Fountain 59 St. Edern Lanadern 4th September

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do 

than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. 

Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore. Dream. Discover.”

 Mark Twain
(November 30, 1835 - April 21, 1910
The American author and humorist, Samuel Langhorne Clemens,
was  better known by his pen name, Mark Twain and two of his two of his many books 
"The Adventures of Tome Sawyer" and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn")


I have always admired Mark Twain. 
And not simply because he invented his name by adopting the term used on the Mississippi River ,"mark twain" meaning "mark number two". This measurement indicated that the river was two fathoms, or twelve feet deep, i.e. a safe depth for a steamboat. 

He had a way with words that rocked the cornerstones of an ordinary ordered life.
Had I the ability to jump the steady ship of my Californian childhood into another, I would have been Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn. 
Of course there are always trials and tribulations whatever the life. However, the romance of their barefooted freedom attracted me long before I was literate enough to read my own copy of "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer".

And maybe it was Mark and Tom and Huckleberry who had nurtured this deep connection that I feel to water, for I longed to sail with them down the Mississippi on a makeshift raft with fireflies flashing their lights around our heads.
Yes, this was the life for me.

            
             
                      Now, a half a century later, Louise has been my raft substitute

  as we explore the waters of France.  



St. Edern

 There were probably many St. Ederns.
The ones that I found were all linked to deer. (or cows)
The name Edern comes either from the Welsh word "edyrn", meaning big, gigantic, or from the Latin "Aeternus" meaning eternal . Which is essentially the same thing.

According to Welsh legend, Edern, who rode on a deer,  was the son of the god Nuz and one of the first lovers of Queen Guinevere, wife of King Arthur.**

Another Saint Edern was a wealthy young man (probably a warrior and/or aristocrat) who in 894 sailed the coast of Cornouaille and built a hermitage at Lanadern where he was buried.


One story tells that St. Edern gave safe refuge to a deer which was being pursued by a "gentleman" and his dogs. After this, the deer never left his side and has become a symbol for the saint. 

Another story claims that he met a deer in the evening and with him rode the boundaries of the country he had to Christianize. Yet another story, a cow story, relates that a cow was left for dead by the lord of the castle. St. Edern nurtured the animal back to health and where ever the cow grazed the wheat grew more abundantly.

Edern's feast day is celebrated in Brittany on August 26th or 30th or September 1st.
He is the saint for diseases of the eyes and many miracles have been attributed to him.

   

 And a great big gushing thank you from me too.
Louise and I have traveled nearly 3000 miles without great mishap or bodily injury.
What more could I ask for?



**King Arthur may well have been a genuine historical figure from 5th or 6th century Britain. 
He is known for his great kingdom of Camelot and the knights who sat 
in equality at the Round Table. 
 He has associations with the Holy Grail, Avalon,and the great sword 'Excalibur'.

An interesting website for more information- http://britannia.com/history/h12.html

Three useful Mark Twain quotes to live your life by:

Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.

Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.