Today wine festival in Wahlwiller. Beautiful weather, good atmosphere, live music and lots of friends: good wine some of them said, many said nothing, a single one disapproved of the wine. Well, wine is like a partner, it’s not always what it seems in the beginning. Some like it, some don’t. A lot of the usual blah blah about brewing a natural product, bottled by hand, the result always surprising etc. And it tasts better, the more you drink. And that the alcohol always works. So everyone praises his wine in his / her own way. I did not feel 100 % o.k., so I thought the wine was not to carouse. Erwin, director of the wine festival, opened the day and presented the new, beautiful wine queen Heike in the presence of the festival’s patron Dieneke Schepel, whom I see (and kiss) only 1 x per year. Dieneke is way over 80 years old and used to be a collegue g.p. of mine. Two sons of her late husband Jan Schepel, were present too. One just came over from Vancouver where he lived. Also present is our mayor Bas (whom I never kiss ). Also present of course were most of the former festival queens.
Among bees queens are getting rare, extinct, but in Wahlwiller we are getting ever more queens. Several of them announced they might join me part of my trip.
I made acquaintance with friend Mike v. d. S’s girlfriend. Wow!
Leonard, Cristine, Thea and many other acqaintances were present like usual. Former patient Ron van den H. has been in Tailand now for more than 15 y., his brother came telling me, Ron escaping his former difficult life in western Europe. I also met a couple of which she has aniridia (never heard of). She was approximately blind, and her boyfriend / partner was wheelchair bound by congenital spasticity. Nice, positive feedback. Reverent Reijnen promised to make a prayer for my trip. A chat with the sister of neighbourvineyard owner Wim H., who long ago had advised me not to travel with a difficult stallion and a dominant male shepherd dog. I had to admit she was right, I now have a castrated horse and a female dog (see selfie). Yes, for you, men, life is easy, I always hear women say. My answer is, just look at those beasts, how difficult it is to be a male. Josette promised to light a few candles in Slevrouwe (Midieval church in Maastricht) for the benefit of my enterprise. I told her it needed to be very big and thick ones. I need the chapel all filled with devotion candles for my trip, otherwise I’ll never make it. What did I start? But if it all works out, if I’ll make it, so much greater the fun. Ha, ha, I’m already enjoying myself. I met a couple of whom I thought he was a Spaniard. So I made my Peruvian daughter in law, Gigi, make acqaintance with them. So they could talk some Spanish. He turned out to be an Iranian. Well, I’m not an anthropologist.
I spoke to winemaker Marcel N. from Schin op Geul , Hans and Annie, who often help me in my vineyard and with my sheep, Paulien and Rob who want to join me a couple weeks in Spain,, also the couple I often meet in the woods, when they are trying out with ther Frisian horses and I with Leon, my Iceland horse (see yesterdays picture) of whom I learned the exact meaning of that the old Limburg word “ungere”. I spoke with a lot of “Hollendere”( people from the north of the Netherlands) of whom possibly also some Frisians-non horses and a lot of other people. Also quite some nice talks, like what does your wife think about your plans? It’s about time to ask her. If Sonja answers’I don’t want you to go’ I’ll be upset, and if she says ‘please go, as soon and as long as possible’ I’ll be upset too. So I’ll answer in her place: great for me, Sonja, to be free for one year, not being responsible to anybody, not having to wait for Harry for dinner, to mention just a few innocent things.
This evening we have dinner with son Serve, his Gigi and 2 our 3 grandchildren. We think they are beautifull, like everybody thinks his/her own partner is, isn’t it? (dangerous). Tomorrow I’ll try again to get horse Leon on the trailer, I’ll go on packing, I-pad-class (I’m afraid to become an old illiterate), practice with filming, in the evening having diner with Ellie and if there is still time left I’ll go for a long walk.
And thus this was a nice day again.
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