STRANGE MEMORIES

 A friend encouraged me the other day, to write something about Mother Goose.  He gave me an explanation of an old nursery rhyme - one you might find in a Mother Goose book.  I got sidetracked.

What that brought to my strange mind, was a goose I'll never forget.  My wife and I and her family were having beers one night (maybe 1968) at a place called the Bier Stube. That means "beer hall" in English. I think it was on North Bend Road in College Hill.  It wasn't a large hall but the beer did flow there.  It was, in fact, very small but it had a little German band and a small dance floor right up against the tables.

If I have the year right, we had just one daughter, a baby.  I have no idea who would have been watching her.  My father-in-law was a great guy, quiet and not really much of a drinker.  We got along great although we really hadn't spent that much time together. He was getting into the German scene that night and was having a great time.   

I drank a lot back then.  At one point, we had most of the family out on the dance floor pretending that we knew how to do a German folk dance.  We were spinning around when someone goosed me - quite hard.  (I later surmised it was my wife.)  So I spun around for retribution and the first butt I found belonged to my father-in-law.   He was stunned!  So was I!  We looked at each other for a long second and, I suppose, we both decided to pretend that it didn't happen.  It was just one of those things I'll never forget.