Friday
22 December 2017

— Second day in a row of a sunny dawn.

God Morning All,

Yesterday evening, I had a pleasant Skype with the birthday girl. She was on her iPhone in her car, but was quick to say Ryan was driving. He’d taken the afternoon off to go to Plymouth with her, so that after she’d seen her four kiddos (and/or their parents), he could take her out for a birthday dinner. (Yes, by the way, it’s the same Plymouth where she was born these gathering years ago!)

When we moved to Arlington in 1953, we had—at first--a party line, and you rang up the operator to make a call. If you got lucky, the call went through, and you got to speak to the disembodied voice of your friend. But here was I, yesterday, talking face-to-face with my daughter as she rode through the New Hampshire hills. For free. I guess all those young whipper-snappers running around today take that for granted, but to me it remains flat-out miraculous.

My set of spare keys has, needless to say, returned. They are back on their usual hook in the kitchen, smugly saying, “Well, old duffer, now that you know we’re worth over a 100 bucks, perhaps you’ll show us a little more respect.”  

At the bottom of our driveway stood our old, rusty, and leaky postbox on a sturdy arsenic-treated four-x-four. After deciding a couple of weeks ago reading damp mail wasn’t the thrill it used to be, I purchased a new box, took the old one off the post, and put the new one on. A two-hour project performed pretty much in the kind of rain that floated Noah’s traveling zoo. To get the old box off, I had to unlock it to get to the screws on the back side. (Virtually all postboxes in Denmark have locks, as opposed to in America where there is a law stating you will be castrated and sent to prison for 100 years for some much as putting someone else’s flag up without cause.)

Once I convinced the screws of the new box to quit falling into the hedge and hiding, once I was about as wet as someone shoved off a dock, the rain sliding down my forehead and along the ridge of my nose, once I finally got the last screw in, I picked up the old box, carried it up the drive, and put it on a ledge beside the front door. I should have put it in the garage, of course, but all’s I could think about by then was getting inside and into a hot shower. 

(Well, I was also thinking: Just out of curiosity, Bheka, is it possible you are even dumber than you look? Who said that postbox had to be replaced on this unusually soggy afternoon? It’s not exactly your daily dance card is so filled up.) (Yeah, well, and also just out of curiosity, feel free to blow it out you backside sideways, because whaddaya know about the sanctity of postbox replacement?)

Anyway, the old postbox remained on that ledge, its door hanging down, such that the keys still in the lock were hidden from view. And there it stayed until two days ago when I packed up a bunch of junk for the dump. Including the old postbox. I picked it up, raised the door to close it, and—'lo and behold! 

Of course I was—before anything else—pleased and relieved. Good job, Bheka, hang the keys right by the front door for two-plus weeks. Next time, why not leave them right in the front door lock, along with a big sign inviting strangers in to browse and take what they fancy.

Enough. Kids arriving on the morrow! Time for the final rush to the summit in house beautifying.

Go Well and Stay Well,

Bhekaron

P.S. Two shots of Johs at work in Ethiopia: