Dancevoir/Chaumont

We stayed in Dancevoir for three months. Joe had this old Crossley (car) that wouldn't start in the morning so more than once, one of the local farmers would pull it with his tractor to get moving. This was embarrassing to say the least. Finally, Joe decided that he could park the car up on the hill, coast down and away we go! All of our friends were scattered over the countryside and on the weekends, we would go visiting. We went to the base movies everytime the picture changed. There wasn't a whole lot to do.

In late March, we moved to a 3rd floor apartment in Chaumont. We really liked it. A friend of Joe's, Al Lambeth lived on the 2nd floor. His wife came over for the summer and when Barbara left, we moved down to their place as Albert moved back to the base. I think our rent was $28 a month. We rented from the grandmother (grandmere) who lived below us. We lived in a winery and Pierre Conrad, his wife Germaine and family lived on the other side of the building. They had 4 kids; Jean Pierre (18), Claudie (16), Francois (13) and Arlette (10). I became good friends with Claudie and loved being around the younger ones as well. We had a large bedroom-sitting room with a fireplace at one end. We shared the bathroom with Grandmere. This was a large room with a high-sided bathtub. You had to light the gas jet to heat the water and many a time, it scared the bejesus out of me when it lit because it made a loud pop! There was also a "douce bowl" and Joe used it to wash his feet until Grandmere caught him and made him stop! The "water closet" was down the hall and the toilet paper was scratchy! When Barbara was still there, we played canasta a lot in their place as it was larger. Pierre always supplied us with wine or champagne but that's another story for another chapter.