Paris Journal 2012 – Barbara Joy Cooley Home: barbarajoycooley.com

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Every summer at this time I think about the uncle whom I never knew, George A. White, Jr., who died in France, for France, while he was a soldier in General Patton’s army. What prompts this annual meditation is the local news coverage of the Liberation of Paris, which happened on August 25, 1944. George was the eldest of three brothers, all of whom are now deceased. He died first – on October 12, 1944. He was shot by a German sniper as American troops from General Patton’s Third Army were withdrawing from Fort Driant – the only battle General Patton ever lost, according to the “Something about everything military” web site. His mother (my grandmother, Edith Violet Egelhoff White) was greatly affected by his death, my dad told me. My dad also told me that I look a lot like his mother. Maybe there is something to this “genetic memory” concept that was recently the subject of an article in the New York Times, because the story about my uncle’s untimely death has always seemed extraordinarily important to me. Edith had the body of her eldest son sent home for burial. So he rests in the Riverview Cemetery in Wilmington, Delaware; he’s not in France. Dad (Winfield Wayne “Whit” White) also was a soldier in World War II, but not in Europe. He was stationed in India, with the Army Air Force. He died last year. And I miss him so much. He was an avid reader of this journal. The other brother, Jim, died within the past year, too. He was in the U.S. Navy in World War II, and was among the first troops to walk on the radioactive ground after the bomb exploded in Nagasaki. They had a cousin who was a pilot in WWII; he crashed into the side of a mountain in what is now Pakistan. Those very, very brave men. I think of them all, every year. They’re gone, but not forgotten. Yesterday afternoon, Tom and I worked together on a perplexing task, and finally decided we’d done enough work for the day. The publisher sent things to Tom on Friday evening, asking for the work to be completed by mid-week, which means working through the weekend. But we generally do, anyway. I know what the problem is: people do not realize how much time it takes to write well. Even people who work for publishing houses sometimes do not know this. At the end of the day, we made one final, big shopping run at “Diabolique” with our shopping trolley. I will never forget the first shopping run there for this summer, when the sparkling wine bottle exploded near my head. That’s when the Dia store became “Diabolique” for us. We loaded up on the heavy liquids: milk, juice, and lots of Badoit. Second priority was fruit; delicious strawberries were the star attraction yesterday, along with luscious-looking peaches. Roasted chicken. Espresso. Brown eggs. We’re all set for light “brunches” for the week. We still will make regular runs to the bakery, however, for traditional baguettes. Shopping will be different in the 6^th arrondissement, where there is no nearby Dia but there is the top-notch Marché Saint-Germain. I’ll be writing more about that place in this journal during September. By the time we finished our “Diabolique” errand and stashed our bargain-priced acquisitions, we were ready for a simple dinner at the neighborhood pub, Le Commerce Café. Tom ordered the pork rib special that came with an enormous pile of mashed potatoes that would not even fit into the photograph, and I ordered the margarita pizza with chorizo. Tom could not resist dessert: a tarte fine aux pommes, glace vanille. That All-American boy loves his apple pie with vanilla ice cream! Find me on Facebook

Sunday, August 26, 2012 Statue of Liberty on the Île aux Cygnes. Tom’s grilled pork ribs and half of his mashed potatoes. When a pizza is hand-made, sometimes it is a little lop-sided. ← Previous Next →