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the children's section of Barnes and Noble
Monday, September 3 2001
setting: Charlottesville, Virginia
Gretchen and I spent the night at Nathan and Janine's place. This morning and into the early afternoon, we hung out for awhile drinking coffee and talking about this and that. Gretchen was particularly interested in stories from Africa and other exotic overseas places. Nathan and Janine also told us of their plan to visit Cuba in December. Since visiting Cuba is officially illegal here in the "free world," part of what they'll have to do will involve bribing a Cuban customs official into not stamping their passport. It's standard practice in a poor nation that would be only too happy to entertain more American tourists.
We stayed at their house for a little while after Nathan and Janine went off on a hike with a couple of their friends, just because we desperately needed to knock one out, and what with all the guests and assorted converting Jews, doing so would be impossible at Gretchen's parents' place in Silver Spring.
In the evening after we'd driven back to Silver Spring, Gretchen's parents took us out to dinner at Thyme Square in Bethesda. As usual we made the rounds through nearby furniture and bookstores both before and after dinner. Despite Gretchen's lifelong boycott of massive interstate bookstores, we went into the Bethesda Barnes and Noble to see if we could find a copy of an illustrated children's book called Sally Goes to the Moon, written and illustrated by Stephen Huneck. Gretchen already has his book entitled Sally Goes to the Beach a story about a black dog (much like our own Sally) who has an adventure on a beach, as told from the dog-centric vantage point of the dog herself. We didn't find the book about going to the Moon, but we did find a book entitled Sally Goes to the Mountains. It turns out there is no book called Sally Goes to the Moon, although perhaps we were confused by childhood memories of the many adventures of Curious George, a monkey with a fundamental trait not shared by his namesake in the White House. We spent longer than expected in the Barnes and Noble children's section looking at such newfangled items as indestructible books (with one-eighth-inch-thick cardboard pages), a complete collection of all the Curious George books, and a stuffed Cerebus doll.
On the way home I was treated to a fine performance of Gretchen impersonating her Great Aunt Helen making hypothetical comments about me. Aunt Helen comes from Long Island and has an accent to match, one Gretchen does perfectly. Things Gretchen impersonated Helen saying included:
So he's a goy, what can you do?
He's in computers. That's a living!
Later in the evening I was put on display for one of the family friends, a woman far more effusive and over-the-top than Gretchen. It was late and I was tired, and eventually I had to beat a retreat off to bed.
Somewhere in the course of the day Gretchen made plans which I immediately approved concerning the dates upon which we'd be getting married. I always thought that people got married on one specific date, but I recently discovered that things are actually much more complicated than that. It all comes down to two dates that are important to us. February 28th is day we "broke up" in 1989 and the day we got back together 12 years later. That's the day we'll be married in City Hall, New York. Then there's May 5th, the day we became engaged. That will serve some other purpose, one more festive. There will be a party and 100 of Gretchen's people will come, joined by the one or two who accept my several invitations.
[REDACTED]
Fred the Dog.
Hoagie in her kitchen.
Dad at his place at the kitchen table.
Nathan.
The yellow dog is Cody, the black dog is Tiyoo, which is Mandinka for "peanut."
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