Wake me up before I die

I come in from the back garden weary and filthy to stroll over to the front window and watch the sun set. Outside I see a huge, shiny black car vie for a parking slot in front of my neighbour’s house. Good lord! A hearse can only mean one thing!

I dash to the door to rush over and see what can be done. I hover. I’m only a neighbour. I can’t just waltz in without so much as a by your leave at such a private moment. I can’t stay here and not offer whatever it is I might dredge up to offer. I can’t go over dressed like this, but no-one will care about what a neighbour is wearing at such a time. What will I say, what can I do? What would my mother say, or do for that matter? I stop talking to myself and plunge out the door. Little voices pursue me down the path. It can’t be "him," that daily visitor with the booming voice and the hearing aide, who stomps all over my floors with his mucky boots and outrageous braces? [translation = suspenders] Not the man who adopted 6 children on top of his own four. The guy who visits his parents and has a good word for everyone? How will they cope without him? A man for all seasons and an open hand for everyone. The one who is always there with a tease and a game, a substitute grandfather to weird foreigners.

I stumble towards their front door through the garden that has taken too many years to construct, because the owner is always too busy doing helpful things for other people, rather than taking care of his own. The self sustaining contractor, [translation = builder] with no functioning sprinkler system.

The door is ajar. I knock and peek inside. No-one hears my knock. The wake must be in full flow. I step inside to see revelers. I had no idea that they had Irish connections? From across the room, I see my neighbour, his lurid braces, hob nailed boots and baseball cap. He slaps the back of his comrade and guffaws loudly enough to deafen 50 yards of neighbours. He spots me and strides on over, “hey there Maddy! Whatcha doin?”
“I just came over…..I ……er , I saw the hearse.”
“Hearse?”
“Yes, the hearse, outside, parked outside, I just wanted to er…..”
“Whatcha mean hearse? There ain’t no hearse out there!”
“Yes, you know….......the big black car.”
“What big black car?” He peers out of his own front window. “That ain’t no hearse, it’s a limo!”
“A limo?”
“Yeah! You know! A stretch limo.” He looks at me, twinkling. He slings an arm, a tree bough around my shoulder and crushes me to his chest, “it’s prom night, fur ma grand-daughter. See her over there, in that big dress? That’s her. Her prom night.” Clearly, it is not only my children who need a "translator."

Wake me up before I die

http://alien-in-a-foreign-field.blogspot.com/2007/05/wake-me-up-before-i-die.html

Catherine Tate Translator

Catherine Tate Translator

http://alien-in-a-foreign-field.blogspot.com/2007/03/katherine-tate-translator.html

Thanksgiving Eve Day?

I start preparing the thirteen vegetables. Of all the things I could be doing with my time this appears to be the most bizarre thing I could choose to do for a household that shuns vegetation of any kind. [translation = meat too]

I’d like to have at least six of them [translation = sides] done in advance as well as the stuffing [translation = fixings ] I realize I lack sage. A quick dash to the supermarket.

It's busy at the check out. [translation = there is a line {sub translation = a queue}] I chat to someone in line because I am lining? [translation = queuing] I explain that senior daughter will not be with us as she’s going to England. The woman is sad for me because all families should be together at thanksgiving if at all possible.

I explain that the fares are cheaper now than they are at Christmas. She finds this surprising. She asks the where abouts of her destination? I explain that she’s going to Plymouth, where the Pilgrim Fathers came from. She is surprised to know that there is a ‘Plymouth’ in England. [translation = Plymouth in England = Plymouth 101, Plymouth in the US = Plymouth 102, although there are several of them, Plymouths in the United States that is to say]

I consider a snapshot history lesson, but think better of it. [translation = British students study of history terminates at about the same time as the Pilgrim fathers set sail. {Sub translation = Brits lost interest}]

As the packer packs my bags she asks if my thanksgiving cards have arrived in England? I pause thinking of the correct response. I haven’t sent any. I did send some the first year we were here because I thought they were so funny. [translation = I don’t know why exactly British people [some] think that turkeys are such a source of hilarity]

I reluctantly mutter that they don’t celebrate thanksgiving in England. Now she is shocked. What kind of philistine’s bags is she packing? I grab my trolly,[translation = cart] thinking of how to escape gracefully; I disguise my accent to tell her “I think you’ll find that they only celebrate Thanksgiving in the United States of America,” and skidaddle. [translation = run away]

Thanksgiving Eve Day?

http://alien-in-a-foreign-field.blogspot.com/2006/11/thanksgiving-eve-day.html