Free Write Couples

 

Today's Free Write's prompt was at a café table where several elderly people were seated on the terrace drinking coffee. We had finished our tea, and been visited by a dog from a neighboring table. He suspected correctly we had doggie treats. Sherlock did not want his own chair or the ground. Rick's lap was better. The sky was that blue so often witnessed in Southern France and seldom duplicated in the rest of the country.

Rick's Free Write

The village was abuzz after the previous evening's meeting in the Town Hall at the Salle Bouisson adjacent to the mairie. 

The mayor had delivered a PowerPoint presentation for 100 minutes describing in great detail -- as he loves to hear himself talk -- the various projects on which the bureaucrats are spending the taxpayer's euros. Environmental endeavors, more cycling paths, school improvements ... but the most controversial are the ambitious plans to come.

A gathering of several senior citizen who had scrunched together tables at Café Bronzette was animatedly chattering in Paris-paced French about the topics: the expansion at the port and the proposed crematorium. 

The eight women and one man in a flat cap did not like either. They lived in the village, far from the sea and were too old to sail, so why was it necessary to destroy more beach and pine trees so wealthy holiday makers could park their dinghys and use use them only one month a year.

As to the crematorium, the specter of having the final fire so close to where they lived (instead of the one 20 kilometers away in Perpignan) was too stark a reminder of the little time they had left.

D-L's Free Write

Franck was the only man at the table with four women.

The weather was a perfect October day for sitting outdoors.

Twenty years ago, there would have been four couples, but over the decades Paul, Marcel and Jean had all passed on, victims of cancer, a heart attack and a car accident, of all things.

For decades the four couples, neighbors in Toulouse, came to this coastal village for a week in October. They said it was better after the wave of summer tourists had disappeared.

Franck felt a bit left out as Marie, Angela, Jeanne and Fréderique delved into women's topics.

Good God, they were talking about their daughters' menopause and the best calcium for osteoporosis. 

If the other men in the group hadn't died, he would be talking about last night's football match: Japan versus Argentina and how France would do against the winner tomorrow night.

His  espresso was cold. 

His wife met his eyes. He knew, she understood what he was thinking.

This morning as they dressed before meeting the others, she'd said she was glad she wasn't a widow. He was too.