Jacques' castle

The beginning: Jacques’ Castle

My first trip to France with John was not long after we met and he asked me to go to Paris for New Year’s, an invitation he didn’t need to repeat. I loved Paris; I was 16 years old, an exchange student, when it became my favorite city…

Chercher la maison

Our weeklong class for artists in September went off well. After this, our fourth trip, we were even more seduced by the Périgord’s grey-green valleys; softly eroded yellow limestone cliffs; wide sinuous rivers; gently rolling farmland; and its slow pace of life. The following year, in the late…

Le Pouget

It’s the name of our hamlet of three houses or the “lieu-dit” in French. Le Pouget doesn’t mean anything, so it must be a family name. No one seems to know. It’s also our address: Le Pouget, St Avit-Sénieur, France. That’s it. No street or house number. We…

Then came Patrick

We continued on the house and worked long, hard days, often leaving after sunset, too tired to do anything but find an open restaurant, dinner and a bottle of wine. Friends visited to check our progress and stayed to help, pitching in with the day’s project, however dirty…

A cow in labor and one solitary bee

We demolished every wall in the house except a stone wall that had been the end of the original house before an addition in the 1800s. Our contractor’s assistant discovered it when he was removing loose plaster. The wall emerged in three days of grueling work, Joe’s jackhammer…