Vines, Rose', and Tears

I made the kilometer trek up to Sylvans vines, apprehensivly. Last week I saw him meeting with a local vineyard consultant, after the consultant drove away I went to see Sylvan. "The harvest will be easy this year", he said slowly, he looked back to the Merlot vines he had worked on for the last five months. "They were hurt badly with the late springs frost." I felt the hairs on the back of my neck bristle, my heart ached for him. "I am lucky if there will be two hundred bottles". I choked back tears and nodded, looked at the wounded rows of Merlot vines, they showed no outward signs of the crippling wounds the frost had left.

Sylvan:

I first met him when our well had gone dry, Mr Coussy ( The man we Purchased the Petit Clos Farm from.)had arranged for him to drop by and deliver a tank of potable water to help my family. We solved the problem by hooking a temporary tether from our neighbors house water supply to ours. But I would never forget him offering to help us. During the rains that spring, two years ago, his van got stuck on the rural road beside our property and I noticed. So I got the old Ford tractor started and drove to his aid, we hooked up a chain and I reversed down the muddy gravel road. Afterward, as we're getting soaked, I was coiling up the chain and he looked at me grinning and said. "The French have a saying, good friendships are usually started by good deeds." I drove the old Ford back to its spot in the large steel barn, glowing inside from this meeting. I have pulled him out on occasion and he usually drops by later that same day with a bottle of his Rose'. I have worked on the 1450 vines, backbreaking work, in all kinds of weather, freezing pruning of the vines, sweltering hot days spraying sulfer and copper from his borrowed gas backpack spraying machine. Weaving the adolescent vines and later clipping the tops of the sprouting vines, so they stay within the wire trellis system, also backbreaking work. Weeding constantly so the vines get what moisture they can without weeds robbing the rain water. It is prohibited to water vines manually, they must subsist by themselves. He works during the days for a vineyard in the area, then after hours he tends his vines, four times as many as mine. He would show up after work around six and stay until exactley nine oclock, then race the 6 kilometers to his house where his daughter Claire would be waiting for him to kiss her goodnight. That accomplished he would race back to his vines, recharged by the love of his daughter. Again he returns to work the vast rows of his tertiary love. I am addicted to my vines, I have never been a gardener, not even remotely competent at keeping green things alive. This year we took the plunge in taking care of our vineyard that was included with our farm, I would be given a pointer course in vine pruning. We arranged to meet a local British vintner, he gave me a half hour course in the finer points of spring pruning, then left me looking at the remainind 1400 vines. GULP. The weather temperature dropped, and so I layered up and ventured out into the unknown. After a week of pruning, the vines were set for spring. Sylvan would drop by and inspect and fine tune my budding pruning talent. I would work 8 or 9 hours and be heading into the house as he would be showing up to work his vines.

Rose'

: Since watching the movie "Sideways", I've been a Pinot Noir fan, skipped white wine and rose' and went straight to Reds. I love the full bodied reds with the vast tastes within. Well Sylvan dropped off one of his Rose's when I pulled his car from the mire. I think I begrudginly took a glass with Cindy and thought one glass and then I could tell him we tried it. Gotta tell ya, I thought rose' from Provence was the measuring stick, this blew the Provencial Rose's out of the water. His is a Merlot grape, that he add a miniscule dash of sugar and it opens up the floodgates of flavor. It has the full bodied makeup of its Red cousins, but it also refreshes. Sitting by the pool with friends, its like kool aid for grown ups. We now purchase six packs of his Rose' telling him our clients and family are the ones drinking up all our Rose' stores, liars. So today I made the kilometer trek up to Sylvans vines, and walked by the rows of wounded vines. I though of all his sacrifices that he made for his third love and inspected his grape bunches. They were like raisins, with a smattering of healthy still green grapes struggling to make it. There were vines wiped out by mildew in small leper like gatherings. Further into the rows the grapes got better, there was hope; but at that point I already had tears running down my face.

 

Vine pruning

Horizontigo
We have decided to prune our hectare ( 2 ½ acres) of Sauvignon Blanc vines ourselves , after having a British couple tutor us on the finer points, they left and we started, well to date we have one third done after three days. There are six rows, running east to west or vice versa if you want. Each row is about 900 feet long, or the equivalent of walking down the side line of a football field, crossing the end zone, then back up the other side of the football field, then across the end zone, completing the perimeter of the entire football field. But it is all one length, and it’s more of a sideways shuffle. This morning after suiting up with the obligatory three layers of clothing, coveralls, jacket, and then an outer jacket, I made my way through the snow flurries the 300 meters away and started cutting. I continued; with each new vine you present yourself to it and stare at the structure, identify the two young growths that will carry next year’s crop and two other shoots that will be the reserves. It seems to me each dormant vine is unlike another, they all present their own set of attributes; there is a focus that is required for each pruning. Yesterday after six hours in the cold, solving each vine, it started to flow nicely. To start, after cutting the twenty or so shoots that will not be required shoots, and trimming off dead growths from the previous year, you cut the two winners at the sixth bud, and the two reservists at two buds. Then you shuffle sideways four or five feet and you present yourself to the next vine. This being my third day, I walked up the second row of six, as it was almost completed, and looked down the row to see how much more there was. After a half an hour I looked down the row again; and it seemed longer, hmmm. After another half an hour I looked down the row and it again seemed longer.
One of my favorite stand-up comedians is Stephen Wright, his irreverent humor cracks me up, I thought of one of his lines while I was looking at the vines.
“I’m not afraid of heights, I’m afraid of widths.”
I was out in the rows, not believing how they kept elongating with a weird foreshortening and then hypnotically stretching out. It was like Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak in Vertigo, Jimmy’s character is chasing a suspect across a roofline along with his partner, the partner slips and while hanging on Jimmy Stewart’s character kneels down to help save him, he loses focus and the height extends and shutters visually, he gets freaked. Well I got to tell you that row of vines was rough, so I kept chipping away, and finally made it to the end of the second row. Packed up the tools, and like Quasimodo as the hunchback of Petit Clos, I meandered home.
Then the snow hit, so we are of vine duty and returning into the house to start punchlisting the semi-completed rooms. Cheers all, hank

cutting edge

As soon as I put the razor in my mouth I knew I had made a really, really stupid mistake.
Two hours earlier; Cindy and I had awoken to a nice snow storm swirling outside our windows. The prairies and vineyards were blanketed with two inches of powdery white snow. We had moved upstairs to one of the two completed rooms, they had efficient wall mounted electrical heaters. I’m not sure why we had been living in Ice Station Zebra for the previous few months, but we were warm finally. Cindy braved the arctic corridor that connected the upstairs bedroom to the downstairs wing of the house that housed the kitchen and living room. After feeding the domestic animals, she brewed up some piping hot coffee and returned to the warm bedroom. After slowly waking and admiring the view outside I dressed, finished the coffee and got ready to start the day. We had targeted the southwest for its mild temperate weather, with that warm thought I made my way to the cold kitchen and got to work on starting a fire in the fireplace. With the fire starting to take the chill off, I made my way to the Living room and started a small fire in the cast iron stove. “Isn’t this romantic?” Was the last thing on my mind, being low on firewood required me to make the trek through the winter wonderland, to the barn furthest from the house and load up the wheelbarrow. Getting that required task done I went to the kitchen sink and tested the faucet, fearing the waterlines may have frozen. In baseball batting .500 is unheard of; to have the cold water running but not the warm water running would be .500 but could be catastrophic. And that’s what it was, so I went through the house testing the faucets. The good news was the existing copper lines that served the old bathroom worked, the bad news was the new plastic lines serving the hot water to the new bathroom and the new kitchen had a frozen block it them somewhere. The ugly news was that there was a hint of septic odor in the first floor. There were a couple lines that had not been insulated so they would need to be checked, and then wrapped with some excess foam insulation for piping. The foam insulation look like the swimming pool noodles except they are hollow, and need to be sliced so that they can be slipped over the water lines. First things first, off I go to the wine chai where the septic holding tank is located. I open the wooden barn door to allow light in to the septic area, and promptly plug in the orange extension cord and listen for the pump, nothing. I open the lid to the holding tank and with a stick, stir it up to ensure the pump isn’t lodged in frozen, well let’s just say frozen. Nope it’s O.K., so I walk back to the plug and as I’m looking at it like a third grader trying to solve E=Mc2, it dawns on me. The extension cord is for the chop saw I had been using it to cut baseboard for the nearly completed hallway (Arctic Corridor), the black cord on the ground was for the pump, righting that wrong I plugged it in and was relieved to hear the whirring sound of something semi-liquid being pumped. The drawback to this chore is that it being an older system there is unfortunately an aromatic blowback that permeates the first floor for about an hour. With the septic being done I unplugged the pump and headed over to the workshop in the big un-insulated barn. I gather up the three lengths of the pipe insulation and search for the utility knife that I will need to slice the pipe insulation. Ah not to worry, there is a package of brand new blades, so I manage to slide one free from the stack of blades and slide it out of the holder. O.K., now to go to the annex and insulate the water lines, as I’m reaching back to close the door, I don’t have a free hand so I instinctively place the new razor blade between my lips.
As I feel the cold metal touch my lips it dawns on me how fucking cold the metal feels, not tastes, feels. Just as I’m clasping the razor with my lips I realize that the razor and my skin are fused as one, cold welded as it were. I literally stop in me tracks, having closed the door behind me during the whole 2 second escapade. I look off to where a camera should be filming me for Americas Stupidest Videos and glare. I think well just heat it up and it will detach. I again without thinking, start to lick the inside of the razor in my mouth, FUTCH, I mentioned it was a new razor right?, well the inside has sharp edges as well, CHRESST, I cut my frozen tongue. So I march into the house, did I mention we had no hot water in the kitchen, so after a couple minutes of running the sink, I make my way to the first floor bathroom. There the water is slightly cooler than lava, after botching the initial razor removal; I managed to retract it from my lips.
Now off to the wine chai to insulate the frozen water lines, passing Cindy in the hall, I think she gleefully said how beautiful it looked outside. Only smelling the septic reflected my attitude at that particular moment.

An Evening at “The Not So O.K. Corral.”

 

Cindy and I were settling down, early in the evening Friday night, while Caleigh was at a friend’s having a sleepover. We were both reclining on the sofa, and each browsing the internet on our own laptops, ah romance. As the phone rang, someone knocked on the door, Cindy got the phone, I got the door. Opening the door at our house requires agility, one opens the door about 45 degrees blocking any exit with their body position, and with their non weight bearing leg they extend it backwards. The backward thrust should always be no higher than 8 to 10 inches, roughly the height of a domesticated, well roughly the height of a Corgi. Then 6 seconds later lift your leg up another 8 to 10 inches,, or roughly the height of an Australian Blue Sheppard. This gives you 15 seconds of quiet while you look, and allows you to say ”Bon Jour” which then just whips the little dears into a greeting frenzy.
It was two of the local Gendarmerie, I smiled an offered them to come in out of the cold weather, and into our freezing house, well the kitchen was warm thanks to the fire in the fireplace. Cindy was off the phone quickly with our friends, Dominique and Patricia, telling Cindy that the Gendarmeries were en route. As they enter the house I lie that the two dogs are “Good” dogs, and I am truthful they don’t bite. Meanwhile Holly the wannabe Corgi is rapidly shining up the toe of the officer’s boot with her tongue. As I point to the fireplace indicating they could stand in warmth, they oblige; which gives me a millisecond to shuttle-board the faux Corgi with my foot across the kitchen tile floor. The conversation was in French, well theirs was, ours was Franglish, but I will write it in English, well American I guess.
“Good evening, do you own horses?”. The senior one asked. The man was late 20’s (Three chevrons on his sleeves) and his partner was a kind looking young lady.(Two chevrons on her sleeves, and a croissant eating badge on her lapel.)
“Why yes, we have no horses.” I say in complete control of the language, in the background Cindy says a simple “Oui” (That means Oui in French)
“Are they in their enclosures at the moment?”
“I believe that they are, is there a problem?”
“There were some horses on the main road to Saint Foy, right down the road”
So we all head outside and they inquire which pasture are they in. The guy has this really powerful handheld flashlight and starts scanning the adjacent pastures. I indicate they have worked their way to the pasture by some vines and an adjacent forest.
“I will go check, is that O.K.?” My mind was racing (Yeah I don’t even want to hear the word “Oxymoron”) I was trying to think the last time I was outside or the last time I saw them, it was today, then I went in to the Dear God matrix.
I dash back inside to grab a couple small flashlights, one as a backup, and stop at the barn to disconnect the electric fence power. Then I muck my way to their last grazing place. The weather has been cold, but not cold enough to freeze the pastures just me; so of course I’m hiking a kilometer in something that rhymes with mucking muck. I arrive to the spot that I’ve deduced the little horses ass, I mean the four horses and an ass would naturally attempt something stupid. Yep the electric fence is cut right there, and no it doesn’t bother me that I’ve gone through the same thought process as a horse. I can make out three horses of to the side of our pasture, so two are still AWOL. I look into the neighboring vines and see two distinct shadowy shapes; I make my way across their flank and manage to get slightly to the side of JOJO.
“Hey boy, easy there, that’s it J0J0” I slowly get a grip on his halter and walk him back to the pasture. He hesitates slightly as we come up on the wire on the ground; even in the dark he is aware of the wire. I step on it calmly and lean slowly forward, he crosses. The remaining ass (literally) meanders along following us then the trot off to group with the other truant creatures.
“Hey Cindy,, yeah I got them back in, they all walk 0.K. I’m heading back.” I end the call on my cell phone and head back after reconnecting the electric fence with the two pairs of pliers from my back pocket.
I return to the kitchen where its warm and take off my thick work coat to warm up.
“So they looked alright?” Cindy asks, looking relieved.
“Yeah, they’re all in, like I said.”
“You couldn’t tell which one hit the car?” She lost the relieved look pretty quickly.
“Hit the car; where did that come from?”
“They said that, can you go check?”
“That weird, hit a fucking car, do you mean hit by a car?”
“I’m positive, can you go check?” she implores.
“Of course, really, hit a car? Jeeze.” I put my still cold coat on and grab the two flashlights. Outside in the cool night air I see that Patrick (The owner of three horses and the ass) has arrived, then the senior Gendarme has decided to join us for the “All Creatures Great and Small” production. I always thought, how romantic horses running free in the pastures, turns out priority number one, two, and three is the absolute importance of fencing, not the goofy looking guys in the white leotards, beehive repair headsets and car antenna’s kind either. As I re-muck up the pasture I’m sure the horse were laughing as they heard me muttering in the mucking muck. “How the hell can a horse hit a car?’ As I looked up the hill I could swear that two specific horses were doing the Ferrari logo silhouette, and high fiving, well high one-ing each other.
We arrive in the dark corral, the horses are milling about kind of looking at each other, Patrick gets in the group, and they all kind of drop their heads in guilt. He inspects them all as best as he can and determines that his kids are alright. Then while I’m holding J0J0’s halter, he raises up one two hind feet, I release the halter as I’m a foot off the ground fearing the worst, and he takes off in a cloud of dust with the others following suit. O.K. I guess we’re done here, so we muck back down the pasture to the warmth of the kitchen. (Turns out the horses were fine, they never made it near the road as all attached pastures were also double fenced and wired.)
As the Gendarmerie’s are finishing things up, I make them some coffee, the senior one politely says
“No thank you.”
“Tea, Coke-Cola, then Vodka.” I offer again.
“Ah Vodka, parfait.” The senior Gendarme smiles.
We kind of chuckle as Holly is walking around and on their feet, while he starts talking to his partner.
“Would it be possible to borrow your 45 and one cartridge for one second, then I can take care of the bothersome dog by your feet?” I ask as he notices the dog.
“Hank, leave my Holly alone!” Cindy implores for the thousandth time since we’ve gotten the little treasure.
He looks at me briefly and continues talking to his partner and looking at her. Then I swear to God, his hand slowly and deliberately drops to his side, he unclips the holster catch and coolly lifts up his 45 and extends his hand toward me with the barrel pointed down, still looking at his partner and talking about their report, he then pauses.
“Only one cartridge” He says smirking towards me.

HOPE

Hope
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune--without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
-Emily Dickinson
We returned with our family intact, Caleigh decidedly thinner; and frail, but ok. The whole experience taught us all different lessons, Caleigh knows that she has to maintain basic nourishment for her body to sustain health, Cindy now has been empowered to ensure the little one eats all the food she lovingly prepares, and that the side dishes of vegetables aren’t optional choices but mandatory staples. And I learned that even though I eat everything on my plate, it is my duty to ensure little one follows suit.
It was a humbling experience dashing through the tiny French villages, following the ambulance, numb with fear and painfully being aware how insulated my feelings were. My only thoughts were getting there safely and praying Caleigh was going to be alright. It amazed me how appropriate the words to Emily Dickinson’s “Hope” kept coming into my mind, to be comforted for a couple days, as hope gave me little respites of comfort. Once there, while they were running all these tests, it was frightening to think of what the problem was as they were going from one extreme to the other with their myriad of tests. The imagery of the little match girl kept reappearing in my mind as I thought of Caleigh, all by herself through some of the tests. In retrospect the problem was her body had deleted any available resources in order to continue functioning, the flu, stress from school, her worried state about relationships in her life, and her lack of any appetite combined for the perfect nutritional storm. She will have to have another couple tests to finalize their complete analysis. I do apologize for the alarm that I sent throughout the family and friends by not summarizing in my last posting that Caleigh was alright, I had two days of nonstop fear and was a bit heavy handed. Merry Christmas; Love the ones your with.

Tis the season

The fields were layered with a coat of frost, and it struck me how cold the light from the sun was, a bright morning but cold. Cindy and Caleigh were probably just waking up in Marmande at the hospital, Caleigh had fainted a couple times and the first fainting was accompanied beforehand with a short seizure. We had called the local fire department paramedics, and they took all her vital signs and deemed it necessary to take her the 30 kilometers to the local hospital emergency room, so Cindy and I got ready as quickly as possible and followed the speeding paramedics van through the small narrow towns to Marmande. We arrived and Caleigh was transferred from the gurney to one of those hospital kraftmatic rolling beds. We filled out a bunch of paperwork and waited a couple hours for our turn. They were thorough, to the point where the tests they ran were everything from a couple gallons of blood , a cat scan, a full body x-ray, and a spinal tap. After eight hours all tests were negative. Because we mentioned that we thought there was a small seizure episode, they decided to keep her overnight and run some brain activity tests the following day.(today) During some of the battery of tests Caleigh had the presence of mind to take a cell phone picture of herself on the adjustable bed with all the tubes and wires, then proceeded to send it to her friend Theo. With all of the days tests done, we waited another two hours in one of the exam rooms for Caleighs room to be completed, it felt like they were literally constructing it. Cindy drove home and picked up changes of clothes and other vitals, and Caleigh and I were shown to the room. Caleigh ate a little and Cindy returned with the camping supplies, I wearily drove home and took care of the animals and tried to sleep. I will drive back to Marmande this morning, but wanted to post this.
It is the holiday season, so for me this Christmas as you are with your family occasionally steal a glance at all the ones with you, and think how much they enrich your life. You don’t have to say anything but manage a smirk as you look at them all and think how lucky you are, and they are. Remember, perspective is a gift of the present based on the past histories of you and your loved ones.

The fourth choice

“Met in the summer and walked til the fall
And breathless we talked, it was tongues
Despite what they say, wasn’t youth, we hit the truth;

Faces of summer that fell from the wall
But nothing is left where they hung
Sweet and bitter, they’re what we found
So drink them down and,

Walk out to winter swear I’ll be there
Chill will wake you high and dry you’ll wonder why
Walk out to winter swear I’ll be there
Chance is buried just beneath the blinding snow.”
Lyrics by Roddy Frame of Aztec Camera “Walk out to Winter”

Since Cindy and I started dating, to present, her birthday has never been acknowledged in a fitting manner by me, although she would be the last to bring that up. I’ve never really bought in to the “this is your Special day” attitude. I really can’t blame it on my youth, that’s for my other problems. Well this year Cindy hit a milestone, at about 90kilometers an hour, and we discussed various remedies…..special outings, none of which really were approved from Cindy as being IT. It got to the point that on her special day we awoke, and laid about in bed and I said;
“Get dressed, we’re going to Bordeaux, and we’ll stop at Flash (French antique shop, nice furniture used stuff, and crap) to see if they might still have that painting, and then a nice lunch.” And for once she listened to me, this was to be a day that the gods aligned the stars for my girl, and it helped that I made three correct choices.
The Painting; Our friend Mickey, a British ex-pat knows all the ins and out of this region of France, he is like Klinger in M.A.S.H. well, he told us about this store in Bordeaux that was really interesting, tons of interesting things, some good prices and gave us directions. It was in May of this year when Cindy’s mother was visiting (working dawn to dusk in gulag conditions) that we first saw the painting. We had been renovating our farmhouse kitchen, and had pretty much charted all the spaces in the kitchen, except for one wall. We are doing the kitchen in a French country, formal style, and the only thing missing was a large old world style still life for this wall. As we were meandering about the store we made our way into a little back room that had twenty or so nice paintings. We both saw this one still life and knew that it was it. Only problem it was 280 euro’s (350 American dollars) and we didn’t have that budgeted for cushy decorating fluff, we were more concerned with buying building material at that point in time. We would come back for it another time.
Seven months later.
O.K. lets get sleeping Caleigh into the car and drop her off at the school and drive to Bordeaux. So we drive to Bordeaux, about an hour and twenty minutes, all the time wondering if the store Flash was even open, as our track record for this was 50-50. The French have this odd store open policy that I can’t even sum up. Mondays stuff is closed, two hour lunches throughout the country, odd holidays, summer to fall hours switched off days for sales. Ooooof!!!
We fully expected to arrive at Flash and see that it was closed, But I felt that since it is her birthday, we should do something and if need be switch plans with something else on the spot. Idiot!, So you can understand the track record for Cindy’s special day with me at the wheel, trying to put on the blinker as I drive off the cliff.
Well the first choice I made was good, Flash was open. We instantly go to the small painting room, and it’s not there. Fine, let’s find another treasure that will remind you of this day kind of attitude. (I believe the word idiot was just used, but I’ll repeat myself) So we browse the aisles and after an hour of bleak prospects Cindy unearths two small wall lights and a small table lamp, hmmm. Well, maybe we’ll stop at the park along the river there was a rinky dink looking yard sale thingy we drove by on the way here. So we proceed to the cashier and pay for the wall lights and lamp, the man only speaks French, so I ask if he has any other large paintings, he kind of understands me, so I motion for him to follow me to the painting room and point out the small still life that we like but gesture we want a larger one. He shrugs and says, or what I understood, he would go ask someone? So Cindy and I stand looking at each other, and the guy returns holding a large painting back to us, then turns it around for us to see. Kinda like this?
You could have knocked me over with a feather, Cindy’s faced changed instantly from we are kind of wasting our time to sheer happiness. (Nice bargaining position) It was our kitchens holy grail. Cindy couldn’t believe it, I told her I had called and asked them to hold it for us, Cindy honestly believed me, but I confessed that it was pure kismet that it was there. That was my second correct choice, by asking out of the blue if they had any other large still life paintings hanging about. We pay for the painting, and go outside and take a few photographs of Cindy with her loot outside of Flash. The huntress has captured her elusive game. O.K. now for a nice romantic lunch, we agree that there is a fun lunch stop outside of Saint Emillion that we’ve always wanted to stop at. Driving out of Bordeaux we get on a side route, as we (me) mistakenly make a wrong turn, and as we head out in traffic I notice a small plume of smoke arises from the front of the car’s hood. I have more issues than National Geographic; one of them is constant monitoring of any noises from the car while I’m driving, on the way to Bordeaux I spent twenty minutes listening intently to a thumping sound that was located in the back of the car, passenger side. Could it be wheel bearings heating up, loose exhaust pipe, faulty shock absorber, blah, blah, blah. I finally asked Cindy if her sweater belt was stuck in the door, and that was it, after we slowed down at a stop light she opened the door and that sound stopped. So anyway I was preoccupied with this tiny smoke plume so I pulled over to the side of the road at some parking area, open the hood and almost something myself, the oil cap is missing and there is engine oil splashed everywhere. CRAP. I stop at the first convenience store gas station combo and buy a temporary cap and a gallon of turbo diesel motor oil. Fifty euros later we are off to the closest Peugeot dealer. This was the third correct choice of the day, saving the engine from seizing and costing a mint to either rebuild or replacing the engine. Our plans are scrapped as the engine is our only priority, well long story short we stop at the first place and it’s 12:10, everyone is out to lunch for two hours. We are near a small quaint town, so we decide to at least go for lunch during our two hour wait. We drive into this small town and Cindy is instantly drawn to a small restaurant named “Le Gare”, (train station) we park the limping Peugeot and enter.
Le Gare, I instantly make my way to the restrooms to try to wash off all the diesel oil, it actually took me longer to clean the sink after washing my hands than actually to wash my hands, another of my issues. I join Cindy, clean handed and relieved to know that we are near a Peugeot dealer. Relaxed we review the lunch offered on the wall mounted chalk board. Three courses, and a little red wine, not gonna argue with these offerings. I look at Cindy and she’s fine, the engine issue has faded for now, so focus on this. We open ourselves up to this lunch experience, after reviewing the options for each course we order. We start with our first course; Cindy has a salad tartine, and I have potato soup, it was real nice, we get the half carafe of local red wine, the first sip was kind of chalky, but did open up, then Cindy’s Filet de Colin (fish) with pimento-aise sauce and my bavette’ (steak) and frites arrive and we argue for ten minutes over who’s was better. They were both wonderful, for our closer Cindy has a fromage (cheese) plate and I get the apple torte with this wicked sauce. We arm wrestle for the last half glass of wine, I let her win. We relax for a while then pay up and return to the Peugeot saga, well we drive to the dealer and they don’t have the parts, but they tell us the next closest dealer’s location. After a fifteen minute white knuckle drive with one eye on the road, and one on the temperature gauge we arrive. The problem is that the engine cowl (cover) had worked its way loose and knocked off the oil cap. This dealer had the oil cap and the retaining screws. I install the cap and we return home with the masterpiece. Cindy was truly happy with this day, everything worked out like clockwork. I was so happy that I had made three correct choices, as I am so thankful for Cindy’s choice to be with me.