Hôtel Sainte Valière
May 26 – 30, 2024
The following is a short reflection piece about my artist residency at Hôtel Sainte Valière, in Southern France. I spent a short 4.5 days at the residency where I began work on a memoir that I hope to publish. The following documents my early stages of writing, and the residency environment which kick-started my writing process.
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May 28, 2024
I’m at Hôtel Sainte Valière (located in the South of France near Narbonne) for an artist residency. I’m here to focus on writing and research and it’s my first time working on writing in a dedicated way, by choice. I say ‘by choice’ because most of the writing I’ve worked on has been through school, which offered a narrowed approach to what I’m allowed to write. Despite the limits that school put on my writing, I continued writing and saving short stories and recounted tales and ramblings on my computer for several years. I’ve kept track of experiences I’ve been through as a means of cathartic release, and to hopefully add up to what will one day become a memoir.
The idea to write a memoir has long been in the running. It began like this:
When I was thirteen, my childhood best friend Gillian (who I am still close with to this day) and I were walking on our block. Gill and I have a schtick that not many others could get behind, as we’ve known each other for so long. I am the bossy brunette. Gill, the blonde, tells me how crazy I am and keeps calm. This one day I can remember being especially unhinged together. When in the mood, Gill would join in on my shenanigans and it happened to be ‘one of those days’. Gill and I were joking around about whether squirrels “had tits” and whether they could be twisted. Odd, I know. Typical teenage silliness. The topic quickly switched (as it often did) to my ‘boyfriend list’; a list of boyfriends I kept in a small lined notebook. The men listed, or should I say boys, had no idea I referred to them as boyfriends – it was a one-sided affair and a secret haven to list any boy I remotely crushed on. Except for that Gill was in on the list too.
Gill taunted that I needed to cut down my options. The banter picked up, and on this roll we uncovered a delusion I possessed: acting as though I knew everything about love and relationships. Gill’s loving humor reminded me that in fact, at age thirteen I did not know much about such topics given both my age and level of experience. It was a healthy reminder to at least try to ‘fake it till you make it’ on topics that were well above my head (not to mention maturity).
Then I cut in: “Gill— one day, I want to write a book. I want to write a book about dating advice and how men and women should treat each other. I want to write about all my crushes and boyfriends and try and understand why I have so many and whether they like me back.” The mission became clear: I was to become an expert on my own life’s stories. I would endeavor to collect as many tales as I could. Except that later down the line, I would expand my horizons beyond the trivial dating theme and track grander experiences.
Gill and I both take credit for the line that came next in our playful back and forth. Gill said; “You are a girl who likes to deal, but whose never dealt. Hahahaha!”
This line indicated a way of dealing with life’s ups and downs without really knowing at all how to navigate them. I was a girl who liked to deal but had never dealt. Thus would become the working title of my memoir—How to Deal, by a Girl Who’s Never Dealt. I should probably copyright that before announcing it to the world, but it’s a part of this story too necessary not to impart, too fitting for the course of both my writing and life’s journey. Please don’t steal my book title!
It would not be without embarrassment, good and bad karma, persistence, defeat, and wavering self-esteem that I wound up committed to the idea of writing the book. I can’t seem to stop talking about how I am writing the book, how it is happening, and that I will publish it. It feels like the only certainty I have in life currently. And that’s what’s brought me here to Hôtel Sainte Valière, to finally dedicate time to synthesize some of my stories and see if there’s something truly out there for me re: writing.
I could have come to the residency to sew and make clothing. For almost ten years I focused on sewing and upcycling garments through a small enterprise. After pushing myself too hard and losing sight of the creative fun sewing once offered me, it felt time to switch gears and enter into a new focus. Sewing felt easy for me because of its tactile, flexible nature. End results in the form of garments could speak for themselves, as people lovingly chose pieces I’d made to wear on their bodies. During the years that sewing was at the forefront, I was deep in obsession with the craft. Now I’m not so sure it’s what I want to focus on, and being here at the residency gives me the chance to reorient towards writing.
I knew about eight months ago that my creative and inner worlds were ready for a change. Writing, as opposed to sewing, feels less forgiving, more exposed, and puts me in a perpetual state of vulnerability. I’m not sure whether this state of being vulnerable matches a pre-existing mood and a need to process the stresses of the past four years, or if it’s just what’s happening and I’m rolling with it. Whichever the case, I’m happy to be here at Hôtel Sainte Valière to turn my life into words.
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May 29, 2024
A bit more about what I did during my time here at Hôtel Sainte Valière:
I focused in on organizing documents and consolidating them into an outline for the memoir. I made a list of goals, themes, and throughlines that I want to carry throughout the book. I’m not working with any sort of formal training or process for writing, so I went with what felt right and I think so far, I’m on the right track. I uncovered that many of the stories I want to tell, are not ready to be written about yet. Some I procrastinate on, others I feel a perfectionist towards as I know they are such good stories, that I want to do them justice.
I’ve been reading bits of Anne Lamott’s beloved book Bird by Bird where she writes that “we need messes in order to find out who we are and why we are here – and by extension what we’re supposed to be writing” (p. 30).1 This is from her chapter on perfectionism, which she likens to be the antithesis to writing from the heart and offering up pure versions of events. Thanks to Anne’s encouragement in her book, I remind myself, compassionately, that many writers go through the ordeal of imposter syndrome, writer’s block, self-doubt, and impending doom with regards to their writing. Not to mention, overcoming perfectionism.
As I’m new writing out loud, I give grace to my process, and reign in a mothering pride, a pat on the back for trying it out. The vulnerability to write, and more so to publish, comes perhaps from not having a college education grounded in Literature, English, Creative Non-Fiction (the list goes on), nor a community of writers to back me up. I have always known that writing would be solace for the overwhelm of thoughts that swirl in my head each day. But do not know it yet as a friend to lean on, to show all the parts to, to broadcast decisions and indecisions that dedicated me to put something together. In time, like my newfound kinship with writing, I hope too that publishing will become a breeze, the layer of perfectionism removed, or at least the false perception that I need credentials to kick-start my dreams. The residency has shown me that no matter the list of certifications, I’m to stick to my goals and forge ahead despite looming doubts.
The experience at Hôtel Sainte Valière has revealed things about myself and gives time to put known variables about myself into words. For example, I am addicted to my cellphone (aren’t we all!) and let devices distract me from the task at hand. I wish I could turn the damn thing off, but feel past the point of no return. I also learned that if I put my mind to something, that I am very capable of making it happen, even if I am afraid. As well, I chose to give up on placing any sort of pressure or outcome with regard to the memoir, but remain steadfast in my goals to publish it. What I mean is, it doesn’t have to be big, or profound, or reveal anything I or we didn’t already know about the world. Writing a memoir is a self-actualizing process that feels important in my life, as I have lived through so many ridiculous situations that would be amusing to track, and I genuinely believe others would get a kick out of reading them.
I also know myself to be more articulate when I write. I joke to many friends, and strangers that “I love communicating”. The written word, when done correctly, is so tangible you can’t escape nuance unless nuance is worked in to the writing itself. I’m working on being more descriptive in the way that I write, providing colours, senses, architectural outlines, to the reader’s experience. The residency has pushed me further than I’ve been able to go in the past; a a joy now in my writing journey.
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May 30, 2024
I’m leaving soon, in an hour, and rushing to get some writing done. I feel so at peace, hidden, tucked away. I could stay here forever and feel so undercover it’d be liberating – how I’d love to be anonymous for a while. I intended to do more writing to contribute to my book, but instead pressed pause to focus on the setting here.
Today is my last day at Hôtel Sainte Valière. The birds chirp constantly in the treetops outside the house. There are many kinds of birds who inhabit these trees, mostly Swifts, who will eventually migrate to Morocco. It takes six weeks for them to fly eastward home. They store their eggs in a sand-coloured stone wall to the left of the house, the fellow residents and I watch them fly patterns above us at nighttime while the sun softly sets in the distance. Sunsets in the South of France are the kind of sunset that you imagine will be bright and big and lasting, but instead they are subtle and gentle. It’s the wind here that makes the biggest impression, which blows with force in all directions. The birds withstand the wind’s strength in tree branches high up. The villagers have learned to put up with the wind, including as a source of energy from wind turbines which stand towering over the townsite. The windmills are both an eye sore and spectacle, for they appear out of nowhere, their white fan mechanical structure starkly contrasted again the rolling green vineyards hills yet so hypnotizing.
Hôtel Sainte Valière is in the Minervois region of Southern France. You can bike to villages nearby, it only takes ten minutes or sometimes twenty, in any direction. I tried out different routes and tested my navigation abilities by relying only on street signs, of which there are few. On the side of the narrow roads leading to town there are weeds that grow in abundance and are easily mistaken for flowers. I’m enthralled by how much green space exists here, and how I will miss the sweet pollen smells when I leave. It is probably the most peaceful place I’ve ever been. What a shame the landscape and lifestyle can’t be copy/pasted into everywhere that needs it.
Here, I speak French with the villagers and they are patient with me while words and phrases return to my memory and out of my mouth. I’m proud of how much I’ve improved over the past year, and how much fun I have speaking French, showing off. It’s easy to make a place feel like home when you get a sense of the language, and especially the food.
I spend lots of time cooking, pretending to be a French chef in the residency’s big kitchen. I make my meals with careful thought using just a small selection of grocery items, and a breadth of creative ideas. I jot down the steps towards making delicious indulgences, I take photos of each plate and draw them in my sketchbook. I imprint the recipes in my mind also, so that I can make them again. These meals will become staples in my culinary world that I hope will come to remind me of sweet French air when I return home to Canada. My kitchen is smaller back home.
Most importantly, I read and write to pass the time. In my small pink lined notebook, I write down daily thoughts, ideas, lists, and track my spending. I do this to fill the moments I’m not at my computer writing, or sifting through prose by other memoirists. I copy other author’s quotes into the notebook. And I remember that I did all I needed to do here, I stayed more or less on track with my goals, my dreams leading up to being at Hôtel Sainte Valière. It was only up to me, afterall, to stay on target. In any case, I’ll take away new things about myself: epiphanies that will guide the course of my writing over the next few years, and a glimpse at what life might be like outside my dreams.
1 Lamott, Anne. Bird by Bird. Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, 1980.