Just to give fair warning, I’m really bad at keeping a diary or updating anything.
We caught the train South to Bordeaux a few days ago. What a bloody city!! I think we will have to go back. The morning before we left Paris, we spent looking for Bae, without any luck. I couldn’t leave without hunting for Bae and searched the gutters and the streets but Bae was not to be found. The toddler did however get her first carousel ride. She was a picture of pure happiness – until it stopped. Then all hell broke loose when she had to get off and her pleas of “one more” were — well let’s face it — denied. I’m a sucker and will give her anything she wants and I’m sure this will include horses and all manner of dumb things; but her mother is thankfully in charge of the family and right in that Adz has to learn she can’t always get what she wants. I ended up making her a doll from a champagne cork and a length of nylon cord. I thought it was cool and the wife named it Cork-head. Not quite the same ring to it as Bae, but I figured it was something she could carry around with her. Anyway, I don’t know where Cork-head is anymore, probably crushed under the wheel of a Citroen in a French car park. Cork-head isn’t missed. I ended up buying her a toy cat (as she loves meows as she calls them) so there is now another inanimate object for her to love; along with the frog toy, the beetle and the bracelet I also bought her. I did say I was a sucker.
But – onward.
The train to Bordeaux was a lot of fun for me. Watching the speed top out at 320kms was a real buzz. The seats were tiny though and I came up with a new reality series idea titled “Getting big guys into small places….” I think it would be a winner.
The toddler has been having a ball. We joined her uncle and aunts and oma and pa in Saint Cyprien and she has had no end of an audience. The town itself is medieval and the house we are in is 14th century. Updated to all mod cons obviously.
We are also right next door to the abbey. Right. Next. Door. Which leads me to the next part in this tale.
I am very jealous with how the toddler can sleep through pretty much anything. I wish I could sleep like she does. The abbey must believe the way to everlasting life is to ring the church bells every hour. Every hour just so you know when they drag you out of sleep at 3am with the clanging bells, that is 3am because the damn bells ring three times to tell you. These aren’t chimes either, they are enormous fecking bells in an enormous fecking church tower. Motörhead never played a concert as loudly as these bells ring. It was a novelty the first night. I actually smiled about it. “How cute” I thought.
During the day they mark each half hour. At 5am the bells ring like it’s the second coming. As though Quasimodo himself is swinging on the ropes – up-and-dfown, balls bouncing as he leaps back into the air. But then they do it twice!! Just in case you missed the first brass clattering world ending announcement. But the toddler doesn’t hear any of it. The clamour of the end of days washes over her, not even causing so much as a twitch in her angelic face. But me however, I’m dreaming up all manner of things I could do the bell-ringing bastard and his mallets of hell. However, I am an optimistic kind of fellow and tend to find advantage where advantage is placed. Hey, I’m awake, and with a subtle nudge in her mothers ribs and a twinkle in my eye — guess who wakes up then!? GAWD! WHAT? NOW YOU’RE AWAKE? I RUSTLED A SHEET FOR CRISSAKE!
Sigh.
We visited Rocamadour yesterday which is a village built on a cliff filled with religious buildings. The Black Madonna is in one chapel and pilgrims would make their way on their knees up the hill. It’s a big walk and the toddler walked the whole thing. She refused to be carried being the independent little punk she is. She walked all the way to the top, ran around chasing birds at the top and then walked back down again. I guess when blessed with the ability to sleep so deeply and for so long one has the energy to do such things.
Well, it’s dinner time. Then it’s time for a sleep filled with the bells of hell.
Adieu.
Danny Matier 