Bon Courage: A French Renovation in Rural Limousin by Richard Wiles

Author:Richard Wiles
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781840243604
Publisher: Summersdale
Published: 2003-06-02T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

What Goes Around

An area of our renovations that we had been keen to proceed with was the installation of windows in the grange. This, we felt, would help to invest the building with its new identity as a human habitation rather than its previous outward appearance as a working barn, while sealing it for security and warmth. In a novel alternative to the traditional wedding list, we had instead asked friends and relatives to contribute to the French Window Fund.

Such was the success of the fund that we were able to commission an English carpenter acquaintance (whose surname, coincidentally, was Carpenter) to construct the casements for Mauvis using as a template the old frame we had rescued from the rubbish tip, which the architect Jean-Luc had waxed so lyrically about. Simon the Carpenter had never before constructed window frames that opened inwards, and had been intrigued by the ancient example we had brought him.

'It's a bit arse-about-face really,' he had announced after close inspection of the window. 'But I'll give it a whirl.'

'Llamas are good companions' stated the little advertisement I discovered tucked away in the classified pages at the back of a dog-eared copy of Living France magazine. During a mild dose of writer's block I had been idly leafing through the journal, imagining I was back in France. Intrigued by the photograph of the cute little cria, or baby llama that accompanied the text, I read on: For helping you clear your property For trekking along French country lanes Or just for pleasure Call me for further info Les Lamas de Briance-Ligoure There was, in addition to a French telephone number, a website address. I soon found myself reading about the herd of llamas owned by Monsieur Bernard Morestin, based only eighty kilometres from Le Mas Mauvis, south of Limoges. I sent an email to Monsieur Morestin with a list of questions about llamakeeping. The next day I received an enthusiastic reply suggesting that I visit his farm on my next trip to France, when he would be able to answer all my questions in detail. He preferred the informal approach, he explained, and would have pleasure in devoting as much time to me as I needed.

As Al and I were travelling to France in a few weeks, I emailed Monsieur Morestin once more and promised to telephone him on our arrival in order to arrange a visit during our stay. Somehow, putting our plans for a future at Mauvis into action, even though it might have been a little premature, seemed to bring us closer to the day when we would finally relocate there.

Once I had completed a substantial wedge of my novel and the manuscript was touring literary agents and publishers, amassing a collection of rejection slips, but not without some favourable comments, Al, Landy and I temporarily evicted my hot-air balloon from the trailer in which it resided, loaded up our completed window frames plus sixty panes of glass (substantially cheaper in England than they were in France) and hauled the load down to Mauvis.

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