Rural depopulation
Grandad May 3rd, 2008
I went down to the village yesterday.
It was a nice sunny day, though there was a bit of a nip in the air. It was ideal weather for a coffee and a smoke of the pipe.
The terrace in front of the coffee shop was packed, which surprised me as it was Friday. Then I discovered they were all Dutch. They weren’t wearing clogs or anything like that, but I recognised the language. I was a bit annoyed that they had taken my usual table but there is always a place kept for me, so Sandy and I settled down.
I had a bit of a problem with all these Dutch. There were a lot of them and I only had the car with me, so logistics decided their fate. I just wasn’t in the mood for multiple trips to the land fill.
Later, I was wandering down to buy some tobacco and I heard the unmistakable screech of an American accent. There were three of them and they were chatting to a local. Sandy and I implemented our usual plan. Sandy pretended to have a dump [I knew she was only pretending, because she is incredibly discreet about her toiletries], and I lit my pipe.
I was disgusted. The Americans were looking for directions, and he was actually telling them the right way.
They thanked him [I found it hard not to throw up], and told them that he seemed to know the area very well. He replied in an awful Stage Oirish manner “yarra, sure I have lived here for sixty years, man and boy”. At that stage I did throw up, and Sandy did do a dump.
I let the Americans go.
But I did have my trip to the land fill.
We have standards to maintain in the village, after all.
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