Here’s a transcription of a conversation between Patrick and JP on 16 Nov 2011 at a restaurant. Originally the audio file was too large to post here, but now [19 Sep 2021] it’s available below.
JD: Well Donna was seventeen, right? I think, she went to school …
PM: When was she born? I don’t know.
JP: I think she was born in ’38 which would make her 16. Now, she must have been born in ’36 because you’re 34, right?
PM: I was born in ’34 yeah.
JP: So I think she must have been born in ’36 aunt Sue or aunt Phil was ’38.
JP: Maybe aunt Phil was ’37 and Chuck was ’38, ’56 is 20. I think she was born in ’38. I think I remember that it was, the math was a little vague …
JP: but it struck me that …
PM: Because, I know she was in the university very young.
JP: Yeah, she entered the university at 16.
PM: 16
PM: So, that would have been 1953. She was 16.
PM: So when was she born?
JP: ’53, 16, would have been ’37 or ’36. Yeah.
PM: She was born in December …
JP: 20th
PM: 20th
JP: I remember John saying that’s how, you know, she went to the uni… , you know, she … went to the university so young and was so excited because here is a great place there are all these boys.
PM: Ja, right! She made a beeline let me tell you, bang, wow.
JP: Well, the first time you met was going to a concert?
PM: Umm
JP: She leaned forward into the back seat…
PM: Well, not on our first date. Blind date. Yeah. It was very quick.
JP: You wanted to be where the pearl was.
PM: Yeah, right. We went dancing in the Student Center and it was like she was pasted…. Didn’t move at all, just stood right.
PM: At least, before all of this stuff.
JP: Yeah, yeah, just stand and a hug.
PM: Yeah it’s funny I hadn’t ever seen them sitting down. She had a good friend. And I was I saw them a lot but I never spoke to them. Her friend had a really beautiful face and that’s the one I was aiming for. But then she stood up to go dancing and she did this [bent over, I think, showing her cleavage] and … so I ended up dancing with Donna.
PM: And that worked out fine.
PM: Good. We went blackberry picking one time and Mom said “Is that what they call it now?”
JP: So when was I staying with little grandmother? [Patrick’s mom] I know she sent me some pictures from when I was two or three.
PM: Your mom and I lived two or three blocks from her on Julian Street.
JP: I remember Julian Street, I remember the name Julian Street.
PM: We walked to Fairbanks Avenue and one block that way and down Stanley Street and there we were.
[Waiter serving “comida” and John saying “gracias”]
PM: [About the food:] This is normally for one person. So, we can always get something else if that’s not enough.
PM: Let see, I can’t remember the sequence but when I left we were living on Julian Street and I think Donna had to leave you with mom and pop while she figured out what to do.
PM: When I saw you next, you were living in the garage apartment in Indiatlantic above the real estate agency. I can’t remember the sequence because my father apparently was crying when you were taken away.
JP: I thought they had already split up by then.
PM: No
JP: It wasn’t until … when did Little Grandmother and your dad split?
PM: Sue would know. I don’t know She was living there. I was already away, in college, then married.
PM: She kept living there and was still living there when we moved to Winter Park.
JP: Sue still living at home when he moved out?
PM: Yes, because Larry was in the Air Force.
PM: Mmm it tastes good. It reminds me of curry hot dog, Oak Hill, WV.
JP: It reminds me of meatloaf on a bun.
PM: That’s one of the things I like to make. I haven’t made one of them in a couple of years.
PM: Everybody is going down a shoe string potatoes. A year ago nobody made shoe string potatoes, they were French fries.
PM: When did they do that?
JP: I don’t know. I like them crunchy, but …
JP: For a while one of the most popular restaurants in California, basically taking mashed potatoes and extruding and then giving like one last shot deep fried. Terrible!
JP: People …. raved about their burgers. I couldn’t stand them.
PM: The thing that gets me in England right now that one of the big things for kids is the buddy sandwich. French fries on a bun.
PM: Can you imagine?!
JP: French fries on a bun? No, but I used to dip my French fries in milk shakes.
PM: They were loose and floating about or ground up?
JP: No, I just did it sort of like dipping into a fondue, you know.
PM: But the sandwich with the potatoes it it?
JP: Hm. That’s what it is a potato sandwich.
I’m the son of Patrick of Meadows.
Donna is Patrick’s first wife and the biological mother to me, Gretchen, and one other sister.
It’s an interesting observation that when she remarried, she took on Rhett’s last name, but when they divorced, she reverted to Meador, not to her maiden name. Lately I’ve wondered about that.