A time to remember. (All Saints Day)

Member Name: thingywhatsit

Product:	All Saints Day
Date:	31/10/06 (294 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Many people don't celebrate in the UK, but it's a good shared event here in France.

Disadvantages: Perhaps an event that goes unnoticed by some.

Today leads to a very special day here in France which is All Saints Day, although what leads towards this day is something that attracts people of many different religions, and people with no religion at all, and the mention of All Saints here in France does not make us think immediately of church. Here, All Saints Day is a special getting together of relatives from all corners of France, to trace their roots, and come back to decorate the graves of distant relatives, friends, and to generally look back at times gone by in a celebration of life, rather than death.

I have lived here for many years now, and during the course of that time, several people that I think a great deal of have died, and I decorate their graves in the same manner. Flowers fill pavements outside the flower shops, and supermarket foyers are filled in the same manner for decorating the cemeteries, although this event is a rather special one, in that you get to meet people that maybe you don't see all year, gathered together to talk, to clean the very stones that cover their loved ones, and to celebrate the lives of those people that are no longer with us.

Today was special, and I wanted to share it for a number of reasons. One, because I know that in the U.K. the concept of the celebration of All Saints Day is different and I enjoy this part of the life I have chosen to lead here in France because of the people that made me feel that I had at last found a home that cares about roots, and that is proud of those roots and not afraid to show it.

Alice. Alice was the first lady I met in France, an elderly Breton Lady that didn't let language barriers get in the way of friendship. She used to tell me stories about the war, and unlike some of the stories I had been told by my grandfather that used to bore me, Alices stories were animated by her facial expressions. She was a child during the war, and this part of France was occupied by the Germans. Little by little, the story of her life unfolded to me, with the help of a dictionary and loads of patience on her part and mine, as she recounted the stories of how the girls used to hide behind hedges to make their way to school so as not to cross paths with the German soldiers.

The occupation by the Germans of Brittany was a difficult period for the people, and especially for children at the time, since they heard talk of what was going on, but were too young to really understand what was being said. All she knew was that she should avoid being near them, and she said how she used to pop her head up over the hedge sometimes to see what the soldiers were like, but was really afraid, whilst having the natural curiosity of a child. Her parents had warned her about rape though at her tender age, she had no concept of what those words meant.

She married and had children and grandchildren, and when she died, she left a huge family behind her that gather every all saints day for a meal, and the conversation is so happy, so filled with memories that made those people that are left behind into the people that they are today. Her husband still cuts wood for the village, and has shown me pictures of when he had to deliver it by horse and sleigh in the snow. Funnily enough, when I see her daughters smile, I see a little part of Alice that I miss, that part that warmed me and welcomed a foreigner into her home, with a welcome not matched by anyone since.

Albertine. This was a lady that was married to the local blacksmith. She had a saucy laugh, and would tell stories about the days when the village blacksmith was single and all the girls chased him. I met Albertine opposite the bakers in our old village, and we got gossiping about things that have changed over the years. She became a friend, and I helped her paint her kitchen, and she insisted that I paint around a huge dresser that had been in place since before the war, as she was scared of what I would find behind it. We laughed. She used to watch soaps, and we have one called "the Fire of Love" which is very popular, and I remember tears running down her face as she watched it when one of the cast was supposed to have died. Real tears that she needed to cry, although of course, she was not that naïve that she thought the story real.

Albertine didn't leave very many family members behind, only a daughter who is unmarried, and distant cousins, although in the same manner as Alice, what she did leave was an echo of laughter, the thought of the fun this lady was and the way in which she made light of her illnesses, and lightened up conversations with her wicked smile. She leaves something more important than hoards of kids, and family. She leaves the people that she knew richer for having known her.

Martial. My neighbours in the last village were a farming couple who sold milk and had the usual animals such as rabbits and chickens, and made their living from farming. These were strong people, who collected the applies each year to make cider, the local delicacy, and I remember Martial being a gentle kind of person who had a need for sociability, although married to a lady that was painfully shy and stayed at home a lot of the time, content with her life and the day to day running of the farm. He leaves behind him his wife and his only son, although he leaves much more than this to me. When he died, I used to go every evening for an hour to visit his wife for a period of a year, and we played dominoes together and although that sounds quite dull, it was actually a good time for her to heal and for us to catch up on stories about their courtship, and how she felt about her life, to explore all the ambitions that she had as a young girl and had given up to become his wife, some of which she has recaptured and is proud of. Martial was her life, and is still in her life through memories and her own history which is still very much alive.

Emile was tunnel visioned for many years and had to wear special glasses. He was a bit of a local character, and always took the time to pop in and say hello, collect the cider apples, cut a bit of firewood for us, toast events in the village, and generally make us proud of him, as he had a very difficult job working for the local Council, and bringing up a handicapped son. Last year, he fell into a coma and was in that coma for many months. We all thought he would recover, though he never did. The legacy he leaves behind him is in the warmth of his home, the smiles of his wife, and the simple memories recounted by his handicapped and childlike young lad.

Each of these stories tells you about the people whose lives I celebrate every year on All Saints Day, although the point of the exercise is not particularly about their lives or their relevance, but about the relevance of remembering and celebrating those people that helped us to become who we are. Many of the people I meet at All Saints celebrations are people with no religion, many strong believers, many who have huge question marks about belief, though the one thing that they all have in common is that each of them, just as each reader that reads this review, has their own story, and for me All Saints Day is a time of importance and one I wished to share with you, as a resident of France.

By tomorrow, being a National Holiday and All Saints Day, the cemeteries will be beautiful, and families will have new memories to take home with them. That to me is what All Saints Day is all about.

For those of my family, I light a candle, kindle a flame, and remember thier importance to my life, all saints in some small manner, though none notable or famous, just people that mattered.

Another year, another reminder of what is behind us, and a step forward to another year with the knowledge that it is those remembered that got us where we are.

Rachel

Summary: A time to be grateful.