French Escape

 Last Saturday during the night, I woke sneezing, coughing, my nose running, eyes watering. I thought I must have a cold coming on.  Because it was the middle of the night, I started to wonder what would happen if I died from this cold. I have no fear of dying, but I do have a great fear of no one knowing that I’ve gone. I couldn’t get back sleep until I come up with a plan to make sure that if I do die here, someone will find me. Of course, when I woke on Sunday, all signs of any cold had gone. It must have just been an allergy! Having established that I was unlikely to die and even if I did someone would find me, I was filled with energy, so I went out for a walk. I walked down into the old town, joined the tourists and locals looking around the shops and the market and then climbed up to the Basilica of Saint Michael Archangel. All before lunch.  After lunch,  I followed the road from my flat and walked 3.8km up to Castellar, the mediaeval town that gives its name...

  T oday is my first day alone.  I dropped my husband, Stuart, off at Nice airport this morning and experienced driving on the autoroute for the first time.  I think that there are easier sections than the tunnels and hills around Nice, but I made it, even the peage. After the first time—leaping out the car, squeezing through the too small gap that I had left, to get to the pay machine— I made sure that I stopped well before the barrier, so that I could go round the front of the car to pay. I’m sure by tomorrow my pulse rate will be back to normal.   I should start writing in earnest, getting on with my book but instead, I have been for a walk, tidied up, checked my emails, rearranged my notepads, posted on instagram, tried to do some washing, complained to landlord that la machine à laver ne fonctionne pas, stared into space, enjoyed the sunshine… Tomorrow I will get to work. And tomorrow I did, and the days after that... If I can keep writing a minimum of a t...

  I cannot believe that I have reached the age of sixty-five years, without ever having driven abroad—although truth be known, if I had the wherewithal, I would have chauffeur all the time. On several occasions during the three day drive to Menton, I considered offering to drive but the words never quite got to my lips.   We set out at 4.30am on 10th November and headed for the channel tunnel—with only one false start when I realised, 200yards up the road, that I had forgotten my phone. I expected the roads to be quiet, but obviously I am out of touch. The M25, when we reached it, was like a Friday afternoon before a bank holiday weekend.  Perhaps everyone was out trying to get through before someone glued themselves to the carriageway… The other side of the channel was wonderfully clear. For the first hundred kilometres UK vehicles outnumbered French, but they soon petered out. We British, on the whole still don’t venture too far. It’s just the same at Brancaster, where ...

In three days I will travel to the town of Menton in the South of France, to spend three months completing my third novel. I chose Menton not only because it is a beautiful place, but on the occasions that I have visited I have felt calm, relaxed, happy. So far all my visits have been short, the test will be whether this feeling of peace continues when my stay is longer. It is impossible to define why some places have such a profound effect upon us. We think that we can explain the feelings that we have, by relating them to the scenery and landscape or by remembering an event— a party, a wedding, a concert, a birth, an argument, an accident but these things happen in our lives anywhere, without the place taking on a particular significance.  We examine the present and the past for explanations for our feelings  but it is often impossible to pinpoint their origin, simply better just to acknowledge them. Occasionally, a place can evoke an immediate feeling of comfort, horror, dr...