Flexibility has its own rewards

When I awoke this morning the only thing on the agenda was coffee in the village with a friend, followed by getting off to the mountains.

A half hour later, it went like this:

Housemate was going to be giving a reading of some of her books, including “The cockeyed Nipple” (bet that caught your attention! http://donnalanenelson.com/ for more information not only on this one – her recounting of her experience with breast cancer – but also on her other published works).  This meant dragging along several of said books (all proceeds donated to cancer research) and as she had intended taking the bus at the top of the hill, I offered to bring her to the bus in the village instead: first deviation from the schedule. Upon arrival there, the bus wasn’t for 20 minutes so she came in to say hello to my other friend and have a tea. We then discovered that the next bus was not going into town, but rather out to the border whereupon I decided to drive her into town when we had finished: deviation two. No sooner said than the other friend’s husband showed up (whom I haven’t seen in a couple of years, and whom I haven’t seen in the coffee shop for at least five years) – deviation number three.

Are we beginning to get the picture that today is not going to the original plan?

Although a bus did show up as we were leaving, it was (and currently still is) a beautiful, warm fall day so I decided that the car was faster and off we went. Housemate needed to do some banking so there were two choices: drop her at the one on the bus line (difficult as no stopping or waiting zones) or go park underneath one of the major grocery stores: deviation four with the excuse that I could get shampoo, chocolate and check out the magazines.

Here we split, each going to her own tasks. As I left – and again on the basis that it was a beautiful fall day – I decided to take the upper route back to my village to pick up the mail: deviation five.

This is where flexibility had its rewards.

A blanket of fog lay along the hills,

Fingers of fog touched the branches and trunks of the trees,

Pools of fog filled in the lower dips and

Wisps of fog circled into the cerulean sky.

The occasional wall of fog along the road let the

Discovery of bright red vine leaves piercing the

gloom shine even brighter.

All that would have been missed had I stuck to the original plan.

I wasn’t able to take one photo as didn’t have either of my cameras – I will have to simply retain the memory.

One is never too old…

 To learn something.

Or at least I have found that one can learn new things, old or not!

This particular trip to my in-laws proves my point: I have been here many times before, I have washed the dishes in this same sink hundreds, if not thousands, of times, but it was only during this trip that it finally clicked how one uses the hot water heater.

Most German homes have this system whereby the water kettle is incorporated on the wall by the sink: they make hot water for drinks this way as well as the extra hot water for washing dishes. The whys and wherefors thereof are lost in the shades of history (Perhaps in the beginning there was no hot water pipes? Or was it much quicker? Or cheaper?).

I wonder if the newer homes still have this system? Or will I have to learn something else when I visit the younger generation in years to come?

« Wandkalender » or

how to miss-read…

A great variety of subjects in at least three different languages (English, French and German) slither into my daily inbox.  My mind isn’t always in one or the other language, which leads to interesting miss-understandings. Take today’s example: the subject was « Wandkalender » and although I am currently in Germany (leaving the safety and security of my home to my younger son) my mind was on tourism and walking so I read

Wander Calendar and was going to consult it to see what wunderbar hikes were being proposed…

Now I am thinking that I need to actually make a calendar of my wanderings…

But not quite sure that the world at large (or my family and friends – thanks for bearing with me) are quite ready for that bit of omphaloskepsis (looking at ones belly button).

So off to wander some more instead of boring some more.

Experiences in the past 24 hours:

• normal, out-of-time, train trip (yesterday’s blog)
• great little hotel www.zur-weinsteige.de

 

stairwell in the hotel

• surprise of the award-winning raiser of Koi carp, Jörg Scherle

 
 

 
 

• A meal that was right up there with the best that I have had.
• A room with under floor heating (too hot), but one of the best bed mattresses ever (one offsets the other)
• A German breakfast, which if any of you have ever experienced one, know is one of the finer points of life.
• A wander down to both Schlösse (castles: old and new); their parks,
• A turn around one of the large department stores (needed nothing so only “did” the women’s floor – and that in under a half hour) – feeling virtuous
• Lunch was a small container of red herring salad (one of the best things I ever was introduced to by my mother-in-law). Not a “red herring”, but herring in a sour-cream beetroot combination that turns it bright pink.
• Trip number one on the underground (having bought the visitor’s card I now need to use it at least 9 times!)
• Half-hour break in the hotel to put my feet up and write this blog.

Ah the joys of travel.

Voyages, voyages, voyages

Rhythme de trains,

Rimes de la vie.

Le paysage défile

De l’autre côté des vitres.

Dedans, ma vie reste

En suspens -

Le temps d’un voyage

Clouds across the plains,

Scudding to the rhythm

Of the train.

Outside life is submissive

To the inside’s quiet.

Did I write the above during my train ride to Toulouse this spring, or during my train ride to

Argelès-sur-Mer at the end of the summer, or even on the train ride to Paris at the beginning

Of the summer ? I don’t remember, but every trip has similar elements.

Today’s no different (except perhaps in scenery and the architecture of the buildings) from yesterdays,

not tomorrows.

Never met a one that I didn’t enjoy and every discovery (even to places visited in the past) is a slightly

Different voyage.

A woman and her hair

Now I know that just by writing that small give-word phrase every woman that read the title will have already had images and thoughts flash into her head so fast that she couldn’t have prevented them if she had wanted.

Those of us born blond are kind of o.k. with the color, as are maybe some redheads, some brunettes, some blacks.

However, when it comes to the type of hair that we would like to have, it seems to always be the opposite of what we actually inherited!  Now I think that at birth mine was rather fine and straight, but too many years (we were the 50s/60s you know) of permanents or “perms” as they were known certainly did nothing to improve upon that state of affairs. I can remember my ponytail in grade school being a pretty honey color and just wavy: just as I can remember as though it were yesterday, the school pictures in 80^th grade – I still shudder at the thought and do have a couple of old prints still as proof, however actually allowing the public to see them isn’t going to happen for many years yet – you’ll just have to take my word for it, that when you live in Hawaii, have had a perm the day before and it rains on the way to school, that the resulting pictures were not pretty: probably not even to my parents who would have thought me beautiful regardless.

I have in the past had a great hair cutter: when my hair was short he would thin it and even knew how to deal with the wave in the back. However, he retired and I never found anyone thereafter (and believe me I tried). To the point that I had given up and simply let it grow. Chemo had thinned it enough to allow me to put it up with relative ease (chemo took half and only a quarter grew back: I am probably the only person in the world that found that a benefit!). 

My husband kept wanting me to cut it and I resisted: to the point that when he passed away I felt that it was unfair to then want to cut it, and so it went for many years.  However, with the passing of time – and the thickness of the remaining rope of hair – I began to consider the radical: cutting it to shoulder length from waist length.

My 65^th birthday was the turning point – let’s celebrate and go wild – how? Hmmmm? A trip? A companion? A new car? Anything ?  Nope, decided to cut my hair (you are by now realizing that I did not grow up very radical-minded).

And have never looked back.

Got lucky in that I had two good friends who’s haircuts I had always admired so when I was ready I walked into the hair salon they frequented and talked to Dominique, the owner.

He was probably flabbergasted that someone would walk in off the street, chat a few minutes then request an appointment to “do the deed” just a couple of days later. He kept saying “are you sure”?

So I have since been going to Extra Coiffure, in Geneva Switzerland www.extracoiffure.ch.

Dominique and Janine are the owners – his specialty more the cut, hers more the coloring.

They are both bilingual, one being French the other English. In addition their staff are open, friendly and always do a great job of whatever they are asked to do. One can also get a very good manicure (someday will try the pedicure as well) so I can highly recommend all of them!

And so, to finish this tale of the woman and her hair, when I walk out of there with my straightened as I like it, I feel on top of the world, almost beautiful – what more can one ask of a beauty shop. Merci Dominique, merci Janine!

Village festivals

Corsier, Switzerland, started their squash festival many years ago when a local farmer opened up his property and sold his harvest.  There were a few other stands, all run by local clubs or persons.

This has since expanded and now people come not only from the village and the neighboring villages, but from as far away as the next canton up the lake. The main event, of course, is squash – squash in all shapes, colors and for all uses. However, one can also purchase many other types of food (again no industrial, only artisanal); ceramics; nuts; jewelry; knitted and crocheted items; and others, which have escaped my memory.  This year there was also two types of rides for the smaller ones and amongst the food – cotton candy!

The entire surrounding fields become a car park – in addition to the school’s actual parking lot. Many walk up on foot, leaving their cars as far as a kilometer away.  Weather was cooperative just the odd drop here and there, but not enough to shut anything down or dim the festive mood. This one is now past, but we are already looking forward to next year and I have promised myself that some year, I will actually buy and carve a pumpkin!

 

Small note to those who are interested in competitions: the largest pumpkin in the world this year was not grown by an American, but rather a Swiss: Beni Meier de Pfungen (ZH) grew one weighing 953,5 kilos thus beating the former champion, an American, whose pumpkin was 911 kilos.

A walk in the woods

Although there aren’t tons of animals in these woods (the last of the bears was killed in the 1800s, the wolves haven’t been re-introduced here, etc.) there are the “locals”: Ibex (usually much higher up during the summer, I was privileged to see a whole troop a few years ago when the snows were exceptionally heavy and lasted exceptionally long – still one of my fondest wild-animal experiences); badgers (never seen one, but the people with gardens and vegetable patches hate them with a passion as they dig holes to get at the worms and destroy the raspberry bushes – not so much for the fruit as for the pricks on the lower branches that they use to scratch themselves); fox - the reason that I never tried bringing up my cats; marmots; birds (the ubiquitous crows, the odd woodpecker, the sparrows and in the fall the magpies); the “people” animals such as cows, sheep, cats and dogs.

Deer are abundant, but difficult to see – I used to always see a couple when I would go down off the mountain early in the morning, but I love hunting season as they know where the protected forests are and I have often spotted the odd one at 10 in the morning if there haven’t been many hikers, or walkers with their dogs.

This was the case the other morning. Came across two in one patch and got a quick (bad) photo before they caught my scent, then saw another 3 too far away to even have a chance. It made my day though to be sharing their woods.

not the usual quality of my photos, sorry