The ferry boat stayed out on the wild stormy sea all day and by the time the waves had calmed down enough for us to get into the port in Arhus Denmark I was sea sick and too late to get the last train to France for the night. I wandered around the streets near the port for a while and began approaching people looking for a place to sleep for the night. I had no money, just 5 German Marks. Amazingly the first people I talked with were a couple of brothers from the Family. One of them I knew from the Odense Denmark home from a year ago. They got permission for me to come to their home for one night. It was astonishing to me the amount of suspicion in that home. If that one brother didn't vouch for me that I was indeed a Family member I would have been sleeping on the street that night.
The next morning they dropped me off at the train station and I got on my way to France. The train took a long time and I ended up in Dusseldorf Germany for about 4-5 hours in the middle of the night. Another passenger and I walked around the courtyard of a museum that was next to the train station, looking at exhibits in glass cases. It was wierd that I never felt unsafe or scared. I was a tiny girl, only 4 feet 11 inches tall. I think I only weighed 82 pounds at the time. It was just a grand adventure to me and I never considered any possibilities of danger.
The next morning the train came into the station in Paris. I had met an American girl on the train. She sat with me at the cafe as I waited for someone from the Paris Family to come pick me up. I didn't realise that the croussants on the table weren't complimentary and that girl ended up having to pay for the ones that I had eaten.
A guy from the Family showed up and we took a taxi to the apartment. Along the way I saw a strange sight and then realised I was starring at the Eiffel tower. It was the only time I saw it while in Paris. The first home I stayed in was the provisioning home. The home consisted of only guys and lots of food. I ate so well the two weeks that I was there. Everyday we went out litnessing to places like the Champs Elysee and the Arch du Triumph. Work, work, work. After Norway Paris was sweltering hot and I ran around without a coat. Everybody else were freezing cold but I found it pleasant after the snow up north.
I think my presence in the all male home was distracting. After a couple of weeks I was moved to a home near the Bastille metro station. It wasn't quite as friendly there but I comforted myself with the thoughts that I would be leaving soon anyway to go be with my fiance Jeremy Jewel in Fougeres France. I had met Jeremy in New York and we had been trying to get back together ever since I was sent to Norway.
The most lasting impressions I have of the Bastille colony were of all the dog shit on the street. I called that street the dog shit alley. It was horrendous and extremely difficult to walk there. I enjoyed the hustle and bustle of travel on the metro and the fast pace of litnessing in Paris. The French people were much more animated than the Norwegians and the coffee was much stronger. One night I was taken out to eat at a restaurant with the brethren from the home. We ended up in a restaurant in a basement. They ordered steak for me and then recommended putting on the "delicious" french mustard. What they didn't tell me is that french mustard is hot. HOT!!!! Really Hot. When I felt the burn start in the back of my throat and rise up to my nose I knew that I was in trouble. Boy did they laugh as I sat there with tears running down my face. After time I came to love the French mustard, but that first time was an experience.
I also met Topaz from the show group in this home. She was there often though I don't know why. She seemed so kind and was motherly to me. I was feeling like such a lonely kid without friends and to this day I appreciate Topaz being nice to me. I did on one occasion go to the showgroups apartment with another brother on an errand. The thing that struck me was how beautiful the apartment was. It was big and well lit, with nice furniture and then a couple of the girls walked into the dining room. They were really beautiful. I felt like a poor person begging at the home of a rich person in Beverly Hills. The quality of that home was so much higher than the other ones I had seen in Paris. The difference was striking.
One weekend we visited a colony out at a farm house outside of Paris. We were having some sort of big get-together, inspiration thingie. There were tons of Family members but I only knew a few. One brother named Jonathan Chipmunk I knew from California. We read some Bible together in the woods and walked around talking. It was nice to see an old friend. This farm house was really old, and some of the bedrooms were up in lofts that looked like they used to be used for storing hay. The weekend was over quickly and back to Paris and litnessing. I was beginning to wonder when they were going to send me on to Fougeres. I was also beginning to wonder "if" they were going to send me, finally I was given my permission to move on and a train ticket. A new brother was sent along with me. He had just joined the Family and was a musician.
We got to Rennes and hitchhiked from there. Apparently there were no passenger trains to Fougeres. We arrived in Fougeres in the middle of the night and were dropped off next to a grand castle. The castle had a moat around it. It was the most incredible thing I had ever seen. The brother told me to wait on the stone bench next to the castle while he went to find the home. I sat there in the foggy misty night next to the castle which was lit up by the street lamps. The medievel houses around me were hundreds of years old. All I could think of was how romantic this town was. I waited for about an hour and during that time I was so happy. This place filled me with joy. The next two months were to be the happiest months of my whole time in the Family.
Posted By: Jane <Send
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Date: Tuesday, 17 May 2005, at 3:06 a.m.
In Response To: The second year (Jane)
This was a marvelous place for me. We had an apartment that was next to and above a small bar. Our apartment was located on a small square at the top of the small narrow road that led up from the castle. Half way up that road was the old wall from the castle that used to encircle the town. Sitting on that wall you got a great view of the old town down below, and the dairy with the stream running next to it, and then the castle at the bottom. Early mornings I used to go out to that wall to get some quiet time for reading. I loved the way the mist would roll through that small valley below. I could almost feel the knights from long ago riding up to the draw bridge, back from some battle.
Jeremy, my fiance wasn't back from a road trip and so I met everyone else in the colony first. There were a lot of people, a few that I remember were Stephen Lightening (French brother), Dawn (Canadian) and her husband, a black sister from Ethiopia, a short but very fat sister from one of the French islands in the Carribean, a married American couple with three children. And Jonas (French brother) who later changed his name to Pierre Pecher d'homme. (excuse my spelling all you french speakers).There were more but these ones stand out in my memories.
When Jeremy came back it turned out that he was the shepherd of the home. He had the back bedroom with the private toilet for himself. He wasn't selfish about it and would let us go through his room to use the toilet, otherwise we would have had to go out of the downstairs apartment, up the public stairs, and into the upstairs apartment to use the other toilet. No one slept upstairs. That was where the kitchen was located, the bathroom with toilet, the large livingroom that was over the downstairs bar. Whenever we had inspiration, with God forbid dancing...the old lady downstairs would bang on the ceiling with a broom and yell at us "Les Enfants De Dieu!!!!?!! Heh!!" It was hysterical.
Jeremy took his duties as shepherd very seriously. He didn't spend an awful lot of time getting cozy with me but I thought it was perfect because we were supposed to be revolutionary soldiers. I was sent on the road most often with Stephen Lightening who was adorable, too adorable. He was very vivacious, fun to be with and it made it extremely difficult on roadtrips when sometimes we would end up sleeping in the same bed. These were the days before FFing became common, sexual relations were still out of the question and besides I was planning on marrying the other guy! I was a good girl but it wasn't easy. Later I would also go on roadtrips with Jonas. We did not see eye to eye on all most anything. I really hated it when he made fun of me because I was American. He said all Americans talked like ducks. We had the worst trials being together. But after a roadtrip with Jonas I could come back to my sweet delightful town of Fougeres and all was right again.
I am naturally a terrible cook and it amazed me that every home I was in I ended up being the cook. This place was no different, but at least there were other girls there with helpful ideas to make things better. We ate a lot of liver with onions and that fabulous mustard. I actually craved that taste. Around the corner from our colony was a small grocery store. I used to slip out to go there to shop, and for some alone time. We had so many people in the home that the only way to be alone was to go outside.
After one roadtrip Jeremy came back with two new disciples, a pair of sisters from the neighboring town of Mayenne. Their system last name was Sallas and they took the Bible names of Verite or Truth, and Claire. They just adored Jeremy and weren't too happy to find out about me. Truth really didn't like me one bit. They were significant to this whole thing because their mother used to visit us all the time. She loved the whole idea of the Family and would bring us over these fabulous pastries and cakes. I think that if she could have joined she would have. She took the name of Tabitha but I have always remembered her as Madame Sallas. Madame Sallas remained our friend even after we had moved on...more about her later.
We had a few visits from the local regional shepherd, a french brother named Judah. He used to be a communist, a real activist and was going to the university. Then he met the Family and well, you know what happened. We all liked him and looked forward to his visits. So I didn't think anything of it when I came back from a roadtrip with Jonas and Judah let us into the apartment. I was startled though to find no one else there. In fact Judah told us that the home was being closed. Everyone else had already been sent to their new homes. I started sputtering, "but what about getting married to Jeremy? I am supposed to be with him. Where did he go? Are you going to send me to him?" Judah said that I was to go to his colony near Caen. He wouldn't tell me where Jeremy was moved to.
The thing that confuses me to this day is why they split up a home that was successful and happy. We were getting new disciples on a regular basis, Claire and Truth were two out of 5 that had joined since I had came. The roadtrips brought in a lot of money which we sent to Paris, and most of all, we were happy.
I think I cried for the next month. I missed my magical little town and the life I had there. I didn't know what had happened to my fiance and they wouldn't tell me. Judah was very nice but I couldn't see past my sadness. I was glad though that our home near Caen was in an old farm house. Walls three feet thick or more. A low stone wall surrounded our grassy green yard. And those funny slate tiles on the roof. Cows in the surrounding pastures and a woods to explore in. I was wondering what was going to happen next.
Here is a photo of the wall I used to read on. It was taken on our recent trip to Europe. The first time I had been back to Fougeres. It took 27 years.
Posted By: Jane <Send
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Date: Tuesday, 17 May 2005, at 5:38 p.m.
In Response To: Love the little "old towns" (Freethinker)
Here is a picture of the building we used to live in. The antique store was our home. That front room was the girls bedroom. We didn't enter the home by that door. We used the door to the side, the public door that everyone used and then we went in a side door that was in the hallway. The downstair rooms were narrow, connected by a long hallway that ran along the wall. There were three bedrooms. The girls in front, the guys in the middle and the shepherd bedroom in the back that had the private toilet. Everyone slept on the floor and used sleeping bags. Except for Jeremy who had a mattress. His room was the only one with enough room to put a mattress. To his credit he later gave his room up for Dawn, her husband and their two kids. He then slept upstairs in the living room alone.
The upstairs area was on the 3rd floor I believe. The lady downstairs used to really get irritated at the noise we made. From the kitchen there was balcony-porch area that overlooked the cliffside out back. Fabulous view. You could see the road that circled the old town and went up toward the more modern homes. You could also see the woods. It was so green and pretty. We kept our vegies on the porch area.
