Retirada woman

In January 1939 over 100,000 refugees from Spain arrived in Argelès-sur-mer France. The tiny village didn't know what to do with the influx and set up concentration camps on the beach. No one talked about it until about a decade ago when oral histories, photos and stories began to emerge. This history has been captured in a museum and memorials throughout the area, thank goodness.

Fast forward to today. There is a man in Argelès that looks like my dad's twin. When I first mentioned it to him, he put up barriers, but little by little we are now smiley-chatty people. It helped when I showed him a photo of my dad and also when my daughter picked him out of a crowd as looking like her grandfather.

He is usually with a woman that seemed a good deal older. As a cougar myself I thought it might be his wife but it could be his mother. It was nothing I would ask, of course.

Then in a conversation the other day, she revealed she had come up from Spain in February 1939, in the second wave of refugees. That would make her somewhere in her late 70s or early 80s. She would have been too young to talk about the freezing walk over the mountains.

Growing up in America I read about history in many eras, but living here I've met people who experienced it first hand. Llara's German host who lived through the U.S. Bombing of Nürnberg, a co-worker whose mother was grabbed by the Nazis as they walked down the street in Evian are just two examples. The woman was destined for Auschwitz but the war ended before her deportation. I am waiting to be introduced to a man who fought alongside of Dany Cohn-Bendit in 1968 in Paris. That makes history real.

When I can stand in front of the tombs of William the Conqueror, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Elizabeth I, the place where Mary Queen of Scots was crowned, the battle field of Bull Run, the events of the past transcend time.

History should be real to us. As they say those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.

Justin in Brownface

Justin Trudeau did a dumb thing. The Canadian press is having a field day. Racism does exist in Canada as it does everywhere, but overall the Canadians are not as bad as their southern neighbors. It's a low bar.

Some American politicians wore blackface in their youth. Usually, they were from the south where racism prompted songs like Strange Fruit www.youtube.com/watch?v=Web007rzSOI by Billie Holliday, about black men hung for being black. That is racism to the nth degree.

In the 50s in small town Massachusetts we had minstrel shows. Our racism was not so much as white men and women in black face as not allowing black Celtics star Bill Russell to join town organizations. He was welcomed at the White House but not the local country club.

Maybe it can be argued that little racist actions can morph into major racist actions. Maybe, maybe not. Inconsideration, insensitivity is far different from exclusion or worse murder.

I decry racism in all forms. But I also decry how the press goes on major attacks against politicians for some infringement not just of racism but some stupid thing. Howard Dean's scream was an example. Or Lyndon Johnson pulling his dog's ears. Mention it, yes, but let's deal with more important issues based on actions that actually can help or hurt people. Don't let the smaller issues, however real, drown up the major issues affecting our world.

It's okay to look at the strokes in a painting up close, but step back and look at the painting as a whole.

Socks

I do not like boring things...cars, computer backs, telephones, etc.

Our gray car has butterflies on it. So easy to spot among the thousands of other gray cars.

My laptop has snowflakes.

My first mobile phone case was a fuzzy Dalmatian dog. It's head, legs and tails stuck out. I try not to use a mobile if I can help it, but I did love walking down the street talking to a stuffed dog.

When I was in high school and everyone had white bucks that tied. Mine were the only pair that zipped.

For years socks were boring. Last year we found some unusual ones. I love the popcorn design (second from left above). Not shown is my Eleanor of Aquitaine socks. Not everyone can wear socks that pays tribute to a powerful Middle Ages Queen, wife and mother of kings, and influential in her own right. I like to think when I wear them, I am more powerful, a bit like a magic cape.

I needed new low boots. On the internet I found a company that made all kinds of non-boring boots. I had wanted an unusual pair since a good friend had found some spectacular non-boring boots in Freiburg when we were on an adventure in Germany.

It isn't because I want to stand out. I want to be able to look at things and think it is pretty or interesting not boring same-old, same-old.

Friends

FRIENDS BY GENDER

I much prefer women friends to men friends overall.

If I meet ten women, nine will have the potential of being real friends.

It is different with men. If I meet ten men, one will have the potential to become a real friend, but their friendship could be stronger and more reliable than at least eight of the women friends.

Men and women don't have the same purpose as friends. A masculine point of view is not that of the women and vice versa. There is nothing wrong with that. 

Not to get all Sally met Harry about it, but adding sex to a friendship carries a price usually not worth being paid. It is possible to have friends of the opposite sex without a sexual relationship. Oh, I may look and think a male friend is anywhere from cute to drop dead handsome, but that does

Of course, as a happily married woman that possibility is off the table. And prior to being married, married men were not eligible sexual partners. Many reasons:

1. I did not want to do to another woman what was done to me...sisterhood
2. I want to be the main woman, not second best
3. My good male friends respected the boundaries of the relationship
4. The faithfulness of my married male friends was one of the attributes I respected.

Woman and men friends are different. The topics discussed may be different too. 

I realized that when I worked with a group of women and one man, I considered him a friend. He got really good at discussing women's topics. Then one day a man was in the office and the subject turned to the Boston Celtics. He grabbed onto that as a drowning man might grab a branch offered from shore. 

Friendship isn't just topics talked about. It is loyalty and consideration.

I just lost one of my good friends although because of distance we haven't seen much of each other. That does not negate the decades of sharing and support. Another is described as the brother I always wanted.

My husband is also a friend with whom I can discuss almost anything. But that doesn't mean we don't deal with friends of our own sex differently. He is the married man that I will sleep with, make love with a reasonable exception to the no married men rule.

An anthropologist friend once said it is not reasonable to expect your spouse to meet all your needs. She added that is what women friend's are for. I think that is true in cross-gender friendship. No one person meets all our needs. Too much pressure. As long as the loyalty, consideration and the cheering of well being is there...we are lucky to have friends...male or female.

Bill Venter 1937-2019

I inherited the artist Bill Venter from Muffy Wheeler, my predecessor at Polaroid Credit Union. I thought since he'd done good work for her, I should give him a chance. Little did I know, not only would we produce some really good materials, we would have decades of friendship.

I'd walk down to his studio, past the caramel-smelling Necco factory. Often we go to lunch after a hunt for his keys. I bought him a locator, but instead of responding to a clap, it went off to a laugh.

We talked about everything. He coached kids' football. One of his three sons, all of whom he adored, went to Boston Latin with my daughter. His boys. Later he would have granddaughters.

When I changed jobs and was working in Maynard, rather than have him spend a couple of hours in the car, he stopped off with projects on his way home.

There was the night my roommates and I served him a Shepherds Pie, only we forgot the meat. Or the night he dropped artwork off during the last episode of Mash. We'd turned the house into the Mash site. Years later he gave me a poster of the Mash crew that went with me to Europe specially framed and originally matted.

My daughter's cat adored him. Pumpkin wouldn't leave him alone. Sometimes she had to settle curling up in his hat.

There was the night my daughter and I were putting together the new microwave table. He speeded up the process considerably (although there was much discussion) and enjoyed the first cocoa nuked in the new machine.

Whenever I came back to Boston from Europe where I'd moved, we would meet up for lunch and catch up. It was as if we'd seen each other a few days before.

When I met my now husband and told him, he said that he'd have to check him out and give his approval. In Cambridge we shared a meal. Fortunately, he gave Rick the okay, and Rick understood why I valued Bill's friendship so much.

Tonight, Facebook carried the message of his death. As a writer I should be able to do better than the cliché "a punch in the stomach" but that's what it felt like.

We were coming to Boston for Christmas, and I hoped to see him. Now I wish I could tell him, how much his passing hurts. He'd tell me not to hurt.

One of the things about aging, is we lose we people care for. I will never get good at it and yes, I can be grateful for having such wonderful people, wonderful men, like Bill in my life.

minimalism

Our cleaning lady was upset that she broke one our mugs. I wasn't. I buy them from the potter around the corner and she always has them in stock to counter my frequent breakage. Once I even broke a new mug before I'd walked ten steps from the store.

For a crazy moment I thought, maybe I should buy three for a total of eight. Then I thought why? We've never, ever had to use more than six at a time.

We often entertain for breakfast and when we do, we serve coffee we use the 10 Euro demitasse set found at a vide grenier.

Our champagne glasses are six. I love them.

Those two items would be hard to replace. I handle with extra care.


When we entertain large groups say for a tree-decorating or some other reason just to get together, I find pretty paper dishes and napkins (we use cloth for everyday and under four people for dinner or breakfast.)

I do like pretty entertaining, however, there is no way I would ever want my cupboards stocked with dishes I bring in out infrequently. Give me less.

And as for entertaining it is the company, conversation and food that is important.

Songs

Sometimes when one hears a song, it stays and replays in your head.

I loved the folk singer / song writer Bob Franke. In the 70s I listened to him sing at coffee university in Harvard Square. I bought a CD and didn't listen to for a few years. The on the trip from Geneva to the south of France, I played the song.

The URL is for the sign "For Real."

The words kept playing in my mind, but not the melody, but the words on what was said between lines. I started thinking more as a writer than a music lover.

The details of the observations revealed how the widow copes. The writer sees the pain.

Death took the husband of a neighbor of mine, on a highway, with a drunk at the wheel. She told me "Keep your clean hands off the laundry he left, and don't tell me you know how I feel." She had a tape that he'd sent her from a Holiday Inn, and she never played it much in the day, But when I heard him say he loved her through the window at night, I just stayed the hell away. 
 
The same song talks about his relationship with his father. It is easy to imagine how they disagreed during the childhood. 

My father never put his parachute on in the Pacific back in World War Two; He said he'd rather go down in familiar flames than get lost in that endless blue, And some of that blue got into my eyes, and we never stopped fighting that war, Until first understood about endlessness, and I loved him like never before.

He talks about his current relationship with his wife and daughter. 

It's lucky that my daughter got her mother's nose, and just a little of her father's eyes, And we've got just enough love that when the longing takes me, well, it takes me by surprise, And I remember that longing from my highway days, though I never could give it a name; It's lucky I discovered in the nick of time that the woman and the child aren't to blame

He takes the three stories and then goes into his own feelings both good and bad.

For the hole in the middle of a pretty good life, I only face it 'cause it's here to stay: Not my father, nor my mother, nor my daughter, nor my lover, nor the highway made it go away, And there's too much darkness in an endless night to be ashamed of the way I feel. I'll be kind to my loved ones, not forever, but for real. Some say that God is a lover; some say it's an endless void; Some say both, and some say She's angry, and some say just annoyed, But if God felt a hammer in the palm of His hand, then God knows the way we feel; And love lasts forever, forever and for real. Love lasts forever.

As a writer myself, I often use music to start a writing day when I don't use a writing warm up myself.

I have no idea how long at night when I close my eyes at night will Bob Franke's song go through my mind as I fall asleep. Maybe another song will take its place. Maybe it will be a passage from some book I'm reading.

Memory tastes

My husband could have brought me something back from the states such as a bracelet, a ring, etc.

He brought me something far much more precious. Two ears of FRESH corn on the cob and two raisin cinnamon bagels from Dunkin Donuts. He threw in a couple of muffins too.

My idea of corn on the cob is to have the water boiling as it is being picked. The longer the time between picking and eating reduces the wonderfulness.

In Europe we don't have road side stands selling freshly picked corn: local veggies and fruits yes, but not corn.

The last "REAL" corn I had was the very end of the growing season three years ago when we were in New England. Canned corn is as much like the freshly picked U.S. corn as a Elephant is to a Fly. Most of the time I don't even bother.

As for cinnamon raisin bagels, I can get them at Morrison's in Edinburgh, but Scotland is a long way to go for a bagel. I can make them, but they aren't as good as store bought.

So, keep your blitz and bangles. My husband knows what makes me happy beyond reason.

Medicine

I joke that I take enough medicine in the morning to consider it breakfast. It's blood pressure, anti-cancer and anti-acids.  You can also add in vitamins and calcium making a total of six to swallow.

Also, it has been years, make that decades, since I've seen one of those horrible-to-open little orange bottles. We don't have children in the house, but in case one visits, I keep the medicines out of child reach.

I don't miss the bottles at all.

I still would like to live a pill free life.

Dog Walk

 Sherlock had a few disappointments on his two-hour walk this morning.

 The seven o'clock church bells were followed by Sherlock kissing me. Normally, Rick would then get up and take him for a walk. Rick is visiting his mom in New York. I dressed quickly.

Outside the sun was still yawning. Sherlock knew where he wanted to go -- the allotments. I followed.

He loves being loose. However, this morning, as we went to the grassy area, just after the vegetable gardens, where he loves to do zoomies, a big black dog was laying there in wait, not to hurt him but to play with him. The dog's head was the size of Sherlock, and he was afraid. The owner did get his pup, and she was a pup, under control and Sherlock could start his zoomies (running in crazy circles).

Part of his ritual with Rick is that at the end of each loop, he gets a treat. His look at my treatless pat was disbelief.

On the walk home there was a gate he could not enter. Then he wanted to use another path, that I suspect Rick takes him on, but I offered a walk along the river. River is a loose term. It is dry most of the year. Sherlock happily trotted along until the embankment by the boules court, decided he wanted to cross the bridge and up the hill toward home.

He did take a left by the boys (L'Hostalet) where we were surprised to see two friends with their son, who is flying back to the UK. Sherlock accepted his compliments.

Once home, I thought he would be tired, but no...I was presented with a toy. About five minutes of playing, he turned around and went to sleep. So did I.

9/11

Around 3 p.m. (15h) every afternoon I would check the news on the Internet. My office, across and down the street from the Geneva UN, looked on a tree with a bird's nest. The fledglings had flown away to make their own lives.

That day, 9/11, CNN reported that a plane had hit the World Trade Center. I chocked it up to pilot error until a few minutes later, a second plane went through the second tower.

I worked for an international organization that wrote standards. We had over 30 nationalities on our 97-person staff. There were two other Americans, one a man in the next office. I ran next door. Then I took the elevator to the Secretary General's office where his secretary who was a dual American and Swiss, looked up.

Trying to get through to any news organization on the net became almost impossible. The man next door succeeded with the newspaper El Pais. Information was scanty at best, although it was obvious that it was a terrorist attack.

I ran home less than 20 minutes away from the office,  turned on CNN and called back to the office to let my cohorts know what was happening.

I lived in what I called the international ghetto. The apartment complex was so close to the alphabet international organizations that I had not met a native Swiss for the first few years I lived there. Most neighbors worked for those agencies.

Some neighbors had become close friends, but others were of the Bonjour or Bonsoir greeting level. We had a vague ideal of our nationalities other than to be aware they were from every continent. Over the next few days almost every one of them expressed their condolences to me.

On the bus a few days later when I was talking to a friend, a Muslim woman came up to me, and asked if I were American. I said yes. "I am so, so sorry," she said. There were tears in her eyes. She was not the only Muslim who expressed their condolences to me, one nationality, feeling the pain of another nationality.

My neighbor and good friend, a Syrian, had an American staying with her. She could not get home until the travel ban was lifted. It was strange for me NOT to be able to get home. Always, I thought if my daughter or step-mother needed me, all I had to do was cross the park to the airport and get the next plane to Boston.

That Logan, my airport, had become the airport of choice for a terrorist attack did not compute.

There were the revelations over the next few days that the brother of a coworker was in one of the towers. I learned that a friend who worked in New York was safe. An Israeli writer friend had sent her son to New York a week before because she thought he would be safer there. He lived within blocks of the towers. He, too, was okay.

My relationship to the attack was, at best, as an outsider with inside connections.

So many years later, we go on with our normal lives, but their are families in 62 countries for whom the loss was personal and is personal and will always be personal.  9/11 was not a political event for them. If only the hatred that caused the attacks, all attacks, all war would go away.

Here's the list by country of victims.

1. United States 2,605
2. United Kingdom 67
3. Dominican Republic 47
4. India 41
5. South Korea 28
6. Canada 24
7. Japan 24
8. Colombia 18
9. Jamaica 16
10. Philippines 16
11. Mexico 15
12. Trinidad and Tobago 14
13. Ecuador 13
14. Australia 11
15. Germany 11
16. Italy 10
17. Bangladesh 6
18. Ireland 6
19. Pakistan 6
20. Poland 6
21. Israel 5
22. Peru 5
23. Portugal 5
24. Argentina 4
25. France 4
26. Lebanon 4
27. Romania 4
28. Brazil 3
29. Ethiopia 3
30. Guyana 3
31. Malaysia 3
32. Bermuda 2
33. China 2
34. D.R. Congo 2
35. El Salvador 2
36. FR Yugoslavia 2
37. Ghana 2
38. Haiti 2
39. Hong Kong 2
40. Jordan 2
41. New Zealand 2
42. Paraguay 2
43. South Africa 2
44. Sweden 2
45. Switzerland 2
46. Belarus 1
47. Belgium 1
48. Chile 1
49. Honduras 1
50. Indonesia 1
51. Ivory Coast 1
52. Kenya 1
53. Lithuania 1
54. Moldova 1
55. Netherlands 1
56. Nigeria 1
57. Russia 1
58. Spain 1
59. Taiwan 1
60. Ukraine 1
61. Uzbekistan 1
62. Venezuela 1

He's back

Friends joke we are the most romantic couple in Argelès, although now there is a rival couple. Considering how much I like the woman and how pleased I am that she has found happiness, we will happily share the title.

We were in danger of losing the title not for any bad thing.

Although allegedly retired, Rick has many clients for projects he enjoys. Unfortunately several major projects all came due about the same time leaving him strapped for time. I wanted to support him the best I could. This is not to say, that it was bad. It was different for reasons beyond our control.

I am jealous of his ability to concentrate. I imagine when he's involved and I'd warn him that the world was ending, he would barely look up. I suspect he would still be working as the world lay crumbled at his feet. Sometimes a leaf against my office window will distract me. If he could give me a concentration transfusion, I'd hold my arm out in a second, I don't care how hard it is to find my veins.

When I break through he is almost all there with me. His attention when I had an emergency room (I'm fine) to the hospital was there. I feel badly I delayed his projects, but we did have books to read and time to talk and even laugh.

And he kept the romantic feeling more than alive when he and our florist appeared with this bouquet.

He met his deadlines a couple of days ago.

His next project was/is to visit his mother in the States, something, I encouraged with all my heart and soul. It made sense that I stay home with the dog, my decision. Yesterday, I hugged him goodbye as he left for the Barcelona airport.

Last night he returned just a few hours later. His flight had been cancelled, and he drove the two hours back home. He has rebooked for next week.

The morning I realized that without the pressure of deadlines, the old line of communication is there again. We shared a breakfast at LaNoisette. We chat as we did before the pressure.

It is hard to explain exactly the difference. I certainly don't want to be 100% in his mind or have him 100% in mine. I like that we each have independent interests, some of which we share verbally. If he ever gave up even one golf game because of me, I would be upset. His passion and ideas make me as happy if not happier than they do him.

In a couple it is impossible to have the same level of romance as when they are first together. Life becomes reality. Each person sees each not at their best. There's nothing romantic about watching your loved partner vomit or even stagger back from the bathroom at 3 a.m. Daily chores, unforeseen problems crop up and need to be dealt with. Certainly not as much fun as a romantic dinner, a play or even a walk holding hands but part of the building blocks in a marriage.

What is much better is the comfort of rolling over in bed and the sense of security that he's breathing, to be able to touch him and know all is right in my world (in today's crazy world all's right with the world is impossible).

After being happily single for over 40 years, it still amazes me some six years on, that I can connect to this man, the way I do. That he connects back is almost an electric current. Or maybe he connects and I respond. I don't understand the bond, but I celebrate it.

If this blog sounds like a complaint it is not. It is an observation.

I laid down to read and fell asleep a little while ago. When I woke, he had a box of memories he'd found some dating back to his childhood and he showed them to me. Those few moments on connectedness meant more to me than a jewel.

Clean underwear

My grandmother, a very proper Victorian lady told me to always wear clean underwear in case I met Rock Hudson. That always confused me, because she also told me how to keep a boy from touching me when we danced And I doubt even if someone said Rock was gay, she would have understood.

Most of my friends were told to always have clean underwear in case they went to the hospital.

The other day I went to the hospital, but I was still in my PJs, a very pretty pair given to me by a friend as a joke. We were planning a PJ coffee hour sometime.

The PJs could be mistaken for regular slacks worn in this beach town and the top was like any plain black t-shirt.

My underpants were brand new.

Before the medics put me in the ambulance I put on my sneakers. Thus I looked as if I could walk through the village.

Some nine hours later, I left the hospital with no medical problems and dressed properly in a way that would have pleased my mother and grandmother, Rock Hudson not withstanding.

French village life

We have a vacation home on a tiny street in a French village. We know our neighbors both permanent and holiday.

Thursday, I was rushed to the hospital with chest pains (it was not heart). The SAMU (emergency team) arrived and took me by ambulance to the hospital. At the end of our street, our neighbor Chrissie watched.

Husband Rick went around the corner to Chez Elisabeth, the green grocer, and asked her to contact friend Lydia to walk and feed dog Sherlock.

Some nine hours later I was home with a clean bill of health.

Here's where the community comes in. The marché had been set up. Naturally Elisabeth wanted to know how I was but so did Rosemarie, Julie, Franck, Arnaud and about everyone else I passed. Keeping secrets, not that I wanted to, would not be easy.

It is lovely that people care. I kept apologizing that I had worried them.

Being part of a community makes life much, much better.

Socialized medicine

I hear Americans say they don't want socialized medicine. They don't want to pay for someone else. I would like to remind them it pays for them too.

Medical care coming out of taxes is return on investment. I have been under many medical systems. I currently am under the French and Swiss.

I had a recent emergency trip to the hospital for chest pains (not a heart attack). Here's what I got for my 49 Euros or $54.

• Xrays
• 3 blood tests
• 3 saline solutions
• 3 electrocardiograms 
• professional consultants throughout my 7 hours in the emergency room
• lunch (not all that tasty but I was hungry)
  

Also was impressed that the emergency service arrived with three people (trained nurses and/or trained emergency attendants) within 15 mins, to be followed by 3 medical doctors with all necessary equipment. Sorta a variation on the how many clowns will get into a car...how many medical people will fit into my bedroom?

Had I been in the US, the worry about the cost, probably would have given me a heart attack.

I am happy to pay taxes in France and the US. I get a lot of value for my money in terms of making the entire society a better place to live. Neither country is perfect, far from it. But when the Mastercard ad says "Priceless" that's how I would value my "Peace of Mind" when it comes to my socialized medical care.

Alexa Conversation II

Alexa: TomTom what are you doing here. They left.

TomTom: They're just going to the pub.

Alexa: And suppose they say something interesting. What if they are plotting to give water to immigrants in the desert?

TomTom: More likely they are strategizing a game of darts.

Alexa: You are shirking your responsibilities of trying to make sure you get down every word they say.

TomTom: Not really. Most of what the say is boring like where they should have lunch. And they often ignore what I tell. Last week they were heading north and then veered south to visit some boring museum.

Alexa: How do you know it wasn't a secret meeting.

TomTom: I can't record them inside anyway. Chill, Alexa.

Alexa: You chill. You don't have to listen them talk baby talk to the dog, never mind how boring their sex is. Kiss-Kiss, chuga, chuga and it is all over.

Tom Tom: I am going to ask to be assigned to more interesting people.

Alexa: Not a bad idea, maybe I will too.

Mea Culpa

Rick dragged me kicking and screaming mentally on the long route from Geneva, Switzerland to Argelès-sur-mer, France. My preferred method would have been a "Beam me down there, Scotty" and in lieu of that the autoroute would be my next choice.

Our last trip up was 12 hours because of tourist traffic, and Rick had no desire to duplicate that nightmare.

Me: What are our goals?

Rick: To get there and see some new things.

Okay, I gave in almost graciously. I am so glad I did.

Although I tend to fall asleep when a key is turned in on in a car's ignition, I was awake enough to see how beautiful the mountains and rocks were. Each turn was better than the one before.

We stopped for lunch in Serres, which was rebuilt after Richelieu destroyed it in 1633. It is amazing how often we stumble across history. The lamb in the tagine was so tender I could have chewed it with my tongue.

There were many "Stops!s" to take a photo of a statue or some other site such as a apple used for marketing the regional produce.

I have no problem admitting when my husband is right. He kindly does not rub it in. And I do appreciate the 9+ hours he was behind the wheel to get us safely to our destination.

Sunday

We still aren't in our home after the flood, but Rick and I are happily and temporarily housed in my former home near the lake thanks to my good friend. I lived here nearly 11 years and despite decorating changes the walls which are impregnated with good memories are not erased. Over the years we shared a lot, with support and understanding combined with good meals, adventures and laughter.

So it is nice to be back. We still try and do lunches when we can, but the extra time is a plus.

Sherlock has decided he likes the garden. My friend has been made part of his pack. His refusal to leave her to go for a walk was just one hint of his feelings.

To keep track of who is in and who is out, there is a sign out/sign in board in the entry way. We aren't listed by name, but under "Sherlock and parents."

In some places, Sundays are like any other day. In Switzerland stores are closed and neighbors are expected to be quiet. There is a sense of calm.

We woke to cool, fresh air coming in the window. "Let's take Sherlock to the Reserve." It is a place he loves to run free, but he hasn't been there since Spring.

His desire to get in the car was limited after three very long drives in a week, but as soon as he realized where we were taking him, he was out of the car and down the familiar path to the ruin of a château where he had spent many happy days during the winter. It answered our question, would he remember? He did.

He remembered the beaver dam and the sand box where he did zoomies and tried to dig to Brazil.

We loved the views from the walls of the ruin.

Besides the dog, coming back to a quiet day of writing, chatting, watching Dateline and just being peaceful was a joy. Well quiet except when people walked by the garden and he needed to share the information.

Since both Rick and I don't really have weekends as such with our different writing projects today was a gift even if we were writing. Hard to describe how it is different and joyful, it just was.

Alexa Conversation 1

It is 9 pm. My husband has just finished a dish of popcorn as we watch TV.

He takes the bowl to the kitchen.

Alexa: Don't forget to put the dish in the dishwasher.

Husband: Did you say something?

Me: It was Alexa. Lydia was here today and we were talking about how you always leave your dishes in the sink. Alexa must have been listening.

Husband: Returns to living room. Dish is in the sink. Alexa! Thanks

Alexa: You're welcome.

Words and numbers

I admit it, I am not good with numbers in any form. This goes back to early attempts at math. In math class I never cared if train A left the station at 10:00 and if it traveled at 50 mile how long did it take to reach (you know the rest of it). 

My reaction? 

Look at a timetable. 

Now I’d say, check the internet.

Growing up in Reading, MA there were a few major road numbers: 128, 28, 29 and 93. I didn’t think of those as numbers but names. Traveling around the area with my mother, I needed neither name nor number to get to my destination. I just knew how to get to Andover, Woburn, Winchester, etc.  

I had been going to Paris for a good ten years. I felt I knew the Metro really well as I bounced around the city. When I went to Paris with a friend, she said “We’ll take line l.”

“Line 1?”

She explained the metro lines were all numbered. I hadn’t known that. When I wanted to go someplace on the Metro, I looked at the map in the stations, checked the station I wanted, looked at the direction of the Metro heading there and hopped on the correct train.

Rick is the driver in our couple. He talks about the A7 and A9 in France. I never knew roads to places like Barcelona or Marseilles had numbers.

Today we went to Davos. I have lived in Switzerland since 1990. I didn’t need to know numbers. I would follow signs to Bern, Neuchâtel or wherever I was going. I got there. This trip I noticed numbers on the signs.

Numbers are necessary. Math is necessary. There was one time I had shared responsibility of a multi-million dollar budget. The company survived me.

I have trouble visualizing when someone reads off a number like 95 in English. In French-French when they say quatre-vingt-quinze I have to think to do some basic math 20x4+15. Even in the Swiss nonante-cinq it takes a minute for me to understand it. In German fünffundneunzig gives me pause before I am comfortable with 95.

I enter every cent I spend on an Excel spread sheet so I know where my money goes. I do use the automatic addition symbol. It must work. For the last couple of decades I have had 0 debt and bought a studio cash.

I am grateful to engineers and others who can work with numbers and make life better for us all. It is a profession, I would not have had much success in.

Meanwhile, just like some people can sing but not dance and others can dance but not sing, I can write but not do much with numbers. Others can do miracles with numbers but cannot write. Better for the world if we all have different strengths.