I didn’t want to walk. The morning was beautiful, sugar maples blazing on Kenilworth, but I didn’t want to walk. Not to Strathmore for a Ride-on, and certainly not all the way to the metro.
Five paces along, I bumped into Mrs F., red-faced from walking her two dogs (she has four; where are the others?). We talked about our daughters, lifelong friends. How do they like college?
Mrs F. panted away down Rokeby, pulled hard by the animals.
Follow her home wait while she showers get a ride…
Not practical. Take too long.
A small green Toyota rolled by.
STOP GIVE ME A RIDE
Slower, slower, stop. Window down, white-haired lady.
“Wanna ride?”
“You read my mind!”
Then commenced a classic Garrett Park encounter.
A scan of this woman’s features told me
1.) I’d known her all my life.
2.) I had no idea who she was.
Our varied, warm conversation began with the sugar maples, moved to the town’s antique streetlamps, swerved back to trees – the royal palms I admired in Key West, the stately palms she saw in Palo Alto – and then leapt for no reason to a hotel in she stayed in once.
“They gave you the loveliest, softest white robe. I wanted to wear it the whole time I was there. My daughter said Don’t prowl around the halls wearing the robe. Only tacky guests do that.”
Now town history.
“The town put an oak in front of our house. It grew too big. Next door used to be Joan R. I loved the way she called to her son all the time. HUGHIE! HUGHIE! HUGHIE!”
“She was Welsh.”
“British. Welsh. Something like that.”
“Evil husband who left her with tons of kids.”
“Right. He left her. But she only had three. I was the one with tons. I had nine…. Our line of houses on Strathmore — three houses, three breast cancer cases. I always thought that was odd.”
“Nine kids.”
“Eight boys. One girl.”
“You kept trying for a girl?”
“No. There was no excuse for all those boys. I just kept doing it. I got pregnant in 1976 and said to my husband a child for the bicentennial. Any excuse would do.”
We pulled up to the station. She wished me a wonderful day.
October 23rd, 2009 at 11:30AM
Was it Mrs. Ganon?
October 23rd, 2009 at 11:30AM
I mean Gagnon. Oops
October 23rd, 2009 at 11:34AM
I don’t think so, because Mrs. Gagnon lived across Keswick, didn’t she?… But you might be right — she had lots of kids…