Pinot, Bretzels, and Cathedrals

Hello my dear lovely friends.

This is well and truly similar to my  letters to you in the ‘old days’, when you wouldn’t hear from me for ages, and then out of the blue, I would pop 16 pages of assorted thoughts, random scribblings, and way more idiotic frustrations than any 20-ish should have to listen to!  I am looking at this web-page, and an entire 7 weeks have passed since I last sat down to pen my news.  The truth of the matter is that I have been in a slump, and between countless school trips, a veritable reservoir of murky emotions, less affection for my squabbling bored children than appropriate, and far too many books on my kindle, I have been more self absorbed than ever.

 

 
To back-track, I guess you know well enough about Dad finishing his Camino.  There have been so many revelations that have been noted, some of which are the following:

1. 3 months prior to Dad leaving for Spain, he was using a dinosaur Nokia prepaid phone, just enough to send SMS’s.  When he left for Spain, he upgraded Moms mobile phone contract to an iPhone 6, (I think partially because he realised that a decent phone camera for hike photos would be a more appropriate solution than taking a big ‘proper’ camera with); had learnt enough to connect to wifi, send ‘blue’ messages and whatsapp, phoned me on FaceTime, had figured out how to copy and paste messages to my sister and I (group chats did not go down well) and use Safari to check the weather.  I managed to teach him how to zoom his camera screen, and to use the installed weather app.  By the time he was finishing his trip, he was asking about e-mail for the phone, and was thinking about branching into social media, ie Facebook…
2. Dad is quite a shy person.  Shy, and somewhat introverted, but not in a bad way… his manner is more respectful of people’s space than anything else.  The Camino is a journey mostly of a solitary nature, but The Way is hardly a place to be to avoid people, and along the way Dad met dozens of new people, dined with them, listened to and shared their stories, had beer and wine with them, handed over his phone so that they could take a photo of him where suitable.  Honestly- I had never anticipated my Dad doing that, but perhaps the other pilgrims offered?  I loved reading his messages where he would tell me about meeting a very rude German Strasbourg lady, or another Frenchman who was able to tell Dad about visiting the Strasbourg Christmas market.  Or another Frenchman who took a photo of Dad, offered to e-mail it and upon hearing the dot-zed-ay address, switched into a perfect South African accent…  I love that a Swiss lady offered to help print a photograph of Mom from the phone so that Dad could leave her image at the Cruz de Ferro.  (Yes, I cried a whole lot at this message.  I still have tears in my eyes now.).  I love that he decided to pack 400g packet of chocolate coated caramel sweets we gifted him (despite saying that it could be too much extra weight), and then one night when there was no Peregrine Menu for the pilgrims, they all pitched in and made a collective dinner, and Dads’ offering was his packet of caramel chocolates for dessert.
3. Speaking of food, I laughed at the idea of  the jar of Nutella we gifted as well, and how it was used up quickly as ‘butter’ to make dry Spanish bread rolls taste better, despite the fact that the rolls had slices of ham plastered in them.  I chuckled when he commented that he had had 4 days of vegetarian food (probably traditional Paella- he talked about rice, peppers and beans) as Peregrine meals on offer. Not one to complain about food, unless its too rich, the suggestion of four days without meat was funny.  That said, he did say that he’d had enough ‘hamburgers’ by the time he checked out of Spain.  A hamburger seems to be bread, a massive stack of bacon, topped with egg and cheese.  It’s okay- I doubt the cholesterol would have done any damage, and since he’d lost 5 kilograms, nobody counted calories.  And coffee… my British-style tea drinking father is now set to be able to drink coffee like a European, although I suspect he prefers une grand noir over l’espress…

I am now waiting patiently for my turn to hear the news in person.  I’ve received snippets of revelations, and for the most part, it has sprung tears to my eyes.  The theme of ‘no regrets’ seems to have followed him back, and each time I think about it, I am reminded of that conversation of the veranda at Godolphin in May, and my heart hurts.  I am so sorry, I am trying hard to avoid this, but Mom’s absence is still so hard to have.  Or not to have anyway.

It’s why I have decided that this recent birthday was the worst ever, compounded by the fact that I haven’t felt more alone in a very long time.  I have been blessed in the last year to have gathered a collection of truly wonderful friends, but my boat has been rocked, and it took my birthday to realise that family is where you should hold your cards truest. Without that card written in her handwriting, I just felt hollow, and without breath.  With money I inherited from her, I splurged on presents- clothes and books for Beth and Alex, pretending that they were from Mom, but the reality of it was that its all just rubbish, a sinister-cloaked wish for life to get back to what it should have been, but will never ever be again.

No, I am not actually okay.  I really struggle sitting here day in and day out, as if it’s a train station, and I’m just watching it go by.  I need distractions, but everyone has their own life that they lead, and no amount of Ladies Breakfasts will help, because it’s a fake mantle masking a superficial existence. (Yes, you say, get a job, but I’m not going to validate that with an answer.)

However, birthday month is over, and the girls are back in school for another 6 weeks.  Clocks have been turned back, which I still have issues with, and while dusk at the school pick-up run is so European, nothing will every ready me for that sudden plunge into manic darkness at 5pm.  Autumn is almost over- the last of the leaves are falling off the trees at Place de la Republique as I write this, and dirty men in big trucks are seen sucking curled grey-brown mushed leaves off the pavements while I wonder how much dog shit is buried underneath.  The foliage has been truly exceptional this year, although this has served to remind me how much Mum loved autumn colours.

Granted, we have had only really a handful of cold days so far, so I should be grateful (I am grateful, I swear) that I haven’t needed gloves nor a hat yet, and scarves have only been decorative.  We have actually had brilliant blue skies for 6 consecutive days and it’s as if we’re in a South African winter.  I live in hope that we’re in for another mild one, but people in the know comment that a warm October and early November means winter will be raggedy, grey and down right nasty.  Which if you’re European is all good, because where would they be without snow?

Up this evening is the Lantern Walk, soon I will head to Bethies school, where the German section is hosting the walk in honour of St. Martins Day.  It’s a festival to recognise the Harvest, (and according to Wikipedia is the precursor to Advent), and in ‘our’ part of Germany it is celebrated by the children carrying lanterns, and singing songs.  In a way, it is the kick off to Christmas. And tomorrow the French celebrate Armistice Day.  Across the Rhine, 6kilometers from our house, the Germans  work.  For the French, its a day to go shopping, a pointed reminder of Germany stirring havoc across Europe a century ago.

I think I am over my current slump.  Despite feeling alone, I know that I am not.  I have Anton and the girls at my side, my sister with whom I am able to commiserate wit, and I realise that I actually do have many friends here; its up to me to make the effort.  There are 7 weeks until Dad comes back and we can have Christmas.  That in itself is going to be difficult, considering I sat on the stoep at Mom and Dad’s last Christmas Day night, soaking up the beautiful moonlit view, the hush of the countryside, and the warmth of the summer evening, knowing that Christmas for me would never be the same. I cried, mostly because a Christmas summer would be off the cards until we returned to SA.  And when Mom came out, and I told her that.

Little did we know just how different it would really be.