If you must turn the big 5-0, you might as well soften the blow by doing it in France. So that's what I planned, and it actually worked. It really wasn't that bad. I have spent the majority of my last few birthdays working at Camp Neyati in Alabama. Jeff is usually working in Bowling Green so it has been his practice to call me about ten times during the day to sing to me. He knows how much I love the birthday song. Since it costs so much to call, even with the international plan, he texted me instead every couple of hours. It was very sweet, but I missed hearing his voice sing, "dear Ju-ya". Mom took a few pictures of me before we headed out to the beaches of Bordeaux.
The beach was really different from any other beaches I had ever been to. There were no high rise hotels or buildings of any kind. The beach had really fine brown sand and was very wide. Several huge concrete structures looked as if they had just fallen there. They had square openings with iron bars that resembled jail doors, and they were covered in grafitti. Mom and Kurt had walked up ahead while Kathy and I stayed back a bit so we could do something sneaky. (I'll never tell) Mom heard us laughing hard and said she knew exactly what we were up to.
We walked a long way down the beach to find a place where the waved crashed onto the shore, then we set out our towels and made ourselves comfortable. We laid back, closed our eyes and listened to the waves while we soaked up the sun. After about ten minutes, Kathy said, "I hear water!" We all opened our eyes and saw that the ocean was upon us! Thirty seconds later and we would have lost our car keys and cell phones to the ocean. We jumped up, grabbed our water logged belongings and headed way back on the beach. We wondered if the other people on the beach had been watching us, waiting, then laughing at us, the clueless foreigners. The waves and undertow were strong. This time, taking our cue from them, noticing that no one else was in the water, we decided not to go in too deep.
It was fun being on the beach with my mother and sister. It reminded me of the old days, only this time, one of her girls was 50.
I bent down to write in the sand, Then Kathy did, too.
After getting our fill of sand and sun, we packed up and drove past Bordeaux to wine country. Most of the family-owned vineyards sell their wines in elaborate barns, however, we were late and most were closed. However, Kurt bought a bottle of Chateau Julia for me for my birthday. I don't know if I'll ever drink it, but I love it.
We used the GPS to find an Italian restaurant for my birthday dinner and followed the directions to a questionable looking place. While sitting there trying to decide if we should chance it, we noticed a steady stream of locals stopping by to pick up take out. Taking that as a good sign, we went in but were promptly escorted outside to eat, which ended up being very nice. It was really good food. I had the vegetarian lasagna which was served in the dish right out of the oven. It actually boiled in the bowl for a long time.
It was a three hour drive home to Baran. All in all, a beautiful way to turn 50!
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