More Letters from France

I have been corresponding with the gentleman from France who knew my dad during WWII. This man is now 72 years old, but he was just a nine-yr-old boy when daddy was there during the war. My father was a young soldier then, in his mid-twenties.

In his letters, R refers to my dad as "our very own soldier." He told me about my father and the other GIs fixing his bicycle for him, and as a young boy of 9, he was "quite proud" of that bicycle from then on. He also said that my father gave him his "first taste of a cigarette." (Looking back, I doubt my father would be very proud of that-- he used to smoke years ago, but quit when I was in high school in the 1960s.)

R also tells me that when he was a boy, his own father was "very severe," but became more lenient when the American soldiers came to their small town of Cremieu. In his latest letter, he told me that my father spent many hours with his parents, learning how to play French card games. He also said that my father and some of the other soldiers set up a "cafe," where soldiers and French citizens could listen to music and dance. R wasn't allowed to go there, because of his young age, but his parents would let his older sister go from time to time.

R also mentioned in his letter that one of the young girls in the town married one of the soldiers. She became a "celebrity" in their town, because she left the village and went "ah.... to America. America!"

In this latest letter from France, R wants to know what sort of work my father did after the war. When R "became of age," he started his own company of "refuse elimination," which is now run by his sons because he has retired. Refuse elimination-- such a delicate way of saying that his company was responsible for picking up the trash in the town.

I think I will look for two books to send to my father's long-ago friend in France: a book on New York City, and a book on Texas. I think R would like to have a photo-essay book of the big American city where my dad spent most of his life, and now that I'm writing the letters for my dad from Texas, maybe R would like to know what this state is like as well.

R had sent me some literature on his little village of Cremieu. Not much has changed there since the Middle Ages..... it looks very peaceful, very old-world, and very beautiful.

It is R's wish that my father come to visit him and his family in Cremieu. I will have to explain to R that that isn't likely to happen. If this "reunion" of sorts had taken place ten years ago, my father would have been able to make such a trip. But now, with his recent diagnosis of the beginnings of Alzheimer's, my father wouldn't be able to travel that far. As daddy said to me the other day: "I can barely make it across the street these days."

The letters from France are wonderful to read, and beautiful to look at. The paper is plain white and unlined, the words are written carefully with a fountain pen. The numbers are written European-style, just like the way my father still writes them to this day. When I was reading the latest letter out loud to my husband yesterday, my voice started to crack and I nearly cried. I don't know why. I couldn't explain it.

R cannot speak or write English, so his friend A does the translating and the writing for him. When I write a letter to R, I also send a short note to A. R lives in Cremieu, A lives in Trept... the two friends aren't that far away from one another. I know the names of their wives, and how many children and granchildren they have. R's daughter gave birth to twin boys this past January, on the very day that my first letter arrived in his mailbox.

When I go to the bookstore for those books, I think I will look for four of them and send two books to R's friend in Trept. And maybe I can also find a book on France to send to my dad.