Dear Diary
Moving to the Pyrénées Orientales: 4 weeks left!
I think stress affects us in so many ways. Any house move is classified as one of the top ten stressful things to do in your life. So to move regions, have another child leave home, go abroad for a few weeks and start a new job all in a couple of months… I definitely know how to tip myself over the edge! I suppose I can’t say that I am ever bored.
The warning signs were there. A couple of weeks ago I went with my daughter to an eye appointment in our local town. After asserting to the receptionist that I did have an appointment even though she couldn’t find one, and insinuating that she wasn’t doing her job well enough in a rather loud voice, I pulled out the digital copy of the said appointment on my mobile phone for that day and presented it to her triumphantly. (I should just add that I had the same doctor from a couple of weeks before as an audience, where I had already embarrassed myself during the appointment with my son). But that is another story. I was so confident, I didn’t even bother to check the details. It was her reply, “Madam, that is for department 33, in Bordeaux” that I finally crumpled and wished the world would swallow me up. Luckily, no bridges were burnt and she made another appointment for the following week which I duly wrote down in my calendar. She gave me a slip of paper with the appointment on it so that I wouldn’t forget it for the following week. You could surmise that I would have had no problems in remembering the appointment and getting there on time. Well as before I raced the following week to get to the appointment in time, swore around the car park a few times until a place became free, raced up those steps in the building where the opticians floor and duly waited my turn at the receptionist. Not the same one as last week’s, but the receptionist was just sitting beside the one I talked to. I presented myself for the appointment for my daughter and I at the desk. No doctor to watch and laugh this time. Again, the receptionist couldn’t find the appointment. I asserted quite firmly I had the appointment and started to look for that damned appointment card. By now the receptionist I saw last week was watching, having recognised me. Well, who would forget the harassed English lady who thought they were in Bordeaux last week. Anyway, triumphantly I found the card and presented it to the woman. Did I learn my lesson from the previous week? Did I check the writing on the card? Not once. So, here again was the English lady presenting her card, rather loudly to the receptionist. She gave me a slightly disparagingly look and said with a slight sigh. “Madame, this is for next week,” bringing extremely loud laughs from my daughter behind me.
So moving house is tough, and you do the most inane things as you just have just too many things in your head to juggle.
There are four weeks left before we are moving from this wonderful region of France and going to try another adventure in the Pyrénées Orientales. We sold our farmhouse a couple of years ago, and are currently in rented accommodation just ten minutes from our children’s schools. In the end this stop-gap house has been a revelation. We have found that we loved it, the location, the smaller size and the change of lifestyle. We effectively moved from an isolated farmhouse in the depths of the French countryside to a little commuter-belt village with a bustling village life all year round. The area of the village we moved into was a very quiet older part, with the most amazing ancient industrial buildings that have been renovated into accommodation, the vestiges of the hat-making past everywhere you look. Not only that we, for the first time ever in France, entered into the lifestyle of having a dog. This has been a wonderful experience and through our fluff-ball Waffles, we have met so many new people that perhaps we would have never even come across before. Even though we ended up in this village for a couple of years due to there being hardly any choice in the local rental market, I think it will eventually be a place sorely missed as it opened up our eyes to so many different aspects of French living we never thought possible.
Our countdown has finally ticked over to 4 weeks left. It has reached the stage of starting a small diary charting our progress into the new region before us and the adventures before us in renovation, integration and just survival. We have probably just a medium-sized van of ‘stuff’ left to transport, the rest of the furniture and belongings already marked to go to the nearest second-hand shop. It can be complicated to live with a minimal amount of belongings, but then also you quickly realise what are the most important things that you couldn’t do without. I am currently on perhaps two drawers of clothes for a few months, which for some people’s standards is unattainable but when you consider that some people have even less than this for most of their lives, you become pretty thankful.
Obviously, organisation is now totally out of the window. Cutlery is now stored in a clothes drawer and the dry food in a stationery cupboard. Pet belongings and food are placed neatly up on the stairs, however shoes haven’t changed much in their position, being still the highest position in the house, away from a curious mouth than likes to chew. I am struggling to get everything put away in sensible places, and only just last night spent an hour looking for the television zapper that had been neatly stored in my makeup bag (obviously!) for the evening. Life is complicated, especially with three children’s needs to be considered, three cats and a fluffy dustbin of a dog that chats to you when you’re on the toilet. However I have to assume it is possible, as so many people before me have accomplished much more and have survived.
My little checklist of things to do this month have included things such as retrieving medical and dental records from past practitioners, and researching where our new doctors and dentists will be located. Suffice to say I will not be making the trip again to our optician, and have found one locally to visit a couple of weeks after our the completion of our move. Hopefully I will be on my best behaviour and will be able to blend into the wall and be as unmemorable as possible.
The house was bought a couple of years ago and we have been gradually renovating it so that by the time we arrive, the electricity won’t kill us and the house won’t suddenly flood. Yes, we did choose a house that needed a lot of work done to it, but with good reason. We enjoy it, and even though we are not naturals and are hardly adept DIYers, it keeps us busy and gradually we learn new skills. I have to say, our skills are still pretty basic and are more confined to decorating and minor repairs, but gradually we are becoming more talented. Over the months we made a few trips to our new house to drop off furniture, and to try and keep on top of several renovation projects. To be honest, when we arrive, I am hoping for the basics, a place to wee and a place to wash and sleep. At the moment there are fewer bathroom options as one bathroom has been totally demolished by hubby and due to unfortunate timings, still totally empty bar the dust. Lots and lots of dust. I have to ask the question: where does it all come from? The job looks tiny and then suddenly everything is covered in a layer of dust including inside the toaster and on loo paper! I think we are all hoping that the swimming pool will be open this summer, so at least we will be able to take showers there. Perhaps I haven’t been clear. The house is definitely not a new house but a renovation project that is over 100 years old. Electricity, plumbing, well everything has to be ripped out and started again. I suppose on the bright side we do now have a new kitchen to make food in!
So, at 4 weeks to go, where are we? Anxious to leave and yet incredibly sad to say goodbye. Some of us are already living out of a suitcase or just out of a couple of drawers of clothes. My husband and I will be quite happy to set our sofa-bed alight in 28 days and tear it to shreds, as the tiny bit of furniture has literally been a pain in our side. Or our back. Countless sleepless nights have been caused by this worthless piece of furniture. With the knowledge of some readers expressing horror at this statement I have to add that no piece of furniture has been or will be hurt in this grand adventure. For those of you that don’t have a queasy stomach I do think the carving knife might come out just for the last day for that sad item that must be nearly 20 years old.
We have always been very careful to ensure that our children’s lives have been stable, and so the changes in their circumstances have been the driving force of our own. A sense of adventure that we haven’t felt for nearly twenty years has made a comeback. The days of backpacking across America or the Orkneys that were filled with nostalgia have given us the added momentum to have another ‘hurrah’ in the new part of France or Catalonia that we will soon call home. It is not going to be defined as the last, as this move has made us realise the restless feet we still carry. People ask questions such as surely you’re too old, what about the children, what job are you going to do, or just why? Why now, why there, why move? I suppose it just, “why not?” The unsettling sense of the unknown, the complete lack of information and uncertainty of dates and places is part of the charm that we love and thrive on. To say that we are excited about the move would be an understatement. The rest of the experience we are determined will be an adventure of self-discovery, learning new languages and cultures, and adding little milestones of achievement to life’s landscape.
MidLife Crisis In France
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