Day 11: Party

Sleeping in this morning felt amazing. Well rested, I woke up at 10:15, and ate a quick breakfast with Garth. He had to drive to Carcassonne to pick up Cheryl, another workawayer. Cheryl was here a few weeks ago, left to go to a workshop, then had to go home to Florida unexpectedly, and is now back.

Since I had some time, I decided to be productive. I was going to finish taking the render off the wall on the front of the house, but there is a very active beehive in the wall where I had to work, and I wasn't so keen on whacking a beehive with a pick while standing fifteen feet up on a ladder. I'll wait until Garth helps me plug up the hole. Instead, I did the dishes. This involves getting a bucket of hot water from the tap, bringing it downstairs, and pouring some in the washing bowl and some in the rinsing. It is done in an ancient "sink," a big stone with a drain that leads outside the house. A bucket must be put outside to collect the dirty water to be put in the garden, or else the foodstuffs stay in the drain.

When the dishes were done I got to work finishing the coat rack. I was almost finished when Garth and Cheryl arrived. They headed inside to get lunch ready and do some other things, and I, getting distracted from the filing, found a patch of render and had to pick it off. I got out the ladder and began to work on it. When I was finished, Garth came out and we put the coat rack up. We screwed into the rock, and welded the rack to the screws. After lunch and lazing around, it was time to go.





Dressed in our finest, we got in the car and began driving north. We arrived at Garth's brother's house at about seven. He and his lovely wife have two beautiful blonde girls, two and four years old. While we waited for the babysitter to arrive, I played with the children and socialized with the adults. The kids have the cutest English accents, and speak unaccented French as well. When eight o'clock rolled around, we headed to the party.

A mix of French speakers and English speakers, almost all separated by a generation from me, were in attendance. It was in a beautiful house; the host is a wine maker. The meat never got barbecued, so there was not much food, and a lot of drink. This lead to quite the night. It's funny how parties don't change as people get older. Except for the quality and abundance of drinks, both much superior to any college party, and the average age, this could have been right out of a college Saturday night.

Using our very good judgment, we decided not to drive anywhere to sleep. Instead, we took out our sleeping bags and slept right there in the lawn, Garth and Cheryl in the car, and me on the ground with my sleeping pad. God, did it feel good to sleep.

Day 10: Dust and Sparks

It's amazing how when a place gets smaller, it is actually bigger. The village I'm living in is home to 200 people. All the villages around are roughly the same size, the the biggest town in the area, Limoux, has a population of 20,000. Small. But when we went to market this morning in Limoux, we walked into at least eight of Garth's friends, and had breakfast with one. There is something very beautiful about walking into people, the spontaneity and organic interaction.

Markets in France are very special. Most towns have them on a certain day each week. They take over the main square, often several. As it only costs about 20 euros to set up a stall, people come with all different things of all different types and sizes. In Limoux, one square was filled with merchandise, and the other food. We walked through the food market, looking for some produce, bread and cheese, all of which were in abundance. This area is known for its organic farming, so lots of farmers bring their organic produce; and one even brought a rooster in a cage. We're not sure if he was for sale or for show.

We had coffee and ate pastries we had bought at the same café/bar as where we watched the world cup the night before. We left limoux, stopped in a grocery store for some things we couldn't get in the market, and then stopped by Alvin's place. We talked to them while they worked sealing the swimming pool with concrete and sealant. Then, Garth and I headed back to the house.

It was time to get to work. I worked on the plaster on the side of the house that faces the road. It's not a ton of plaster, about three or four hours of picking can take it up. It was dry, and the wind was blowing into my face. I could barely breathe, and was getting dust in my eyes even though I was wearing goggles. We sprayed it down to control the dust, and I got on my way. In between pickings, I used a pneumatic pick to take off some mixture of plaster and concrete around the door frames. Talk about fun.

At about five, I helped Garth affix the sculptures he made to their bases, by welding. I held them together and he welded it. When he was finished, we looked around to see what scrap metal there was around so I could make something. He found a small pitchfork, and remembered he had wanted to make a coat rack for the work shop. So, while he showered and prepared pies and dinner, I worked on that. For about three hours. Here is the work in progress.


At eight something, Garth tore me away from the workshop and I took a shower. We then ate dinner, and played Petanque, known in the US as Bocce Balls. Though Garth was talking lots of shit, I beat him handily, I think fifteen to eight or something. We then went through the nightly routine and went to bed.

Day 9: Meeting Ends

I woke up this morning with one goal: to finish picking the plaster off the wall of Garth's house. I worked at this all morning, and by the time lunch rolled around, I had accomplished my goal. After lunch in the garden and a short nap in the hammock, I got to work scooping up all the plaster that had piled up in the driveway. I filled about seven boxes with the very heavy, dusty plaster, and we drove a few minutes down the road and dumped it in a trash heap by the side of the road. Alvin, years ago, thought this place was on his land, and began to dump his crap by the side of the road to make a turn around spot. One day, while off-loading some stuff, a man approached him and informed him, quite calmly, that the man owned this land, not Alvin. The boys still use it, discreetly, instead of driving to a legitimate dump twenty minutes away.

After the scooping came the fun part: learning to weld. Garth is working on some metal sculptures his friend Sophie, a winemaker, is going to put in her wine tasting bar. He taught me the basics of using an arc welder, and set me to work, on the piece he was working on. Now that is trust. I did not mess anything up too horribly, and then worked on grinding the excess off the joints. After another trip to the dump, I set to work practicing my welding. I took some scrap pieces of metal, and, well, welded them together. Garth is going to find something that actually needs doing so I can weld something of importance. Welding is way cool; it opens up a whole new world. Metal is very flexible, and can be used in so many different ways, and welding makes it workable. After a shower, and my first skype date with my brother, I gave Garth a short massage.




For dinner we headed to Stephan's house, in Limoux. We had a small dinner with Stephan, his daughter, and his adorable four year old dog, and their beautiful dog Chica. Switching between English and French, we had a lovely dinner. After the meal, the guys headed to the bar to watch the France/Mexico match. Coincidentally, during the game, Alvin and Andrea showed up in the bar. It was a sad night for France. As Chuck quoted, "France hasn't been devastated like this since every war they've ever fought."

After the match, we headed home. I didn't make it through more than fifteen minutes of So You Think You Can Dance before I headed to bed, and had a great sleep.

Day 8: Picking and Pulling

We got to work earlier this morning, taking advantage of the bright sun while it lasted. I got right up on the ladder, and started working on removing the plaster from the outside wall of the house. It's a good workout, and quite satisfying watching large chunks of plaster fall twenty five feet down and crash on the driveway.

After doing this for a little less than two hours, I decided to preserve my back, and move onto a different task. After tea and cake in the garden with Garth, I began weeding. I started working around the house, pulling out the plants growing between the stones in the wall and on the street. I then moved into the garden, and got all the weeds out of the gravel that lines the path through the garden. After considering the damage to the chicken coop wall done by the ivy climbing up it, we decided it should come down, even though it was very romantic. So I spent a while pulling ivy off the walls. It was incredibly tenacious, and only came off in very little chunks.

When this was finished, I moved behind the chicken house structure, and began to weed what will become a little vegetable garden. It had plants easily up to my knee, and probably up to my hip, but they all came out with relative ease when I pulled. I found a toad at least the size of my hand, with the most substantial and expressive head I've ever seen on an amphibian.

I then came in and helped to prepare a lunch of gnocchi with delicious goat cheese, tomatoes, garlic and parsley, and bread with an amazing hard sheep's cheese.

After lunch, I headed back up the ladder. Not long after I got up, the thunder started. And then the rain. Just before the storm passed over us, I came inside. Then, the heavens let loose, and it poured. We ran around the house, frantically putting buckets under all the leaks. One whole portion of the house is completely unfinished, and has an old, rotten roof that let water pour in like a tap in several locations.

When the rain subsided, I got back up the ladder, and worked until 5:30, at which point half of the house was completely finished. The rain made the plaster soft, making my job much easier.

Garth told me to stop at 5:30, but I still had a lot of energy. I decided to get on the bike. After biking for about 20 minutes, exhaustion caught up with me, and I turned around. I had passed some goats on the side of the road, and when I got back, I headed straight for the goat cheese. I think the prospect of that goat cheese is what got me back up the hill. Nutella and goat cheese is, as would be expected, incredible. Try it. I took a shower, climbed into my loft, and read and slept for about one glorious hour.

After rousing myself from a deep sleep, I walked outside. The most incredible double rainbow spanned across the sky, originating behind the great line of windmills the next hill over. Thirty photos later, I walked back up the hill to Garth's, read the New York Times for a bit, and then we headed to Alvins. Alvin bought several conjoined houses for very cheap years ago, and has been fixing them up since. Each one is eccentric, and unfinished. His project this week is the swimming pool he is building. After going into three houses looking for a corkscrew, we found one, and opened a bottle of rose while alvin finished cooking dinner. We (Garth, Alvin, and an Italian friend and builder Andrea) took dinner in the library of the main house. It's dark; filled with photographs and candles. Dinner was good, and the conversation was hilarious. Between Alvin, Garth and Andrea, they have been all around the world, ran into each other and mutual friends over and over, and been in crazy situations with artists and art collectors.

Dinner was over at midnight. We drove back through the mist, and, when we got back home, the auditions for season seven of So You Think You Can Dance somehow showed up on the computer, so, accordingly we watched it.

Day 7: Cutting and Bending

It was cool when I woke up this morning; the kind of cool that keeps you in bed, the blanket tucked in under your shoulders and up to your neck. I did finally manage to pull myself out of the covers, down out of the loft I sleep in, and into the makeshift kitchen that is, for now, Garth's kitchen. It's interesting what gets done when when one builds their own house, particularly while he is living in it simultaneously.

After breakfast, my back was feeling a little sore, so I decided not to continue chipping away at the plaster. When Garth was finished getting things ready, I got to work. I had three tasks: taking sheets of galvanized steel and zinc, cutting them into litle rectangles, and bending them back so they lie flat; cutting the steel reinforcecements that held oak wine barrels together into strips with a chop saw for metal, and then bending them flat. See a theme? It was mostly nice work, jazz playing out of the stereo; the work not too tedious but not too serious either. Bending the long strips was hard work, I had to find the sweet spot where they would bend to flat, but not bend too much to create a kink or a bend the other way. I worked at this until lunch, and then for about two hours after lunch, at which point I was finished.

After I finished, Garth had gone to Toulouse to run some errands and pick up a friend from the airport. So after skyping with my dad, I got on the bicycle (Garth's; the not broken one). I set out with my camera in hand, and not a good idea of where I was going. I flew down the hill from the village, and biked through the valley below, stopping occasionally for a picture. Just as I was hoping to find another village, one showed up in the horizon, the silhouette of an 11th century church towering over the rest of the village. I biked into Magrie, then up above it, then back down into it, and walked around taking some photos.

I then continued on, making it to the next village, very similar looking to the last, walked around, and then headed back to Magrie. The biking was truly stunning, fields of grape vines stretch beyond the eye can see, speckled with rose bushes, broom bushes, poppy flowers, and little huts. I got a little lost on the way back, and ended up biking down to Limoux, the biggest town in the area. I didn't really see it, though, because I decided to turn around and get home. The last half hour was almost all uphill, but not too hard to enjoy. I made it up the last hill, got home, and took a shower.

Not long after my shower, Garth showed up with his friend Alvin. Alvin is a british photographer, who spends half the year in a town just down the road from here, and half in midtown Manhattan. He is a very interesting guy, and quite funny. We started in the garden, drinking blanquette de limoux, the predecessor of champagne, and eating chips and oysters. Blanquette de limoux was the first sprarkling wine ever created, and they are very proud of it in these parts. When we were finished, we headed back inside, finished preparing dinner, and ate duck, salad, potatoes, tomatoes, and bread while engaging in somewhat rowdy conversation.

After dinner, alvin showed us some photos. He started with the photos of the apartment he's been fixing up, all himself, so it is ready to rent out. I don't know where these guys get their handiness, but it sure is impressive. He then showed us some of his work. At least from the sample he showed us, he only photographs nude women. He has them jump on a trampoline, encases parts of their bodies in reflective plexiglass, and projects light onto them. The work was provocative, sometimes dirty, but also very beautiful. Though he walked us through some of his process, I am excited to spend more time with him and learn more about how he goes about his work.

Day 6: Chipping Away

After a breakfast of cereal, rice milk, passion fruit, and Nutella on scrumptious bread, it was time to work. My first task was very demanding, mentally and physically: cleaning the keyboards on the computers around the house. Mac keyboards, all jokes aside, were not made very well 6 years ago, and collect dust like its their job.

When that was done, I began work on the bike. I first patched the tire I blew yesterday, and then tried to fix the front derailer. Though it's not yet fixed, I did learn a good deal about derailers. I'll try and fix in tomorrow.

When I was finished with the bike, it was time for the fun stuff. I climbed high on the ladder and began picking off the plaster from the ancient wall of Garth's house. It was like archeology; using a pick to reveal new layers of old architecture. They really knew how to build walls in the middle ages.

I took a break for lunch, my right arm tired from the work. After lunch (bread, cheese, salad, gnocchi) and a little break, I got back up on the ladder, higher this time. I was working directly above me, and got tons of plaster in my shirt, my hair, my ears, everywhere. It started to rain, and then pour. I stopped working when the rain plus the plaster was dirtying my goggles too much to see. I headed into the garage, and pasted brown paper to a box to be sent in the post, and then scraped plaster (notice a theme?) off the plastering tools, so they'll be fresh and new when we re-plaster the wall.

I took a wonderful shower, longer than most due to my almost dreaded hair, and then crawled into bed to read and nap. After a perfect nap, I got up, helped cook dinner, which we ate in one of the studios (the one in which the loft I sleep in is situated) by the Gowdin, a treasure of a French wood burner.

After dinner, we headed up to watch the finale of season 6 of So You Think You Can Dance. Wow. They can dance. We then had a photo sharing, which was really wonderful. I showed Garth a lot of my work, and he showed me selections from his latest trip east.

Now, after reading the comments on my blog (thanks guys! Keep them coming!) it's bed time.

Day 5: Soaked

Today began with a grueling uphill climb on the bike. We were headed a few towns over, to a big flea market. The ride was gorgeous--straight up and down, through fields of grape vines, poppy flowers, and bright yellow broom, and along the river Aude, and through little towns. We spent a good deal of time at the market, looking through old books, playing with old cameras, and leafing through postcards dated between 1914 and 1960. We then explored the town, a fortified city with beautiful medieval architecture, amazing stone work, and the impressive ruins of a cathedral dating between the 9th and 13th centuries.

We then began our bike ride back, taking a detour to go the Sunday market in another town. As soon as we remounted our bikes, it began to drizzle. We continued on, and soon it was pouring. We decided to take shelter under some trees, but soaked through our clothes in a matter of minutes anyway. After the rain slowed just a little bit, we remounted, and biked the rest of the way in the downpour. We got to the market dripping wet and cold, and bought incredible pastries and bread, sat down outside a café, and drank hot cocoa and ate our pastries. Almond croissants are delicious.

After warming up a little, and buying goat's cheese, passion fruits, and licorice root, we got back on the bikes, and began our ascent to the top of the hill. The rain had subsided, and warm air lifted the amazing smells up to us, and bathed us in warm, wet, welcome air. The last bit of the hill was real tough, and when I had only about 59 pedals left to go, I heard my tire leaking. I made it to the top, took a few breaths, and then headed down for the long freewheel back home.

We prepared lunch and ate it outside, still in our wet clothes, but comfortably warm. After lunch I got out of my soaked clothing, and took a walk around the village to look around and take some pictures. When I got back, I got to work. I first sanded and painted a metal headboard that will be used as a railing outside a window. I then did the same thing, on one that is already in place on the second floor. When that was done, I helped Garth buff the floor he had just waxed. Doing this involves kneeling and scrubbing the floor with wool. It's hard work. When that was done, Garth prepared dinner while I talked with my parents and then tried to get the paint off my hands, and arm, and armpit in the shower, only about 50% successfully. Dinner was delicious, and then we watched more "So You Think You Can Dance" while I worked on the computer, and then massaged Garth's knees, and then it was bed time.