My lovely neighbour and friend Miriam came as usual yesterday; bringing 10 newly laid Bantam eggs and a cutting from her mimosa tree. She brings me so many eggs that Cesar now has a great fondness for hard-boiled eggs still in their shell.

I have given up telling her I cannot eat so many, and she doesn’t understand why I don’t make omelettes for Cesar as she does for her dogs. Wasteful though I am, and have been all my life, the idea of making omelettes for the dog to use up the fresh yolks is a touch too much. Hell, I’d never be bothered to make one for myself. (I made one once. So, been there, done that.)

But then I suppose when there is a constant bounty nothing is seen as excessive or odd when all is mixed up in the cycle of life and reused.

Take the vegetables and fruit. It is Pierrot’s job to plant and grow them, although he really only likes potatoes and green beans.

The potager overflows with aubergines, tomatoes, courgettes, peppers, beans of every kind and all the herbs one could demand in a recipe. It is Miriam's job to harvest and turn them into produce for the freezer or cook and reduce them for sauces and pies.

She becomes even more reclusive in the gathering season as she works hour after hour to fill up pantry, fridge and freezer.

And of course, she must take the haunches of venison, boar, the many bits of pig and the fowl either hunted, caught by or given to Pierrot and quickly turn them into pâté, rillettes, stews and steaks.

She showed me one – yes, one – of her pantries once, and it was like looking into a Victorian below-stairs period film, with row after row of kilner jars containing God knows what amazing things. (Forgive me: my vocabulary is lousy when it comes to foodstuffs. Pulses, sauces, … things …)

I probably recoiled before saying: "Bloody hell" or an approximation in French. "Why? Do you use them all?"

She looked at me in the same way I’d looked at her. "Why?" she replied. "Because we grow them."

There was little point in asking why she grows so much that she has shelf after shelf of preserved food, and enough to give me a box full of jars that I’ll never use in a decade.

Actually, I have a confession to make: there’s a strange side of me that would love a pantry. Really. A walk-in pantry with loads and loads of suction-topped jars filled with homegrown, home-cooked … thingies.

But then there’s a strange side of me that would also love a tennis court, a croquet lawn, a helicopter pad, a pool with a hot tub … Hey, it's all relative.

By now you will hopefully realise today’s column is all about displacement therapy.

Tomorrow is the first round of the French elections – the ones we’re not meant to pay too much attention to, as they are the classic up-yours vote.

And if I’m writing about legumes and good neighbours it’s because I’m nervous.

The polls are all over the place, as are the political pundits. I look at Macron, my choice, and think again, as I see his hard, too-pleasing eyes. I watch his body movements and his "trust me" looks to camera and I recall the young Tony Blair who I found repulsive from day one.

But then I think: no, he’s different. And I think he is the only horse in the race that can take on Le Pen and the last ones running.

I say all these things to Miriam after she’s brought me the eggs and the mimosa.

I need to talk politics. I need to know what my neighbours really think. I know she is not Front National – far from it.

She shrugs. I get cross with her and say, "After all the time we’ve known each other, please tell me what you think."

She shrugs again. "No," she says, "it will never be le Pen. Not a chance. Non."

And that is it. She finds it inconceivable that Marine le Pen could win come the second round and finds my arguments bizarre. She looks away and gives a vague smile.

I know that every morning on awakening she watches the equivalent of Sky News to catch up on the day, yet she refuses to acknowledge that the French could ultimately vote le Pen as president. God, I hope she is right. I no longer know. The world has gone mad and I’m in my field in La France Profonde surrounded by voters of the Front National.

Anyway. I’ve just been out for a walk with the boy. The clouds were quite beautiful in their volume and we walked without him trying to drag me over and break another bone.

Little things. Hopeful things.

And three white van men came past us and slowed down to allow Cesar to sit for a biscuit and ignore them.

It’s a strange, strange time. I’ll sit up to hear tomorrow night’s results and then … And then? Well, then there’ll be all to play for, won’t there?