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Post by traveler63 on Jun 23, 2009 17:24:04 GMT
Tilliystar:
What you did to change your life is one of the hardest decisions any woman that has been battered has to make. I commend you for having the courage to leave, because most women in your situation have lost so much self esteem. Congratulations in changing your life.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 13, 2009 6:18:32 GMT
I have several new splits in the road coming up in a few years. Since I know they are approaching, I am wondering if that counts. If you have time to plan ahead, you are actually building the road yourself, not taking a sudden turn.
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Post by bazfaz on Jul 13, 2009 8:29:55 GMT
There have been many defining moments in my life. I remember my first view of Europe was arriving by ship at Venice. From that first glimpse I knew I wanted to live in Europe, not South Africa. I wrote a novel that was never published - but a real producer and director bought the film rights (no, it dodn't make it to the screen). I realised i could make a living as a writer. I dscovered my wife (now ex) had given thousands of pounds to her church without consulting me; she said she knew I would disapprove. I think it was the fact that my view counted for nothing with my ex that doomed our relationship. I could feel something turning inside me when she told me. And now... A rockfall from a cliff on our land damaged a neighbour's property. There is no clear law about who should foot the bill for making that cliff safe though we certainly found court decisions saying that we could not be forced to pay the bill. In January there was a meeting at the prefecture to which our neighbour was invited - but not us. All these important people put pressure on our neighbour to take us to court, saying they would back him up. (He refused, incidentally, saying it was not our fault) As I say, these civil servants (who should be neutral) did this in our absence. Our mayor, who was present, did not protest that this was totally improper behaviour. From that moment we knew we did not want to live here any more. So... we have sold our house and will be moving in a couple of months. A new chapter will start for us.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 13, 2009 8:34:34 GMT
Small village life can be so nasty. Stories like this are in the news all the time, and I'm sure that hundreds of others don't even make it to the local press.
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Post by bazfaz on Jul 13, 2009 8:49:03 GMT
There is a bitter feeling lurking around in our hearts that this was done to us because we were not French.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 13, 2009 9:18:07 GMT
I know enough about village life to be able to affirm that if you had been outsiders from the next village, that would have been enough of an intrusion already.
I don't know why the French media are always on about warring suburban gangs as a probem of modern life. My grandmother used to tell stories of the hoodlums from Vernéville (population 400 at the time) coming to Batilly (population 700) 5 kilometers away to pick fights at the Saturday night dances.... in 1918. To this day, the people of Vernéville and Batilly still do not like each other.
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Post by bjd on Jul 13, 2009 9:30:51 GMT
Yeah, Bazfaz, I'm not sure that it's a problem of not being French. A French friend's house and pool were recently inundated by mud from a neighbour's field. The guy was told 10 years ago to dig a ditch. It was never done, the municipality has never pressed the issue. It's just local crap. Small towns and villages are worse than cities in that respect.
When we lived in Besançon, a lot of people were having houses built in nearby villages. They had a hard time being accepted -- they were from 15 km away!
Are you staying in France?
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Post by tillystar on Jul 13, 2009 9:57:24 GMT
Oh Baz, that is awful you always sound like you love living there so much.
Do you know where you are moving to yet?
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Post by bazfaz on Jul 13, 2009 11:35:53 GMT
We did some research trips in the Lot and the Lot et Garonne. If you are prepared to do a lot of work there are some potentially good properties there but we want something we can move straight into. Two places interested us. One was the most beautiful place I would ever have lived in. The problem was it had no garden, just a very steep slope at the back. With a lot of hard work (and money) this could have been terraced but it would never have been a garden to walk round or relax in. Common sense prevailed and we said no.
The house we are buying is in a village in the north of the Lot, near Cazals and Salviac, not far from Gourdon. It has been modernised with good taste. There is one interior wall we want to knock down to make the sitting room larger - I think BigIain has promised to do this in return for unlimited wine from Cahors. The garden is large enought to interest us without being so demanding as our currrent one. It is flat (hooray). And has a swimming pool.
I foresee a pissup next year.
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Post by bjd on Jul 13, 2009 14:45:07 GMT
That's nice -- lots of nice old houses around there. It's an interesting area with picturesque villages. Probably a bit colder in winter than where you are now though.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 13, 2009 15:29:44 GMT
Really, really happy to hear that you've found such a congenial place, Baz. From what you've described in the past, I understood that you had to use the car to go into town for shopping and whatnot. Being in the village itself should be a nice change. You sound enthusiastic about the new place -- not always possible under the circumstances that made you decide to move.
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Post by spindrift on Jul 13, 2009 17:19:54 GMT
This shows his strength of character. He is unfailingly cheerful even in adversity!
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Post by bazfaz on Jul 13, 2009 17:38:53 GMT
I need extra reserves of character just now. We did not receive the compromis de vente (first step on buying) on Friday. Nor today. The agent rang to say that they had seen the property documents and there are unexplained servitudes on our garden. The current owners (who have been there 6 years) don't know what it is all about. We don't want to wake up to find some farmer is grazing his cattle round the swimming pool. The notaise will look into it - but not till Thursday.
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Post by spindrift on Jul 13, 2009 17:43:09 GMT
I am so sorry to hear of this set-back.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 14, 2009 4:28:17 GMT
Most servitudes are just a right of passage for people walking. It's true that if it concerns flocks of cattle, that is another matter entirely. But that would have been visible when you visited the property, no?
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Post by bazfaz on Jul 14, 2009 7:30:48 GMT
I agree it is probably just a right of passage. But I have read of new owners who were thunderstruck to discover that the right of passage actually went through their house.
I am curious to know where this right of passage could be. It is a village house, one of a row, with no alley or passage between the buildings. The garden stretches back a way. On one side is someone else's garden. On the other side there is a patch of land that belongs to the school (the school proper is elsewhere; the building is used to store stuff) and then a bit of neglected garden belonging to an old woman. Then at the very top is a grassy track belonging to the commune. Beyond the track is a field. Any problem must lie up there but it is not obvious that anybody could want to cross our garden to get to anywhere else.
We shall see.
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Post by Jazz on Jul 14, 2009 7:49:09 GMT
Baz, I love your resilient spirit! Perhaps this is the time to reread An Orderly Man ...to calm you as you sort all of this out. When the dust has settled (literally, as you put Iain to work), it may well be your most loved home.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 14, 2009 11:33:07 GMT
Good luck with this Baz .
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Post by tillystar on Jul 15, 2009 13:06:53 GMT
I hope it is nothing to worry about and no more hiccups - I guess moving wouldn't be moving if these things didn't pop up. Its part of the natural order, I suppose inflicted on us so that once we move in we love our new home all the more
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Post by traveler63 on Jul 15, 2009 13:28:24 GMT
Hang in there Baz, hopefully everything will work out.
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Post by bazfaz on Jul 15, 2009 14:36:30 GMT
Thanks, folks. I hope it works out too. Today is the last day of the cooling off period when the buyer of our current house can change his mind. If he backs out after this he forfeits his 10% deposit. So it looks like our house is truly sold and we must be out by 21 September. (The buyer originally wanted it on 20 September until someone pointed out this was a Sunday when notaires are unlikely to work)
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 15, 2009 14:48:03 GMT
Baz, relying on the shreds of information still in my brain about property covered in the Napoleonic Code (which I assume would be similar to French real estate laws), I suspect this is some kind of easement rather than full-scale passage. In my experience with people and contracts, the present owners may never have completely read their property documents. This is probably something that entails a strip somewhere on the property line, probably of less than a meter's width. Still, it's frustrating and worrisome to be left in limbo until the notary finally looks at it.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 4, 2010 6:05:45 GMT
Soon I will have to decide how to end my professional career -- and what I want to do thereafter.
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Post by Jazz on Sept 4, 2010 18:27:08 GMT
Just reread this thread and this phrase is haunting me, 'if you don't act, you will be acted upon.'
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2014 0:59:58 GMT
Now I am wondering if I still have any new roads left to take.
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Post by bixaorellana on Jan 22, 2014 7:02:20 GMT
Always! There are roads out there we don't yet know about, or roads that we never thought might tempt us.
I received an email today from a couple from the US who had been living in Mérida for over 20 years. After spending a few summers in Maine to escape the heat, they wound up living there for a while, then moving to Florida. You could have knocked me over with a feather. I couldn't have imagined myself doing such a thing, but probably they would have said the same. I love not knowing what the future holds.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2014 17:26:11 GMT
Same here Bixa. I have so many aspirations for the future that I believe to be achievable. Six months ago I don't know if i would have said the same but feel more optimistic that even small, simple changes in my life can and will occur. I feel very blessed and grateful to live the life I do especially in light of the lives of so many less fortunate people in the world.
I'm grateful to not feel trapped in some suburban lifestyle somewhere, saddled in debt, unencumbered by worries about the lives had we children and what the future holds for them.
I have some regrets to be sure, but choose not to dwell on them.
My current state of mind is "be here now". I am powerless over anything else that may or may not have been had I taken a different route....
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2014 17:59:00 GMT
One thing that I am really grateful for is to have absolutely zero debt, a fully paid residence (for at least 10 years already), and a healthy amount in savings. So that does leave me the option of completely changing my life some day. I think that I might find a whole world of possibilities after my mother dies, but for the moment she is a mission that I cannot countervene.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2014 18:24:48 GMT
I like the uncertainty of the future. The possibilities and yep, the road yet not traveled. I'm lucky in that I have no debt and it worked out that way at quite a young age for me. Which in turn equals = Freedom. I like the way things have worked out, I'm glad I had my kids young and that now also equals = Freedom. What to do with that freedom, that is the question....? I'm looking forward to travelling the roads not yet traveled by me at least. And there are so many of them, I'm quite excited by the possibilities
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Post by Deleted on Jan 22, 2014 18:35:00 GMT
Mine too, casi. I was thinking about it the other day and asking myself, would being somewhere else make me any happier than I am now and the answer is 'no'. Being here right now, is what makes me the happiest. I love everything about it. I have always loved to travel and that is my next step, but I'm in no rush, I guess what I'm feeling is contentment.
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