Simone’s Reasonable Adventure

About 28 uninterrupted hours on two planes, three trains, and one automobile, and I am in my room in France.

At five o’clock on the morning of June 2nd, my alarm went off in Oregon, at the Headquarters of my research department (and her husband). I’d crashed there with my luggage after dropping off the keys to my apartment on the last day of May. It was really quite wonderful to be surrounded by a peaceful American life before launching this next adventure.

Because I was pressed for time, I chose to fret over not being able to strip, deflate, and pack away the air bed I’d been using, before we headed two hours up the road to the Portland International Airport. I was informed that I was being unreasonable under the circumstances, and had I tried I would have been tackled and brought down. Recuperating now in my guest room in the heart of France, I think a reasonable approach is worth considering. 

I do not like relying on others, and when I receive help I am deeply grateful, but still see it as a personal failure of some sort. Imagine being reasonable enough to take it for granted that everyone relies on help whether they like it or not, and no doubt the more successful rely on it the most. Do they worry they have nothing of equal value to offer?

 

My familial reputation is of a women who has only the making of food to offer. Perhaps my hunch that I will be letting go of that was behind my last burst of traditional cooking with garden rhubarb and early local strawberries. And yes, I rendered the fresh lard that made that pie crust explode in flakiness.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A heart-wrenching good-bye curtailed by the very diligent parking police at the curb, and I was whisked away by a kindly porter who delivered me to check my two large bags of everything I think I’ll need until I find an apartment. 

On the way to Seattle for the final leg, I took a last look at Oregon for at least a year, assuming things all go reasonably well. That is our beloved Mt. Hood, just beyond the great Columbia River.

 

 

 

Waiting with my 323 fellow passengers, there it was. The Air France partner that was delivering me to a new home. With a French flight crew! Time to start using my French, and I was a bit nervous. Like other French officials I’ve observed, they tend to be groomed and dressed quite nattily, and will switch to English if you are not on your toes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I did not suffer that humiliation, however. By the time I arrived at my lodgings, I had had a thorough immersion in the language. A crisis broke through the barriers of shyness and false pride.

Due to my refusal to leave the Charles de Gaulle airport in order to catch a train to the small town of Moulins, I was taken south to Lyon on the TGV train, or the high-speed Train de Grande Vitesse. In Lyon, I finally made a mistake, and after seeing the platform posted for my next and last local train, I got up and wrangled my three suitcases while leaving my satchel containing the new computer upon which I am obviously writing this. I didn’t even notice until I’d loaded all three bags onto the train, at which point I dashed out onto the platform, breathlessly explaining to the spiffily-hatted SNCF employee what had happened. He said “Vous devez vous dépêcher, madame.” 

After quite literally running back to where I’d thought I’d left it, and finding it gone, I frantically collared a worker and told him it was stolen. He immediately escorted me to where about eight uniformed security guards were standing, and they all escorted me to look again. One, who seemed to have taken over, realized I’d not checked the right place, and so further on, in an identical waiting area, there it lay on a table where I’d been sitting. But my train had left without me. With all my luggage aboard.

The entire team seemed to become my personal posse, and many calls, questions, and consultations with other officials ensued. Someone on the train took a picture of my luggage which I’d described. Someone at my destination said he would remove it and store it for me. My phone did not work, being between cellular carriers, but my laptop served for me to send a chat to my hostesses via her listing on the website. She actually responded in real time, and was very agreeable about me arriving two hours late. Finally the lead security guard saw to me getting a new ticket. Unlike the first, it required a layover in Vichy, but I could not complain. The Lyon train station security team is much to be commended, though not a one of them attempted a word of English during the whole fiasco. I had instantly become remarkably fluent, as well as grateful.

So the only picture I really have of France so far is today’s featured photo. It was taken from the high-speed train, which averaged 173 miles per hour, on up to 200. The views starting after The Forest of Othe, into Burgundy, were all at least as bucolic and even more verdantly pastoral than this one. Small stone villages nestled in the hills and punctuated with one church steeple would appear and disappear at rare intervals. It happened so fast I never caught it. Being that telephone poles flew past at about the speed of a rapid heartbeat, this is the shot that did not contain one of those, and did not have a window reflection. 

But really, I do hope that going close to thirty hours without real sleep is the last unreasonable thing I attempt on this adventure.