La Renetrée

Look no wobble

After three weeks of family staying with us and with closing the campsite for the season, we have all too quickly arrived at La Rentrée – return to school. When the kids go back to school for the autumn term, it is a big “thing” in France. You see “rentrée” everywhere, it is as if the country is reawakening itself after the soporific summer months. Strangely enough the rentrée this year has seen a return to some summer weather - sunny and hot - after a miserable and cold August. The hottest day so far this year was Saturday, when the local clubs and associations were having their annual membership drive in Cluny and we were called into action to do some Tai Chi demos.

What better way to spend a Saturday than gentle exercise on a sunny grass verge with the towers of Cluny in the background.

Tai Chi on a sunny lawn

Moments before impact

Unfortunately it was hot and I mean HOT, so we retreated further into the shade of a tree. That however, brought certain hazards with it. Even with my somewhat diminished height, twirling your stick under a tree means that it will eventually bump into some branches and if that doesn’t put you off your stride, I don’t know what will. The second stick demo and I made sure I was in the sun!

It was the first public set of demos we had done as a group and I thought we coped very well, the 24 of Beijing went well, no one fell over or even wobbled on the leg kicks and apart from my argument with the tree and Christophe’s fan flying off into the blue yonder at an inappropriate moment, we did rather well and at least the audience applauded, which made it all worth while.

Maybe next year

So it is back to school for us all, this time next year maybe I will be able to join in the fan demo as well – we’ll see.