Well, the big day is over. Polley’s birthday, otherwise known to some of you as Valentine’s Day, was a busy and nice way to celebrate Polley’s ¾ of a century on earth. In fact, it dawned on me yesterday, that Polley and I, on this anniversary, have been together longer, that she was alive previous to meeting me (before really LIVING!). She was 37 when we met and yesterday marked the 38th year of the commencing of our relationship.
Before getting to yesterday’s activities, let me go back to Monday. The weather has been pretty overcast the last few days. We had a terrific rainstorm on Sunday morning, but it did not ruin our weekly dinner at Vitea restaurant, down on the Malécon, where our friends know they can find us each Sunday evening.
Monday I was up and walking. Have gotten up to about 2 miles now, but did have a bit of a setback after the Tuesday am jaunt. So, I am going to back off a bit and see if things settle down. May have thought I was better than I really am. Don’t know what caused the nerve issue, so I don’t want to do anything that could set it off again.
Anyway, Monday was a pretty typical day. But that evening we had invited José, the waiter from LaFuente and his wife to go to dinner with us. See him her with Polley and Aurora, the manager of La Fuente, on Polly’s birthday yesterday.
José has been so nice to us over the years that we wanted to have an opportunity to thank him and to get to know him a little better. We had never met his wife and while José had quite good English, we were not anticipating that his wife had English. We were correct. However, we had a delightful evening. We ate at a place on the Malécon called The Blue Shrimp. I must admit that taking a waiter, and a very good one, to a restaurant is interesting. José was not impressed (actually, waiter or not, none of us was impressed with the level of service or the food. The company was terrific and even Esperanza, despite the lack of English, seemed to have a wonderful time. It was a lovely evening, a disappointing meal, but the very sort of relationship we so treasure on our travels. Now if could only remember to take a photo of such events!
Of course, yesterday was the birthday. I gave Polley a card, which was, naturally, in Spanish. We spent a bit of the morning on Google Translator determining exactly what wishes I had made. Fortunately nothing too embarrassing.
We the went down to La Fuente, where, as they have for the last 5 years, had a special celebration for Polley. To accompany our margaritas, we had a chocolate dessert and, of course, some flowers. See the above photo.
Each waiter had to offer a special birthday wish. Here is Raphael with Polley.
After that gathering we went back up the hill to our place for lunch. When we arrived, we found a beautiful bouquet from Polley’s middle son, Terry.
Terry, regardless of where we are, manages to get flowers to mom. Based on where we live, this time must have been a real challenge! But arrive they did.
Finally, last night, we celebrated year number 75 with 5 friends, all from Oregon, at Vitea. It was a lovely evening.
George and Pat, at the far end of the table next to Polley, Molly, with the short white hair and her husband, John, seated next to me and their next door neighbor, Dorothy, who happened to be down here on a visit. A fun group that loves good food, drink and conversation. Polley and I completed the day with a stop at El Patio es mi Casa (the old Candela) for a nightcap before finishing off a pretty exhaustingbut memorable day.
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