Appreciate the Silence

I was in Montpellier recently and noticed this sign:

It means:

Appreciate the Silence

With a little less noise, we listen better.

I find this to be a noble effort on the city’s part, even though it will likely have little to no effect on decreasing the noise level.  Montpellier is a city that can be rather loud, relatively speaking.  It’s not New York or even Chicago, but I understand its reasoning behinds such a campaign.  Montpellier has thousands of students, constant traffic, and the city is also trying to fight a growing trend – smoking outside bars.  Indoors, smoking is no longer permitted, so many patrons move curbside, and along with them, comes the noise.  Sometimes, there are more people outside than inside and once quiet neighborhoods have become louder than Wrigleyville after a Cub’s home game. 

I do recall my life back in Chicago, and I did (gasp!) live in Wrigleyville once.  I learned to block out the sound of the bars’ closing time or the 4 am rounds of the garbage trucks.  I got used to it, just as now I’m used to the quiet.  At night, I’m woken up by the sound of wind or rain.  The worse is a fox howling, which sounds like an old asthmatic dog with laryngitis, but I prefer that over the sounds of neighboring bars and PBR induced monologs about philosophy as patrons are shuffled towards the door.

So, I like the idea of instilling into society a conscience of neighbors, the sounds produced, and the effects all that noise has on society and how it reacts.  If Chicago, New York, or Montpellier could be silent for just a few minutes, there would be a greater appreciation for what is shared and why.

As Mark Twain once said, “Noise proves nothing” so why not try proving something by just being quiet?  I think Montpellier is right in its idea to try to make the city a little quieter.  We do hear each other better when we learn to listen and appreciate when nothing is said at all.



Can you drop the Riff-Raff?

We went for a walk this weekend up to the crest and this is the view from there:

Yes, I really do live here.

I really do live in the middle of nowhere – somewhat.  Within less than an hour I can get to a train station, international airport, and a large metropolis.  I spent just about the same amount of time getting to the grocery store as I did when I lived in Chicago, except I’m not sitting in traffic. I’m close enough to things I want, but far enough away from the riff-raff that fills our lives  Oh, and when I say riff-raff I mean the junk we can live without such as fast food drive thrus, Glee, 50 Shades of something or another, and anything vampire related.  It’s out there, but where we live makes it easier to block out; it’s not at my doorstep daily.  When we return to Chicago each Christmas, I absolutely love indulging myself and find that calling for a pizza is much quicker and easier than making one, but I find the distance has given me some space to reflect.  These are indulgences, and should stay that way.  Everyone talks about “getting away from it all”, but I don’t really see anyone really doing it.  Getting away from the riff-raff can really do a lot for a person.  You should try it; I highly recommend it.  The whole “unplug” thing really goes a long way.  I know, it’s a bit hypocrite coming from someone who writes a blog, but I don’t walk around texting on my cell phone.  In fact, I don’t own one.  The mountains in Southern France might not be the place for everyone, but the point is to drop the junk that really isn’t important; look around and take inventory of what’s out there.

Sometimes, I struggle living where I do: I’m far from family, French is not my native language, and my employment opportunities are limited.  But, sometimes, when I’m given a view like this I’m reminded of all the good I have and why I could care less about vampires.

Door to Door

I’m back.

Twenty six hours door to door.

I’m not complaining, I had an extended vacation visiting family and friends back in the US.  The journey was long, but worth every minute of it.  I know I said I was going to pop in from time to time over the break, but just like everyone else, time slipped past me and before I knew it, I found myself back in France.  Here’s the rundown on what went down:

Train, plane, family, shopping, eating, presents, chocolate, Santa, real Vermont maple syrup, bacon and eggs, Michigan, friends, New Year’s Eve, Bell’s brewery, good burgers, wii bowling, homemade pizza, New Glarus beer, standing rib roast, and the first snow of the season. 

The last came in as a shocker on the very late date of January 12^th, the day of our departure.  Chicago somewhat surprised me here.  A city that normally takes a snow storm in stride suddenly got nervous when 6 inches fell.  Our international flight out was only slightly delayed, but I learned from stranded passengers that domestic flights were cancelled across the board.

We missed mild temperatures while away, but were welcomed back with hard frosts.  Work in the village appears to be continuing, but I’m unclear on what’s been done and what still needs to be completed.  We look forward to a good year, filled with hope, love, warm fires, homemade breads, good health, a bountiful garden, and lots of adventure.    

             

My Maple Tree

           

 I’ve mentioned that we don’t get the autumn colors like I had growing up in Chicago, and I miss that.  Sure, in Southern France, there are the vineyards which change seasonally, but there aren’t the vast forests of colors as I remember.  I particularly like maple trees, so Christophe planted one for me in the garden.  This is its first year, and its leaves turn flaming red.  I love it.  It reminds me of autumns where colored leaves fill the ground and a perfume lingers in the air.  I smile each time I see my maple tree because I know with which intention it was planted.  It works and I’m happily reminded of home.

Autumn's Arrival

            After a brief reprise, autumn clearly announced itself this morning with its hollowing winds and overcast skies.  Autumn is a wonderful season here (hunters aside, of course), but it is quite different than the falls I knew in Chicago.  I loved the reds and yellows of the changing maple trees and the quiet calm of the early morning as I left for work.  Bright blue skies would appear as the day unfolded and the leaves poetically floated down to the ground.  Idyllic, I know, but there were days like that, even if they were rare.  I recall the other fall days too; the cold rain, bare trees, and hard frosts.  Those days announced the arrival of winter, and even though I grumpily scraped the frost off my car and waited impatiently for the heat to kick in, I look back with nostalgia on those days too.

Living in the middle of a forested mountain range, I expected the foliage to rival Vermont with its waves of color on an endless flowing landscape.  I was wrong.  Some of the trees here, like chestnut and popular, do change color, but most do not.  They are only small yellow specs in a sea of green and brown.  Some trees, like the fig, simply drop their dried leaves, and many others, like the white oak, do not lose leaves until the spring.  I get glimpses of color, but it’s something I search for.

The wind is another issue.  It almost sounds comical coming from “The Windy City”, but the winds here are ferocious.  Fall is a very windy season, and it is not uncommon to have winds at 100-110 kilometers per hour for days on end; that is, day after day of wind at 65 miles per hour, just 10 below a level 1 hurricane.  The wind whips through the trees, creating a tremendous amount of noise which often ushers me quickly back inside.  Everything here grows or is constructed with the wind in mind; the trees bend at an angle and no window faces north.  I didn’t know this force until I moved here and still cringe when the weather announces strong winds.

But, like I said, autumn is a wonderful season.  It’s the season of gathering, of preparing, and of harvesting the rewards of hard work.   It’s about change, transition, and acceptance.  Autumn does have something amazing to offer.  It shows what nature can do; the changing colors, the violent winds, and the adaptability of all living things.  And for that, I am still in wonder of the season.

Country Mouse; City Mouse

During the cold winters of Chicago, it wasn’t unheard of to find that a mouse had made its way into the apartment.  It was disturbing, and prompted a quick run to the hardware store to buy poison.  However, the mouse was nothing in comparison to the daily rat sightings in the alleys.  City rats are huge and became immune to the city’s weekly doses of poison.  I recall one summer evening sitting on a friend’s back porch and watching in disbelief the vast quantity of rats foraging in the garbage below.  It was savage; they tore through bags and fought amongst themselves for what was inside.  I don’t remember exactly how many there were, but there were so many we gave up counting in lieu of going out for a beer.  Rats and mice are part of urban living, like it or not.

            Now, the country rodent is a bit different.  First, it is much smaller than its urban counterpart.  In fact, a country rat is about the size of a city mouse.  I saw one practically face to face this summer hanging out in a fig tree behind the house, and it didn’t look half as malicious as the ones I saw years ago from that city porch.  It just looked at me and ran away.  The mice are much smaller too, sometimes no bigger than a walnut.  With all the fruit trees, vineyards, and vegetables gardens, there is no need to search indoors for food.  This is why we were so shocked to find a mouse hanging out in our chimney this week.  There is no food there, so after the first sighting of it we made a bunch of noise and hoped it would figure out the mistake and just quietly leave.  After all, there are plenty of figs just outside it can eat and it would have its pickings if it just settled near the compost.  Its second sighting proved us wrong; it didn’t leave and that prompted some dire action: a mouse trap.  We opted against poison because we didn’t want to take the risk of it dying behind a wall where it couldn’t be retrieved and then we’d have to live the smell of a dead mouse as nature took its course.  The trap quickly worked; there was a clean kill and the walnut size carcass was quickly discarded.  We didn’t reveille in this, but the mouse’s place is outside and we did give it a chance.  This made me think of its larger, urban counterpart in the same situation, and I could image flipping on the lights in the kitchen and  finding a very angry mouse with its head in the trap squeaking, “What the heck!” 

All my urban rat memories came rushing back, and this made me happy that I now only deal country mice.