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Going-Away Party

One of our neighbors is moving
after about fifty years.  Another neighbor--
another "founder" of this good corner of Eagan--
hosted a gathering to send them off
to a one-story house about ten miles away.

I met the Gotts for the first time.
He is the guy who rides around on a motor scooter
with a Samoyed dog sitting in front of him. 
He has a sign by his driveway that says, "Gott's Acre".

I am smooth, so I asked him
why he called it a cemetery.

"It's German, you know," he said.
"It means "God". 

I said I knew:  "God's field.  A cemetery."

God Gott said, "Huh?"

I am not only smooth.  I am erudite.
I taught him all about Søren Kierkegaard,
whose name also means cemetery.

That conversation, and a little exchange
with another neighbor who did not mind
living next to a cemetery,
but who had severe reservations
about people with brown skin led to
a discussion about who was really dumb and ugly,
and that's how the vase was broken. 

Bud and Mardell said they could not stay
for all the festivities in their honor;
and said they had to get packing. 

Tom and Mary helped me out, and said
they hoped I could find my way home safely.
____________________________________

This may not be precisely what happened at the party,
but things could have worked out this way,
had everything gone differently, and I not have been so smooth.

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