There Goes the Bride (and Everybody Else)

Eleven bridesmaids, two moms, one future sister-in-law, a flower girl, two hair stylists, and two make-up artists. The last bit of behind-the-scenes chaos before the main event. Hours of trial and error. Stray eyelashes littered the table, like little caterpillars. Curls were tightened, brows reshaped, blotches corrected, search parties assembled for a missing lip gloss. There was a revolving stream of hotel staff and food deliveries and photographers and friends running emergency errands in the rain.

My goal: to leave the stray hairs and the smudges behind. My daughter's wedding would be as perfect as the chignon at the nape of my neck, still invisible, by early afternoon, to my naked eye without a hand mirror.

I have braced myself for this morning after, creeping up on me only hours after I finally fell into bed, only minutes, it seems, after toasting my daughter's engagement more than a year ago. The relief is welcome, after so much worrying about every little thing that could go wrong. Now, there is no expectation that might not be met, no unseen disaster lurking between the lines of countless check lists. What is left, today, is a renewed even keel, and days where bad hair is not a tragedy of epic proportions.

What is left is departures. By one-fifteen in the morning, the ballroom that had only hours earlier been drenched in sparkling light and infectious music and dancing fools and a massive pillow of "flutter-fetti" (best thing ever, by the way) had reverted to an unrecognizable cavernous space filled with tables as stark and bare as winter trees. Remnants of decor lay strewn across the floor, now nothing more than "mess." The most steadfast revelers straggled out, spent but not quite ready to stop. Room numbers were whispered; the celebration would continue, damn it.

The bride and groom, even more resplendent, last night, than they are when they are together on ordinary days, will head off tomorrow for a "mini-moon" to tide them over before the real deal. My youngest daughter, whose magnificent toast to her sister and her new brother-in-law made me at once smiley and weepy, will head back to school for finals. My son, the one I couldn't help but cling to the most this weekend, will head back to Japan in a few days for what will, no matter what, seem like an eternity to me until we can visit again. Everything seemed so right, having all my children with me, together, for a while. A snapshot, like the wedding itself; just a party, an event. Preceded by anticipation and worry, as perfect as a chignon while it lasts, as fleeting as the magic of a souped up hotel ballroom.

As with everything, there were some bumps, and even some minor catastrophes. There was cause for concern, yet everything seemed, at least to my naked eye, perfect. The lights are out, the guests have gone home, but this most magical night will stay with me for quite a while.

The Best Laid Plans....

There was a small pack of us, early one morning last week, commiserating about the last minute flight arrangements that had us bouncing through Cleveland on our way from Chicago to New York. The layover was brief -- too brief, even, to accommodate both a bathroom run and a pass through the Starbucks line.

We traded war stories as we waited to board, again, each of us intent upon assuring the others that we would never have endured even the minor inconvenience of this stopover by choice. My story -- though not particularly tragic in the grand scheme of things -- evoked the most sympathy. My mother had broken her hip, less than two weeks before she was to travel to Chicago for her granddaughter's wedding.

I knew something was amiss when my daughter called me, right smack in the middle of the hour and a half time frame that she, her fiance, my brother, and my mother spend almost every Sunday having dinner together. Same restaurant, same table, same orders, same waiters. Sacred time for them, time that I always -- not so secretly -- envy.

My daughter had known something was amiss when her grandmother had not yet appeared five minutes before the appointed time. Grandma fell, she told me. Her voice was calm, purposely, so I wouldn't have a heart attack. Grandma fell. Empathy eluded me. My mind went immediately beyond any thoughts of pain or breakage or the possibility that my mother, a spry 86 year old, might not walk again. I didn't even dwell on the irony of it all, the woman who has worried out loud for the past twelve months or so about falling, obsessively taking every precaution. My mind went right to the wedding, and how she had to be there.

My ex-husband and I agreed it would have made a lot more sense for her to have missed our wedding, the wedding for which she had to pull her head out of the oven to attend. The ironies are endless.

I arrived in New York committed to doing anything that had to be done to get my mother out to Chicago for her granddaughter's wedding. I sat silently as physicians and nurses and physical therapists and social workers paraded through her hospital room, waiting for them to just be quiet so I could get to the real point. The wedding, I explained to each of them. I will carry her if I have to; their job is to make sure she is medically cleared.

My mother, uniquely intuitive and surprisingly practical, knew from the moment she fell that the wedding was out of the question. She knew, also, that we would all survive her absence. As for me, well, it took some time -- a bit of convincing, a slow evolution. A tree falling noiselessly in the forest, with nobody to bear witness; could it actually happen, without my mother there in her St. John suit?

I'm okay with it now. When friends look shocked that my mom won't be there, I feel shocked that they could even think otherwise. I used to think that way, I tell them. When I was delusional and naive.

I'm getting a grip. It's all about showing up. Not just for the parties, but for the "everything else." My mom has been there for the "everything else." She has been there for the journey that began 28 years ago, when her first grandchild was born. She has been there for the journey that began more recently, when my daughter met the person she would marry. She has been there for dinner every Sunday (except for the day they got engaged, but that's another story). She has been there for all the milestones (okay, there's a story or two in there too, for another time). She may not be at the wedding, but she has always been there, and will be there as long as she is able, always showing up when it matters, even if she has to skip the occasional party.

My fellow traveler last week, when he heard my tale of woe, laughed. All of a sudden the napkins don't seem all that important, right? So true.

The Girl on the Q Train

Newkirk Plaza. The bank where my mom opened my first savings account is still there, with a different name. I remember the blue passbook, with all its empty pages, waiting to be filled. I remember her telling me that interest was compounded daily, and I remember having no clue what that meant. I’m still that way about money.

It was weird, taking the brand new Q train from the Upper East Side of Manhattan to Newkirk Plaza in Brooklyn. A “plaza” that hardly resembles what most of us would expect a plaza to look like, no bustling open space surrounded by cafes and upscale stores. Even the term “brand new” in New York can be misleading, conjuring up, as it does, images of gleaming perfection. The Q train is nice enough; the seats are not yet cracked, and graffiti is minimal. Occasionally — very occasionally — it pulls into a bright and architecturally modern station that has not yet been permeated by the stench of petrified urine.

It was weird for a lot of reasons, this voyage down memory subway tracks. I left my mother in a hospital room in an upscale neighborhood that always seemed more suited to her than the gritty streets of Brooklyn where, despite her incongruous designer wardrobe, she has always felt so at home. I travelled, alone, lost in my thoughts, back to the place where I grew up, where foreign lettering on awnings lining potholed commercial thoroughfares are the roadmap through a rambling mosaic of ethic enclaves. I am flooded by memories at both ends of the Q line. More visits than I care to count to world renowned medical complexes on the north end, my childhood to the south, and everywhere in between.

The old bank. My elementary school, still surrounded by a concrete schoolyard enclosed by a chain link fence. The apartment building on Foster Avenue where I would meet my friend Miriam on the way to school, where her mother always made the most exotic treats. The curb outside where I once saw a dead cat, flattened by a car. The Bohack store where my friend Eileen and I used to go get giant pickles for a nickel from the pickle jars — half sour for her, sour for me. Bohack is long gone. Now it is a sprawling Jewish school.

It was weird, as I turned the key to enter the apartment where I grew up, knowing that nobody would be greeting me on the other side. The day my father died there, I remember how empty it felt. I had just seen him there, that morning. At least my mother was there to greet me then. This time, nobody.

I was collecting her things for her, for what will hopefully be a brief rehabilitation for a broken hip. I was in a hurry to get back to the Q train, but I had an irrepressible urge to spend some time, to look at all the albums and the pictures. To inspect the neatly aligned contents of my mother’s refrigerator, to poke around in the closets where a few keepsakes remain — from my own childhood and from my children’s visits. A party favor from my Sweet Sixteen; an almost full box of Lincoln Logs, reminding me of all the times my father sat on the floor with my kids, building.

For years, I have encouraged my mother to move to Manhattan. Where the restaurants are. Where the stores are. Where, in her designer outfits, she blends. But on this visit to the old neighborhood, and the old apartment, by myself, I felt a sense of relief that she has stayed. It’s a vestige, all this stuff, but it’s my vestige.

I glanced at her nightstand before I left. We are reading the same book: The Girl on the Train.

The Penis Parade

Everybody loves a parade. I still remember the time I attended the St. Patrick's Day parade in New Orleans with my two daughters. You don't have to be Irish to get caught up in the revelry, snatching beads out of the air while we dodged whole cabbages being hurled from floats like missiles.

Missiles. There was no kimchi flying into the cheering crowd during the parade in North Korea the other day, no necks laden with beads. But that didn't appear to dampen the enthusiasm of the crowd. It's a matter of taste, I suppose, but some folks just get off on a march of missiles, some encased in outsized camouflage canisters, some emblazoned with ominous black lettering. Yes, I know that a cigar is, sometimes, just a cigar. But I cannot help but think this is just a high stakes sword fight, frat boy style. There's no morning after, for these two, though; no pounding headache tinged with regret. There is no break in the whipping out, just to see whose is bigger.

It's become a bit surreal, this post-November 8, 2016 world. It's a world in which once rational people can now feel an inexplicable loathing for the Easter Bunny. Ironic, that our bumbling and ignorant White House press secretary has Easter Bunny on his resume. Actually, it makes a lot of sense that his career would have included a position that involved neither speech nor thought. Pity that he somehow made it out of that rabbit hole into this one.

But here we are, applauding all the penis waving while we have absolutely no idea what either one of these poor excuses for humans (much less leaders) will do next, and neither one cares what anyone thinks as long as they can enjoy some eye popping applause. The "wow" factor -- it's intoxicating. There is little incentive for either one of them to keep it in their pants.

But at least we are pivoting toward normalcy. The White House Easter Egg Roll must go on, and Melania will slum it at the White House tomorrow. A big test for our new first frau, as she tries to exude warm and fuzzy while her stilettos get stuck in the mud. Steve Bannon may have been silenced in recent days, but there's no reason to think he won't be unmasked as the new mascot. Note to Jewish kids: skip the Egg Hunt this year. And careful when you leave, guys; they hired Wile Coyote to stuff the goody bags, and you know how he gets when he smells bunny.

Where do we go from here? Just hope they don' mess with the Tooth Fairy.  

Why on this Night?

Passover seders can be tedious, so I am careful to attend only those conducted by like-minded folks who recite ancient words with a touch of cynicism and focus instead with the utmost orthodoxy on the more important rituals of food and drink.

Every year, for as long as I can remember, I have attended a seder at an old friend's house in Deerfield, where I raised my children. Other invitees come and go, but I have become a constant, along with a rotating assortment of my own family members. This year, our numbers were particularly small, but, as always, the gefilte fish was delicious and the pinot noir (no Manischewitz in sighti) was plentiful. And, as always, I gorged myself on my friend's butter soaked lemon chicken, picking at the leftovers in the kitchen while the others salivated over Grandma Cissy's homemade "I can't believe these are kosher-for- Passover" desserts.

Rituals keep us grounded, even when there are more than a fair share of absentees. Only one of our six children was present, with the others scattered, literally, across the globe. It was all right though; that one representative was enough to conjure up several lifetimes of shared history, to repeat the same ridiculous stories and still find them funny, to maintain sufficient irreverence and disruption to keep us from getting too wrapped up in the grave meaning of the holiday.

This year, we paused for a new ritual. The rain delay at Wrigley Field proved auspicious; between the meal and the closing prayers, we sat and watched the Cubs raise their World Series Championship flag. Fitting, really, on the night of the first seder, to celebrate the triumphant end to such a long and arduous journey. It was odd, watching these giddy young men, most of them younger than at least two of my own children, celebrate what so randomly binds them together and to us. A new ritual for so many of us to share, conjuring up collective images of ancient agony and joy, hope and despair. It was hard not to get caught up in it — unless you happened to be playing for the other team on this particular opening night.

It’s hard for me not to get caught up in Passover, no matter how irreverent I think I am. Cops directing traffic outside the local grocery store; an odd influx of Jews into the local liquor store; bumper to bumper traffic on roads that connect pockets of Jewish suburbs. My favorite lemon chicken, and an odd ritual meal that always seems to include at least a handful of Gentiles. Shared beginnings, and shared history. Even with a diminished crowd, our universe expands.

Message in a Tomahawk

Somebody asked me what I thought about the tomahawk attack on a Syrian airbase. What is there to think? Nobody thought much about it beforehand, and there is no indication that it accomplished anything substantial -- either positive or negative.

The dogs and ponies have put on a show, and I can't help but imagine 45, adrenaline coursing through his aging body as if he were a seven year old boy (no offense to seven year old boys), watching the footage from a sand bunker at Mar-a-lago and barely able to contain his testosterone rush. POW! BAM! KABOOM! Small hands notwithstanding, he is still the all powerful one, the one with all the little buttons at his fingertips.

There's no denying the good optics. The brutal slaughter of babies replaced by exploding rockets. Oh say can you see, Mr. President? When television news becomes better than a video game, 45 is engaged. Energized. Empowered. Better than a good pussy grab, though that would certainly have capped off his evening.

Ahh. We are sending messages. To Syria, though it is unclear what the message is, and to whom it is directed. To Russia, that our love is not unconditional. To our broken Congress, where, if at first you don't succeed, change the rules. Next time I lose in Words with Friends and the app offers up a "rematch," I will decline and seek the rule-change option. No more seven letter words. All triple-word spaces belong to me. POW! BAM! KABOOM!

Nobody can please everybody all of the time, but 45 has mastered the art of changing the conversation, at least for a moment long enough to cause collective amnesia and bring on a bunch of approving nods. Killing babies is bad. Punishment must be swift and obvious. Nobody thought much about the end game when rampant anti-Hillaryism helped install a bombastic, uninformed, erratic man-child into the White House. And, clearly, nobody gave much thought to the end game of launching all those tomahawks. We the people find it hard to resist the immediate gratification of a  not-so-cheap cheap thrill.

What do I think? Why should I be the one who has to think?

The Gilded Standard

A law school classmate (okay, I think he eventually became my husband, and then my ex-husband) once attributed our collective tendency toward lackluster academic performance to the statistical theory of regression toward the mean.  Our self-deprecation became not only amusing but justified. An inevitable gravitation toward average -- to fight it would be pointless. 

Years later, I still lament my lifelong failure to live up to the potential that may have been bestowed upon me by my DNA, but I take comfort in the notion that "the mean" exercises its gravitational pull from both directions. For all I know, I have vastly overachieved. There are worse things than being average. 

Which means, I suppose, I should stop being offended about the low bar that has been set for our 45th president; after all, why hold him to a standard that would be unattainable by even the best among us? Fair enough. 

It's different though. The bar has been set so low for 45 that even an insect would have a hard time limbo-ing beneath it. He stuck to a script with only a few inane ad libs. So presidential. Footage of children writhing in agony before succumbing to death in their parent's arms had an impact on him. Such presidential compassion. Tomahawks launched, only a day or two after he initially reacted to the carnage in Syria by blaming his predecessor and revisiting his electoral win. So presidentially decisive. 

We are living in the new gilded age of paper thin gold plate, and we have become content to allow even the most minute glimmer of normalcy to gloss over the rotting insanity that lies beneath. We live in a world where seemingly intelligent people have suggested everything might be all right if he just stops tweeting. Yes, we are all, collectively, regressing toward the mean. 

But for 45, the mean would be a good thing, and still appears to be an insurmountable climb.