November 2018

The main thread to this month was organizing our living space. The painters were done,  we hung curtains in the bedrooms, we had not yet found some furnishings we needed and some that we had ordered had not been delivered. The temperatures in Lille gradually dropped in preparation of winter. The hot water radiators here are in every room and produce even heat versus the furnaces in the US that we are used to, which wait for the room heat to drop before coming on, creating an up and down cycle of heat. Even so, we only have one of the radiators on in the hall as you first come in, it’s on low, and it keeps the entire unit comfortable.

Besides spending the month organizing our space (and it still continues), we ran back and forth to a variety of stores for hardware, office supplies and such. We chose wardrobe racks rather than armoires because of the size of the bedrooms and the additional issue of getting them up to the 3rd floor. Also, huge cabinets would really make the rooms feel small.

There were  the usual problems of things not coming when we were told they would,  arriving with a bit of damage (us too tired of not having those things to return them) and French speaking delivery drivers meeting two American’s speaking appallingly, very little French. When the rest of the furniture did arrive, it was delivered on a rainy, busy Friday evening, through the living room window, as we had often seen done in Paris.

We made a hasty decision regarding living room chairs when we had hired the truck lift, just to make sure it was included in the delivery.  They were larger than what we actually would have picked, given time, but we really didn’t want to hire a truck lift twice.

On the heels of that delivery, we finally got our bed and frame, which they said would not come until January. What a great treat ! The arrival of the desk meant that we were finally able to put our paperwork and therefore, finances in shape.  We had begun to feel like we were operating in the dark; indeed as we uncovered a several-months hold-up on one of the social security accounts, which required quick action to iron out the difficulty.  We ordered and got in a printer plus a paper shredder. Files are still in bags and the computer files have gotten dumped in places somewhat haphazardly, because we didn’t have time or space to really work. All of those things will be worked on over a longer period of time but really need to be straightened out before end of year taxes. It sounds really chaotic but this month we saw a lot more things coming together.

With the kitchen being stocked we ate most meals in, which was treasured.  As was having a dining table to eat on.  Although we haven’t suffered from eating out. It’s no surprise to say that the French are really all about the food; the freshness, the regional bests on wines, beers, charcuterie, cheeses, breads, pastries. Fondue is common but we are in the north and Swiss/ Flemish/Welsh influence is everywhere. Welsh rarebit is on many menus and meats braised in beer, pâtés, jellied terrines, barrata with tomatoes are all a surety as well, and then of course, the sauces. We learned that this northern region is referred to as “Ch’ti.” The North. A particular dialect difference in pronouncing the “ch” in words. Southern French make fun of the Northern French in the same way the East Coast makes fun of the West Coast in the United States. Moving to Lille from the southern areas is considered a bit like a punishment by them.

Anyway, as the month continued, we began to feel less like we were camping, and more like we had a home. We were able to find better solutions to some online accounts that were not working well, which made our life easier. However it was the internet connection that was and continues to be, the biggest problem. We lose our WiFi connection a multitude of times, daily. All of our equipment rely heavily on the WiFi, so to have something so important to continue to experience interrupted service, is more than a major irritation – it’s key to our financial and personal connections. Efforts to correct this has not yet yielded results.

When Thanksgiving arrived, even though it obviously isn’t celebrated in France, we made an effort to replicate a typical Thanksgiving dinner. It’s not something we ordinarily did, neither of us being big fans of that particular dinner. Somehow with all of the things we were grateful for this year, it seemed appropriate to give it a try.

Many key ingredients turned out to be difficult to find. We never did find a turkey, so we settled on a roasted chicken. We made stuffing when we would usually have reached for Pepperidge Farms herb cornbread stuffing mix. Cranberries were hard to find and the only ones we did find were dried. Rehydrating them did the trick and that dish we found on the internet was actually one of the best we made.

G had caught a cold, so I ended up doing the whole meal which indirectly affected the dessert. We’d manage to snag the last pumpkin in the grocery store – it even had a jack o’ lantern face painted on it. I pureed the pumpkin by hand mixer because I was too tired to get the new blender out of the box. It wasn’t enough so the texture was off. We couldn’t find pumpkin spice, allspice or ground cloves. I took whole cloves, crushing them since the kitchen was sparse on tools but even so, the flavoring was off.  Lastly,  again too tired to make a crust, I tried a ready made one we’d bought. Although it looked like the pie crusts we got in the US, it was more like a puff pastry. So texture, flavoring and crust all off and the pumpkin pie was the least well represented.  Edible and tasty – just not American Thanksgiving pie. In the end, it was a very tasty meal and we even shuttled sampler plates over to Flo and downstairs to a couple of women who had kindly helped us out in translation issues. Well, except for the ‘pumpkin pie’.

But on Thanksgiving we watched the Macy’s parade, ate a very nice replicated, traditional dinner and gave thanks for an incredible life, filled with incredible friends and family. We are so very grateful for all of it.