On a beautiful day in northern New Mexico, The Roommate called me at work...
Can you get away to come home? Uncle Charlie is here!
That was something of a surprise, because my parents were also visiting at the time.
It seems that at an earlier time (Uncle Charlie and my dad did a great deal of time on the road in their work, and both preferred driving), Dad was somewhere in Oklahoma when he saw a car headed toward him on the opposite side. From the slow and irregular speed of the other vehicle, Dad deduced it must by Uncle Charlie, so he turned around, and overtook the other driver. They had a pleasant roadside conversation, and since Uncle Charlie had been traveling west, Dad gave him our Santa Fe address, and suggested he look us up sometime. It was a mere happenstance that the "sometime" occurred when my parents were there! However, I was delighted to see both Dad and Uncle Charlie together, because, I a good listener, but lousy in a one-on-one verbal conversation. THEY were the talkers in our respective families . After a while, we decided we should go for a drive and show Uncle Charlie our (at the time, "little town") of our beloved Santa Fe. We all packed ourselves in our 1960 VW, with Uncle Charlie at "shotgun". We took in the "mandatory" Upper Canyon Road, and circled back on the other side of the canyon, Cerro Gordo Road, Then we began a ride up the mountainside to show Uncle Charlie the beauty of our chosen home. We were not too far up when I was trying to point out the lovely vistas, and noticed that he was pressed so tightly against the passenger side door that I feared he might break through and bang hid head on the cliff. I heard him saying "Billy, you got a nice little car and a fine home, can we turn around now,please?" It was somewhat later in life that Uncle Charlie took his "trip pf a lifetime" to Europe aboard a ship, and "fell in love" with Europe. He gave up his fear of high places, and decided that flying aboard a jetliner would probably not kill him, and would spend a great deal of time exploring the sights across the pond, jumping over, rather than floating across..
It seems that at an earlier time (Uncle Charlie and my dad did a great deal of time on the road in their work, and both preferred driving), Dad was somewhere in Oklahoma when he saw a car headed toward him on the opposite side. From the slow and irregular speed of the other vehicle, Dad deduced it must by Uncle Charlie, so he turned around, and overtook the other driver. They had a pleasant roadside conversation, and since Uncle Charlie had been traveling west, Dad gave him our Santa Fe address, and suggested he look us up sometime. It was a mere happenstance that the "sometime" occurred when my parents were there! However, I was delighted to see both Dad and Uncle Charlie together, because, I a good listener, but lousy in a one-on-one verbal conversation. THEY were the talkers in our respective families . After a while, we decided we should go for a drive and show Uncle Charlie our (at the time, "little town") of our beloved Santa Fe. We all packed ourselves in our 1960 VW, with Uncle Charlie at "shotgun". We took in the "mandatory" Upper Canyon Road, and circled back on the other side of the canyon, Cerro Gordo Road, Then we began a ride up the mountainside to show Uncle Charlie the beauty of our chosen home. We were not too far up when I was trying to point out the lovely vistas, and noticed that he was pressed so tightly against the passenger side door that I feared he might break through and bang hid head on the cliff. I heard him saying "Billy, you got a nice little car and a fine home, can we turn around now,please?" It was somewhat later in life that Uncle Charlie took his "trip pf a lifetime" to Europe aboard a ship, and "fell in love" with Europe. He gave up his fear of high places, and decided that flying aboard a jetliner would probably not kill him, and would spend a great deal of time exploring the sights across the pond, jumping over, rather than floating across..
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