Of cake and wine

Fortunately, I wrote my story this morning - thank you, Marina, for the inspiration.

A friend of my mother's, Ld, called up last week and said the third of the triumvirate, Lr, was heading this way for a Garden Club Reunion.

Now, all three have been friends since, ah, the late 1950s, so it's a long time friendship. Due to retirements, each moved hundreds of kilometres away.

Ld said to expect them on Monday. I made cack... sorry, cake; chocolate, in fact. ("Lr doesn't dobought cake," my mother said.) And so, we waited. No sign of them - and no, Lr isn't the kind of person to ring and say they'll arrive on such-and-such day at such-and-such time. I also arranged for a wine salesman to come on Wednesday, figuring 'if not today, the friend will turn up tomorrow.'

Tuesday, and we finished off the cake, made another. And so, we waited. No sign of them - and no, we didn't know where they were staying, nor their phone number.

Today. I made a nice butter cake, with cream and chocolate frosting - urg, licking the bowls gave me a monumental sugar rush. And we waited - my mother happily watching the television, me, curtain twitching. Two o'clock came and went, then three. I asked the parent whether she'd like to come into the other room to wait. I kept watch on the door while printing out some old photos for her, and we chatted. Finally, four o'clock arrived. My mother gave up and went back to her room, since the wine man was due at 4.30.

And lo, the weary travellers did turn up - at a quarter to five, while I'm sipping a rather bland French white.

The wine man wasn't sure whether to arrange another day, or stay and listen to the reminiscing. I urged him to stay and he settled back, occasionally pouring from a new bottle, that we briefly discussed while the other conversation continued. Lr's husband chimed in with comments every now and then about the wines he wasn't tasting.

Lr and husband declined coffee and cake, and stayed barely an hour. They left with promises of long letters. The wine man stayed another fifteen minutes or so, since he had another appointment.

I bought some rather nice Aussie wines, the story is written and all is right with world after my time with various wines - and there's still cake.