Editor's Blog February

This business called love is particularly pertinent to many who have arrived to make new lives in Normandy.

Some are here to enjoy a happy retirement with lifelong partners. Others have moved in search of more quality time with loved ones.

Many come to France to start again with a second marriage, at the same time escaping the messy fallout of an earlier one. And I know at least three sets of readers who have divorced and remarried the same person and come here to give the the same relationship a better chance second time round. Some of you are avoiding the opprobrium that can shadow an older woman-younger man or a gay partnership.

Whatever the reasons, most of us are thrown far more into our partner’s company in this new French life than ever we were in the UK - and this is the real test of a relationship. It’s OK loving each other for a couple of hours at each end of the day: can you love each other for nigh on twenty four hours a day?

Enduring love is of course nothing to do with White Chargers and Milk Tray. It’s not about a pair of sexy knickers, a cup of tea in bed and a dozen red roses just once a year on February 14.
Operatic passion is undoubtedly thrilling. But it doesn’t give you the strength that does constant love. On the contrary: Romeo and Juliet threw their lives away, Antony’s soldiering prowess was destroyed when he was bewitched by Cleopatra’s charms. Rommel entirely missed the D-Day landings when he nipped back to Germany for his wife’s birthday.

But look at Churchill and Clementine or the unobtrusively supportive Denis Thatcher; consider the achievements of Mikhail Gorbachev who derived his strength from his love for Raisa.

Quiet, unflashy devotion is what gives us the assurance to pursue our dreams. The simple fact of loving and knowing that we are loved in return.

If you agree, you may also consider the following one of the most powerful love poems ever written:


Recipe for Happiness (Anon)

One grand boulevard with trees
with one grand cafe in the sun
with strong black coffee
in very small cups.

One not necessarily very beautiful
man or woman who loves you.

One fine day.