A Summer without My Bodyguard in Causses et Veyran / by Nette

It’s summer in Causses et Veyran. My first summer in 35 years without my bodyguard by my side. To stay grounded, I keep myself busy working during the days in Studio Causses. We’ve just completed our new Gallery Causses, where we now showcase furniture and Fine Art Photography. That means there are now several art exhibition spaces in our little village in the south of France. Work keeps my brain active and allows my thoughts to focus on positive things. But evenings are different. That’s when I find myself diving into the archives, searching for memories. "Handsome Bengt" really was something extraordinary. Among all those memories, I came across some old notes, titles for paintings I once exhibited at Halmstad Konsthall in a show called Thoughts on Time.

I remember recording voice files for visitors to listen to. I also remember the struggle that came with that exhibition. Afterward, I packed away my painting supplies, unsure if I would ever return to them again.

One painting was titled:“Every cloud has a silver lining, meaning there is always a glimmer of hope in every sorrow”  Today, as I watch the common swifts darting across the sky, I feel one of those glimmers. Another painting was titled: “When I was a child, I used to paint clouds. I believed that if I wrote down the time and direction, I could come back the following year and see the same cloud again. Now, as an adult, painting clouds once more makes me wonder. Perhaps all of this is really about seeking the unchangeable  something that time can never touch. Or maybe I should avoid naming things at all, stop looking for patterns that might not exist. I've painted clouds for a year. It’s been fun, and sometimes very hard. Clouds are so very special" I still love clouds. That fascination never left me and I’ve started painting them again.

A few weeks ago, I visited a medium. Say what you want about such things but it gave me peace, and it made me smile. Since my bodyguard passed on, a lot has happened in the village. He’s stirred up a little mischief both in my life and in the lives of our friends. A few days after his passing, I used his phone, simply because my son Sam had accidentally taken mine to Stockholm. I came across a lovely post on Facebook with pictures of him, and I immediately had a though: that particular photo hadn’t been liked by the bodyguard. Suddenly, the screen started shaking, and a text message began to type itself. It was shaky and full of nonsense just a jumble of letters but then came the word, Ugly! My first reaction was to quickly turn off the phone, what if someone saw a strange reply from Bengan? But when I turned the phone back on, the text was still there, no longer shaking, and with the clear word,  Ugly! You might think, and I did, that if you can communicate, wasn’t there anything else you wanted to say? And there were,  lovely things came through the medium as well. And yes, I like to believe he’s still out there somewhere. The medium told me things meant to comfort me but some details she shared… she couldn’t have known. My bodyguard was, after all, a bit special. So is there life after this?

I realize reading only about my grief might be heavy. So I asked my friend Marie, who runs the gallery with me, if she’d also like to start blogging.

She said: Yes!

And that, dear friends, might turn into something truly wonderful.