A Bright Sun and Long Shadows

vacation and part research in preparation for our retirement. When, at last, we purchased the village ruin we would someday call home, we took several "before" pictures. The early photos, like our vacations, had dual purposes. They documented the condition of the property and provided help in our planning. We used them to sketch the revisions, giving the builders the visual aide they needed to help us pull out of these old stones the inherent potential that we saw in them. But the unexpected, perhaps symbolic, purpose of our photographs was seen in the shadows. Our first pictures were marred often by deep shadows created by the angle and fierce brightness of the sun. Pictures of the front elevation of our village house were almost impossible. First, there was the narrowness of the street. We could not get a photo straight on, because we could not get the camera far enough away from the façade, even with our wide-angle lens. Secondly, there was the shadow cast by the sun. The sun, which highlighted the rustic beauty we wished to capture, also created deep shadows that obscured the architectural and structural detail. In time, we found photographic ways to overcome the shadows. But little did we know, that this was just the beginning of a way of life for us in France.

This is not the book I had intended to write. A Bright Sun & Long Shadows is a picture of life in France unlike the many we read during our years of preparation before we made the decision to retire to the Midi. In retrospect, our armchair research, our on-site preparatory vacations, and our personal contacts over a ten-year period heightened our anticipation about the best that France had to offer. We learned too little about the shady side of life in the Midi. Originally, the book I intended was of tales from our first year of adjustment to the new life in France. We expected culture shock and the stress that accompanies major life-changes - even when we so eagerly sought these changes for ourselves. The book, as originally envisioned, would have been like too many others. It would have chronicled our adjustments to French life. It would have reflected its charming curiosities with a little irony, and a lot of "looking at the bright side of things".

Yes, A Bright Sun & Long Shadows does reflect our experience of creating our new life in France. But, it has also grown beyond the initial intent; grown into a book that reflects how deeply the building of our new life has been affected by the dark side of French culture and the everyday ways of the people living around us