All France, All the Time

It's kind of amazing how this France obsession follows me everywhere I go. If this was you and your family, take it as the musings of a crabby old lady, but really. I had an up-close-and-personal experience with why the French hate Americans in restaurants.

We were in Pizza Hut in Goshen, Indiana. I can just hear you saying already, "Well, what did you expect when you went to Pizza Hut?" And I answer, I expected what was there when we first walked in, a lovely Mennonite family eating and talking quietly in the corner, two televisions in the corners with very low volume, and some background music. It was not romantic, but it was bearable. We were making our decision about where to best spend our fat calories when the atmosphere changed.

It all began with the entrance of a FAMILY. I put that in capital letters because it seemed as if it was very important to them that everyone know THEY HAD ARRIVED. It appeared to be a mother, father, four children, and a grandchild. And can I just mention that the youngest child had a hair tail! When was the last time rat tails were in vogue? 1985? I don't think this little kid was mimicking the manga characters, either.

To make a long and unimportant story short, they shouted at each other throughout the meal, various members of the family crossed the restaurant to go to the toilets while loudly discussing their toileting needs, and in general ruined the atmosphere of the restaurant.

If this is what some Americans do in France, then I can understand why they hate us. So often the behavior of one person or group of people spoils it for the rest of us. To paraphrase the immortal Jackson Five, "One bad apple don't spoil the whole bunch, France. Oooh, give it one more try before you give up on Americans."

By the way, although I think International Delurking Week is over, please comment and let me know you are reading. I'm interested to know who's out there in cyberland.

La Décadence Part Two

Gérard Depardieu. Sexy leading man. Lover. Winemaker. Think Green Card with Andie MacDowell, think Cyrano de Bergerac. I thought that I would never get tired of watching him work in his movies. When I committed to reading books and watching movies set in France, I guess I didn't really think that there might be ones I didn't love, love, love. I'm really sorry to report that Vatel left me disappointed, but don't think it was Depardieu's fault. A great actor is only as good as his material.

Since France is now on my radar in ways that I have never before experienced, I was excited to see a review about a foodie movie in the North Shore magazine. In the wake of the enormous success of Julie & Julia, Vatel was recommended as another "foodie" costume drama for its depiction of the excesses in the court of the Sun King, Louis XIV of France. I tried to find it at my local rental outlets, but to no avail. After buying and viewing it, I know why it was difficult to find.

Vatel is the fictionalized story of the real-life chef Francois Vatel who was the "Maître d'hôtel" for Prince de Conde in 1671. When Louis XIV came to visit the out-of-favor and perilously "poor" Conde, Vatel was in charge of Festivities and Pleasures designed to feed and entertain Louis's court. Louis brings with him not only his queen, but count them, three mistresses! Then there's his nasty brother and all of the toadying courtiers who treat working people like dirt. It's a political catastrophe in the making, and if Vatel does not succeed in keeping the king and his court happy, the prince won't receive any money from the king and will go bankrupt. As the story unfolds, Vatel becomes disillusioned with how he is regarded by the nobility. I'm not going to tell you how it ends, but I guarantee it will make you sad. It will also make you think about how in the world Europe became so socially divided into the haves and have-nots. It is no wonder that the immigrants coming to America were willing to risk just about anything to get away from their lives under these repressive societies.

Depardieu opened the 2000 Cannes Film Festival and then the $37 million movie was premiered. "Reporters -- virtually to a man -- trashed both the opening ceremonies and the Gaumont film, which was shot in English. They reserved special criticism for Depardieu's performance. Associated Press writer Jocelyn Novak observed: "Some of Depardieu's lines end up sounding silly ... and occasionally he sounds like he doesn't exactly know what he is saying." Sheila Johnston writing in the British trade publication Screen International, described the movie as "this long, bloated piece, " but said that the star cast "might give it a moderate arthouse career' " (IMDb). Although it didn't win anything at Cannes that year, the movie was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Art Direction -- Set Decoration, but lost to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

I watched the movie again today, and it's kind of a guilty pleasure movie. The viewer is horrified by the behaviors of these real-life characters and the excesses of the time, but it's kind of hard to stop watching because you might miss the next horrible scene. Peter Travers at Rolling Stone said that "Vatel acts like a pre-Food Network Emeril taking time out for bedding a courtesan (Uma Thurman) and stopping the king's brother (Murray Lachlan Young) from buggering little boys. This putrid dish marks a new low for director Roland Joffe and - mon Dieu - he's the guy who gave us Demi Moore in The Scarlett Letter." And that's kind of it in a nutshell. Mon Dieu indeed.

La Décadence Part One

It's time to move away from emotional love letters to my friends and family to what you're all here for -- juicy stories. Any time you study French culture, you're going to run into France's dirty laundry, so today is your lucky day if you're into France's decadent past and its revolutionary history.

For Christmas, I asked for and received a favorite movie, Marie Antoinette, with Kirsten Dunst in the title role. Based loosely on Antonia Fraser's biography, Marie Antoinette: The Journey, the movie is a luscious look at the child queen's reign and downward spiral toward her death. The stylized scenes -- shoes, food, clothing -- are mouthwatering and I loved the modern score underlying all of the period costuming and scenery. It got mixed reviews, but I've always liked Sofia Coppola's sympathetic portrait of Marie Antoinette as an innocent pawn. Kirsten Dunst is luminous as Antoinette and is a believable virgin queen who waited seven anxious years for her marriage to be consummated. As I'm sure you are all aware, poor Marie Antoinette's story ends with the beheading of Louis XVI, followed by her execution nine months later. The tragic story continued with the imprisonment, abuse, and eventual death of their third child, Louis-Charles, who should have succeeded his father to the throne. There were many pretenders to his title, but modern-day science has proven that none of the claimants had Louis and Marie's DNA and it is now assumed that Louis XVII died in June of 1795 as was claimed at the time. The movie, however, leaves the viewer in the carriage with Louis and Marie as they leave Versailles for the last time under armed guard and does not force us to witness the violent last months of their lives. If you love costume dramas with a twist, you'll love Marie Antoinette as much as I do.

Every time I write a post, I get distracted by the researching and historical facts that I uncover. This time, I discovered that Élisabeth-Louise Vigée-Le Brun became Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI's court painter and was the most famous female painter of the eighteenth century. Over a six year period, she completed thirty paintings of the queen and her family, including the infamous "muslin dress" painting. Completed and exhibited in the 1786 Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture (Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture) Salon, Marie Antoinette was shown wearing a straw hat and a white muslin dress with tight pleated sleeves. The Queen was becoming more unpopular by the minute, and critics said that she had portrayed herself in a totally inappropriate blouse. Coppola clearly channeled Le Brun's painting when creating her version of Antoinette's clothing when she was living informally at the Petit Trianon with her cronies.

Marie Antoinette appears to have been a silly young girl who became a loyal spouse and a loving mother. I found this Le Brun painting of the Queen and her children, which also appears in the movie, to be very poignant. Marie Antoinette is shown with her three children, Marie Thérèse, Louis Charles, and Louis Joseph. The empty cradle recalls one-year-old Marie Sophie who died of tuberculosis. One year after the painting was finished in 1787, Louis Joseph died too, and the Queen had the painting moved because every time she passed it it made her cry. The painting was exhibited in the Salon of 1788 and was the last of the thirty Le Brun portraits of the Queen and her family. She was criticized for her choice of the elegant red velvet dress and for posing in the royal Mirror Gallery at Versailles, an inflammatory choice given the unrest brewing in France at the time.

I've always felt sorry for Marie Antoinette; she just couldn't catch a break from anyone. Although this movie shows us in living color why the French people became so disillusioned with their royals, its lavish spectacles are a treat for the eyes. Next time, I'll give you a taste of another period movie that isn't quite so kind...

Julia and Joann

On Monday it will be eleven years since my beloved mother-in-law passed away. Joann was a child of the Depression, raised on a farm in Ohio, and was a part of a close-knit Mennonite family. Her trajectory from a stunningly beautiful young woman at Goshen College, through her years as a respected and beloved teacher in Rye, New York, and finally to her retirement in Arizona as the "hostess with the mostest" is one to be admired. She was kind, generous, and although she was not without her mistakes, she welcomed me and my son into her family with open arms. I miss her every day. Since we inherited some of Joann's prized possessions, including her cookbook collection, I am surrounded by memories of her. This is how I came to have a 1961 copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking on my bookshelf.

At some point in her mature adult years Joann became enamored of all things "Country French." Although she and my father-in-law traveled extensively in the United States when their sons were young, they turned their sights farther afield when the boys left the nest. They traveled all over Europe and went to Russia, Egypt, and India. They were on one of the first tourist groups into China and regaled us with the stories of the "luxurious" dormitory-style accommodations those early groups encountered. She tracked down her Mennonite relatives in France and visited the ancestral farm. Joann and Art hoped to instill their love of travel in their grandchildren and took each of them on a trip of his or her choosing for a graduation present. But, Joann wasn't just cruising through these countries. Among her books are photo essays on the culture, furniture, ceramics, glassware, and art of the places she visited and wanted to visit. Joann's amazing intellectual curiosity and love of beautiful things kept her vibrant right up until her last days.

It was always France that drew her back, though. She collected French pottery and furniture, and redecorated her houses around her collections. She scoured antique stores looking for just the right piece and it seemed like she bought every piece of Quimper that she ever encountered. As I have studied Quimper faience pottery, however, I find that she did actually specialize, and it is interesting that Joann mostly bought pieces from the Henriot factory that were made in the early 1900s during war times in France. Maybe it was the relatively inexpensive price, but I'd like to think that the earthy Breton peasant people who inhabit these plates reminded Joann of her farm roots, even though she moved far away from them as an adult.

The other thing that Joann collected and educated herself about was cookbooks and cooking. She found that when she moved to suburban New York she needed to upgrade her expertise and staple recipes in order to participate appropriately in her new social circles. In her cookbook, she would write the date and a list of the guests next to the recipe that she served them so that she would not repeat it the next time, and this is something my husband and I still do today. Joann's cookbooks are a treasure trove of information about the life she and Art lived and how they entertained, and they bring back memories of meals that she cooked for us. I can remember being picked up at the airport after a trip through O'Hare and La Guardia airports with two small children at Christmas time, and arriving in Rye to find an amazing meal almost ready for us. She purchased jumbo shrimp through a seafood buyer -- they really were jumbo, that's not an oxymoron! -- and we always looked forward to her cooking.

So, that brings us back to Mastering the Art of French Cooking. There are parallels to be found between Joann and Julia. Both were women who reinvented themselves as their lives demanded. Although Julia was not blessed with children, her life-long love affair with her husband is similar to the more than fifty happy years of marriage Joann and Art enjoyed. One of the reasons that Julia learned to cook was that she needed to entertain Paul Child's business associates, and by the time Mastering the Art of French Cooking was published in 1961, Joann was also trying to be an executive wife to her upwardly mobile husband.

It is disappointing to me to find out that apparently she did not use this cookbook because it is almost pristinely clean. You can see from my photo that it still has its original dust jacket with just a small tear in it. I wonder where she got it; did she buy the cookbook herself or did someone give it to her? It is a Book Club edition; did she get it because it was the most popular cookbook of its day and it just came automatically? I wish I could ask her, but both she and Art are now gone and the minutiae of their daily lives is gone with them. Since, thanks to Joann and Art, I live with beautiful antiques all of the time, I refuse to feel guilty about using my 49 year old copy of Julia. I intend to read it, to cook from it, and that will probably include getting it dirty. We will write in it just as Joann taught us, and I can't help but think that both she and Julia would be proud. Je t'aime, Joann.

Famille/Amis

I can't remember a holiday season in which I have had more fun than I have had this year. Starting with Thanksmas in Ohio with my mother and brothers and their families, through a lovely long weekend with my husband and our grown children, and all the way through a full staycation week of Chicago activities, every day is full of delights to be savored. I feel very blessed to be a part of such an amazing circle of friends and family.

Sometimes I wonder if anyone beyond the people I force to read this blog actually read it, but based on the thoughtful presents I received this year -- from the bouche de Noel to the copy of Up to the Villa (a travel memoir) -- I guess there are friends and family who are enjoying my craziness. I appreciate every single one of your kind comments and gifts.

Having recently finished reading My Year in France by Julia Child and viewing Julie and Julia, I can't help recalling the scenes in both the book and the movie where Child gathers in a group of people and creates a family wherever she lives. She lost her mother early, her relationship with her own father and stepmother was strained and it appears that she was disappointed to remain childless, but she made up for this sadness in her life by being a catalyst who drew disparate people together.

Not surprisingly, her lasting friendships appear to have revolved around food and travel. The Valentine's Day scene in Julie and Julia in Paul and Julia's French dining room is poignant and felt very meaningful to me as it triggered memories of the wonderful meals I have shared with family and friends in 2009. Even when I went to the movie web site and watched the trailer, I was reminded of incredible meals from the movie and from my own life.

After reading both books and bookending the books with viewings of the movie, I heartily recommend that you do all three. The movie is good enough to stand on its own, but your enjoyment and understanding of the characters involved will be deepened by reading the books.

I came away from this holiday season with a sense of wonderment about the blessings in my life. Somehow, this very flawed individual has managed to be a part of a magical circle of people who make my life worth living. My devoted husband, my amazing children, my sweet mother, my loving brothers, sisters-in-law, brothers-in-law, nieces and nephews (including darling Libbie) all bring me joy every day. And then there's my other family -- the incredible group of friends who are there for me no matter what -- and are always bearing the necessary food and wine. Like Julia, I am a brash, overly-large American who has a purpose and contentment in her life. C'est magnifique!

The lines are blurred -- my friends are my family and my family members are my friends. What more could a girl want for Christmas?

Star Stalking and Other Guilty Pleasures

Here I am again, wondering how ten days could have passed since I last wrote a post. I recently had a conversation with a group of my students about how quickly time passes; it was interesting to hear them apply mathematics to life's passage. They told me, albeit politely, that the reason I felt that time passes so quickly had to do with the percentage of my life that I experienced every year (read: you're old). They, on the other hand, are only thirteen and fourteen years old and their two weeks of winter vacation represents a significant part of their young lives. For me, these two weeks will fly by and it will barely feel as if I got any vacation.

Luckily, in the last two weeks I have finished one book and two movies that I want to share with you. I previously discussed A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle; I had some trouble finishing the book, but loved the movie. The chronological organization of the book translated well to the screen and the addition of a fully developed wife in Lindsay Duncan was a welcome addition to Mayle's vignettes.

It was with some trepidation that I pulled out the second book in the Provence series, Toujours, Provence. Although Mayle brings back characters from the first book and treats his vignettes with the same light humor that he used in A Year in Provence, this book has a feel of being recycled. I also became uncomfortable with the fact that he never refers to his wife by name; she is always "my wife" and rarely plays an important role in the stories. Perhaps that is their agreement, but I know that if I were writing a book such as this, it would be hard to keep my spouse out of the stories. We are a team and our stories star both of us! Still, Mayle is a good writer who knows how to tell a story; my students could learn from his voice. Maybe I should choose a safe story to use to teach narrative structure.

While researching Mayle I stumbled across a blog that includes several Mayle sightings and a photo. I chucked about this, because it could easily have been me taking the photo with Peter Mayle. Once my son and husband had to forcefully drag me away from a possible star-sighting in New York; I was willing to wait to see if the enormous limousine carried someone important. I actually took a photo of Barry Manilow at O'Hare airport; he was delightful and willing to pose. It was too bad that his botoxed face didn't really move when he smiled for the photo. I also just heard that my daughter's friend actually waited on Puck from Glee and engaged in conversation with him. I would have definitely been right there, but I guess I would have had to ask for an autograph for my "granddaughter." And right here, I'll put in a shout out to my a cappella chat room friends. I love that you love star-stalking, too.

I also found that my husband was right when he reminded me that Mayle wrote A Good Year, which was made into a movie starring Russell Crowe. I'm a sucker for these types of movies and thoroughly enjoyed it at least twice. That would be fun to watch this week while I'm on vacation. It got reasonably good reviews and Crowe is worth looking at for an hour and a half. For those of you who are snowed in, try A Good Year for a glimpse of a warmer climate.

I'm hopeful that there will be time for me to dig into My Life in France in the next few days. I need me some Julia before I cook up a storm this weekend. Bon Noel!

Getting Started

It seems strange that I am planning my next vacation before I finish cataloguing the digital photos from the last one, but maybe it’s not really strange at all. Isn’t that what travelers do? I don’t think I’m much different than anyone else who loves to travel. I read magazines and books and watch movies and see intriguing locations in which I want to be more than an armchair traveler. So, here is my journey. I’m going to write it down for the world to see. Maybe someone wants to connect with me, maybe not, although I’m hopeful that people will comment and recommend special places. Mostly, I just want to write about my thoughts, plans, and dreams.

In looking back, I know I started planning this trip several years ago after my friends came back from visiting France. A military family, they were figuratively blown away by the experience of visiting the Normandy beaches and the cemeteries. Then, my father died in the spring of 2009. He was a WWII veteran who was drafted in 1943, became a mechanic, and followed the Normandy first wave into France. He never got to go back to Normandy, and I’m not really sure if he wanted to. He hated how WWII was shown on television and movies and never really came to grips with the fact that many human beings learn how to deal with grief and pain by using humor to leaven the memories. When my brothers and I tried to watch Hogan’s Heroes, Dad always said, “That’s not really how it was.” We children were supposed to take his war and all wars seriously and understand the toll that war takes on individual soldiers as well as nations. He was proud of his military service and appreciated that he got to see places in Europe as a young man that he would never have had the opportunity of seeing, and he also valued the benefit of the GI Bill that allowed him to go to college when he came out of the Army. So, when the opportunity came to plan a trip to France, I knew that I wanted to honor Dad’s memory by going to Normandy.

As I started to look at my options, I began reading about trips to Normandy that included visits to the beaches. Many of the reviewers commented about having WWII veterans on their tours, and I realized that shortly, there won’t be anyone traveling who was actually there. Honoring my father’s memory became easier; we were going on a tour that was likely to include WWII veterans. That’s why I decided to choose a Seine river cruise from Paris to Normandy and back.

I asked my dear friend Nadya, who is a travel agent, to recommend a cruise line. As with so many other elements of traveling, she has experience with the cruise lines and was quick to sort through our options. We decided to spend four days in Paris on our own prior to sailing, and then another extra day at the end of the cruise. That way, we have some group time and some individual time to tour.

Now that you know my story, here is the road map for this journey. As I read books and view movies to prep myself for the trip, I’ll comment on them and review them for you. In between, I’m sure you’ll find more of my homegrown philosophy and some more about my wonderful family and friends. Bon voyage!