So Much to be Thankful For

With the sleep still in my eyes, I kissed Jason goodbye and staggered down the stairs. It's true what they say about the dark before the dawn, and in late November, chilly, misty mornings are the only type of mornings there are. My bag was heavy, filled with wine and chocolate and my good boots in anticipation of the wintery weather that was waiting for me.

Excitement and a cup of bitter coffee keep me from sleeping. It's been 10 months. How much longer until we're there? I just want to be there.

There is no greater sight on the face of the earth than my parents' smiles when I finally step off the escalator in baggage claim. My dad always waves one thick, rugged hand and my mom always looks as though someone has finally taken a heavy load off her shoulders. It bring tears to my eyes every time.

"Have you been watching the news? They finally lifted the state of emergency in Buffalo. Aunt Carol says the thruway is open again and they are working on clearing the snow at the church parking lot. It looked bad for a minute there but I think they're going to pull it off." While Rochester was completely unscathed, our neighbors to the west were buried by the worst snowstorm in recent history, with certain parts of city seeing up to 7 feet of accumulation over the course of a week. If rain on your wedding day is supposed to bring good luck, what does a record-setting blizzard bring?

Of the seven cousins on my dad's side, Steven has always been the witty, quietly silly one. He can give you a look and you're laughing immediately, not even necessarily knowing why. Ashley is just as sharp, just as quick with exactly the right thing to say. But they both have this earnest sincerity about them, as well. Watching them recite their vows to each other, you knew they meant it. I am excited for the rest of their life together.

Patrick and I don't talk much. He filled his quota of big brother duties when we were still in elementary school and we have been pretty absent from each others' lives for a good 15 years. I love him, but I don't know him anymore. Moving to Buffalo and starting a family of his own was certainly not the only cause of the growing divide between us but for the first time in a long time, I felt like that gap shrank a little bit. We sipped cocktails, and laughed and talked about being adults and how that changes everything. And we danced.

Some of my favorite people in the world

Consumerism has spoiled most holidays for me but Thanksgiving has remained pure and beautiful. It's hard to ruin a day that is exclusively dedicated to family, food, and feeling grateful. My time at home is always so limited and it has shown me how important it is to truly get the most out of every moment with the people I love. There were many wedding-related errands to run, but the giddy excitement in my mother's eyes as worth it. Even the simple act of sitting next to her in the car again is time well spent.

Just as suddenly as it began, the week was over. On the way to the airport, we stopped quickly at Grandma and Grandpa's house. At 96, his health was fading quickly and as Grandma put it in her blunt way, "God's calling him but he can't hear Him!" (The high-pitched squeal of his hearing aid is forever etched in my memories from childhood but he had given it up completely.) Knowing that he was due for a little fresh air, we managed to get him into the van so he could come along for the ride. Absent the dry erase boards that litter the house, I scrawled a simple note in the back of the book I was reading: "Taking Nicole to Airport. She's going back to France." It took him the entire ride to decipher it and I doubt he knew that I was Nicole but it didn't matter. As I gathered my bags, he waved one thick, rugged hand and it looked as though a heavy load had been lifted from his shoulders. I knew the sad, inevitable truth that lay ahead, but in that moment, he looked so genuinely happy and it brought tears to my eyes.

The Bayers in Bordeaux

After hearing how much fun everyone had in April, Jason's father Jay decided that he should visit us in Bordeaux, if for nothing else than to see what all the fuss was about. It took quite a bit of convincing and there was even a moment when I thought he might just say forget it and never come, but Jason's powers of persuasion are strong. Julie was, as she always is, just excited to be spending time with us.

Jason is quite the planner when it comes to vacations, so he had their whole 10-day adventure laid out: Day trips to a few nearby towns, plus a night in San Sebastian, all strategically interspersed with downtime in Bordeaux. Some of you may be thinking to yourselves "Ten days with your in-laws sounds like a lot" and you would be right, BUT it's a long time to have ANYONE stay in your house and keep them entertained. I must admit that the time really flew by because we had so much to do thanks to Jason's expert organization. No visit is perfect but we got pretty darn close. Here are some highlights:

Cognac
We stole this one from when Kelly and Kate were here. Tour a maison, drink lots of cognac, hang out by the river. Check, check and check. The only negative point of the day was the wait time on our dinner. I swear it was a full hour between our appetizer and our main dish, with no one coming to offer us more wine or an apology for the delay. Service in France isn't maniacal constant badgering like in the US but it's not usually total abandonment, either. I swear, I nearly got up to go fishing for my own damn merlu... And then I remembered I was having a three-course meal in Cognac and I felt just a bit pretentious!

If I had any artistic ability, this is what I would paint.

Portes Ouvertes in Graves
This was such a hit with my mom last year that we decided to do it again with Jason's parents. (Jay is not one to miss out on the fun if everyone else is doing it.) We rented a car and dragged Rick along for the ride for a perfectly sunny day of wine tasting and touring. As is often the case, I got to play translator at a few places and show off my bilingualism a little bit, and Jay discovered how tricky it can be to separate two Romance languages :"I keep saying 'Sí' but I know I'm supposed to say 'Oui'! This is ridiculous." Also, wine!

Château Cerons

Château Castres 

Toulouse
As a girl, Julie had a couple of pen pals from Toulouse so she had always dreamed of visiting. Jason and I are in the business of making dreams come true so we hopped a train and off we went for a day in the ville en rose. It was our first time, too, so we had plenty to explore and discover, and it was kind of cool to share Julie's wide-eyed wonder in this new city. We almost got stuck with a 50-minute delay on our return to Bordeaux, but I was able to get us home on time by requesting seats on the train prior to ours that was also late. Bam! Nicole saves the day.

Finally talking to Jay
My relationship with Jay has always been a bit... strained. I don't know if it's because he thinks I'm encroaching on his time with his one and only baby boy, or if it's because we have such vastly different opinions on literally everything, or maybe it's because I don't fit his ideal of what a "good woman" is. I got on like a house on fire with everyone else in the family while Jay and I were barely making sparks.

One night after some escargots and a few glasses (bottles) of wine, the two of us ended up getting in a very intense conversation about everything from white privilege to systemic racism to socialized health care and everything in between. I'm not saying that we see eye to eye on all of these issues now, but I do think that I helped him see the flaw in the "bootstraps" argument that he believed so earnestly. So you mean black and brown people aren't just inherently lazy? And that even though I grew up a poor kid in the country, I still had certain advantages afforded to me simply because of my skin color? It took hours, but if I can get a staunch republican to admit that there are systems in place in the US that keep certain people in power and others marginalized, it gives me hope for humanity.

In addition to the higher moral victory, it was also the moment that finally got Jay to see me as someone worthy of his time. There was a very tangible shift that night from my being some know-it-all liberal girl corrupting his only son to a well-educated, well-spoken person with passion, and even Jay can appreciate that. I don't necessarily need us to be best friends, but I do need him to respect me and I think we're finally getting to that point.

San Sebastian and Basque Cider Houses
In the final leg of Jay and Julie's trip, we drove down to our favorite Spanish town for the evening and relished in the local flavors of bacalao, rioja and endless pintxos. Rows upon rows of small plates, lined up across the bar, luring us in with their bright colors and intoxicating aromas. I love French food, but there is something so playful about tapas-style eating. You can try so many different things, a little at a time, taking a little culinary voyage with every bite. It also doesn't hurt that San Sebastian is a stunningly beautiful city.

Pintxos for dinner

The view from our hotel

After a night of snacking and drinking, we ventured outside of town a bit to the Petretegi cider house for a fun day of learning about the Basque region, cider making and of course lots of drinking. The giant barrels were so pressurized that the cider would come shooting out of them and lightning speed. You had to be pretty quick with your glass to catch it all!

With over a week's worth of memories and new experiences to share with their friends, Jay and Julie headed back to Pennsylvania. We can't be sure, but something tells me they'll be back...

Fall-ing in Love

They say no one can tell you when you're in love; you just know it. Well, baby, I am smitten.

I am in love with Bordeaux
As our summer drew to a close, I had to take a moment to appreciate how amazing it was. We visited six different countries, a dozen cities, and made countless new friends, all in just four short weeks. This is the kind of thing that's really only possible in Europe. International borders are fluid and never that far away, making it incredibly easy for eager travelers like us to get our adventure fix. Looking through the pictures back home in Bordeaux just reminded me how fortunate we are to be here and to be on this crazy journey together. We live in an amazing city that continues to surprise me everyday.

We finally climbed to the top of Pey Berland. Seen here: Pont de Pirre, St Michel spire, and the Grosse Cloche

September is the rentrée, when everyone goes back to work with colorful stories, fresh tans, and a positive attitude, which, I might add, is harder to find in France than a bakery without baguettes. It's always a blur of bisous and innumerable apéros en terrasse to catch up while the weather is still nice. Do you remember how happy you were to see all of your friends again on that first day back after summer break? It's like that, but all month and with way more wine.

One of many beautiful days in Bordeaux. Visiting Palais Rohan @ Hotel de Ville

Freshly scrubbed free of soot and grime. Thanks, Alain Juppé!

During the first weekend in October, we were treated to unseasonably warm weather for the harvest in Bourg. As a beer-loving American, I always had this vision of wine as being something chic and inaccessible for laypeople like me. Fancy glasses, fancy tastings, fancy words like "sommelier" and "connoisseur"... It all just seemed beyond my simple tastes. But then I came to Bordeaux and learned that vintners are nothing more than grape farmers who like to drink. Unlike last year, when all the grapes were ruined by the ultra-wet weather, we easily filled our harvesting baskets to the brim at every vine. There is something uniquely beautiful about getting out in the fields and being close to the earth after spending so much time in the city.

The harvester was much faster at grape-picking than we were.

Typical Jason

The fruits of our labor... GET IT?!??!?

No, you don't get to stomp on them.

La Garonne and the town of Bourg

I am in love with Gaelic Football
After nearly two years of laziness/cowardice, I finally decided to grow a pair and find myself a sports team. The women's rugby teams here are not really my speed (either novice students or semi-pro) and I found the Ultimate team to be uncharacteristically boring and not that friendly. Enter: Gaelic Football. A few of the girls from Chesapeake used to play in the off season or as cross training so I knew that the sport existed but that was about it. Since my life is apparently one giant serendipitous moment after another, I just happened to be at the CEL when one of the new teachers was hanging a promotional poster for the team. An obscure sport, you say? Where do I sign up? I sent the club president an email, dragged along my Kiwi friend Laura and trucked out to Bordeaux Lac to give it a try.

On our first day at practice, most of the team was in Sweden for a tournament so we had a very laid back initiation to the sport. Hand pass, kick pass, solo, dribble... There are a lot of skills to master and it's all a bit complicated at first glance, but I swear there is some method to the madness. Plus, if you've ever played any field sport ever, you realize very quickly that it's all kind of the same thing: Pass the object in some special fashion so that it gets to other side of the field. GO.

My hand-foot coordination, and thus my ability to consistently execute a solo (kicking the ball back up into your own hands) left a bit to be desired, but everyone was incredibly supportive and encouraging, even when I booted the ball in the wrong direction for the 72087th time in 20 minutes. The thing that really got me to stay, though, was this instant feeling of camaraderie. After practice, everyone hung around for a couple of beers and some snacks and without even mentioning it, we had offers for rides back into town from three different people. It felt so much like the days playing rugby and Ultimate back in the US that I immediately felt like part of the team and knew that I had found my niche. It's good to be home.

(I'm just right of center, in orange)

I am in love with my husband
Maybe it's corny to say it, but it's true. Do we just gaze into each other's eyes all day long, tears brimming because we're so overwhelmed by our love? No, because we have jobs. Ain't nobody got time for that. Do we ever fight about stupid things? Yes, because we are human beings. I can't tell you how many times we have bickered about my obsession with right-side-out socks or his inability to replace the toilet paper roll and HEAVEN HELP US if we have to make a joint decision on what to watch or where to eat...

But we're comfortable and we're happy. I like being with him. I like that he makes me laugh. I like that we are starting to know each other so well that we can be proactive about situations where the other might be upset. (Note to self: always eat before going to the market on Sunday morning. H'anger is a real thing.) Of course there are days when we seem a little out of sync, and they are that much more striking because we are normally in lockstep, but it just tells me that we're still figuring it out. And that's okay! We're growing together and learning together and making mistakes together. But we always figure it out and I am really looking forward to a lifetime of figuring it out with Jason.

*Cue sappy music and "awwww"s*

It's good to be in love.

We are Aoûtiens - Part 4

August 28-29: Olivia and William's Wedding

We had just one evening at home before we were off for our final adventure of the summer. One of  Jason's colleagues, Olivia, was getting married and we were on the guest list. The wedding took place in Jonzac, a little town not too far from Cognac, just over an hour from us in Bordeaux. We hitched a ride with our French friends Guillaume and Alexia, and our ol' pal Rick was along for the ride as well. The five of us jammed into the car, with our sleeping gear and dancing shoes.

I had attended a few parties with Olivia and her crew before so I suppose I should have known that this wedding was going to be an epic event. The ceremony at the church involved a lot of hymn-singing, which was made even more difficult because they were all in French, but we gave it our best effort. After what was (probably?) a lovely service, the newlyweds came out into the church yard for photos and mingling. It looked like something out of a Disney movie.

Over to the reception where more impossibly beautiful and perfect things would happen. The invitation said it was at a château, which is par for the course in France, but I was not prepared for what we rolled up on.

Really? When did I have friends with homes like this?

Firstly, it belongs to Olivia's grandfather, which is already extra cool. I know someone with their own château! Secondly, the yard was set up for cocktail hour. To me, cocktail hour is some veggies and dip, cheese and crackers, and lasts exactly one hour. WRONG. This cocktail hour included smoked salmon, sliced meats, pâté, gourmet mini-soups in tiny plastic cups, all the champagne in the world and 3000 oysters. That means 10 oysters for everyone who attended the wedding. There was a freaking jazz trio. Unlike the name would suggest, cocktail hour lasted for a good four hours. I kept waiting for them to announce it was time for dinner so I was pacing myself on the snacks, but I should have just gone hard when I first got there. It would be ages before we sat down for dinner.

Boats of oysters!

Keep the champagne coming, sir.

When it started getting dark, they brought us into the chai for dinner (because I know people with a place other than their adjacent châteaux that can seat 300 people comfortably) and we had a beautiful meal of salad, foie gras, pork medallions, roasted vegetables, and even a cheese plate. There were speeches from the fathers, a musical number by Olivia's cousins, more speeches from the bride and groom. This was followed by a spread of desserts like none I have ever seen. There were little strawberry-basil smoothies, macaroons, mini crème brûlée, and a self-serve ice cream truck. Not like the powdered stuff you used to have in the dining hall but real hand-crafted French ice cream. And in case you were somehow still sober after cocktail hour and the wine at dinner, there was more champagne and cognac for the digestif. All. Night. Long.

But who has time for drinking when there is a dance party going on? The DJ was spinning one great song after another and the dance floor was packed all night. It seemed like every guest knew how to swing dance, and the room was a blur of bouncing curls and swirling coattails. The last time I went to a party with Olivia, we were up dancing until 5am. This time, the sun was coming up before we decided to call it a night. We had been at it for 13 hours, after all.

We were invited to crash at the other château on the property (two châteaux?!?!?) and Olivia had explained to Jason where we should sleep. There must have been some misunderstanding because when we went to set up our air mattress, Jason insisted Olivia had told him that we were supposed to sleep in the vestibule of the bathroom. You know, that little room outside the toilets that has the sink and maybe a linen closet. I was skeptical, but he seemed awfully sure of himself and I didn't have the physical or mental energy to fight with him about it. Jason has a tendency to snore when he's been drinking and this evening was certainly no exception. Maybe it was best that we were in our own little area so he didn't keep the rest of the house up all night (morning?). Unfortunately, every time someone had to use the bathroom, which was often after a night of drinking, they had to stumble over our semi-comatose bodies, sprawled in front of the door. Needless to say, it was not the most restful sleep I ever got in my life.

It was around noon when we finally started moving again and we were met with a little good-hearted teasing from Olivia. "I don't know how you sleep at night with that snoring, Nicole! And why were you in the bathroom? You couldn't have gotten any sleep with people disturbing you all night!!" Yes, yes. Laugh at my pain. And for the record: I WAS RIGHT, JASON.

I was expecting to pack up our things and head down the road, but we were invited to a post-wedding brunch of leftovers from the night before. We had plenty of oysters to finish, the rest of the cheese plates, hard-boiled eggs, cold cuts and what French meal is complete without a bazillion baguettes? Oh, and that ice cream was not going to eat itself!

We spent the rest of the afternoon on the patio, soaking up the sun and letting the bread soak up the booze that was left in our bellies. By 5pm, we decided it was probably time to go back to real life. Guillaume and Alexia were staying a bit longer so we bid our hosts goodbye and Rick, Jason and I hopped a train back to Bordeaux.

As the summer drew to a close, we were tired but happy, with a whole bunch of new memories and a few more places checked off the bucket list. The new school year is already back in action but at least I have a few light days to ease me back into the swing of things. I'm still recovering, that's for sure.

So long, sweet summer. See you next year.