achingly sad.....

This article is from my newspaper today......I just have the feeling that her lover is an Englishman, or why put the bottle in the English Channel? Anyone have any other thoughts?..........smiling.

A French love letter and a lock of hair have been discovered in a bottle washed up on a Cornish beach.Martin Leslie, a coastguard manager, discovered the note at Praa Sands when he was clearing debris from the shore in west Cornwall.

The bottle, which was sealed with candle wax, was dropped into the English Channel / La Manche on 28 September this year. It was written in French by an unnamed woman who poured out her feelings and understandings for her lover who had to return to his wife

The letter included references to love, death and heartache. It covered three pages of A4-sized paper and was accompanied by the lock of brown hair.

It opened with: "I'm not, and nor are you. When I am dead and that I will have lost the spark of my 20s, and I know that happens, at this point I will come back to you and you in turn will give me back your extraordinary passion for living. I am not dead. Yet."

Mr Leslie, who does not speak French, tried to translate the letter and was concerned about its content. He assumed that it was a suicidal note that he had come across and contacted Falmouth coastguard who sent a fax of it to their counterparts on the French coast.

"It was found to be a love letter. She (the writer) explained they had a good time together. She loves him but understands he has to return to his wife, and hopes she will find a man like him to live a beautiful life."

The unnamed women recalls the time she and her lover spent together, alluding to the affair in the letter:

"These magic moments are pure secret. The secret of life and pleasure without limits. In twenty years, it will still be here, the previous moments of happiness, when life will get dreary, we will be able to tap into these memories to remember what it is to live again."

Mr Leslie said he was planning to keep hold of the letter, which was left unsigned, with no contact address.

La mer
The Sea
Qu'on voit danser le long des golfes clairs
That one sees dancing along the clear gulfs
A des reflets d'argent
Has silver reflections
La mer
The Sea
Des reflets changeants
Changing reflections
Sous la pluie
Under the rain

La mer
The Sea
Au ciel d'été confond
In the summer sky merge
Ses blancs moutons
Its white sheep
Avec les anges si purs
With such pure angels
La mer bergère d'azur
The sea, shepherdess of azure
Infinie
Infinite

Voyez
See
Près des étangs
Close to the ponds
Ces grands roseaux mouillés
These large wet reeds
Voyez
See
Ces oiseaux blancs
These white birds
Et ces maisons rouillées
And these rusted houses

La mer
The Sea
Les a bercés
Has rocked them
Le long des golfes clairs
Along the clear gulfs
Et d'une chanson d'amour
And with a song of love
La mer
The Sea
A bercé mon cœur pour la vie
Has soothed my heart for life