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The homecoming (parental truths number seven)

25th September 2007 by Helena 7 Comments  

Porquerrolles

We got back yesterday evening from a perfect press trip. I did write and tell you all about it but the blog seems to have vanished. I can only assume the tourist board of the Var, keen to avoid yet more visitors to the magical islands of Porquerolles and Port-Cros somehow managed to infiltrate my blog and delete it. Anyway, to sum up, it was totally perfect. Lots of sunshine, sea, sand, and not a PR person in sight. The only PR I saw a lot of was Pale Rose.

Then we came home. It started well. “Did you have a nice sleep?” was Leo’s first question. But then it went pear-shaped. Children, rather like animals, will punish you if you go away. The parental truth is that much as you NEED to get away in order to remain married, they don’t care. I mean they care about you remaining married but they don’t care what takes you away, they don’t like it.

They bickered and fought and pushed each other off the trampoline and argued and wept and generally behaved as badly as was humanly possible until it was time for bed.

But I was prepared for this. I had three days to prepare for this. And rather like a terrible hangover after a fantastic party I have to conclude that it was worth it.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2007


Filed Under: Children, Family, Parental truths, Travel, blog --> Tagged With: homecoming, number, parental, seven, truths

7 thoughts on The homecoming (parental truths number seven)

  • margaret says:
    25th September 2007 at 8:34 am

    Just to say I read the vanished blog and thought I had lost my mind when it had mysteriously disappeared! I am so in need of a break that I imagine the whole episode.

    So, tell me quick, before your site is inflitrated again, where was it and where did you stay. Promise I won’t tell anyone!

  • helena says:
    25th September 2007 at 8:51 am

    They tell me the server was being upgraded, so no more mysterious than that!
    The Golden Isles are just off the coast of Provence, nearest big town Toulon. They are just the most beautiful islands you can imagine. The smaller one, Port-Cros, is reminiscent of the Caribbean. There are no cars allowed on either island. The hotel to stay in in Port-Cros is Le Manoir, dreamy, old-fashioned, almost colonial. I would in fact stay there the whole time and take day trips to Porquerolles. Don’t miss lunch at the one-star Michelin Mas de Langoustier – amazing. But do avoid the Provencale on Port-Cros, not good. For Sunday lunch head for the restaurant closest to the port and have the fish of the beautiful eyes.
    I am already longing to go back, although the children are being nicer this morning!
    Hx

  • Jacques says:
    25th September 2007 at 8:54 am

    I always believed you hated fish. ???

  • helena says:
    25th September 2007 at 9:00 am

    I like fish that doesn’t taste of fish – that is white, fluffy kind of fish. But show me an anchovy and I run like hell.
    Hx

  • Miko says:
    25th September 2007 at 3:55 pm

    No Jansons for you then! Surstromming perhaps?

  • helena says:
    25th September 2007 at 4:44 pm

    Even worse!
    Hx

  • Peggy says:
    25th September 2007 at 5:27 pm

    Come on, Helena. You cannot really be said to have truly lived until you have opened a can of Surstromming indoors, avoided keeling over and then bravely eaten the contents!

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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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