Tuchan
Holiday Memory - dedicated to Pat, my brother who came to Tuchan for the first time since his stroke in 2018
Being in Tuchan village in 41 centigrade, a house full of people cramming for slithers of air in the stilled day. Relief when the village internet popped its G4. So we slipped away from phones and computers, and talked in the shade of the ruelle, sharing each other’s shadows.
Dylan Thomas wrote a prose poem in 1947, Holiday Memory, which is one of my favourite pieces. I found my precious copy in the attic of my house in Tuchan.
And the woman who lived next door came into the kitchen and said that her mother, an ancient uncertain body who wore a hat with cherries, was having one of her days and had insisted, that very holiday morning, in carrying, all the way to the tram stop, a photograph album and the cut-glass fruit bowl from the front room.
This was the morning when father, mending one hole in the thermos-flask, made three; when the sun declared war on the butter, and the butter ran; when dogs, with all the sweet-binned backyards to wag and sniff and bicker in, chased their tails in the jostling kitchen, worried sandshoes, snapped at flies, writhed between legs, scratched among towels, sat smiling on hampers.
The poem is a flashback of one long beach day and the preparations to get there, remembered through Dylan’s childish eyes.
I think of his words, now, as the house in Tuchan is full of folk, bitten by the wild dry sun and trying to find enough towels and hats for soaking the sun on Torreilles wild beach.
TUCHAN HOLIDAY MEMORY
Full moon in Leo, the village slumbers still in 41 degrees heat.
There is little water and communication is low, the village G4 popped and the house is full. Nine of us filling the space in unbearable closeness of the heatwave which does not give up. The heat wails, a fire siren screams as a rooftop two alleys down melts like butter on toast. We walk to the end of the ruelle to see the fireman sweat and sweep the corner to the rue du R. In the end it’s nothing more than a childish prank gone a little bit wrong. People scream at a child, a holidaymaker who cries as they tell him he could have burnt the entire village down with the matches. He walks off sulking, kicking a stone to the air.
V remembers the grapes in the garden need propping and insists on going now.
The fridge has broken down, it did last night, so everything is warm.
Matuba says she has a fridge-freezer, can we pick it up now, over in Paziols, the sister village 3 k’s down? We save a picnic from the fridge’s debris. It is Bank Holiday Monday, and so everything is closed.
P. suddenly wants to go to Spain across the boarder where there is no bank holiday! She has just read about the Church of Sant Romà. “It's the oldest church still standing in a body of water” she says. A. insists on the beach as she bought expensive creams which promise to make her white skin brown. V. says he HAS to tie the grapes in the garden or else they’ll rot!
We push Pat along the rue du Vatican and garden hidden like a little jewel. Here the heat magically ceases for a moment, time to trim wild flowers, wear halos of vine leaves and tie the hay for Karen’s horses down the lane.
We forget about Spain - it was a short dream which is left in the corner for another day.
The lads push Pat back to the house to finish off the wine and wait for Matuba and her fridge. The rest of us go the beach. A. pulls out her creams as we slide along sticky backroads to Torreilles beach.
The sea is thick and warm, no fish swim, and the sand burns bad. An old man cries for help stuck between his towel and the sea. “Like a kid he is,” says his wife, eating melon, safe in the shade of a bright yellow umbrella.
Later, back home, the fun of the fiesta
The travellers are here, the rides, the dodgem cars, the rifle range. The Spanish belle in her candy-toy kiosk sells ticket after ticket, pocketed by hot summer hands. No one wins but we all have fun.
In the lull before the big band plays, we go home to pack our bags. Matuba has still not come back with the fridge, the only things to eat are garden grapes and drying bread.
Sun setting in the sky, bags almost done, quick photo, then running back to the square where the music will begin.
I turn back, the house sighs in silence. I know she loves the summer, the comings and goings, the goings and comings. Always been this way, on the hot summer days. On long hot summer days.
Thank you for passing by, have a wonderful weekend in the heat, be safe.
Jeanne
As I listened to this, your words came alive. It is an absolutely moving experience. A slice of a life, the house watching over you all. The bells, a perfect way to close the day.
Jeanne, life is a story and you live it well because it is your story...