Dear Readers,
It’s December, Christmas Day is already behind us, and I hope you had a merry one. This year I celebrated in France, in Nointel, a village in the Parisian suburbs. My home, surrounded by forests and fields, is lovely, drafty, and damp. It looks like the setting for a period piece, but less than two miles away the landscape changes. Shopping centers and high-rises dominate the skyline.
A few days before Christmas, I heard a knock at my door. When I opened it, the mayor of the village and her assistant were standing outside. They had a gift for me, a large basket filled with all the goodies and trimmings for a delicious Christmas feast.
Why this honor? Very simply, because I am old, over 65, one of the village “aînés,” the village elders, worthy of respect but also of protection. Thanks to the Christmas basket, no one had to worry about us oldsters going hungry on Christmas Day.
Taking care of the elderly at Christmas is a tradition in France. When I had a country home in Condé sur Huisne, the village held a formal dinner for everyone 65 and over and, from what I was told, it was a very nice affair. Even in Paris, I was entitled to a gift. I received a card in my mailbox inviting me to go to the city hall of the 19th arrondissement where I lived till January 2022, to pick up a box of chocolates, courtesy of Annie Hildago, the city’s mayor.
I’ve enjoyed receiving the chocolates and the baskets of goodies, and I’m getting used to being considered “over the hill.” In France, anyone over 50 is. Here you’re put out to pasture young, and few people can conceive of a person my age still working—unless they’re politicians. At this very moment, the French are battling against raising the retirement age to 64.
I enjoy working, I enjoy writing these articles. However, I’ll admit, age brings change. My thoughts turn inwards and towards the past. I think more about Pottsville, Schuylkill County, and the coal region. At a time when France’s government is very unstable and a budget crisis looms, I think less about France.
That is why, after 15 years of a monthly Pottsville-Paris connection, I’ve decided, not to retire, but to change. Beginning on the last Sunday of January 2025, in my articles, I’ll no longer be travelling back and forth between Europe and the United States. I’ll be concentrating on the coal region, its artists and the art it has inspired. I’ve already compiled a list of painters, sculptors, engravers, and photographers, as well as filmmakers, writers, musicians and collectors of local lore. Faithful readers, rest assured! This is a monthly column that could go on for years, inshallah, as we say in France.
Autumn landscape, George Luks
As a teaser, I’ll just mention some of the exceptional talent from—or inspired by—our region. There’s George Luks, whose 1927 mural of Necho Allen discovering coal can be admired in the library of Penn State Schuylkill; and two photographers, Judith Joy Ross, born in Hazleton in 1946, and Mark Cohen, born in Wilkes-Barre in 1943, whose work I discovered at Le Bal, a major gallery in Paris specializing in contemporary photography.
I’d also like to include local talent without, for the moment, an international reputation. In that, the coal region abounds. In my French home, I have two works by Pottsville artist Kathy Connelly, a book of reproductions of her paintings of Pottsville and a sweet watercolor of a robin singing. For Christmas, my sister Susan Hahner sent me a photo by Sue Frantz, a bold red fence, some redbrick houses, a steep Pottsville street in the snow, a vibrant study in red, black and white.
So much to write about and, I hope, for us to discover together.
Over the past 15 years, I have shared much of France and beyond with my readers. Some may remember my uphill battle to get a French driver’s license (September-October 2011), my bidding in a French country auction (February-March 2017), or my disastrous but exciting trip to Tblissi, Georgia, where I survived on bread and water (June-July 2018). I’ve also explored the French healthcare system, France’s approach to childcare, and the place of the disabled in French society. And I presented French country living, not as it is depicted in glossy magazines or sites online, but as it really is.
There is also my February 2023 article on Lieutenant John E. Young, a pilot and member of the 337th Bomb Squadron of the 96th Bomber Group, a Pottsville hero who, in September 1943, gave his life for France. If you would like to go back and visit this article or others, you can find nearly 15-years’ worth of reading at https://pottsville-paris-express.blogspot.com/2024/
Meanwhile, I haven’t entirely given up on travelling back and forth across the Atlantic. I’ve simply chosen to do it in a more personal way. I now have a Substack publication, “Paris on the Skook,” where I explore how a girl from Pottsville ends up in France. I explore Pottsville and the coal region too. You can subscribe for free by downloading the Substack app or by following this link: https://nancyhonicker.substack.com/p/memory-lane-leads-nowhere
For now, I thank you for reading and wish you a happy and healthy 2025, surely a year of change. Whether for better or for worse, only time will tell.
And I hope we meet again soon, on my blog or on Substack or in the pages of this paper. Don’t forget to read about anthracite art on January 26, 2025.
