JEANNE-THE FLOC'H: THE GUARDIAN OF THE TEMPLE IS GONE

On September 19, Jeanne-Thé Floch passed away. The guardian of the Temple, I should say, has gone, gently, surrounded by her loved ones, light as the generous, resisting with a smile the last assaults of the camarde.

At Ecole des Roches, she had girls that life hadn't given her. Thousands of them, blonde, brunette, redheaded, sweet, determined, rebellious, misunderstood, withdrawn, expansive, happy or sad, whom she tamed with a kindness whose power remains a mystery to this day.

But more than that, Jeanne-Thé forged bonds with "her" daughters that time has never weakened. Juan Les Pins had become the navel of a world, the temple of memory for the children of Le Moulin and La Guichardière. People came here as if on a pilgrimage, to say what they had become, to say thank you, to recharge their batteries after a professional or amorous mishap.

She remembered some as well as others, but also some as well as others. Together with Jean, her husband with his strong Breton character, she had channeled the beginnings of countless lives at the École des Roches, at a time when they were potentially explosive. In the fortress of La Guichardière, she had to maintain an interior discipline tinged with tenderness, hours of listening and intelligent firmness, while protecting her "flock" from the gaze, words and gestures of boys agitated by age, to the point of being too eager.

I met her in her apartment in Juan, where she summed up her arrival at La Guichardière in two sentences. "We had to make it work. Jean and I naturally divided up the tasks to be accomplished.

Trying to unravel the secret of her success, she had summed up for me the three main qualities of a chef and a chef de maison. "The first is to listen. Jean used to say that you have to have Buddha ears. The second is to know how to meet expectations, while explaining when necessary why certain things aren't possible. And finally, to build trust by being able to talk about all subjects, even the most sensitive ones: life, community life, not forgetting love life".

Occasionally, and according to well-established rules, she would gather boys and girls together for a coffee ceremony. The happy few would hurry along the route de la Guiche, to sit in the salon under the watchful eye of Madame Floc'h, who seemed to enjoy the meeting of all these energies. How many incidents had she managed to avoid? She'll never talk about them.

She received a letter from a minister. From Paris and beyond. From the Americas, Asia and the Middle East. She would reply, and her correspondents would keep her letters like a first-aid kit.

Last but not least, she was the temple of our memory, holding in her heart what we all were as children, then teenagers. She talked to us about it, giving us the missing pieces of the puzzle of our youth.

It's priceless.

Today, it's up to us to take back what we've learned from her after she's gone. Benevolence, tolerance, listening and optimism.

The least we can do.

Olivier MICHEL (Pins 1971 - 1974)

General Secretary of the Alumni of the École des