The Weather

Reading and transcribing my grandmother’s diaries, I am reminded of the old remark to the effect that in England we don’t have a climate, only weather! She religiously starts each day with a reference to the weather. Can you imagine someone in Phoenix, Arizona, saying: “It looks like it’s going to turn into a nice day”? In my grandmother’s diaries, expressions such as “cleared up later”, “turned into a glorious day” and (my particular favourite) “unsettled weather” feature prominently.

Here where I live in the eastern part of France, there is not the same degree of unpredictability; there is not the same likelihood that things will “clear up” later in the day, or that rain will “move in” from the west. In short, we are nearer climate than weather over here.