ROMANCING ENCHANTING THE SWAN
THREE THINGS INSPIRED ME WHEN WRITING ENCHANTING THE SWAN: ROMANCE, LOVE FOR MUSIC AND MUSIC IN LOVE. IN SHORT: FOREVER ROMANCE:
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HERE IS THE TRAILER: https://youtu.be/8vHdGKGWQEo
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Don’t take me wrong: it is not only love that makes the world go round: pigheaded ultraconservative family rules preventing a SHINING love blossoming from the heart and conceived in music, GREED versus compassion, JEALOUS PURSUIT to snatch away someone else’s love, ABUSE IN MARRIAGE, desperate escape and FINAL REDEMTPION in music: it’s all in ENCHANTING THE SWAN, a love story as no other.
Paul Cramer, MBA graduate and Fiona Baroness de Maconville, cellist, play The Swan, a famous cello-piece by Camille St. Saëns, before their William & Mary Audience. That’s where their love bloomed: at the Department of Music in the Ewell Hall, located at the College of William & Mary, situated in rustic Williamsburg, Virginia. They play it also at the Graduation Ceremony!
Neal Cary, Professor and cellist teacher at the College of William & Mary, writes about Enchanting The Swan: “…a beautiful story — full of suspense, drama, and enduring love centered around music. John Schwartz has created a whole world, and a wonderful escape. The characters jump off the page with such personality and imagery that this book could make a great movie. Enchanting the Swan is a very enjoyable read, and I recommend it highly.”
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What does VT Mom say: I loved this book! I had not read a novel in several years. After only 3 chapters I was hooked. I live in Virginia so I was very familiar with the college where Paul and Fiona met. Very impressed with the author and his attention to detail. Hope he writes many more.
And Vera: Enjoyed the book. Well written book. First book to read by the author, but sure will read more of books by him in the future. They seem to click and make beautiful music, have plans for the future when graduate, but when go by her place she has now gone. Not even a word to Paul. Seems like wishes of her Godparents are more important. A very heartbreaking love story. How can every thing seem so right, and now so wrong?
And MJOrlean: John writes beautifully – I found the book difficult to put down – an easy read, full of intrigue, love, passion, international travel and dubious banking business, and lots more – a must read.
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As you see from the back flap, the beginning of their love seems doomed in a bitter family feud of old stiff Belgian nobility with modern times. Fiona, an orphan raised by godparents after her parents died sailing into a storm at the Belgian coast, must break off because her noble godfather wants her to marry into their Belgian circle. At a heartbreaking lunch in a restaurant at the Grand Place in Brussels, The Roi d’Espagne (right on the photograph) she tells Paul she can’t marry him.
Paul joins a financial postgraduate course at the Free University of Brussels for a few weeks in the hope Fiona and her godparents change their mind, but eventually must capitulate, and when offered a promising internship at First Swiss Bank in Geneva he takes it. And off he goes, heartbroken, not knowing this step leads him into lots of trouble. Read the story in http://amzn.to/1LPFw5o
Paul skiing in Swiss Alps
Facing the Mont Blanc from the Dole near Geneva with devilish Diane
After a disastrous career start-up in Geneva, Paul returns to New York where he finds to his consternation Fiona in utter disarray, divorcing after an abusive marriage.
What did Dan Dwyer say of this novel? “…If you like old fashioned romance stories, you will like Enchanting The Swan…She marries into nobility while Paul trudges off to the same continent to work for a Swiss bank where he gets involved with another woman whose lack of scruples gets him in trouble. No sooner does he extricate himself than he finds out that Fiona is unhappy in her marriage. That’s all Paul needs to know. Fate and friends conspire to bring them together, but not so fast. There’s more to this story than Dewey eye romance. John Schwartz has written a fine romantic thriller than doesn’t let go until the very end. “
Will Paul and Fiona ever get together again and play their Swan?
Find out for an intriguing end and snatch it at http://amzn.to/1LPFw5o
Brussels: A Cancerous Religion emerges.
Brussels is again the focus of Islamic radicalism. Brussels is the center of the European Union and has been the center of Europe since the European reunification began after World War II. I worked and visited Brussels many times for work and pleasure. Like I mourned with my friends in Paris last November, I mourn with my friends in Brussels now. It is a place with great treasures, such as the Grand Place. Now Islamic Radicalism is overwhelming the city with brutal force to stem the growth of Europe as a symbol of Western Union and Civilization after it stabilized after two terrible wars in the twentieth century and many more before since the Middle Ages.
The issue of Radical Islam has become so predominant in current times that many believe it is something new that only now comes out of the woodwork. In fact, Islam has always been a political movement, starting with Mohammed whose armies swarmed over the Middle East to suppress peoples into submission. Islamic religion, the Quran, has many good thoughts, but it is also a religion of strife. Christ was a prophet of the cross, whose sacrifice we are remembering this week. Yes, many religious and political leaders have also abused and misused Christianity for political purposes. Popes, Emperors, Bishops and priests. Christian fundamentalism in the Middle Ages and many wars between Catholic and Protestant forces caused huge suffering and destruction for four centuries long. With the last remnants of these terrible fissures finally solved with peace in Northern Ireland only some fifty years ago, Europe no longer has religious wars between their main religious beliefs.
Yet now Europe is again overtaken by Islamic Jihadism. Actually, Islamic strife has never really stopped. The Islamic march to conquer Europe was defeated several times, in 732 by France, in 1492 by Spain, in 1683 by the Austrians when the Turks laid siege to Vienna, and in 1918, when the last caliphate, the Ottoman Empire, crumbled at the end of World War I. But jihadism continued to rumble on after the creation of artificial Middle-Eastern countries from the broken Ottoman Empire, and the birth of Israel. Political Islam has consistently grown. Out of a deep hatred for whatever is “Western” or “Jewish,” activist Islamic groups have been attacking and murdering: Iranian Mullahs, Hezbollah, Hamas, then Al-Qaeda born from Saudi-Arabian Wahabism, and now ISIS and its offshoots. Islamic migration to Europe has been largely unassimilated. Zones of Islamic radicalism are created in Europe where police is not even allowed to set foot.
Millions of people of Islamic belief live peacefully, doing their daily work, growing their kids, going to their mosques, trying to live a decent life. So why is it that many of their leaders continue their strive towards Islamic supremacy? The killing, at genocidal proportions, abhors every reasonable person, even peaceful Islamic believers. Why do they not stand up against their own?
Rational Muslims must eradicate the cancer in their Islamic religion. Like any cancer, it kills. If the Muslims themselves do not eradicate this built-in cancer of jihadism in their religion, it will ultimately kill the religion itself. So far, few Muslims have spoken out. How many more terrorist disasters must happen before they realize they must put a stop to it to protect their own religion from oblivion? Christian and Western peoples are not going to let themselves be pulverized into Islamic submission. Jihadism will lead to further war, as it has done from the times that the religion emerged in 632. If that is their wish, it will cause Europe and the USA to lean more and more to leaders who will execute a radical counter-terrorist military offensive, and vote out politicians who practice peace, political correctness, and weakness. It will make the life of innocent Muslims more threatened than ever. They will only have themselves to thank for it.
Vive Bruxelles!
Mars Man’s TV – Economy Stupid or Stupid Economy?
Our popular show “Mother Earth’s Weekly Squirms” was on Mars City TV to discuss the results of the USA 2010 mid-term elections.
“No surprises in the USA,” I said, opening the talks. “It was in the cards for many months. The Pied Piper got a good shaking down. He says he was not on the ballot but he clearly was. It’s the first time in a long time that mid-term local elections became national indeed. The majority of the American electorate said it rejects socialism. Shamus, tell us, was it what they call the economy stupid that broke the back of the President and his obstinate Democrats?”
“It was the stupid economy,” Shamus said coolly. “Because it does not want to do what the politicians want.”
“But don’t politicians know that?” I asked. “After all, they’re supposedly intelligent people, no?” Shamus put on a learned face.
“They try whatever they can to circumvent the economic laws promising heaven and manna to keep their seat. Especially the House with its two-year cycle. When it’s not working they blame the other party or Bush.”
“I thought economics was a social science, not a manipulative device,” Pasha said.
“True, it’s exactly the opposite of a manipulative device,” Elmer said, agitated. “That’s what the socialist’s ideology wants it to be. They disregard the fact that economics responds to a system of unwritten laws and doesn’t conform to the ones their lobbyists drafted and they voted on blindly. When lawmakers ignore them, they do so at their own peril and everybody else’s when the dirt hits the fan, and it did majestically this time.”
“It’s a science all right,” Shamus pointed out, turning to Pasha, “but not like a predictable chemical formula where you know that if you mix liquids, they explode. Politicians mix their laws with your tax money, saying you would be better off if you let them do that and when you look in your wallet a year after and you wonder why it’s empty, they still want more from you saying things take time.”
“But what about these economic laws?” I asked. “Our viewers would like to know.”
“Well, to simplify,” Shamus said, “Suppose I am manufacturing cars. Demand is good and I sell a lot of them. Other carmakers do too and we employ more people to manufacture more to supply demand. People make good money and buy more stuff. Everybody’s happy. Then Mr. Obama needs money for lofty programs that make his voters feel great, and his political majority enforces higher corporate taxes on cars to pay for them. Suddenly I can’t sell them my cars any more at the price I got, have to lay-off workers and must raise prices to stay in business. Then the buyers can’t buy cars at the price they could afford and I am loaded with inventory, make losses and can’t pay the high worker salaries anymore. Then the workers go on strike and I am forced out of business. That’s the economic laws that are at play, works like gravity. But because that’s bad politics, the politicians compound their mistake of raising taxes, and use tax payer money or borrowed money from China or both to keep me afloat and buy off my debts. To pay for that they must raise taxes even more and the Central Bank must print money. Then the US dollar declines in value and makes imports more expensive in the shops, people buy less, and slowly they go down the drain in the rest of the world. Double whammy as they say in the USA. The original mistake was to raise taxes to pay for programs that are not needed or they can ill afford. You have to live within your national means, not your political dreams.”
“Simply put, a stone does not fall zig-zag in physics but in politics it does,” Elmer chuckled.
“But don’t all parties on Earth do that?” Huda asked.
“Some more than others, but socialists in particular,” Tamil said. “The more they give people the more people depend on them and when the next government has to take that away to clean up, the people get mad. Look at France. Till the whole place is in such a mess that only draconian austerity can drag you out of the hole. Look at Britain.”
“But I read over the wire that even some reputable economists support these spending policies,” Pasha wondered. “Don’t the economic laws apply to them?”
“Some economists are socialist economists,” Shamus said. “for them capitalism is the culprit. They base their assumptions on ideology and skew their assumptions in such a way that the outcomes seem right. But their assumptions are artificial. They lack a mathematical base. Socialist ideologues make everyone poor because they want to kill the human urge that wants more. With them, life gets pretty drab, except for those in power. But not all is right with the capitalist economists either. Capitalism gives incentives to the risk takers to invent, produce and make money, but then everyone goes for the same buck, the economy overheats, and the balloon bursts. They call that the business cycle. Humans are imperfect and so are their markets.
A good governor with a good team knows how to manage these ups and downs. Socialists want to get rid of the business cycle all together but throw the baby away with the bath water.”
“So, if the business cycle bursts at the same time as elections are held, as it did in 2008,” Pasha concluded, “the populace swings to the socialists for correction and when they wake up seeing the bad results, they swing to the capitalists again.”
“Exactly,” Shamus said, nodding approvingly like a university professor.
“Has anyone any views on what happens now?” I asked.
“There’s no major change in government like in Britain or even Sweden and Holland,” Elmer said, “Obama is still president and his Czars in the White House are still penning socialist policies and regulations. The main change is that his ambitious spending programs will be arrested. We will see what happens in 2012.”
“Stopping spending is the first thing the new majority must do,” Shamus said. “Confidence will return and bring people back to work and the economy will pick up again. Taxes must be kept low for at least the next five years and Obamacare must be repealed, so that businesses can plan to make a profit for a reasonable return on their money and re-employ people.”
“Why could the socialists not do that too?” Huda said, puffing in her chair. “It sounds pretty logical to me.”
“For socialists, profit’s a bad word,” Elmer explained. “They say it’s steeling from the worker, forgetting that it’s the investor who’s risking his hard earned money. They want the government to produce what everyone needs at a given price and in accordance with their regulations, and pay employers and workers a fixed wage. They forget that human beings aren’t made that way. Only dictatorships can enforce such policies. That’s why they lose at the ballot box.”
“But the huge USA deficits still burden their economy,” I said. “It will keep the recovery down. The new majority will face criticism in 2012.”
“I bet Earth’s socialists are banking on that,” Tamil said, laughing. “If it goes better, the president can say, hey, folks, you see that we are doing better after all thanks to my policies?” and if it does not he can say “hey, you see who’s been messing up again? Didn’t I tell you about the failed Bush policies? Vote for me!”
“The economic laws don’t take sides, the average voter does not understand. They vote emotionally.” Shamus said. “Despite all the warning signs hanging around his neck, people just discarded all the negatives and voted for him, regardless.”
“The Pied Piper played on that handsomely in 2007,” Pasha said. “Remember the Obama girl? She’s nowhere to be found. They just had Halloween down there. I heard she was cultivating pumpkins in Michelle Obama’s vegetable garden. Others reported she returned as a witch at that teleprompter that reportedly broke down during a speech when he lost his cool.”
“Earth was ripe for an illusion in 2007,” Huda said. “The Pied Piper played all the right tunes. Hope and change. Nobody knew what that was, just an orgy. But he did, like his cronies of the sixties whom he appointed Czars. The Presidential seal that fell down to the floor for the whole universe to see was a bad omen and a good laugh for many.”
“Former President Reagan warned about these people at his speech in 1964 at the Republican Convention, as a young supporter of Goldwater,” Elmer said. “I looked it up. His words are as right today as they were then because the same sixties people who were acting up then are now Obama’s friends, mentors and Czars or close visitors to the White House. They finally got their chance in 2007. The result? A debt burden almost as large as the USA’s gross national product. No wonder people get scared. The whole Earth is looking down on the USA.”
“Obama is off to India this week for a state visit to forget the election debacle,” Tamil said. “A country of 1.3 billion people. You imagine? A nice tax-payer paid vacation at a cost of 2.5 million dollars a day. And that with a USA deficit that sticks way out of his ears in a country where per capita income is a little over 1000 dollars a year only.”
“The Republican Party’s euphoria may be exhilarating,” Shamus said, “but if they don’t resolve the deficit problem and perform to the wishes of their multiplex supporters, they will lose again in 2012. What’s needed is at least six years of conservative statesmanship to put their fiscal house in order, bring the deficits down and balance the budget. It all depends on who’ll be minding the store.”
“The big issue is indeed who will be their leader,” Elmer said, seriously. “If they can’t find someone who can face up to the Pied Piper and talk him under the table, God forbid, the USA will be written off for good.”
“Well,” Shamus said,” let’s not be over pessimistic. Humans on Earth have screwed up time after time but overall progress has been impressive.”
“There’s always a silver lining to Earth’s tough luck,” Pasha said, smiling. “As long as they don’t do so well financially, they won’t come visit us and spoil our way of life.”
“That’s the last word, dear panel,” I said. “Our next Round Table will be joined with Earth’s TV show Where the World Turns to discuss the fall out of the USA mid-term elections and their impact on the rest of Mother Earth. See you then.”
Making Love to The Village Beauty
Last time I met John van Dorn, he told me the following love story:
After two months of grueling boot camp, I was on two weeks’ leave at my grandmother’s house. Late in the morning, still suffering from yesterday’s long drill march, I was sound asleep in my attic room, my coverlet pushed aside.
Vaguely I heard knocking on my door. It opened before I had a chance to call out that I was still in bed. Only half awake, I lay with a firm morning erection appearing through my pajamas. Tisja, the beautiful young help in the house, just about my age, who’d been with us for a few years, innocently stepped in to clean up my room. She broke into laughter when she saw my fierce masculine weapon pointing in her direction.
“Well, look at that!” she sputtered, laughing. “That’s all I need!”
I felt awkward. I’d always been told to be gallant to the help in the house while keeping my distance. Tisja was sort of family and a good friend, but I’d never thought of approaching her sexually because getting close to a servant was “not done” according to the family code. But the rules in the book didn’t prescribe what to do when an attractive servant catches you with your physical pride protruding upfront.
I smiled back at her clumsily, pulling up my bed sheet. Suddenly, her sparkling eyes turned dark and took on a velvety glossy look.
“Johnny,” she hushed, “if you want, why not come to my room one night?”
She darted away, perhaps shocked by her own words, and left me in confusion, which grew into a thick ball of desire.
It took a day before I found the courage to act on her suggestion. My body wanted it and at eighteen, fresh from boarding school, after my sad farewell from Lucy, I was still a virgin. Her room was next to mine; we were the only ones sleeping in the attic. But would my matriarchal management not hear the wooden floors squeaking when I sneaked to her room in the middle of the night? Wouldn’t they hear the thumping of the bed?
I found her alone in the kitchen and helped her with the dishwashing, standing close to her.
“I think it would be better on a Sunday morning when everyone’s gone to church,” I whispered to her. ”I’ll pretend I’m sick. What do you think? Will you be here this weekend? It’s still my furlough.”
“Yes, good idea,” she said, smiling. “This weekend I’ve duty. Jane’s off. And they don’t have breakfast before church so I can sleep in.”
When Sunday morning came, I acted as if I had belated stomach pains from the army food, and my mother allowed me to stay in bed. Matriarchal management went to church. As soon as I heard the taxi drive away, I scooted to Tisja’s room, opened her door and peeped in.
She was lying in bed, a sheet simulating the enticing sculpture of her body. “Hi,” she said, smiling. “Come in.”
I entered her room on my toes, still scared someone might hear me. The windows were open and looked out, like mine, on the majestic oak tree, slowly waving in the warm late summer breeze, blowing in scents of jasmine and lavender. The doves were cooing. I stood beside her bed, not sure what to do.
“Come, lie with me,” she said, calmly sliding the sheet from her body. Boy… she was almost completely naked. “Take off your pajamas.”
She looked like the mermaid statue I’d seen in the Efteling Theme Park, so delightful and pure. I dropped my pajamas and joined her, timid. But when her slender body touched mine, everything changed in my life.
I gazed at her lively eyes, soft dark hair and nice round shoulders, touched her breasts, nipples, drawing in whiffs of her peachy perfume. I wanted to make love to her, but wasn’t sure how. To help me on the way, Tisja caressed my sex, which got stiff as a broom.
“Is this your first time?” she asked, stroking my hair.
“Yes,” I admitted, feeling silly.
“Don’t be afraid,” she said.” I have something in me to stop babies.”
She kissed me, fondled me, held me, and made me gently enter her. It was such a warm feeling. She begged me to get deeper and deeper, shifted my hand from her shoulder to her breast, made me rub her nipple and I felt it hardening. I kept pushing, urged by the instincts of nature and the increasing delight of the warm fluids that surrounded my sex while she was arching up to me. After some time, she yelped, sighed and I felt her heart pounding. As I hadn’t come yet, she fondled me, and I erupted in her with a flush of splashing sparks shooting right to the top of my brain, leaving me breathless.
“How did you like it?” she whispered in my ear.
I didn’t know what to say. “Nice feeling,” I said, “and you?”
She laughed but didn’t answer. We chatted a while about me and her boyfriend Tommy as we were both drafted in the army.
“When are you going to marry him?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I’m not ready yet to make that decision, but my parents want me to. There are so many things I can do with my life before getting babies. It’s nice at grandma’s house, but I’d like to do something more. Go to a school for secretaries as your mother said.”
“I’m sure my mother will help you and talk to your parents. She knows them so well.”
I kissed her on her lips and stroked her hair. I hoped that the dogs outside would bark to warn us that the church goers were back.
“Want to do it again?” she asked.
“Right now?”
“Yes, why not, I’m sure you can.”
She fondled me and we kissed. More confident, I stroked her breasts, her tummy, and inner legs, and we made love again. It took a bit longer, but Tisja wanted it badly. She moved her pelvis up and down, holding me tight by my buttocks and I moved with her rhythm. She came again before me and then again, till it was finally my turn.
She puffed, mumbling she was dead, and so was I. We slept for a few minutes in each other’s arms. I woke up worried about the time, but counted on the dogs barking when the churchgoers got home.
I pushed the sheet away and looked at her body. She had a nice flat tummy with a silky patch of black pubic hair.
“You’re so beautiful,” I said.
“You too,” she said, her hand cupping my penis that had shrunk to a harmless little tube. “I looked at you walking naked to the bathroom and when you were sunbathing on the balcony below with your pants off, naughty boy. I wanted you all the time.”
Footsteps on the stairs. Blast!
What was happening? The dogs hadn’t barked. Who could that be? My mother coming to see how her sick sonny was doing? I jumped out of Tisja’s bed and hid in her closet amidst her dresses, closing the door behind me, holding it tight. Then I realized that I’d left my pajamas on the floor. I heard knocking. Oh hell….
“Tisja, good morning, it’s Jane. Can I come in?”
Damn Jane, you were supposed to be off!
“Sure,” Tisja answered, making the sound of a yawn.
I heard Jane coming in.
“You’re still in bed?” Jane sounded surprised. “Tommy called he wanted to see you this afternoon.”
Geez, Tommy, her boyfriend. If he knew…
“I said okay,” she continued. “I’ll cover for you. Whose pajamas are those?”
“Pajamas?”
“Yes, those pajamas.”
“Oh, Johnny’s, he threw them out of his room to wash, you know, the slob, and I picked them up this morning on my way back from the bathroom.”
Good excuse, I mumbled, keeping the closet door tight, though I felt hurt about the “slob” part.
“But I heard he was sick,” Jane said
“Was he?”
“Is he still in bed?” Jane kept asking.
“Would I know? We don’t do cleaning on Sundays.”
“Tisja, you’d better get up and get the coffee ready. The ladies will soon be home. I’ll do the service. Go and see Tommy.”
“Thank you, Jane, very nice of you.”
I heard Jane leaving, but didn’t hear her going down the stairs. She was probably taking a peep in my bedroom. I heard her coming back, knocking on the door again. I kept holding on to Tisja’s closet door for life, fearing the worst.
“Tisja?”
“I’m not ready yet, Jane,” Tisja answered, splashing at the sink.
“You know where Johnny is?”
“Not a clue, why would I know what that silly lad’s doing?”
Don’t overdo it now, Tisja….
“He’s not in his bed.”
“Maybe he’s in the toilet doing you know what or he went to play tennis.”
“If he’s sick?”
“I don’t follow his footsteps, Jane. I’ll be right down, just a minute.”
I heard Jane going downstairs and shortly after that Tisja rapped on the closet.
“Jane’s gone,” she whispered, and left her room.
I waited a minute to be sure no one was in the attic anymore and slid out of Tisja’s closet, but didn’t see my pajamas. Of course, Tisja must’ve taken them down as proof she’d picked them up to be washed.
My heart stopped when there was more stumbling on the stairs. Stark naked, I could only cover myself with Tisja’s bed sheet. Better than nothing. Wrapping it quickly around my waist, I skedaddled like a bat out of hell to my bedroom. The attic door opened just as I dove into my bed. I pushed Tisja’s sheet underneath mine and tried to keep a suffering face. But I knew I was playing a losing game.
My dear mother came in.
“Johnny, why did you come flying out of Tisja’s room?”
“Out of Tisja’s room? I didn’t, I knocked to see if she had aspirin, but she wasn’t in.”
“Jane said she was there just a minute ago.”
“Really? Not when I knocked on her door.”
“And she’d seen your pajamas on the floor in her room. What’s been going on? I want to talk to you downstairs. Get dressed. You aren’t sick at all.”
“But I am!”
She left, slamming the door, clearly suspicious about my alternative use of Sunday church time.
I shaved, bathed and got dressed, put Tisja’s sheet back on her bed and drooped down the stairs, aware I’d have to face the music. But I was determined to stick to my story.
The matriarchal management had grouped on the veranda for coffee, as usual after Sunday church, enjoying the late summer weather and the view of grandmother’s colorful roses. Jane brought out the coffee, dispensing its addictive aroma. I avoided her eyes. Tisja’d gone off to her Tommy.
“Jane, what’s been going on with Tisja this morning?” my grandmother blurted out.
“I don’t know, madam,” Jane stammered.
“Jane?” she pressed.
“Well, she wasn’t up yet when I went to her room.”
“When was that?”
“About eleven…”
Grandmother squinted at me. “Johnny, were you still in bed at that time?”
“Yes,” I said, which was true, although it was not mine but Tisja’s bed.
“What’s this story about Johnny’s pajamas, Jane?” Oma was about to uncover my white lie.
“Tisja said she’d picked them up outside his bedroom, where he’d left them to be washed,” she said, embarrassed.
“That’s true, Oma,” I butted in. “I’d sweated all night from the stomach flu. I was soaking wet, so I dropped them outside my bedroom, as I always do with my laundry. I don’t understand why you all are making such a big fuss about my pajamas.”
“We wouldn’t if I hadn’t seen you spurting from Tisja’s room naked with a sheet around your bottom,” my mother said coolly.
“What would I do naked in Tisja’s room? I told you, I wanted aspirin and because I’d thrown out my pajamas, I had nothing else but my bed sheet for cover….”
“It all sounds like a twisted story, soldier,” grandmother intoned like my commander-in-chief. “All right, Jane, you can go now, thanks for filling in for Tisja.”
“You sleep down in the guest room from now on,” my mother ordained, puncturing any hopes of a repeat. “We don’t want people talking in the village.”
“But what about, Mother?”
They had no solid proof, just vague unsubstantiated hunches. I knew Tisja was smart enough to talk herself out of trouble. Grinning, I got up, went to the grand piano, lifted the flap, sat down and imitated Errol Garner’s jazz tune Avalon.
It sounded like a victory lap. Thanks to Tisja, I’d learned how it was to make love to a woman.
Read more of this in “Some Women I Have Known.”
http://amzn.to/1QIL94B
and about Frank in “A Naughty Romance.”
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A SCARY FLIGHT
Our Beechcraft stood at Executive Airfield near Charleston in the glistering afternoon sun. Friends dropped us off after a weekend fishing off the South Carolina coast. We loaded our bags in the hull and walked back to the flight desk for weather information. Tom, my muscled friend from college and a Boeing 737 captain, and I drew up our flight plan. We had been flying the Beechcraft for several years now and enjoyed the fruits of our investments, going out each weekend if we could. I had been flying small planes since I was twenty-five. As I did well in my career as an investment banker, I could afford purchasing the aircraft. Tom pitched in as well.
“Fueling done?” asked Tom
“All fine. Here’s your invoice,” the attendant said. “Weather report OK, but you may hit some thunderstorms near your destination. Nothing to worry about.”
It was my turn to take the Beech back to Manassas in Northern Virginia, our hub. I started the engines, let them roar a few times, and taxied to the run way. Patrick Allen of Dreamstime.com took our picture. A few moments later we were airborne. Soon we would be home to tell the funny boat stories and show off our tanned bodies. Sunita, my wife, would be waiting anxiously. She would never come along. Andy, my son, and daughter Sonia, sometimes flew with us, but they were busy with parties this weekend. Besides, Sunita did not like them coming along. Tom was engaged to his umpteenth beauty, a smart girl from Manilla, but she felt terrified in small planes.
We were flying under visual flight rules in clear skies at an altitude of 9,500 feet, enjoying the scenery of fluffy clouds, the patches of forests and fields gliding by below us, the sonorous hum of the engines. As the weatherman had predicted, after about an hour and a half we began to experience some turbulence but the bright cumulus turned dark much faster than we heard.
Tom radioed Flight Watch for an update and they reported that conditions ahead were changing rapidly. I contacted Flight Service and activated our instrument flight plan, as visibility deteriorated fast. We contacted Air Traffic Control, and the Washington Center controller reported significant storms developing along our planned route. Tom and I discussed if we should return or reroute. But from the cockpit, the sky to the west looked darker and even more menacing. The controller suggested we proceed in northeastern direction to avoid the worst of the storms. Knowing they might have a better radar overview than we, we accepted the new course. It didn’t look much better, but at least it seemed less threatening.
Then flying conditions got suddenly pretty rough. We could not see anything anymore because of the harsh rain and thick clouds. I asked Tom, who had more experience, to take over the controls. We were about twenty minutes from Manassas. The hazardous weather and fierce lightning was now all around us. Turbulence shook the aircraft pretty badly and the instruments beeped several warnings. Tom struggled to keep the aircraft level. The controller informed us of severe thunderstorm activity near Manassas. Tom sneered that it couldn’t be worse than what we were having already.
The controller said landing was still possible and instructed to descend to 4000 feet, but there the clouds were even darker. Lightning kept slicing through them.
Hail began to clatter and the turbulence became increasingly violent. Then the aircraft experienced a sudden loss of 2000 feet. “Damn! Microburst!” yelled Tom to the tower. “Loosing speed going down!” We were far too low, still half a mile from the runway and facing tough headwinds. I led the landing gear down at about 100 knots. Tom applied full throttle to gain height but the aircraft continued to be pushed down. We saw the ground approaching fast. Tom tried to pull up again and level but the Beech veered abruptly to the left in strong gale winds and the nose pitched downward. We hit the ground, skidded and spiraled several times with tremendous shocks, and came to a very rough halt. My seat broke loose or cracked, I didn’t know what happened, but I felt a terrible pain in my back. Luckily no fire broke out and the canopy was still intact, but rain, hail, lightning and thunder continued unabated. Tom leaned forward over his stick, his shoulder hugged in a forward position. I couldn’t move.
“Tom!” I screamed. “The hell wake up man! I feel like I’m dying.”
I noticed a slight shrug in his shoulders, thank God he was alive.
“Tom!” I yelled again.
He came through slowly. His hair was bloodied and his lips were cut. “Come on, John, don’t panic! The tower knows. The meds are coming. Hold on!”
We tried to loosen our seatbelts but everything was twisted. My vision blurred and my senses numbed. The last thing I heard were the ambulance sirens. Thank God! I just hoped they would be in time to get us out before the plane blew up.
* * *
We woke up in a bright white hospital room. Sunita stood near my bed, with the kids, tears in her eyes, but so glad I was alive. Tom’s fiancée, with her typical Philippine name, Mahalina, stood at Tom’s bed, holding his hand. He looked like a Sikh and a surgeon with his head in a ball of white bandage.
“You guys are very lucky,” Sunita said. She wore her black hat as if she had been preparing for my funeral. “Better leave that flying to the birds.”
I laughed, Tom grinned painfully. He couldn’t move his face.
“Yes,” he mumbled through his bandage. “Flying is for the birds.”