Happy spring now that golf and daffodils are upon us

Marylou moved to Rehoboth from New Jersey where she was a clinical social worker for children and adolescents. She met people through the Socrates Café and the American Association of University Women. She loves the low cost of living here and has recently signed up to take a real estate course. “I go to NYC once a month to work as a docent at an Asian art museum I’ve been involved with for many years. It’s a nice dose of city, but I still have the serene life of Delaware which is the best deal for me.”

I like that dose of a city too every now and then. I just returned from a trip to Spain to visit my daughter and her partner, and I saw two things we could adopt in the USA. In the Madrid airport, the escalators are one long moving incline or decline with no indentations for stairs, so everyone is not trying to balance a suitcase on a step two sizes too small where the luggage pull forces your elbow to elevate to your ear. Very easy on the back. Secondly, on the island of Gran Canaria in Las Palmas, people can take a bike for free to use to commute into the city and then just lock it to another rack for the next commuter. Metal locks attach the bike to a rack, and once you download a code to your cellphone, the bike is released into your hand. How cool is that?

If you didn’t know this, you can also borrow a bike for free at the Seaside Nature Center at Cape Henlopen State Park and enjoy a trail ride through the sea oats, pine trees and Fort Miles and stop to see the ocean! This is thanks to the Friends of Cape Henlopen State Park and the donations of others.

Thank you retiree Pat from Millsboro who answered my question from the previous column about the flying geese on sticks planted in the cornfield. “Have you noticed that we live in hunting country? These were decoys to lure real geese into the shooting zone.” OK, Pat, I suspected as much, but this columnist knows nothing about hunting, or geese either. However, it is likely the real geese know the truth and some of them are dressing in camouflage to fool the hunters.

Finally I heard from Bette, who retired to Lewes after living 43 years in the D.C. area. She writes, “We took some ballroom dancing lessons a year ago and although we’ve forgotten most of it, we would love to take it up again and have a place to foxtrot, waltz and swing.” Sad to say, Bette is the only one who wrote to me about dancing. Hmmm. Very disappointed. I have your email, Bette, and will keep you posted if I hear of a place to kick up our heels.

Currently, I am mending my pride and the entire right side of my body after falling off that free bike. Just 20 minutes before the crash, my daughter had taken a superb picture of me worthy of impressing my older and fatter friends on Facebook. Then down I went onto the only green patch of grass for miles. God is good. Heavy sigh. Grateful to be home in Delaware with Rayquest who is at this moment teeing off on a golf course in Berlin, Md. Oh happy spring now that golf and daffodil days are upon us Delawareans!

Write and share your travel adventures, mishaps and celebrations of retirement with me and the snow geese who are reading this column.