Cherry Gilchrist
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Butterfly, Dragonfly: Life writing in France

14/9/2013

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Butterfly, Dragonfly: Life writing in France

A late summer morning in the Limousin. At Chateau La Creuzette, shafts of sharp sunlight pierce the tree canopies – the grand old cedar, oaks and chestnuts – and set the dewdrops on the lawn sparkling. Fire and water meet, an ancient symbol of alchemy. Will our class achieve this same kind of fusion, turning life experience into gleaming, golden words?

Over the reedy pond, an enormous dragonfly hovers, bulbous, an iridescent deep blue. This too is an old emblem of transformation, and there will be many more dragonflies coming and going during the week, bringing their own particular touch of magic in the garden. And as the day warms and the sun strokes the petals of the flowers, butterflies appear in the gardens to bask there: lemon, gold, cream and rust, mottled and marbled in colour. They alight, pause, and flutter on. Symbols of the soul. Libelulle and papillon, alchemy and the soul, dragonfly and butterfly.

At ten o’clock, our writing group gathers in the ‘cave’ – that means cellar in French , (it’s subterranean) but it might as well be an alchemist’s cave, a place where we prepare, brew and distill our word potions during the week.
(take a look at the photo gallery at the end!)
We’re here on a kind of quest, a journey of life writing. Some of the eight members have flown half way round the world to be here to take this course. It’s a big responsibility. so I’d better be alert – watchful like the dragonfly, sensitive like the butterfly. Will I be able to offer them what they need? Alchemy says: ‘Start with what you have, with what is often overlooked and thrown away.’ This is the way real transformation begins: making gold from what might be seen as dust. So we start with childhood memories; everyone has them, but they have a potency like nothing else. Find them in depths, fish them up and write them. Simplicity is best. Don’t elaborate, just let them be revealed in the light. Then they’ll sparkle like those dewdrops in the sun. We work thus at the dawn of the world, our personal world, where the seeds of creation are stored.

Later, we trek through the terrain of adult years, charting chronology, recording its peaks, its troughs, its moments of joy and terror. As a British tutor working with eight South Africans, I am in shock when some of them write about being hijacked, robbed, or having a gun put to their heads. But the dragonfly has to keep on hovering, not dip in the pool and drown. I too am learning from this. And so do they. The implicit question as people continue to write down their experiences, is, ‘Where am I in all this?’ Life writing is nothing without a degree of personal reflection. But, I teach them, a little goes a long way, like a powerful spice. Let the main ingredients – events, encounters, experiences – do the work of the telling, but add your own touches of philosophical reflection to give it that special flavour.

Life writing isn’t just about recording events, but is also a process of seeking knowledge. It can change the way we view our lives.

Our lives intermesh with others, and these too come into the scope of life writing, sometimes with intense significance. One of our number, Annette, is on a quest to understand the short life of her daughter, an accomplished, beautiful woman who died in her prime:

"Like a butterfly, freeing itself from its cocoon, she came into this world, gasping for air and struggling to free herself from the birth canal.......With the same effort to be born, it took three days for her to leave this world, slowly spinning herself away. On her birthday, 42 years later, almost to the hour, we lay her body in the ground.  Her life as short as that of butterflies. My butterfly was flying freely."

She wants to write a tribute to her, and this butterfly symbol begins to take on its own life in the course. As the week flows on, we see butterflies everywhere –not only in the garden but at dinner, a (paper) butterfly clipped onto every napkin, in one of the astonishing table settings created nightly at La Creuzette dinners, and flying colourfully on scarves and jewellery and designs around us. There is no escaping the butterfly, and its implication of soul. The group becomes closely bonded, unafraid to share personal revelations, but always putting the writing and the journey first.

By the end of the week, I know for sure that life writing can be work for the soul. I have taught many classes of life writing, but the chance to bring a small group of committed people together, in these glorious surroundings (not essential, but it helps!) to connect and work together recording some of the most intense experiences of their lives, shows me that the process can be truly transformative. And the participants do this work for themselves. I am only the guide, frowning over my route maps, steering them along the way. I help them to keep walking on, but each person takes those steps independently.

Yes, there is a touch of magic to it, symbolised by the sorcerer dragonfly with his uncanny presence, and the delicacy of the butterfly with her elusive beauty of the soul.

At the end of the course, Annette buys herself a butterfly necklace. She knows her direction now, and is ready to travel further – quite literally, in one sense, on a Silk Road trip, which her daughter always wanted to do. And the class gives me a gift – a dragonfly pendant. I am wearing it now, as I write this.

Next year at La Creuzette, it will be a different journey, with different travellers. I will be unrolling my maps, but aware that even with the terrain marked out ahead of us, it will always be a venture into the unknown. And my job will be to help the group take this trip, moving forward as one. We will work together, as this year, dividing our time between the soothing dim light of our ‘cave’ at La Creuzette, and the brilliance of nature and sunlight around us, butterflies and dragonflies gracing the garden, when we step out to take the air.




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Jubilee Jollity in the Church (2)

3/6/2012

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‘Parents, would you now take your children to the graveyard?’ 
Mirth from assembled company. Flustered, the announcer continued: ‘For the treasure hunt. And would you please ensure that they avoid the Garden of Remembrance. The square rectangular.’
More laughter.

We know how to have a good time in this village. Early rain provoked the sombre shaking of heads and the decision to scrap the celebration on the green. The church would have to do instead. And so it did, swiftly transformed into a scene of revelry, and something cunning done with the pews so that we could sit facing each other. Heralded by Morris men (mostly Morris women) a-dancing down the green,  with our Pimms and beers in hand, we all entered the portals where Robert and I stepped up to get married three years ago, picking up our disposable packs of red or blue plate, ditto cutlery, and Union Jack napkin on the way. Flags to wave were already on the tables. You could say that it was the perfect lunch club venue – I can see the write-up now: ‘gracious interior with lofty ceiling, elegant stained glass windows and raised area for live music.’

With 300 tickets sold, overspill guests had to go downstairs in the Parish Rooms. But we got the better deal, with the amazing Gloucestershire Constabulary Band, playing up above. Who’d a thought it? All those policemen making the most incredible, harmonious sound together, everything from the Dr Who theme to the – wait for it, you’ll never guess – Land of Hope and Glory. They got about three standing ovations. If I see one of you on the beat, dear coppers, I will go straight up and kiss you!

Char ladies aka chaps from the choir dressed up conducted the band as the mood took them, drew the raffle and played merry pranks all afternoon, including stealing my flag when I wasn’t looking. Formerly reserved neighbours swung, danced, waved and sang with abandon. The children were having fun, too, till they were despatched to the graveyard.


Indeed, I didn’t think it would be so much fun. Oh, and the Coronation Chicken was pretty good too.


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Do chickens eat ice cream?

31/5/2012

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Yes, chickens do eat ice cream! Here’s the proof. It happened one summer’s day in Derbyshire….

While watching the programmes about Chatsworth House on TV recently, I remembered the frenzy of delight with which the Duchess’s famous free range hens seized my ice cream cone. They had the best ducal manners too, and waited till it was offered - no snatching. It was enormous, probably the most generously-sized cornet I’d ever had.


Well, I hope it put a gloss on their feathers.


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The Cows are Out!

18/5/2012

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Every year on or about May 13th, our life changes radically.  No, it’s not necessarily off with woolly jumpers and on with the suncream , but it’s time to keep the gates shut and watch where we tread when we step out into the lane. The cows are out again.

We live in a Gloucestershire village bordering a huge stretch of common land, owned by the National Trust. Apparently it has always been common land, and remained as such because the locals were a fierce lot who refused to be subdued when the Enclosures Acts, which began in 1750,  forced England’s open spaces into private ownership. The villagers around the common (then known as The Wasteland) probably gave any officials a good trouncing, and so they were eventually left alone. It also had a reputation for highwaymen, but that’s another story.

So the commoners’ rights to graze their livestock have never been usurped. Among the deeds for our house, which backs onto the common, is permission from the County Council for us to keep ‘two beasts’ there. We are still considering this. Not absolutely every animal is a cow. Last year, four ponies appeared though, much to everyone’s delight. So will we choose something exotic? Llamas? Horses? Camels? Goats? Once, while out for a walk, I was thrilled to see two grey goats tethered there; when I got closer, however, they turned out to be rocks. I had gone out without my glasses that day. But whatever we choose, they aren’t allowed up there in winter, so stabling them could be something of a problem.  May 13th is the magic day, the first of the grazing season.

At this time, the common is covered with an amazing carpet of cowslips, buttercups and purple orchids. Luckily, it takes quite a while for the 500 or so cows, released in herds small or large by a variety of farmers, to munch their way through these. The National Trust takes good care of  the land, and it’s now known for its different species of flowers. I have found a bee orchid, Star of Bethlehem, yellow rattle, milkwort and plenty more.

The cows are not confined to the common but roam as far as they can, through a number of lanes and villages, stopping to trim the ivy from the walls and, if they can force the gate, to strip our neighbour’s pear tree. Good defences are essential, and although we find the roaming herds utterly charming, we will change our minds if they manage to get into our garden one day.

There are black cows, brown and white cows, mottled cows, striped cows (I have named my favourite Tiger), white cows, fawn cows, red cows and every combination imaginable. My theory is that some farmers buy ‘bin end’ cows at market, the odd-looking ones, and use their free grazing rights to fatten them up over the summer. Fate unknown.  Actually, we do know the fate of the Belted Galloways, the ones that look like furry black and white humbugs. The National Trust owns two herds, one of which is ‘thinned out’ at the end of each season. We collect a box full of delicious organic steaks, joints and stewing beef from the NT each November. Some cows meet a sadder end, hit by cars or lorries. Despite warning signs and speed limits, motorists don’t  always manage to brake in time and around 6 or 7 each year die in this way. Not very good for the vehicle, either.

Some cows give birth on the common, apparently without needing barns or vets, and then you’ll see a wobbly chestnut or milk-white calf staggering after its mum through the tall grasses. Speaking of milk, none of the cows are in milk, in the sense of needing to be milked. Once turned out, they’re in residence for the season, which usually ends in late October. Car drivers who don’t know the area shout at the lumbering beasts when they lurch, in slow motion, across the road. Shouting does nothing. Most things do nothing, in fact. When a cow wants to move, it does so, slowly and irrevocably. The only thing you can try is winding down the window and banging the side of the car.

Golfers have to contend with ambling cows dropping messy splats on the greens. Yes, there’s a golf course on the common – a shame, I always think, but then it’s not my idea of fun, and I console myself by remembering that it’s very historic, dating  from the late 19th century, long before the National Trust took over. But walkers and cows co-exist peacefully, as long as you don’t try as one woman did, to reunite a calf with its mother when they became separated by a road. She was buffeted and bruised for her pains.

By the end of the season I guess that most of us are relieved that we can leave our gates open if we want to, and don’t have to worry about meeting a black cow on a dark road. But we miss them too, when they go. At the beginning of May, the now famous village Cow Hunt gets us in the mood again. We’re not looking for real cows then though, only dressed up wooden cows with silly names like Romeo and Mooliet, Moonet the artist, and Pirates of the Cowibbean. Then there’s tea and fabulous cakes on the common – something that would be impossible to enjoy to two weeks later, when the real cows are out.


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Jubilee cow
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    Cherry Gilchrist

    Author of books on family history, relationships, alchemy, myths & legends. Life writing tutor teaching for Universities of Oxford & Exeter. Keen on quirky, ancient and mysterious things.

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