May 17, Saint-Ismier.

Today is a holiday in France (another one of those Christianity-based holiday religiously honored as a day off in the most non-religious country in the world) and we drove to the Vercors mountains and to the town of Villard-de-Lans, where I spent most my childhood summers.  It was the last stop for my brother Patrick, who died there another summer almost twenty years ago.
We hiked a short trail, had lunch at the café we always went to, walked the streets we always walked and where I remember a perfect childhood bliss, and everything looked exactly the same, the same shops, the same atmosphere, and not even a new building around to spoil the scenery, breathtaking, the town looks as pastoral and postcard-perfect as it did thirty years ago, and it was resplendent in the spring light.

It's Hollande.

May 6, Saint-Ismier.

Joy then, in spite of all the years gone by, in spite of time, and doubts.
Memories of so long ago, 1981 and the arrival of Mitterand, a breath of fresh air, and I was improbably young then, and we moved to Paris shortly after, out of the miasma of decrepit sun-seekers to the electric youth of Paris, in time with what felt like the much-needed renewal of the country, so long in the hands of the right, so stagnant and old, a breath of fresh air with the first Socialist president, thirty years later and in spite of all the disillusions and the distance, in spite of such a different world and such a different life, joy still, and pride in this country that is not quite my own anymore now, pride for electing a new Socialist president and choosing a new hope.
And I can almost taste that vibrancy again, the youth, the electric hope, on the eve of going back to the U.S. and starting life anew on my own.

 April 22, Saint-Ismier.

Gourmand: one who loves to eat, for the sheer pleasure of eating (there is no exact translation in English, a word to be invented.)
Each day I encourage Dylan to write a new word, then illustrate it.  Small, giant steps.

Cold skies.

April 19, Paris.

There'll always be Paris.

April 19, Paris.

Paris holiday, with kids and Mom, five days filled to the brim with wonders, the Eiffel Tower, a so-French puppet called Guignol, the science discoveries at Parc de la Villette, crossing the city by boat, five days almost marred by the cold and rain but not quite.

Things left in the park (Easter stroll.)

April 9, Saint-Ismier.

Nicolas turned five and we had a party with Jules and Augustin et les autres, since Gaspard couldn't make it.
Easter came and went and we had an egg hunt in the house, the first in an actual house, maybe the reason gilded memories of my childhood came rushing back. I didn't grow up in a circus, but maybe I wished I did. The long Easter week end came and went and we headed for a park and threw stones in a pond.

The sky over Belledonne (feeling melancholy.)

March 23, Saint-Ismier.

Fanny's gone.

March 23, Saint-Ismier.

Today was Fanny's last with us.
Fanny was Nicolas' teacher and I loved her as much as he did. She had been substituting for six months and was supposed to come back each Friday to provide a crucial continuity for the kids, but was yanked at the last minute, this afternoon, because the French Education Ministry lacks replacement teachers after years of cutbacks in hiring. She has endured twelve years of this and still remains a great teacher. I'll miss her.

Waiting for spring.

March 18, Saint-Ismier.

It has turned summery, all of a sudden, and it has made life easier, but time still yawns and the days are long, sometimes, even when the kids make them fly, and I long for the companion of my road, and for the road.
We go for walks in the sunny breeze, and Dylan adopts a beetle and sets it down gently back in its post after taking it for a ride, time to listen to a dreadlocked donkey bray, and Nicolas says he's too loud.

Bed time around here.

March 8, Saint-Ismier.

Last day on the slopes.

February 26, Saint-Ismier.

Cold, cold still but we can see the end of it, and the snow is wet, and the sleighs slide reluctantly down the slope, the energy is gone.
The sun chased the clouds, and the kids watched.

Southern escapade (continued.)

February 19, Saint-Ismier.

Southern escapade (continued.)

February 19, Saint-Ismier.

Southern escapade (continued.)

February 19, Saint-Ismier.

On the beach in Nice.

February 19, Saint-Ismier.

Southern escapade.

February 19, Saint-Ismier.

An escapade to the South, to Nice and my friend Isabelle, to Avignon and the grandiose austerity of the Popes' Palace, breathtaking (more so because on the day we arrived the city was in the grips of the Mistral, a wind from the North that rules over the Rhone region of France with painful force,) back to the garrigue around Pont du Gard for a hike among thyme and rosemary and the benevolent olive trees that reigned with loveliness and legend over my childhood, on to the village of Grignan with its castle and its tortuous streets.
An escapade, with the kids and my parenting demons, Dylan and I like rams, and I am not sure which needs to learn more, but we had fun, the three of us, listening to swinging French children songs, Hélène Bohy and her sailors, swear words under my breath at each missed turn on the road, but we have time, what do we care.

Kids corner.

February 12, Saint-Ismier.

New year, new clothes.

February 12, Saint-Ismier.

The kids.

February 6, Saint-Ismier.

A month of school has passed, and my fears about Nicolas not developing right have dissolved as he goes a' skipping into class each morning jumping up to the sweet fabulous Fanny, his teacher, with a resounding Bonjour! and she tells me he's learning just fine. Dylan is in demanding first grade and still catching up but he's doing it so fast his teacher says she can see smoke coming out of his ears. We work at home every day; he's endearingly eager to learn, and likes math best.
The week ends go just as fast. Yesterday we went out to the movies to see Le Tableau, a gorgeous intelligent trip through painting, had a smorgasbord of a lunch with Dylan's new fancy, sauerkraut, did school, ran out to a meadow up the road from my mother's house where we go sleighing every day it seems since I finally bought the kids a sleigh on Wednesday, then came home to a kid painting session before munching on fresh bread and cheese for dinner and the usual protracted reading time before bed.
I don't have a minute to spare with them, they're two free electrons bouncing up my walls and if it is exhausting most of the time, it is also damn lucky as can be. If I wasn't profoundly agnostic I'd say we're blessed.

La Chartreuse.

February 6, Saint-Ismier.

Winter.

February 6, Saint-Ismier.

It snowed here in the Alps last week, before a Siberian cold descended upon the country, breaking records not seen for decades. Finally a sleigh for the kids, and we're out on a pasture above my mother's house every day it seems.
I had forgotten how much I enjoy winter, when it's white and sunny and stepping outside slaps you in the face.

Mud puddles.

January 22, Saint-Ismier.

Both kids sick, again, but still, mud puddles.

Lives.

January 19, Saint-Ismier.

Fridman left yesterday to go back to Hugo and the circus.
Another life.
I am reminded of the infinity of sad situations we could be facing and I do not feel sad, just altered. My mind wanders to a son dying at the age of eleven while playing a dangerous game of daring, my friend Virginia told me one day, friends of hers left with the pieces of a life devastated, living on for the other child, burdened by the impossible; a brother dying on the road at the age of twenty-nine at the end of a life graced by gentle muses and wasted by melancholy and drugs, and my mother left with a life bearing yet more sorrows, as lives will, lives of pain the world over, and I feel joyful for all there is that is light and beauty.

Looking for dragons.

January 14, Saint-Ismier.

Another try at finding dragons, an eleventh-century fortress in Mornas, then the Grignan castle, where we arrived at night unfortunately, and under a frightfully cold wind.
Nicolas knocked at the fortress door, looking for dragons.

The Grignan castle, once home of Madame de Sévigné.

The Uzès castle.

January , Saint-Ismier.

Nicolas asked where were the dragons?

Saint-Antoine l'Abbaye.

January 8, Saint-Ismier.

Roman holiday.

January 8, Saint-Ismier (France.)

In France since late December, and this week end, the first since school started, an excursion to the South and the sun, and a step back in time: we began at the abbey in Saint-Antoine l'Abbaye, an eleventh-century Gothic beauty, stern and chilling, and today trekked in the fragant hills of Provence to the Pont du Gard, a Roman aqueduct that is one of France's foremost tourist attraction, not a stone missing in a construction dating back to the early first century. To top off the road trip we headed to the city of Arles to see the Roman amphitheater.
Nicolas wanted to see the dragon in the castle and we had to explain that it was not a castle but a church, a bridge and an arena. No dragons, but powerful ghosts still.

Florida and the kids.

December 15, Ft Myers.

Fridman comes back from a month in Peru today and soon we will be in France and stay there until spring.
I dreaded staying in Florida for a whole month by myself with the boys. Time dreaded metamorphosed into time enchanted, like the butterflies Dylan loves to catch, precious time, daily walks in a Florida wildlife and nature preserve not far from the house, and with a net he found at a yard sale Dylan became a butterfly catcher, my son the poet, catching butterflies, the first time he tried, letting them loose, the walks a daily wonder, seeing an alligator by the marsh on the side of the trail, careful to step around a snake seemingly sleeping on our path, taking in the beauty of the native Florida scenery, the kids engrossed in a cricket, and the house cat. There were hard times too, Dylan can be difficult, and especially so when his father is not around, but these were all the more enchanted times because I thought they were going to be just that, a prolonged trial of boredom not altogether avoided morphing into discipline nightmares.
When we weren't a the nature center saying hello to the rescue bald eagles before hitting the trails the boys played with their Legos, doing and undoing them over and over again, and we read books and did school and read more books and went to the playground and went to garage sales and the days went by in a dream of soft breezes and carefree, warm afternoons.
This morning we visited Lee County Manatee Park and didn't see any manatees but discovered another beautiful peaceful place to keep in our heart for when we are deep in school and winter.

In memoriam.

December 3, Ft Myers.

My friend Lily died Thursday after complications from a stroke, the second she'd had.
The first one defined her life, leaving her unable to speak, walk, remember, redefining her life and making her an even more beautiful person than I imagine her to be, before, refining her down to the essential, the pure joy of being alive, like a child.
She died and left that joy in all of us an empty place, resonating with the sound of her voice velvety and lulling, the touch of her hand strong, stubbornly irresistible, the feel of her lingering pace. She walked at her own pace after that first stroke, she forgot things, she moved though life slowly, lingering behind, she drove you crazy sometimes and then you would catch yourself and feel remorseful and cruel and wait for her as she walked to you softly smiling and there was nothing you could say but yes, we are here, now.
She was a photographer, before that first stroke. A photographer she met another photographer, who would become my friend Marie and would introduce me to Lily, and they walked the road together for many years.
In the end I didn't know much about Lily all these years but that she was a photographer and then she had a stroke that left her like an infant, the heart of a child in the body of an adult woman for the rest of her life, her heart that betrayed her again and then stopped. I didn't know much about Lily but that she was to live forever with us, our angel lightness, walking life softly.

Kristine's visit.

December 1, Ft Myers.

Enchanted days on Sanibel Island.
With my friend Kris here for a week from New Jersey we discovered an enchanted national wildlife refuge full of slim graceful birds and the occasional alligator. The vistas are what I sometimes imagine paradise to be when I daydream there were one. It's turned Florida cool, but before it did we enjoyed our usual spot at the beach, and coffee on a canopied deck, trying to keep the kids under control.
She is leaving tomorrow.

There but for fortune.

November 18, Ft Myers.

As my neighbor, Connie, was driving us to the farmer's market in downtown Ft Myers we came upon an old homeless man crossing a six-lane highway with a walker, one painstaking step at a time. We stopped and hoped others would do the same, then Connie drove around to come back and check on him, to see that he had made it safely to the other side, and he finally did, slowly, seemingly oblivious of the danger he was in every step of the way - talking with Connie about being grateful, reminded of the Joan Baez song, There but for Fortune, and I am grateful, for there but for fortune go I, risking my life for crossing the street, alone in the world, muttering to myself, adrift.
Reminded never to pass judgment, for there go I, but for the grace of my life - yet.

Sand.

November 14, Ft Myers.

The presents.

November 14, Ft Myers.

Ft Myers Beach.

November 14, Ft Myers.

Dylan is six.

November 14, Ft Myers.

We celebrated Dylan's birthday again today.
We rented a car and went to the beach, better late than never. We drove back from the beach full of sand and sun and went to an arcade gallery. We came out full of noise and fun and went home to another cake and candles, and the presents, the presents, at last.
Dylan had a great time, and I filled my memory with a moment of joy, precious, in the midst of what has been a rather difficult time, full of anxiety over insignificant thing and momentous clouds, car problems bogging us down, Fridman's imminent departure leaving me alone here with the kids for a full month, Nicolas worrying me as he grows up, or fails to.

At the fair.

November 6, Tallahassee.

Six.

November 6, Tallahassee.

The Anastasini Circus (Rebecca.)

November 6, Tallahassee, Florida.

One more day.

November 6, Tallahassee, Florida.

Off, after all, after one more day, a day in Hugo, for Dylan, to say goodbye to his friend Nathan, and play, for a ceviche with Marcos, for a day in my old quinta. Off, but not there quite yet, stopping in Tallahassee for one more day of circus, at the fair where Rebecca and the Poemas are working with the Anastasi family show. We decide to throw Dylan a surprise birthday party with his other friends, and go to the fair after the show.
One more day of circus before the winter.
A day brimming with fun, and nostalgia already.

Hugo.

November 5, Hugo.

Sandro's house.

November 3, Dallas.

Sandro's house.

November 3, Dallas.

The old Ford truck.

November 3, Dallas.

Diesel.

November 3, Dallas.

Days in Dallas.

November 3, Dallas.

Days go by, unchanged, not my house and too much TV for the kids, nowhere to go with Fridman off to here or there with the car, helping Castro change the engine on my old Ford truck. Days go by and still not hitting the road, and maybe there is the itch, the restlessness, the sleepless nights wondering what to do with no new job in sight.

Alain.

October 24, , Dallas.

Seeing Sheyla again after so much time has passed, married now with Alain, and Friedman, Nicolas' natural match as soon as they meet, playing, best friends, and they're inseparable, long lost cousins, Dylan the loner for once.