THE NEW MISS BECKY EMERGES

Dearest Friends,

There are three or four things that I remember most about early '77.  First was that, thanks to those books by Adelle Davis, I was rethinking the way I cooked and ate.  I was buying things like vitamins, yogurt and whole wheat flour, for the first time ever, and using them to make whole wheat banana pancakes, yogurt popsicles, and even home-baked bread.  Second was that things at work were really cranking up, and my boss seemed to be giving me more and more responsibility.  I was crazy busy taking inventory every morning, then would take the paperwork home with me to tally up at night.  Once that was complete, there were many new shipments due in that would need to be unpacked and priced, and then M. would be off to Paris again for another buying trip!

Miss Nellie Celebrates a Birthday

Most of all though, I remember the parties -- lots and lots of parties!  There were birthday celebrations and Mah Jong luncheons.  We hosted one party to welcome old friend BW from Indonesia, and went to a Chinese dinner that was a going-away party for JH and his family, who had been so helpful to us when we first arrived.  The highlight of the evening at that one was getting to sit around and watch two guys play the hottest new thing on the market -- an electronic game called Pong!  I'm afraid I was less than impressed.  There were dances at the American Club and out at the fab yard mess hall, and even a barbecue out in the desert.  Sometimes we even went to two parties in one night!  Perhaps we were trying to distract ourselves from that fourth thing -- the thing that was occupying our every waking thought at the time (and probably my dreams as well) -- John's imminent departure. 

Not sure what this party was for.

On Saturday, Feb. 19th, we got word that he would be heading offshore in the next day or two.  On Monday he took off from work early, and drove me down to the hobby shop to get stocked up on projects.  Guess he figured I needed things to keep me busy while he was away.  The next day, right after lunch, I took him out to the fab yard to catch his boat, only to find it was being delayed 24 hours.  We took advantage of our little reprieve to go to the movies that afternoon.  Young Frankenstein happened to be showing, and we figured some good belly laughs were just what we needed.  Much to our surprise, unlike the time when we saw it back in the states and the audience was rolling in the aisles, this time we were the only two people in the entire theatre who laughed even a tiny bit!  I guess Mel Brooks just doesn't translate well into Arabic.

I checked back with John at lunchtime on Wednesday, but he still didn't know when the boat was to depart.  That afternoon I went to my very last French class -- another reason why John was concerned about my having too much time on my hands while he was away.  He finally left early the next morning, Feb. 24th, and our only consolation was that at least we had a month's home leave coming to us in June, and we were planning a stop in Greece on the way home.  Finally I would be able to step foot off this tiny island!

One other thing has become increasingly obvious to me, though, as I have been writing these stories and posting these photos -- something I don't think I was even aware of at the time.  You see the girl in those black slacks and that flowered haltar top, in those two photos above?  She's not the same girl who arrived in Indonesia some 20-odd months ago.  She's come a long, long way from being that shy little mouse who sat meekly in the corner at parties, and rarely strayed from her hubby's side!