Love Comes Full Circle

In a few short hours, my beautiful daughter Julie will marry the love of her life in St Lucia. I wish I could be by her side, to help her into her dress, fasten her necklace, tell her how stunning she looks, hold her close, and then walk proudly with her to Frank, the man she’s always wanted to call her husband. Instead, I will gather with two of my closest friends around an ipad at 2 p.m. where we will join her via FaceTime to witness the ceremony. And for that, I am grateful.

Their story began 25 years ago on a residential street in Queens and as with many love stories that come full circle, it is a sweet one to tell even though there were parts along the way that were definitely not ‘sweet.’ The protective mother in me was more than relieved when Frank graduated high school at the end of her sophomore year and their often stormy courtship came to an end. Seemingly, the only residue from that time was on her wooden bed frame, where she had practiced writing her first name combined with his last name over and over again. Julie Wagner. 

Julie always wanted to be in a relationship. It was of primary importance to her. I used to marvel, silently of course, how she was able to pick herself up when a relationship didn’t work out, tend to her wounds and move on – her psyche seemingly undamaged. This was an area where she and I were very different – I, who fled, terrified, from intimate relationships, was astounded by the relationship resiliency of my little girl. 

Over the years, many young men (and I guess some older ones too) fell in love with my Jule. Of course they did. She is smart and funny, pretty and motivated, kind and generous. She could have married some of them, in fact, almost did marry one of them. I have the cancelled deposit checks to prove it. But something was never quite right. She just couldn’t bring herself to say, “I do.” She knew in her heart that it would be a mistake. And I admire her for having the courage to walk away from some of the guys who were crazy about her. (A couple might actually have been really crazy.) 

Jule and I would joke with each other about the fact that she wished she could take elements of the various guys in her life and put them together to make the perfect one. Elements like this one’s sense of style, that one’s self-confidence, another one’s work ethic, still another’s kind acceptance of her…… Frank’s name would come up during these conversations too. She would say, wistfully, “Of course, I’ll always love Frank.” He hovered around the edge. Always. They were in touch. Occasionally. She’d tell me it was his birthday, or that she’d gotten a text from him on her birthday. Or if they were still together it would be their 7th or 12th or 15th anniversary of their first date. He may not have been officially in the picture, but he was always in her peripheral vision. I did not really take it seriously – their relationship had been quintessential adolescent drama as far as I was concerned.

I knew he was married. Knew he had a child. As I said – he did surface now and again. But then one day, Jule mentioned to me he had called her – something he wanted her opinion about related to a job offer. He was divorced. I was suspicious. Alarmed, even. I told myself, calm down – it’s just a phone call. He had a way of disappearing, and surely he’d disappear again. She called me again. He’d invited her to spend the weekend at his family’s summer place upstate. She was going. My heart stopped. This was serious. Twenty-five years ago, she had longed for such an invitation, and now it was being extended. I kept my tone light, “Have fun, love.” Inside I was fuming, “WHAT is she DOING??” 

The weekend at the summer place was from all reports, magical. I could hear it in her voice – see it in her face. I wanted to shake her. “Jule,” I remember saying, trying to keep my voice even -- “When we had all those talks about the elements of the guys that would go into the perfect man, WHICH PART WAS FRANK??? Where was he in that equation?” I was desperate to protect her. She is my best friend. My munchkin. My Jewel. I love her fiercely. 

She didn’t answer me right away. But a day or so later, she came to me and said she had an answer to my question –“It’s the way he makes me feel, mom. It’s how I feel when I am with him.” 

I couldn’t argue with that. In that moment I understood what had kept her from falling in love with any of the others. Frank was the one she wanted all along. In her heart she knew that. Nobody could compete with him. All those elements that had gone into our collective fantasy of the perfect man -- that self-confident left arm of someone, the sense of style on the right leg of another… they didn’t matter at all. The fantasy man (or lack thereof) had kept her safe and single, waiting for Frank to come to his senses. 

I was in the car with her – the place where we have some of our best conversations – when she told me that she was done – done with her search for Mr. Right. Done with the “find your right partner” handbook. Done with the memberships to ‘eharmony’ - done with speed dating. 

It’s been not quite three years since that fate changing weekend upstate. There was a lot of work to be done. Adolescent air to be cleared. Years of on-again, off-again contact to be sorted through. One cynical mother to be convinced. 

At a recent family dinner celebrating this soon-to-be union, I told him that he’d won me over, that I support her choice in marrying him. I’ve never seen her happier, or more content. I love how she looks at him and how he gazes back at her. He truly puts the sparkle in my Jule. Julie Wagner, that is. The circle completed.

Resolved: Just Keep Moving in 2014

I’ve slid once again, along with everyone else, into another new year. It is one in which I will turn 61 (Gasp! How did this happen?). I will return to Barcelona (and Gaudi!!), explore the northeast quadrant of Arizona, and shuttle happily from city to city around the Baltic Sea during 2014. I will also begin the arduous (and hopefully fulfilling) work on my dissertation.

As I always do at the end of one year – as many others – I take an internal survey. What was positive, what was negative? What did I accomplish that I wanted to and what did I not do? What am I thinking about as I move my life into another calendar? Here’s what it looks like:

Positive:
* No longer have to walk on eggshells every day. Some readers will “get” that.
* Passed the rest of my comprehensive exams
* Spain with my sister
* Grand Canyon with my brother
* Maine with my daughter
* A class of (mostly) terrific students who stayed awake Thursday nights long enough to learn research
* My wonderful – repeat, wonderful – staff who have my back and are my friends

Negative:
* I’ll get back to that

What did I accomplish that I wanted to do?
* Passed into the dissertation phase
* Consumed less sugar
* Practiced my guitar most days
* Eliminated some of my clutter (go Ebay!)
* Entertained friends at my home - I’ve been talking about that for years

What did I not do that I wanted to do?
* Dance
* Write regularly
* Take another surfing lesson (I’ve GOT to get up!)
* Visit certain older friends
* Exercise more -- or just exercise. Forget the 'more' part. Who am I kidding? I can’t figure out how to exercise and not sweat so much. It’s bad for my hair.

What did I learn?
* Facebook friends can be a real source of support during trying times.
* I really do not have to answer the phone. So if you want me, email me. 
* People have the same personalities as adults that they had as children. If they irritated you then, they will probably still irritate you now.
* I am not ‘stuck’. There are ways out of impossible situations.

What do I want to do in 2014?
* Start working on a dissertation. I gave myself off the holiday season so I could enjoy it for once.
* Figure out a way to include dance in my life
* Write more regularly. The barrier I encounter is not wanting to p** off the living.
* Go take that 2nd surfing lesson. I finally have feeling back in my left knee from my first attempt.
* Visit those older friends.
* Tighten the sugar ban. Eat less gluten.
* Sleep more.
* Spend less (read: Stay OFF Amazon)

I was supposed to get back to the negative but I have nothing to say. Sure, there were days that didn’t go well – even weeks. But I have nothing to complain about. Nobody close to me has died or gotten seriously ill or been in any accidents. Nobody has lost a job or suffered financial ruin. Everyone is speaking to one another. There is a lot to which I look forward. Dare I say I am content?

What are you thinking about as you enter 2014?

Red Is My Color

I should have known something was amiss last Easter when I arrived at my brother’s group home to pick him up for the long ride to Virginia where our sister and her family live. He had his old 35 mm film camera in its case and sitting on top of his packed suitcase. “Why are you taking that camera,” I asked. He ignored the question. I handed him the camera case, and started down the hallway wheeling his bag. “We buy film?” he implored.  “I guess we can,” I said, “but why don’t you take your digital one?”  “This camera this time,” he said. I was annoyed. Film isn’t easy to come by at just any store, plus it meant another stop, plus the cost of the film and the eventual processing.  I held my annoyance at bay. I took a deep breath and thought, ok, why not. Everybody likes a change now and then. Aloud, I said, “All right, we can stop at Walmart and see if they have any.”  

  

My brother has been camera-crazy since I was in high school. And he has quite the eye.  His photos have won awards in Exceptional Artworks Exhibits and have been displayed locally in our hometown.  He’s even sold some of them. However, in addition to taking some really fabulous photographs, he also takes hundreds of what I call “garbage photos”.  Those include photos taken off the television and “still life” of various objects found around the house…. a toaster, a ceramic Indian he made, a box that holds a video, the contents of a drawer, the cover of a wrestling magazine, a cup with a straw in it.

After our mom passed away, the task of taking my brother to get his photos developed became mine. It didn’t take long to realize how much money was being spent (i.e., wasted) on what were mostly “garbage photos.”  It irritated me no end. I thought about getting him a digital camera but rejected the idea.  I imagined him getting frustrated when he couldn’t figure out something about the camera and breaking it. It wouldn’t be the first time frustration led to breakage.

A year or so later, however, I relented.  My sister and brother-in-law and I went in together and bought him a point and shoot digital camera.  He was hesitant at first – the concept of taking pictures with no film did not compute.  The little screen through which one frames photos was also confusing. He was used to framing through an eyepiece. But with encouragement and practice, gradually he got used to the camera and the old film camera was relegated to a desk drawer. Until Easter this year.

Sometime in May, I was in my hometown for the weekend visiting my brother as I often do. Saturday was coming to a close. I’d returned my brother to his group home, and I sat outside talking with my aunt and uncle at their house. The conversation turned to him. One of them noted that David doesn’t take his camera with him as often as he used to (for years, he would not leave the house without his camera.)  Yes, that’s true.  Perhaps that might be my fault. I hadn’t been very diligent about taking him to get his legitimate photos off the little storage device. Because he wasn’t always handing me little canisters, I tended to forget about getting his photos printed. I said that next time I was in town I would make it a point of taking him to get some prints made of whatever he wanted.  I said perhaps he was losing interest because he wasn’t seeing the products of his picture taking efforts. I should be more diligent.

So the next time I was in town, I approached the issue. We had just pulled in the driveway of his group home after eating breakfast out. I was dropping him off so I could go to the hair salon, after which I would pick him up again to spend the day together. “Tell you what, David,” I said. “When I come back to get you, let’s take that little chip out of your camera and go to Target to get photos printed. We haven’t done that in a long time.”  My little brother stared straight ahead and shook his head. “Maybe not,” he said. I persisted, “Why not? I’m here and we have the time. Let’s just go and do it.” My brother bit his lip and opened the car door. “Hmmm. Not today.”  He put a leg out.

“Wait a minute, David.” A bad feeling was creeping over me. I was remembering Easter. The light bulbs started going off in my head.  He put his other leg out and stood up. “David, I’m talking to you,” I said. “Don’t ignore me.” He looked down in to the car at me. I kept my voice even. Or at least I think I did. “David… did something happen to your camera?” He burst into tears and slid back down in the car.  “David, what happened to your camera?” Between sobs, he managed to get out, “It broke.”  “Oh, Dave, how did it break?”  “Fell on the floor,” he cried. “Kaboom.”  “Honey,” I tried to console him. “What broke on it?”  Through his tears, he wailed, “the lens.”

My mind was busy processing. Maybe it wasn’t so bad. Maybe he just thinks it’s beyond repair because he knows nothing about cameras, really. “Honey,” I said. “When I come back from getting my hair done, show me the camera. Maybe it can be fixed. I’d like to take a look at it.” My brother cried harder. Another light bulb exploded in my head. I hated to even ask the question. “David,” I said, “do you still have the camera?” I closed my eyes and prayed for patience.  “No,” he shook his head and sobbed some more.  “What did you do with the camera, David?”  “I throw it out,” he admitted. “In the trash?” He nodded, “uh huh.”  I was incredulous.  But I also could see the logic that propelled the action. My brother has been watching (and learning from) television for almost 50 years.  Smart criminals get rid of the evidence. Kill someone. Hide the body…… Break a camera. Throw it out.  But smart criminals don’t have a meddling sister who asks too many questions.

“You threw it in the trash?” I repeated. It was a rhetorical question. I was buying myself some thinking time. “Yes,” he squeaked out. My next thought was the photos on the storage device. “David,” I said, “what did you do with the little chip inside with your pictures on it?”  Here comes another piece of David logic. “I erased the pictures,” he said. OK, I thought. Why throw out perfectly good pictures? Simple. You don’t. You erase them first.

I pulled him close to me and he lay his head on my shoulder. Part of me was really upset. The other part of me was putting myself in his shoes. If I broke something of my own, it would be an accident, no matter how it happened. I’d say, “oh sh**” and if it was something replaceable, I’d go buy myself another one. Nobody would ever know what had happened, unless I chose to share my clumsiness. But David….. he breaks something he owns and he can’t just go out and buy a new one. Someone will always know. Someone has to provide him with the money. Someone has to take him to the store. Someone has to approve his purchase. He can never make a mistake of that magnitude and get away with it. He always has to answer to someone. Usually me.   

“Honey,” I said. “Everybody makes mistakes sometimes. I know you didn’t mean to break your camera.”

“Oh yeah?” he sniffed. “Yes,” I said. “But you have to be careful about where you are putting it.” I was beginning to envision what had happened. My brother is, well, a slob. His room is a disaster. He piles things all over the place, often illogically. It makes me crazy. I could see him setting the camera on top of an unsturdy pile while he concocted one of his “still-lifes” and having it slip-slide to the floor.

 “We can get you another camera,” I said. Of course he would get another camera. No question about it.

The sniffling slowed down. “Oh yeah?” My brother has realized that I’m mad but not that mad.

“Yes, but you have to tell me when things like this happen. Your camera might have been able to be fixed. But we won’t ever know that because you threw it out.”

“Me a dumb-dumb,” he said. “No, you aren’t a dumb-dumb. But you do have to be more careful. And you can’t be so sneaky and try to hide things when you make a mistake.”  I probably might as well talk to the wall on this one.  

I kissed his forehead. He nestled into the space between my chin and my right shoulder.  He was still whimpering a little. “I’ll look on the computer when I get home and see if I can find a new camera like your old one.” Life would be easier for us both if I just got him one that worked the same way.  “Same? Zoom lens,” he said, anxiously. “Yes,” I said, “it will have a zoom lens, David. Don’t worry.”  

Now that he knew: 1) I wasn’t going to kill him; and 2) I would get him another camera, he wasn’t going to let an opportunity go by. “Red,” he said. “Red what?” I asked, confused. “Red camera,” he clarified. And then emphatically, he stated, “Want a red camera. Not silver.”  I pulled far enough away from him to scrutinize his face, and wondered, have I been ‘had’? “A red camera…. You want a red camera?” I repeated.  He’s just had a narrow brush with death and he’s thinking about the color of his camera? 

“Why, for heaven’s sake?” I was starting to rethink doing him bodily harm. 

My brother looked straight into my eyes. “Red,” he said seriously, as if I should know better, “red is my color.”  “I’ll give you red, little brother!”  I shook my fist at him. He laughed at me knowing that he was not in any danger. None at all.   

My Mom, A Class Act

My mother was a class act. I’m not 100% sure all that goes in to that. I just know that she was.  

As soon as I thought it, I told her so. “Mom,  you are a class act.” She looked at me quizzically, as if to say, “What brought that on” and “Who, me?” all in the same thought.  I would tell her that again and again, whenever the overwhelming feeling welled up inside me. I told my sister and my daughter that I thought this way, too.

It wasn’t that my mom was perfect. She could be very stubborn. She was kind of a perfectionist. She could be a bit of a martyr.  Just a bit. She didn’t have a great sense of humor and she hated socializing.  She was not an intellectual and she was a teensy bit on the prudish side.   

My mother should have hated my father. She had every reason to do so.  My father was charming and talented, smart and hugely fun-loving. He was also seriously narcissistic, arrogant,  impulsive, and reckless. He was unfaithful to her again and again throughout their just-about thirty year-old marriage. The cheating started before I was born – of course I did not know this until I was an adult. The woman lived in the trailer park my parents owned – she cut my sister’s and my hair. He cheated again when I was in my teens. This time it was a woman from the Eastern Star – a Masonic lodge my parents were long active in. And he cheated when I was in my early twenties, newly married – this time with a woman who worked for him at his regional newspaper.  He would leave my mother for that woman, with whom he lived until she passed away from lung cancer. There could have been others – there probably were others. Those are the ones I know about.

My father wrecked my mother’s life financially. Never one to be fiscally responsible, he was less so without my mother to keep the checkbook balanced. A series of missteps combined with some bad luck and terrible timing after he left her resulted in my father losing his property which included the house I grew up in – the house in which my mother and brother still lived.  The house was to be sold by the bank. My mother was facing homelessness. My aunt and uncle kindly stepped in and bought the house. She would have to pay them back. She was already 60 years old. My mother squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, and spent fifteen years letting college kids live in her upstairs in order to pay her debt back.  My mother. Class act.

My father, meanwhile, had no money of his own. Never one to let reality interfere with his plans, however, he moved in to an old decrepit mansion in our town. Why? He’d always wanted to live there and now he didn’t have my mother’s boring practicality to hold him back. It didn’t look run-down on the outside – but on the inside – holy cow. Plaster falling down, pipes exposed, holes in the floor, erratic electrical outlets, bare lights dangling from the ceiling.  But hey – he was living in a mansion – with his girlfriend and two of her four children, who were 12 and 14.    

My mother worried about those kids.  It was Christmas. It was western NY cold. She knew they didn’t have much heat and that there also wasn’t much food.  She went to the grocery store and bought bags full of groceries. “They can rot in hell,” said my mother, about the two supposed adults.  But she sent me with those bags full of groceries to that mansion so those kids wouldn’t suffer any more than she imagined they already had. “Don’t tell him I bought them,” she said. Like hell I won’t, I thought to myself.  My mother. Class act.

Many years later, the girlfriend passed away. By then, my father had pulled himself together. He was no longer living in the falling-apart mansion. He’d dusted off his engineering skills and went back to work. He was no longer living hand to mouth.  But now he was alone and very sad.  Christmas was coming.  “Tell your father he’s welcome to come for Christmas if he wants to,” my mother said to me.  I looked at her incredulously. “Really?” “I imagine he’s feeling lonely – and it’s Christmas,” she said. And just like that, my father was invited back in to her home – which was not yet fully paid for – given a seat at the table, and in front of the fire, and made to feel comfortable and welcomed. My mother. Class act.

More years passed. My father was dying of esophageal cancer. Now he was living with another woman – this one had insisted, however, that my father actually divorce my mother. So she was his wife. He was in hospice care at home and though his wife had promised the hospice administrators that someone would always be there when the nurses or aides were not, she disregarded that direction regularly and left my father alone in bed for hours. It did not matter that he was getting weaker by the day or that no one would be there to get him some food or help him to the bathroom.  My mother fretted. “He should NOT be alone,” she’d tell me.

My mother also had cancer at the time and was in the middle of her own four-year battle for life. She endured one round of chemo after another which brought on horrible mouth sores, incredible exhaustion, and some serious kidney problems. One gray and cold morning in January a few weeks before he died, my father called my mother.  It was just 7:30. “Are you doing anything?” he asked her. “Do you think you could come over?”  The last thing my mother wanted to do was dress, summon the energy to scrape her car of snow and ice, and drive the few miles to my father, who was lying alone on the couch in his house. But she did. She sat with him for hours until the hospice nurse came while he alternately dozed and roused. Later she would tell me that she thought he had been afraid he was going to die that morning and he was afraid to be alone. My mother. Class act.

During the last weeks of my father’s life, he asked for parsnips. My angel mother scoured the grocery stores in town for some to make him. He reminisced about the macaroni and tomato juice soup he used to love. She made that too.   I helped her with the oyster stew he asked for.   She wasn’t feeling well but she directed its making from her couch in the living room. I delivered it to him and watched him slurp it down, grateful to my mother for being who she was. Class act.

After he died, my sister and I arranged for the funeral that his wife said she could not afford. We could not let him leave without a proper send off. My mother offered to host a buffet lunch afterwards.  Of course his wife was welcome.  His wife, I might add, is not a class act. Most people aren’t.

I think it all comes down to this. My mother was a class act because she was full of humanity. She acted consistently from a position of kindness and compassion even if she had plenty to be angry about. My mother simply did the right thing. Always.

I miss you, mom, every day. But the things that you did, the example that you set, guide me every day.  Happy mother’s day to my mom, the class act.   

My Knees (K)Need a Facelift!

I am cursed to be very short-waisted. This is probably inherited from my grandmother, who I recall lamenting this fact of her body every now and then as long as I can remember. What that means in case you don’t know is that my midriff is short. Think about the last old man you saw with his belt buckled up around his chest.  That could be me if I’m not careful . (Goddess, forgive me for dissing old men here. However, the visual conjured up by this admittedly stereotypical reference does explain why I call this problem a curse.)   

Due to this curse, I rarely wear anything that cinches visibly at the waist.  I won’t tuck in shirts. I get rid of anything with a belt as a decorative accessory.  The fashions of the late sixties and early seventies were kind to my body type. Empire-waisted and dropped-waisted dresses were my styles of choice.  They moved my waistline up or down a few inches so no on-looker ever really knew where the real thing was in the equation.     

Empire waists have been making their way back to the fashion scene the last couple of seasons. I was thrilled about this until I tried on a top last year in Banana Republic.  I had two responses to the look. 1)Ugh.  I feel pregnant; 2) Ugh. I feel  15, and not in a good way.   Sooooo, I turned my hopes to a lower waist line and waited. Every few months, I’d google ‘drop waist’ to see if I got any hits that weren’t in some vintage clothing store/website.  Finally, I got a bite. First, they appeared on websites where the going price for a simple frock was upwards of $600. But I was patient. The rich always get first dibs on everything. Sooner or later, I believed that the trend would filter down to the other 98%.

Which brings me to a Saturday afternoon a few weeks ago.  I was in our local overwhelming mall where I ventured to return an impulsive on-line sale purchase that did not look as good in person as it had on my computer monitor. I returned my item and as I was leaving the store, I stopped dead in my tracks. There was the dress I’d been waiting for – a cute black and white knit DROP-WAIST dress.  There was no way I was going to leave the store without trying it on.  Inside the dressing room, I slipped it down over my head and let it fall. I was more excited than I like to admit over a piece of fabric, however, if you have an imperfect body part rendered tolerable by a particular fashion, you will understand.  I surveyed myself critically in the mirror, loving what I saw  -- until my eyes landed on my knees.  I looked down in alarm. What happened to my knees?? When did they turn so ugly? Is that what they call “knobby”?  Is that (gasp) fat above my knee cap?  I was not a happy camper.  Of all the body parts I have ever been obsessed over or even gave more than a second thought to, my knees were not one (or two) of them.

Several solutions flashed through my head…. If there was more of a hem, an inch or so would solve some of the problem. If I wore stockings with the dress, that would help. But alas, the hem was miniscule – and I had to acknowledge that this particular dress begged to be worn with sandals.  I could also hear my daughter saying, “Nobody wears stockings any more, mom!”  I reluctantly put the dress back on the rack and headed home to google “ugly knees”  and find out if there is a remedy.

It turns out there is quite the literature on ugly knees.  I found:

“Bad knees to sexy knees.”
“Knees are ugly.”
“I have ugly knees.”
“Extremely ugly knees.”
“Why are knees so ugly?”
“Ladies, do you have knees that, like, pop out?”
“Wrinkly, knobby, saggy….meet the celebs going weak at the knees.”
“Ugly knees and a cool summer breeze.”
“Ugly knees… the curse of the kninkles” (I think that means knee wrinkles)

I am not alone.  People actually do undergo surgery to make their knees look better.  One cosmetic surgeon reported about 10% of his clients are seeking knee-relief.  However, one writer warned that trying to get rid of the fatty tissue just above the knee cap is tricky – removal of too much of it will cause the thigh to sag. Great.  What a visual.

One blogger wrote that all women over 40 should send their knees under cover – permanently. This kind of made me mad.  Why should we be sentenced to a life of long pants in hot weather?  A contributor to  “Bad knees to sexy knees” countered this advice, however, suggesting a little bit of exercise (i.e. lunges) to strengthen the muscle around the knee, a beauty product called “Body Glow” which gives legs and knees a “healthy glow”, a powerful moisturizer like La Mer, and an occasional scrub. After that, he said, “flaunt your knees”, whatever their condition.  

I took a peak at the article about celebrity knees and came face to knee with photos of the ugly knees of Catherine Zeta-Jones, Angelina Jolie, Eva Longoria, Sharon Stone, Elle MacPherson, Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Aniston  – even Katie Holmes who hasn’t even hit 40 yet! The writer of this bare-all even suggested that Demi Moore, who reportedly had an expensive knee lift a few years ago, should ask for her money back!  As I gazed at their ugly knees, I felt my perspective shift gears. I reassessed my knee situation.  I could try some lunges – that could only help, and I usually do go for some self-tanner in the summer.  I still have a stash of LaMer from my daughter’s days at Estee Lauder.  I’ll do what I can but I will not obsess about my knees for one second more.  

 And I think I’ll go back for that dress.

You Don't Own Me

The girl waits patiently – though patience is not her virtue – while Carol, the short and stout old-timer divides up the day’s take and slides her share, $6.46 across the table.  She unties her burgundy apron – the required uniform – and pockets the money. The man – her husband – will not be happy. “Thanks,” she says, “for not much” she does not say. “Bye, guys,” she nods at the others -- Barb, the sharp-tongued hostess; Greta, wispy-gray-haired Austrian; Kay, divorced mother of two hellions; Tom, the busboy in love with Frankie Valle; and Lee, the pissed-off cook.  “See you tomorrow.” The girl deposits the apron down the laundry chute next to the short order serving kitchen and leaves the dining room.

Out in the lobby of the country club, to the left, the bar is almost empty.   That also means the man – her husband – is not making much either tending bar on the day shift.  The girl decides against poking her head in to say hello. The man was in a foul mood this morning. Another slow tip day will make matters worse.

An unknown man in a fedora chats over the front desk with Ralph, the general manager, who nods and smiles as she passes.  To the right in the sunken part of the members’ lounge, Victor is tugging at a vacuum cleaner.  Madeline scurries past, her arms filled with freshly laundered, burgundy table cloths and napkins, ready for the dinner crowd -- crowd being a relative concept.  The tall Christmas tree speckled in tiny colored lights glows in the lounge and makes the girl feel happy and sad at the same time.  

The girl enters the main prep kitchen through swinging doors. Lenny, the head chef, is arguing with the bread delivery guy about what was or wasn’t delivered yesterday. At the back of the kitchen, she pushes through a non-descript brown door into a back hallway and begins the climb to the third floor. The stairway is narrow. If she put out both elbows she would skin them. The walls are a shade of dull green, smudged and nicked.  

The girl reaches the top landing.  She is home.  There are four doors – the one on the left belongs to Victor, the porter. The one on the right belongs to Madeline, the laundress. They have both lived here for what might be decades. Straight ahead to the left is the bathroom, which they all share, and to the right is the room where the girl and the man have lived since September. She unlocks the small padlock that keeps the door closed and enters, praying this won’t last for decades.

The girl sits down on the bed in the attic room -- home. She unties her white waitress shoes. On this gray day in late November, there is little light coming through the tiny dormer windows.  She turns on the small bedside light. There are two hours before she has to be at her next job in the greeting card department at Sibley’s, two towns away. She turns the clock radio on and slowly unbuttons her white waitress uniform. “I want to be Bobby’s girl,” is playing. The girl loves this station but she can only listen to these oldies when the man is not around. The man hates this music. He hates the era from which it came.  But this music makes the girl happy. It fills her with something between wistfulness and eager anticipation. She remembers hearing the older kids on the school bus sing these songs while she yearned for entry into their world.  Even when the lyrics are of death and breaking up, they sound upbeat.

The girl feels sad and empty even as she looks around this crowded room – home.  Every inch of this room is full. There is the bedroom set she fought to buy with some of their wedding money, the table and chairs from her mother, a recliner from her grandmother which he has claimed, his crappy old television, her stereo and her records which he does not let her play. There is a 3 foot refrigerator with a tiny freezer (his), an electric frying pan (hers), and a two burner hot plate that looks dangerous (definitely his). This is the kitchen. There are her plates and her glasses and her silverware, her Revere Ware pots whose copper bottoms are still shiny even though he gets irritated and says it is a waste of time to shine them. There is no oven. There is no sink. Water is retrieved from and dishes are washed in the bathtub in the shared bathroom next door.

She is here because the man was dissatisfied. He is a grass-is-always-greener, rolling-stone-that-gathers-no-moss kind of man. The man is vaguely discontent wherever he is, whatever he’s doing, whomever he is with.  He has come back to this country club, where he worked at some point in his wandering past, questing for some unknown, unnamed “better.” A “better” that is not working for her father (nobody tells the man what to do), a “better” that has taken her from her family, her town, her job, her education.  The girl has begun to despair that this man’s “better” is not “better” at all – just different.

This life he’s insisted upon usually begins and ends with the man groping for her. This life spends weekends visiting the man’s aunts and uncles and cousins along with their ill-behaved children, in towns everyone with an education flees. She sits in their cluttered, dirty kitchens gazing at dusty, stained floors, and hopes the man will not say ‘yes’ to staying for dinner.  This life has no room for hope. This is not the life she wants. This life will never go to Europe or water ski, eat crème brulee or see a Broadway play.   

The girl and the man fought this morning about Christmas. The man has said “no” to the girl’s wish to erect her small Christmas tree in the room. The man has declared a vehement distaste for any holidays – especially this one.  The girl loves holidays – especially this one.   Sometimes she suspects that anything remotely festive makes this man miserable. 

The girl dons the skirt and blouse she will wear for her next job. She will leave before the man finishes his shift and if she is lucky, she will get home after he has fallen asleep. She can see snow has begun to fall and it is coating the roof. She should leave soon. Another song is playing -- one which she has never heard before. She stops to listen. "You don't own me. Don't try to change me in any way." Wha, wha, what?? She moves quickly toward the radio, not quite believing what she is hearing. She grabs a pencil, she must not let this song get away. "I'm free and I love to be free, to live my life the way I want, to say and do whatever I please." When the music ends, the girl's tears begin to fall. The announcer uncharacteristically gives the girl the information she needs to find this song, which she will play over and over again on her stereo when the man is not around. 

It is time for the girl to leave. For the first time in many  months, something close to hope hovers around her edges. She padlocks the door behind her. Tomorrow, she will decorate her Christmas tree.

We Have Forever Together

It was March 26, 1985, a Tuesday. I left my job on West 57th Street at lunch time and walked 19 blocks north.  All the way, my stomach did double flips. I found the building I sought and pressed the doorbell, 4D. I waited.  There came a voice. “Who is it?” I looked around before I answered, and then said my name. The door clicked in release and I dove for it. There is a short window of opportunity with those buzzers. Inside, I found the elevator and pressed 4. It moved very slowly. When the doors creaked open, I stepped out and looked to the door on the left.  4D.  Whew. Easy, I thought.  I pressed the buzzer. My stomach had moved on to triple flips. “Yes?” called the voice. Damn…. I’m going to be forced to announce myself again. I hated saying my name. The voice instructed me to go to the other door.  There was another entrance? Silently I cursed my friend – the one who’d referred me to this voice – she could have made this easier with better instructions.

The voice opened the other door.  Attached to the voice was a solid woman about my height with large brown eyes and short, straight blonde hair that hung not quite to her shoulders.   She led me a few steps to her office, and closed the door behind us. Inside the office on the left against a wall of book was a couch that looked like it might have belonged to Freud and a chair. Across the room on the opposite wall was another “normal” couch.  She headed for the chair at the head of Freud’s couch.  I made a beeline for the normal couch across the room. I sat probably 10 feet away from her with a wide expanse of rug between us.

 Now what?  “What brings you here?” asked the voice.  I took a deep breath and the words came tumbling out. “There’s this guy,” I started. I did not stop for 50 minutes.   I was crazy, madly in love with “this guy.”  But this guy was not crazy, madly in love with me. I wasn’t whimsical enough. (To this day, I wince when I hear that word.) I was too much like him – serious, responsible. He wanted his opposite. Nobody specific – there was no competition at the moment – but he hadn’t met her yet.  Not that he didn’t “love” me in a way.  Just not the way I desperately wanted. Yes, we were sleeping together.  But for him, it was just a fun thing to do with a good friend. He was crystal clear about that. But I chose to believe his actions and not his words because his actions gave me hope…. a reason to think that there might be a chance I could morph into someone else.

I told her the whole story of how I’d met him at school, how we made films together, how he’d urged me to move to NYC a year before, found me a place to stay with his then-girlfriend, referred me for a job that he knew about, about how I’d moved in with him when the girlfriend broke up with him (crazy girl, lucky me), and how I was now living in an illegal attic apartment in Brooklyn. About how attached I was to him, how he made me laugh, how handsome I thought he was, how he made me look beautiful on film (he had magical powers), how the deep sobs rose from my toes and could not be stopped whenever the conversation turned to our (lack of) future together.  All the while, she just sat and listened to what must have seemed like the presentation of a person in the grips of mania.  I finally stopped and took another breath. Oh yeah, I continued, and there’s my daughter. I have a daughter. She’s 7 and she’s living with a family – they’re friends – in Queens. This was another huge situation in my life I couldn’t seem to get a grip on.

“We have to stop now,” the voice said. We discussed money. I had none. She asked me what I could manage and I told her. The deal was made, and I was shown the door. “I’m sorry that I talked so much,” I said. “I was afraid I wouldn’t have time to tell you everything.”  She smiled just slightly. “I was wondering why you were in such a hurry,” she said. “You know, we have forever together.”

Being that I was never mentally where I was physically located at that point in my life, it didn’t sink in until later. Then I thought – what a curious thing to say—we have forever together. What did she mean by that? Forever was a concept I didn’t quite “get”. Forever implied – well, a long life. Just a week before, I had stood in line at my bank waiting to open my first IRA as a defensive maneuver. The bookkeeper at my job had roughed out my taxes for me and due to accidental under-withholding my first year in NYC, I was going to owe the government money. I was terrified.  I only had about $2000 to my name and the bookkeeper had suggested an IRA as a way to solve my problem. The line at the bank moved very slowly and I was having an out-of-body experience. I was not quite 32 years old. I would not have access to my $2000 again for close to 28 years.  This was both stunning and sobering to me because I realized that I had not anticipated living that long. Opening an IRA was like a commitment to living. I wasn’t so sure it was possible.

When I returned to my office after the appointment, I realized I had forgotten to tell her that I wouldn’t be there the following week because I would be out of town. But I was “phone phobic.” I could not possibly call her to tell her so. The words would get glued together before exiting my mouth. I did the only sensible thing. I sent her a letter to tell her.

Two weeks later, I returned to her office. “What happened last week?” asked the voice. I panicked. “Didn’t you get my letter?” I did not want her to think I was irresponsible, that I would do such a thing as just not show up. “Yes, I did,” she said. She went on to tell me that she had been concerned because she was going away the following week for two weeks, and she had wanted to be able to tell me this the week I wasn’t there. She said she didn’t know how I would feel about such short notice. “It’s ok,” I said. Again, I was curious – why would she think I would have feelings about short notice? It would be fine for her to be gone, I wouldn’t notice the difference.  Have a good time, I said.

Well, that was for sure the last time that she would go away without me caring. “The voice” became the woman I call my ‘heart mother.’  [Not that I didn’t have a perfectly wonderful real mother but this was different.]  She moved into not only my heart, but every cell of my body.  It is largely because of her that I made it to the age when I could officially get my $2000 back.  

My heart mother will turn 70 on Tuesday this week.  I honor her and I thank her. And I’m still counting on her to keep her promise – that we will have forever together.  Somehow.