Origins
Someone told me in passing one day a piece of advice that I’ve taken to heart: to find happiness in the little things and the day to day events. Ever since, I’ve been trying to find the beauty in the every day, and one of the ways I have done so is by photographing everything.
Photography to me is also one of the ways I’ve always communicated my day to day to my family living on the other side of the Atlantic. My mother is originally from France, and her whole side of the family still lives there. Before the use of phones to capture images, my parents would print out images they took with disposable cameras of our home and our lives in America. On the occasion that we would go to France- not that often because of the price- we would take these photo albums with us, passing them around to family members as we sat on a deck in the summer air. My mother would explain each picture in detail to her family- this is the playroom where the girls keep their toys. This here is their bedroom, that’s the cat, here’s the yard. It was her way of showing her family she left behind about her new life in the United States. Photographs was also the way I could see the faces of my cousins in France. They’d send us pictures of them that we would hang on the fridge. There’s still plenty of those old pictures still up there- a testament of a time when photographs were a physical object. Now they still send pictures. They’re just digital. Selfies sent through snapchat, or family pictures sent through WhatsApp messages and emails. Photography has always been there to help me keep up with family.
As I grew older my parents were able to take my sister and I to France more to see family. Pictures were still worth a lot, but we were able to take pictures together, to be together. Now when I’m in France, I take pictures of my family’s life. Their mundane everyday experiences, like getting bread, feeding the goat or going grocery shopping. I also take pictures of the things that I see. Each trip starts and ends with a day in Paris, and there are endlessly interesting things to see and photograph in Paris. Some of them, like the Eiffel Tower are too often taken pictures of. But the structure is beautiful and iconic. I try to take a picture that hasn’t been seen before. To try an angle that’s not used as often. It’s always interesting.
Going to France is retracing my origins, and I’m always happy to be there with family, and to photograph it.
I took this photo in August of 2017. I was walking down the deserted streets of Fontenay-Le-Conte, France’s Rue Des Loges with my mother and grandmother. La Rue des Loges is an old street, it was around during the Middle Ages. At that period in time it was busy and bustling, staying that way until recently. Fontenay (as everyone calls it) is the town where my grandmother and all her ancestors live and are from. But it’s a dying town. There’s no more jobs, so everyone is leaving to go to bigger cities in the region. La Rue des Loges suffered because of this. It was turned into a pedestrian street with tons of shops at one time, but that only killed it. No one wanted to go, so everyone left. Now it’s where the town drunks go, a sad testament to a dying town.
My godfather is named Jean-Luc. He’s a happy go lucky older man with gray hair and bright red cheeks because he loves a good bottle of wine. He’s my grandfather’s brother, and lives in a small village near Fontenay. He lives with his partner, Sylvianne. They both are the kindest people, and whenever we go we are always invited for lunch of Mogette (a type of bean) and ham. We get there, having a late lunch and then ending up staying for supper, and leaving at midnight. I feel happy and comfortable at their house. They live next to a strawberry farm, and at the time that this pictures was taken in August of 2017, they had just had a big storm that knocked down a lot of trees, so Jean-Luc had to cut them into the stubs we see here. But it only made their yard more interesting. The white plastic lawn chair hangs in the balance, not sure whether to stay up or fall on to the ground. The sky is a deep blue in France- i love it! I love the colors in this picture, and the mundanity of a backyard.
This picture is from July 2018, one of those days at Jean-Luc and Sylvianne’s where we are invited for lunch and stay till supper. It was a beautiful day out, and we ate outside. The cider, seen in the center of the picture, was bought just for me because of how much I loved it. I remember this day as being one of my favorites. Being 18, I was truly one of the adults in the conversation. Talking about everything. Politics and alcohol and cooking with my father and Jean-Luc, gossip and teaching and cats with my mother, grandmother and Sylvianne. I was bit by a spider, but it wasn’t that big of a deal. We just spent hours eating drinking and talking, and when it became night we went inside and ate the leftovers. This picture reminds me of the happiness I felt that day, and the good times I have with family just talking about everything and nothing.
My mother’s cousin, Celine, is a daycare owner in a small town nearby called Pissotte. Ever since I was little I always remembered the town because of the unusual name. Celine is married to Arnaud, and they have four daughters: Pauline, Amandine, Laurine and Adeline. Celine and Arnaud own an old farmhouse with multiple bedrooms. In the hallway leading from the front door to the kitchen they have this light fixture on the ceiling. It has a fancy carving on the top, but just one exposed light bulb attached to it. It stood out to me because of the difference between the ornate and the practical.
My grandfather died in 2016. When he did, my grandmother moved out of the large four bedroom house that they owned and into a tiny apartment only a block away. The house was empty for over a year, but we were able to sell it in 2017 to a woman who was the daughter of one of my grandmother’s childhood friends! Because of this, my grandmother goes and sees her old house on occasion. This house meant so much to me growing up. Even though we weren’t there as often as we could have, we would stay for long periods of time. And to my sister and I the house was always interesting. It was large, with a winding staircase and a creepy attic, as well as a wine cellar in the basement and a storage room where a garage should have been. My grandfather loved flowers, and the enclosed backyard had plenty of geraniums and roses in it. There were two kitchens, and very outdated furniture. We were always there during the summer, and in the evening when my sister and I should have gone to bed, we would keep the windows open from our room and listen to our dad play the guitar in the yard. I have a very vivid memory of tripping and falling on the cement steps of the yard… I remember crying, blood gushing out of my elbow and my dad picking me up and rushing me to the tiny bathroom- it was the size of a storage closet- and fixing my wound. I still have a scar on my elbow from that fall. This picture, taken in August of 2018, is of a rose growing on the wall of the garden of their old house. It’s a reminder of childhood and summer, and of my grandfather, who I missed dearly.
I’ve spent three of my twenty Christmas’ in France. The first time at one years old in 2000, the second time at 16 in 2015, and the third time was at 19 in 2018. I did visit France in December 2019, but not for Christmas. Christmas in France is different than Christmas in America, not only because it’s a new experience, but because it’s lively. Christmas with my dad’s side of the family has always been almost somber. A nice meal with casual conversation, and some light singing before going to bed early. The next day, a normal meal after opening presents. Christmas in France is a different story. Though Christmas Eve 2015 was almost uneventful because my grandfather was sick at the time, Christmas Day was the long and happy celebration, with lots of food and drink and talk. But my best Christmas was 2018, because all of Celine’s brothers and their children were there. There was 25 of us packed in Celine and Arnaud’s dining room, with kids and adults and lots of fun and festivities. The meal didn’t start until 10, and it ended at 3 in the morning. I had more to drink than I ever had before then. There was laughter, there was joking and there was also tears. It was course after course and conversation after conversation. We went to bed late, woke up even later, and headed over to Celine’s to do it all over again on Christmas Day. It was so much fun! This picture was taken a few days after Christmas, at Jean-Luc and Sylvianne’s. I took it because of the colors and the beautiful Christmas tree they had.
In France, every meal has a baguette. You can buy them for 30 centimes at any store, and they’ll be delicious. It’s a part of life that is as normal as getting gas or waking up. Everyday, my grandmother goes to the bakery down the block and buys her bread. It’s a way for her to get out of the house and talk to people. Ever since my grandfather died, she’s living alone, and so the simple act of buying a baguette gives her something to look forward to. Bread, and food, are important in French culture. Food is less about how much can I eat, and more about the gathering around it. Sitting down to eat is slow and meaningful. There are multiple courses, even in a simple meal, and each course is eaten in order. Eating is about the taste and the quality, and brings people together. In French restaurants they don’t rush you out the door once you’ve finished your meal. They let you stay and savor the food, and then when you’re done they let you talk for hours. It’s all about the experiences, and the relationships that grow around the food.
In December of 2018 I took this picture walking behind my grandmother after having gone to the corner bakery. It just seemed like a scene I needed to capture- an aspect of French life that we hear about, and that lets us continue to spend time together at a dinner table, with good food and wine, and amazing conversations.
Celine and Arnaud have a lot of pets. They have a fluffy white dog, Lenny. He is very clingy and loves to be pet. They also have multiple chickens, who lay eggs for them. I know that their rooster is named Playboy. And then they have Biscot, the goat. Biscot is a funny goat, and she hangs out on a leash in their backyard. She “mows the lawn” by eating the grass. But she doesn’t produce milk. Instead she acts like a dog, wanting to be pet and have attention. Adeline adores her, and loves to show her off. Biscot had an unfortunate incident though, when a bunch of wild dogs attacked her and ripped a piece of skin on her neck off. Mimi, Celine’s mother who lives next to them, heard and chased the dogs off and Biscot survived. Arnaud and Adeline nurses her back to health. Here I took a picture of Biscot in the backyard, posing for me. She likes attention! It reminds me of my ancestors and their farming roots. They were all farmers, raising livestock and growing crops. They lived rural lives and relied on agriculture. Some of them lived in a city, but a small one that was nearby a farming community. The rural farming roots are still evident in the everyday life of my family members and the buildings and land that they live on.
Nearby Fontenay is a town called Vouvant. Its claim to fame is Mélusine’s tower, which is where the serpent-fairy Mélusine apparently lived. The tower is a beautiful monument in the tiny touristic town, and for 2€ you can get the keys to enter it and climb up to the top. At the top the view is spectacular. You can see for miles, the two rivers that meet nearby, the cemetery, the whole city, even cities far away. It’s a beautiful view especially at sunset, when we had gone. This picture was taken in Vouvant by me, of Aaron, my sister’s partner in December of 2018.
I’m Franco-American. I have both cultures, and both languages and both ideas and values in my life . Even though America and English is what we are surrounded with, my mother always talked to me in French, and taught me in French and taught me her culture and origins. At 16 I became an official citizen of France. At 20, I feel more French than I’ve ever felt, but I also feel that I am not French enough. When I go to France I feel at home, but when I open my mouth my accent indicates that I’m not from here. The accent is not placed as American- it’s sometimes been mistaken for British- it doesn’t have a place. People say that it an accent of its own. Not quite French, but not quite anything else. And though in America I blend in easily as American, I still stand out at times for things that are considered odd here, but normal in France. When I’m asked what my language at home is, I can’t say because there’s two. I can’t say I’m American, fully. But I can’t say I’m French, fully. I’m a mixture of these two cultures that my parents taught me. I get a lot of questions from people about this, and it’s a little tiring. I’m just myself, an observer of the world.
I’ve never lived in France, but I’ve always been connected to this country because of my origins and my family. Being able to connect with it more often is a blessing, and something I’m afraid of losing now that I’m in college and not at home all the time. I’m faced with the question of how do I continue my origins and heritage now as an adult? When I have children, will they learn their French culture? How can I tell people a crucial part of who I am without feeling that I sound pretentious? I think I can do it through photos, both of America and France and the beautiful things I see in my two countries.
