Making Fire

Today marks 2 weeks since we left Canada. We’ve experienced so much in that time that it’s hard to believe it’s only been that long. We still have 12 weeks left which is honestly amazing because we could come home tomorrow and feel satisfied. (That being said, we’re not gonna so we’ll still see you in January).

I know I’ve said it before but for those of you reading, which I guess is all of you, the best thing you could ever do for yourself or your kids is to board a plane and fly somewhere, anywhere and “resort or vacation spot” doesn’t even have to be in the title. We chose to stay at out of the way places on purpose and it has ABSOLUTELY been the best the decision we’ve made. Touristy places are fine to visit, but to stay or live there longer than 3 days, not worth it. Not only are they 2-3 times more busy and expensive, (London, Paris and Madrid versus Bidford, Proissans and Granada) – they’ve been systematically drained of their local culture to attract Westerners with big checklists and only 2 weeks’ vacation. That being said, we are very excited about our Mediterranean cruise so I guess there’s a time and place for all kinds of travel, especially if that time and place is yummy and includes Greece, Turkey and Italy. Still, don’t restrict yourself by just travelling the tried and true, go off the beaten track. Thats where the jewels are.

So here’s something cool. We share our acre with another cottage that was just recently inhabited by a young family with 3 kids. We assumed they were from France (dumb us) and so I made my way over excited to use some French phrases I had just memorized a few seconds earlier. Half way through my god awful French they smiled and in broken English said “we are from Switzerland.” Kinda embarrassing actually but they seem like a cool family and acted excited when I invited them over for wine one night this week.

Here’s something not so cool. Because I am “the man” as Angie calls me (strangely only when she needs me to do something not fun) I have taken responsibility for keeping our wood burning stove blazing at all hours of the day. The cottage has a heater but we figured it would be cheaper and cozier to go ‘all fire all the time.’ Once the fire gets going, I have to admit, it’s great. But, to get the thing going is about a simple as teaching my youngens ping pong, which I’ve also been trying to do all week. (Truth be told, the ping pong has been a blast and they’ve picked it up quickly).

Anyways, our cottage is OLD, meaning stone, so each morning when I wake up – wait a minute there’s 4 people in my bed - imploring me to get the fire going. Brilliant me didn’t pack pajama pants so I throw on my swimming trunks, pulling them down to resemble PJ’s, then make a B line outside to get wood then back inside to the stove. The temperature inside the stove is frolier and the first day it took Boy Scout John a full 53 minutes to get the fire going which ironically displeased the 4 warm people, snuggled up on the couch in wool blankets. Ethan tries to encourage me in my fire starting by saying helpful things like “just throw on more paper” or “just throw on more matches (ha), or the very sweet “poor dad, working so hard on the fire, you don’t have to do this dad.” It’s gradually gotten better though as I‘ve learned to baby the fire- giving it lots of affection, but still, unless I have 25 minutes to spare, I point the freezing 4 towards the wool.

The plan for this week involves canoeing down the Dordogne, past the region’s great castles, lots of cave exploring seeing 15,000 year old paintings and natural lime formations, the markets of Sarlat, touristy Rocamadour and of course, making fire. Oh yeah, and continuing to slog through Les Miserables, my 1200+ page Frenchy book. A remarkable story.

John

P.S. I ordered the plat du jour today at a restaurant and later I found out one of the things was salad with duck hearts. Nice.