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Freedom

29th June 2011 by Helena 1 Comment  

We are on holiday. I don’t know why we don’t spend more time on holiday, it is quite wonderful.

As soon as we got to our friends Norrie and Mary’s the children did what they long to do in Abu Dhabi bu can’t, ran through a lush green field. It was one of the happiest sights I have seen. I called the photo ‘Heaven’ but I sent it to my mother who came back with ‘Freedom’ which I think is better.

We had all talked about the first thing we were going to do when we got there was. Apart from running in the field, the children were going to see the rabbits. I was going to lie on the lawn, something I didn’t achieve until the end of the second day. It’s amazing how little you can get done on holiday, I have been trying to post a letter since I got here (sorry Jacques). But I have managed to swim (naked) in two rivers, play some good tennis, drink too much wine, watch Wimbledon and have a dreamy dinner in a candle-lit cave with old friends.

We are in the Languedoc where we are having a series of “one-nigh-stands” staying with my in-laws and friends. The children are also spending a night with Chantal and Gilbert. Chantal was our childminder right from when we first moved here in 2000 to the day we left in 2008. Apart from immediate family and close friends I can’t think of anyone who loves them more. It will be interesting to see how they communicate though as the children have resolutely refused to keep up their French and Chantal speaks not a word of English. I figure it will be a kind of language and love immersion and they will be fine. All that French must be there somewhere?

It is so nice to be back, and the good thing about only staying one night with people is they don’t get fed up with you. And traveling with three children there is always that danger. Although I would love to have had more time. It has been so nice watching the little ones recognise things, chatting to their grandparents (Leo and my father-in-law Peter had a lot of cricket talk to catch up on) and feeling so at home. It made me realise how important it is that we come back every year.

Next we head off to Italy to see my mother. It will be great to get there but I am not looking forward to the drive and the six million ‘are we there yets’ along the way.

But at least there will be green fields to run through when we eventually get there.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2011


Filed Under: Family, France, Travel, blog --> Tagged With: freedom

One thought on Freedom

  • mimi says:
    30th June 2011 at 11:48 am

    the green field does look lovely, and it’s something I’d never thought of missing when you live in the sun!

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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi-based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor-in-chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. She is working on a thriller set in Sweden as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

In 2022 her short story The Japanese Gardener came second in the Fish Publishing Short Story Prize. One of her stories was also shortlisted for the Bridport Short Story Prize. When she’s not writing, she works as a headhunter for the media and entertainment industry for the Sucherman Group. 

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

Bibliography

More France Please, we’re British; Gibson Square 2004

Two Lipsticks and a Lover 2005; Gibson Square (hardback)

All You Need to be Impossibly French; (US version of above) Penguin 2006

Two Lipsticks and a Lover; Arrow Books (paperback) 2007

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (hardback) 2006

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (paperback) 2007

So Chic! (French version of Two Lipsticks) Leduc Editions 2008 (also translated into Chinese, Russian and Thai)

More, More France; Gibson Square 2009

To Hell in High Heels; Arrow Books 2009 (also translated into Polish)

The Viva Mayr Diet; Harper Collins 2009

Love in a Warm Climate; Gibson Square 2011

The Ex-Factor; Gibson Square 2013

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles; Gibson Square 2016

The Arnolfini Marriage; Amazon Kindle December 2016

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles (paperback); Gibson Square spring 2018

The Longest Night; Gibson Square spring 2019

 

 

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