Living For Free – Part 3

Silvia_Fischer

by Silvia_Fischer

Story

While roaming around the small nearby town, I found again lots of useful things: a bag with semi-defrosted frozen food, ice cream was in there as well (raspberry sorbet and coconut). So I went straight for it. Unfortunately, I missed a small new carpet, which I didn’t take with me right away. Someone else had found it and took it. I left the bolster and the food I had taken with me on the way through the garden where I had laid down twice when the residents were still on vacation.

I continued walking along the red and white-marked path to a hermitage. It was signposted for a one and a half hours walk and went up a 650-meter-high mountain with a wonderful view on both sides. It was simply breathtaking! As I was the only one on the way, I assumed that it was actually forbidden to hike there at the moment, as that was the case for other mountains in the area after eleven o’clock in the morning. The reason for that is the danger of fires.

I also found, among other things, bathroom and kitchen wall paint, two black skirts that fitted me, and six seat cushions. Besides a sunflower from the field around the corner, which I also took with me, I was especially happy about the skirts. The one I have worn so far was more a skirt for flamenco dancing. The new ones are asymmetrical, but that’s fine. Sandals were also included.

With my wanderings through the area, the weekend just flew by. The next day, I let Thierry drop me off about six kilometers from the city, and I walked the rest of the way. My desire to hitchhike has been a bit subdued lately because of the pushy men I have encountered.

During the week, I was in my parking lot, this time with a whole row of stuffed animals at the head of my mattress, which I had found in the middle of tons of stuff. The next morning, a gentleman came by, peeking over the fence saying:”Well, you seem to be doing well there.

“Thanks,” I said.

Most of the days I went to the swimming pool at seven in the evening. The ticket office closed at 7:00 pm. You can swim until quarter past seven, then you have a quarter of an hour to shower and get dressed. For someone who doesn’t have her own swimming pool (and has no money to pay entrance fees), that’s not bad in the heat of southern France. Better to spend ten minutes in the water rather than not at all. The first time I did that, I felt like a newborn baby.

The two vagabond cafeterias in the city had both taken a two-week break, which meant there was no coffee, and no breakfast in the morning, which made things a bit boring. That is why I went out into the countryside again on Wednesday and brought a lot of useful stuff to Pappy: a practically new shower curtain (the old one had an antique value), a bedspread with which I covered one of the desolate beds in the other room, and a lot of fruits and vegetables which I picked up from the market where I passed by shortly before the end of the day.

© Silvia_Fischer 2022-11-04

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