Pardon My French by Rachael Mogan McIntosh

Author:Rachael Mogan McIntosh
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Published by Affirm Press in 2021
Published: 2023-01-13T00:00:00+00:00

Biggles scrubs up

This week I face the task of dragging young Biggles into the land of respectability. This is a full-service job; he is a disgrace from nose to tail. Biggles is a pants-optional sort of person, and clothes are becoming an issue for us here, especially as December gets colder.

At home, where the kids wear a school uniform, it’s much easier. I have to sew up a rip every once in a while, the hats are constantly lost and the uniforms have often been handed down through a series of ragamuffins before they get to mine, but it’s low-maintenance drama. Our little beach school is full of kids dressed in the same style. Uniforms cover the weekdays and on the weekend, the kids pair some questionable combination of garments from the dress-ups box, stay in what they wore to bed or grab the closest thing to hand. Sometimes they don’t bother with clothes at all. I try to keep everything clean, but shirts get holes, shorts fray and if an item appeals to the kids, they will squeeze into it or tie it on, disregarding the fact that it is eight sizes too big or too small.

When we have an event or party to go to that requires all three to be in a decent outfit, it usually involves a shopping trip. But here in France, other children never look like they got dressed from the rag bag: every day is ‘proper outfit’ day. It’s killing me. As the temperature drops, the kids require more layers of clothing, as well as numerous accessories like thermals and beanies and gloves.

The shops here in town are really just boutiques for the Saturday-trippers, way out of my budget. I’ve had a terrible hit rate shopping online here – I can’t seem to get the sizing right and the complex return policies are a nightmare to translate. I can’t drive as far as Montpellier and Nîmes, the nearest cities, because that would mean certain death. My driving safety zone extends as far as the Intermarché or the expensive Urban Sport next door, but those give me a choice between supermarket style and sports luxe, and the cobblestones eat expensive shoes as quickly as cheap ones. I’ve tried both.

The Croix-Rouge is my saviour. Tucked down a side alley, it has confusing and mysterious opening hours, but there are racks and racks of second-hand clothes and the ladies behind the counter (one very large and one very small) are kind and patient with my awkward French. I load up with layers of sweaters and jeans, and on the coat rack I find the most beautiful woollen Little Red Riding Hood coat for Mabel. She is thrilled. Kat and Gigi deliver hand-me-down beanies and we pick up winter gloves and socks from the rack at the Intermarché. All in all, the girls are not hard to pull together, but Biggles doesn’t make things easy.

He has decided, as part of his grouchy anti-France stance, that he will only wear black.

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