Loretta hates TV, but every once in a while she tells me about a travelogue to Switzerland. As a teacher I didn’t have excess funds in the past, but I did, one summer, take her and my youngest son to Switzerland, which is not overly advertised by the NY Times. She talks about places we saw, some with fun festivals we missed.
Switzerland is not a big place. I covered a good part of it, mostly because I had relatives there who took their American cousin, his wife and son, everywhere. Loretta didn’t know it’s the world’s oldest existing republic (democracy) and that life during World War II was not exactly halcyon. (Forgive me for springing these words on you, but halcyon means peaceful, quiet.) She saw the hidden entrances to the alpine bunkers, though we missed the hangars that opened up on mountain highways.
But there were the beautiful, deep mountain lakes, the quaint architecture, the cheeses and chocolates. I love the mountain smells, even the horse manure. We didn’t see Heidi; she’s my cousin and came to America to marry a Navy vet.
Civilization 