Dear Jeril... Love, Dad

By Wayne P. Anderson

As a Father's Day gift Wayne Anderson's oldest daughter Jerilyn, often called Jeril, presented him with a fat three-hole notebook containing the letters and stories he had written her from the time she was twenty until she was thirty-eightâ from 1977 to 1995.

It was one of his dearest Father's Day gifts ever. And it was an especially appropriate gift as she had been an avid reader since childhood and was now a creative librarian who continued to cherish the written word.

Anderson was amazed at how much detail there was in the letters about his adventures around the world. He has decided to share the parts of these letters that other travelers, active or armchair, might enjoy in this Venture Bound Book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: eBookIt.com
• Release date: Apr 26, 2016
• ISBN: 9781942168317

Book preview

destinations."

CHAPTER 1

GERMANY, SUMMER, 1977

Dear Jeril,

We are in a pleasant German village surrounded by fields of grain and small forests. The village, like many in Germany, includes many farmers whose barns and manure piles sit next door to the bank or a modern apartment house. Flowers are everywhere, it is quiet, the air is clear, the temperature is seldom over eighty, and good fresh bread is in the shops—all in all, a good place to relax and do as little as possible.

And that is mostly what I’ve been doing. The last two months in Columbia had been days, nights and weekends of activity, much of it almost frantic. As a result the first four weeks here I slept and read and took an occasional work break. (Actually I teach my classes three days a week.)

We live in a three-bedroom duplex with our landlord above us. They’re friendly, but have typical German compulsiveness. The Germans are the most security conscious people I’ve ever lived among. No outside doorknobs on houses; you must have a key or be let in. All inside doors are heavy with a key prominent in them, and thin curtains are pulled over the windows at all times, or the owner speaks to you about it.

The heavy window shutters must be down at night, and cars by law must be locked at all times. They also correct your pronunciation of both German and English and never fail to loudly point out any minor traffic violations.

Our four days in Paris were very pleasant and gave me an opportunity to reappraise my attitude toward the French. I now feel much warmer toward them. They jay-walk, going against the lights both walking and driving. They never correct my miserable mispronunciations and generally try to be helpful only when asked. I didn’t remember them that way on my former visits, and it may have something to do with the contrast with the Germans. I also find the French to be physically more attractive since they don’t seem to gain weight the way the Germans do as they get older. Fifty percent of the Germans are overweight.

The above should not be taken as any indication we don’t like living with Germans. We do enjoy it here. My German is now good enough for daily commercial matters and an occasional slow, halting conversation on mundane matters. This certainly increases my sense of comfort when traveling.

In what has now become a European tradition with us, our Volkswagen has turned into a jinx. It has a mysterious ability to cloud mechanics’ minds so they do strange unexplainable things, like hook up hoses wrong, put in wrong parts, mis-connect wires and make misdiagnoses. We’ve tried three Volkswagen places, all of which have made mistakes.

In the follow-up breakdowns they stand in awe that such a mistake could have possibly been made. They swear at each other so fast I can’t follow them. I learned my German from books so I don’t understand those words, anyway. They do repair for free their former mistakes. In one case they even managed to foul that up. At times I feel I’ve been caught in a three stooges comedy.

Coming on the base today my car was checked by a bomb dog and my ID by one armed guard while another one covered me. We’re on a terrorist alert, and all bases are being carefully checked, and even those of us with military license plates are evidently suspect.

We also get checked on those days when war games are being played. Last week the Education Center at Ramstein became a casualty, but I managed to disappear before the stretcher bearers arrived to carry the ‘’injured and dead" off. The Air Force puts very realistic wounds and blood on its practice victims.

We have finally really gotten into the mood for travel. Besides Paris we’ve been to Strasbourg, Baden-Baden, Worms, Dijon and a dozen villages and small towns in France and Germany. Next weekend hopefully we’ll be in Munich. We got our energy for travel back just as the dollar started to fall apart. Fortunately we don’t have any overpowering urge to dine out much here in Germany. They serve big meals, and like good depression babies Carla and I feel we must eat whatever is put in front of us.

Our best trip so far has been to the Burgundy region to visit an archaeological dig run by an assistant professor from the University of Missouri. Although many places we have visited have old Roman ruins, this site in Burgundy was an attempt to reach down for some Celtic remains.

The Celts used to come out of their hill fortifications—tall, naked men painted blue—and proceed to beat the Romans over the head. That was, before superior tactics finally overcame them. The soil is so acid that remains are hard to find, but we enjoyed seeing the techniques of a dig and did see at least a few pieces that will end up in a museum.

Strasbourg is considered a must-see for those who like quaint cities with a foot solidly in the past. It’s also the season there for music and dance. The dancing is done with much élan, but lacks a bit of finish. The wet, cool weather continues; but from what I hear about conditions in Missouri, we have missed little by being here.

The summer hurries toward its end—a couple more classes, a few more bottles of white wine, and we’ll be homeward bound.

Love, Dad

CHAPTER 2

AVIANO, ITALY, 1978

Aviano, Italy, September 1978

Dear Jeril,

Here we are in Sunny Italy, and it really is sunny. Italians seem to take a cloudy day as a personal affront. We live at the base of the foothills to the Alps, so mountains rise out of our backyard, often topped with fog. I understand in the winter they are topped with snow when there is no snow here in Aviano.

We are surrounded by grape fields; but since fifty-five percent of the farming here is grapes, I guess where ever you go, you will find grapes. This makes wine very reasonable; we are drinking good wine at fifty cents a liter. The bread is also excellent; we go each morning to the bakery to buy our daily supply. Cheese is also reasonable so we use quite a bit of it.

The small family restaurants are fairly cheap, but the bill always gives me a shock until I translate it. For example, L8800 looks like a lot of money, but it is only eleven dollars.

Tonight after gymnastics we’ll go out for a late dinner. Stephanie already plans on having an Atomic Pizza. Pizza is much better here than it was when we ate it in Italy six years ago. It’s almost as good as American, but not quite.

After all the trouble I had, or we had with the 411 Volkswagen last time we lived in Europe, I thought never another one of those beasts. Well, as you know by now, when we got here it was a 1973 412 not a 1973 1600 as I had expected, so we took it. The size is ideal, and at this point it runs beautifully. I’m hoping my run of bad cars in Europe is over.

It sounds like your social life is moving along. Once you get a start like you describe, it should build rapidly. As the little girls (Stephanie twelve, Rosie fourteen) have probably told you their social lives leave something to be desired. Rosie did go to a dance and had a great time—evidently the boys even slow danced with her.

The girls entered an Italian run with me Sunday and finished in time to collect their medals, but they said, Never again! I think I can get them out for another, however. We haven’t gone much of anywhere yet because of your mother’s abscessed tooth. It’s been slow to respond to treatment. The dentist changed antibiotics yesterday so I think the worse is definitely over. She does look much better today and even took a long walk with the girls and me this morning.

Jeril, your mother expects to write you tomorrow about plane tickets to Holland for your visit with us over Christmas. I’ll write more as soon as something happens.

Love, Dad

Aviano, Italy, October 2, 1978

Dear Jeril,

Even though we haven’t traveled much as yet, we still have the impression that most major cities of Italy have the second most famous palace in the country and the third largest cathedral. With so much to chose from, certain impressive structures don’t even get listed in the ordinary guidebooks. It’s like a comedian who has so much good material he can afford to throw away lines.

When we visited one of these throw-away palaces last week, we were most impressed. The last Doge of Venice had lived there, and on one of his visits Napoleon had slept there. Europeans use Napoleon slept here the same way we use Washington slept here. Actually Napoleon had stayed here long enough to arrange some important treaties and to get the area organized so that the mail ran on time.

Italians practice the art of keeping up a good front (far bella figura) and we visitors expect them to act happy and festive for our benefit. Sad is only allowed for women who are singing for the benefit of said visitors. It was therefore a bit disconcerting to have one of the young guards at the palace let the basic sadness and frustrations of his life show. His English was limited, but he had obviously studied the palace and its history. But he found the job dull, leading nowhere and for someone of intelligence allowed little use of his talent.

We live in one of the very few tall buildings, four stories, in Aviano. This may be a mistake. Within moments of meeting several Americans here, they were telling me the story of their experiences in the last major earthquake two years ago. It is a preoccupation with many, even those who feel Aviano is probably the best place in Europe to be stationed.

The whole earthquake experience was so shocking that they were left with many cues that now create anxiety. A rumbling sound, rooms with hard-to-use exits, driving along a cliff face—all bring back memories of the quake and send their hearts racing.

A number of my students who had lived in apartments first moved into tents, then at great expense in breaking leases moved into one-story houses. Their concerns now have me waking at odd hours of the night to contemplate quick exits from our fourth floor apartment.

Speaking of the apartment, it is an interesting mix of class and harass. We have real tile with beautiful designs in both bathrooms, the floors are made with very striking tile, we have generous hallways, three bedrooms and every room opens unto a balcony.

The harassment comes from water being off at odd hours, sewer smells in the bathrooms, and echoes so that it is difficult to talk from one room to another and be understood. We also have an elevator that attempts to maul passengers—that is, when it is working. If you don’t move briskly on exit or entry, it may close its doors on you and you must argue with it awhile before it lets you go. The girls have taken to moving in and out with a minimum of lost motion.

Besides fighting the elevator, we keep in shape with a daily run/walk. Weekends we join the Italians for a marcia (march) or group run with medals for all competitors. There is a charge for entry, the proceeds of which go for medals and wine halfway through and at the end. What is left goes to charity.

This last weekend the girls and I went through a beautiful mountain pass, narrow, steep and scary, to a mountain village where the marcia was held. The biggest excitement of the day was at the parking lot where the first arrivals had carefully filled two rows down the middle of the lot completely cutting off the other half. The police kept directing traffic down the narrow drive to the lot expecting them to find a place to park.

This allowed us to see Italians at their most exuberant—waving arms, shouting, honking horns and generally having fun. The cheerful(?) shouts my friends translated for me consisted of idiots, insane bastards and other terms they felt would be inappropriate for the girls to hear.

Anyway, eight hundred Italians and many Americans were led off by a full Italian military band for a 14k (8.5 mile) walk. The band dropped off after four blocks and went back to wait for our return two and a half hours later.

Small change is a chronic problem in Italy as anything less than a one hundred lira piece (thirteen cents) is rare. As a result some strange things turn up; telephone tokens, sticks of gum and small candies are used for change. My baker just takes turns with me taking the loss my turn today, her turn tomorrow. The bread as expected is great so I’m out of the bread baking business for this year. Their pizzas are tasty and cheap so ditto on that.

I certainly can’t complain about being overworked with my teaching assignment. My three classes of three, nine and fourteen students respectively have been a problem to instructors in the past. The students are very close knit and had evidently worked out ways to manipulate instructors, who were seen as outsiders unless they became part of the local party cycle. My predecessor, who saw the conflict of interest in this, seems to have shaped them up since I find them a hard working, cooperative group.

There has been a real problem in our getting organized to see Italy. I’ve been like an addict who has just discovered a new source of drugs, except its books to read and the time to read them. I’ve probably read a dozen books in the last two weeks. I’ve just had a long talk with myself and expect we’ll be moving out to some real adventures in Italy this weekend.

Love, Dad

Aviano, Italy, October 1978

Dear Jeril,

Italians are people watchers—sitting in a sidewalk bar or café, standing in a group on the corner—they watch. They have even organized, unofficial and somewhat spontaneous, their watching into a promenade. We’ve been involved in these promenades that take place in the main public square and streets in at least four cities. The women get dressed in their best, and where we’ve been their best is very nice. They wear high narrow-heeled leather boots, well-cut dresses and marvelous makeup, and parade in pairs and threes.

The young man and woman who have found each other walk with arms around each other showing off the magnificence of their catch. The young men who parade in groups are not as well dressed, but are better dressed than the men who stand with their motorcycles on the corner and look masculine.

Everyone looks and admires and is admired. In spite of the stories I’ve heard about Italian men as rather aggressive women watchers, I have only seen the most polite behavior.

The beach appears to be something else. Our time on the Italian Riviera, after the official season, allowed me only minimum chance to watch the watchers. Italian men wear the briefest of jockey bikinis. Women also leave little to the imagination. But here there is little staring except by American males who wear walking shorts or long bathing suits. In fact, if you want to talk to an American, just strike up a conversation with the man in the long drawers.

As a consequence of some of my watching here and there, I have drawn some conclusions. While women in Italy are rumored to know their place and to give appropriate respect to men, here are some of my observations.

1. There appear to be many women disk jockeys and announcers on the radio.

2. Even older women ride motorcycles and Vespas (motor scooters) cutting in and out of traffic with the best.

3. You do not step ahead of Italian women in a line at the market, else you will see what a few assertiveness training programs do for women in America.

4. Women do not wear slacks or shorts; younger women do wear bright colors and shoes with high platforms.

5. As Italians put on weight they seem to distribute it fairly evenly over their bodies as opposed to Germans who put it all in a few places.

As Italians still like demonstrations, in both Florence and Venice we were treated to protest marchers. In Venice the hospital workers for the area were on strike and paraded. Since there was no vehicle traffic to block, they blocked the grand canal with small boats.

We’ve really been traveling the last three weeks and have touched base in a fair number of cities. We are still overwhelmed by the number of things to see and the richness of art, architecture and history in even small cities like Lucca, Ravenna and Rimini. I’m too lacking in observation skills and knowledge to deal with all I’ve seen in any meaningful way; instead my memories are of sharp little moments such as these examples:

Venice: The old street singer with a black eye and a slightly alcoholic demeanor (rare in Italy) was singing in a charming, rich voice to a very appreciative audience.

Pisa: My eyes were fighting my sense of balance as I walked the winding