Voting

 

Rick and I voted today as good Swiss citizens. We voted on things such as (among others):

• Giving AVS (Swiss SS) recipients a thirteenth payment in addition to their twelve other payments
  
• A change in an anthem
• Lowering the automobile tax 
• A couple of changes in the cantonal auto tax which is higher in Geneva than any other canton
• Constitutional  changes
• The retirement age
  

We had read the booklet (boring) sent to every Swiss citizen in their main language. Ours was in French. The booklet listed the proposal, the main pros and cons and governmental recommendations.

The back of the booklet had the recommendations of the major and minor parties all 44 of them in a simple oui or non. Yes 44 groups could weigh in.

We had also reviewed all the campaign posters displayed in every village, town and city in the main language. 

I was chuffed to see that my opinion matched the parties that I support.

We filled out the registration card, sealed our votes in a separate envelope, and Rick carried our votes to the post office to meet tomorrow's mailing deadline.

Our other choice was to vote in person on Sunday. Most people vote by mail, but it is kinda nice to go down and greet the people who work the polls. In smaller villages like ours, coffee, tea and sometimes pastries are often offered.

Results will be announced late Sunday afternoon. 

We go through this at least four times a year depending on the issues introduced by the people or verification of the laws passed by parliament that the population needs to weigh in on.

This is as close to real democracy as is possible. With about nine million people it is easy to run these votations. Major cities like Paris and London have larger populations.

Having been granted Swiss nationality, Rick and I feel it is our duty to weigh in on issues, although not all Swiss exercise their right to vote. 

I'm not saying the system is perfect, but it is probably as good as it gets.

Free Write The Old Man

Note: We found a rather scruffy man with a full beard and long hair in the café as our free write prompt. 

Rick's Free Write

He was sitting at the corner table in the back, where he sat every morning about this time – except Friday and Saturday when the boulangerie was closed. (I know, odd days not to be open, but this was a small village, and the residents did as they pleased, regardless of convention.) I nodded to him as I sat down at a  table kitty-corner, and he dipped his head slightly, comme d’habitude.

We never spoke. Well, not never. Once, months ago, when I first encountered him, when I was new to the village, I had tried to engage him in chit-chat. But he didn’t reciprocate. Just kept munching bits off his croissant and nursing his espresso.

I’d guessed he was in his 70s, like me, but looked older. Shaggy gray-on-gray hair and unruly beard. A weathered face that suggested working the farm fields for many years. Presumably retired, but then again, maybe 9:30 in the morning was the end of his chore time at the farm.

I watched as he struggled to his feet, then shuffled toward the door, partly dragging his left foot. Maybe he’d be run over by something. Or just severe arthritis.

He left, comme d’habitude, without a word.

I wonder what he thought of me.

Julia's Free Write

He is in the bakery CUM MINIMART EVERY TIME I GO IN.

I imagine he is a daily customer although he never seems to interact with anyone.

I further imagine, sleuth deduction based upon appearances, slightly scruffy around the edges, that he has no one at home.

And what was his life?

Where did he work?

Where in this small village does he live?

Born and raised here in the village?

A farmer who no longer has a farm?

An industrial worker?

Has he travelled – if only into the neighboring town? Or has he always been only here?

More questions than answers, until…

I mentioned him to friends in the village: “Oh, didn’t you know? He had a major construction company, travelled all of Europe doing business. Then when his whole family died in a fire 30 years ago, he sold it all and lives on his own in that mansion on the hill.

Remarks: story based on similar stories of two other men: one oe whom is Martin Gray, author of “For Those I loved” and a man in the next village over from mine, whose name I don’t know.

D-L's Free Write

Olie's coffee grew cold, but he was in no hurry to go home.

Home. Hah!

An apartment. The only reason it was furnished was that his son insisted he take furniture from the house he and Lydia had shared for 47 years.

The waitress knew better than to ask him if he wanted another cup of coffee.

He had perfected his growl, launching it through his thick beard and shoulder-length hair.

He thumbed through the Tribune de Genéve. War! War! War! The world had gone crazy.

His leg hurt. He shifted it. He wouldn't tell his son, who would insist he go to the damn fool doctor.

The café buzzed with people, two, three or four to a table. Blah! Blah! Blah!

A woman entered with a brat, a boy of maybe three or four.

Olie scowled imagining that the brat would throw a tantrum if he couldn't have whatever.

Instead, the boy walked over and stared at him. "Why do you look so sad? Did one of your reindeer die?"

Julia has written and taken photos all her life and loves syncing up with friends.  Her blog can be found: https://viewsfromeverywhere.blogspot.com/ 

 

Rick is an aviation journalist and publisher of www.aviationvoices. com

 

D-L has had 17 fiction and non fiction books published. Check out her website at:. www.dlnelsonwriter.com

 

Rick created the art work using Midjourney.

 

 

Moments

 

 

Rick and I were reading in bed with Sherlock curled up between us.

Then the dog raised his head, barking at the top of his tonsils (Do dogs have tonsils?) andsprinted off the bed and ran into the living room.

Putting my book aside, I followed him. He was standing on his back legs, front paws on the window barely breathing between barks. He was seven kilos of tension.

I had no idea what was in the garden outside. The squirrels were probably sleeping. Cats were rare. Maybe the fox had come for his nighttime meal.

I pulled back the window drape and gasped. The moon was peeking through the branches that would be plum laden in a few months. 

Sherlock stopped barking, although I doubt that the moon was the reason.  

What followed was a moment of peace and beauty.

Fondue Drizzle

 

It's still cool enough for a fondue lunch. We tend to buy the cheese already grated and mixed.

Rick went out to buy Sterno. I've been told that in Switzerland fondue making is more of a man's thingie. I had no problem with letting him make lunch.

But then, he was able to find our tiny fondue pot, but not the container to hold the Sterno. We have not made fondue at home since we moved.

My taster had been set for fondue.

Rick had also bought Julia bread, our name for the Manora bread with a variety of seeds. It was our friend Julia, who introduced us to it.

"We'll melt the cheese on the stove with the garlic and white wine but put it on slices of Julia bread" I said.

Rick had his head in the frigo (fridge). He found sliced turkey and bacon. 

Voilà. We had a special open-faced sandwich that was wonderful. I'm sure we will make it again, not in place of the traditional fondue, but for another meal.

We've named it Fondue Drizzle.

I just hope they don't take our Swiss passports away.

Anti migrant? It could be you!

 

This morning I woke up very early in a warm bed. I needed a lamp to read my book before getting up.

Outside my window, a few birds landed in different branches in the tree in my garden.

My breakfast would be toast, maybe a left-over scone. Should I drink tomato or apple juice? I still have half the tea my husband brought me.

With every cell in my body, I'm aware of how lucky I am to have all of this unlike the millions who are living under bombs, without shelter, without food. 

I did nothing to deserve this. It was an accident of my birth.

Yet this could change in this crazy, violent world as people vie for power in too many countries.

If not by man, an earthquake, a volcano, a fire could change everything.

I will never understand the people who are anti-migrant, anti-refugee, people who probably would not be able to survive under the same conditions that those poor people have survived.

Happy Birthday Jo

 

Jo is two years old today and I need to buy him/her a birthday present. S/he hasn't grown at all. I suspect that the refrigerator is too cold.

My first stop is a bookstore. What does a two-year old like to have read to him/her? Is there anyone in the lab that will open the refrigerator door and read to him/her? I would need to call and ask.

S/he must be cold. A scarf? Hat? Sweater? jacket? Clothes,  don't come in xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxsmall. 

Toys? Lego? Fischer Price? A cuddly teddy bear? All might frustrate Jo since s/he has no arms or hands yet to play with his/her toys. Would s/he even recognize them without a developed brain?

Her parents are divorced. They can't decide on custody so Jo's mother hasn't picked Jo up. Since Jo lives in Alabama, it may be too late.

Jo's mother is furious because Jo lives in Alabama and there is some doubt that she will ever be able to claim Jo.

I suppose a music box might work. 

The beanpot

 

Eating at Le Cottage with my husband and a writer friend, I mentioned how the bean pot I use was used by my great grandmother, grandmother , mother and myself. It had been in the family since the Civil War. 

I imagined all the conversations that must have been held over it: the wars, the depression, the weather, what were the Sunday plans, my grandfather's garden. Politics, of course, with nary a good word about Roosevelt, Franklin. Teddy would have been praised.

I'm not sure whether it was my husband or me who suggested it would make a great saga. 

It wasn't me. I have too many projects. Still in the weeks that followed, I keep thinking of capturing my family history in a fictionalized book centered around the women who used the bean pot.

I've done a bit of research. I needed to know more about Beachmont and Google images had some photos. I was able to pull birth-death dates of my relatives from the internet. I kept thinking of scenes as memories of stories my grandmother and my mother had told me.

Here's what could be the opening (draft, rough draft, rough, rough), Time frame late 1800s.

Today, I sat down and free wrote the first draft of the first chapter.

The Bean Pot

Medora Young Stockbridge poured water into her beanpot after adding another log to the stove. The beans needed at least another hour before they would be done.

The smell of burning wood was a constant presence in her kitchen along with roasting meat, cookies, pies depending on whatever she was cooking. 

Cooking was about the only thing she enjoyed in keeping this house for her family. Deciding what to make than enjoying the preparation, watching it all come together. It was her reward later in the day after the tiresome chores of bedmaking, washing clothes, removing dust so it could resettle minutes later.

Her Stockbridges followed the New England Yankee tradition their ancestors: baked beans every Saturday night. The Puritans didn't cook on Sunday so the cold beans would be their Sunday meal or so she'd been told since her childhood. 

There was nothing religious about their Saturday night tradition. It just was what her parents and what Charles's parents had done. It was like brushing your teeth in the morning.

The bean pot had been a wedding present from her mother-in-law, who had written out the recipe that she had used since she had been a bride. 

Medora's own mother had taught her how to cook, including a slightly different version of baked beans. Her mother had added more molasses and a smidgeon of mustard.

Both recipes were similar, but after 24 years of preparing the same meal almost every Saturday night, she didn't need a recipe. Sometimes she made brown bread, sometimes cole slaw to serve with the meal. Sometimes they had ham with the meal, depending if there was enough money at the end of the week.

If there were beans left over she would eat them for her lunch on Monday, the same day she did the washing.

Her husband should be home soon. It didn't matter. He would think the beans were too soft or too hard. There was too much or too little molasses. Had she forgotten the onion? Why did she use so much mustard?

The almost same type of questions every week...she no longer listened.

Charles was always complaining. The children, Archer and Florence were too loud or too quiet. Their grades were too low although both were honor students or had been. Archer had graduated, but Florence still had two more years to go. 

They would be home soon. Florence had gone into Boston to research some subject of another at the Public Library.

Archer was walking along the beach with his girlfriend Maudie. Medora was sure that Maudie Keltie would be her daughter-in-law someday. She hoped so. Archer adored this girl, who was sweet and gentle.

She heard the front door slam and footsteps thumped up the stairs to their bedroom.

She set the table, making sure all the silverware was in matching positions on each placemat.

When she looked up, her husband was in the doorway. He was still good looking and had most of his brown hair with only a few strands of gray. The same with his beard, that he kept well trimmed. Granted he weighed a bit more than when they married, but at 20 he had been much too thin.

Then Medora noticed he still wore his winter coat and held the one suitcase he used when he needed to travel for business. 

"Where are you going?"

"I'm leaving. For good."

Before she could say anything, he disappeared much like a ghost would if there were any such things as ghost.

The front door opened and shut. 

For a few minutes she didn't move. Then she went to the door. 

His house key was on the oak wood table next to the dish that held the mail he hadn't taken with him.

Visit www.dlnelsonwriter.com

Less is More

 

Beginning writers are often told less is more.

Imagine my surprise when reading the wonderful book by Judi Dench who in describing acting in Shakespeare the same less is more philosophy can apply to actors.

From page 106:

"When you are young you don't dare to do less. Just because you can twitch and slide on the floor doesn't mean you should. Acting is learning how to edit. It's not just what you put in, probably but more important what you choose to chuck out.  Much better to do one thing than five. It's all a question of balance -- how much madness, how much passion. Learning how to convey just enough."

She may be talking about her portrayal of Ophelia in Hamlet but the same advice is good for poems, short stories, novels and even journalistic pieces.

Thanks Judi, for the reminder.

 

Free Write A Penguin and a Squirrel

Tuesday's Free Write was at Pages & Sips, a delightful English bookstore in Geneva's old town. After a lunch of pumpkin soup and a scone with goat's cheese, and honey covered nuts, Rick and I selected the squirrel and penguin statue on the window sill. We sent a photo to Julia who couldn't be with us but still did the free write.

Three very different approaches to the same prompt.

D-L's Free Write

Jana added a bit of red to the brown and held the paint-laden brush to the carving of the red squirrel.

She had had no problem with the penguin's black and white and just enough gray in the white to make it look like feathers.

Do penguins have feathers? This one would.

He, if the penguin was a he, held a tray with a tea pot and two cups and saucers. The pattern was roses of a dusty pink.

She wasn't sure where to place the squirrel in the painting. Maybe at the round table with its baby blue tablecloth and a floral arrangement in a white vase.

This was her first freelance assignment for the children' publisher. The title of the book was The Penguin and the Squirrel Have a Tea Party. 

It wasn't just that she needed the money, although she did. This was her chance to break into the world of publishing illustration.

She picked up the brush and started on the curly tail of the squirrel. An hour later she dropped the brush in a can of turpentine.

She looked at the painting.  She'd nailed it. Now, only if the publisher felt the same.

Rick's Free Write Mrs Squirrel and Mr Penguin

Melissa loved to go to the bookstore. Every week, usually on Fridays, her Mimi would take her on the 33 bus, then the 92 navette, up the winding streets to the top of the Olde Towne, to the P&S book shoppe and tea room. 

Melissa would race directly to the back room, the children’s room, to the table by the middle window. That’s where Mrs Squirrel and Mr Penguin lived – on the windowsill. 

While Mimi browsed the bookshelves, always keeping Melissa in sight, the little girl would make up adventures about the animals. Mrs Squirrel and Mr Penguin visit the Jet d’Eau. Mrs Squirrel and Mr Penguin go skiing in the Alps. And when she grew a bit older and Melissa started to travel, Mrs Squirrel and Mr Penguin in Paris… in London… in Rome.

Squirrel and Penguin never had first names, only pronouns. But what amazing personalities! Mrs Squirrel was mischievous, always getting into troubles, from which Mr Penguin had to rescue her. Penguin was cautious, afraid of most things, and had to be dragged on their adventures. Well, waddled.

One day recently, Melissa found herself in Olde Towne. And after lunch with friends at La Place de Bourg, she wandered up the hill, past the mairie and the armory, to see if the book shoppe was still there. To her delight, it was, as was the heart she had carved in the windowsill – where Mrs Squirrel and Mr Penguin still lived.

Julia's Free Write Unlikely friends

Here we are in the corner of what appears to be an empty flat: two stuffed animals, a penguin and a squirrel.

Squirrel: How did I get here? This isn't my idea of a tree, and where's the food?

Penguin: And I? See that sun outside, I'm so far from home with not a clue as to how I got here nor how to return. And my food - there's not even any water around, never mind fish! Oh - there is that gold fish in a bowl, but too far away for me to reach.

Squirrel: And why are we together? Such an unlikely pairing.

Penguin: We can't even escape as the window at our back is shut.

Squirrel: Oh, I get it!

Penguin: You do, what?

Squirrel: See that little boy and that girl over there? And see those books?

Penguin: Yes, I get it too: we are their pets put here while they find more books to read - Unlikely friends, far from our homes, but in a new one and the hearts of  our owners.

Julia has written and taken photos all her life and loves syncing up with friends.  Her blog can be found: https://viewsfromeverywhere.blogspot.com/ 

 

Rick Adams is an aviation journalist and publisher of www.aviationvoices. com

 

D-L has had 17 fiction and non fiction books published. Check out her website at:. www.dlnelsonwriter.com

 

The Pantry

 

I love pantries, although I have only lived in two houses with them. They are like a mini-store, but I don't need to go shopping to select the cereal, canned tomatoes or type of pasta that I want. It is already there.

I just have to go to the pantry. 

They also stimulate the decision on what to cook by discovering something behind cans on a shelf.

My first pantry was when I was a bride. We had rented an apartment on the second floor of my grandmother's childhood friend, a spinster hoarder. It had not been updated since pre-WWI. Our stove was like the sketch below.

 

The bathtub had claw feet. But the pantry was wonderful holding not only all our food but our dishes, pots and pans.

Our German Shepherd used the pantry when we forced  pills into her mouth for two weeks. Only later did I discover 14 little white pills in a pile hidden behind the door.

My current pantry is a flat in an ultra-modern house in Switzerland yet still has an old-fashioned feel. 

We happily store our canned and baking goods, mason jars and more. It doesn't have a door but a curtain. However, the door to the alcove where the pantry is located works to hide the pantry from those walking by. 

When one of us asks, "Do we have (fill in the blank) the other will answer, "It's in the pantry." Love it.

Note: visit www.dlnelsonwriter.com

 

My life in magazines

 

Magazines are going the way of the dodo. As advertising dries up, they have a choice between going bankrupt or going digital. It also means that reporting staff and freelance writers have less work.

I'm torn. Part of me loves reading stuff online. Half of me likes paper that I can read while curled up on the couch or take with me for lengthy visits in the bathroom. These are places where my tablet just isn't the same as paper.

Still there are certain magazines that I remember fondly.

Jack and Jill

Started in 1938, the magazine had fiction, non-fiction stories for children. The writers were top notch including Pearl Buck, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature among others.

I would wait for each issue and read it cover to cover.

Started in 1938 it has been sold and resold and is now published by the Children's Better Health Institute and directed to kids between six and 12.

Seventeen

As a teenager I awaited each new issue of Seventeen. I loved looking at the clothes and the latest lipstick color. Started in 1944, it was targeted to 13 and 19-year-old girls.

I just checked their website and the articles today seem vacuous at best, but I'm no longer in their target group. And then again wondering what the new lipstick color would be "in" was not a sign of great intellectual pursuit but normal for a teenager.

Playboy

My husband was a reader, and I found a lot of the articles interesting. The women shown had bodies that bore little resemblance to mine. 

It was monthly from 1953 until 2020 when it became bimonthly then quarterly and now it is just digital.

It was a joke that men read it for the articles and it did have some great articles. I did read the famous Jimmy Carter quote about "lusting in his heart" when it came out. 

Ladies Home Journal (1883-2016)

I read it as a teenager, loving the "Can This Marriage be Saved?" feature. What was most fascinating was the contrasting points of view. I preferred it to the others my mother subscribed to such as Good Housekeeping and Woman's Day.

Other Magazines of My Youth

There were Life, Colliers, Reader's Digest, The National Geographic and Saturday Evening Post. 

As for Reader's Digest, my mother could always beat me at the vocabulary quiz. When I can find a copy where I live in Switzerland, I always get them all right, but then again, I'm far more experienced and educated than when I was an 8th grader at the Parker Junior High.

The New Yorker

Even though I live in Europe, a year's subscription was one of my Christmas presents for several years. I loved it, although I found some of the articles over long. 

One of my problems was the magazines arrived to our French address and we were often in Switzerland and would return to find at least eight issues awaiting us. Had we changed the address, the problem would be the same.

Yes, I could read it online, but there was something about the paper. I'd read almost cover to cover, enjoying the articles, the cartoons, the funny little drawings. I'd finish it and put it the bathroom for my husband to read. 

When finished, he'd pass it on to a French friend who had spent years in the States. She loved that I would write notes to her in the margins. In turn she'd pass it onto another friend, a former New Yorker.

The Atlantic

Another bathroom magazine.

Some of the great literary figures of their time were supporters of its founding. including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Herman Melville, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Nathaniel Hawthorne and the standard throughout the decades hasn't diminished since 1857 even though it was sold and resold.

Their articles tend to be shorter than that of The New Yorker but still in depth. It has continued with a paper copy.

Politically it is liberal and has been since endorsing Abraham Lincoln for President.

At the moment it is the only subscription we have.

Paris Match and other French/Swiss Magazines

I tend to buy Paris Match which is combination current events, celebrity publication. I learn about French culture and sometimes American and English. I was impressed with the article about John Irving, whom I did my Masters thesis but also Amélie Nothomb, who was one of the first French authors I read regularly.

France has a wonderful selection of history magazines. I used to buy one for my frequent train trips between Geneva and Argelès-sur-Mer near the Spanish border.

I hope publishers of not just magazines but news publications find a way to make paper profitable, but I’m not holding my breath. Sigh.

Note: Visit www.dlnelsonwriter.com