June 22, 2013
The Kindness Of Strangers

          Aside from the car-leasing personnel, I am struck by the many small kindnesses shown me by many people since I arrived in France: the efforts of David Chevalier, the manager of the Hotel d'Orsay in Paris to get my hiking poles back to me, for a start.

          Two days ago, on the way back from Narbonne after picking up  the Seat Lion, I get lost after taking the toll-road exit for Carcassonne, good and lost in the street-lets called ruelles along the Canal du Midi.  A young man, seeing that I have already made one bad attempt to get back on the road, says,

          "The Pont Rouge Intermarché Hypermarché? --I'll take you there", and proceeds to drive a good many miles out of his way to get me to the right Intermarché.  He doesn't stop --had he, I had a twenty Euro bill to give him to cover the gas-- but he just turns around and waves as he drives away.

           In Pézenas, well-groomed older man emerges from the Hôtel de Ribes just as I am reading the historic marker.  He invites me in to see the venerable courtyard, the subject of so many photographs and postcards of Pézenas.

           Lost in the fields on a bicycle ride earlier, trying to find out how to get back to Caunes, as well as how I got lost in the first place on an earlier trip to Peyriac, I meet a man walking with a dog who accompanies me until I reach the main road.  The personal civility of the people combined with the natural beauty of the area is balm.

           At one point I cycle through a detour from road works in Peyriac.  Three boys, about ten years each, emerge around a corner.  Two are on a bicycle big enough for an adult, with one pedaling, the other, barefoot riding behind.   One of them is carrying a large black bird in his hands.  It has a red band on one of its legs.  When I ask him about it, expressing concern that it might be diseased, he answers

           "No, we're teaching it to fly--"

            On the other hand, the French can be crafty: the taxi driver who took me to Narbonne to pick up the Seat told me that he was not taking the toll road, so that he could stretch the trip out and be paid more than if he took the faster road.   And in Caunes, I have observed a man filling up several gallon-sized plastic bottles with water from the fountain at Place de la Republique.  The water is not potable, so why would he?  Probably because he wants to water his plants and keep his water bill as low as possible.