May Day

Today was such a nice day, so nice that I want to capture it in writing. Today is the first of May and it is a holiday here in Germany. It is the day for "workers", on this day off we went on a "wanderung" (a nice way for saying a -walk-). The eve of May day is called Walpurgisnacht , in the night of Walpurgis the "witches" come out and cause trouble, here it is the local punk kids, they toilett paper trees and cars and turn street signs around etc... yesterday my mother-in-law told me that "in her time" (on the night of Walpurgis) if a boy had a crush on a girl he would spill a line of chalk (liquid) from his house to hers- the idea being that she wake up and follow the chalk line to her secret admirer. So back to the story last night we went out with friends to a bbq and played cards -the men poker, the ladies- phase 10. This morning we picked up Joey, he was at oma's house last night and met up with 4 other couples and a dog We walked 3km (1.5 miles) to Beckstein (a neighboring wine producing town http://www.beckstein.de), in the town there was a big May day festival with food and music. The hall was very nicely decorated with vineyards and there were waitresses running around pouring you wine before you had a chance to say "I'll have another". I had a salad with chicken breast stripes and Jochen had roast beef with horseradish sauce and noodles, and Joey had a bratwurst with fries. After eating, some had a cappucino but I was busy running around in circles with Joey. He was overly excited listening to the polka music and looking at all the people. There was a wood carver there showing his trade and Joey was pocketing all of the shavings the man carved out. We then made our way back home and chose the uphill route instead of walking the way we came. We walked up the hill toward the vineyard through a narrow residential street and do you know what we saw???? A chalk spilled line that either ended or started from one house and led to ??? down the road that we didn't take. We took the road were the pavement turned to grass and we entered the vineyards of Beckstein. It was a steep ass hill but we had our fun. Joey too- he tried to run up hill and his body was at such an odd degree that he looked like he was going to kiss the dirt. Once we were out of the vineyards we had a wonderful view of Koenigshofen, we were on top of the hill that we usually see out of Joey's window, it was a nice change of perspection. We then walked down the lightly forested hill and I was surprised to see information boards along the way (kinda like the historical markers you see along the road in TX.). These info boards informed me that dinosaurs once roamed our area, that seashells were embedded in the hill, what types of fruit trees were along the path and that Napolean's troops once crossed this hill. There was also a little ity bity house that was used as a shrine (forgive me you catholics out there- there is a diff. name for it I know). Then we walked down to the little Biergarten were I used to work and had a bier/latte/apfelshorle. Joey played in the playground and got sand in his mouth when we asked him if an ice cream would help him feel better he somehow felt better again
It was now around 2:30pm and Jochen remembered that last night he amoung others made a semi drunken agreement to play baseball. So we (2 of the four couples) walked up to the sport fields here in Koenigshofen. Noone was there at 2:30 but they all trickeled in within the half hour. Almost everyone that was at the bbq yesterday was there today and it was a great atmosphere. Christoph and I were teaching those that don't know the rules - the rules of the game. Christoph is a coach at the higschool and he has a private set of gloves and bats so that everyone was set to go. They played for about 2.5 hours, the cheering crowd on the side had made a impromtu picknick. Joey was running around with another girl his age and many people took turns to watch the kids. It was then around 6:30 when we decided to go home. We bathed Joey and he was astonished how much sand was in the bathtub. We then made him a quick dinner, played in his room, read a book (or two), and now he is talking himself to sleep. Jochen (my wonderful husband), is cleaning the kitchen and I.... am sitting here typing this up so I can remember what a nice may day we had. In 15 min. Dr. House is on and that's where Jochen and I will eat our tomato & mozzerella salad with a nice garlic baguette. Till next time,