Monsieur le Facteur or The Mailman

Nothing is more sacred in France than the lunch hour. Whether you are sitting in a busy cafe in Paris, in a bathing suit at some station balneaire, or quietly in the country somewhere. It's all the same. Missing out on lunch well, it's like missing out on life. It's not done. 

We would be having lunch, all sitting around the large dining room table, the shutters and windows were all open, the curtains swaying ever so gently with the occasional ocean summer breeze. It was quite outside, even the cars filled with packed tourists on as summer outing had found a little place to stop for lunch. It was a sacred moment in the day. People stopped what they were doing, gathered around and broke bread. Well almost all.

We had just finished soaking up the last of the vinaigrette, having made sure we had carefully wiped every square inch of our plates so as not to miss even a drop. The doorbell on the front gate rang as it was pushed open by a man of some size with a large leather bag strapped around his chest, and his official hat tilted back on his head revealing beads of perspiration from his bike route. Simone, our dear housekeeper, three star cook, confidant, country doctor and timely bearer of all the bad news Ouest France could publish each day, greeted Monsieur le Facteur. Country pleasantries and local gossip were exchanged as both were, du pays. As if on cue, my father would turn around and ask Monsieur le Facteur if he would care to join us for a little glass of wine - un petit verre de vin Monsieur? It's good business to be polite in these parts and one cannot say no to a kind offer of just a little glass of wine; that's all he has time for. He is a busy man. The second course was kept on hold while this little ritual played itself out.

There we were all nursing our wine or in my case watered-down wine (injustice), Mom and Dad making small talk about the weather (warm for this early in the season), the unusual amount of tourists, the markets (I don't mean the capital markets)  and Monsieur le Facteur doing his share in a very heavy Breton patoit (local accent - which I am proud to say I have been know to mimic quite well (beinn oui,dame). A second round was offered but respectfully declined by Monsieur le Facteur who collected his bicycle and walked out the gate. Until the next time when a letter or a postcard was to be delivered. I don't know if any of us every knew his name. As far as I know he was always Mister Mailman, Monsieur le Facteur. That was it.

At long last, the second course was presented and Simone would place in front of my father, with much flourish and a corresponding "ooo--la-la" on our part. This time the piece de resistance was a colin en sauce blanche (hake fish) with head still firmly attached in a delicious cream sauce with capers and boiled potatoes from the vegetable garden. The colin and I had a staring contest going on and I believe I blinked first. When  the colin was a mere shadow of its former self, dinner plates were removed and replaced with a third round for the cheeses and the tossed green salad -home grown, of course, salade verte. More bread and more wine please. Finally, it was desert time and a special desert had been prepared just for Simone's favorite petit chou-chou (that would be me folks). The crepes were proudly presented tableside and we added sugar or jam or both - if no one was looking. My father would abstain and state matter of factly: "I don't see how you could possibly eat that sweet stuff after such a delicious meal." Finally, with our additional poundage, we made our way outside to the courtyard for coffee which meant for the children we would have a "canne a sucre" or a sugar cube dipped in coffee. Our bellies completly full and our system well sugared, maybe it was time for some light reading in the deck chair perhaps or a nap upstairs, or was I going to be shanghaied into making yet another trip to antique stores, another magasin de brochante. Please say no.

That scene was typical of the many, many meals we had all gathered around the table as a family on those lovely summer days in Brittany. We ate like kings, we swam in the ocean, we took long walks and played like the kids we were in a summer we felt sure would last forever. When I returned by myself, many years later, I opened wide the windows   onto the courtyard, and enjoyed the late afternoon breeze as it gently moved the curtains and filled the dining room with fresh sea air. There I sat at the same table and in the same ladder-back chairs I use to complain about as a child; I listened quietly, letting my mind and my senses travel back to those days once again. The same smells, the loud ticking of the grandfather clock, the sound of feet running upstairs then scrambling  down the well worn staircase, the ocasional car zipping by on it's way to the beach. It was as clear as a bell for me, and I know I heard someone say tout le monde at table! Sit down everyone, it's time for lunch!