Grafting for a Slow Life

I was rung up last Thursday by our delightful 'Alistair Sawday' inspector. She is an American lady of high culture who has gone native up in the high Pyrenees with a restored auberge called 'La Genade'. We met almost a fortnight ago when she came to give us the once over for inclusion in next May's re-publication of 'French Holiday Homes'. She is the epitomy of that group of civilised, well-travelled, intellectual Americans, so despised by their previous president and his accolytes, who is as at home in London, Paris or Beijing as they would be in New York, Atlanta or San Francisco. We have been privileged to meet many such Americans on our travels over the years and I am thrilled for them that the new Obama administration has enabled them to lift up their heads once again.

Needless to say, after the serious business of the day was done, we talked of such things. We also talked of 19th century English literature, her great love, and every conceivable aspect of French, English and European history and culture that it was possible to cram into a long, slow lunch under the lime trees at Bardies in one afternoon. I finally waved her off to drive back up the mountains at 7.30pm.

Such are the joys of life and lunching in our part of the world. Speedy Brits, used to a 'Pret a Manger' sandwich or salad at their desk, take a few days chez nous to 'chill' [as my teenage kids would phrase it]. We consider it a good lunch if we are still going at 4.30pm and there is still some chilled 'rose' left in the bottle to finish. Critics of the French economic model, of course, bemoan the impact of the lunch recess. Given the choice between the two, I know which is the more civilised option, although it has to be said that when you find the electric doors of your local 'bricolage' store, or bank, or 'tresorerie' refusing to budge at one minute to midday the temptation to mutter 'merde' is often overwhelming.

Meredith had just finished harvesting some fresh peas from her 'potager' when she called. She told me that she had been speaking with the head of Sawdays in Paris, who is putting together their first 'Slow France' publication, and that I should seriously consider applying for a listing at some stage. I was flattered, of course, but my reply was 'Gosh, Meredith. Think of the work!' I simply couldn't imagine doing it all myself, and neither could she. It takes a phenomenal amount of energy keeping up with her own 'potager', her 'table d'hote' guests, and her own cleaning, as well as the washing and ironing of bed-linen. When my house is full with non-paying guests, it's not much easier either. We had a laugh as we spoke of the vagaries of a fantasy 'slow' life, a la William Morris et al. Such a life was always the privilege of the aristocracy, who had minions, inevitably paid a pittance, to support their creative aspirations.

These days, Sissinghurst, Charleston and the like have been superceded as role models by the much more 'hands on' approach of Jimmy's Farm and the River Cottage. We sit in our cosy houses with food on the table and look back nostalgically to a world where we could physically touch and see the products of our labours. Marx got it absolutely right when he describes the process of 'alienation' in a soul-destroying world of rapidly advancing industrialisation and 'division of labour'. Cut off from the source of our energy, especially our food, the capitalist role model swallows us up in its ever-demanding quest for profit. We are left bereft and in search of our very souls. It is the price we have paid for material gain.

Short of a major revolution and the overthrow of capitalism as we know it, it's hard to see how the average working man or woman can afford a slow life, especially at Tesco prices. I know that the demand for allotments in the UK is at an all time high, but I wonder at the other compromises that have to be made to put home grown vegetables on the table. My mum did it in the 50's and 60's, when over half of our long, narrow garden was given over to vegetables. She had both the most beautiful and the most productive garden in the street, alongside a full-time nursing job, four children and home cooked food. She certainly couldn't afford help and as a result, she was permanently knackered. Sadly, I don't remember her ever having enough time to sit down to talk or play with us.

Don't get me wrong. I think that slow living is great if you are privileged enough to be able to do it. I just know, as a busy mum, that there are only twenty four hours in the day and that the struggle to do and be all these things often leaves us going to bed riddled with guilt and failure. It takes real graft to lead a 'slow life', as the five historians and archaeologists who set out to recreate farm life in 1620, in Peter Sommer's 'Tales From the Green Valley', so ably demonstrated on our television screens recently. Carl Honore's admonition of impatient sex in 'In Praise of Slow' may be wonderfully apt but, unfortunately, at the end of a tough day labouring on the farm, my guess is that some 'slow sleep' is more likely to be the urge that comes to mind first!

Interestingly, I read today that Britons are less satisfied with life than many people in poorer countries, and that they use too many of the world's resources. The 'Happy Planet Index', devised by Nick Marks [no pun intended!], which measures life expectancy, happiness and the environmental impact of different nations, put Britain 74th out of 143, with Australia at 109 and the USA at 114. The highest ranking European country was the Netherlands at 43. Britain's poor ranking, unsurprisingly, was deemed to be due to a combination of social problems, including high levels of inequality, poor living and community breakdown, as well as the high carbon footprint of most of the population. The countries that came top were middle income countries in Latin America, Asia and the Caribbean with a high level of life satisfaction and a low carbon footprint.

Clearly, if we aspire to the basic tenets of slower living, and reduce our carbon footprints in the process, we will be happier human beings. We will also be doing something, hopefully not too late, to improve our world for our children. This strikes me as the main motivation for a conscious realignment of our priorities, rather than the misty-eyed vision of past times gleaned from our television screens. We can learn a lot from the lessons of the past, but we need to be realistic. The great advances of the 20th century, in science, technology and medicine, have already made our lives much easier and, let's not kid ourselves, better. We now need to harness them to the needs of a changing world with an uncertain future. And we will.

Slow living is the natural order of things in this part of France, and long may it last. Bardies, until the ravages of two world wars, had always been self-sufficient. Throughout the house, when we bought it in 2000, there was evidence of the industry of the previous owners. They did everything themselves, from growing fruit and vegetables and making their own conserves and chutneys in enormous copper confiture pans, to raising cows, chickens and sheep and making their own charcuterie. In between they rode, hunted and fenced. The women made, embroidered and mended curtains, bedlinen, napkins and clothes. Bardies was a veritable cottage industry, little changed in centuries. But hidden away in armoires upstairs, were masses of servants' uniforms, all hand-made as well. A whole army of people enabled the house to function. These days, there is just me, with a little occasional help from Carine. I'm forever grafting for a slow life. The good news is I'm a fast worker!