Feet on the ground but mind in the clouds

At the prompting of a new visitor, Siepfft, whom is a really good writer I might add, I will now speak of our journey into France.

When we went to get our bags and humungous boxes off the belts, we were moving at the speed of light because it was coming down to crunch time to get them. We took them off the belt at lightening speed and proceeded to move them to the door.

As with many things in that portion of our life, some things are much of a blur. Our arrival and the time frame of things that occurred are all jumbled to me. Perhaps I was just so exhausted and jet lagged that I couldn't even think straight. I believe that their time was roughly 7-9 hours ahead of our time.

Anyway, we lugged all of our bags and our two kids out the door and to my embarrassment they had rented a truck to haul us to our destination. Of course their cars and trucks are all minis and half the size of those found in the U. S. so it wasn't like a 27 footer. But it was micro size. I was embarrassed to have all of this stuff and only spending a week with the keyboard player when I visited L.A., he must have thought that I was most definately a woman or something. I mean really, when women pack, they PACK! But my excuse was the two kids so that embarrassment was short lived after a litte jibing from both him and Pat.

(SIDENOTE: I must explain that the three band members and their significant others/family was to inhabit this house that we were headed to. The drummer who's brother is a resident of France and lives in a dome home that was the subject of many laughs.) was to live at his brother's, and the bass player to live with this wonderful family that I kept hearing about.

Once things were loaded I looked at the two of them oddly and asked them how they could be wearing jackets? It was a balmy 54 degrees that day, gloomy, but beautiful. You must remember that when we left Minnesota, there was snow on the ground, and it was in the lower 30's so this was like the bahamas for me. They tried to explain to me that I was the crazy one, that it was cold out and that eventually I would adapt and feel how cold it was. Yeah, whatever is all I could say.

We crammed into that truck but I really don't have much of a memory of that drive. I was suddenly very, very tired. Drained from all the stress at home, drained from the flight, just plain drained. Everything looked weird there, foreign street signs...yes, duh, a foriegn country... but not foreign in that sense. The roads had no lines on them, people drove where they wanted. There was a lane called the 'suicide lane' where people passed at their own risk. They were single lane roads. Speed limits were in kilometers as were miles and people drove like friggin' maniacs.

Now since I am one of those really cautious passengers who needs my own brake peddle, I paid more attention to the road around me instead of the sights. I would take a quick glance up to take a peek at my surroundings but my memory wasn't working too well. Pat tried to point out this and that, the train system I remember but ultimately I missed the ride. Had I known then what became painfully obvious in a really short time, I would have paid more attention and soaked every last inch, meter, kilometer of that experience in.

Pat and Magic Fingers were ranting and raving about the time they had spent there so far. They had aquired some really good friends. My belief going into this though was that the French hated the Americans so I was somewhat confused by this. Only after they explained that that was true in Paris and not in the country did I register this. As I said before, this family that had adopted the band were REALLY wonderful people. Artistic, loving, and our friends for a long time after we returned to the states. But I will get to them.

After about an hour of driving on these crazy roads, we arrived very close to our new home. In Marsengy pronounced: Mar-son-gee, the 'n' is silent. We turned down this road and that road and were surrounded by hills and fields everywhere. Chateau's were starting to appear, not castles or anything but nothing like I had ever seen in real life. Very intricate architecture/masonry. Bricks all the way up to the top. There were also what we in America would call normal houses but those too were nothing like the cracker jack boxes that one would see across the street from them. It was like driving through a whole different era. I could just feel the age, the history, the sweat and labor that went into these structures, not to mention the pride.

There were a lot of curves in the roads and of course a lot of very large hills. We entered into the small town of Marsengy. This would be our town. It had a brasserie (bar) pronounce bra-ser-y, and a bolangerie (sp)(sweet shop/bread/wine)pronounced bo-lau-ger-y. Another thing that I noticed were mirrors hanging from the corners of the buildings that aided drivers in the sighting of oncoming cars and such. Weird I thought at the time but it amazes me even now how in some areas in our own town I wish they would install them.

We passed through this quaint little town that I immediately fell in love with and went up this immense hill. It seemed to go on forever. And once we reached the top, the truck slowed and pulled into this driveway. I looked and said, "this is the house?" From the road all one can see is the garage doors and the tops of the windows and the roof. I was baffled wondering how we were all going to fit in this tiny little, what I thought would be, disappointing shack. I dreamed of one of those brick structures, not of a house that one could get in America.

Silly me. I was led down these stairs on the side of the garage and to may amazement saw something that I wasn't expecting. A beautiful, beautiful yard with cherry trees, woods lined the edge, and it was huge. I stood in awe for a moment until Pat knocked me out of my daze and drew my attention to the large, large stone patio and off the corner was a fish pond. It was just this little thing but that fish pond was the highlight of the yard. There were actual gold fish in that pond and I was just stupified.

The boys were anxious to get the girls and I unpacked though so they rushed me along into the house. The entrance had double doors and on either side of the doors were large windows, roughly 5 feet tall by 6 feet wide. Peculiar that they had no screens but we were able to open them. Bugs, what about bugs. Basically that whole wall was on big entrance into the house depending on how one wanted to make their way in--climb through the window or use the door. It was a tough decision actually.

We entered into this living room/dining area and a fireplace was placed at one end. A beautiful wooden mantel that extended the width of the room. (This post will make this house sound like a mansion but in reality, it wasn't as big as all that. ) Straight ahead there was a teeny little bathroom, a bedroom which the singer got dibs on and then the entrance into this tiny little kitchen. I don't remember helping the guys carry in any of our things, I just remember standing there in disbelief that I had finally arrived in France after a year of waiting.

So, Pat gave me the grand tour. The kitchen turned off to the right and then through a door was the 'garage' where the fridge was and the laundry area. Then there were some steps leading upstairs and this was where we would be sleeping. There were three bedrooms up there. The girls was really small and ours wasn't that large either. And it lacked any sort of bed. All the rooms in this house were long and narrow.

All the floors in the downstairs were stone. The carpet in the upstairs rooms were just remnants and pieced together. Outside of the bedrooms upstairs was a large empty space that was named the kids' play area.

By the time I was done soaking in all of this new reality, it was time for Pat and Magic to leave.
They were actually going to leave me and the girls to fend for ourselves while they went to buy us a mattress', returned, quickly threw it on the floor of the living room and left for the night and at the time there was no electricity so we were literally left in the dark. But they had to go prepare for their first gig in a French Bar.......

But this post must end. I will speak of the Band in my next post as there is a lot to be said about all of these very talented, stubborn yet in their own ways, nice musicians......