From Paris we took the train an hour north to the small town of Sacy-le-Petit, in the village of Picardie. Chateau de Sacy stands tall at the entrance to the village, a grand mansion that's too old to know precisely when it was built. Hermine, the owner, tells us it's been in her family for seven generations. Before that, no one who's alive knows its story. But I'm getting ahead of myself. From the train station at Chevriers, we were to walk 5 kilometers to the chateau. With our packs. In the hot sun. Nick was in charge of hitching us a ride while I was trying to keep upright with my pack on, opening and closing my fists to try to get the circulation back in my arms that the shoulder straps of my green Kelty cut off. After a handfull of failed attempts, my body was waining under the pressure. I stood in front of Nick as a car approached and stuck my leg out in addition to my thumb. The man pulled over. He spoke French, and very quickly, but we understood that he was going the other direction from us, though he would take us as far as he could. I climbed in the back and Nick got in the front seat. The man spoke on, in French, and I kept nodding, saying "oui", and "bon" a lot, too tired to translate. His humanitarianism took over and he kept on driving past his turn. We arrived at Chateau de Sacy, greatful and exhausted.
Through the giant ancient iron gates we walked back in time. The chateau stood tall and wide, with ivy flourishing and strong pale green wooden shutters, framing the thick old glass windows and into the dark rooms. I couldn't wait to explore. We had tea with Hermine, the 69 year-old French woman who runs the chateau, and Connor, the barely 18 year-old from upstate New York, a fellow wwoofer. After tea he showed us around and I fell in love with each step. In the rustic kitchen the paint had chipped and worn away on the outfacing wall to reveal the stones and mud concrete the original builders used. The varying shapes and sizes of the stones are an al fresco mosaic, striations forming fossils of the history of Chateau Sacy. Down the hall is Hermine's office, painted a warm sunflower yellow, a green and masculine billiards room, and my favorite room on the ground floor, the drawing room, outfitted with turn of the century red velvet couches and intricate regal apholstered chairs. A thick but buckling creamy wallpaper with faded green and yellow floral design covers the walls, and giant gold gilded mirrors hanging off the walls somewhat precariously, while a white marble fireplace adorned with a porcelain bust sits opposite the door. A room so grand you feel the need to whisper inside it. The chateau holds two more floors, and my room is reminscent of Van Gogh's spare but lovely one with colorful walls, high ceilings, and a giant window.
reading in the kitchen
Hermine is such a character I often can't believe I'm not reading about her in a book, but she's really here, doing and saying unpredictable things and running the grand maison. In her past lives she was a tightrope walker, a singing sensation (largely in Japan), and who knows what else. She's now the wife of famed English writer Hugo Williams, among other things. It's all there on Wikipedia if she's too "bored" (one of her favorite words) to tell you herself. She has rules for eating, like no butter on your bread at lunch or dinner ("daft Americans, it's just not done in France!") and if I get the wrong plates when I set the table ("those aren't for potatos, we're not having stew!") I get yelled at. She's interesting, scatterbrained, and always busy running around talking (to you or herself?). When she gives you a job in the morning she follows or proceeds it with "If it's not too boring" or "Can you face it? Is it too terrible?", and you do it, and hope it's how she likes, and that at the end she says "Ah, bon" and not "Oh, no! What have you done?!" which can sometimes be the case.
The jobs we do are fairly easy. Weeding the potager (kitchen garden), planting new seeds (winter lettuce and beans), and clearing the paths from place to place. The landscape is vast and beautiful, with the potager, an open field, a small field of rasberries, a tree-lined square, a secluded path throughout the back of the garden, and beyond a locked old wooden door, the secret garden, or what Hermine calls the forest garden. At the edge of a wheat field, it has mostly weeds, but also a beautiful path (thanks to Nick) as well as a black plum tree and some small wild flowers. All the greens are lined with quaint rectangular english bushes, like a maze. Hundred years old pear trees, apple trees, and plum trees pepper the property, as well as a mulberry tree, red and white currants, roses, herbs, and flowers. The Chateau is quiet and serene, the only thing to interrupt you are the birds singing to each other and the occasional wild French cat.
I've made rose hip jelly, plum jam, and apple sauce with fresh ingredients harvested from the garden. An ordeal, I quite like making jam, and love the look on someone's face when they're enjoying it. After work I like to read at the yellow table with one chair hidden in the back corner of the property among the trees. We play table tennis with Lloyd Durling, the English artist in residence (who's said my rose hip jelly is the best he's had), and John, the English cyclist who's also wwoofing. I spend time gazing out my giant window, breathing in the fresh summer air, while the boys play French Billiards.
Collecting apples for applesauce
When I'm in the kitchen alone I look into the beautiful antique tin boxes full of tea, sugar, and coffee. I fantasize about what I would do if the Chateau were mine. The changes I would make and the things I wouldn't dare to touch. I picture myself walking around the big empty house in winter, clutching a sweater close the my neck, in wool slippers, tending to the fire in the drawing room and gazing out at the gray white sky deciding whether or not it will snow. Is this life in my future? Only time will tell.
