Community Rentrée and a Sad Story

The whole of our town (well, the whole of France in fact) marks the rentrée with a rash of exciting events and things to join in with. The Forum des Associations (Clubs Fair) is on Saturday, but I've already found something to take part in: a Town Photography Competition!

The Willows are on the case, of course:

It's more their scene than the whole back-to-school thing, anyway.

The topic for the competition is the 'hidden heritage' of our town, so I'm really showing you a few photos I snapped this morning that don't quite fit that category - I need to save anything I think I might enter. I loved the cosy quilt on the bench outside the maternelle canteen! Really welcoming...

I spent a long time in the graveyard (I'd never been in before), looking for this boy. I can't tell you his name, because our street is named after him, and I don't want to publish our address. This poor boy, aged 15 or 16 (and therefore the same age as Son 1) was shot in Nazi reprisals following an ambush on a convoy just outside our town. He ran into the street by the church shouting, 'Don't shoot, don't shoot!' Ben thinks the marks left by machine-gun bullets raking across the wall are still there:

It's sobering indeed to remember that this is the fairly recent past of our town. Britian had it hard during the Second World War, but we knew nothing like this.

So I found his family tomb, and although it may seem a very gloomy way to have spent my morning, in fact I felt in tune with our town, and paid my respects to someone who, as part of our address, almost feels part of our family, too.