I arrived 25-years too late . ..

What Blanche Would Look Like if She Were Human.



Alas, the luxuriant, long French meal, en famille is now a quaint custom of days gone by.

"There has also been a breakdown in the classical French tradition of mealtime as a family ritual so disciplined and honored that opening the refrigerator between meals for a child was a crime worthy of punishment. A side effect is a blame-the-mom syndrome, as fewer mothers have time to shop at markets every day or two for fresh foods and instead put more prepared dishes on the table."

The populous is stitting around in front of their television, alone, eating microwaveable meals . . . getting fat. To hell with the French Paradox! Hello Industrial Food.

Alas, the unfeeling corporate maw detroys everything beautiful that lies in its path.

The other day, Roger called to ask if I wanted to come over and strip the cut grape vines away from the wires after he cut them . . . then I could collect the faggots afterward as I did last year.

My husband had left me with express orders not to bring home any more vines as I hadn't used up last year's and they were taking up too much space.

But, I wanted to have an excuse to help Roger with his work, so I said I'd be over the next morning.

I arrived at 10 am as he had suggested, with my trusty sidekicks Antoinette and Attila, and started pulling the vines off of the wires and stacking them in piles that would be tied together to become faggots.

Roger returned from town, changed his clothes, and came out to work. I asked him why he had cut all the branches off the vines. Didn't he usually leave one on? Yes, that was the normal protocol. But he told me that he's RIPPING OUT HIS VINES.

He went on to explain that the price paid for grapes has fallen drastically and there's no reason for a retired man like him to be taking money away from the younger growers. I expressed the fact that I was upset with this development and he asked why and I replied, "because the vines are you."

He eyes welled up with tears and his reached for a handkerchief and to dab them. "But I thought you'd prefer to have pasture for your sheep here."

I replied, now crying, "but I want to see vines between your house and Therese's . . .this is the vrai France."

I told him I'd take care of the vines, if he'd just teach me, and he seemed to think this over; but I found out later, after we had finished clearing the vineyard and were sitting at his table drinking ratafia and I was chowing down on a large bag of potato chips that he always keeps fresh, and on hand for me, that the die had been cast . . .he was being paid to take out the vines. It was a government program.

I used to think that my little area, south of the river, was safe from development. Because the vintners would never consent to selling their vineyards. But globalization has caught up to my little paradise and I angrily resign myself to the sad reality that soon, my beloved farmers will be gone, the lush fields and vineyards will be gone, and in their place will be us relentlessly consuming, always striving foreigners . . .thinking we're living in la belle France, but just fooling ourselves -- we're just re-creating little cloned suburbs of London, Amsterdam, and San Francisco.

The Dutchman down the road told my husband a few weeks ago that agriculture has disappeared in Holland. And when I heard this, I felt a deep loss for Europe . . . and I felt a little more sympathy for the Dutch who have moved down here in hordes. I also felt sort of smug, rejoicing in my good fortune to have happened upon MY special rural haven of the western world.

But my smugness has been slapped from my consciousness . . .and I only mourn . . .for the murder of Roger's 50-year-old vineyards, to my awakening from my dream that I had escaped the corporate maw in America . . .only to encounter another clawing at my sanity.

The other bad news is that the ancient little mill in our commune was purchased by someone British. That means that there will be four properties in our commune that belong to foreigners, 12 that belong to the French . . .25% of my commune is foreign . . .I want to puke.