Robbie

Posted on July 5, 2008 by Jim

“Coconut custard pie. I’m sorry I missed it on Monday. It looked super!”

This was in response to the question, “What would you like for dessert at lunch?” The question was posed at 9:15 in the morning as I was tucking into perfect over easy eggs, plump sausages, lofty toast and a divine wedge of papaya. I loved the way the morning sun filled the small dinning room of the Desert Rat. Ten tables spaced nicely apart, and as long as the weather was hospitable, the glass doors to the patio were taken down to provide an uninterrupted view of the lagoon, the coral breakwater and the Caribbean Sea beyond. Ceiling fans moved the soft sea air. I was told by James that there was no need for air conditioning, even in the summer.

Summer? I am not sure that it is an important designation when you are a mere 15 degrees north of the Equator.  My Father told me you could get a suntan in your room in Barbados. He got that right.

It was a brilliant morning. The sea breeze drifted into the room, as did Robbie… she who asked for my dessert preferences. Constance Robinson, Robbie to all who met her. She was the proprietor of the Dessert Rat, a small Inn in Saint Lawrence Gap, Christ Church Parish, about half way between Oistins Bay and Bridgetown.

Robbie and her husband Colonel Westerleigh “Westy” Robinson (now deceased) settled in Barbados after he had finished fighting the Hun in WWII. Colonel Robinson was the Commander of the 3rd Regiment of the Royal Horse Artillery, of the 7th Armoured Davison that served nobly at the gates of Al Alamein and relieved the siege of Tobruk.

Robbie sipped her Campari and soda making note of the other guests having breakfast.  Choose any time of day and if you caught sight of Robbie there was always a glass in her hand.  Campari and soda before noon, Pink Gin after lunch, Dry Vermouth on the rocks with a twist during the afternoon hours, a Gimlet before dinner and a good Claret for the balance of the waking hours.  It was an amazing display of tolerance.  Honestly I don’t know how she did it, and manage to run the Desert Rat.

I guess the secret (the open secret) to her success was the incredible staff in her employ.  They ran the Desert Rat.  James checked you in.  Took your bags to one of the 12 guest rooms in the main house, or to one of the two suites in the bungalow. Mixed your Martini. Played the piano.  And James was just one of a dozen souls who were responsible for taking care of the rooms, preparing their tremendous fare and serving the guests.  And most important, they took care of Robbie.

Robbie’s lone responsibility was to drink all day and “supervise” the kitchen staff.  This latter duty was also somewhat of “wink”.  Chef Martin took care of the kitchen; but Robbie did put on an apron every day and made a cake and a pie for the dessert menu.  This activity was done mid-morning after she had visited with the breakfast guests, and after she had two or three Campari’s.  Don’t be fooled… even with the Campari’s, Robbie was a splendid baker… and I think that’s why Chef Martin accepted her into his domain.

I was told that it wasn’t Robbie’s habit to ask what a guest wanted for an upcoming dessert.  James noted soto voce to me, as my coffee was topped up, “Miss Robbie makes what she wants to make.  It’s her calling.  On Monday Miss Robbie saw the disappointment on your face when you were told that we had no more coconut custard.  I think she wanted to make another coconut custard today… she willed you to ask for that pie.  You see, Mr. Jim… you may think otherwise; but you had no choice in the matter.”

Robbie continued to make the rounds, she visited the table of Fred Magrin and his Mother Margaret. They were yearly regulars of the Desert Rat.  Fred was from Toronto, he never married.  His Father had died years ago when Fred was still in College, and he had promised the Senior Magrin that he would always take care of his Mother.  I can’t imagine that Fred’s Father meant for Fred to give up his life.  But there you are, and Fred scored high marks with the other regulars for his tenderness with regard to his elderly Mother.  Robbie smiled, made a brief comment, pointed her Campari to the sea, allowed a small laugh and then nodded in my direction.  Maybe she did will it.  I gave it no further thought; but I was certain that coconut custard pie would be on the dessert menu for lunch.

I am sure there were many things that could occupy one’s time between breakfast and lunch in Barbados. Call it my heritage.  I come from parents who worshiped Ra. This was in the day before we identified over exposure to the sun with skin cancer.  Let others patrol the sights of this island paradise, I would take my book, a plastic bottle of Coppertone, and a towel to the edge of the lagoon.  I was there for the sun.  I was there to get a tan.  I spent my morning reading, applying a coat of Coppertone, swimming, drying out and repeating this sequence… numerous times, ’til the lunch hour neared.

On occasion I would catch sight of Robbie in the late morning.  And if I did, there she would be on the “patio deck”: a broad picture hat of light straw to shield her face from the sun, a floral smock and espadrilles. And a glass of Campari.  She looked into the brightness of the day.  She would lift her head slightly, close her eyes, pivot to the direction of the sun to accentuate her majesty and then simply smile.  No.  It was not the Campari.

Westy Robinson was a hero. Commander of a regiment whose history stretched back to the Napoleonic Wars.  You do your job. His job took him to North Africa.  His job took him to help stop the Axis advance in the Mediterranean. Which he did. With distinction. And with the loss of one eye.  While Colonel Robinson dealt with the Afrika Corps, Constance Robinson supported the war effort in the Nursing Corps. You do your best.  Which she did.  Sometimes your best is not enough.  Why does your child die?  Not to the bombs of the blitz.  She died to a sickness.  The stink of death was all around… in the North African Desert, in the London streets; but why the child?  The answer was not understood to Westy outside of Tobruk, nor to Constance in the Cambridge Military Hospital.  To lose a child? 

The calm in Robbie’s face did not betray her continued sense of absence.  The sun reflected off the water, sand and stucco walls of the Desert Rat and she gloried in it.  Maybe she came from a line of Ra worshippers, too?  She caught sight of me, raised her Campari in salute and retreated back into the Main House. 

Her rooms were in a small wing on the first floor adjacent to the kitchen.  From the sitting room there was a door to a closed courtyard, a six foot high brick wall served to separate her from the rest of the world.  If you didn’t see Robbie, and if it wasn’t baking time, it was a good chance that she was in her garden sanctuary.  In 1947 the Robinson’s purchased the Sugar Cane House, fixed it up and renamed it the Desert Rat (the nickname for the members of  the 7th Armoured Division).  The Colonel added the private wing and closed garden to the first floor of the Inn, and in 1960 they added the bungalow suites to the far side of the Shade Patio. 

I could tell it was nearing lunch.  Yvette of the kitchen staff emerged from the Main House, crossed the beach and waved to one of the fishermen who brought his low slung boat into the lagoon.  He tied up to a stake a short distance off shore, and without much fanfare, Yvonne hitched up her skirt and waded out to the bobbing boat.  A brief negotiation ensued and when she returned back to land she had a string of six good sized fish.  Lunch.  Time for one more good swim out to the coral breakwater to work up an appetite.  A re-baste with Coppertone, small snooze then time to move to the patio deck.

I think it was a tribute to the marvelous kitchen of the Desert Rat that kept guests from wondering off to find other places to dine.  No need.  The preparation was fastidious.  The food the freshest… witness the fish brought from the lagoon minutes before it appeared on your table.  And the people you saw at breakfast, you saw at lunch, saw at tea (if you took it), at cocktails and then at dinner.  It was like being on a ship. 

James would always seat Fred and his Mother first.  The table farthest from the open patio.  Fred thought that Mrs. Magrin might get a chill from the breeze.  I looked for Robbie; but she was nowhere to be seen.  She must been in her garden, or taking her lunch in the seclusion of her private dinning room.  Occasionally I would see a tray going back to the private wing, simply prepared fish… and a Campari, or a Pink Gin if it was that time of the day.

The far wall of the dinning room was filled with photographs.  The Colonel, lean and fit, stripped to the waist leaning against a lorry in the blazing desert sun.  Westy and Robbie in a sailing ketch.  Westy and Robbie in tennis whites.  Robbie sitting on a piano, legs crossed showing some “cheesecake.”  The original Sugar Cane House.  Westy and Robbie at Ascot (this was my favorite… she is wearing this marvelous hat.  She is stunning.  What a handsome couple).  Westy and Robbie on horseback.  Westy and Robbie with the original staff of the Desert Rat.  Robbie with Chef Martin in the kitchen.

Then, one photograph in the far corner of the wall at perfect eye level (at least for Robbie).  Westy, Robbie and a small girl of about 6 or 7, I’d judge.  They are on a beach, fitted out for a swim, a large umbrella casts a partial shadow.  Westy’s right arm rests around Robbie, his head close to hers.  Robbie is holding the little girl on her lap, arms surrounding the little girl, squeezing her close.  The little girl’s head is lifted up, eyes sparkling, dimples, mouth open to a laugh or a giggle.  Maybe Robbie had just tickled her, or said something silly?  The little girl, enclosed in the arms of her Mother, a strong and vigorous Father adding to the sense of safety, what could be better?

I tried to remember if I had ever had coconut custard pie before.  My Mother must have made it, too… a pretty good baker in her own right.  I hope that she wouldn’t consider my love of Robbie’s version a betrayal.

“Mr. Jim, Miss Robbie wanted me to ask you if you enjoyed the coconut custard pie this afternoon.”

“James, I’m not sure.  I think I’ll reserve judgment ’til I try a second slice.  That is… if there is any left.”

Posted in Stories & Brief Tales | Leave a comment

She Told Me Not To Be Afraid

Posted on June 27, 2008 by Jim

Mom told me, “They’re playing nine pins, don’t be afraid.”

It was at night. I was not sure who the “they” were. I was too young to know of Greek and Roman Gods, to imagine Mars and Neptune engaged in some sort of sporting diversion.  I may have been downstairs in the den when the sounds became unmistakable.  At first, a low rumble.  The tree limbs in the next-door yard started to sway, the leaves twisted, their lighter underbellies reflected in the street light. 

Don’t be afraid… It sounded like whatever they were doing… they were doing it right above our house.  They?  Possibly other celestial Deities… maybe an angel or two? 

Playing nine pins.  I have no idea where Mom came up with that… I can’t see Mommie Soph telling her that when she was a young girl.

No, I suspect this was a story of her creation. Or maybe it was a common story of the time, like the stork bringing babies.  Or possibly she picked up the idea from reading Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle. That would explain her use of nine pins, instead of bowling.  Little men, somewhat mischievous and having a good ol’ time rolling a ball down a path toward standing nine pins.  And certainly the sounds of rolling thunder matched the image.  A ball rolling its way toward the pins, its sound building to a crescendo before the crash of the pin strike… or in the case of a storm… the crack of thunder.

I don’t recall how Mom explained the lightening… but it certainly went hand in hand with the effect of the ball knocking down all those pins.  After all, we’re talking about the expanse of the heavens, and not some dumb duck pin lane on Amity Rd.  I can see the electrifying light flash in the night sky… I have moved to the staircase landing between the first and second floors, looking out of the window, into our yard.  The garage, the grass, trees… everything in a monochromatic steely grey. No, this is really big.  To pull off the sound and light, they have to be real big.

They’re playing nine pins, don’t be afraid. There was something in the way that she said it… a reassurance in her voice; very calming but with a dollop of whimsy. “Sure it’s noisy; but those men are having fun up there!” Don’t be afraid. Well, it did sound like they were having fun!  And I wasn’t afraid.

In the movie Bell, Book and Candle, Kim Novak plays a witch (Gillian Holyroyd) and in order to get even with a college classmate played by Janice Rule (Merle Kitteridge), she conjured up thunderstorms to terrify her. Which indeed, had its desired effect. Sure, some people are terrified of thunderstorms.

Not me. In fact, I rather fancy them. The noisier, the better.

Posted in Childhood | Leave a comment

From the Desk of Philo Kvetch: What is the Proper Tip?

Posted on June 11, 2008 by Jim

Yes, it caught my by surprise. I just thought I was pulling in for a fill-up.  I wanted to check out the Mobil station that opened in the south end of Woodbury.  Nothing could have prepared me for the reception I was to receive.

A young lad approached my car. He was attired in navy Dockers, a blue shirt with a muted red stripe in it (must be the corporate colours), white round collar, a red bow tie (which I assumed was pre-made), his short blond hair was combed straight back… teeth gleaming white.

I put down my window.

“Welcome to Woodbury’s Mobil Gas Station! How can I be of service?”  He may have clicked his heels; but I couldn’t tell from my position behind the wheel.

My first thought… my what a refreshing throw-back! Then my natural cynicism took charge. What’s this kid doing out of school? Tell me he dropped out of school to get this job! I wasn’t sure, but it looked like he had been recruited from the ranks of either the Hitler Youth or the Young Republicans. I smiled back, “fill it with regular, please.”

“Right away, sir!”

As my “Hummer” (actually it’s Subaru Outback; but I like to pretend that it’s a Hummer) was taking on fuel, he came around to the front, cleaned down my windshield and proceeded to look under my hood. Checked the key connections, looked at my oil and water, shut the hood and wiped any offending smears from the top, “You’re fine, sir! Would you like me to speed-vac your foot wells and floor mats?” And with this he opened my front door.

“Well… gee.” And before I could answer he vacuumed my floor mats and the edges by the door. I should have asked him if he would iron my shirts and press my boxer shorts.

While he was on my side of the car, he polished the side view mirror and began cleaning the side windows working his way to the back. I thought about this… Well, this is Woodbury! We have First Selectman just like New Canaan and those other fancy shmancy Fairfield County Towns! Hah! I bet they don’t have this!

My windows done to a spotless shine, he returned, “Would you like a useful road map of the Northeast.  They’re FREE!  And even with GPS systems, a good map always comes in handy in finding places of interest that you may not even know existed… like this: Somers Mountain Indian Museum in Somers.”  He had a point.  I have lived in Connecticut for only 58 years and I never knew that there was a Somers Mountain, or a Somers, Connecticut.  But it’s pretty safe to assume that in our small state, at one time the forests teemed with Native Americans… so it makes perfect sense that there would be a museum there.

I declined the map.

He finished the fill-up to the tune of $39 and something, figured at $4.23 a gallon. I gave him my debit card and he asked, “Would like a cup a fresh hot coffee and a cinnamon donut from Dottie’s Diner, it Mobil’s way of saying, ‘thanks for your kind patronage!’”

“I’ll pass on the donut (even though Dottie’s, formerly known as Philip’s, donuts are insane); but a cup of coffee would be nice.”

“Irish Cream or Dark Roast… and how do you take your coffee?”

“Dark Roast, black.”

I’m thinking that on fill-ups you should tip 20% and on partials 15%… and if he offered to press my boxer shorts, or if he could prove that he tied his bow tie, I can see going to 30%.

He returned and handed me the chit to sign, “Today’s weather calls for intermittent showers, breaks of sunshine, a chance of thundershowers in the afternoon and a return to humidity. You have a good day, sir and drive safely!”

So I don’t eat dinner for the next couple of nights… big deal!

As soon as Zagat’s hears about this place, you’ll have to make a reservation to get gas! Definitely… 20%

n.b. I made everything up, except the price of the gas. Oh, and Dottie’s Donuts are great.

Posted in The Ash Creek Bourbon & Conversation Corner | Leave a comment

The Cricket Stopped Singing

Posted on May 30, 2008 by Jim

I don’t know if you can anticipate the way you will feel at the final leave taking of someone who you love.  I can only imagine how Aunt Meggie felt when Uncle Saul passed away… a person who had been part of her life since she was sixteen or seventeen.  But Meggie never betrayed the void that entered her life… at least to me.

That’s Meggie.  Nothing could slow her down.  The “Unsinkable Mollie Brown.”  On a day that you were seated at table #5 at so-and-so’s Bar Mitzvah or Wedding, there Meggie would be…  smiling.  And she would be up for every dance.  She danced with men.  She danced with women.  She danced by herself.  She even danced with me!

“Your Father was a great dancer,” she told me as we slow stepped to some nondescript number.  This I knew. 

“Yes, Dad was amazingly light on his feet for a heavy-set man.  Jackie Gleason, Zero Mostel, Lou Costello … and Dad.”  I didn’t like to be reminded of this.  I didn’t hold it against Dad… it just made me feel clumsy in contrast.  I was tempted to tell her that Adolph Hitler was known to be a great dancer, too.  Which may have been true; but it seemed a misplaced observation since two dances earlier we had the obligatory group hora, and besides, it would have sounded like I was rejecting a compliment of Dad.

Meggie just danced, and danced.  She would take brief pauses at our table.  And each time I glanced across the table in her direction  I saw one thing, and one thing only.  Meggie smiling and mid-flight in some story. If there was a lull in all the activity, looking at Meggie, I would be reminded of Saul and his absence.  He would have enjoyed this day, too.

Saul.  Now there was a dancer! Everyone said it.

I am reviewing this… and other times and occasions: weddings, family picnics, Thanksgivings & etc. as Meggie and I join the locals one morning to drink fancy coffee and feast on the incredible jelly donuts from the Chatham Bakery on Crowell Rd.  Saul and Meggie had purchased a clapboard cottage in Chatham years ago. It was their July and sometime weekend retreat from their Woodbury home.  Woodbury was quiet enough; but they sought further distance from Saul’s law practice and Meggie’s 8th grade science class in Bridgeport.

They loved Chatham for its simplicity, removed from the hectic pace of mid-Cape Cod. And yes, today it was more developed; but it was where Meggie settled after retiring from teaching and after Saul had passed away. She sold the house in Woodbury, consolidated the key belongings and moved fully to their vacation retreat.  Retired from teaching, yes; but not from living.  Meggie volunteered at the Hospital in Hyannis three days a week and once a week she helped at the Chatham Library’s teaching adults to read program.

I loved coming to visit.   I loved sharing in the old stories.  Many involved my parents, many involved Saul.  Those stories soothed my spirit.

Between sips of hazelnut cream I mentioned, “As much as I love visiting you here at the Cape, when I was a kid I loved going up to see you in Woodbury.  In the winter you had better snow and in the summer I loved it when Uncle Saul took me on nature walks.”

I smiled at the memory.

“You know, at first I didn’t want to go on them.  And then he told me that he knew a place where we might be able to find the living descendants of dinosaurs!  That caught my attention; but I told him that I thought they were extinct.  And he said that’s what everyone thinks.  But they just didn’t know where to look for them.  He took out two butterfly nets from the work shed and handed one to me… ‘Gee Uncle Saul, are these big enough?  Or are we going to just steal their eggs?'”

Meggie laughed, “I just can imagine Saul taking you on a ‘dinosaur hunt’ with two butterfly nets!”  Then she shook her head, got quiet and stared away for a moment as if the memory of Saul touched her on the shoulder.  She looked back at me, slapped her lap, “Time to go!”  She said that she wanted to pick something up from the market.

“Dinosaur eggs?”

“No,” she laughed, “Mangoes.  I want to put up some mango chutney.  It’s a recipe that I learned from your Mother… and I saw that the Chatham Village Market had them on special.”

“I don’t remember Mom making it.  But as a kid I was a pretty fussy eater.  It might have been something that I thought was an adult food.  Although I have always been keen on eating mangoes just plain.”

When we got to the market Meggie wasted no time and went straight to the produce side of the store.  Displayed prominently was good sized table filled with mangoes sold by the mini-crate. I was grateful that this was going to be a quick in-and-out.  But was I ever wrong.  Meggie picked up one mango from one of the crates and carefully inspected it.  Smelled it, and felt the skin, “I want them to be nearly ripe… you have to be able to smell the fruit.  The texture of the skin is critical.  There has to be a little give… if it is purely taut, then it has to be kept for a week and I want to make the chutney today or tomorrow.  This one is good.”

She picked up another from the crate, “This one isn’t ready yet.”  And she put it in different crate.  Then she found another she liked, discarded another, discarded another… one was deemed a maybe and this she kept in her hand as a just in case.  I am not sure if the other shoppers appreciated Meggie’s diligence.  But that was not her concern.  She inspected each and everyone of the original dozen or so mangoes in the crate… and by my count only 4 were considered worthy… and 8 mangoes from the other crates had to be located and the various crates had to be adjusted accordingly. 

I even got caught up in this pursuit.  “How ’bout this one Aunt Meggie?  It smells OK to me.”

She shook her head, “I don’t like the colour.  There has to be some red or yellow.  Those straight green ones don’t make good chutney.” 

I think she felt obligated to take one of my selections… which she did.  I think she would have been just as happy if I had remained outside the market grabbing some sun.  When she said that she had to pick up some Granny Smiths for the recipe, I nearly fainted.  The thought of another detailed examination of fruit derailed me.  She was quick to notice my pained expression, “Don’t worry Jimmy, the apples aren’t all that important.  I am just going to pick up this bag.”  What a relief.

When we got back to the cottage it was quickly apparent that I was going to be dragooned into helping to make this chutney.  My suggestion was that we just eat them… I even offered to take some home with me. 

That was met with a wave of the hand, “if we were just going to eat them then I would have had to make an entirely different selection… mangoes reaching ripeness over a ten day period.  That would have taken more time.  Here, put on this apron.”  Aprons aren’t a favorite of mine.  This one had one of those clever captions: Give the Chef a Beer.  “It was Saul’s apron… I don’t know why… for some reason I have kept it.”

She set me to peeling, coring and chopping of the apples while she handled the messier task of the mango prep, “So did you ever find dinosaurs with Saul.”

“No.  Try as we might.  Even though I was a little kid, I knew that we weren’t about to find an undiscovered dinosaur colony in Woodbury.  But I pretended that I thought it was a possibility… and Saul pretended it was a possibility, too.  So even when we were finding other great stuff, we behaved like it was secondary to our real purpose… finding evidence of living dinosaurs, their descendants… or eggs.  One time Uncle Saul asked me, ‘Jimmy, when we find stegosaurus eggs, we’ll take them home and make an omelet.  I think one egg should do for the both of us.  What do you think?’  I told him that I thought that an omelet was an adult food, and that I like my eggs from chickens and scrambled with a little bit of salt and pepper.”

“Were you scared looking for all the strange stuff?”

“Uncle Saul had a confident tone and it made me feel safe.  The first time we went into this field that led to a pond… Saul knew there would be oodles of things of interest… but I was taken by the noise.  The sounds of the cicadas and the crickets?  It was a noisy racket that I found vaguely scary.  I mean you heard these loud sounds, where the hell was it coming from?“

Meggie, done with the mango prep turned her attention to the spice cabinet… granulated sugar, dark brown sugar, black pepper, salt, cayenne pepper, cinnamon, ground cloves, allspice and ground mustard seed were moved to the staging area on the counter.  I was given a large onion to peel and chop.

“Uncle Saul looked on the ground near us… left and right.  He got real quiet and prepared to drop his butterfly net on something, he motioned me to be still.  Still? I was scared shitless! I thought that he had just found a diamondback rattler or something!  He pounced, and when he was sure that he had his quarry, he looked at me and smiled.”

Meggie brought her eyes up from the counter, “Dinosaur eggs?”

“I only wish.  No, it turned out to be my introduction to the cricket.  Not counting Jiminy Cricket, I had never seen one before.  This one certainly didn’t look like Jiminy!  But Uncle Saul carefully took it out of the net, and held it in his palm so I could have a better look.  A black thing… no vest or top hat!”

I peeled and cut three carrots. 

“Uncle Saul showed me the cricket, ‘See.  It has rear legs that are big like a grasshopper.  They can jump, too.  Now they don’t sting or bite or bother us at all.  But they make that wonderful chirping sound you hear.  It’s their song.‘  And he returned the cricket to an open patch of ground so I could see it hop.  And the thing stood stock still.  I asked how they made that chirp. Uncle Saul smiled and pointed to its big hind legs, ‘He uses those legs for more than jumping… he rubs those legs together to make the chirp!’  Well, I thought that was impressive!”

Meggie brought out her brewing pot, put in all the ingredients, spices… added a cup of raisins and dumped in a quart of apple cider vinegar.

“So I asked Saul, ‘Why do they chirp Uncle Saul?’  And he told me, ‘First you got to know it’s only a guy thing.  Lady crickets can’t sing.  The males use two different songs.  One is to tell the other guys, I’m here!  I’m working this block, shove off! And that song also puts the ladies on notice, I’m here! Let me take you home to meet Mom!  And then there is the other song they sing… and to the lady crickets it sounds like Frank Sinatra singing I Only Have Eyes For You.  See?'”

“Let me take you home to meet Mom?  Yeah, that’s pure Saul!”  And Meggie laughed and laughed.

“I was hoping to see our cricket give a demonstration of his song, at this point he didn’t even show off his jumping skills, ‘This one doesn’t look like he’s interested in singing?’  Uncle Saul looked at our quiet cricket and told me, ‘If they have a tushie rash they can’t sing… no matter how much they want to take a lady back to meet Mom!”

“Tushie rash?  And you believed this?”

“Well, it seemed reasonable given the explanation on how they made their songs.  And I knew what a tushie rash felt like, and I knew I would be in no mood to sing either.  Besides I was a little kid and thought that Uncle Saul was our family’s designated naturalist. He told me, ‘You know Jimmy, whether a cricket is singing his song to other guys or to the ladies, he sings because he is happy.  And it’s a sad day when a cricket stops singing.'”

Meggie finished the preparations for the chutney, covered the pot and put it into the fridge.  “There.  That should be fine.  It develops its full flavours over night, tomorrow I’ll cook it, and put them up into jars.  You will have to come back for yours.  But here, this is a mango I didn’t use… eat it in three days.”

It might have been Mom’s recipe; but Meggie took possession of it… and anything else that might have pertained to mangoes.  I took off the apron and handed it back to Meggie.

“You know…  I was watching a program on the Animal Channel and it was about crickets!  The part about the chirping coming from the legs is a common misconception.  The chirping is actually generated under its forewings.  So if they didn’t sing it wasn’t because of a tushie rash… it was more like an underarm rash… which I also know about.  Something else, the Emperor of China would keep crickets in bamboo cages for pets.  They knew about their songs, too.  They knew their songs made for a happy home.”

Meggie smiled at me, looked at the apron, paused for a moment, folded it and put it back in the pantry.  “Uncle Saul used to sing I Only Have Eyes For You to me.  Uncle Saul could hold a tune… and my, what a dancer he was!”

Posted in Meggie & Saul | Leave a comment