Chateau de la Fontenelle

Dear Sienna Elyse,

        I have this little thing I do as a treat for myself (though maybe it really isn’t that much of a treat because it ends up making me crazy jealous of really wealthy people); About once a month, I go online to this website that lists mostly mansions for sale in other countries and I shop around for a castle in France. Always a castle, always France. They’ve listed a new one (I’ve already looked at the others extensively), and like others that I’ve fallen in love with, I’ve completely fallen in love with this new one. It’s called “Chateau de la Fontenelle.”  Yeah, it’s that kind of castle - it has its own name and such a pretty name at that! It’s really beautiful and as I look at the pictures, I can totally imagine myself living there. Ha. It has a tower (I absolutely adore towers!!) and these massive tiled halls, a stone balustrade and fireplaces in almost all the rooms, even the kitchen has one (quite handy, I think!). It has a pond, a couple meadows, a cottage or two, a chapel and one of the bathrooms has its own balcony. It would fit our whole family in there and then some. It’s listed at a “negotiable” $1.4 million. A down payment on that is a mere $280,000. I can’t quite conceive of the mortgage payments even with a 20% down payment. Hmm…I’ll have to figure that out some day so that I know just what it would take to live there. Of course, you’d have to factor in the cost of living there as well, I guess. For example, one would have to hire a maid service at least once a week, and given that I can’t cook, it may be a good idea to hire a cook as well. Mowing the lawns and keeping the yard neat would likely be another good area to hire someone who knows what they’re doing.

        Naturally, while I’m imagining myself there, I’m imagining you there too and I get worried about safety. But this one looks pretty safe – I’ve seen some castles on the edge of a cliff and those worry me quite a bit.

        Well, this is all just daydreaming. But wouldn’t it be lovely if I wrote a book deserving enough of a castle? Ha. Yes, that’s a daydream that I hold very dear, even though books don’t make as much of a living as they once did. But who knows what can happen? That’s why I’d like to know what it would cost to pay for something like that. It’s beautiful, isn’t it? Though, I suspect this picture may have been photoshopped. Can a place as beautiful as this really exist? And then on top of that, rainbows decide to arch lovingly around it? It just seems a bit much, even for my imagination. Ha.

        But, my dear, you can always imagine! You can always dream big. I know it’s not likely that I will live in this castle, but at least, if I ever had the money to do something, I know what it would be! So many people can’t look outside of their own lives or world, or perhaps they’re afraid to. It’s the biggest tragedy, I think. Can you imagine growing up and never thinking that your life could be anything great? Regardless of where I find myself, I am always going to strive for more than what I am, more than what I have, more than what I’ve already done.

          So my darling, as I dream of a future with you, sometimes I do think I might be crazy to dream so big when I haven’t got a lot to build those dreams on. But I know that I am going to be showing you my France one day. Taking you around a castle and running through a yard…it may be someone else’s castle and yard and we might have to pay to do so, but we’ll do it! Oh! I almost forgot, I’ve never tasted chocolate like the chocolate in France (or maybe Europe, I’m not sure). It’s different, somehow, and I intend to show you the difference. Perhaps we’ll end up living there one day.

        Today a famous doctor died. His name was Jack Kavorkian. I’d talk more about him here, but I just don’t think there is enough space to go into that subject! So I’ll leave it at that so you can look back and say “My mommy wrote me a letter the day Kavorkian died.”  It’s a bit of history. You're welcome.

        I love you,

Your mom