The tuba set the tone.
We had spent the morning in Souillac, a medieval mill town with quirky modern touches. After picking up some cerices (cherries), we hiked up a hill to Le Book Store where I picked up some new notebooks and refills for my Parker pen. (I love Claire Fontaine notebooks; they are slightly oversize and have options with graph lines rather than rows.) On the way home we passed through the town of Le Roc and its pastures of sunflowers and hillside of sculptured shrubs. After a light lunch we napped and, as the sun grew low… it was time for fête!
It is tradition in French farming towns for the village to take a long weekend during the mid-summer to come together and celebrate. The adverts for this annual village festival had been in shop windows and on fence poles since I’d arrived: black letters over fluorescent background announcing Fête (in our small town) 3, 4, 5 Julliet (July). Tonight, the first night, would be a community dinner (paella) spritzed with soft drinks (for the little ones) and local wines (for the adults). Early evening found us parking the Peugeot along an alley by the church, a spot carefully selected to provide easy exit during or following the festivities.
The grass in the park behind the school had been cut short earlier in the week and the groomed field was now filled with long, white party tents. Two contained rows of tables and folding chairs, and the third housed the (at this hour the more popular) refreshment stand. Zia and I claimed some seats in one of the tents, then set out to mingle. She got some wine, and I got some water; she fell in to conversation with friends (in French) and I began to explore the park. I met up with Diana (the artist from Fajoles market mentioned in Part Deux) at a bench by the swings and we began chatting (in English) as well. It turns out this mild-mannered British grandmother was a fascinating woman: her husband, an engineer and architect, had commissions all over the world and she had followed (rather than stay home as is the British tradition) raising and educating her children in countries across Africa. Soon we were joined by her daughter (born in Tanzania) and her three children. Diana and her daughter caught up on recent events while the three youngsters took turns on the swings and slide. After a bit the children’s attention turned to the four-horse merry-go-round and arcade games set up for the occasion nearby, and I took the opportunity to explore.
The hamlet was smaller than I expected: the école (school), the shuttered storefront of a former boulangerie; and further down (past some homes), two cafés and the church. I snapped some pics: the war memorial, a fence ornament, overgrown flowers in the yard of the former rectory. I passed some children playing cops and robbers and the ornamented van belonging to local anarchists. My circle complete, I was back at the tents.
By this time the local band, an all-ages group of horns, guitars, and woodwinds, had begun it’s first set: local folk songs (and the occasional 80’s dance hit) played with enthusiasm on a stage near the head of the park. Zia was seated with Diana and her family; the children were deep in rounds of the ‘would you rather’ decision game with their father while the ladies talked the ex-pat life. They had saved me a seat so I joined them, switching between girl talk and fantastical scenarios. The tent was filled with voices: cheerful, earnest, laughing, French with the occasional English or Catalan and the occasional jovial boom boom of the tuba.
Time passed, courses came in waves: bowls of nuts; rolls; a salad of fresh lettuce, tomatoes sweet from the vine, and sliced and salted cukes with a deep, earthy flavor; and then the main, rice with veg richly flavored with local herbs, garnished with a trio of prawns.
We ate, we drank, we smoked (okay, not me on that last one); the sun set, the sky darkened, and the stars emerged. The band began their second set, folks young and old filed out and began to dance. Children played off to the side: down by the slides, tag at the far end of the park, or napped curled on pairs of chairs. I grew sleepy, and it turns out Zia did too. We were soon back at the allée by the church, in the Peugeot, and on our way back to the abode, the warm air mixed with warm memories.
