France Retrospective #1: Why France?

My close friends and family know the answer to this question, but I thought it would give a good context for blogging about my recent trip.

Put simply, France is in my blood. My American grandfather served as a US soldier in France during WWI. He met my grandmother there, and in due course my mother and my aunt were born. My grandparents then separated, and he remarried. In 1929 he returned to the U.S. with his new family and his eldest daughter--my mother. My grandmother and my aunt remained in France. This resulted in the curious situation of having a mother who is American in all respects, but an aunt who is equally French.

I can't tell you when I learned all these details; I can say that I don't remember a time when I did not know my mother's heritage was French. Unfortunately this didn't lead to any practical steps in my youth, such as learning to speak French or developing a correspondence with my French aunt. The real awakening took place for me in recent years, brought about in part because of my interest in genealogy. I began studying French with just enough success to grow bold: I would go to France!

In 2005 my first trip to France took place. After a week in Paris, we took the TGV to Antibes, and met my aunt at her home in the Riviera town of Cagnes-sur-mer. It was a delightful trip and we couldn't wait to go back. In the interim, worrisome things were happening--letters sent to my aunt came back marked undeliverable. Fortunately, I was able to get in touch with a very distant relative in Paris who caught us up on events and let us know that my aunt is now in a nursing home.

The main point of all this is that while we designed our trips as vacations, at the heart of each voyage is a lovely little French lady whose entire remaining family resides in the United States.