This was pretty uneventful. It was the beginning of what would be, literally, a month of rain in Paris. But, that’s Paris. It’s grey and black and beautiful. The gardens are green.
It did make me think about rain. It is raining right now. I think rain is good, but I don’t think it’s good luck. I read this:
“It pops up through Shakespeare”s works and I imagine it would have to do with a pastoral society, where rain would symbolize fertility- hence it is good luck on awedding day.”
Rain, freezing rain, means older people need to get home. So, three hours later, one is still in the University Club library, trapped. I didn’t talk to my friends, but I hope they had fun and the food was likely delicious. I love the candids someone took. The bridesmaids carried Duchess roses.
And, Bonnie Winston helped with the menu inadvertently. I was a hostess at The Prospect in Westport. It was textbook Prospect, minus the apple pie å la mode. Maybe that’s why people always have so much fun at other people’s weddings, regardless of the outcome. They don’t have to be one of the actors.
So, rain and weddings bring me back to talk about Langeais and this sketch.
“One particular noteworthy event at the castle took place in 1491 – the marriage of Anne of Brittany and King Charles VIII, the first stage in the reunification of Brittany and France. The political wedding included agreement that if Charles VIII died without leaving a male heir to the throne that she would marry the next king – and since all her children died very young that is what she did, marrying Louis XII after the death of Charles.”
I still don’t quite understand how this worked, but I will look it up later. I have looked at many pictures of Langeais. I see absolutely no remnant of anything looking remotely like this tower in my drawing.
I do like the stairs and stepped wall. As well the tile or whatever it is that supports the upper lookout. Maybe this was her escape tower. But which way did she go?
I was avoiding doing this post because I didn’t really like the sketch. It’s growing on me…
If you’ll look at this link to Chateau d’Amboise, you can see I’m sitting on the edge of the wall while I am sketching and the perspective is not all that bad. I still don’t remember how the grade happens to drop off so steeply at the wall. It must have been built into a hillside.
This is all my notes say:
chapel-Leonardo is buried
Flamboyant Gothic Style-lacy stone cutting. His and Hers Chimneys.
Chateau-Renaissance and Gothic.
Leonardo came to France at the age of 64, but this gives me an opportunity to talk about his work before that time.
This is a good link to Leonardo’s life. Skim to the letter of introduction he wrote to the Duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza. I found this interesting because he was educated and formally trained in art. He had been working as a painter with successful commissions for some time now. He is 30.
The letter to the Duke of Milan.
He is listing his capabilities as a designer of both civil and military machines. Italy at that time is internally divided by wars between city-states, followed by an invasion of France. Military engineers were important figures, for this was a time of rapid development of firearms and explosives. Leonardo lists many ideas for fortifications, bridges, weapons, and river diversions to flood the enemy. At only the end of the list of the ten ideas, that he notes his artistic capabilities in a post note.
“Also I can execute sculpture in marble, bronze or clay, and also painting. In which my work will stand compation with that of anyone else whoever he may be.
Moreover, I would like to undertake the work of the bronze horse which shall endure with immortal glory and eternal honour the suspicious memory of the Prince your father and the illustrious house of Sforza.
And if any of the aforesaid things should seem impossible or impractical to anyone, I offer myself as ready to make trial of them in your park or in whatever place shall please your Excellency, to whom I commend myself with all possible humility.”
There was no reply to the letter, but he was summoned to court one day where it is said, “he was the least nervous of the pair.”
Florence.
In 1502, after working as a celebrated painter and engineer in Milan, he returns to Florence. He meets up with Michelangelo, but Michelangelo mocked him about an unfinished overambitious design for a bronze equestrian statue. Leonardo was deeply hurt, so they were never friends despite having so much in common.
They were both commissioned to do murals in the Palazzo Vecchio which neither finished. This might be due to a different focus for needs of the time. Both helped lead a revolution in anatomy. Doctors had formerly relied on textbooks and past practices, but artists and doctors alike changed this tradition. They began to dissect bodies and recorded the results accurately. The work of artists and doctors during the Renaissance was often very similar. This was also the time of his interest in flying and bird flight sketches.
Rome.
He moves to Rome in 1513 and continues to work for Giuliano de Medici in the Belvedere Palace of the Vatican. But, it is a time of frustration and illness for Leonardo.
France.
By the time Leonardo is summoned to France in 1517, he is a very sick man. His right hand is paralysed from a stroke. The King did not require he fulfill commisions, and he spent time organizing his notebooks.
But, that doesn’t mean he didn’t have to earn his keep.
“Leonardo had to suffer frequent royal visits and produce plans for festivals and plays. The King would enter the manor house of Cloux via a stretch of tunnel connected to the castle at Amboise. One of the items Leonardo made for him during this period was a mechanical lion with a breast that opened to reveal lilies.”
Leonardo died on 2 May, 1519 just after his 67th birthday. Therefore, I don’t know why I wrote that he was buried at Chateau d’Amboise. Other records say he was buried in the Church of St. Florentine, but his remains were scattered during the Wars of Religion.
Giorgio Vasari would write in his biography on Leonardo that,
“Everywhere, his mind turned to difficult matters.”
And last, I hope that Leonardo had a lovely time in France in his later life. I will think that he ate beautiful food and enjoyed the French Countryside as a guest and companion of the King. And best to us, looking over his sketches and putting them in order.
I don’t think I replied to your post, Tom. In desire to not impart any misleading information, I have to tell you that the XIT Ranch in southwest Kansas and the Oklahoma Panhandle is likely not the XIT that you passed on your drives. The XIT Ranch feels they are THE XIT RANCH, if not everywhere, than in Kansas. They have been under family operation under the Adams Cattle Co. for over a hundred years, so this is deserved.
They don’t have a sign, the relevent people find them. I have well-drawn maps for others. I do hope for a nice big neon “Party Ranch” sign for the kids someday. This will be executed by another best, local, family business Luminous Neon of Hutchinson.
The XIT Ranch in Texas does NOT stand for this:
X (Ten)
I (in)
T (Texas). The brand was to thwart cattle rustlers, but I have no history of the actual reading of the X I T. It did cover land in ten counties in Texas.
A brief history of the “other” XIT Ranch in Texas.
In 1879, the Texas legislature appropirated 3,000,000 acres of land to finance a new state capitol for Texas. In 1882, the legislature made a deal with Charles and John Farwell of Chicago to come up with the money: $3,000,000.00, provided by a syndicate led by the Farwells of mostly British investors, in exchanage for the 3,000,000 acres in the Texas Panhandle. The XIT Ranch began operations in 1885, but timing was bad. Cattle prices crashed in 1886. It was only in operation as a working ranch for 27 years. I wonder if those Brits were annoyed with this investment? Nonetheless, the land deal left us with the beautiful pink granite Texas State Capitol in Austin.
But, every feedlot, feedstore, etc. in the area keep the XIT in their business name. I’m sure there’s some remnant of the original. I’m thinking, Tom, that you were maybe driving through Dalhart? I want to hear your L.A. to Kansas path.
Unlike a Ranch name of which there can be many, only one XIT brand can be registered per state. It used to be that a brand was still required in the state of Kansas to sell cattle within a sale barn, and it still increases price of the animal.
They use a flat bar brand for the XIT, still do. That is, it has to be executed in 5 strokes. The fancy ones you imagine, all “built-in one,” get muddy.
Cattle rustling is still alive and well. I think the Kansas Livestock Association still awards $250,000.00 for any knowledge of thereof. It is more of a problem in Texas. Recently, I heard of a very sophisticated middle-of-the night load-up complete with trucks, but I’m sure they were caught.
Guns and fear are still a big deterrant in Kansas. Old School.
So back to how the Adams of present have the XIT Brand and the XIT Ranch.
Formation of the XIT East and West Ranches and use of the XIT brand.
John Adams grandfather, Raymond Adams, Sr. was the youngest son of H. G. Adams. Horace Greeley (Go West Young Man!) Adams acquired the original landholdings upon which the Adams family descendants now ranch. The land is in southwest Kansas and the Oklahoma panhandle along the Cimarron River. Ray and his father formed the Adams Cattle Co. in the teens. In the next generation, early cornfeeding of Raymond Adams, Sr. and Jr. enabled them to buy back 2/3 of H.G. Adams original landholdings. Thus, having the two XIT East and West Ranches which anchor the land along the River. And, with a little help from the marginal land given to this youngest brother which turned out to be quite a historic “field”.
But, the point is that the youngest son of H.G. Adams had these XI cows and lost the flip with his brother for the brand. He had to change the brand to mark the cattle. There was no XIT brand in Kansas, so he added a “T”.
More history on this brand. All brands have stories and some have intricate ways of reading, as noted in above book.
Here’s how it worked:
X-I-11 is the original brand. McCoy Brothers of Dodge City operated the land and other ranches. They sold to Colonel Summers of Keokuk, Iowa. It was then shortened to XI.
The XI Ranch Headquarters is now the Headquarters of the XIT Ranches formed by the two Raymond Adams generations.
The XI Ranch is still under operation with descendants of H.G. Adams, all first sons are H.G.’s.
Here’s a picture, just for the ladies, this is from National Geographic. The XIT and XI Ranches are neighbors and “neighbor” (a verb) when they work cattle. H. G.was married, now both happily. Cooper got fan mail from this and they are not easy to find. They were mainly disappointed that there wasn’t more mention of the ranch in the article.
Tanner Rollins, H.G. Adams, V, Cooper Adams. Summer 2007.
Summers, Robert, John Chisum, Sallie Chisum connection.
And more about some interesting former owners connected with this historic ranch, ending at this point in time with the Adams. Summers was in business with William Robert of Preetz, Germany. Robert physically lived on the ranch, and actively ran the operation. William Robert had been John Chisum’s accountant and bookkeeper in Anton Chico, New Mexico. This is Tom’s department (the movie, that is), but John Chisum was a famous New Mexico Cattleman. The Lincoln County Wars were depicted in the Emilio Estevez version of Billy the Kidd.
Robert to Kansas.
Family rumor has it that William Robert left when it got wild down there. He was the well-educated money guy, so he had to be along to do the deal. It still works that way, you are there to count the cattle when they go on the truck. Wherever there is. I don’t know if another responsibility might have been keeping the unruly cowboys in tether when they shot the lights out in Dodge, wearing their fancy duds. This may have been a one-way, one-job deal for cowboys at that time, so Chisum could cut them loose with no responsibility. It’s expensive to feed them on the way back and put them up for the rest of the year.
How ranching worked prior to closing of the ranch, after Civil War and during the time of the cattle drives…
Before the range was closed, anyone who bought land along the river (and was a bit of a b@d@a$s) ruled. They ranged off uplands and their neighbors. There were many, many more neighbors at the time, even in the Panhandle. They were the settlers who were enlisted to take the West from the Indians with the 160 acre gift from the U.S. Government. This was somewhat of a folly with the type of land and rainfall in southwest Kansas, particular along the hilly Cimarron. Though there are still remnants of houses on the ranch, they were soon bought out by speculators. Anyway, Roberts had scoped it out and bought into the partnership with Summers.
William Robert and Sallie Chisum.
Another note, William Robert was married to John Chisum’s niece Sally Chisum. Sallie never lived at the XI Headquarters, though they had two children together. She held court down there with the cowboys and Billie the Kidd, much more fun. I’ll get a picture, but that’s another story. There’s some Roberts marrying Adams, and later, some descendents marrying back into Adams. All very interesting…
"Here Comes de Boss..." Keith Avery. Wall Drug, South Dakota.
Here is another picture of my late father-in-law, Raymond Adams, Jr. that hangs at Wall Drug in South Dakota. If you do a driving trip to the Badlands, Old Faithful and Crazy Horse, look it up. It was also painted by Keith Avery, the illustrator and portraitist mentioned above. Keith Avery was most renowned for magazine covers for Western Horseman.
The subject, Raymond Adams, Jr. (Raymond Adams, Sr.’s eldest son) was quite a cowboy, as are his sons, as are their sons and daughters. You do know, some of the best cowboys are cowgirls, don’t you? His was the generation whose fathers had them start doing the skilled (and grueling) work of the Cowboy. This was also a necessity with the introduction of labor laws and taxes. You know, that year when everyone’s grandfather’s office had a fire. Income taxes were retroactive.
And, back to the relationship of Raymond Adams, Jr. to Keith Avery. The mounted portrait above now hangs in John Adams office of the XIT Headquarters in Meade County. And, here is the letter from the artist, Keith Avery, to Raymond Adams, Jr. clarifying some details and catching up.
Letter from Keith Avery to Raymond E. Adams, Jr.
My father-in-law and John are very proud of this portrait. I think my father-in-law had some problem with the way he did the horns, it wouldn’t be proper without this.
So a final word about historical misrepresentations to come full circle…
This picture at Wall Drug is printed on a postcard you can buy in the Gift Shop. It is captioned, “Here Comes de Boss” and describes the location as “herding cattle on the XIT Ranch in Texas”. I brought up it up at a family dinner that I thought this needed some correction. It was political, I’m not blood kin, so I dropped the issue. After his death, I shot a letter up there to the curator, and it it is now corrected. It had to be done. The visage and profile are so obvious to the portrait in the Headquarters home I provided. They were appreciative to have the letter. So, if you buy the old postcard when you’re there, you’ll know the real story. Unless they’ve re-printed it with correct information. In that case, please buy me some, I’ll send you a check.
So, if this seems like shameless marketing of history and anecdotes via Tom Rooker-producer-of-Hollywood-Films-a Johnson- County-Resident-Clint Eastwood’s-campaign-manager-and-personal-buddy-when-he ran-for-mayor-of-Carmel, so be it.
The theme is historical accuracy in my mind with a few stories thrown in.
Postscript May 23, 2011.
I fact-checked on everything but Tom, so professional of me when posting on a movie producer’s wall. He sent me this message on FB.
Tom Rooker The class president was Tom Weary. Thanks for the clarification on XIT locale!
So, the title of the post has been changed. STUCO was a much harder job than…. planning the reunions? Do our class officers do this? He did a splendid job of organizing our picture at the 30 year.
Go West, young woman. Bring your samsonite. Paula à la Horace Greeley Adams.
I know that if I was ever on a Wagon Train across the Prairie in a former life, I most certainly would have had a large trunk labeled “outfits west.”
This is a story to be added to, for the good Kansas girls for whom it was a rite of passage are climbing out of the sideboards. So far, Sally Malley Stevenson, Barb Goolsbee Bollier, Ginna Getto, Linda Warwick Manco and Terry Beach & R. A. Edwards daughters with whom I have to follow up.
I only know how I got there. My grandmother, Mildred Evelyn Lee Ward grew up in Hays, where her father was a professor at Fort Hays State University. This was one of numerous Kansas History outings we took, a few others being the Garden of Eden in Lucas and fishing at Juan Madden Lake though I think it now has another name. There were two other driving trips to southern California and Texas, but many, many to Santa Fe and Taos.
If you’re new to Kansas, skip this next. Unless, as my father Dean Graves would say, you like to follow Kansas family history as you would a sporting event. He’s very good at it, I might add. I do it because my mac tech guru understands better than I that perhaps my only “point” is in fact some people and relationships and places recorded at a given time in Kansas through the eyes of one woman, though who really cares?
The first year we went with Marianna Kistler Beach of the Museum with the beautiful Chihuly chandelier at Kansas State University. She and Millie were friends and friends of art. My grandfather was the young lawyer partner of Ross Beach, Sr. and then Marianna’s husband Big Ross who passed away last spring. Ross was, among many, many other things, Jerry Moran’s first campaign manager. Anyway, Marianna’s grandgirls were a bit older and we didn’t know them before, but Terry Beach married R.A. Edwards, Lawrence. For the SMEasters, Senator Harry Darby’s four daughters were Radar Evans’ mom, Mary Alford’s mom, Harriet Darby Gibson who’s husband my father worked for at Darby Steel Corporation in college, and Joanne Darby Edwards who married Roy whose family owned Rudy Patrick Seed Co.
Millie Ward, Marianna Beach, and the Graves and Edwards girls.
Gina Graves, Millie Ward, Paula Graves
My grandmother looked like this all the time, though this was a “sport” dress of sorts. I mean, we all slept in a covered wagon in sleeping bags, so how she pulled this off I’ll never know. I don’t think she was wearing any pantyhose, though. The Lee women were pretty ahead of their time on that one, ask my mother. I don’t think she had a pair of slacks until she was in her 90s. More about Millie later.
But, she has that determined look on her face and I know she was thinking, “I’ll see to it that one of these girls ends up in Western Kansas working in the arts and history before she moves to her apartment on the Plaza (or house in Santa Fe) to watch the lights and go to parties with artsy people.”
Already trying to get attention from the wrong men.
But enough about me for a bit and a little about the clothes…we’ll see how wordpress likes this, may have work out the quirks….you could also re-post these in the blog or be guest poster bloggers but that’s a lot of attention to ask of you for posterity.
Ginna Getto I was about 12 or 13 also and went with my mom and a family friend. I remember there was an old, old cowboy who had a horse who did tricks. There were people from all over the world on our trip. I remember feeling kind of sorry for the folks on the trip who weren’t actually from Kansas. I wore a dress and sunbonnet and whole deal one day, but what I most liked was riding along side of the wagon train on a horse.
8 hours ago ·
Sally Malley Stevenson I went in 73 and I wore the “little House on the Prairie Dress I really thought I was Laura Ingalls!!!!! Remember how scarey the Indian raid was??????
11 hours ago ·
And below, just for the record I got like triple mileage out of my prairie dress with the Hays Centennial, Wagons Ho! and some other historic event I can’t remember. I’m hoping Ginny saved it so my great granddaughter can wear it for the parade by the Toon Shop when Prairie Village celebrates its centennial in the marketplace in 2057.
But enough about me for a bit, the Hefners were the family who started Wagons Ho! primarily Ruth Hefner.
Letter from the Hefners delivered by pony express expressing concern for the "little pioneer friend" carried off by Indians to "still be with us at the end of our trail."
I just googled and it is interesting when I think that she was just a bit older than I am at 53 in this picture. I wanted to be their beautiful daughter Barby who played the guitar. What they provided in terms of capital outlay in wagons alone, access to private property, assembling the cast, music, food, sweat equity, family, and love cannot be described in pictures, just people whose lives they influenced.
HEFNER, RUTH C.
Deceased Name: Ruth C. Hefner
Ruth C. Hefner, 89, Oakley, died Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2005, at Logan County Manor, Oakley.
She was born Feb. 28, 1916, in Dighton to James and Angeline (Wristen) Coberly. She graduated from Dighton High School and attended Fort Hays State University.
She married Frank C. Hefner on Aug. 13, 1939, in Gove County. He died May 6, 2004. She was a homemaker and founder and operator of Wagons Ho, Gove.
Survivors include two sons, John Hefner, Newport Beach, Calif., and David Hefner, Gove; two daughters, Ann Bowman, Hutchinson, and Barbara Hefner, Santa Fe., N.M.; a brother, Glenn Coberly, Gove; eight grandchildren; and 11 great-grandchildren.
Services will be at 1 p.m. Monday at United Methodist Church, Gove. The body was bequeathed to the University of Kansas Medical School for anatomical research.
No visitation is planned. Memorials are suggested to the Wagons Ho Historical Record, Quinter, Logan County Manor, Oakley, or Modern Homemaker’s Club, Gove, in care of Schmitt Funeral Home, Quinter.
(Hays Daily News ~ September 16, 2005)
Yes, Sally, that Indian Raid was super scary.
As I said on facebook, the picture still scares me.
I have this note from the first trip in my sketchbook with the Indians.
Blounds have more fun.
Secretly, I was dying to get carried off by those ethnic bad boys….took me a while but I got’her done.
I've never received anything like this kind of attention from cowboys.
Watch out for that one, Millie never warned me that cowboys can dress up like Indians.
And last here’s a picture that my Grandfather Paul took of me with Rosie, he was ever the photographer with trusty Leica.
This makes me sad because I rode her when I was 5 and then again later in this picture. My old friend that I'd returned to has long since died but we will meet again.
It was my pleasure. Thank you Hefner Family for that moment in time.
Chateau de Chambord. Francis I country house and hunting lodge. north façade.
My sketchbook notes were minimal, so these are my thoughts with a little help from Louise Gardner’s 7th edition. Here’s some background on the owner and creatives…
After a divided 15th c., France was under leadership of strong kings. She became aggressive with her Italian neighbors, taking the artists Leonardo and del Sarto into court first. The Renaissance artists didn’t make a mark in France. But, later Florentine Mannerists implanted Italianate style which finally overtook the French Gothic. The religious art of the Middle Ages was superseded by glorification of the King. Here’s the guy…
rumor has it "The merry monarch was a great lover and hero of hundreds of gallant situations." Louise Gardner.
Jean Clouet, Francis I. Tempera and oil on panel. Louvre.
Certainly captured the twinkle….
“The personal tastes of Francis and his court must have run to an art at once suave. artifical, elegant, and erotic.” Louise Gardner.
Italian Mannerists Rosso and Primaticcio assembled the art crew (School of Fontainbleau) for Francis I palace combining painting, fresco, imitation mosaic, and relief stucco sculpture. Look it up if you need a day trip from Paris, (Venus Reproving Love, Gallery, some frontal) but I liked this house better.
So, a guy’s gotta have his lodge, built near a forest to commune (hunt) with the animals. Being a meateater, I have no problem with this. Someone has to do the dirty work.
“It has been said of Francis I that his one obsession besides women was building.” Louise Gardner
So back to Chambord.
Plan by a pupil of Giuliano da Sangallo.
I’ve oriented the plan like my sketch. Do you think the head architect Giuliano was getting a little grey behind the ears? or it he’d just gotten fed up and said “you deal with him”? Well, it’s a service industry and the well-paying customer is generally lead to be thought that he’s right. And he is, in my opinion, pretty-much right-on in this collaboration. The ordered Italianate Renaissance banding on the bottom and earthy French Gothic Turrets, dormers, chimneys and lanterns on top are quite the sexy couple.
I remember standing within the very center of the square block. The broad central staircase to the upstairs was marble and amazing. It kind of reminded me of the stairs at the Nelson from the lower level by Atkins auditorium to the bookstore. I’m having a flashback because Gina and I used to race the twin staircases while Ginny worked the education wing. That is, until one of those guards more frightening than the Duane Hansen caught us.
Anyway, we couldn’t go upstairs at that time, so I went out to sketch. I sketched by “le snack bar”, albeit tasteful and serving wine, then just west of the chateau. We did get to go up to the roof. It reminded me of something but I haven’t quite put my head around it. Edward Scissorhands castle or some celluloid collage I have in my head.
Arrived at Hotel Campanile in Orléans at 6 pm. Cindy (Bean) and I went for a 20 minute run & had our fist contact with Frenchmen. They rode bikes (stingrays) and were probably about 10 & 12 years old. They insisted on following us on their bikes and asking questions very rapidly. It is very hard to run at the same time you are trying to understand, formulate and respond in French. Good practice for us, little boys aren’t as intimidating.
les gentilhommes qui roulent
Dinner-hotel at 8:00 pm. sausages, boiled beef, vegetables and les pommes frites!
Hotel is nice-I have a room with Ginna Ghetto & Cindy.
$- 9 francs for stamps (timbres-poste). 2.4 francs for postcards (cartes-postales).
I went to school at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris with Parsons School of Design, New York City in 1980. But, it wasn’t necessary to take French for the School of Art and Design at KU. After five years of Madame Honig (Indian Hills) and Madame Speidel (Shawnee Mission East), I decided that I was not going to forget those words and I took French classes all my semesters at KU.
I went with the French Department at KU with the French students with whom I traveled for two weeks (chateaux of the Loire Valley, la cathedrale of Bourges, Morzine in the French Alps, Chamonix) staying in youth hostels. Three days before they departed for the French Alps for Paris by bus, I had to be at school at the Louvre because the students from New York were arriving in Paris, and I took the train by myself during the night.
A woman of a certain age plus twenty years took me under her wing et told me to take care to stay far from the dark men of Paris. It was useful advice for the entire summer (it’s just my opinion, but I think that the French have never embraced the words politically correct, particularly not a country whose metro signs said “give your seat to the mutilated of the war.”) I love the French.
After the summer in France, I dreamed in French.
And after I moved away (withdrew) in my head and to the country, I dreamed (yearned) of France.
When I went running on the Cimarron River, I dreamed of my running route on the banks of the Seine by the Louvre.
When I made homemade baguettes for the cowboys (too funny, a woman who bakes…there is not even a word in French for bakes, much less, bread) I daydreamed of the bakery on rue du bac near l’hotel Cayre on le Boulevard Raspail where I lived that summer.
France, I dream of you still.
Here is my book of that summer, the food, the buildings, the people, the strange men, the professors, my epicerie (like a deli with artichokes), the boulevards of Haussmann, and the stories of that summer when I was able to be a young French girl from Kansas. With only myself, but never alone.
And now, my French friends have returned to me in Kansas.
Pour votre securite, ne prenez pas des photos de l’auto. Gorge du loup. photo, Paula Graves Adams
Je suis allée à l’école au musée des arts décoratifs à Paris avec Parsons School of Design, NYC l’été de 1980. Mais, il ne faut pas prendre le français pour l’école de dessin à l’université de Kansas. Après cinq ans de Madame Honig et Speidel au lycée, j’ai décidée que je n’est pas allée oublier les mots et j’ai pris les classes françaises tous les semestres à KU.
Je suis allée avec le département français à KU avec les étudiants du français avec qui j’ai voyagé pour deux semaines (les chauteaux au vallée de la Loire, Bourges, Morzine, Chamonix) restant aux auberges de jeunesses. Trois jours après qu’ils se sont départis des alpes français de Paris à l’autobus, j’ai eu être à l’école au louvre parce que les étudiants de New York etaient arrivés à Paris, et j’ai pris le train avec moi-même pendant la nuit.
Une femme d’un certain âge plus vingt ans prendre moi sur s’aile d’oiseau et dites-moi de prendre soin de rester loins des hommes noirs de France :). C’etait des conseils très utils pour tout l’ète (c’est seulement mon opinion, mais je pense que le français n’embrasserai jamais des mots politiquement correcte, pas un pays où le métro a dit “donnez votre chaise aux mutilisées de la guerre.”). J’aime le français.
Après l’été de France, j’ai rêvé en français.
Et après que je m’éloignais dans ma tête et au pays, j’ai rêvé de la France.
Quand j’ai fait du jogging au rivière Cimarron, j’ai rêvé à ma route aux bancs de la Seine par le Louvre.
Quand j’ai fait des baguettes pour les cowboys (trôp drôle, une femme qui bakes…il n’y a pas de mot en français!!! un peu moins du pain) j’ai rêvé tout éveillé de la boulangerie sur la rue du bac près de l’hôtel Cayré au boulevard Raspail ou j’habitais cette été.
La France, j’ai rêvé de toi toute la nuit.
Voila mon livre de cette été, la nourriture, les bâtiments, des peuples, les hommes étrangers, les professurs, mon épicerie, les boulevards, et les histoires de cette éte quand je pouvais être une jeune fille française de Kansas. Avec seulement moi-même, mais jamais seule.
Et maintenant, mes amis françaises sont retournées à moi à Kansas.
note: C’est tout en français pour maintenant jusque mes ingénieurs de website installent un plug-ins dans wordpress parce que les accents prendre plus longtemps. A bientôt…
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