I’ve arrived in Fouras, near Rochefort in the Vendee. It’s a site I’ve been watching for a while; on the shortlist for a place Rosie would like. It’s right on the seafront, has a bar/pizza place (where I’m sat writing), a pool. Once I’d set up, took a walk on the beach, wearing shorts and a fleece. Everyone else was wrapped up in down coats against the cold wind. Hard, I am. I was hoping to find seafood, which would have made it perfect for her, sadly not here.

Listening to the accents, it’s got much more Occitan twang round here, though not strong. Still can’t catch more than the occasional word and I have to concentrate in conversation. Hence the title of this post: both their parole, and mine, is like a cracked mirror, giving a partial understanding, glimpses of meanings, and sometimes errors.

Yesterday was a ‘rest’ day, immersing myself in nature on the banks of the Loire. Ended up walking 6km, 10000 steps. I walked past a tree with a noisy cuckoo in it, and on the way back startled a green woodpecker on the path. The track was part of the Loire cycle route and busy with both serious road bikes, and young families just having fun. The day was cloudy, and cold at 10deg, so one to snuggle up and read.

Whether the enforced rest, or getting on the road again, or maybe the music mix popping up long forgotten songs we’d enjoyed together on our trips, the journey was emotional today. In particular, tracks from the 2012 opening ceremony took me to a very different place, with the vulnerability I wrote about earlier. I think maybe I have more psychic work to do than I thought.

Trigger warning: I’m about to open up, so it’s OK to skip if you want. I hadn’t thought to write this just yet, but just as the Odyssey is a therapy, and a laying of ghosts, so the blogposts themselves have a therapeutic value for me. Matthew sometimes asks me if I need to talk to someone, and I usually say not yet. I’ve read advice from various charities; the consensus is that everyone’s grieving process is different. What has surprised me is the place that grieving comes from: a deeper part of the brain than consciousness, deeper even than my experience of emotional memory. Oh Mr Stanislavski!

No this is the animal brain, the part that wants to tear things limb from limb, that wants to shout and scream into the tempest, the part that makes people give their lives for their children without asking why. It is the root of desire and passion, the yearning of the swan that loses their life partner, the upwelling of warmth when the grandchildren cuddle on the sofa. When I wrote earlier that I’d become more sensitised, it’s like losing two layers of skin, so every touch, every nerve ending is working overtime. Except this time it’s the psyche.

Most often the trigger is music; though it can be expressions of social justice that do it, people fighting for or achieving their rights against things that are oppressive. Today it was Elbow whistling Caliban’s Dream from 2012 opening ceremony, which Rosie and I had often played while driving the autoroutes, and a ceremony in which I was very invested; the soundtrack was on her old iPod that we’d taken in to Kings as she drifted out of consciousness. Those were difficult days at her bedside; we had had, at least, time to say what we meant to each other. We had a lot of fun, didn’t we? 46 years together habituates more affection than I knew, like the swans. Another cracked mirror, like the language.

I don’t want to wallow, and I try to keep her memory alive in conversation, while not over sharing. Others, Jennie and Matthew in particular, have their own burdens, and their own way of coping. Friends, some of who follow this blog, have been kind; with offers of support when wanted; for which I am in gratitude.

On a lighter note, tonight’s meal at the bar was my first proper one on the trip (I’m not counting the galette in Nantes). The menu was mostly pizza, but the plat du jour was skate wing with capers; chips and salad. A glass of local rosé on the side. Baby I’m back!