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In the early 1980’s I had just returned from 21 years of living in countries outside the United States. Newly divorced, still mourning the lost marriage, and finding myself a stranger in my own country, I set about trying to make up a new life. I resolved to accept any invitation which came my way simply because I desperately needed friends, as well as a way of making a living, and I certainly needed something to focus upon outside of myself. A man whom I had only talked with a few times, invited me to a dinner party at his house. I accepted, of course. At his townhouse I found him still in the throes of preparing the meal. No other person graced his living- dining room space. Oh, darn, I thought, or maybe it was, Oh, shoot. After all, I am an Okie. It was certainly one of those epithets. Anyway, I thought, most uncharitably as it turned out, that I'd been lured to his lair with promises of food, talk and friends and I’d been offered none of those things. I was T 141 pao ma sure I would get the food. After all, he was madly chopping and slicing and stir- frying just about a foot or so away from where I perched on one e of his barstools. I’d been a wife for 21 years so I didn’t 1 1 T wad " tout wad quite know how I would handle what I was sure would be offered me after the dinner. Well, John D, let this stand as a public apology for my inner “darns” and “shoots.” I answered the door because you had your hands full and I ushered two couples through the narrow hall to the long table you’d set up and in moments we were all sitting down to eat. Your promises, John, were fulfilled. All those folks became my friends. The beautiful, tall, blonde woman was the kicker, though. I, who had always been a _ thoroughly unregenerate who had been thoroughly INTRODUCTION