Pinot, Bretzels, and Cathedrals

Last week Alex went off on her much awaited grand school trip- 4 nights/5 days away from home, with her class, and teacher.  What a big deal.  Granted, I was quite chilled about my 7 year old being away from home for a week (that’s what boarding school does to you), and I figured that her teacher and the staff at the facility would keep them busy all day long that she wouldn’t have much time to miss us. Alex is pretty good about doing her things- she can choose her outfits, brush her hair, and settle herself in her bed, so my only fear was that she would come back absolutely ravenous because she’s a picky eater.

Out of all my friends, I was the mom that was most blasé about our babies being away from home for so long- understandably, because these little ones are between the ages of 6 and 7, and have probably never spent a night away from home.  Some moms were worried about their children not being able to brush their hair in the mornings, a handful were concerned about the stigma of theirs wearing diapers to bed, while others had reservations about more sinister issues that I will leave to your imagination.  After all, they’re only 6 years old…

Eventually- closer to d-day, the reality sank in that my baby girl would actually be away from home for the week, and I started to worry that she would miss home, us.  But then I realised that her teacher would have filled up every waking hour with activities, and there would be no time to miss home.  She is also surrounded by many friends who care for her- they’re a special group of kids!

While up in the mountains, us parents were given a secure website to log into where we could send our little babies messages (yes, I happened to be the very first parent to do this, and shamefully, I wrote it in English, not thinking that her poor French teacher would be reading the messages out aloud.)  The teacher wrote up a review of the days’ activities, and posted photos too, so we were kept in the loop.  I was really impressed.

The class arrived back on Friday under a downpour of rain, Alex was happy to see me, but maybe not so much Beth who was being a menace in the rain with an umbrella (I hate umbrellas, I have realised.  They are the pits when it comes to my children), so I figured she felt that she hadn’t even gone away. 😉

While Alex might not have been happy to compete with Beth again, Beth certainly missed her big sister.  I thought I would treat myself to the week off, and we let Beth eat in the cantine for the week which left my schedule wide open.  I did some cleaning, some running, some baking, and coffee sessions with my girlfriends.  But I hadn’t counted on the afternoons, and my “no TV ‘til after your bath” rule:on the first afternoon I managed to fight off a 16h30 bath session by telling a story.  Reading stories to this child has no appeal for some reason, so I started regaling stories from my childhood.  “Tell me about the time you and Aunty Annie burnt a tree down Mom!”  Sorry Sis- she gets confused between you and Gray.  And so became the routine last week- every afternoon I would have to tell the story of when my brother and I burnt down a huge tree on the farm.  And the time my pony sat down in the stream on a cold autumn morning en route to polocross.

Sorry- what’s that?  Yes, I really did burn down a tree.  No, not intentionally.  We didn’t realise it until the sun had gone down, and there were great red flames licking their way to the top, and a friend had to drive round with chains, saws and staff to cut it down.

It was in 1985, in our winter holidays- we had been helping Machala (one of the staff) to burn rubbish.  The rubbish in question was from the polocross tournament that had happened the day before- a Sunday.  (This story has become more vivid since the appearance of my class 2 winter holiday diary that Mom gave me when we were home).  I think Dad was the president of the club back in those days, and his duties included clean-up.  As a result, our own ‘waste disposal facility’ was pretty full up that Monday morning.  Garbage trucks and street sweepers don’t head out into the countryside, and Dad had dug a hole in the ground where anything that could be burnt would be discarded. 

Back in those days, the hole was located under a very old, very tall cypress tree, which stood among a sinister clump of other cypress trees.  It was less than 100meters from our house.  This old lady was particularly interesting to little me, because it had a hollowed trunk and at the time I was reading The Enchanted Wood.  Realistically, it was home to a swarm of wild bees, so the idea of a magic tree didn’t last long. 

I digress.  Picture us standing under the creepy shadows of the cypress trees on a tepid mid-morning winter’s day; my brother- Graham-, the herd-boy Machala and I.  Machala’s job was to burn the rubbish.  This entailed dipping the top of a thick wooden stick into paraffin, and lighting it.  The tip would have a ‘gentle’ flame- a torch- that could be used to set the paper, cardboard and whatever else alight.  The length of the stick meant you didn’t have to stand in the rubbish pit.  I was 7 years old, Graham was just 6, and fire had always fascinated us, and we were given a ‘torch’ with which to help. (The reason I started telling my children this story was to scare Alex off lighting the dinner table candle without me being around.)

The morning wore on, but soon our attention wavered, and we wanted to leave.  It might even have been lunch time.  As we made to leave, we tossed the torches into the hollowed old tree, and didn’t give it a second thought. 

Much, much later in the day, my Dad left the house after dark, which was a little unusual, so we stuck our heads out to see what was going on.  From our veranda, the north-eastern night sky was cast in a scary orange glow, the flames licking the heart of the tree, blackening the trunk, and if left un attended, fire of dire consequences would have evolved .  We were lucky that the cypress was as big as she was- she burnt slowly and we had avoided a catastrophe.  It was a tough lesson that we had learnt.

It has been 30 YEARS since then and the landscape has changed a lot.  I think the forest of cypress trees got sick and died.  Eventually they stood bedraggled and empty, ghosts watching over the changing times. 

Anyway, that’s me for today.  School holidays start tomorrow.  When we return to school we are into the last term before our summer holidays.  Yip- blink and you’ll miss it.

Big hugs and kisses to all, miss you so much.

Me

Xxx