A summer fête
Our summer vacation at the Chateau began with a heatwave, rallied with a fête and cool weather, and ended with fond farewells as "la rentrée" begins...
The Chateau in the heat of summer, under blue skies and surrounded by a leafy green canopy
Chère amie, cher ami,
After my last letter to you, I laid down my pen on the desk in the library.
It was a summer’s day in the middle of August. Outside, the slanting afternoon light bounced up from the gravel and glinted off a parasol. A circle of transats sat empty in the heat.
Henry was playing Debussy’s “Réverie” on the piano. The notes, tender and mysterious, swirled through the open doors of the salon. Otherwise, the house was still. Dorothée, who is four, waited patiently to follow me upstairs for la sieste. She likes to investigate the drawers of my dressing table while she is supposed to be taking a nap. James, in front of the toy cupboard in the hall, gazed with silent intensity at piles of battleships and soldiers, ready to be transformed into armies and a vast armada. And little Charlie, sweaty, curly-headed, and plump, had been settled down by his mother in his cot.
The other little cousins had been whisked away to slumber, too. The elders stretched out on a chaise longue in the shadowy drawing room or went upstairs with a book and a propensity for falling into le petit somme.
It was the hottest summer in France in almost a decade.
We stayed out of the bright sun. The thick walls of the château kept out the heat.
But in the gloam after the sun had begun to set, life began afresh. Reinvigorated, the children chased each other across the lawn, their muffled shrieks wafting over the grass. Fireflies glittered in the deep shadows among the trees. And, cooled and refreshed by a bath and the evening air, we conversed by candlelight over dinner and glasses of thin-bodied Loire Valley wine.
True to form, however, “la Vierge du 15 août change tout.” The very day after le Jour de l’Assomption, August 15, the weather abruptly changed. The next morning dawned misty and fresh. The sun sparkled on dewy spiderwebs stretched across twigs and blades of grass.
Dorothée gives her little brother a push across the cour d'honneur
The cooling weather was a good thing. The very littlest one wasn’t sleeping through the night too well. His parents were becoming hollow-eyed and touchy. And the grass, even in verdant Normandy, was tinged with pallid brown. No one could ask the cows their thoughts, but they had been fed on hay since the month of July.
Furthermore, we were about to give a big party for Viola and her husband of almost a year. In the final dim throes of la crise sanitaire, dear friends and many family members had been unable to travel to the wedding the year before…and this was the occasion to present le jeune ménage to a wider world.
You can never satisfy everyone, of course. Our farmer, relieved that the heat had broken, now gloomily predicted torrents of rain. My husband checked his phone and concurred. The météo, he showed me, featured clouds and pelting drops of blue. Fortunately, we had reserved a tent.
Even better, our friend and neighbour Madame Chantal had brought over her statue of Saint Joseph. He was safely hidden in a bush, where he would not be accidentally disturbed.
I had never thought of Saint Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus and husband of the Virgin Mary, as the patron of le beau temps.
Chantal smiled modestly.
“You must care for him,” she explained.
“Ave Joseph, le Sauveur a reposé dans vos bras et grandi sous vos yeux,” she recited from the Octave of Saint Joseph. “Hail Joseph, the savior slept in your arms and grew under your watchful eye…”
Saint Joseph, she clarified, helps the family.
I am happy to report that, all day, the sun shone brightly and with none of its past ferocity.
The tent arrived early in the morning, a little worse for the heavy wear it had received the night before. The tentiste apologized, but we understood. France has flung itself into la sociabilité -- weddings, baptisms, receptions, parties -- after the isolating circumstances of the last two years.
We rinsed the smudges off the plastic window on the side and the worst scuffs off the walls. We disguised the utilitarian metal tent poles with branches of greenery. Edward and his friends strung la guinguette -- garlands of small round light bulbs -- over the metal rafters. They arranged tables on the grass and gravel, decorated them with lanterns. The groom’s sister, with her mother and daughter, picked flowers in the potager to make little bouquets. And Monsieur Martyn and Monsieur Damien, gardener and homme à tout faire, raked and weeded the gravel, snipped and tidied the flower beds.
The newly planted waterlilies in the canal flowered this summer
The fleuriste drove up with a magnificent pair of tropical arrangements -- red anthurium, red bromelias, birds of paradise and red dahlias – to flank the entry to the tent and a slightly more modest pair to decorate the buffet tables.
The caterer…un merveille!...set up his truck behind the château. The dining room was commandeered as a command center.
We had invited our convives to a cocktail dinatoire, a hearty feast taken while standing or perching on chairs around tables. There were stands serving hot seared foie gras, delicately sautéed scallops, thinly sliced Spanish ham, smoked salmon and steamed shrimp…there was tajine of lamb…charcuterie and crudités…hors d'oeuvres of diverse shapes and tantalizing tastes.
Towards nine o’clock, there were petit fours and hot coffee…and, in a “clin d’oeil” for les jeunes mariés, a pièce montée. Made of puff pastry shells filled with a rich and unctuous crème pâtissier and piled into a pyramid, this is the “croquembouche” – named for the crunchy caramelized sugar that delicately cements the ensemble. Since the 19th century, when it was a new creation and the latest fashion, the croquembouche is the traditional dessert at French weddings.
At last, just before midnight, as if they had suddenly seen their watches, our guests rose up and went away. There was not another glass of champagne to be toasted, nor one more bottle of wine left to uncork. There was very little left to eat. Pieces of the croquembouche were strewn over the serving platter…sure to be délicieux the following day.
“It’s just as it was before!” exclaimed one of our guests, throwing her arms around my shoulders as she kissed me farewell.
No, not like the heatwave! she protested. The warmth of being once again in a throng of friends, of family, the mingling of generations.
She stopped and gazed around her.
“And the château…dans toute sa beauté!”
The lights from the upper windows gleamed out into the darkness. Through the open doors, the chandelier of the great hall was reflected in the mirror behind it.
The days that followed the grande fête were delicious, too.
Friends from Paris unexpectedly arrived the following night. They had mistaken the date, but stayed for dinner. There was a birthday party for young Jacques, Viola’s new nephew, who was turning 12.
Every day we inspected the brambles to see if the blackberries were ready to be picked. We bicycled along the country roads. We picked vegetables in the garden. We fed the chickens all our table scraps and collected their eggs – except for those jealously protected by the broody speckled hen. Feathers fluffed out protectively, she pecked our fingers indignantly with her soft beak if we dared to disturb her.
Too soon, it was la rentrée. Les grandes vacances, summer vacation, was at an end. It was time for school. For the world of work. And for evenings outside with a petite laine, a light shawl, instead of bare arms.
The autumn equinox has come. The late wildflowers are blooming in the hedgerows. The last sweet tomatoes cling to drying vines. The apples are ripening in the orchard. Wood must be cut and stacked for fires.
We look at photographs of those happy summer days with a sigh – and turn with renewed inspiration to new projects at Château de Courtomer.
A bientôt au Château!
Elisabeth
Autumn comes to Chateau de Courtomer...looking out through the stone pillars in the park to the fields.
As always, Heather and Beatrice (info@chateaudecourtomer.com and +33 (0) 6 49 12 87 98) will be happy to help you reserve your own holiday or special gathering at the Chateau or just to rent the Chateau, the Farmhouse or both. We have just a few openings for this year and 2023, and are taking bookings through 2024. We look forward to hearing from you.