Autumn in the Midi is a time of quiet serenity. The hordes of vacationers have departed, the roads are once again empty, and the area returns to itself. The weather is perfect and the days dreamy. Even when it becomes overcast, grey and rainy – as it did on the Sunday following my birthday, it was still lovely and allowed an indulgent day of working at the desk.

Much of the time I devoted to working on a response letter to the British Charity Commission who have yet again rejected the Pagan Federation’s application for entry onto the Register of Charities. Everyone must affirm belief in a “supreme being or entity” and follow paganism as a religion and not a philosophy or ‘way of life’. The Commission also wants ‘tangible evidence’ for the effectiveness of magic. My earlier correspondence with the Charity Commissioners on this same subject occurred twelve years ago. I had assumed that the Pagan Federation had been accepted by this point.

Once the official response was finished, I wrote something closer to my heart (Magic and Meaning) which I added to the Pagan Group and also have entered under My Comments on my webpage.

After their vendange in the Beaujolais country, Moses and Heather returned to Tellus. Both Richard and I found them simply delightful and most enjoyable. For the evening of the Ides, I booked us all at the Restaurant Gourmets. Richard and I had been checking the post box daily for our blood lab results. I had already checked for the day earlier, but as the four of us were walking to the restaurant, Richard looked again, and there they were. These results indicated that for both of us there was no trace of hepatitis C to be detected. We were stunned – stunned and relieved – and at the restaurant immediately order some Glenfiddich in celebration.

Heather and Moses departed by taxi to Les Arcs two days later. It was my birthday, but any celebration was delayed until after my visit to the ENT specialist in Draguignan where the bandages were removed, and Robin Geier was pleased with my post-surgery progress. And I could hear again. In St. Maximum-la-Baume, Dr. Maistre the next day was pleased with Richard’s cataract surgery as well. We went to the basilica afterwards. It had been several decades if not more since we were last there. We viewed the skull of Mary Magdalene but were disappointed on the much less dramatic manner in which it is now displayed. Formerly, one entered the crypt to see from behind a cast-sculpture of a woman with long flowing blonde hair. When one walked around to the front, instead of a face, there was a niche containing the skull. Now the sculpture faces the viewer upon entry but has been placed behind a gate and set into the wall. With the grill work in front of it, the whole thing is difficult to see.

During our no guests hiatus, we went for a day to Aix for shopping. We had lunch at Riedermer. Since there were no films that we wanted to see or none until late in the evening, we went instead to the Musée Granet. It had been several decades since we had last visited it as well, and we were both delightfully astonished at the collection that appears there now: Cezanne, Picasso, Renoir, Monet, Van Gogh, Braque, Dufy, Laurens, Léger, Klee, Redon, de Satel, Dubuffet, and Giacometti. There was also a self-portrait by Rembrandt, a Jupiter and Thetis by Ingres and a room of works by François-Marius Granet which were delightful discoveries – old-fashioned, captivating and art as it used to be. The museum is presently augmented by the Jean and Suzanne Planque Collection and all-in-all was a full treat.

Richard had the second cataract surgery on the 24th of September. There was not this time the dramatic improvement there had been almost immediately with the left eye earlier – the ‘very serious’ eye as opposed now to simply the ‘serious’ eye. So the first night we went to bed a bit depressed. Richard was saying that he was still happy with being able to see with the one eye, but throughout the following day, the fog cleared – as did both of our moods. It is now so lovely to watch him to be actually able to see and be now so happy. He is astounded over how bright and light everything is. The colour blue in particular has assumed what he calls an ethereal quality.

So September is sliding into a close. Caroline and Amanda have just phoned from the Bar-Tabac in town – having arrived with the bus from Les Arcs. They are having a wine. Peter phoned from London yesterday having just been released from two weeks in the hospital. His kidney had packed up possibly from the back pain medications he has been taking. Doctors said he had about two hours to live when he was first brought to the hospital. Marlowe meanwhile is absolutely thriving. And though I would not use the word ‘absolutely’ for ourselves, we are at least currently thriving in a delightful joie de vivre – and the autumn transition depression has not yet occurred.