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Franche-Conte: A Pastoral Haven
People often ask me ‘why do you love France so much?’ As those of you who share the love affair will know, if the question has to be asked, the answer is impossible to give.
For me the heart of this beloved country is the eastern region called the Franche-Comte. Its towns and villages have seen the joys and sorrows of generations within their walls. This part of France remains pretty well off the beaten track, and mostly ‘out of sight and out of mind’ to tourists. It is a region steeped in tradition, a beautiful green countryside dotted liberally with tiny villages and bigger towns. And it is here that I have been led by a series of unplanned contingencies over the years, and here that, for reasons I cannot explain, my heart has chosen to feel completely ‘at home’.
As a child in school in Australia, I was thrilled at the opportunity to have a French pen pal. I was allotted Jacqueline. All I ever knew of her whereabouts was that she lived in the Jura, somewhere in France, but so began a friendship-by-letter, lasting through the years of our schooling until her marriage in Paris and mine in Sydney put a stop to the joys of childhood, and we lost contact.
Some years later, by now a single mother studying Fine Arts at university, I was given an open choice of French artists of whom I was to study one in depth, in order to prepare a tutorial as part of the course. I chose at random Gustav Courbet and subsequently studied him in some detail. I never did understand this choice, because I was not drawn to his work at all and prior to this knew nothing at all about him or his place of origin, the town of Ornans. I knew only that it was in France.
Then here in Sydney I met Joel. In the way of these mysteries, I ‘recognized’ him at once, and I think it was the same with him. We married, a joyous second marriage for both of us, and one of the first things we did was travel to meet his family in the Haute Saone. All I knew about the place was that it was in France.
I met my sister-in-law at their family home and we became close friends despite the language difference – she speaks no English and I had by now forgotten a lot of my schoolgirl French. But she offered to drive me whereever I would’ve like to have gone, and I vaguely mentioned Gustave Courbet – ‘He came from Ornans’ I remembered. She knew exactly where the town was, an easy drive from ‘home’ so I got to spend a wondrous day in Ornans, where I visited the maison natale of Gutave Courbet and learned to appreciate him more than ever I had in Uni. I walked the stone streets he would have walked, dangled my legs over the stone wall beside the river, as he might have done, and explored his family home, which, like most of the others grouped together in the town, looked out over the dark waters of the river Loue.
Another day, another offer of a drive, and this time I repeated the well-loved and well-remembered postal address of my school-time pen pal. It was in the Jura, I was able still to repeat the address parrot-fashion although it meant nothing to me apart from the one word ‘Jura’. The village name my family did not recognize, but we found other references on the road map and set off, this time through St. Claude in the Jura Mountains to the very isolated and tiny village where Jacqueline had lived as a child. I gasped as I saw, through the thick mist and overhanging trees, the sign bearing the name of the village, the name that I had written on my letters, a long time ago, only a few hours drive from ‘home’.
We had arrived at noon, the hour for dining – even the mairie was closed, a thick mist blanketed everything - the only signs of life were the cows, the only sounds the muffled bells on thick leather straps around their necks. The address I had remembered had simply defined the village and the family name. In this silent mist-enshrouded place, it would have seemed an unthinkable intrusion to start knocking on doors or searching out neighbours who might have remembered ‘Jacqueline from years ago’. So we ate our little picnic without even leaving the car, and made our way back down the steep mountainside and home in time for the evening meal.
There was a thread emerging, linking all these ‘random’ high points in my life, and I could only marvel, silently, at the fragile chances that had worked together for me. There was beautiful order, at last, where once there had been only extended chaos.
A little while later my mother, emptying a cupboard at home here in Sydney, found a bundle of letters Jacqueline had sent me when we were still in school. I sat down and wrote to that misty mountain village, addressing my letter to the family of Jacqueline, and asking for help in finding her, la correspondante de ma jeunesse.
The reply was swift and full of joy - family still in the village had forwarded my message to her home just outside of Paris. With a brief note was a photo – ‘Me’ - it said, just the same inscription as on the old school photo she had sent me when we were kids. And she looked familiar, recognizable, the same tilt of her head, the same smile.
We have never met. By now she is divorced. Sadly I am recently widowed although my husband’s family has truly become my family and I visit them each year. She has grandchildren! And she spends time, again, in the family village.
It is hard to imagine the amount of time that has passed, the experiences we have had, and yet I think when Jacqueline and I do eventually meet, hopefully this year, it will be as old friends. It is as though she represents the first step in my pre-ordained but unplanned lifetime contact with the Franche-Comte, which contains within its boundaries the three departments, the Haute-Saone (where the family lives), the Jura (where Jacqueline lived) and the Doubs (where Gustav Courbet lived).
For me it represents a mystery. I am wondering what the next miracle could be.
Treat the area gently. You will need a few words of French to enjoy the towns, especially the shops.
(c) Kay Keller, Sydney Australia.
