Amanda Takes Off...

"I wonder if the people upstairs moved. Their kid doesn't seem to be as noisy any longer," I said.

"Maybe they ate children's fingers," Good Man replied.

"What?"

"Maybe they ate children's fingers."

"I have no idea what that means."

Good Man sighed. "I don't know either."

"Do you know why I married you?"

Good Man grinned. "Because I am comedian?"

"Yep, exactly."

"Do you speak Korean?"

I hate that question.

I have no idea how to quantify it, so I usually say, "I speak enough Korean to get myself in and out of trouble." Or, "I speak enough Korean to deal with my mother-in-law when my husband's not around." Or, "I'm studying, but I'm not very good."

I qualify things like that so I don't end up looking like the chick we ran into on the way home from the airport, on the Super Shuttle. I don't usually pay attention if people claim to speak a language but really don't. This time, I had to bite my cheek to keep from laughing.

There was some girl that the driver seemed to know. He was chatting with her about her trip (she'd gone to Japan).

He asked if she spoke any Japanese and she said she did when her father was alive, her husband spoke Japanese, and she knew a lot of slangy Japanese from her family in Japan and she could communicate with them.

OK, so I was sort of eavesdropping, of course, because they were the only people speaking, so it was hard not to, and because a white-looking girl speaking any Asian language is unusual.

So the driver asked her how to say "thank you" in Japanese.

And she couldn't tell him.

He asked her how to say "excuse me" or "I'm sorry," and she couldn't tell him.

He said a friend had taught him some phrases. He'd say them and she'd say she wasn't sure because she didn't really know how to say it. She kept sort of pronouncing things and then claiming she didn't know the phonics.

The lyrics "domo arigato, Mr Roboto" kept running through my head and I wondered what she and her family "communicated" about.

Since she was failing at Japanese, she said she spoke French. Apparently she didn't know the driver's native language was French. So he started speaking French to her.

"Well, you know, I haven't studied it in a long time," she said, "but I know Spanish, too."

So he switched to Spanish. You can guess the outcome of that.

It was a little embarrassing to witness.

Saturday, over dinner, Good Man said, "I want to go bowling tomorrow."

I stared at him. The three pre-Grandpa times we went bowling together, I had to beg Good Man to go with me. "Really?"

"I think the lanes are narrower here," he said.

"No, same size. It's just that Grandpa taught you how to bowl and now you like it."

"Yeah, that too."

***

We went bowling with Grandpa twice at the bowling center he took over nearly 30 years ago (Treasure Lanes, now my uncle is the primary manager, since Grandpa retired about five years ago). Both times we bowled three games. Grandpa taught us how to pick the ball properly, a little lane etiquette, how to adjust where we stood to pick up pins, as well as how to bowl.

"Seriously, I can't just pick up the ball by sticking my fingers in it?"

"No, do risk dropping it on your foot."

He also complained that women always wear bowling shoes too small. "Your bowling shoe needs to be a half-size bigger than a regular street shoe. So when we mark a shoe a 9, it's really a 9 1/2. The shoe needs to be bigger so your foot can slide. I got so tired of women not listening, buying smaller shoes and then complaining when their toes broke the fronts of the shoes!"

Grandpa also showed us how fingers should fit in a ball. He picked up his bowling ball with two fingers and curled it into his palm. "You try it," he said.

"Grandpa. There is no way I can pick up a bowling ball with two fingers."

After our last bowling session with Grandpa, Good Man had broken 100 for the first time. I, however, was not doing as well. Grandpa patted me on the shoulder and said, "You need to find one style and go with it, because you are trying to change too many things." My aunt joked that was code for "find another sport."

***

The night before we left Florida, we went to a local Italian restaurant together. I had convinced Grandpa to let us treat them. At the end of the meal he wanted to leave the tip. We decided to arm wrestle for it.

Grandpa beat me.

I am both ashamed and awed to admit that.

Good Man shrugged. "What do you expect? He can lift up bowling balls with two fingers."

I pulled the stubborn granddaughter card and paid the tip anyhow.

***

Last night we went bowling. The local place has all you bowl Sun-Thurs for $6.99 plus shoes after 9 pm. The lanes weren't as well-kept as Grandpa's lanes, I don't think. But hey, we made do.

Good Man's scores beat mine overall, which made him happy since he was in a one-sided competition with me. Over eight games his average was 99 and his three above-100 games were 120, 102 and 113.

I was trying to get over 70 consistently, since my previous three games had been something like 40, 80, 50. All of my games were above 70, so I was rather pleased. My average was 90 and I had two above-100 games, which were 103 and...139.

Now that 139 was a lot of luck, but I was thinking of Grandpa's advice. Don't think so much. Relax. Look at your mark, not the pins. I wish he'd been there to see it!

In fact, when either of us messed up, we'd scold each other like Grandpa. "You were holding the ball!" "Do you know what your mark was? Because it wasn't where you put the ball." "You're thinking too much!"

At one point, Good Man landed a pin in the gutter (beyond the reach of the sweep). A few frames later, a pin ended up on the lane.

I went to the service desk to tell them about the pin. While I was waiting, a woman was there to meet her friends. The clerk asked what size her shoe was. "Do they run big or small?"

The clerk sighed and said large.

"OK, I'll take a 6 1/2," she said.

I tsked her in my head.

There was a family of five bowling next to us. A teenager went to pick up her ball the wrong way and...dropped it. I looked at Good Man, my eyes wide. I guess Grandpa was right.

Once, Good Man hit one pin and we thought that was it. A few seconds later, five pins decided to jump up in the air and fall over.

"Did you see that?"

"That was weird."

I managed to pick up a 7-10 split, which was some impressive luck. Good Man is getting really good at picking up the 10 pin for a spare.

At one point I had the 1, 5, and 8 pins standing. Somehow I managed to knock down the 5, but nothing else.

"Did you see that?"

"That was weird."

One of the most delightful (and somewhat frustrating) things about Grandpa is that it seems nobody in the family has a complete idea of his military service.

Here's what I know:

• Grandpa lied about his age to join the reserves at 16.
• The records were destroyed in a fire, so he doesn't get credit for those lied-about years.
• Grandpa fought in the Pacific in WWII.
• He flew planes when the Air Force was part of the Army.
• Grandpa created (or modified) the three-letter airport code system still in use today. (The way he tells it, he was tired of saying the full names and said that they should abbreviate it. So then he sat there and brainstormed three-letter codes for various bases. Somewhere in the basement there's a certificate of this accomplishment.)
• Grandpa was stationed in Japan and did not directly fight in Korea. (I had this wrong—I thought he had.)
• Grandpa did not fight because he had too many "secrets" in his head. The primary knowledge he had was that of radar and where various militaries (American and to an extent British) were with the use of it.
• Grandpa has been stationed in Guam, Japan, and the Philippines, as well as multiple domestic stations.
• Grandpa and his buddy flew over a mountain they were specifically told not to fly over and Muslim militants in the Philippines shot at their plane. When they got back to the base, they couldn't lie about what they'd done because of...radar.
• Grandpa applied to be in the Mercury program but was denied. They said it was his age, but he thinks it's because he didn't have any college degree.
• One of my aunts was born while they lived in Japan. While they were in Japan, they'd often follow maps and find that the roads ended. They'd find the sole person in the village who spoke English, who would then say, "Yes, your bombs destroyed the road."
• Grandpa flew goats to Guam during the Korean War. A lot of families were moving to Guam and they needed a food source.
• Grandpa helped write the armistice that paused the Korean War.

When Grandpa got to that last point, I stopped him.

"Wait, Grandpa, how come when I Google 'Korean Armistice,' I don't see a darn thing about Michael S?"

"Well, I was in Japan and helped write the original papers, the idea and the framework. But it wasn't my job to present it."

"So you helped do the work but get none of the glory?"

"Well," he laughed, "it was part of my job!"

Grandpa, Grandma, and Good Man

Today we left Florida. Today, my grandparents celebrate their 62nd wedding anniversary.

Last night Good Man and I poked around in the photo albums in the guest bedroom. Their wedding and honeymoon photos—my God, my grandparents are gorgeous at any age. Grandma in her bikini on the beach in 1948 with a little smirk on her face? She looks like a movie star, especially with her Army Air Corps husband by her side.

We found Grandma's high school photos, and Grandpa's military photos. We also found photos of my aunts and uncles growing up. We found old church directories. And I found photos of Johnny and me at a very young age.

A few nights ago, Grandpa stayed up with us chatting for three hours. I learned so much about him, and about our family. When we finished chatting, Good Man said to me in private, "Sometimes I wish I lived 100 years ago."

"During the Japanese occupation?"

"Well, maybe. It just seems like those times were more interesting than these."

Sixty-two years is a long, long time. I raise a toast to my grandparents. Happy Anniversary to them!