Gonna make it !

Made it through the past three days without a hitch. It feels good to
let the 'old ways' go and to get back on track again. I feel better each
day . I'm PROBABLY never going to NEVER binge again in this life but I'm
sure going to do everything that I can to be strong and to stick to my
program.

I always FEEL thinner when I eat this way. I LOOK thinner in my mirror
and I have this attitude that is better too. I KNOW that while I eat
better that I don't see those mood swings either. Like while I'm eating
sugar I get crazy and I sometimes believe I act like I've had a few too
many drinks. So I stay away from the things which cause me to binge.
Everyone looks like they are doing pretty good here lately. Yaal gave me
GREAT AVICE while I faced the "panic" recently. Thanx again guys!!!!

Hey, have a great new week and post here LOTS. I'm watching you)

glo

"Gloria" wrote in message
...
Made it through the past three days without a hitch. It feels good to
let the 'old ways' go and to get back on track again. I feel better each
day . I'm PROBABLY never going to NEVER binge again in this life but I'm
sure going to do everything that I can to be strong and to stick to my
program.

I always FEEL thinner when I eat this way. I LOOK thinner in my mirror
and I have this attitude that is better too. I KNOW that while I eat
better that I don't see those mood swings either. Like while I'm eating
sugar I get crazy and I sometimes believe I act like I've had a few too
many drinks. So I stay away from the things which cause me to binge.
Everyone looks like they are doing pretty good here lately. Yaal gave me
GREAT AVICE while I faced the "panic" recently. Thanx again guys!!!!

Hey, have a great new week and post here LOTS. I'm watching you)

glo

Good going!!!!!!!!!

I love this story. My aunt sent it to me a couple years ago. I had
forgotten about it.

Beverly


"Carol Frilegh" wrote in message
...
In article , Gloria
wrote:

Made it through the past three days without a hitch. It feels good to
let the 'old ways' go and to get back on track again.

This is an Insight of the Day springtime favorite Friday story,

The Daffodil Principle

Several times my daughter had telephoned to say, "Mother, you must come
and see the daffodils before they are over." I wanted to go, but it was
a two-hour drive from Laguna to Lake Arrowhead. Going and coming took
most of a day--and I honestly did not have a free day until the
following week.

"I will come next Tuesday, " I promised, a little reluctantly, on her
third call.
Next Tuesday dawned cold and rainy. Still, I had promised, and so I
drove the length of Route 91, continued on I-215, and finally turned
onto Route 18 and began to drive up the mountain highway. The tops of
the mountains were sheathed in clouds, and I had gone only a few miles
when the road was completely covered with a wet, gray blanket of fog. I
slowed to a crawl, my heart pounding. The road becomes narrow and
winding toward the top of the mountain.

As I executed the hazardous turns at a snail's pace, I was praying to
reach the turnoff at Blue Jay that would signify I had arrived. When I
finally walked into Carolyn's house and hugged and greeted my
grandchildren I said, "Forget the daffodils, Carolyn! The road is
invisible in the clouds and fog, and there is nothing in the world
except you and these darling children that I want to see bad enough to
drive another inch!"

My daughter smiled calmly," We drive in this all the time, Mother."
"Well, you won't get me back on the road until it clears--and then I'm
heading for home!" I assured her.

"I was hoping you'd take me over to the garage to pick up my car. The
mechanic just called, and they've finished repairing the engine," she
answered.

"How far will we have to drive?" I asked cautiously.

"Just a few blocks," Carolyn said cheerfully.

So we buckled up the children and went out to my car. "I'll drive,"
Carolyn offered. "I'm used to this." We got into the car, and she began
driving.

In a few minutes I was aware that we were back on the Rim-of-the-World
Road heading over the top of the mountain. "Where are we going?" I
exclaimed, distressed to be back on the mountain road in the fog. "This
isn't the way to the garage!"

"We're going to my garage the long way," Carolyn smiled, "by way of the
daffodils."

"Carolyn," I said sternly, trying to sound as if I was still the mother
and in charge of the situation, "please turn around. There is nothing
in the world that I want to see enough to drive on this road in this
weather."

"It's all right, Mother," She replied with a knowing grin. "I know what
I'm doing. I promise, you will never forgive yourself if you miss this
experience."

And so my sweet, darling daughter who had never given me a minute of
difficulty in her whole life was suddenly in charge -- and she was
kidnapping me! I couldn't believe it. Like it or not, I was on the way
to see some ridiculous daffodils -- driving through the thick, gray
silence of the mist-wrapped mountaintop at what I thought was risk to
life and limb.

I muttered all the way. After about twenty minutes we turned onto a
small gravel road that branched down into an oak-filled hollow on the
side of the mountain. The Fog had lifted a little, but the sky was
lowering, gray and heavy with clouds.

We parked in a small parking lot adjoining a little stone church. From
our vantage point at the top of the mountain we could see beyond us, in
the mist, the crests of the San Bernardino range like the dark, humped
backs of a herd of elephants. Far below us the fog-shrouded valleys,
hills, and flatlands stretched away to the desert.

On the far side of the church I saw a pine-needle-covered path, with
towering evergreens and manzanita bushes and an inconspicuous, lettered
sign "Daffodil Garden."

We each took a child's hand, and I followed Carolyn down the path as it
wound through the trees. The mountain sloped away from the side of the
path in irregular dips, folds, and valleys, like a deeply creased
skirt.

Live oaks, mountain laurel, shrubs, and bushes clustered in the folds,
and in the gray, drizzling air, the green foliage looked dark and
monochromatic. I shivered. Then we turned a corner of the path, and I
looked up and gasped. Before me lay the most glorious sight,
unexpectedly and completely splendid. It looked as though someone had
taken a great vat of gold and poured it down over the mountain peak and
slopes where it had run into every crevice and over every rise. Even in
the mist-filled air, the mountainside was radiant, clothed in massive
drifts and waterfalls of daffodils. The flowers were planted in
majestic, swirling patterns, great ribbons and swaths of deep orange,
white, lemon yellow, salmon pink, saffron, and butter yellow.

Each different-colored variety (I learned later that there were more
than thirty-five varieties of daffodils in the vast display) was
planted as a group so that it swirled and flowed like its own river
with its own unique hue.

In the center of this incredible and dazzling display of gold, a great
cascade of purple grape hyacinth flowed down like a waterfall of
blossoms framed in its own rock-lined basin, weaving through the
brilliant daffodils. A charming path wound throughout the garden. There
were several resting stations, paved with stone and furnished with
Victorian wooden benches and great tubs of coral and carmine tulips. As
though this were not magnificence enough, Mother Nature had to add her
own grace note -- above the daffodils, a bevy of western bluebirds
flitted and darted, flashing their brilliance. These charming little
birds are the color of sapphires with breasts of magenta red. As they
dance in the air, their colors are truly like jewels above the blowing,
glowing daffodils. The effect was spectacular.

It did not matter that the sun was not shining. The brilliance of the
daffodils was like the glow of the brightest sunlit day. Words,
wonderful as they are, simply cannot describe the incredible beauty of
that flower-bedecked mountain top.

Five acres of flowers! (This too I discovered later when some of my
questions were answered.) "But who has done this?" I asked Carolyn. I
was overflowing with gratitude that she brought me -- even against my
will. This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

"Who?" I asked again, almost speechless with wonder, "And how, and why,
and when?"

"It's just one woman," Carolyn answered. "She lives on the property.
That's her home." Carolyn pointed to a well-kept A-frame house that
looked small
and modest in the midst of all that glory.

We walked up to the house, my mind buzzing with questions. On the patio
we saw a poster. " Answers to the Questions I Know You Are Asking" was
the headline. The first answer was a simple one. "50,000 bulbs," it
read. The second answer was, "One at a time, by one woman, two hands,
two feet, and very little brain." The third answer was, "Began in
1958."

There it was. The Daffodil Principle.

For me that moment was a life-changing experience. I thought of this
woman whom I had never met, who, more than thirty-five years before,
had begun -- one bulb at a time -- to bring her vision of beauty and
joy to an obscure mountain top. One bulb at a time.

There was no other way to do it. One bulb at a time. No shortcuts --
simply loving the slow process of planting. Loving the work as it
unfolded.

Loving an achievement that grew so slowly and that bloomed for only
three weeks of each year. Still, just planting one bulb at a time,
year after year, had changed the world.

This unknown woman had forever changed the world in which she lived.
She had created something of ineffable magnificence, beauty, and
inspiration.

The principle her daffodil garden taught is one of the greatest
principle of celebration: learning to move toward our goals and desires
one step at a time -- often just one baby-step at a time -- learning to
love the doing,
learning to use the accumulation of time.

When we multiply tiny pieces of time with small increments of daily
effort, we too will find we can accomplish magnificent things. We can
change the world.

"Carolyn," I said that morning on the top of the mountain as we left
the haven of daffodils, our minds and hearts still bathed and bemused
by the splendors we had seen, "it's as though that remarkable woman has
needle-pointed the earth! Decorated it. Just think of it, she planted
every single bulb for more than thirty years. One bulb at a time! And
that's the only way this garden could be created. Every individual bulb
had to be planted. There was no way of short-circuiting that process.
Five acres of blooms. That magnificent cascade of hyacinth!

All, all, just one bulb at a time."

The thought of it filled my mind. I was suddenly overwhelmed with the
implications of what I had seen. "It makes me sad in a way," I admitted
to Carolyn. "What might I have accomplished if I had thought of a
wonderful goal thirty-five years ago and had worked away at it 'one
bulb at a time' through all those years.
Just think what I might have been able to achieve!"

My wise daughter put the car into gear and summed up the message of the
day in her direct way. "Start tomorrow," she said with the same knowing
smile she had worn for most of the morning. Oh, profound wisdom!

It is pointless to think of the lost hours of yesterdays. The way to
make learning a lesson a celebration instead of a cause for regret is
to only ask,
"How can I put this to use tomorrow?"

Jaroldeen Asplund Edwards


Did you know just as many people suffer from a fear of success as suffer
from a fear of failure?

--
Diva
*****
The Best Man for the Job May Be A Woman

One at a time! Carol, thanks so much for this !!!! What a message which
I'll keep always OF COURSE I shed a tear or two but GOOD TEARS they
were.
POWERFUL stuff)
This has really made me THINK,
thank you AGAIN.
glo

In article , Gloria
wrote:

One at a time! Carol, thanks so much for this !!!! What a message which
I'll keep always OF COURSE I shed a tear or two but GOOD TEARS they
were.
POWERFUL stuff)
This has really made me THINK,
thank you AGAIN.
glo

Tears are not fattening. You Go Glo!

--
Diva
*****
The Best Man for the Job May Be A Woman

Just one word -- Wow!

Thanks, Carol!

Chris

Hark! I heard Carol Frilegh say:

The Daffodil Principle

big snip

It is pointless to think of the lost hours of yesterdays. The way to
make learning a lesson a celebration instead of a cause for regret is
to only ask,
"How can I put this to use tomorrow?"

Jaroldeen Asplund Edwards


Did you know just as many people suffer from a fear of success as suffer
from a fear of failure?

Excellent advice, Carol -- thanks for posting it...


--
J.J. in WA State - 251/232/150
(Change COLD to HOT for e-mail)

(Gloria) wrote in
:

Made it through the past three days without a hitch. It
feels good to let the 'old ways' go and to get back on
track again. I feel better each day . I'm PROBABLY never
going to NEVER binge again in this life but I'm sure going
to do everything that I can to be strong and to stick to my
program.

I always FEEL thinner when I eat this way. I LOOK thinner
in my mirror and I have this attitude that is better too. I
KNOW that while I eat better that I don't see those mood
swings either. Like while I'm eating sugar I get crazy and
I sometimes believe I act like I've had a few too many
drinks. So I stay away from the things which cause me to
binge. Everyone looks like they are doing pretty good here
lately. Yaal gave me GREAT AVICE while I faced the "panic"
recently. Thanx again guys!!!!

Hey, have a great new week and post here LOTS. I'm watching
you)

glo






Even it you do blow it, get back on the horse. Every day is a
chance to start new.

Good for you glo, and I know just what you mean about feeling better
as soon as you start to eat better - it works like that for me, too.
Have a good week
janice

On Mon, 26 Apr 2004 08:57:14 -0400, (Gloria) wrote:

Made it through the past three days without a hitch. It feels good to
let the 'old ways' go and to get back on track again. I feel better each
day . I'm PROBABLY never going to NEVER binge again in this life but I'm
sure going to do everything that I can to be strong and to stick to my
program.

I always FEEL thinner when I eat this way. I LOOK thinner in my mirror
and I have this attitude that is better too. I KNOW that while I eat
better that I don't see those mood swings either. Like while I'm eating
sugar I get crazy and I sometimes believe I act like I've had a few too
many drinks. So I stay away from the things which cause me to binge.
Everyone looks like they are doing pretty good here lately. Yaal gave me
GREAT AVICE while I faced the "panic" recently. Thanx again guys!!!!

Hey, have a great new week and post here LOTS. I'm watching you)

glo

Carol Frilegh wrote in
:

In article
, Gloria
wrote:

Made it through the past three days without a hitch. It
feels good to let the 'old ways' go and to get back on
track again.

This is an Insight of the Day springtime favorite Friday
story,

The Daffodil Principle

Several times my daughter had telephoned to say, "Mother,
snip

Nice story, which brought to mind a classic French story from
a few years ago, I first saw as an animation short film. Well
worth reading. Though I like the daffodil story, I'm
wondering about it's originality.

JEAN GIONO

The Man Who Planted Trees


Translation from french by Peter Doyle

In order for the character of a human being to reveal
truly exceptional qualities, we must have the good fortune to
observe its action over a long period of years. If this action
is devoid of all selfishness, if the idea that directs it is
one of unqualified generosity, if it is absolutely certain
that it has not sought recompense anywhere, and if moreover it
has left visible marks on the world, then we are
unquestionably dealing with an unforgettable character.

About forty years ago I went on a long hike, through
hills absolutely unknown to tourists, in that very old region
where the Alps penetrate into Provence.
This region is bounded to the south-east and south by the
middle course of the Durance, between Sisteron and Mirabeau;
to the north by the upper course of the Drôme, from its source
down to Die; to the west by the plains of Comtat Venaissin and
the outskirts of Mont Ventoux. It includes all the northern
part of the Département of Basses-Alpes, the south of Drôme
and a little enclave of Vaucluse.
At the time I undertook my long walk through this
deserted region, it consisted of barren and monotonous lands,
at about 1200 to 1300 meters above sea level. Nothing grew
there except wild lavender.
I was crossing this country at its widest part, and after
walking for three days, I found myself in the most complete
desolation. I was camped next to the skeleton of an abandoned
village. I had used the last of my water the day before and I
needed to find more. Even though they were in ruins, these
houses all huddled together and looking like an old wasps'
nest made me think that there must at one time have been a
spring or a well there. There was indeed a spring, but it was
dry. The five or six roofless houses, ravaged by sun and wind,
and the small chapel with its tumble-down belfry, were arrayed
like the houses and chapels of living villages, but all life
had disappeared.

It was a beautiful June day with plenty of sun, but on
these shelterless lands, high up in the sky, the wind whistled
with an unendurable brutality. Its growling in the carcasses
of the houses was like that of a wild beast disturbed during
its meal.
I had to move my camp. After five hours of walking, I
still hadn't found water, and nothing gave me hope of finding
any. Everywhere there was the same dryness, the same stiff,
woody plants. I thought I saw in the distance a small black
silhouette. On a chance I headed towards it. It was a
shepherd. Thirty lambs or so were resting near him on the
scorching ground.
He gave me a drink from his gourd and a little later he
led me to his shepherd's cottage, tucked down in an undulation
of the plateau. He drew his water - excellent - from a natural
hole, very deep, above which he had installed a rudimentary
windlass.

This man spoke little. This is common among those who
live alone, but he seemed sure of himself, and confident in
this assurance, which seemed remarkable in this land shorn of
everything. He lived not in a cabin but in a real house of
stone, from the looks of which it was clear that his own labor
had restored the ruins he had found on his arrival. His roof
was solid and water-tight. The wind struck against the roof
tiles with the sound of the sea crashing on the beach.
His household was in order, his dishes washed, his floor
swept, his rifle greased; his soup boiled over the fire; I
noticed then that he was also freshly shaven, that all his
buttons were solidly sewn, and that his clothes were mended
with such care as to make the patches invisible.
He shared his soup with me, and when afterwards I offered
him my tobacco pouch, he told me that he didn't smoke. His
dog, as silent as he, was friendly without being fawning.

It had been agreed immediately that I would pass the
night there, the closest village being still more than a day
and a half farther on. Furthermore, I understood perfectly
well the character of the rare villages of that region. There
are four or five of them dispersed far from one another on the
flanks of the hills, in groves of white oaks at the very ends
of roads passable by carriage. They are inhabited by
woodcutters who make charcoal. They are places where the
living is poor. The families, pressed together in close
quarters by a climate that is exceedingly harsh, in summer as
well as in winter, struggle ever more selfishly against each
other. Irrational contention grows beyond all bounds, fueled
by a continuous struggle to escape from that place. The men
carry their charcoal to the cities in their trucks, and then
return. The most solid qualities crack under this perpetual
Scottish shower. The women stir up bitterness. There is
competition over everything, from the sale of charcoal to the
benches at church. The virtues fight amongst themselves, the
vices fight amongst themselves, and there is a ceaseless
general combat between the vices and the virtues. On top of
all that, the equally ceaseless wind irritates the nerves.
There are epidemics of suicides and numerous cases of
insanity, almost always murderous.

The shepherd, who did not smoke, took out a bag and
poured a pile of acorns out onto the table. He began to
examine them one after another with a great deal of attention,
separating the good ones from the bad. I smoked my pipe. I
offered to help him, but he told me it was his own business.
Indeed, seeing the care that he devoted to this job, I did not
insist. This was our whole conversation. When he had in the
good pile a fair number of acorns, he counted them out into
packets of ten. In doing this he eliminated some more of the
acorns, discarding the smaller ones and those that that showed
even the slightest crack, for he examined them very closely.
When he had before him one hundred perfect acorns he stopped,
and we went to bed.
The company of this man brought me a feeling of peace. I
asked him the next morning if I might stay and rest the whole
day with him. He found that perfectly natural. Or more
exactly, he gave me the impression that nothing could disturb
him. This rest was not absolutely necessary to me, but I was
intrigued and I wanted to find out more about this man. He let
out his flock and took them to the pasture. Before leaving, he
soaked in a bucket of water the little sack containing the
acorns that he had so carefully chosen and counted.

I noted that he carried as a sort of walking stick an
iron rod as thick as his thumb and about one and a half meters
long. I set off like someone out for a stroll, following a
route parallel to his. His sheep pasture lay at the bottom of
a small valley. He left his flock in the charge of his dog and
climbed up towards the spot where I was standing. I was afraid
that he was coming to reproach me for my indiscretion, but not
at all : It was his own route and he invited me to come along
with him if I had nothing better to do. He continued on
another two hundred meters up the hill.
Having arrived at the place he had been heading for, he
begin to pound his iron rod into the ground. This made a hole
in which he placed an acorn, whereupon he covered over the
hole again. He was planting oak trees. I asked him if the land
belonged to him. He answered no. Did he know whose land it
was? He did not know. He supposed that it was communal land,
or perhaps it belonged to someone who did not care about it.
He himself did not care to know who the owners were. In this
way he planted his one hundred acorns with great care.

After the noon meal, he began once more to pick over his
acorns. I must have put enough insistence into my questions,
because he answered them. For three years now he had been
planting trees in this solitary way. He had planted one
hundred thousand. Of these one hundred thousand, twenty
thousand had come up. He counted on losing another half of
them to rodents and to everything else that is unpredictable
in the designs of Providence. That left ten thousand oaks that
would grow in this place where before there was nothing.
It was at this moment that I began to wonder about his
age. He was clearly more than fifty. Fifty-five, he told me.
His name was Elzéard Bouffier. He had owned a farm in the
plains, where he lived most of his life. He had lost his only
son, and then his wife. He had retired into this solitude,
where he took pleasure in living slowly, with his flock of
sheep and his dog. He had concluded that this country was
dying for lack of trees. He added that, having nothing more
important to do, he had resolved to remedy the situation.
Leading as I did at the time a solitary life, despite my
youth, I knew how to treat the souls of solitary people with
delicacy. Still, I made a mistake. It was precisely my youth
that forced me to imagine the future in my own terms,
including a certain search for happiness. I told him that in
thirty years these ten thousand trees would be magnificent. He
replied very simply that, if God gave him life, in thirty
years he would have planted so many other trees that these ten
thousand would be like a drop of water in the ocean.
He had also begun to study the propagation of beeches.
and he had near his house a nursery filled with seedlings
grown from beechnuts. His little wards, which he had protected
from his sheep by a screen fence, were growing beautifully. He
was also considering birches for the valley bottoms where, he
told me, moisture lay slumbering just a few meters beneath the
surface of the soil.
We parted the next day.

The next year the war of 14 came, in which I was engaged
for five years. An infantryman could hardly think about trees.
To tell the truth, the whole business hadn't made a very deep
impression on me; I took it to be a hobby, like a stamp
collection, and forgot about it.
With the war behind me, I found myself with a small
demobilization bonus and a great desire to breathe a little
pure air. Without any preconceived notion beyond that, I
struck out again along the trail through that deserted
country.
The land had not changed. Nonetheless, beyond that dead
village I perceived in the distance a sort of gray fog that
covered the hills like a carpet. Ever since the day before I
had been thinking about the shepherd who planted trees. « Ten
thousand oaks, I had said to myself, must really take up a lot
of space. »
I had seen too many people die during those five years
not to be able to imagine easily the death of Elzéard
Bouffier, especially since when a man is twenty he thinks of a
man of fifty as an old codger for whom nothing remains but to
die. He was not dead. In fact, he was very spry. He had
changed his job. He only had four sheep now, but to make up
for this he had about a hundred beehives. He had gotten rid of
the sheep because they threatened his crop of trees. He told
me (as indeed I could see for myself) that the war had not
disturbed him at all. He had continued imperturbably with his
planting.
The oaks of 1910 were now ten years old and were taller
than me and than him. The spectacle was impressive. I was
literally speechless and, as he didn't speak himself, we
passed the whole day in silence, walking through his forest.
It was in three sections, eleven kilometers long overall and,
at its widest point, three kilometers wide. When I considered
that this had all sprung from the hands and from the soul of
this one man - without technical aids - , it struck me that
men could be as effective as God in domains other than
destruction.
He had followed his idea, and the beeches that reached up
to my shoulders and extending as far as the eye could see bore
witness to it. The oaks were now good and thick, and had
passed the age where they were at the mercy of rodents; as for
the designs of Providence, to destroy the work that had been
created would henceforth require a cyclone. He showed me
admirable stands of birches that dated from five years ago,
that is to say from 1915, when I had been fighting at Verdun.
He had planted them in the valley bottoms where he had
suspected, correctly, that there was water close to the
surface. They were as tender as young girls, and very
determined.
This creation had the air, moreover, of working by a
chain reaction. He had not troubled about it; he went on
obstinately with his simple task. But, in going back down to
the village, I saw water running in streams that, within
living memory, had always been dry. It was the most striking
revival that he had shown me. These streams had borne water
before, in ancient days. Certain of the sad villages that I
spoke of at the beginning of my account had been built on the
sites of ancient Gallo-Roman villages, of which there still
remained traces; archeologists digging there had found
fishhooks in places where in more recent times cisterns were
required in order to have a little water.
The wind had also been at work, dispersing certain seeds.
As the water reappeared, so too did willows, osiers, meadows,
gardens, flowers, and a certain reason to live.
But the transformation had taken place so slowly that it
had been taken for granted, without provoking surprise. The
hunters who climbed the hills in search of hares or wild boars
had noticed the spreading of the little trees, but they set it
down to the natural spitefulness of the earth. That is why no
one had touched the work of this man. If they had suspected
him, they would have tried to thwart him. But he never came
under suspicion : Who among the villagers or the
administrators would ever have suspected that anyone could
show such obstinacy in carrying out this magnificent act of
generosity?

Beginning in 1920 I never let more than a year go by
without paying a visit to Elzéard Bouffier. I never saw him
waver or doubt, though God alone can tell when God's own hand
is in a thing! I have said nothing of his disappointments, but
you can easily imagine that, for such an accomplishment, it
was necessary to conquer adversity; that, to assure the
victory of such a passion, it was necessary to fight against
despair. One year he had planted ten thousand maples. They all
died. The next year,he gave up on maples and went back to
beeches, which did even better than the oaks.
To get a true idea of this exceptional character, one
must not forget that he worked in total solitude; so total
that, toward the end of his life, he lost the habit of
talking. Or maybe he just didn't see the need for it.

In 1933 he received the visit of an astonished forest
ranger. This functionary ordered him to cease building fires
outdoors, for fear of endangering this natural forest. It was
the first time, this naive man told him, that a forest had
been observed to grow up entirely on its own. At the time of
this incident, he was thinking of planting beeches at a spot
twelve kilometers from his house. To avoid the coming and
going - because at the time he was seventy-five years old - he
planned to build a cabin of stone out where he was doing his
planting. This he did the next year.

In 1935, a veritable administrative delegation went to
examine this « natural forest ». There was an important
personage from Waters and Forests, a deputy, and some
technicians. Many useless words were spoken. It was decided to
do something, but luckily nothing was done, except for one
truly useful thing : placing the forest under the protection
of the State and forbidding anyone from coming there to make
charcoal. For it was impossible not to be taken with the
beauty of these young trees in full health. And the forest
exercised its seductive powers even on the deputy himself.
I had a friend among the chief foresters who were with
the delegation. I explained the mystery to him. One day the
next week, we went off together to look for Elzéard Bouffier,
We found him hard at work, twenty kilometers away from the
place where the inspection had taken place.
This chief forester was not my friend for nothing. He
understood the value of things. He knew how to remain silent.
I offered up some eggs I had brought with me as a gift. We
split our snack three ways, and then passed several hours in
mute contemplation of the landscape.
The hillside whence we had come was covered with trees
six or seven meters high. I remembered the look of the place
in 1913 : a desert... The peaceful and steady labor, the
vibrant highland air, his frugality, and above all, the
serenity of his soul had given the old man a kind of solemn
good health. He was an athlete of God. I asked myself how many
hectares he had yet to cover with trees.
Before leaving, my friend made a simple suggestion
concerning certain species of trees to which the terrain
seemed to be particularly well suited. He was not insistent.
« For the very good reason, » he told me afterwards, « that
this fellow knows a lot more about this sort of thing than I
do. » After another hour of walking, this thought having
travelled along with him, he added : « He knows a lot more
about this sort of thing than anybody - and he has found a
jolly good way of being happy ! »
It was thanks to the efforts of this chief forester that
the forest was protected, and with it, the happiness of this
man. He designated three forest rangers for their protection,
and terrorized them to such an extent that they remained
indifferent to any jugs of wine that the woodcutters might
offer as bribes.

The forest did not run any grave risks except during the
war of 1939. Then automobiles were being run on wood alcohol,
and there was never enough wood. They began to cut some of the
stands of the oaks of 1910, but the trees stood so far from
any useful road that the enterprise turned out to be bad from
a financial point of view, and was soon abandoned. The
shepherd never knew anything about it. He was thirty
kilometers away, peacefully continuing his task, as untroubled
by the war of 39 as he had been of the war of 14.

I saw Elzéard Bouffier for the last time in June of 1945.
He was then eighty-seven years old. I had once more set off
along my trail through the wilderness, only to find that now,
in spite of the shambles in which the war had left the whole
country, there was a motor coach running between the valley of
the Durance and the mountain. I set down to this relatively
rapid means of transportation the fact that I no longer
recognized the landmarks I knew from my earlier visits. It
also seemed that the route was taking me through entirely new
places. I had to ask the name of a village to be sure that I
was indeed passing through that same region, once so ruined
and desolate. The coach set me down at Vergons. In 1913, this
hamlet of ten or twelve houses had had three inhabitants. They
were savages, hating each other, and earning their living by
trapping : Physically and morally, they resembled prehistoric
men . The nettles devoured the abandoned houses that
surrounded them. Their lives were without hope, it was only a
matter of waiting for death to come : a situation that hardly
predisposes one to virtue.
All that had changed, even to the air itself. In place of
the dry, brutal gusts that had greeted me long ago, a gentle
breeze whispered to me, bearing sweet odors. A sound like that
of running water came from the heights above : It was the
sound of the wind in the trees. And most astonishing of all, I
heard the sound of real water running into a pool. I saw that
they had built a fountain, that it was full of water, and what
touched me most, that next to it they had planted a lime-tree
that must be at least four years old, already grown thick, an
incontestable symbol of resurrection.

Furthermore, Vergons showed the signs of labors for which
hope is a requirement : Hope must therefore have returned.
They had cleared out the ruins, knocked down the broken walls,
and rebuilt five houses. The hamlet now counted twenty-eight
inhabitants, including four young families. The new houses,
freshly plastered, were surrounded by gardens that bore, mixed
in with each other but still carefully laid out, vegetables
and flowers, cabbages and rosebushes, leeks and gueules-de-
loup, celery and anemones. It was now a place where anyone
would be glad to live.
From there I continued on foot. The war from which we had
just barely emerged had not permitted life to vanish
completely, and now Lazarus was out of his tomb. On the lower
flanks of the mountain, I saw small fields of barley and rye;
in the bottoms of the narrow valleys, meadowlands were just
turning green.
It has taken only the eight years that now separate us
from that time for the whole country around there to blossom
with splendor and ease. On the site of the ruins I had seen in
1913 there are now well-kept farms, the sign of a happy and
comfortable life. The old springs, fed by rain and snow now
that are now retained by the forests, have once again begun to
flow. The brooks have been channelled. Beside each farm, amid
groves of maples, the pools of fountains are bordered by
carpets of fresh mint. Little by little, the villages have
been rebuilt. Yuppies have come from the plains, where land is
expensive, bringing with them youth, movement, and a spirit of
adventure. Walking along the roads you will meet men and women
in full health, and boys and girls who know how to laugh, and
who have regained the taste for the traditional rustic
festivals. Counting both the previous inhabitants of the area,
now unrecognizable from living in plenty, and the new
arrivals, more than ten thousand persons owe their happiness
to Elzéard Bouffier.

When I consider that a single man, relying only on his
own simple physical and moral resources, was able to transform
a desert into this land of Canaan, I am convinced that despite
everything, the human condition is truly admirable. But when I
take into account the constancy, the greatness of soul, and
the selfless dedication that was needed to bring about this
transformation, I am filled with an immense respect for this
old, uncultured peasant who knew how to bring about a work
worthy of God.

Elzéard Bouffier died peacefully in 1947 at the hospice
in Banon.