Thirty-Seven Harvests or French Gleaning as a Hobby

Thirty-Seven Harvests or French Gleaning as a Hobby

Almanac for Belonging Notes: September 28, 2025. It must be time for my annual viewing of Agnès Varda’s documentary film, Les Glaneurs et La Glaneuse (2000). This morning Maire-Pierre, one of my neighbors, wrote us all via our neighborhood What’s App group to ask if we wanted to remasser—harvest some apples from our other neighbor’s orchard. She said there were both Canada Gris and Granny’s up for grabs. One more piece of evidence that I belong here. September 29, 08:13. As forecasted just a few weeks earlier, the sun has crossed my personal equinox ley line, the Canal de Garonne, which runs basically east/west at the foot of my garden gate at 44°12’37.9”N 0°31’34.0”E. Now, having moved behind the Shady Oak Trees and Lost Orchard, I make my coffee by the kitchen window in the glow of its first light. September 30, 6:56. While I make coffee in the still dark kitchen, I flick the porch light on for Chica to run into the Oak Park and shake herself awake. The waiting for sunlight rituals change week by week but I am patient as I already peeked at the weather. It promises another sunny day. Time to gather the cosmos and zinnias which have gone to seed for next year’s garden before it rains. October 1, 2025. Market day today! But could I possibly need more vegetables since I went to the Saturday market and really loaded up? Oh, yes! Although my kitchen window table ‘shop’ looks full, I realized that once I put the Savoy cabbage in the Garbure, along with some onions and garlic, and make a harvest tart with the apples and pears, I was only left with a basket of some ripening tomatoes. So shop I did and I can’t wait to share the results! I belong at these Autumn markets! October 2. I am happy to rise early this morning before 7 a.m. as I have guests coming for lunch and there is much to do. Last night I made the broth for the Garbure—a Basque/Bearnaise soup celebrating cabbage, white beans, carrots, turnips, duck confit, and jambon. All the autumnal goodness in one big brothy terrine to bring to the table and flavored with these whole vegetables- onion, celery root, parsley, garlic, tomato. This morning, I’ll peel the whole vegetables I bought at yesterday’s market and pop them in the broth to slowly poach until tender and sweet. I’ll serve this with big slabs of rustic bread rubbed with garlic and duck fat, carafes of local red wine and followed with some fig leaf/tonka bean ice cream and a buttery crusted harvest croustade filled with pears, apples, and prunes. Bring October On Lunch coming up! October 3. I didn’t need my weather app this morning to predict the future. When I finally woke at 7:30, the light outside my window was soft blue and very muted, a felted sort of light reflecting the matte clouded sky. But not all Almanac clues are visual here at Camont. When I opened the kitchen door to let Chica out for a quick run and sniff along the driveway, I heard the weather shift. When the skies are clear and the prevailing high pressure system moves from the Gulf de Gascogne across our inland kingdom, the sound of the trains speeding into Gare d’Agen is carried across the Valley over 2 km away to the north sound as close as if the tracks were laid on the canal just in front of the house. This morning the roar of the Autoroute and early commuters to Agen over 3 kilometers away to the south, the completely opposite direction, assured me that within 24 hours we would have rain, the weather would change. What other aural clues alert you to the world around you? October 4— Thirty-Seven Harvests or The Gleaners and I, my version. In a true cyclical almanac fashion, I come around to that time of year where a long ago image was burned into my memory on a day just like today—early autumn in the Garonne River Valley. Many years ago, we were driving back from the Airport in Bordeaux having dropped off barge guests for their return flight home. It’s a speedy 1.5 hours on the toll road, Autoroute des Deux Mers, at 130 kilometers per hour to Camont. Just past the Le Mas d’Agenais exit, where the Landes Forest is left behind and the valley opens up into flatter farms and fertile fields. The floodplain still echoes of this former tobacco growing area; decaying black-oiled, wooden tobacco drying barns pin the ragged farm yards down. Tobacco long replaced by corn and wheat fields, barley, colza, and soy beans. I was quietly daydreaming as my husband drove and I watched the passing landscapes scroll past the windows of our van like a vintage 16-mm home movie. Off to right, I spied an older couple, dressed in timeless French workwear—he in bright blue twill trousers, rough shirt, and oversized black beret; she in a faded floral overcoat house dress, a straw hat tied to her chin. As we sped past at full speed, they simultaneously sprung into action, lifting a flat round basket between them in a practiced choreography to toss the wheat berries in the air as the early Autumn breeze lifted the chaff and blew it off across the farmyard. Winnowing. I knew the word but not the action. We were already several hundred feet down the highway before I realized I had just ‘filmed’ that timeless motion of winnowing wheat in my mind storing it indelibly linked to the images of Jean-Francois Millet’s painting of The Gleaners which I must have seen in hundreds of art books, but maybe never in real life. The two actions, winnowing and gleaning were now filed away in my “French Memories” section of my brain. Now fast forward over 20 years, when I had moved off of the barge, into the farmhouse, and finally bought a television; streaming services had come into our rural internet lives. I discovered the world of France’s Nouvelle Vague filmmaker Agnès Varda and her most memorable documentary titled “The Gleaners and I”— filmed in the year 2000, a meandering journey around France, country and city, as she gleaned the first digital images of her gleaners. They were Les Glaneurs and she was La Glaneuse. “The film was included for the first time in 2022 on the critics’ poll of Sight and Sound‘s list of the greatest films of all time, at number 67.[4] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gleaners_and_I#cite_note-4] In 2025, it ranked number 88 on The New York Times [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times]‘ list of “The 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century.” “One notable aspect of the film: in making a film about gleaning, Varda recognized that she, too, was a gleaner. “I’m not poor, I have enough to eat,” she said, but she pointed to “another kind of gleaning, which is artistic gleaning. You pick ideas, you pick images, you pick emotions from other people, and then you make it into a film.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gleaners_and_I [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gleaners_and_I] Thirty-Seven Harvests in the October Kitchen. I find myself 37 years on from those first harvests, each one new, distinct and yet, echoing of a past, one that I never experienced. That image of winnowing farmers, that painting of gleaners, and that quirky digital film all compress into an accordion-folded memory—nostalgically-tinted peasants, timeless neighboring paysans, and avant-garde films that circle around each year as the harvest time returns. While I shop at the weekly markets, a friend stops buy with a bag of lovely heritage apples after a rainy walk with the dogs through the already harvested apple orchard rows. I willingly accept the extra free plums from a farmer I know without shame. I stuff a few plucked rosehips and hollyhock seeds into my pockets as I pass by a neighbor’s wild garden. I remember the first thrill of 35 years past as I spotted a whole fish tossed to the waste side at the end of a market in Villeneuve-lès-Avignon which I greedily gathered into my basket on the bike to take back to the barge. I still gather all the green tomatoes to pickle rather than let them compost into the field. I, too, am not poor, I have enough to eat. Gleaned Apples: Twice-Baked Apple Sweets Easy enough to make these twice baked apples, cored and stuffed with butter, brown sugar, and raisins. Place them on a thick slice of country bread and bake in a very hot oven (200’C/400’F) for 45-50 minutes until the skins split and sugary juices run out the bottom of the core and onto the toasting bread. Next, smash the soft apples flat onto the bread and return to the oven for another 15 minutes or so until the apples are caramelised and all the juices are thick. I love to serve these still warm and dressed with warm custard, crème fraîche, or ice cream. Or just as they are. The Camont Journals with Kate Hill is a reader-supported publication. To receive all new posts, videos, and podcast and to support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber. More Almanac for Belonging. This is the free Monthly newsletter for all subscribers of The Camont Journals. Join me this month as a paid subscriber as we glean more ideas—a seasonal companion of Autumn ingredients, recipes, and kitchen and gardening tips & trucs. I’ll be sharing my favorites: soups, starters, main courses, and desserts in videos and with stories to “French up” your Autumn in my Almanac for Belonging. You can read some other autumn thoughts on gleaning below from the archive- another perk when you are a paid subscriber— over 300 essays with recipes to browse through. Hungry for more? I post these daily Almanac for Belonging notes on the Substack App Notes and you can read the archive of my 300+ posts, a treasury of recipes and seasonal inspiration. I’ll be adding a few more videos for Autumnal recipes to the Youtube channel this week including some favorite simple suppers. Happy here? Please support as a paying subscriber and consider gifting one of your friends with a subscription, too! Merci, Kate This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Introduction to my Podcast: The Camont Journals- an Almanac for Belonging. Voice Over

Welcome to my new podcast, a hybrid of voice overs from my writings on The Camont Journals on Substack and some sound poems of life in the rural slow lane of Gascony. While there will always be a free newsletter monthly, and thus a free monthly podcast, most of the others will be for paid subscribers as an additional love note of time to share with my faithful supporting subscribers. Interested in becoming one of the aurally enhanced here? Just subscribe for the monthly or yearly rate now. The Camont Journals with Kate Hill (and new Podcast!) is a 100% reader-supported publication. To receive all posts, podcasts, and videos please becoming a paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Start here! "An Almanac for Belonging-A Seasonal Companion from Camont"

Welcome to what’s next at the Camont Journals! And why an Almanac for Belonging? An almanac (also spelled almanack and almanach) is a regularly published listing of a set of current information about one or multiple subjects. It includes information like weather forecasts, farmers' planting dates, tide tables, and other tabular data often arranged according to the calendar. Celestial figures and various statistics are found in almanacs, such as the rising and setting times of the Sun and Moon, dates of eclipses, hours of high and low tides, and religious festivals. The set of events noted in an almanac may be tailored for a specific group of readers, such as farmers, sailors, or astronomers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almanac [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almanac] belonging /bɪˈlɒŋɪŋ/. noun—an affinity for a place or situation."we feel a real sense of belonging" Dear Friends, Over the too hot summer months, as I hid out in the small, cooler Barn office/library, I moiled over the future of how I would continue to use this shared space, The Camont Journals, and what more I had to share of any value for you, my faithful readers. More recipes? Yes. More French observations? Yes. Of garden and nature, landscapes and markets? Yes and Yes. But I was searching for a stronger cord to tie this French life together on paper. I started calling it The Legacy Project. And just like that, it started to gel. Often it starts with a title, or just a word. And for me that word or phrase becomes a peg on which I can hang my work apron, and allows me to come and go, between admin for the Relais de Camont, emails to friends and loved ones, house and garden chores, and that quiet moment resting on a small soft bed next to the terrace door, i.e. the afternoon nap. And so The Legacy Project grew in my mind beyond a catchphrase, and started sorting itself into chunks of time—in the past, in the future, and now. BF or AF? As I started looking back on a lifetime’s work I began to label it BF or AF—Before France or After France. I focused on a legacy of culinary work that took over the second half of my life—37-73 AF. Those early years were when I began to dig deeper into the fertile Gascon soil to uncover the ingredients I was barely beginning to understand, season by slow season. Then, once I had settled here at Camont, I began to abandon my restaurant and private chef training and instead, refined the simpler techniques of a prolific home cook who must provide delicious meals three times a day—a French housewife. I realized that more than my light-hearted memoir of learning to cook, Finding France: a Memoir in Small Bites (and the link to the archive is here on Substack [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/s/finding-france-a-culinary-memoir]), this new catalogue had to not only look backwards but it had to move me forward into a new space where my writing work would be challenged and continue to take precedence over the years of actual cooking and teaching. I wanted to work on a larger scale; The Legacy Project—would it become a book? a film?? a video game??? and still to continue on Substack as The Camont Journals, a creative weekly practice that feeds my growing needs as a writer while allowing me to belong to a larger writing and reading community. Where to begin-On Process. How I approach writing projects like I approach cooking a large meal. Part way into August it becomes clear to me that there is so much growing in my head’s creative nodes now, that I can’t contain it in one space. And while I am grateful to welcome a return to a brighter energy, if not reliable stamina, I knew that I needed to take this larger, grander project down into smaller bites, not like I weekly serialized Finding France: a Memoir, but more of banquet of choice—some starter thoughts as apéros; followed by some deeper tastings; interspersed with some single exceptionally memorable bites. The Camont Journals would still be perfect for this. The other exciting bits will come later and I will share more as they develop, too. So Why Almanac? As I looked back over these 37 years, I see the patterns and rhythms of 37 seasonal repeats, including some of the time from the BF years (remember Before France?) more tenacious than others like slaughtering that first pig on Lopez Island in the mid-1970s— the back-to-the-land days. Or the AF seed-to-sausage butchery and charcuterie courses at the Chapolard Family Farm and here at Camont. They are exquisitely intertwined. (You can see some of these early days on this wonderful old video on my new Youtube channel). So it was over a cup of coffee and slice of cake, that my good neighbor and wise creative mentor Tamsin Jardinier [https://unfoldingconversations.substack.com/] suggested that I use that wonderfully evocative word ‘almanac’ as a way to describe the narrating of my seasonal days. Initially, I resisted the old-fashioned farmer and celestial-based sense of the word (including all that new moon and planting advice— which I do follow!). But I came to love the delicate balance of factual information—gardening tips, ingredient information, and simple seasonal recipes— with the barely “woo-woo” acceptance of the stars' distant guidance and the moon’s gravity on the heart. It is that daily dance between the two that continually keeps me charged creatively as I make my ho-hum chores into a game of French life at Camont. And Belonging to What? I belong to Camont like it belongs to Gascony. I am, now after all these years, at a new cycle of harvests that grew from an accidental breakdown of an old Dutch barge along a French canal. I stay on in great anticipation of the days to come, when orchard fruit drops after a heavy rainstorm and I know that the windfall apple tarts will be made every week throughout the coming autumn months. I belong to this house, to this small farm/large garden, and above all to the community of food growers and cooks who welcomed me 37 years ago into their Gascony. I would make it my own over time, with every word I wrote or story I told, until I felt at home here more than any other place I lived. I belong to the old stone and brick walls, the porous red tile floors, and to the damp that rises when the weather changes. I belong to the food, too, that my neighbors grow and I buy directly from them at the markets or on their farms. I belong to the platters of food that I cook, learned in those kitchens, at their dining tables, and from the few old cookbooks I found along the way. I belong because someone told me a story about my own house before I knew it, or just because I notice that that elderflower bush along the fence blooms every year at the same week. I belong—because I choose to. What will be this Seasonal Companion from Camont? Just like in my early days as puppeteer, when on-going rehearsals and two performances a day were de rigueur, I understood that it was the repetition that I loved as much as the initial creativity. I could watch a performance of The Magic Egg 600 times without a single moment of boredom. So when I look back and repeat here— a phrase, a recipe, a story of how I came to be— please have patience and reread along with me with all your funny voices. Like in any almanac, our moon and stars come around again as the seasons reappear with astonishing regularity. What Spring again! Where did the Summer go? Oh, the last of the waning moon… And with that repetition comes a delicious sort of anticipation—like knowing which chocolates to pluck from the bonbon box. Anticipation can be as wonderful as surprise or as amazing as what might come next. Over time, we too begin to recognize what will happen next in our little lives, in our neighborhoods, our gardens, parks, food, and even with friends. Come inside my kitchen now, again, and you will know what season it is immediately—a deep orange squash or two, a bowl of scented apples, a fresh garlic braid all announce that it is indeed, l’Automne - Autumn, or as I say as an American, “Fall has spun around to its rightful place, again.” I know exactly what that means with a frisson of anticipation for the next 3 months— slow cooked, deeply flavored foods, the cutting and drying of cranberry-stained hydrangeas, and the pairing of harvest fruits and buttery pastries for apple croustades and chaussons de pruneaux. And so we begin to belong, together, belong to a place and a situation that is Camont. Join me as I start this Season of Thirty-Seven Harvests. The Camont Journals with Kate Hill is a reader-supported publication. To receive all new posts and support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber. What’s next at an Almanac for Belonging ? Thirty-Seven Harvests: Welcome to l’Automne at Camont While there will always be a free monthly newsletter to welcome you to what’s next at The Camont Journals, the following weeks will now be for paid subscribers only. After a year of lowering my subscription rate to just 6€ a month, I will now bounce back to to my pre-Champêtre subscription rate on October 1, 2025. So subscribe now for access to all the Camont Journal archives, recipes, video classes, ebooks, and future French fun! * Weekly Writing Most every week I’ll share with you the minute seasonal observations of this slow French life at Camont … * Seasonal Recipes All the hits! The Gascon classics as well as my adaptation for a simpler way to cook good french country food. * My New Youtube Channel for my Videos. Pop over to my new Youtube channel here https://www.youtube.com/@katehill.france [https://www.youtube.com/@katehill.france] where I am loading seasonal cooking videos that I produced during 2022/23 as part of an online cooking course—Kate Hill Cooks! I have already uploaded a sampling of short and long cooking class videos there and while these are open to all the public, I will be sharing more of them for my special paid subscribers including a printable pdf recipes. * AND Voice Overs! Did you know that Voice Overs = Podcasts? I’ll take my time recording voice overs for new and current posts as I publish them for paid subscribers; the monthly free newsletter, like this one, will be recorded as well. So if you like to listen instead of read, all of these newly recorded The Camont Journal posts will be available as a podcast for listening on all the usual places- Apple, Spotify, etc… and of course, here on Substack. I’m so excited! * Live Q&A here on Substack And once again, I’ll brave the timid talking to myself part of offering a monthly Live Q&A here on Substack. Low tech, winging it, and all the fun of old school stumbling around on camera/phone somewhere in my kitchen, garden, or reading room at Camont. Thanks for reading (and listening!). I so appreciate your attention and support as we begin a new year of French living at Camont- an Almanac for Belonging. Kate Hill is the author of over a dozen cookbooks, including A Culinary Journey in Gascony, Cassoulet: A French Obsession, and A Gascon Year Series of 12 recipe and story volumes (available here) [https://relaisdecamont.com/ebooks]. Published in America’s Best Food Writing 2019, curated by Samin Nosrat, Kate Hill has written for Saveur Magazine and The Los Angeles Times. Kate and her cooking, butchery, and charcuterie programs have been featured in Bon Appétit, Food and Wine, Condé Nast Traveler, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Boston Globe, Faire magazine, My French Country Home, and countless websites. The Relais de Camont is in Gascony, Southwest France. Over the last 30 years, many artists and writers, photographers, filmmakers, and dreamers have found their inspiration at Camont, Kate Hill’s home in Gascony, France. In 2022, Kate opened the Relais de Camont as writers’ rooms and creative residency for those seeking a less structured yet productive environment.relaisdecamont.com [https://relaisdecamont.com/creative-residency] This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Garden like a painter. Write like that gardener.

Champetre: A love affair with color and French light. When I first started this run of French country-infused writing, declaring that “Champêtre: a French Field Guide” would be my leitmotif for the next year or so, I browsed through some of my favorite French paintings that influenced my early life as an art student—those Impressionists and Post-Impressionists, les Fauvists, les Nabi, and other early 20th-century French painters. Over and over, I fell in love with the colorful canvases by that lively gang of turn-of-the-century dandies—Matisse, Vuillard, and Bonnard—initially for their glowing and colorful interiors and still lives, and then for their bright and colorful gardens, often seen from inside their windows—painted shutters flung open to the French light. From inside my own windowscapes at Camont, this year’s exuberant tulip crop started jumping out of the crowded pots as the warmer spring weather beckoned me outside to dig and plant. I buried small hard anemone corms close to the terrace to pop up with their purple, dark pink, and red blossoms. I sowed the tiniest seeds in egg cartons and yogurt pots to germinate inside the kitchen window. I had to stop resisting the wild urge to throw myself into full-on Jardinière mode. Yes, I would shop and cook, write and photograph, but first I needed to design, plant, and nurture a new front garden by my renovated barn and its front door Paradis terrace. But where to start? How would I describe my heart's garden desire? I looked back at the first words I wrote about Champetre here [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/p/bonjour-champetre-a-new-french-word] and let that lead the way. “Champêtre” is where I will cross-pollinate all my French lessons: cooking, gardening, restoring, decorating, photography, painting, and especially writing— under one pastoral and rustic tiled roof.” Garden like a Painter Mon Jardin Sauvage After watching this brief video on Bonnard’s garden above, look at the colorful painting below by Pierre Bonnard. It’s quite simply titled “Garden.” I have referred to Pierre Bonnard’s earlier life and work here [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/p/french-dreams-for-october], as a Post-Impressionist painter and printer, one of Les Nabis group, and a transitional figure to Modernism. But I hadn’t thought much about his role as a gardener as well as a painter until I came across this video about him and Monet, who were neighbors living just a few kilometers apart in Normandy. “ He preferred the thick clumps of vegetation, unkempt grasses and baroque flowerings of his ‘wild garden’ in Normandy to the flower beds that his friend Monet grew in Giverny, which were organised like the paint on a palette.” Isabelle Cahn, “Pierre Bonnard, Gardens” 2015, Éditions des Falaises. So, I sat with my coffee this morning and thought about how I would garden as a painter rather than a Giverny gardener. Bonnard’s wild garden resonated with me, not just in the sense of letting things “go to seed” or for the protection of pollinators, but also from a purely visual perspective. If I scrunch my eyes, do I see the splotches of deep fuchsia geranium flowers like brush strokes against the chaos of greens, bright acid to deep forest oak leaf? Maybe you have never been to the south of France in the spring, but you don’t need to if the colors of Bonnard’s “Garden” painting allow you to connect the implied dots as French blossoms—tulips, irises, silver-leafed lamb’s ears growing between two crab apple trees. So many years ago, two artist friends on board my barge proclaimed, “Oh, now I get it! Those aren’t brush strokes of yellow paint on Monet’s paintings; they are fallen poplar leaves on the canal.” I think of them each fall. The reality of the falling leaves is only important in the context of the season. The small, bright daubs of cadmium yellow paint let us fill in the blanks as we bring the landscape or garden to life in our minds. You can read more about this in John Berger’s “Selected Essays—The Eyes of Claude Monet.” [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/12350/selected-essays-of-john-berger-by-john-berger/] Gardening outside the lines If I look at my farmhouse garden at Camont as art, as a late Impressionist gardener rather than a mid-1800s Realist, I begin to feel the stirrings of something long ago buried as a young art student. I want to be this “Nabi de la Terre”, more modern in my works as I become a modern elder. While I am still influenced by the tight 19th-century Japanese prints I love, then and now, my focus today is less on one element at a time, one season at a time. Rather, time compresses into a playbook of all the previous springs, all the memorable autumns of falling leaves onto that ever-flowing canal. While I still pay attention to the individual elements of my garden, I am looser with my planting strokes, less precise, more reckless and wild as I reach outside the edges and boundaries. Now, I throw flower seeds, starburst orange cosmos and apron-blue nigella, among the clumping bushes as well as in the flower beds. I will plant and fill the kitchen hillside with splashes of color, much like Bonnard's paintings. “Garden like a painter” is not just about producing lovely paintings, but is an expression of how we could live our most artful days later in life. I have a sloping grassy patch from the jammy Muscat vine fence on the roadside down to the Keeping Kitchen terrace where my salad greens thrive. We had to cut down two older quince and an apple tree that caught some “fungus thing” at the end of last year, leaving two pretty crabapple trees to flower in memory. I have been getting used to seeing that bare grassy open space over the winter and wondering what to do with it, until now. When I saw Bonnard’s wonderful, bright green background framed by two fruit trees in the “Garden,” I started my journey down this particular rabbit hole. Now, I don’t want a landscaped border garden. Instead, I want a painter's vision of splashes of bright colors, hot pink and orange cosmos and zinnias, purple anemones and bronze irises crowding through the grass and letting this year's wonderful tulips poke through next spring. Those driving by Camont will see a blur of color dots and patches of green. I shared my idea of “painting the garden” with Allison Makgill, my garden angel. She and her husband, experienced tree surgeon Trevor, help me tend the acre-plus of wild and not-so-wild garden/lawn/potager/orchard/park at Camont. They do all the heavy lifting; I look and point, and spout slightly absurd ideas and take the credit. Now, they are used to me. And as friends and neighbors, we share in each other’s successes—farm fresh eggs from their hens, hydrangea and rose clippings from my mature bushes. I breathed an audible sigh of relief when I showed Allison the Bonnard painting on my phone, and she didn’t even roll her eyes! So I turned around the Relais this morning, the sun kept playing hide and seek. I saw other new patches of color—the yellow flag against a backdrop of quivering poplar trees and acid green willow curtains. The acacia tree near the terrace table just exploded today with fragrant white bunches of blossoms threaded through its spindly branches by an old rose—Blush Noisette. I spotted a solitary bronze iris under the now spent cherry trees; the composting pink petals must have fed the iris and honeysuckle that grow there. I looked at the photograph I took and imagined a more painterly version in front of the rustic garden gate, once painted woad blue, a million years ago. “Bonnard did not paint from life but rather drew his subject—sometimes photographing it as well—and made notes on the colors. He then painted the canvas in his studio from his notes. "I have all my subjects to hand," he said, "I go back and look at them. I take notes. Then I go home. And before I start painting I reflect, I dream."[ [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Bonnard#cite_note-26]1] Do I write like a gardener or dream like a painter? And this is where that idea rattled my old bones and injected a dose of new energy into a flagging spirit. If I could imagine a new way of gardening after decades of “plan, plant, and prune,” “clip, deadhead, repeat,” could I not apply this same re-wilding spirit to my writing? What if I oversowed the predictable blog posts and 1200-word essays, letting the lyrical notes and small French vignettes drift up through the pages of weekly recipes and market porn? What if I let go of the planned rows of orderly paragraphs and clear outlines and let the words drift across untended pastures, full of wild orchid promises? Could I harvest a new yet-to-be-written book, so long mired in publishing fears and questions? (Who will buy it? Who will sell it? Do I have enough social media?) What if the words reflected this slower living, taking the time to hold a dying bird, a song thrush, and bury it under the roses? Are these words enough to spur you to continue to read? Yes, maybe, not every time, but often enough to keep you coming back. The writer in the garden Here I am at the end of the sunniest days of April, warmth pushing between the banana leaves and highlighting the palm tree flowers that grow incongruously in a French farmhouse garden. I agree that they do indeed look like pale yellow fish roe, Raquel [https://substack.com/profile/76480829-raquel]. I wonder if they are edible, too? Finding one’s voice as a writer, an artist, a photographer, or any other human is less an exercise in filling notebooks and journals, but more about living each day fully and as it presents itself—fractured, in pieces, broken by shards of light that are the glory moments remembered forever. * Come into my garden and my kitchen. * Sit on my sofa, read, and bunch the pretty pillows under your book. * Take a walk along my towpath, through my markets, and meet my friends who grow the food I cook and eat. * Without a plan. Without an outline. * Come live a day in the small villages and rolling countryside that defines what Champêtre embodies—a way of living with the seasons, minute by minute, of each special day. Isn’t that just enough? * As I live it day to day, I also open the Relais de Camont [https://relaisdecamont.com/] year-round for creative residencies. Yours, Kate [1] Art, Smith College Museum of; Davis, John; Leshko, Jaroslaw (2000). The Smith College Museum of Art: European and American Painting and Sculpture, 1760-1960 [https://books.google.com/books?id=3Yq0IRs_ZZwC&q=bonnard%20before%20I%20start%20painting%20I%20reflect,%20I%20dream&pg=PA28]. Hudson Hills. p. 28. ISBN [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISBN_(identifier)] 9781555951948 [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/9781555951948]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Camp Cassoulet Q&A Live!

A flashback to a live Q&A All About Cassoulet. Join me for my next live video in the app. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe [https://katehillfrance.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]