the sunflower

a trip to Bordeaux + the strange sensations of grief.

Hi friends,

I’m glad to be back at my desk after a couple of weeks away. It was the first break I’ve taken since this newsletter launched in January, so somewhat overdue.

Whilst I was drinking wine in Bordeaux focussing on resting I gave my writing life a slight audit and decided I needed to make a couple of changes. From today:

• The Murmuration will continue to land every other Thursday

• Golden Hour will be published every other Sunday for paid subscribers + fun extras when I’m able.

I felt I was at risk of a) bombarding you and b) starting to write nonsense, so I hope that this slightly pruned offering leaves you wanting more (as opposed to less). As always, thanks for being here.

Bordeaux was the result of a Friday spent drinking Margaritas with my friend Lauren, who I’ve only known for six months. Things were fine until we walked home and I started rambling about this watermill I’d seen on Airbnb. It looked idyllic!

Going away is a litmus test for even the most mature friendships, and so I was a little surprised when she agreed to an impromptu family holiday to France with less than four weeks’ notice. I assumed she might text me the next morning politely backing out. But the tequila had spoken—and within twenty-four hours we had booked the aforementioned Airbnb, complete with watermill and watermill-adjacent riverbank…

I would describe the property’s décor as ‘quirky’. Think multiple kilim rugs, hand-painted furniture and several pieces of art which were signed by the same artist (the owner? The owner’s lover?). I grew particularly fond of one portrait hung in the kitchen which captured an older man with baby blue eyes. He nursed a fag in his right hand and had a suitably pensive gaze. In the same room there was a long farmhouse-style table, the kind that could comfortably seat ten or twelve for a meal.

If for whatever reason you grew tired of looking at the man with baby blue eyes, then there was a terrace by the river. That’s where we spent most of our evenings, taking it in turn to cook meals whilst we played whack-a-mole with our respective offspring.

Each morning someone would brew a pot of coffee—a sacred ritual which must be performed before any babies are fed. On the Tuesday I was the first to get up, so I put the kettle on and started getting some mugs out for when the others had surfaced.

My husband soon joined me at the breakfast table saying he had missed a call from my dad, which was odd, and that he’d left a voicemail asking us to call him back. It dawned on me that he was probably calling about his mother Gwyneth who he had just visited in hospital. She had been deteriorating for some time, but Dad had seemed optimistic when we talked the night before. She wouldn’t die this week, the Doctors said.

I walked into the hallway and called him back. She had died earlier that morning, he explained. I can’t remember if he actually used the word ‘died’, perhaps it was ‘faded’, but I suppose it didn’t matter.

I went back into the kitchen and asked for some more coffee.

I’m told it’s unnatural to be in your thirties and still have four living grandparents. But thanks to some serendipitous family planning and the wonders of modern medicine I was quite happy to be part of this anomalous cohort; people who find themselves comfortably sandwiched between multiple generations of the living.

There’s a comforting sense of completeness that comes with this knowledge, perhaps a naïve illusion of invincibility that exists when you are still in possession of the ‘full set’.

Unlike me, familial bereavement was a touchstone of my grandmother’s life. She was given the middle name Margaret after an older sister who died in infancy before she was born. I always wanted to be a sister, she would say on the occasions we talked about it.

My grandmother was the spiritual matriarch of my family. An earnest woman who would train to become a Methodist lay-preacher and would always finish her texts asking me to pray for her. I am so fortunate to be her granddaughter, and glad that she witnessed the first year of her great-granddaughter’s life.  

Since getting the news of her death I have had a strange tight feeling at the back of my throat that won’t go away. My knees hurt too; I keep on popping ibruprofen and icing them with packs of frozen peas. At night images of my childhood return to me in waves. In one memory I’m stood on a set of steps cutting out scones on my grandmother’s kitchen table. In another we’re talking about her recipe for lamb cakes (food was her enduring love language).

I suppose these are all the normal things people experience in grief. But it is a new sensation for me, as it is for most members of my family. We keep on tentatively messaging each other, checking that we’re ok.

We stayed in Bordeaux until the end of the holiday as we had originally planned. Someone asked if we were going to cut our trip short, but it wasn’t something we seriously considered. Eating and cooking and spending time with new friends felt like a fitting way to honour the person she was and the things she cared about.

Now I’m back on UK soil things feel a little more tangible. We are making plans for her funeral and having to figure out how many people to cater for at the wake.

The fields surrounding our holiday home were planted with Sunflowers that were stretching toward the heavens. My grandmother spent her life in much the same way: communing with God and orientating herself towards the light—the source of her being.

Thanks be to God.

Gwyneth Pengelly holding her great-granddaughter