White Noise, Old Friends, & Dining with the Help!

It is a very curious thing: at home I am disturbed and distracted by the doggy daycare behind the building I live in. Add to that the racket that comes through the very low ceilings in my apartment -- slamming footsteps, vacuum cleaners at rather odd times (10:30pm?), washers and dryers that shake the walls of the living room, the howling beagle...... But right now I am in New York City where, even on the 36th floor in my son's flat, the jackhammers, sirens, honking of horns, all become white noise to me. I am rarely conscious of it and it certainly doesn't keep me awake. I grew up on a dead-end street in Brooklyn. A train went by frequently when I was very young. Then, after the war, it could be heard only a few times a day. Noise from the avenue across the lots behind our house -- must have been. I don't recall a disturbance. But there were clanging trolley cars and car traffic and screaming kids. On our street, there were delivery trucks arriving regularly. I suppose I absorbed the sound as city music. The sounds I hear from my current home are dissonant; noise pollution. Living two streets from the ocean -- I expected a different concert. I don't know why the racket in New York plays out like acceptable background to me. But it does.

I came to the city for a birthday get-away. Last year I went to Italy for six days. I couldn't replicate that trip since I've been unemployed for almost 11 months. But I had promised myself a trip of some kind to celebrate my birthday from then on. So I commandeered my son's charming apartment in mid-town Manhattan for 6 days. I traveled by train which was fine except that getting to Amtrak from where I live is a hassle with luggage. Though it is March, it was summertime in the city. Of course I was wearing my P-jacket (coming out of New England) and shlepping my suitcase the mile from Penn Station -- well, I was a bit warm by the time I arrived at the flat.

I saw a play that first evening; my son left me a ticket as a birthday gift. A good play -- NEXT FALL -- and so a good start of my holiday. The next day, a school chum bussed it in from Pennsylvania. We had a lovely lunch (her very kind treat), a long walk through the Metropolitan Museum of Art in search of a newly acquired Monet; tea and pastries at the Neue Gallerie Cafe Fledermaus. The latter is the German museum and the cafe serves Viennese desserts. Very elegant; felt for the hour as though we were in a foreign country. The waiters spoke Spanish instead of German, but no matter. The next day, Sunday, I went down to the Chelsea/Soho neighborhood to visit with a friend who had been at my little acting school -- The Acting Place, Inc. -- back in the day. We visited Chelsea Market, had lunch at a little French restaurant (again a very lovely treat for me), and then strolled the new High Line elevated promenade. We chatted a bit in my friend's delightful little penthouse apartment. On my way back, not ready to end the day, I went to see ALICE IN WONDERLAND at the movie theater. I love Lewis Carroll. I liked this film -- had it been called "ALICE RETURNS TO WONDERLAND" it would have been right on the mark. Another wonderful day. Visiting with friends who share history -- the best, truly. A classmate of my son bought me lunch at a great diner on rainy Monday. My Sunday friend, after reciting the weather report for Monday, said to me: "It's going to rain all day Monday. What can you do in New York in the rain?" So I told her: " The same things I'd do if it didn't rain -- except with an umbrella." So I bought an umbrella and walked and walked and walked. I love to wander around New York. Looking for yesterday perhaps. Do we search always for our lost youth? (Mine was Manny Luftglass, a kid in the Navy, and he was a heck of a kisser! Lost him over 50 years ago.)

On my birthday day, I visited the Museum of the City of New York. My dad and I used to go there together. I believe I wrote about this in an earlier blog. It is worth mentioning again. The exhibits are always fresh and enlightening and fun. On the third floor the toys and games are kept. Bits and pieces of my childhood. Yours, too, if you're as ancient as I am. They have my older brother's favorites: an erector set; Lincoln Logs; cast iron fire trucks, and on and on. But my favorites are the doll houses. All hand built. All magnificent. A number of years ago, my son, Jamie, built a doll house for me. He built my fantasy house. It took him six months. It was indeed a labor of love. And love it I do -- so much.

On my way back to my son's flat, I stopped at one of my best liked restaurants on 9th Avenue -- Basilica. It was a few minutes past three o'clock and I hadn't eaten all day. They were not open yet, but I was invited to sit down anyway. A waiter appeared and after looking at the menu, I told him what I wanted wasn't on the menu. He asked me what it was; I told him a simple pasta pomedora, a salad mista, a glass of red wine (well, the latter was certainly on the menu). They prepared the meal for me. The staff sat at a table across the way having their meal and took turns checking up on me. They put on some lovely music -- Andrea Bocelli -- and I was transported to the same time the year before, when I had the same birthday dinner in Florence, Italy. That evening I saw the play RED. I liked it very much; the performances (Alfred Molina) were brilliant. It is rare to see a new play, done well.

One more day. A visit with a friend I worked with when I lived in the neighborhood a few years ago. I went up to the office and saw some of the folks and then ate some Indian food with my Indian friend. I had meant to walk through the West Village or the Lower East Side, but I was suddenly tired. I went back to the apartment; chatted for an hour with my son's friend, then left to see the preview of the Twyla Tharpe ballet -- an homage to Frank Sinatra. (a college friend left a comp for me at the box office. Nice!) In the elevator on my way out I met a man who - it turned out - was from the same part of Brooklyn where I grew up. We chatted onto the street like a couple of old friends. It is rare for such an encounter to happen in Massachusetts -- unless you meet another New Yorker. If you smile at a stranger in Boston he/she will turn and run. If you smile at a stranger in New York, he/she will either say "What??!!" or " I know you? " or something else that acknowledges your existence.

So I thank all my friends in the city who treated me so well; my long-distance friends and Facebook friends who wished me so well; my son who shared his crib with me; and the blessed universe that has permitted me to reach this age with mind and body pretty much in tact. And now, like the March Hare, I will celebrate all the un-birthdays until the next actual one. We journey on.

"Alone" - in search of a definition

You know more than you think you know,
just as you know less than you want to know.
............Oscar Wilde

Alone is not a word that is simple to define. Nor is the condition/state of being. Sure it is, you say; no one else is in the room. That's not what I mean; I suppose I'm taking an existentialist approach. i.e., one can be alone in a room full of people. Since I'm being obtuse I'll take the long way around to explain and tell you a story. Picture, if you will, a little girl -- five or six years old; blond hair, chestnut eyes. Not a waif; more of a presence. She lives in a big city with her family: parents, grandparents, older brother, baby brother. She is passionately in love with her family although she feels, oddly, that she is on loan to them; that she does not come from them. (She'll suffer later for both these emotions.) Her mother is distant, being very close to her own mother and subconsciously wanting to be the little girl of the family herself. Her older brother is "the prince;" the first born son with biblical impact. Her baby brother is the baby after all. So our little girl is vaguely apart from the family.

A huge occasion: the end of WW II. The entire city pulsates with joy. She runs across the empty lots behind her home to greet her brother returning early from summer camp. They hug and race back to the house. And before adults of the family turn the corner to greet them both, her brother swings, smacks her across the face and levels her. The parental response is what did you do to deserve it? It begins with this and continues for the next 10+ years. Empty space is created around her; she steps back.

In all seasons, she runs to that house believing each time that it is truly home; safe haven. But there are challenges: the adult cousin of her father who corners her in the upstairs hallway and she has to fight him off; the stepbrother of her mother who attempts to bother her when she's sleeping on the living room sofa so he and his wife could have her bedroom while they visit. The mean kid from her religious school class who follows her home on the dark winter evenings and tries to assault her on the street. She goes to her parents who are ill-equipped to deal with any of this. What did you do? She steps further back.

She hides somewhere in her head; in her fantasies; in her imagination. She lives in her love for dance, and movies, and poetry. Not a good enough dancer to make a career, she's told. That poetry is obviously not yours -- what did you do?? She steps back further still.

Racing ahead. She marries young believing that her husband will be her best friend. Her true partner. But he is looking to be taken care of; and to protect his own chosen isolation. They inevitably part. What the hell did you do??

Don't hang up -- I know this reads like one huge kvetch! But really it's a street-map of sorts to understand a way of being. Our little girl, now a grown woman, creates camaraderie with her own children and within her artistic endeavors. When the children and the artistic endeavors move on, she steps back again and this time falls, like Alice down the rabbit hole, into a place that she doesn't recognize nor from which can she seemingly escape. Having lived in too many different places to establish community; having an internal sense of isolation (growing out of the events above and more) that prevents her from pressing into clubs or groups, etc., she can indeed be defined as alone. No -- please do NOT believe that she is a victim. From that first day when she was five or six years old she rejected that role. You can be sure that falling down the rabbit hole was not an accident. She knew exactly what she was doing.

Alone is not necessarily a bad thing. Not the greatest condition either, to tell the truth. But at the bottom of the rabbit hole, if you recall the tale, Alice goes among mad people. And probably doesn't inspire a sense of normalcy herself. "We're all mad here," says the Cheshire Cat. "I'm mad; you're mad." It's a fine madness; a sort of protection against the terminal loneliness that "alone" can cause. The moments of clarity when one realizes the lack of "remember that?" moments; "no one to call" moments; the absence of a daily witness to one's existence. But since our girl is filled with love of life; of being; creating; since our girl has dear friends in various parts of the world (though not available for a walk on the beach) who care so much that she's there -- since our girl is an eternal tourist and is surprised constantly by the small moments of each day -- she is one with the world. And if you asked our girl what the hardest thing is about being alone, she'd no doubt tell you that she misses almost most of all -- the dancing.

The Inner Eye of the Beholder

"The best mirror is an old friend."

.............Peter Nivio Zarlenga

It was lovely to begin the New Year in Northern California. The 60 degree weather was a delightful improvement over the 12 degree agony I'd left in New England. I had coffee each morning with the fat cat, Archer, and would walk a couple of miles in the residential neighborhood being amazed by palm trees and Dr. Seuss shrubbery. Soon after my return to the house, the family would begin to awaken, one by one. My son, my daughter-in-law, my teenage grandchildren -- I'd slide from role to role to role without realizing the adjustment. A few days into the visit my son drove me out to a town near Modesto, to visit with a dear friend from my college days. We were good buddies at school; both in the theatre department. Lloyd has had a substantial career in theatre and film. He's a brilliant talent as actor, director, writer. We had reconnected after -- what? -- 24 years -- and had been speaking through email, and mailing writing samples to each other since summer.

His charming companion of 12 plus years was as welcoming as he, and we toured the wonderful little house and property. We lunched at a great "Greek joint," as he called it, and visited a performing arts center in Modesto, designed by another classmate of ours. And we talked and talked, trying to catch up -- make up for 24 years of silence. It was amazing. We started school together 54 years ago. And we were grateful to look at each other and to say -- We're still here.

A whole rush of memories followed me back to my son's home, and more slip through my offending mind each day now back in Massachusetts. But equally remarkable is the strange, almost familiar feeling I walk around with. It is not mother, mother-in-law, grandmother. It is not friend, job applicant, teacher, etc. It is me; bare-naked soul, disconnected to anything or anyone except my own affections, my own space, the me-of-me. When I was teaching actors, we used an improvisation where two people were talking on stage, and one by one other characters would join the scene revealing a different relationship with the original actors. For example, two lovers are speaking; a girl arrives into the scene and turns out to be the granddaughter of one of the characters -- a change happens. And so on. That's what happens to us in our real day. For me, I am constantly struggling to own my identity as just me -- not the perennial mother, caretaker, grandmother, etc. Trying to find the balance -- remaining me and still able to contribute to the lives of those around me without losing me in the process.

A bit obtuse? I guess. I'd forgotten, you see, what it felt like to have someone speak to me as me -- not as the life-role I am playing. My friend does not know me as grandmother, mother, caretaker, etc. He sees Mickey; he speaks to Mickey. A wondrous thing!

Yes, Santa Claus, there is a Macy's

I walked into the store through the door I'm used to; so I can find my way out and also locate the mall entrance.  These commercial ventures can be rather confusing.  To the left are the coats; to the right hang the weird, hippy-ish, trashy fashions that junior teens love.  Straight ahead, in front of the escalator, are the black, white and beaded evening separates.  Walking to the escalator I noticed two massage chairs oddly placed among the dressy clothes.  A twenty-something woman, casually up-scale and very slim, was attempting to figure out how to start one of the chairs.  As I started to the next level, the customer was settling into the chair with audible sighs. After some grazing, I found a scarf and sox that I had come for, went to a cashier (now called a service center) who had been there a minute ago.  Peering over the top of the counter, I saw the girl sitting on the floor, arms around her knees.  "Are you on break?" I asked.  I thought that was politic.  "No.  I can help you," she said with disgruntlement.  So I dealt the Macy's cards I'd been receiving in the mail several times a week for several weeks.  "What can I use?"

The salesgirl calculated the cost, looked over my cards, chose the one that worked.  The amount was 2/3 less than the ticket price after the reduced sales price.  Delighted, I thanked her and walked off with my happy parcel, glancing back to watch her slip down the wall to the hidden position I'd disturbed.  

The store was extremely busy.  Well, it was December 23rd.  But the customers appeared blithely occupied.  Not sure what my next purchase should be, I sprayed myself with Chanel Number Five and walked out into the mall.  I visited several stores: strolling through, looking at various articles, pausing, trying to decide.  In one store I was followed around (stalking?).  In another, the salesperson told me she'd be right with me.  I left ten minutes later.  She hadn't shown up.  All the shops boasted sales, but none as good as Macy's.  So back I went.  I'm not cheap, just unemployed for almost eight months. Anyway, I only had two more items to buy.  I found both of them; each at fifty percent off.  I laid all my cards on the counter of a more diligent saleslady.  "What I can I use?"   She did the calculations, looked over my hand, and offered a better percentage from the most recent advertisement.  I used my Macy's card, signed the little signing machine, and gathered up my cards.  As the lady handed me my package she said, "You saved $35."  I backed away looking over the receipt.  A two percent further reduction and Macy's would owe me money.  As I rode the escalator down to ground level, it occurred to me that it must cost like ten cents to make most of the articles sold here. I turned toward the exit as the twenty-something customer was just standing up and turning off the massage chair.  I looked at my watch.  Two hours had passed.  How hospitable of Macy's to permit the young woman a spa treatment.  

I can joyfully report that Macy's is more than a parade.  It is a pathway to a jolly red suit.  Happy Christmas!

Who the Hell is Murphy?

A few weeks ago I woke up, stretched in my bed, smiled at the ceiling, and saw a line of what looked like leakage. The upstairs resident's kitchen is over my bedroom.  I know; a very weird apartment.  Very nice but difficult to live in.  Anyway. I stood up on my bed and touched the line in the ceiling.  It wasn't damp at all.  But it was definitely a stain.  I sent an email to the upstairs resident and she confirmed that her garbage disposal had leaked and was being replaced and she was very sorry, etc.etc.etc.  So I phoned Bob L., the remarkable "handy man" who is a true gift to a single woman.  (Stop it!!  That's NOT what we're talking about.  Besides, he prefers 30-something women which I most definitely am not.)  Bob came over later that day, told me he could repair the damage without having to paint the entire ceiling.  Not right away at any rate.  He'd let me know when he could come to do the work.  Okay.  The next day the kitchen faucet began to drip; a definite kind of WW II torture.  I started my list.  The bathtub began to drain verrrry slowly.  A variety of small annoyances.  Until today.

Today.  While my five year old granddaughter lulled in the bathtub, and my daughter (who had spent the evening before in the emergency room monitoring very high blood pressure) washed at the sink, water poured out from under the toilet.  The seal had broken.  Scooted the ladies out of the room; turned off the water at the source; flushed the last of it away; employed every towel I owned to mop it up.  And phoned Bob L.  He came over, checked it out (causing a second flood in his investigation) and called his plumber-buddy.  It being Saturday (the Saturday before Christmas no less) nothing could be done before Monday.  Okay.  I gratefully have a powder room upstairs.  Bob left and I mopped the water up again.  Now every towel I own was in the bathtub.  We had someplace to be so the gals got ready and I put a few of the towels in the washing machine (laundry room off the stricken bathroom) and we left.  I returned a few hours later and visited the bathroom expecting to put the towels into the dryer.  Well, for some reason yet to be discovered, the water that drained from the washer came out through the same broken area under the commode.  ???  Except it was so much water this time that it ran into the hallway and the room adjacent soaking the wall-to-wall carpeting.  Nothing to be done until Monday.  I mopped again; put two dehumidifiers in place to hopefully alleviate some of the carpet moisture; loaded all the wet towels still in the tub into big plastic bags and spent the evening at the local Laundromat.  

My landlord, who is my son, lives in California.  We spoke on the phone.  He understood the problem and all the worst possible scenarios.  Nothing to be done until Monday.  Fortunately the upstairs washroom isn't adding to the downstairs problem.  Today we are having a blizzard.  The real thing.  Christmas is Friday.  Saturday I'm to fly to San Jose to visit my west coast family.  I don't know this plumber or his phone number or if he'll even show up.  I am trying to stay in the moment since there is really no where else to stay.  But I do wonder who the hell Murphy was and why his law still more than occasionally prevails.  Not that it would change anything.  Nothing to be done until Monday.

Now is the Winter....

It is a contradiction, I know, to love the changing seasons and yet despair the winter cold.  But I do that; always have.  In the past ten years, the approach of the cold has filled me with foreboding.  Yet here I am still living in the North East, dreaming of Barbados or -- at the very least -- a working fireplace.  It is, with my economy, not a simple matter to relocate.

This winter, its chill preceding its official date, is complicated by chilling events.  I lost my job last May, and have not been able to find something since.  "Admins" I'm told are not in great demand.  My daughter, recovering from mitral valve replacement surgery, is back in hospital with pancreatitis.  Almost two weeks now.  This is her third hospitalization since July, and her little five year old is confused and bereft.  It has been very difficult for us all.  Christmas is something of a blur.  And while I am so looking forward to a trip to California the day after Christmas to visit with my oldest son and his lovely family, I approach it with trepidation.  Will my daughter be okay?  So many cancellations since July.  It's hard to proceed with optimisim.  

I am kvetching; that wasn't my intention.  My thought this morning was all the different kinds of winter one deals with -- Macbeth's not the least of these -- the winter of our discontent.  It is best I think to huddle -- not quite like "once upon a time..." at the general store pot-bellied stove or four to a bed.  But to have a society; to get together with family and friends and surround oneself with the warmth of affection and good conversation.  Barring that, there is the apology for the lack of the latter:  a good book and a comfy afghan.  A glass of brandy doesn't hurt either.  

The shortest day approaches; from then on minute by minute the days lengthen and it will be Spring.  Ever hopeful. 

I wish whatever readers of this there may be the warmth of love in this season.

My mother thanks you, my father thanks you, & I thank you..

The NPR stations have been visiting immigrants' kitchens this week to find out what they cook for Thanksgiving.  I listened with interest and amusement.  A Greek chef and his family had turkey but the lamb cooked in the open pit was the star.  All side dishes were Greek.  The French chef did very sexy French things to the turkey, and converted all else to French attitudes.  And so it went.  I had never thought of mine as an immigrant family, but since I'm a first generation American, I suppose it was.  As a kid I thought it odd when other kids had grandparents born in America.  Perhaps I imagined that everyone came from somewhere else.  Anyway, today I accepted my origins and recalled the Thanksgivings in my parents'/grandparents' home.  The only thing foreign was the conversation typically in Yiddish.  My grandparents' generation was all about assimilation.  My grandmother, Genya, became Jennie.  Her brother, Toldras, became Harry.  You get the idea.  She was hurt and angry if you referred to her accent.  She insisted she didn't have one.  (Meryl Streep could have imitated her for Sophie's Choice.) So my grandmother and mother referred to magazines and cookbooks to create the consummate, American Thanksgiving dinner.

My mom loved to set an elegant table.  Organdy appliqued tablecloths; crystal cornucopia with fruit and nuts pouring out onto the table; Lenox china with a gold wheat design.  Her turkey was the largest she could find; her stuffing began with cornflakes (really!).  Candied yams, apple pie, jello molds, apple cider.  On and on.  The gorgeous Henredon table, it seemed, opened to accommodate a cast of hundreds.  And waking up Thanksgiving morning to the smell of that dinner cooking; well, it was childhood euphoria.

After my father died, predeceased by grandma Jennie, my mother married Bonpapa.  He was Belgian and spoke many languages.  But his primary language was French and his accent was cultivated French (very theatrical).  When we went to their first Thanksgiving dinner, I expected something different;  the French touch??  It was the same dinner; the only difference was the abundance of wine.  Not an unwelcome addition.

I'm grateful for those memories.  And the how-to.  From the beginning of my married life, when our economy was non-existent, our table -- no matter the size -- welcomed all who would come. (the only request we'd make is please bring a chair to sit on!) My turkey is basically the same as mom's -- including the stuffing.  Other dishes have changed to satisfy the taste buds of my children and now my grandchildren.  Not so many people in attendance these days.  My friends are far-flung; my children have happy lives in remote cities.  And the folks I care about here have gatherings with children and grandchildren of their own.  The constant that remains is the gratitude; my thanks for the giving.  The gifts of the universe;  the love and caring of my family and friends.  My ability to give when needed and asked for and when needed and anonymous.  

And to keep myself company while preparing the all-American feast,  I sing Yiddish songs, an occasional French tune,  and permit the wondrously familiar smells that permeate my apartment to take me back to many a Thanksgiving-Past.  When my little gathering arrives, I, of course, spare them all of that.  They're making memories of their own.