31. On the wedding at Alet les Bains.

Dearly Beloved,

This letter was written when we were all asking questions “will we ever escape from this pandemic” and “will life will be different afterwards”. Two weeks before that the world suddenly seemed full of possibilities. My wife and I attended a family wedding in the South of France, not far from the town of Limoux. Nearby are the vineyards in which the grapes for the famous, and oldest, bubbly wines Creme and Blanquette de Limoux are grown. The town has a ruined abbey, a substantial portion of the houses are medieval and are bound by the old city wall on two sides whilst the river bounds the town on the other two sides.

On the morning of the wedding there was a rehearsal of the choirs and the songs to be sung. That was attended by all the saints that adorn these southern French catholic churches and by Ava the groom's three-year- old niece. Later in the day the church was full of saints and sinners for the service itself. Ava asked all the right questions at critical moments in the ceremony in a loud voice “What're they doin now?” When her mother sang a song to accompany the bride down the isle, she picked up the last high note of each verse and echoed it loudly, pitch perfect, winging it to our hearts. As Peter, the father of the bride said “every marriage should have a three-year-old girl”. The C of E vicar, brought in for the occasion, talked of love and charity as necessitating compassion in action with the emphasis on action and then made everyone repeat their vow of support for the married couple twice, just to ensure they had got the message necessary for our egotistical times. After the service the church emptied and the entire congregation processed around the mediaeval town led by a hunting horn and a single skinned drum/tabor to end up at the hotel where, after bubbling glasses of Blanquette de Limoux had been offered, an early dinner appeared.

Then there was endless conversation. Weddings are supposed to unite families and lead to mutual support. At this wedding the bride's family and friends were from all over Ireland and the groom's from the south of England, so two nations had to be united too. Inevitably there was much reflection on, and talk about, the historical divisions and the way in which the history of Ireland and its relationship with England was largely absent from our English education – so we did a bit of catching up.

Nowadays people marry later and at this wedding the friends of the bride and groom were mostly in their early thirties, the prime of our lives. Everyone was escaping from Covid inhibitions. Many people had worked out and implemented the most contorted international travel plans for themselves, some with young children who were at school, for just a week-end, to accord with both the national restrictions and the restrictions of airlines and railways all with the aim of slowing the spread of the Covid-19 virus -- There had been an orgy of rule reading, form filling, the making of declarations and the provision of Covid test certificates.

The energy generated at this wedding was extraordinary; live music gave way to recorded and that to the singing of an ad hoc choir, all continuing until dawn. The manageress of the family-owned-hotel called a halt at 04:30 but all that happened was that everyone who was still standing, swayed into the center of the town to a friend's house. The Gendarmes turned up at the hotel at 01:00 hrs and reappeared at the friends house at 05:30 hours, but weddings, in this part of France at least, are given special privileges to make a noise and celebrate. We had met the bride's parents after Church and were impressed by their generosity which had paid for this powerful party.

My wife and I were staying at the hotel where the dinner was held and retired at midnight to sit on a balcony above the party of revelers below. I was reminded of the passage in one of those diaries of a country clergyman who recalls riding on horseback with his wife over the hills surrounding his village and looking down at the lights where the people are celebrating their annual fair. We shared with him that wonderful feeling of community, and that, oh so rare feeling, that all is well with the world.

Peace,

Paul.

Completed 9th September 2001


The wedding at Alet.

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