EVANGELINE

Family dinners should be a time for emotional, intellectual and cultural stimulation as well as nutrition. I’ve pretty well abandoned TV because family dinners depicted there are usually generational, sibling and Freudian rivalries. The only common thread to real and fictional family dinners is humor. I miss dinners, not merely family ones, of Savannah where, once past sex, politics and religion, wit and humor are essentials. There, one is at a real disadvantage if not well read and educated… unless they bring wholesale humor with them. Some of my best, recent, Savannah memories are amusing table talk with the late writer/editor Arthur Gordon and friend John discussing hoisted upon one’s own petard or which monuments in Savannah’s squares should be replaced and with whom. You’d better know your American History before wading into the latter.
This week’s multiple family dinners covered Namibia and Cajuns, two totally unconnected topics. I knew nothing about Namibia but quickly learned since I was told my oldest son was there and offering a bribe/trip over to his nephew, my teenage grandson. Hmmm…
My father was responsible for my basic knowledge of Cajuns (of Acadia) which has been expanded by frequent visits to family in Louisiana and other trips just because until the 60s it had the only big city in the South. I don’t know who brought up the subject and we were three Southerners and two Nons but I believe it was one of the Nons. After my oldest grandson gave a humorous, verbal Cajun imitation, I shared the first fact my father had given me: that they were kicked out of their original homes in Canada and New England which immediately shocked the Nons. My son, well versed in history, took up the explanation as I mused that such very well educated people could not have known it (and so the previously mentioned rivalry evidently persists).
Since, I’ve spent pleasant hours this week with Mr. H.W. Longfellow, generally considered our nation’s best poet, and his Acadian masterpiece, Evangeline. What DO they teach in schools these days?

Ramblin' Unwreck

As always I am scouring the internet booksellers for long-out-of-print books with little or no luck. When I do find one I covet, it is usually priced in triple digits in some weird currency (meaning anything other than $US). And the current value of our dollar vs the Euro or GBP discourages plunging head long into international shopping. So if any know where I can get a copy of the story of my life by G. Allan Heron or Thomas Gerald Lamford without mortgaging my grand childrens’ future, do let me know. I have my favorite person, Trevor, working on it on the other side of the pond.
Meanwhile the weather, though not the road traffic, in Roswell is Idyllic. It’s our dry season so I’m having to hand water the last of my summer Impatience, lime “tree” and one-bloom-snapdragons but my bonsai can flourish on its own. The only negative is that ragweed and its equally toxic cousins are still spilling pollen everywhere so I’m a bit nasal. Have cut off the AC and not needed heat yet so my energy consumption is almost zilch. The deciduous trees are stingy with their Autumn pigments so we’re still quite green.
Had to take my son to NE Atlanta in rush hour traffic Thursday... a bit like joining the July 4th Indianapolis 500 mid race. Made it almost home (300 feet from the Chattahoochee River bridge) without losing my dignity, if indeed I have such a thing. Fortunately was well off I-85, I-285 and GA-400 so traffic was consistently about 50 MPH bumper to bumper. A young man in an over-sized truck cut me off from the shoulder to my right (there wasn't even an emergency lane there) and glanced in his rear view to see if I was going to ram him. That one glance was enough for me to distinctly but quietly enunciate my feelings which caused even that young buck to blush. I din't hit him, of course. He was far too lovely and I'm not so old as to not appreciate that. Unfortunately my words reflected more on his family, particularly the maternal side. Unfortunately the English Language seems to offer few curses that do otherwise. On the other hand my late, angelic looking Mother told me the reason English was spoken worldwide was because it was the only language that allowed a cursing person to peel the paint off a barn at 50 feet.

OOPS!

I was celebrating Christmas in October yesterday and so missed my usual posting. (Can’t wait to see if anyone noticed.)
My daughter in law gave me a day at the theater and dinner but her life got immediately out of hand. (Should have told her marriage does that to one but figured it was too much the mother-in-law thing to do.) So at last we got around to observing it yesterday. The delay wasn’t her fault, my son’s schedule and mine played a part also.
The play, Meet my Husbands by Fred Carmichael, was a delightful two-act play at Roswell’s Kudzu Theater. Unknown to me, my son had to forgo taking his youngest son to the Braves baseball game to accommodate taking us to the stage performance. He sent him and a friend there instead. If I’d known, I’d have postponed it again but I’m not sure I have that authority.Dinner on the patio of a Greek restaurant followed and the wonderful early Autumn weather was perfect for it. Hadn’t had Musaka (you know: ground beef, eggplant and potatoes with a sauce) in years and it was just as delicious as I remembered it. A lovely Christmas present just in time for Halloween.