missy and I by the sea

We walk slowly up the sandy path bordered by petunias that catch the breeze.It is our first day in our new home, these cottages at Saintes-Maries.They are small and not too rich in windows ,in my view ,but we are as happy as kids.We have come here to write and to be.

Saintes Maries is noted for being a meeting place for gypsies and that is what we are.Missy is my alter ego.My writing leans to the serious ,hers is full of humor and wonderful insights.We met at Bellsouth Mobility in 1996, where we struggled to satisfy irate customers and wrestled with emotionally unbalanced employees.Not a day would go by that we didn't dash into each other's office,shrieking,"You're not going to believe this!"She got me through.

Missy is about twenty years younger than I and we met when her son was 6years old. She brought his youth into my life with pokemon cards and beanie babies.

Missy is the perfect friend.She reads my stuff, makes me laugh, is a spiritual being and knows it and she posseses the whimsy that I lack.This is a friend that gives me children's books for my birthday because she likes them and they turn out to be such a joy.She loves the writings of Ferrol Sams and swooned when I told her he was my General Practitioner.I gained great friend status that day.When I gave her a book by Sams, she clutched it to her chest like the Grail.

On La Mer,where these cottages were in Van Gogh's time, we are going to get up early and have prayer time.Then, a lovely swim in our bikinis(not);after that refreshment, we will begin our 3 hour writing session at crude tables by the windows.The tables have to be crude and have uneven legs for the muse to be present.

Her room in the cottage will be neat except for the sand.Her desk will have little boxes of various shapes and sizes and underneath on a shelf will be old games.On the wall will be pictures of her 2 loves and her siblings and she will write of them often in various stories in different guises.Her favorite themes will be family and growing up.

On a shelf above her desk is her camera and her excitement at capturing the sea in all its moods will often be frenetic.I share her love of taking pictures so I see us racing down the beach over the dunes to get the first picture of the day,the sun coming up over La Mer.

I don't recall a single time in the years that we have been friends that we haven't gotten along but living together is another matter.When the lean ,tall beach boys come to call, (carrying Sangria)after noticing us on the sand ,we better have rules for sharing.Sorry, this is ,after all, fiction.

We will go to market,observe and collect stories.She will find humor and I, lessons.

Evening will find us at peace and feeling that a day of writing is a day well spent.
We will drift off to sleep with hopes of a vivid dream that will turn into a story.Everything is grist for the mill.