Where my heart is

 My blogging has become very popular and I am going to start another one in French. Even so Marinette, the lady who sells the cepes, needs her page to be printed off so she can see how famous she is. (Quite rightly so too, she will star in more posts).

I have been given access to the archives in the Mairie and a local historian and author, Monsieur Dixmerias,  has been incredibly generous with his vast collection of documents and photos. I have only just begun sifting through them and the photo above made quite an impression. The snow is so deep that the villagers had to cut a tunnel through it to go about their daily business.
What has become obvious is the passion that so many people share for this extraordinary place. I fell in love with it on the first visit and my enthusiasm has never faltered.
The front windows of La Jovienne look out onto L'église de St Loup, a church with Roman origins that has just been beautifully restored. People have always loved this village and it shows in the architecture;

The top window opposite my kitchen window is a heart (all the others are quatrefoils)

And there is another heart in the stonework on one of the old village houses.

La Jovienne is full of hearts too;

And of course my heart is here too.

I never tire of the views that change every moment of the day.

 

I am finding that there are some amazing stories to be told. Not only that, Job has a rich textile history too. I have just discovered that the bakery a few yards from my door used to be a silk mill, using the pure water from the spring that rises beneath the church to prepare the silk from the cocoon to be sent to Lyon for dyeing and weaving into sumptuous damasks and brocades.
I wonder what else I will discover?