Our House is Not in Paris (6 page)

One of the many favours that Jean-Claude did for us was to come up with the perfect name for our barn, La Forge. He told us that there used to be blacksmiths in the area and that it would be just right. We thought we had also come up with perfect name for our house: Pied de la Croix, named after the man we bought it from. So, we were very surprised to discover that, just near our house, there were signs to other houses with the very same name! And indeed, nearby was a little iron cross in the grass with
Pied De La Croix
engraved upon it. We had even checked whether it was acceptable, according to French custom, to have this name, so we were also disappointed and confused not to have a unique name. Our intention had been to honour the previous owners and name the house after them, as well as to retain its sense of history. As always, with our myriad of questions, it was back to Jean-Claude for an explanation.

We discovered it was, in fact, an extraordinary coincidence, for not only was it the name of the previous owner of our house but it also means ‘the foot of the cross'. Despite other
maisons
in our village sharing our carefully chosen name, we decided to keep the link to our
petite maison
's past. So, now, the house and the barn would each have a name. Jean-Claude told us in an email later that

Regarding la forge, there were several in the village since horses had to be attended to and Mr Dal's house was a relay for postilions and carriages. The house next to yours was indeed a forge and café in old times since the two went together for people thirsty from travel in sun, heat or cold, dust, and the fire of the forge!

Monsieur Dal was the man we bought our
petite maison
from. The original owners were de la Croix. You can see their name carved into the golden stone outside the heavy barn doors. Another layer of history and meaning.

Pied de la Croix is the small district where our house is, as opposed to the
bourg
(city centre) where Jean-Claude and Françoise's house, Le Vieux Prieuré, is. There is a cross by the ex forge, and the cross sort of dominates a small area, hence the appellation ‘pied de la croix'. It makes it sound like a large town when, in fact, it is a small village of only about 300 people. Le Vieux Prieuré, or the old priory, is most definitely not in a city centre! Our village doesn't even have a single shop any longer. However, the room that is right on the street of Le Vieux Prieuré was originally a shop. It is the only part of Le Vieux Prieuré you can glimpse, as the rest is hidden behind high stone walls; outside is a bell you can pull to announce your arrival. It is now Françoise's guest room and the place she chooses to iron, for, hidden behind her lace curtains, she can keep an eye on all the comings and goings in our village.

Did I mention the barn? Now, the barn is a mere four metres from our house and yet it took us five days — yes, five whole days — before we had time to venture in and explore it. We certainly intended to every single day but time always overtook us. That was despite getting up very early and staying up far, far later than I absolutely ever do at home. The house got under my skin in a way that I could never have possibly anticipated. It was like no other renovation we had undertaken before. Likewise, it was two whole weeks before we finally managed to walk around our village. It seems ridiculous in retrospect, but time was always rapidly ebbing.

The barn. How can I describe it? It is huge and needs lots and lots of work to make it into a home. That will also require lots and lots of money and, for now, and a long time to come, it remains in the category of dreams. However, knowing Stuart's passion for projects, I'm sure that one day the conversion will also become a reality. However, what was fascinating, upon seeing it for the first time, was that I could see exactly how it could be transformed into an absolutely stunning space. Equally fascinating was how the vision just came to me, considering I had never been into a single French barn in my life, let alone one that had been converted. Even before we could contemplate at what point the conversion would ever take place, it seemed to take on a life of its own. Before we knew it, the barn already had a name, La Forge. As with so many of the things we discovered about both our new home and village, Jean-Claude brought it all to life for us. We also found out the owners of our
petite maison
made their money from the elusive truffles. What a pity there are no longer any left for us to make our fortune.

Back to the road and how it turned out to be such a stroke of good fortune and the source of our wonderful new friends. A few days after meeting Jean-Claude, a car pulled up in the front of our little house. It was Jean-Claude and his delightful wife, Françoise. When we met Françoise, it was like two guardian angels swooped down and ‘rescued' us. I will always remember the first time we met her, as they arrived to whisk us off for a much-needed respite to their fairytale house. It was like being in a children's book, especially the tour of their enchanting home. When I first met Françoise I flung myself into her arms. Her face is one of the kindest and friendliest I have ever known. I must have innately sensed her wonderful, warm spirit; now that I have come to know her even better, I was right to instinctively allow myself to be enfolded in her affectionate embrace.

Though just a few minutes from our house, we went with them since they were already in their car. While Le Vieux Prieuré is right on the main road, the garage is at the back of their property. This meant walking across the sweeping expanse of perfectly mown grass to arrive at the rear of their home. Françoise led me through an arbour, cunningly placed to reveal their pool and beautiful surrounds as you walk through. I'm sure I gasped aloud — it was just like a luxury resort. We then entered their house on the lower level; there are seven levels in all. It was one of those magical and privileged experiences that rarely, if ever, arise in your life. We could have spent years going to France without ever receiving an invitation into someone's home, let alone one as magical as this. Then we ascended the wide, sweeping stone stairs with stained-glass windows perfectly placed so that shards of light glow upon the centuries-old stone. The tower was built in the thirteenth century, and the small window was to watch for invaders. It comes complete with a trapdoor. I felt a close sense of the past and heard echoes of the invaders appearing in the distance.

So many elements of our ‘story' are just that: a story. Meeting Jean-Claude meant that he had become not only our friend but also our guide and mentor. The three of us went on walks around the village. In just a few short
promenades
with him as our tour guide, our
petite
village turned out to be a set for an Agatha Christie. There was no way we would have discovered that the wife in one particular house tried to poison her husband — and Jean-Claude assured us he knew this in good faith, as a
gendarme
had told him. Or that Estelle Loomis, a wealthy elderly lady who owns lots of properties, huddles in her fireplace to keep warm in winter.

I had heard about Anne Barnes, who would have been our next-door neighbour, before we went to our house. Kim and I had entered into an email relationship after Stuart met her and bought our
petite maison
. Shortly after he returned, Kim told me that Anne, who had worked for the United Nations, had died in the hurricane in Haiti and her funeral was going to be in the village church. So, even before we went to Cuzance, I had a sense of this woman I had never met yet was just a few years older than me and whom, after having heard so much about her, I felt I would have become friends with. When I first met Kim, it was uncanny to be told that I looked similar to Anne Barnes. Then, shortly after meeting Jean-Claude, he told me that he and Françoise had been very good friends with her and he would often help her. It seemed that, in some strange way, we had come into their lives when Anne had gone. The first time we had
apéritifs
together, they served the rum that Anne had brought them from Haiti every year upon returning to Cuzance. With our new friends, Stuart and I toasted the memory of someone we had not met. And, yet, I had already heard so much about her, I felt I did know her.

I was touched by Anne's memory and felt tearful. Then one day, as we were working, an agent came to open her house. He invited us to have a look before the prospective buyers arrived. It was a beautiful, large house; the garden by now was sadly overgrown, yet the roses bloomed profusely around the doorway. This time I wept for Anne Barnes — for she always seemed to be referred to by her full name — when I saw her slippers placed side by side next to her bed, and her book, with its bookmark in place, waiting for someone who would never finish it.

Later, Jean-Claude told me about her funeral. Apparently Anne Barnes' French boyfriend was despised by her sister, and he was forbidden to attend the funeral. He organised his own service for her in the village, ran into the church and seized the ashes. I don't know the rest of the story but this moved me very much and was yet another example of how Jean-Claude provided us with glimpses into the lives of those around us in the village.

There have been so many occasions when, at home in Australia, we reflect on how very different our experience would be without the friendship of Jean-Claude and Françoise. One early evening, Françoise appeared to inspect our progress after hearing Jean-Claude's daily reports about our frenetic activity. She took one look at me and was horrified to see how tired I looked. When she asked what we had been having for dinner, I had to confess that it was often only
pain
. This horrified her even further and so, there and then, we were again whisked away to the comfort of their home and a delicious
dîner
.

It is all very strange for us — but utterly wonderful — to think that we were in the very privileged position of having another life on the other side of the world.

This brings us to the decision regarding our pool. When we look back, the adrenaline that fuelled us and the pace we worked at seem beyond belief. What would have taken months at home, we often achieved in a few hours. Even more astonishing is that my French was virtually nonexistent but I was very expressive and, as a teacher who tends to be very dramatic, I think this quality may have helped on many occasions. So, with just a few days left, we decided to look at
piscines
. The plan was to maybe one day, way down the track, put in a pool — again, in the ‘dream' category. So off we went to Brive-la-Gaillarde, just for an initial reconnoitre: one pool place and one appointment that afternoon, then ten months later, across the other side of the world, we had a pool going in. Well, we did try to go to another pool company but it turned out to only sell pool supplies. Not our usual style at all to do so little research, especially for such a major undertaking. Our rationalisation?
Let's enjoy it now rather than in the future
. Second rationalisation:
It will help us to relax every year and not just simply have an extended working holiday that would stretch on ad infinitum
. As anyone who has ever renovated knows, it simply never stops — turn around, and there's another task waiting. As we have also come to know only too well with all our renovating projects, every job always takes much, much longer than anticipated.

The pool truly has been in the ‘surreal' subset of all that had been unfolding. The company had someone available that very afternoon who spoke English and could come to our house to look at the site. By now we had our table from the fabulous
Troc
in Brive and so Nicolas set up his laptop, inspected the site, did his calculations and,
voilà
, printed a quote. If we had been so inclined we could have signed there and then. Not quite our style. I must say, though, that our usual considered, meticulous approach seemed to be flying out the window. Perhaps we were starting to live an altogether different life. I didn't think it was really our style to go ahead and make the momentous decision a mere few months later, either, setting the wheels in motion to actually have a
piscine
the following year.

What was exceptionally fascinating about the entire process was that there were not any phone calls at all to make the arrangements, very few emails exchanged with the company and, at the end of the process, no emails at all for weeks.

In fact, we were almost entirely in the dark as far as the company, Piscine Ambiance, was concerned — which shows either a huge degree of trust on our behalf, or a staggering degree of naïvety; I'm not quite sure which. Without Jean-Claude, our ‘man on the ground', we would simply have had no idea at all about what had been happening. So he became our de facto manager (without the pay) and it was simply sheer good luck that he and Françoise returned to Cuzance exactly when our pool started to go in.

Oh, IKEA. We just love IKEA, as do Brigitte and Erick who make regular trips there for their c
hambre d'hôte
. Setting up house of course meant spending bucketloads of euros, but it was so much fun! Another doona cover, throw it in the trolley. Tea towels, towels, kitchen equipment — you name it, we bought it. Yes, the French debit card Stuart had set up had a limit that we exceeded rather considerably. This meant that, in the Bordeaux IKEA on our way back from Martine's, we were the people holding up the very long queue and attracting the sort of looks you try to avoid, especially in another country. We then had to use our Australian credit card as well, which of course attracted a huge fee.

The
Trocs
, or second-hand shops, are our idea of heaven, and we were thrilled to find two in nearby Brive. They were full of the most wonderful treasure imaginable: tables, chairs, lights, sofas, dinner sets and artworks. It was in one of them that we found our dining table, complete with two drawers that are used to sweep the bread crumbs into after a meal. There was also a minute scrap of old newspaper; when Jean-Claude examined it, he was able to pronounce that its vintage was around the Second World War.