some grapes by hand but somehow it never happened. I am sure it is very hard work. Anyway, the other day I heard a tractor putt by and grabbed my camera to get some photos of grapes being cut from the vines by machine, the usual way for making alot of wines.

Not too clear as the sun was shining into my lens.

View from the side

The grapes are collected into two containers on the side of the processor and then dumped into a waiting tractor.

A common view on the roads during the vendage season

The next day I was on my way to Aix when I passed the wine co-op which had alot of activity going on. Usually, the doors are down and the only thing to be seen is cars of customers there to buy wine. But this day I saw six or so tractors with wagons full of grapes waiting to be processed. I parked and got out of my car to take photos. They were all very nice and friendly and didn’t mind my interest at all. One of the drivers even gave me some grapes to taste which were very sweet and flavorful and will, I imagine, lead to some good wine. The grapes are dumped into a huge container behind which are women entering information into computers. There was an open grid on the floor and you could see down two stories where the grapes were crushed and then sent on to holding tanks.

Grapes being dumped into the holding container

This is the man that gave me a grape to taste about to dump his load of grapes into the holder.

The co-op where they have been doing business since 1924

I followed the smell of grapes to behind the co-op and found the grape skins and leaves coming out of a pipe onto the ground. There is a smart woman who wondered if something could be done with the grape skins and seeds and came up with some creams for the skin called Caudale. It is very good stuff with an incredibly wonderful smell that can be bought in French pharmacies. There is also a Caudale spa outside of the city of Bordeaux.

I enjoy trying the wines of Provence and the experience of seeing how it is produced after watching it grow in local vineyard really adds to the pleasure of it all. It is great to sit out on our patio with a meal and hold up a glass of wine knowing which vineyard it came from-part of the joy of living in France.

Last year we were eating in an Italian restaurant and were given free apperatives. It was a light, lemon tinged liquor. After the meal I got the name so I could buy it for myself. I love anything sweet so it was no surprise when a French friend told me that most after dinner drinks, such as limoncello or Contreaux, had sugar in them, along with very potent alcohol. A few months later I saw on the Internet that you could make your own limoncello so I thought I would give it a try.

First you must buy a bottle of special alcohol for this although some people just use vodka.

This is what I bought.

Next you must get the peel off of a dozen lemons or so and, this is important, get off as much of the white part of the skin as you can as this can lead to bitterness. This is a real pain in the neck and took me a long time. The peel is added to the liquor and a glass container-I had to use jars as I can’t find any large containers in France. This mixture sits in a dark, cool place for 40 days, rather like Noah.

I marked my calendar and removed the mixture at the end of the time and the alcohol and turned a lovely yellow color. Then you make a sugar syrup with 4 1/2 cups of sugar and 5 cups of water that boils for 5 minutes, gets cooled down and then added to the lemon mixture. At this time-I misread the recipe-you add another bottle of the alcohol. Then it is another 40 days into the closet.

Take out the peels and strain the mixture and put it into cute bottles. I didn’t have any cute bottles so I reused the alcohol bottle and a couple of wine bottles. Maurice thinks the drink is way to sweet and so I bought some more alcohol to add to it but I sort of like that sweet thick lemon-ness.

So, would I do it again? Probably not. The bottle of alcohol cost me ten euros and I saw a bottle of limoncello at the store for thirteen euros. I don’t know if it was worth the savings of three euros for all of the labor I put into it, but it is sort of a voyage back in time before things weren’t very available in every store.

I have a friend that I met via the Internet that loves hats. No matter where we are, and it is usually at markets or shops, she always trys on hats.

She didn’t buy any of these but I have been with her when she has-it is always a big one-and she hand carried home on the plane.

I don’t know about you, but summer sure went by quickly for me. It seems like it was just a few weeks ago that we arrived in Provence to fill the pool and plant some flowers and vegetables. Now I am pulling up spent tomato plants and feeling that first faint chill in the air.

I probably never would have discovered poetry if it hadn’t been for a few literature classes that I took in college, but I found that I do love it. I don’t read it alot but here is one I saw in the interesting book by Patricia Atkinson called The Ripening Sun about her life in France.

Autumn

by James Tomson

I solitary court

The inspiring breeze, and meditate the book

Of Nature, ever open, aiming thence

Warm from the heart to learn the moral song

And, as I steal along the sunny wall,

Where autumn basks, with fruit empurpled deep,

My pleasing theme continual prompts my thought-

Presents the downy peach, the shining plum

With a fine bluish mist of animals

Clouded, the ruddy nectarine, and dark

Beneath his ample leaf the luscious fig,

The vine too here her curling tendrils shoots,

Hangs out her clusters glowing to the south,

And scarcely wishes for a warmer sky.

I am often asked how I happened to meet and marry a Frenchman. Women often ask with awe and longing in their voices, like it must be heavenly, like it was magic or something. I guess it must not be that common although you wouldn’t think that if you started looking at all of the blogs out there written by American women married to French men.

I was married before, for 26 years, to an American. After a very painful divorce and finding out how much of an illusion my marriage had been, I went through years of depression and floating about in life. I became a traveling nurse and moved around the States like a ball in pinball machine. It wasn’t until my oldest son and his wife were expecting their first child, my first grandchild, that I decided I wanted to be back in Texas. I didn’t want to move back to Dallas where I had lived with my ex, so I choose Austin, a city I had always been fascinated with. It’s not like most places in Texas but has a looser ambiance, a hippy feel left over from the 60’s.

By then almost seven years had passed since my divorce and I felt ready to start dating again. I even joined a dating club and must have dated a dozen men but nothing clicked. Then I was set up on a blind date by some friends with this Frenchman. Was it love at first sight? No, but I found him attractive and he was a very nice man. A gentle man. He didn’t have that force field and aggressiveness that most American men seem to have and I found that refreshing. It wasn’t until our third date that there was that “bing” as he calls it.

We dated for about 6 months and it was wonderful. Then he got transferred back to Paris-he worked for IBM. I visited him there a short time later and loved it, Paris not being the most romantic city in the world for nothing. But, when he asked me if I loved him enough to marry him one day, I really panicked. I wasn’t ready for marriage. I liked being single and in control of my life. So I went back to the States and started dating other men again. I broke it off with Maurice. Maurice is a man who can quietly get things done and get them done his way. He got himself transferred back to Austin a year later. The minute I heard his voice on the phone when he called me after he arrived, I don’t know why, but I knew I would marry him.

We had our wedding in France, in a small village near Annecy close to the Swiss border. We ended up back in France via IBM again. Maurice retired a few years later and we still live in France. I know he would move back to the States with me if I wanted but I am enjoying life so much here that, even with guilt and longing for my family in the States, we live in France.

Why am I writing this? We will celebrate our 7th wedding anniversary this week. Has it all been a fairy tale? Of course not. We’ve had our ups and downs but I have a fantastic life and he really is a wonderful man. I never could have guessed the direction my life would take, how with the closing and opening of various doors in life I would end up in France. I never spoke French, I never had a longing to live in France. I did have the longing to travel and see as much of the world as I could and I certainly have been doing that with Maurice. I wasn’t sure if love would ever come to me again after my divorce, but it did. I feel like I am in part II of my life, and it is fabulous.