shifting winds

in the summer, in southern french wine country, you want the wind to come from the north, because it is dry and keeps the grapes from succumbing to mildew and fungal disease. a steady marine wind from the south can cause endless headaches.  in the fall you want the wind to come from the south, where it is warm, and where rain might fall and replenish the soil with water the vines can draw from. a north wind in the fall is just biting and cold. this roseau, or reed, appears to be subject to every kind of wind at once, and looks elegantly flustered.

roadside reeds (roseau)

coing, not poire

an excerpt from my husband’s instagram post says it all:

“I once found one of these beneath a tree in my neighbor’s orchard. I brought the enormous pear home to my family. What enormous pears they grow in France, I said. Then I put the gigantic pear on the terrace table and forgot about it for several weeks, during which time it did not soften, did not change color, and did not rot. I admired the heartiness of this feisty pear every time I passed it on the way to do laundry or grill dinner. Then one day I saw an identical enormous pear at the market, but it was labeled “coing” not “poire,” because, of course, the supernatural pear on my table was actually a very average quince.”

quince (coing)

summer’s end

pardon me if this is the second photo of olenader you’ve seen in the past couple weeks. i typically don’t repeat myself that frequently. but, i finally learned that this ubiquitous plant, which we see spilling over every fence in our neighborhood, and which i have only ever known as “laurier rose,” is actually oleander in english. and like a toddler with a new word, i am seeing it everywhere, and pointing it out with tedious repetition… “oleander! look! over there! oleaneder! oh and there’s a pink oleander! and that one’s white!…”

dried oleander flowers

france

there is the romance of southern france. the towering plane trees. the endless rows of vines. the olive trees. and then there is the reality of southern france. where it is more important to generate productivity than beauty all year long. where the mûrier platane tree is hacked back to a knotty crown each year, and where the vines in winter look like black and crooked crucifixes. this is also france. it just doesn’t play well on the promotional brochures. i love both versions

pruned mûrier platane tree

magic carpet

i made a magic languedocien carpet today. look at it long enough, and it will bring you right here to southern france. which is to say that my magic carpet may not fly, but it does transport.

bits and pieces of languedoc in autumn