Let's move to Brittany

 

Hayter article for July 28, 2024

Moving to Brittany?

 

 

 

          Last week, Kay met a gentleman in the parking lot of HEB who was British. Kay said she thought he was Aussie. I was unaware that if the Brits stay in the U.S. long enough they start to sound like Australians.

 

The man and his wife have lived in the USA for the past 20 years, but want to return to Europe. He said that there has been a change in the America he used to know. He thinks we’re more argumentative than before. We can find something dire in practically everything. That and things have gotten a lot more expensive.

 

          He and his wife were encouraged by friends to move to Brittany.  Like you, I thought Brittany was in Britain. It’s in France! It seems like Henry II or one of those other Henrys took it over for a short while. Brittany is a peninsula in the northwest of France. It’s northern part borders the English Channel and the southern part borders the Atlantic. – Sure, get a map. I’ll stall.

 

          While his friends admit that Brittany doesn’t have all of the amenities of Paris, they’re still going to love it. There are no big grocery stores, because meat and vegetables are grown locally. I picture people eating fresh lettuce, cucumbers, squash, and… uh, sheep and goats. To me Europe seems more sheepish than beef-ish. And, along the coast, Brittanians eat a lot of fish. And, considering the number of grape vineyards, they drink a lot of wine, too.

 

          The HEB Brit said that he and his wife are buying a house in Brittany that costs a little over $100,000. I found pictures of some homes in Brittany, and sure enough, they’ve got a bunch for sale. The less expensive homes have been there for a long time. Napoleon likely slept in several of them. I imagine they have air conditioning, but no garbage disposals. Just a guess.

 

          While it may sound like I’m pooh-poohing the place, I don’t mean to. It is just different from Montgomery County. Half of the people speak French and the others English. And people seem to get along well.

 

Kay and I only know the names of two families on our cul de sac. The rest of our neighbors probably have all the friends they can handle. In Brittany people make it a point to know everyone. Kay said the gentleman at HEB was eager to take part in the Brittany experience.

 

After Kay told me the man’s story I asked if she wanted to move to Brittany. She doesn’t. She would prefer Scotland. I lied and told her I’d love to move to Scotland, but we can’t because I’m too dependent on my eye doctor and dentist who lives much closer. That, and my ears have developed selective hearing. Those Scots don’t sound right. It’s probably the fog. I have never seen a movie filmed in Scotland that didn’t have a bunch of fog in it.  

 

          If I had to choose between Brittany and Scotland, I’d visit Scotland for a week, and spend the rest of my life in Brittany.  I doubt anybody in a little town in Brittany has as nice of a refrigerator as we do. It’s got an automatic ice maker and dispenser! The bathtubs in the small town might be deeper, but I doubt the bathwater can get as hot as it does in my tub. Television? I don’t even want to think about it. That and I’d probably have to learn French. I’m fairly sure that some of the French can pick up on my English as long as I speak it with a French accent. That’s a piece of cake for me, monamie. (mo-nah-mee)

 

          The good thing about Brittany is that they actually urge foreigners to move there. Kay mentioned several places that urge tourists to stay away. Kay and I used to watch a detective series filmed on the island of Majorca off the coast of Spain. A beautiful place to visit. Unfortunately, Majorcans are trying to discourage tourists, and I can understand why.

 

Someone wanting to spend time on a beautiful island near Spain off the Mediterranean coast would have to be in-the-money. Unfortunately, the citizens of Majorca can’t afford to pay the same prices for going to restaurants, buying groceries or items in retail stores. Parking has got to be a mess. And to rent a home would have to cost a fortune. The tourists in Brittany don’t have that problem.

 

          The people in Barcelona, Spain, also don’t want us to visit.  Nor are we welcome in Machu Picchu, Peru, Venice, Italy, Amsterdam in the Netherlands, the Acropolis in Athens, Iceland, and a bunch of other places worth seeing. And the National Park Rangers aren’t that eager for more of us to visit the great American traffic jams.

 

          Bottom line, I’m not going anywhere for a good while. I don’t seek the displeasure of being a tourist. Which is good, because I can’t afford any of those places… except for Brittany. If the place has good TV programming and reception, fewer stairs, more restaurants, a great hospital, an HEB, and a professional football team, I’d talk Kay into letting us move there.

 

Whoa! I take that back. France has professional football, but it’s really soccer. Talk about tricker-people. The game requires some of the best athletes on the planet, but it’s as boring as waiting for the Popsicle Man to arrive in Bristow, Oklahoma. A flyswatter is mandatory.

end

hayter.mark@gmail.com

         

A life examination

 

Hayter article for July 21, 2024

“How is your life going?”

 

I shall start this morning off by asking you a very personal question. --“What are you living for?” Keep in mind that age has a lot to do with your answer.

 

When I was a child, I lived to play. I enjoyed hide ‘n seek, Red Rover, Monopoly, Checkers, badminton, baseball, football, and camping out in Steve or David’s backyard. 

 

Back then each of us kids had our own worries, but they were generally geared toward “will we or will we not have fun today?” We had a load of stuff to look forward to -- Summer, the Christmas Holidays, vacations with the family, church service being over, and Dad taking us to the movies. That was our life.

 

When I was in the sixth grade on the last day of school, we got a free day outside on the playground. We’d have different games to play and goodies to eat. There would be races, a softball distance-toss, hoola hoop contest, and my favorite – the high jump.

 

I learned how to high jump from my big brother Dennis. Dad set up a sandpit in the backyard so Dennis could practice high jumping. He was good. I was not, but I had practiced with Dennis in the back yard, learning the Western Roll. Back then that’s what they called to best method of high jumping.

 

No other six-grader knew the Western Roll. They tried to just hop over the bar.  Obviously I jumped higher than anyone… until Joe Camarillo walked over. The guy had never high jumped, and knew nothing about the Western Roll. Since he was late to the contest, the bar was raised higher. So, Joe took about five running steps and leaped over the bar, thus winning the contest.

 

Joe was the best athlete I have ever known. He was great in junior high and high school. I don’t know where he went to college, but he got a scholarship somewhere. And, he has no memory of winning the high jump award at Pomeroy Elementary. My main reason for living that day was to win the high jump contest. Here it is 62 years later, and I still remember being the loser at the sixth grade high jump contest. It doesn’t hurt much now, but it visits my brain more than is needed.

 

My best happening in life was running into Kay Cross during our college days. We had pretty much the same friends while in junior high, but went to different high schools. About three years after graduating we met again at the wedding of a couple of our junior high friends. I did a double-take when I saw Kay. She was, uh, just not as I remembered. Charmingly beautiful is what she was.

 

We started dating after that and married almost three years later. So it was the marriage of our friends that brought us together again. That could be a song lyric.

 

The second greatest thing that happened in my life was retirement. My dad died of a heart attack one year after retiring from a refinery. He was so looking forward to retirement and had only one year to enjoy it. The thought still breaks my heart.

 

It’s been a decade-plus since I retired from teaching high school. I was blessed to have had a good job. Teaching was not easy by any means, but it did provide me with a sense of accomplishment. Plus I got to meet so many super young men and women. A great job, and I picked a great time to retire.

 

 On the last day of school for teachers, everyone was in a hurry grading makeup work and checking in 100+ textbooks, as well as accounting for those missing. Also we had to remove the posters in our rooms and check our mailboxes for the last time. 

 

I decided to be among the last people to leave school. I did not enjoy, waiting in line to turn in my textbooks and get signatures from the librarian and department head.  After that the principal signed you out and you were gone. It being the last day of the school year for teachers, most of them raced to get everything done so they could start to enjoy the summer. They would get to see one another again the last week or two of August. I was not among the returnees… and it felt good.

 

As a retiree, I spend a lot less time working on stuff than I did while teaching.  I have several friends who have told me that since retirement they spend more time working at stuff than they did when employed. If you currently feel that way, it means you’re doing retirement all wrong.  

 

Now that Kay and I are retired we don’t live to stay busy. I’ve seldom been a fan of “being busy”. Kay and I, each have our own projects. At the moment my goal is to get my two last novels published. I self-published my first two books, but hope against hope that someone might publish the next two.

 

While I’ve not yet managed to achieve a majority of my goals, I am pleased with my current place in life. I have accepted all of my mistakes and am thankful for whatever success I may have had.

 

Perhaps that’s a goal for each of us. To be accepting of where we are and who we have been throughout our life’s time. And since we’re still around, to remember that there is still time to make memories.

 

end

hayter.mark@gmail.com

Hurricane Beryl

 

Hayter article for July 14, 2024

“Then there was Beryl”

 

       A few years ago, Kay and I handled Hurricane Harvey without a problem. Piece of cake. I can say that because we were with my niece Rhonda and her husband Curt in Grandview, Washington at the time. 

 

We spent over five months with the nicest kinfolk you’d ever wanna know. -- How nice? --  Rhonda and Curt sent emails yesterday, asking us to return to Washington until the hurricanes are gone. I’ve gotta tell you, everybody up there just loves Kay. I believe she’s the one who received the emails.

 

Kay and I stayed home during Beryl. We lost power Monday morning and got it back Wednesday morning. The experience was survivable at best. The wind was terrifying. It rained in sheets. Fortunately, the toilet still flushed. 

 

Speaking of which, near bedtime, she gave me a sleeping pill. I wish she had thought to do it after breakfast. The pill was well-named. “Sleeping.” I was out like a dead bulb. When I awoke, there was a little rain and less wind. That and I had a powerful urge to relieve myself. Might’ve been the pill.

 

By the time I quit playing solitaire on my cellphone, the wind died… along with my phone battery. Perhaps I should have paid more attention. Did I mention I missed Hurricane Harvey?

 

It was the absence of electricity that messed up me and a lot of other people living in the wide trail of Beryl. Without electricity America, as we know it, cannot function properly. Both my phone and laptop ran out of juice. I had no way to communicate.   

 

I was upset that I could no longer continue my writing, but even more so that I couldn’t send or receive emails. Or get YouTube! And you can forget Hulu, Netflix, and Prime Video. They were gone. All I could do was play solitaire on my phone, up until the time my phone died.

 

Do you want to know how many candles we have in this house? Well, pretend you do. We’ve got ONE! It’s big and fat with a great smell. And it puts out the same amount of candlelight as a birthday candle.

 

We’ve got six or ten small flashlights in this house. Some of them even work. I’ll have you know that the week before Beryl came to our house I went to Sam’s and bought two packs, each containing 24 batteries. One was AA the other AAA. Triple AAA was the one most used.

 

When the smoke cleared, I had four working flashlights. The others refused to work. You would think I stored them in a cigar box along the Galveston Jetty. They were paying me back for the neglect. Flashlights!

 

       Among the greatest things that Kay has ever done since our marriage, was she prevented me from opening the refrigerator freezer during the power outage. It was a tough time, my friend. For breakfast I had oatmeal. For lunch, I had cereal, Wheat Chex. For supper I had oatmeal mixed with Wheat Chex.

      

The next afternoon, Kay and I were hot, tired, bored and hungry. Sociologists call it the HHTBs.

We got in the car to see how the rest of the town was doing, and what they were eating. Come to find out, the townspeople were better behaved than I’ve ever seen them. The traffic lights were out practically everywhere, yet, people were patient as all get out!

I approached four long lines of autos pointed in the same direction. Together, they were headed in 12 different directions. Most of the traffic was caused by people searching for a store and a burger joint. I was at the end of the half-mile line of cars waiting to drive past the intersection.

Each intersection had four lanes of traffic. That’s sixteen lines of cars. If they all went at once, it would’ve made the news. Yet, the politeness of each driver was spectacular. When a car from each lane made it to the front of the line, each driver waited for the proper time before moving forward. To do that, you’ve got to wait for the four lanes of cars waiting to go east, west, north, or south. The lights were dead and no one was waving the traffic through. The people were displaying the best manners I’ve ever witnessed in Texas.

          The only store we found open was HEB. That doesn’t mean there weren’t other stores, we just never noticed. What I did notice was that clerks and customers were the nicest I’ve ever seen. You ask me, distress is a miracle worker!

          My last observation happened on Day Three when the power came back on, meaning we had to clean out refrigerator. It’s one of those three-door things with one door for the freezer and two for the not-freezer compartments. It was to be the first time the freezer doors would be opened since the power outage. Has the ice cream turned to milk and the shrimp into bait?

          Kay saved the freezer for last.  The top part came out better than expected. The milk was okay. I won’t kn ow about the eggs until I fry one. Everything plastic storage container was tossed, as was anything with leaves.

The freezer? Everything was still hard as a brick. Kay and I did the dance of joy. After which I said, “I love you.” – She said, “I love you, too.” – I said, “Do you ever think you’ll stop?” – She said, “Only if you make me.” – Even during a power outage, there are unreasonable stipulations in a marriage.

      

end

hayter.mark@gmail.com