A Historic Day

December 7, 1941 is a day that will live in history. But I would be willing to wager that very few of you know of the significant event that occurred just a few hours before.

December 6, 1941 was a momentous day. Evanston, Illinois was the town; Evanston Hospital was the place; Elizabeth Hamilton Wood was the baby born to Millicent and James Wood.









No, this is not a picture of the baby, but her dad is in there somewhere. But I digress. The baby eventually grew up, married, raised two beautiful daughters, and matured into the lady you know as Dr. Betsy Rogers.

Which brings me to the real reason that I am subjecting you to this trip into the past.











Becky had told us there would be a party on December 6th and that we were expected to attend wearing tattoos, in addition to normal party attire. Where to get tattoos? With the help of some younger friends, we went online and immediately found a source for the type we wanted to take to Africa.





The night of the party arrived. We applied our tattoos, packed up our offerings and headed out. I had made a platter of sushi which disappeared almost as rapidly as the champagne.






The setting was beautiful, both inside and outside. This home is in the foothills of Table Mountain, on a large property with extensive, well-tended, beautiful gardens.

Birds of Paradise, Astrolomaria, Golden Cypress, Bears’ Breeches, Mandeville Bush (not a vine), six foot tall Geraniums, and many, many more outstanding varieties of perennials and annuals. Spectacular!



We sat down to enjoy our dinners and some more wines. It is customary for everyone to bring wine and pass the bottle around so that all can have a wee taste. So we “wee tasted” for some time that evening. We also toasted Betsy and sang Happy Birthday to her.







The evening ended with dessert wines, one of which was purchased quite some time ago, brought to us by Mike and his wife who own a wine shop. It currently retails (if you can buy it) for R25,000 ($2,500) a bottle. It was nice, but get real! Actually, it was really nice.






We had a great time. Happy birthday, Betsy.

Floyd