We did a little food shopping, then looked into a new cell phone
for Martin. Katya drew me a picture of her and me and Ollie sitting on a nice
large bee flying through the air. (Ollie didn’t like the rendering of the
drawing because it appeared to him as if he were sitting on the front of the
bee’s face, flying backwards, so he smoudged out the ink on his face the best
he could. One of those sibling squabbley things, you know.) That’s me in the middle, with Katya holding on to me for dear life, and Ollie precariously astride in the front. Just did the family and kid
relaxing time-off-from-work thing mostly. Hey, that’s what I’m all about!
Leah made sweet potato, lentil and chard curry.
Oh, my gosh! And as if that weren’t entirely enough, we topped that off with
homemade, warm brownie squares, loaded with chunks of several different chocolate
candy bars -- with ice cream ẚ la mode, of course. (Oh, sorry,
didn’t you get some?!) Leah tells me she’s been working on perfecting that
recipe for a while.
Introducing a new character into the story: during
the last month or so Martin and Leah have become dear friends with a young dad
they first met when he showed up at their Harborne Ward – which meant, of
course, that I became his instant, adopted friend, as well. Jesse is a young
guy with three little kids who left his family temporarily back in Oregon to
come and work on his doctorate, in linguistics, at the University of
Birmingham. In fact, he is also doing some guest-professor lecturing, so the
department has arranged for and is paying for all of his living arrangements while he
is here for six weeks. His specialty is one that the linguistics area of the university is
especially keen on. Lucky for Jesse – except for the missing your family part.
He tells me that he Skypes them at least once or twice every single day from up
in the room where he lives.
This is the first I’ve been privy to the hilarious,
witty, lighter side of Martin. (It is easy to see why Leah fell madly in love
with him back all those many years ago.) You should just see what goes on when the
lively tomfoolery between those two get warmed up. It is play on word paradise, for
sure. (“Oh, Jesse, you are SO “pun”ny!) The kids adore him, too. He is a true
dad, in every sense of the word, and they can naturally feel it. It must be
very difficult to be so very far away from one’s young family (the youngest is
less than six months old) for so long. I know that having this almost daily interaction
with the Ward family has got to help a lot!
As soon as the kidlets were off to bed, it was a
rousing round of cards between the four of us, till we all cried “uncle!”
Ollieism_
I’m a
hungro!
So, what’s a hungro?
Someone who’s hungry and eats a lot all day long.
Profound Ollie question, said in an especially
profound voice – a British voice, at that: Is England a jungle of trees, daddy?
Photos_
1- Olympic Google doodle – patriotic 50-year-old,
Roald Bradstock, won silver
2- family of bees, with one disgruntled brother bee
3- little felt Dalmatian Katya created just for me,
in anticipation of my arrival – well, did I feel loved or what!
4-
Wardy family @ dinner with Jesse & guest (that’s me at my place taking the
shot)
