Sunday, April 19, 2015
10:35AM
A college French course! Très bien! Bon courage! Debbie, you are amazing!
I love French. I took one semester in Fjord High School, three semesters in Baltimore. Twelve years later, before a motorhome trip through Quebec with Viv, I purchased, at Goodwill, an antiquated text book of conversational French. It had a set of LP records with it, but I didn’t have a record player anymore by then. These many years later, alas, I don’t think I could tell an oeuvre from an hors d’oeuvre if the horse came up and bit me. When you get the hang of the language, perhaps you can teach me how to order a two-egg omelay.
Thank you for commenting on the picture of the naked man. You type raised eyebrows very diplomatically, possibly even Frenchly.
Dad sounded good this morning. Yesterday afternoon, on the phone, referring to his RAV-4, he asked whether Celeste or I could tell him how to operate “that screen that can give me directions to places.” We recommended that he consult Google Maps instead. We told him we have tried, and failed, to figure out the GPS in our own Toyota. We asked him where he wanted to go. He said, “Oh, I don’t know. I’d like it to tell me how to get to Ninian.”
We didn’t discuss it further then, but later in the evening Celeste and I wondered if Dad just happened to use Ninian as an example or if perhaps he actually needs help now finding his way along the fourteen miles of country roads that he drives three times a week. This morning, at seven, when we called Dad to ask, “Are you up and ready to leave for church,” we also asked if he has been having trouble finding Ninian. He chuckled and assured us, no, his memory has not failed him on that particular journey.
I have another RAV-4 story for you, if you can stand it. Late Friday afternoon, Celeste and I trimmed back the trumpet vine by the clothes line and hacked the hydrangeas down to ground level outside The Room Formerly Known as Deborah’s. The sun had set by the time we hauled two loads of trimmings to the brush pile behind Grover’s Grocery. When we dumped the second load and got back into the car (which, I think I may as well mention, we purchased new on 12-13-14), Celeste observed that our odometer was displaying the number 1937. “Two more miles!” she said cheerily, referring to the year of her birth.
We had cameras with us, so, instead of going straight home, we drove out Union Street, through the Mobil station, onto the highway, and then all the way down Lincoln Avenue, and out E. Fjord Street. We turned north on First Street, west on Galloway Street, south on Second Street, crossed back over the tracks, and turned left on Mills. When we arrived at our own driveway, we still had not completed a two-mile route! Couldn’t be far now. We turned right on High Street, and, within that block, in front of Aunt Francine’s house, the 1939 appeared. So I pulled over and took a photo of the instrument panel. “Let’s keep going,” Celeste said, “and you can get a picture of 1949.” I said, “Yeah, we could do that. But let’s just go home and eat supper. If we go somewhere tomorrow, remind me to take a picture.”
We did go somewhere on Saturday. We went four miles to the farm. Then we went however many miles it is to Piggly Wiggly. And then we returned to Fjord. Just as we were turning off 16 onto W. Fjord Street, Celeste thought to look at the odometer, and she exclaimed, “Nineteen-sixty!”
I guess I must know someone somewhere who was born in 1960, but I was so despondent over missing 1949 that I didn’t take a picture. Ha, ha! This could be a WoW for next Sunday, if my vibrant young bride will consent to my publishing the year of her birth for all our thousands of fans to see.
I wish you a fine day, Ms. Deborah Ann. We are looking forward to seeing you this coming Saturday.
Love, Dave
