Ghosts of Christmas Past, Redux

It seemed clever but familiar to me, to call this post something like "Ghosts of Christmas Past." I was correct, at least about the familiar piece. Seven years ago, a year before my divorce, but my second year back into the world of Jewish Christmas, I used that exact title. I was still getting accustomed to the notion that I was no longer a part of something.

I suppose you never really get accustomed to not being a part of something when you were once a part of it, even when it's just a small something that comes and goes quickly, once a year. When I was little, my father used to drive us by the single block on Ocean Avenue (not to be confused with Ocean Parkway, my street) where a row of large single family homes (unusual in and of itself on a main drag in Brooklyn) was lit up like, well, a Christmas tree. An essential part of our holiday tradition, I suppose, along with Chinese food and a movie. In my mind, those houses are still lit up, the same families still inside.

Back in those days, it seemed that very little was expected of me except that I go to an Ivy League school and one day marry a Jew. In that order. It seemed reasonable, just as it seemed reasonable that I would have the attention span or the drive to meet my own expectations of myself and eventually go to medical school and become a doctor and go into practice somewhere on Park Avenue with my brother, who really would have liked to be an architect but there is, after all, a hierarchy of expectations and some are simply not optional.  He is a doctor.

So I married a Gentile, which never struck me as a viable option but somehow I got away with it and my mother eventually pulled her head out of the oven, if only because grandchildren (Jewish grandchildren, to boot) are irresistible. I had always known that the world wasn't really like where I grew up, where my father had to put us in the car and drive for 15 minutes so we could see a bunch of houses lit up like Christmas trees. But becoming a part of that world, that was different.

I enjoyed my years of celebrating Christmas, even the years when I would trudge off to Midnight Mass with my in-laws and choke on the incense and feel a little out of place when everybody was kneeling (I thought those things were foot rests). I liked being a part of their holiday, and the music was so pretty. I liked the last minute Christmas Eve day shopping. I liked ripping open presents I didn't need, and watching my kids do the same. I liked the smell of bacon frying in the morning, loved the taste even more. I liked my runs through the snowy and eerily quiet neighborhood. I liked sitting around in a food coma watching an endless loop of "A Christmas Story," the movie that has forever saved me from the agonizing pain of licking an icy cold flagpole.

It's been almost a decade since I was a part of Christmas, and a lifetime since I marveled at the lit up houses. The ghosts of all of it haunt me but still make me smile, as I struggle to create future ghosts.

A Wandering Jew

As a traveler, a friend told me recently, I could be described as a flaneuse. Everything sounds better in French, and this is no exception. Flaneuse makes me sound far less haphazard than, say, aimless wanderer. It's "a thing," flaneuse. "Un chose." A meanderer with a purpose.

In travel, as in life, I have always been content to let others do the meticulous planning, perfectly happy to stumble around without an itinerary. I have been known to wile away the endless hours on a plane ride home poring through tour books, reading about what I have already seen. It may seem ass backwards to some, but I love the "eureka" moments. Ah yes, I've been there. Now the sights have  context, and the memory seems richer. If I am lucky enough to revisit, even better.

A few months ago, I traveled to Japan, for the fifth time. My friend, Ellen, came with me, well warned that, despite the long journey, my visit was more about spending time with my son than sightseeing. Tokyo was out of the question for our brief stay, but I guaranteed plenty of wandering and a smorgasbord of shrines and some good eats in Kyoto and Kobe.  Ellen is the opposite of a flaneuse; she researches beforehand. We walked together, the accidental and the purposeful tourist, through a Kobe neighborhood where I had wandered countless times. I had never known about the Jewish temple sitting so comfortably within the Japanese cityscape. Were it not for Ellen's research, I would never have experienced the odd sensation of standing before a bima flanked by a Japanese flag on one side and an Israeli flag on the other. Flaneusing isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Since that visit, thanks to my son, I have learned a little more about Jews and Japan and, I suppose, wanderings. He had just traveled to a small port town, Tsuraga, where there is a museum commemorating the arrival of thousands of Jews escaping the Nazis in 1939. They arrived there, after an arduous journey from Lithuania through Siberia, thanks to a largely unsung Japanese hero who defied orders and hand-wrote thousands of visas. They arrived there, entire families, hungry and filthy, and ethnically different from the towns' residents, and they were taken in. Their caravan was the Trans-Siberian railroad and then a boat. There were no walls. Nobody told them they should not have risked their childrens' lives to make the journey. Thousands of Jews are alive today, thanks to the humanity of one man and the people of a small port town.

Another friend is heading to Japan tomorrow with her family. Everything has been mapped out, and she just called to see if I had any last minute tips. What to wear, what to see, whether to bring an adaptor. I told her to just enjoy the sights and sounds, take it all in without sweating the details. To be a flaneuse. But I also told her about Tsuraga, a town I have never seen, would not have heard about had it not been for my son's curiosity. Flaneusing aside, I will just have to stumble over there,  accidentally on purpose, the next time I go.

Another Thanksgiving, Another Pound (or two) of Flesh

It's become so familiar it's impossible to imagine Thanksgiving without it. The New England-y inn with the Christmas tree all set up, twinkling boughs of holly lining the staircase,  extended families taking photographs in front of the fireplace, while their clothes still fit. The long anticipated prelude to the long anticipated day of stuffing ourselves silly.

At my cousins' house, we have heated debates over baked brie and crudites and pigs in blankets. Smoked turkey or fried? Whom does the newest baby resemble? (She is the only one in the room who can carry off a bald head and a double chin.) Is it appropriate to laugh when a two year old slips, mid-tantrum, in the puddle emanating from his own juice box? I anticipate and fend off the questions about my dating life the way my youngest daughter used to with questions about where she wanted to go to college. Is there a man in your life? No. What happened to. . . ? Gone. I thought you. . . . Once. No more. Never. Have I shown you a picture of my dog? 

The turkey hangover hits almost immediately, followed closely by the sharp pains and the bloat. After decades of the same routine, we have an epiphany. Next year, we will wear sweats.

In the New England-y inn the next morning, the extended families filter into the lobby again, far more interested in coffee than photographs. Everybody seems a bit more subdued as they sink into the chairs, recovering. I marvel at the ones who can eat the apple donuts and the other sugary treats. My jeans barely have room to accommodate my desperate gulps of caffeine.

Eventually, we disperse in a thousand different directions, vowing to never eat again, exhausted, but surprised, somehow, at how quickly it all seems to pass. Relief tinged with regret. Wondering how we can all do this year after year, wondering how we could not.

Back in Brooklyn, Through the Lens of History

As I remember it, my mother's uncle, aunt, and young cousin all perished in concentration camps. I remember it mostly because the young cousin -- whose name I may have once known, but have forgotten  -- was my mother's age, and looked just like her. It always made me think about how random life is, how being born in one place as opposed to another can be a matter of life and death.

My parents were both born here, in America, and their parents were all here long before Hitler marched through their homelands to exterminate all the Jews, having escaped hatreds of an earlier time. I grew up far removed from any first hand narratives, two generations away from anybody who actually bore witness. I have friends who, unlike me, are first generation Americans. Some know their family histories in intimate detail, from their parents. Some know little more than I do, because their parents had tucked the horrors of their childhoods neatly away; it was the only way they could move forward.

Even first hand recollections, whether told or buried, can become fuzzy, as fuzzy as the fraying photographs I've been sifting through all morning. But time (if you're lucky enough to have it) keeps the essential details in tact. Not so with re-tellings. Maybe it's human nature to revise, on purpose, or maybe it's just the way our brains work, to protect us. My son has become curious, as he always has been about all sorts of history. The stories we have been told, we realize, do not exactly match.

My mother joined me on the floor by her father's old desk, where the old photographs have been stowed, helped me to identify the people I never knew. My own grandfather, his parents, my grandmother's parents. Some I could recognize from memory, even though they were gone by the time I came around. All these people, who helped shape the ones who shaped my mother who, for better or worse, helped shape me. I want so much to know what they were like; I wonder what they would think of us, of me, the way we all turned out. I wonder what they could tell me about life when people like us were hunted down like vermin, when anti-Semitism drove the fortunate ones across a vast ocean, to start over again in a strange place, a place where they would always be safe. Where the ones who were here, in the late 1930's and early 1940's, never really grasped what was going on over there. How could they?

My mother is certain, now, that my grandfather's brother sent his wife and his little girl to Sweden, while he stayed behind in Warsaw. She is certain, because she remembers when the letter arrived, that her uncle was killed in a camp. She is uncertain about what happened to her aunt and her cousin. My guess is, and my recollection is, they did not survive. Otherwise, we would know. My son is curious, and so am I.

It was mostly pictures, in my grandfather's old desk, but I also found my nana's glasses, and a change purse she carried, filled with coins and a "Chai" key chain. Life. I am taking the small artifacts home with me. The lenses in the glasses are too powerful, and the frame, on one side, is cracked. I will put my own lenses in, fix the crack, and keep searching.

City of Brotherly and Sisterly Love

I haven't been to Philadelphia since the spring of 1976, when I had thought I was going to college there. That was before I changed my mind -- or, more accurately, my mind was changed for me -- and I ended up, somehow, in the wilds of upstate New York. I've always thought the decision was a bad one, but one I would never change. Everything about my life would have been different, and there are certain things -- three living breathing things in particular -- I could never pass up. Not for all the brotherly love in the world. 

More than forty years later, here I am, somewhere along the fabled Main Line, sleeping in a room filled with the vestiges of young girlhood while its permanent inhabitant finds her wings in New York City. I feel as if I have gotten to know her better, from the collage of pictures on her walls, the lotions and such in her bathroom, the bundles of hair ties hanging from a hook on the wall. I moved her well worn stuffed animals off the bed, but the Siberian cat has sought me out, draping herself over me for two nights in a row. Her purring is a comfort. Suddenly, I think I like cats. 

I am here mostly on the way to somewhere else. My friend's sister hosted a fundraiser in honor of my friend's son, now gone almost three years. I was surprised at how much at home I felt here, among all these people from another place, people I had never met. Many of them had heard stories about me -- the friend's sister's friend -- though I could not imagine why. The friends of my friend's sister are warm and boisterous and generous. I tried my best to remember all the names, knowing full well they all had a slight advantage, having only to remember one. I flubbed several, but nobody cared. 

My friend had to speak, and she was nervous. Not just because she had to speak in front of so many people, but because she had to speak about why she was there, about why they were donating money and, hopefully, time, for a cause in her son's name. Just talk about Adam, I told her. The rest will come. 

It was mesmerizing, not just for me, but for all of us. It's not easy listening to somebody who has suffered the unimaginable, who inhabits a place nobody should have to inhabit. My friend will mention Adam, in passing sometimes, or when we reminisce about something funny. But here she was, explaining who Adam was, to this group of people who never knew him, to me, to her sister, to her brother-in-law, to Adam's own grandmother. To herself. She brought him to life, again. 

In Philly, this week, more than four decades since my last visit, when I had no idea who I was or where I'd be or how three children, one day, would teach me how to love in a way I had never known, I was re-introduced to a place. To a young girl who grew up here. To cats. To my friend's family. To my friend, who lit up in a way I'd never seen her light up, and who lit up a room full of strangers who are no longer strangers. And I was re-introduced to Adam, who still has many secrets to reveal.

Falling Back, Stumbling Forward

For some people, the end of daylight savings time means an extra hour of sleep. For me it means staring at the ceiling, wide awake, waiting an extra hour for Starbucks to open.

As if to herald the coming darkness, my backyard was strewn with leaves this morning, leaves that only yesterday were on the trees. I turned on the television, though, and nothing had changed. The polls say blue, the polls say red, depending on whom you ask. Even if you don't ask. I opted for tennis. Nothing new there, either, except Federer and Djokovich are far easier on the eye than your average politician or pundit.

Speaking of darkness... I admit I've been worried about the upcoming election.  Not just about the real possibility of the House staying red, but about the equally real possibility that it will go blue. What if it goes blue, but the dysfunction remains the same? Reading my mind, I think, a Starbucks buddy informed me that you don't have to be a member of the House to be Speaker of the House. I was skeptical, especially when he told me he remembered learning it in college. He's even older than I am, and I remember nothing.

It's true, though. We verified it on his phone. My buddy planted a happy thought in my head on this gray November morning, the idea that there is an infinite pool of candidates for the job. Hmmm. Obama? Biden? Oprah? One of my really smart friends? A girl can dream, can't she?

Come to think of it, I do remember something from school, back in the day. Pyrrhic victory. A victory that inflicts such a devastating toll on the victor that it is tantamount to defeat. It was my fear for Hillary, and it's reared its dark head, again. Especially these days, when politics has become less about doing good than about pointing fingers. Especially these days, when things seem so broken it would take a miracle to fix them. Mere mortals would fail. Average politicians will fare far worse.

Back to the leaves. They had fallen, but they were still bright and colorful, not yet crunchy enough to disintegrate beneath my feet. And I can still occasionally remember something I learned in school, even if it's useless. There's hope.

Coming to the Table

On my way to meet my Republican friend for a drink, I voted. My guess is we have cancelled each other out, and we could just have easily agreed to both not vote, saved each other the trouble.At least I wouldn't still be trying to peel the last layer of my "I voted" sticker off my suede jacket.

We dabbled in the obligatory pleasantries at first -- our kids, work, our travels, my failed attempts at dating and the sad truth that single men my age tend to have their hearts (or whatevers) set on thirty-somethings. So much for my fabulous personality.

Then we got into it, the whole Trump thing. The great divide, the stereotypes and the mutual disdain that has us retreating into our corners, like mortal enemies. He is able to divide Trump into two separate people -- one, the vile, indecent, grossly unqualified person who is our president, the other, the guy who's keeping the economy booming and our taxes down. At least for now. I cannot separate the two; sure, I wouldn't mind being a little bit richer, but the price is too high. My friend made a good point; Trump did not invent racism, and xenophobia, and automatic weapons. True. But he has turned over the rocks, trafficked in hatred, legitimized the most base instincts of the worst among us and given them sunlight. It is unseemly, to say the least, for the leader of the free world to behave as he does.

My friend has grown tired of being viewed as stupid because he's not offended enough by the "person" half to budge on the economics. I've grown tired of the absurdity of it all, that all intelligent conversation is eclipsed by the antics of this one, larger than life buffoon.

We found common ground on so many things, my Republican friend and I. We tossed around names of possible future presidents, and we agreed on most. He admitted he would vote for a moderate Democrat. I admitted I would vote for a moderate Republican (maybe). We are searching for that elusive middle, that space where compromise is not a dirty word and consensus is the only way we can accomplish what's best for most.

Our conversation gave me hope. About democracy anyway. Single men my age will always chase thirty-somethings, no matter who's in power. Which will free me up, sometimes, to take a Republican to lunch.

Coming From A Long Way Away

Finally, yesterday, I saw Come From Away, the brilliant Broadway musical about the unlikely collision of cultures in Gander, Newfoundland, on 9/11.

The moment the cast appeared on stage, I felt my hands clenching, the memories of that day flooding back. On my left sat my daughter, Nicki. She was five years old then, sitting with me in the kitchen as I watched one plane hit, then another, while I talked on the phone to my brother in New York. In New York, a doctor at St. Vincent's Hospital, only blocks away from the scene. The hospital where they waited, and waited, for the injured, as if mere injury were a possibility. They had been ushered away from the windows, and it was up to me to give him the play by play. I remained glued to the television for days, until Nicki asked why does this keep happening? I was still trying to understand why it happened even once, why the twin towers I had watched go up over a number of years had evaporated in what seemed to be a split second. 

On my right sat my mother. My 87 year old mother, who is virtually deaf, but loves going to the theatre and, though she cannot hear, reads voraciously beforehand and knows exactly what it is about. She was in New York that day, too. New York, her home. Though she still had her hearing, back then, she was out of earshot when it happened, somewhere on the subway -- by my calculation very near the World Trade Center -- on her way north to a museum. She emerged from the subway, several miles away, to a stunned and eerily quiet city, smoke billowing in the distance where buildings used to be. My brother and I were frantic, for a while, trying to reach her. It hadn't occurred to her to turn on her cell phone, and even if she had, service was spotty at best. Interrupted. 

A musical. About my youngest daughter's first real memory of life outside her own childhood. About the day my brother remained quarantined within his hospital's walls, awaiting patients who never arrived. About the day my mother, against all odds unless you know my mother, somehow made it across the river, home to Brooklyn, while the tip of Manhattan smoldered. About the day I lost my innocence. Or my ignorance, I suppose. A musical, of all things. 

A musical about the worst day. About the day when folks in a town in the middle of nowhere and the "plane people," the thousands of passengers on planes that did not blow up that day, collided. A day when people sprang into action and gave everything they could to welcome these unwitting victims, imperfect strangers. The plane people all came from somewhere else, from away, places where the locals had never been. By the end, there was no such thing as "away." Everything had changed, and nothing, no place, would ever seem the same. There was much good that arose from the ashes that day, and in the days and weeks that followed. This story was just one of many. 

My hands eventually unclenched. I could see that Nicki felt as uncomfortable, at first, as I did, laughing. We were both spent, by the end, from crying and laughing, as we rose with everyone else to cheer the cast and the musicians who had helped us to remember so much of what we often forget, from so many years away. 

Two Mothers, Journeying

We landed in Japan only (only!) eighteen hours after we left Chicago, but the better part of two full days had disappeared. It never ceases to be disorienting, this jump in days that happens somewhere over the Pacific.

It's my fifth trip here, and my friend's first. I assured her it was no big deal, getting around in a country where nobody looks the way you do, nobody speaks your language, and they don't make shoes large enough to fit your feet. I was lying -- not about the shoes, but about the no big deal part --but she knows that. 

Thankfully, Matt, my son, was with us to help work out the minor snafu with hotel bookings. Otherwise, my friend and I would probably still be growling silently at each other while we both stared helplessly at the hotel clerk, who stared back at us as if we were from another planet. With good reason; it can certainly seem that way sometimes, here. 

Today, we are on our own, while Matt is at work. I am the seasoned one, perfectly capable -- theoretically -- of getting us from Sannomiya to Shin Kobe to take the Shinkansen to Kyoto. She is still struggling with pronunciation, and I am guessing they all pretty much sound the same. I'm feeling a bit pressured, without my translator. I have grown accustomed to relying on Matt to point me in the right direction here, even tell me when and at how steep an angle I should bow. I am looking forward to dinner, when I can once again settle into my incompetency while he takes charge. 

It is difficult, sometimes, having a child live so far away. Even when he is twenty-eight years old, and would no doubt be spending little time with me if he lived closer. He is busy figuring out his life, wherever it takes him. As is the case with all three of my children, I simply love being in their presence, breathing the same air. I love listening to them, and watching them. I love imagining them when they were little, and marveling at the people they have become. 

I know how much of a luxury it is, for me, and for anybody who can do this, even if it's only a few times a year, at most. My friend and I raised our kids together, and we share a lot of the same memories. I can still imagine her sons when they were little, and she can do the same with my kids. She has lost one of her sons, and, almost three years later, here, on the other side of the world, visiting Matt with her, I imagine the bittersweet dissonance of fond memories and painful "what ifs." 

The best I can do, for my friend, is navigate the rails today, get us to Kyoto in good order, and back to Kobe in time for dinner with Matt. To eat some good food and drink some good wine, to get lost in our shared memories of all our children. To be in the presence of this tall, thin young man, the once chubby-cheeked boy, and marvel together as Matt inhabits a part of the world that neither of us can fully comprehend. 

Plastic Beach Boats and Stoops in Brooklyn

U.S. Negroes are Americans.

The headline jumped out at me as I flipped through the ancient issue of Life Magazine, removed from its cellophane envelope for the first time since I brought it home from Paris two years ago. It has sat on my bedroom dresser since then, under a pile of this and that, its silver stripe peeking out as an occasional reminder that I have yet to give it to my son the next time I see him. Even so, I have forgotten, several times.

When I slid it out of its packaging, I was surprised at how delicate it seemed, afraid the pages might disintegrate in my fingers. It was from the summer of 1949. I tried to remember why I had bought it, why I wanted to give it to my son. There is a picture of a woman standing in the surf, leaning on what looks to be a blow up raft, the kind you can pick up anywhere, really.  The kind we toss away carelessly at the pool when our vacations end, either because they seem kind of pointless or maybe because deflating them is too depressing, when you're already feeling deflated.

Plastic beach boats read the caption. For the first time, it occurred to me that these didn't always exist. Post-war America was filled with new inventions, I suppose, logical accompaniments for the growing landscape of suburban tract houses and white picket fences and folks re-acclimating themselves to leisure time. By the time I was born, ten years later, plastic beach boats were old news.
Maybe I thought my son would be interested in this little snippet of history, and maybe that's why I decided to buy it for him at the flea market somewhere in Paris.

It had  never even occurred to me to look inside. The headline was jarring -- U.S. Negroes are Americans. It seemed as odd to me as a cover caption about a plastic beach boat, as if it were newsworthy.

On the opposite page was a picture of Jackie Robinson and his young family, on the stoop of their home in Brooklyn. The quote was his, a polite response to being hauled before Congress to explain why Negroes are not Communists, at least not all of them, just because one Negro claimed that no Negro would fight for America in a war against Russia. Nineteen forty-nine, only ten years before I was born. Sometimes I forget that progress takes time and a lot of hard work, and a lot of backsliding. And heroes and leaders from the most unlikely places. Like an ordinary stoop in Brooklyn.

Fast forward almost three quarters of a century. I am flying somewhere over Montana, connected to earth by some invisible transmitters, on my way to Japan, I cannot believe there was a time when I couldn't do this; when I couldn't charge my cell phone in flight; when I couldn't take my phone out of the house. Technology never ceases to amaze.

I cannot believe there was a time when there had to be an article explaining that Negroes are Americans, or that a gifted athlete without a bully pulpit (other than a stoop in Brooklyn) would have to say this:

And one other thing the American public ought to understand, if we are to make progress in this matter, is the fact that because it is a Communist who denounces injustice in the courts, police brutality and lynching, when it happens, doesn't change the truth of [the] charges. 

Who knew folks could be so backward back then, that the inherent wrongness of racial profiling and stereotyping and discrimination had to be explained. Phew, glad that's all settled. The unlikely hero continued:

[The] American public is off on the wrong foot when it begins to think of radicalism in terms of any special minority group. 

Yes, the wrong foot. Seventy years later, we've come a long way. At least from plastic beach boats.

Curing Hiccups

If I could only teach my dog to stand behind me and rub my earlobes while I drink water when I get a chronic case of hiccups, I'd be perfectly content living alone. 

I thought about this last night, as I curled up on the couch with Eli for a marathon MSNBC hand wringing session on the huge flat screen TV I bought a few years ago so the guy I was dating could watch sports or other crazy shit when he came over. I remember wondering how somebody could stay so happily glued to the television, waiting for something interesting to happen. These days, I'm happy I don't have to compromise.

Even Eli rolls his eyes at me. He sighs audibly as I perk up each time "Breaking News" flashes across the screen, knowing full well it's the same stuff that keeps on breaking. He got to me yesterday, so I decided to flip to something different, something light and refreshing. Madame Secretary. Guest starring Hillary Clinton, Colin Powell, and Madeleine Albright. Sprinkled with some white nationalism and nuclear threats and a whole bunch of women's issues and, of course, faint glimmers of hope that decency will prevail and we will all live happily ever after. Well done, at once uplifting and depressing. 

I felt wistful. Sort of the way I felt when I watched my friend rub her husband's earlobes the other day while he drank water to quash his hiccups. I'd be perfectly content, if only I knew this thing we are witnessing every day were nothing more than a hiccup. 

What struck me most about the episode -- which ended with an inspiring speech warning of the difference between nationalism and patriotism -- was the woman piece. There's the obvious one, of course -- Tea Leoni's character:  beautiful, brilliant, ambitious, powerful, and married to a fabulously handsome and brilliant and sensitive man (that's just not fair). And there were the more subtle ones, about how we all wrestle with our inner contradictions and try to define ourselves in a world so filled with possibilities and barriers. I loved the mix of tension and comprehension between a very young woman and a much older woman, how the accidents of birth and moments in history and and the passage of time put our dreams and ambitions on a rocky continuum. I loved Tea Leoni's confusion, how her competency at work dissolved into blithering idiocy when her daughter lay in a hospital bed, how this superstar on the grand stage could come up with nothing better than more pillows for her immobilized child. 

It made me think about all the twists and turns in my own life -- blissfully less extreme -- and how dangerous it is to think about us women as one monolithic group. At worst, as victims, or an angry mob. At best, as a threat to the old guard, those women who don't shut up, who refuse to know their place. 

We have our struggles, but, like everybody else, we persist the best we can. Must persist, really, no matter where we end up on our own continuum of dreams, if we are to get rid of this hiccup. 

Dialogue vs. Demagogues

This is not about democrats versus republicans. This about democracy and the republic. Enough already.

An old friend commented on my last blog. Right after the 2016 election, when I was loudly wondering, on Facebook, how we had somehow elevated the personification of indecency to the presidency, he had been suggesting -- equally loudly -- that we sore losers stop whining. We both, I am guessing, wondered how we had ever been friends. Our dialogue, last night, based upon his comment, reflects the deep divide, but at least it was civil.

I am over Trump. Not over my firmly held belief that he is an unprincipled conman who cares about nobody but himself (and maybe Ivanka and Don Junior), but over my once irrepressible urge to express exasperation at his vile insults and grossly uncivilized behavior. He is just the flame, the shiny object, the thing that captures our attention while everyone chokes on the smoke. What we don't see -- and what we need to pay more attention to -- is the stuff that fans the flame, the oxygen that fuels the disaster.

The oxygen is everywhere. In the media, both liberal and conservative. When I watch the rare press conference, watch the president or Sarah lie and insult and shut down questioners, I silently implore the journalists to either call them out or walk out. The calling out comes later, when everybody goes back to their ideological cable camps and preaches to their own choir. The walking out never happens. I wish it would. I wish the media would stop covering Trump rallies. I wish they would stop giving air time to his vile tweets.

But how do we stop the oxygen that has revealed itself so starkly in the last few weeks in the United States Senate? Peaceful protest, the thing that defines democracy more than anything, is referred to by the majority leader and his buddies as "mob rule." When asked whether he believed that George Soros (and maybe other wealthy Jewish liberal philantropists?) were paying the Kavanaugh protesters, Chuck Grassley said "I have heard so many people believe that. I tend to believe it." I tend to believe it. Now there's a standard. Just like he tended to believe Kavanaugh was truthful in denying anything that might make him look bad, even when his bad behavior was on full display, in real time. Mitch McConnell persists in referring, from his bully pulpit, to the Democrats as if they are our country's mortal enemies. He talks about how he observes the rules, which I suppose is true, since he has the power to change them, and does, as he sees fit. I listened as Republican after Republican uttered the absurd talking point, about Kavanaugh's accuser, that they believe she is credible because they believe she truly believes that she is telling the truth. What? Is there anything more insulting? More demeaning and patronizing, to say about a woman who has risked everything to come forward? Don't even get me started on Lindsay.

I see no righteousness in any of this, yet there are people out there, old friends even, who disagree. We dig in our heels, and we have grown to view each other with distrust and disdain. We have, somehow, forgotten that it is okay to disagree, and, I believe, it is because we have given oxygen to the loudest and most powerful purveyors of divisiveness. Mitch and Chuck and their ilk still invoke the Clinton name as a last resort to fan the flames, the tried and true dog whistle for the haters. Kavanaugh did the same. What about Bill? What about Hillary?

What about what's happening right now, before our eyes. Americans versus Americans, when we should really be worrying about common enemies, about bigger issues that affect us all. I welcome the dialogue with my old friend, and anybody else, even the ones who call be a snowflake. I think it's our only hope.

The Rape of Lady Justice

A Republican friend thrust his phone at me this morning so I could read about what an asshole Obama was as a teenager. They don't publish those kinds of "truths" in my newspapers, certainly don't discuss those kinds of things on my cable news shows. (I cut this particular Republican some slack, because he refers to me as "nice, for a flaming liberal," even though I am neither.)

The truth, my only truth, I suppose, is that I don't really care how much of an asshole Obama was when he was a teenager. If you're going to be an asshole, the teenage years are certainly a good time for it. Life is a series of trade-offs, I think. What we lose in skin elasticity we gain, theoretically, in the wisdom of age. Theoretically. And possibly some measure of generosity and a modicum of good judgment and even  a small dose of sobriety -- within reason -- that just isn't all that cool when you're 17.

The year I turned 50, I began to reconnect with some old friends from high school. Facebook was being hijacked by folks my age, and the half-century milestone seemed to spur us on. I thought it was pretty cool, even though my kids did not. (They mocked me because one time -- seriously, ONE TIME! -- I mistakenly referred to it as "The Facebook.") Eventually, the kids moved on to more hip things like Snapchat and Instagram ("the Instagram"?) and let us have our old-fashioned cyber fun. Those were heady times, reconnecting with people who had been so much a part of my daily life so long ago, people I had not seen, sometimes not even thought about, for over 30 years. My friend list grew; for the first time in my life, I was impressed with my social life.

Fast forward nine years. We are knocking on the door of 60 now, and we are older than our parents were when we knew each other.  Yikes. One of my old friends sent me a message the other day. I knew him when we were 17, but only to the extent we can know anybody when we are 17. I know him at 59, but only to the extent you can know a person from his pictures, or his posted thoughts, or the pictures of his family. Oddly, though, I think I know him better now, because, well, like I said, with the loss of skin elasticity comes at least a bit of wisdom. We have journeyed through lots of years together, my high school friends and I, even though we have been apart. My friend and I agreed it was a good thing there had not been security cameras in our high school newspaper office. Enough said. That was a long time ago.

My point is, and I've probably said this once or twice in the last week or so, that it's okay to be an asshole when you're 17. It's even okay, sometimes, to be an asshole when you're all grown up. As long as you own it and apologize for it. It is not okay, ever, to be, well, whatever the fifty-something year old Kavanaugh was at his Senate hearings, no matter what happened or didn't happen when he was a teenager. A grown man tossing questions back at his questioners, sneering at them, weeping openly as he reminisced about summer nights with Tobin and Squee and, to quote Matt Damon, Donkey Dong Doug. As if a place on the Supreme Court bench was his birthright, and damn all those Communist Hillary lovers trying to pull it out from under him.

Seriously? Almost every 17 year old I have ever known would have behaved better. He threatened us, all of us, that what goes around comes around. This, as of tomorrow, is our new swing vote.

Mr. Kurd's Wild Ride

I have always liked to think I have a pretty good sense of humor. Maybe I have misjudged myself.

When I walked into Starbucks this morning, a man I had never seen before was talking to two men I know. I stopped by to say hi; the new guy glanced over and immediately went back to his conversation. If you could call it that, since he was the only one who appeared to be talking.

"My sister lives out in California," he told them. (As far as he was concerned, I was not there.) "She thinks Trump is crazy." My guess is he was rolling his eyes, but I cannot be certain because I could only see the back of his head.  "He's a genius."

I may have made some sort of noise, because he turned to me, for a moment. "You don't think he's a genius? You have to admit he's entertaining. Even if you don't like his politics." His politics? What are those?

Not only do I like to think I have a sense of humor, but I also like to think I'm pretty good at conversation, always ready with a quick response. Again, the best I could come up with was some sort of noise. I left.

Okay, when I want to be entertained, I watch late night comedians. When I want genius, I read a good book. Or watch late night comedians.

My jaw dropped yesterday, stayed dropped for over an hour, as I watched a raging imbecile who calls himself our president insult pretty much everybody (except Sean Hannity), lie about pretty much everything (except his devotion to himself), and reveal the kind of ignorance of the world around him that tops Sarah Palin waving at her Russian neighbors from her back yard. He referred to a Kurdish correspondent as "Mr. Kurd," although he did, to be fair, announce that the Kurds are great people. He referred to the press corps (except for his friends at Fox, even though he rarely talks to them) as maniacs, liars, and failing. He said he just wants the Palestinians and Israelis to be happy. One state, two state, red state, blue state. Dr. Seuss must be rolling over in his grave. He's leaning toward the two state thing, by the way -- just another real estate deal.

Contrary to what several men of the Republican persuasion have accused, I do not automatically believe women and disbelieve men. I have no idea what our Supreme Court nominee did or did not do back in the day, although I do know that I dislike his politics and his hard line views and I am not a fan of having the likes of him in a position to shape our future. I am certainly not a fan of the process -- the one he thinks should be fair (to him). As for hypocrisy, there is plenty of that to go around. Except when it comes to the president. He's pretty consistent.

His news conference yesterday was not funny. It was downright frightening.

A Work in Regress

I saw The Wife recently. I don't think I'm giving anything away when I borrow the quote from the preview, when Glenn Close refers to herself as a "kingmaker."

Behind every great man there's a strong woman. It's a quaint and somewhat antiquated idea, certainly in the two thousands, when the concept of gender equality is old news, almost as old as I am. I grew up with the small, incremental victories of budding enlightenment; I still remember when they changed the rules and allowed us girls to wear pants to school.

By the time I went to law school, classes were more or less equally divided between the sexes. There were no barriers to success, to having it all. Well, not until later on, when we had to figure out how to juggle careers with motherhood -- not just in the logistical carpooling kind of way, but in the visceral and instinctive kind of way that none of us anticipated when we were studying for the bar. Back when our strength and our brains and our independence were ours alone.

Behind the nominee for the highest court in the land sat his wife, cringing inwardly, no doubt, as they sat for a softball interview on Fox News. They were both robotic -- he, with his repetitive non-responsive responses that would have had even the most passive jurist tearing at her robe, and she, with her perfect posture and preternatural muteness. At one point, a question was directed at her, the woman behind the man. She bobbed her head, opened and closed her mouth a few times, and stared helplessly at her man. He responded for her. Non-responsively, of course.

I don't know what the justice-in-waiting did when he was in high school and college, though I think I know more than I want to.  Certainly, his wife, the strong woman sitting slightly behind him for the interview, knows too much, but she also knows her place. She is a kingmaker. She may be strong and intelligent and independent, but her job is to remain mute. He would not be where he is without her.

Only the nominee and his accusers know the truth. But what I do know is this. A man with views as antiquated as the ones I was born into, when I had to wear a dress to school, stands poised to dictate what women can do with their own bodies and, by extension, their own lives. A man who cannot answer a soft question with a straight answer stands poised to demand clarity from others on matters that will have a broad and deep impact on all of us. A man who seemed comfortable with his wife's muteness will shape our nation for decades, a half century after we all thought gender equality was, at the very least, a work in progress.

It should give all of us, not just women, pause. I, for one, never signed on to be a kingmaker.

Facing Out

I was startled when the woman approached me, hand outstretched, to reintroduce herself. I was certain we had never met, though she somehow knew my name.

Occasionally, rarely I like to think, I am wrong. When she identified herself, I remembered her immediately. I remembered her long, perfectly straightened hair, and I remembered what always appeared to be an air of overconfidence. We had played tennis either together or near each other a few times, and I remember thinking how odd it was that her hair was always down. Other than that, I never paid much attention.

The woman who approached me yesterday had a chic short haircut, the tendrils shiny either from a fresh wash or a touch of product -- it was tough to say. She was strikingly pretty, with high chiseled  cheekbones and a straight nose and a warm smile. Her teeth were ever so slightly imperfect -- almost overlapping a bit, as if an extra one had been crammed in. I knew very little about her, but I had heard that she had been gone from tennis for a while. Breast cancer.

I debated for a nanosecond before I blurted it out. "I love your short hair." Of course I knew it could not have been her choice, this new do, but it was so stunning I couldn't help myself. She didn't seem offended, and didn't feel compelled to tell me why her hair was suddenly short. I marveled to myself at how so much seemed different about her, with her long hair gone. She had never seemed to be particularly friendly, and I had never been drawn to her. Now, I had this overwhelming urge to ask her if she wanted to grab a coffee later.

She admitted she felt unsure about her short hair, how it put her face "out there." Yes, it certainly did, and I could only see that as a good thing. She admitted she was trying to grow it, go back to her long hair that never went into a pony tail, even for tennis. She wondered if anybody had ever noticed that, thought it strange. Yes, actually, I had. She admitted to her vanity; her obsessive need to hide parts of her face, no matter how impractical or uncomfortable. I touched my own sloppy pony tail, suddenly self-conscious about the mismatched clips pinning down my stray hairs, suddenly self-conscious about all that face "out there."

Whether she grows her hair out, post-chemo, or keeps it short, my guess is this woman has changed in more ways than I can imagine. What I had perceived to be an air of overconfidence was, I suppose, vanity, but it strikes me more as under-confidence, a misguided sense that she should not reveal too much. Funny, what an arduous journey can do to someone. The whole episode made me want to shed all my bullshit, maybe even shave my head. Ahh, maybe if I had finely chiseled cheekbones and a straight nose I would.

Hit to the Girl

Years ago, on a bunch of Saturdays, I somehow found myself filling the last spot in a tennis game with a bunch of guys.

It was fun, in a different sort of way. I enjoyed the male banter, especially how they went at each other without fear of being rude. Never hurtful, but never afraid to tease about the stuff that I only find funny when I tease myself about it. Guys don't tend to be self-deprecating, except when they can do it on some other self's behalf. Not that I mean to generalize.

Of course, there was the girl watching. The favorite was Pocahontas, the woman a few courts down. Not Pocahontas in the derogatory sense that has become so familiar these days, but in the dumb, star-struck kind of way that men admire a goddess from afar. Tall and tan and fit, with smooth and shiny jet black hair that didn't seem to frizz with sweat. She seemed goddess-like to me as well, from afar. I was kind of disappointed when I met her. It's not that she wasn't tall and tan and fit, with smooth and shiny jet black hair that didn't seem to frizz. She was pretty but mortal, supremely ordinary when she spoke. I always hoped the fantasy lived on a bit longer for the guys.

I ran into one of the guys the other day, and we had fun catching up. About the group, about what everybody is up to. He still plays, although some of the old guard has been replaced. I played on those courts just the other day, and was surprised to learn that some of the young women playing nearby were the daughters of women I used to play with, now with children of their own. I reminisced about how I was one of them, years ago. A minute ago, or so it seems. I remembered what it felt like to transform myself from mom to amateur athlete for an hour or two, how satisfying it was.  My version of a fantasy. George Cloo

ney could have been on the next court, and I wouldn't have noticed. Okay, well maybe just a peek.

Hit to the girl. My old friend told me that's what one of the guys used to say when I was on the other side of the net. Funny. I would have looked at it differently, hit to the one most likely to give me a run for my money, whether it was the girl or the boy. Even if it meant I would lose the point. After all, it's just a game., isn't it? 

It's Saturday morning now, and in a few hours the guys will be on the court. My friend said he's going to tell the other guy that he ran into "the girl." As I recall, that guy -- the one who said hit to the girl --he's the one who had no daughters, only sons.

A Special Person, Gone but Remembered, Fondly

I never knew his name, and he never knew mine, but he always asked me about Eli, my boxer. He would tell me how much he loved Eli, which I thought to be impossible. They barely knew each other.

His name was Billy, and, as it turns out, he is the one who died the other day, hit by a car. I had heard rumblings about the tragedy, the circumstances, given it a moment or two of pause, and then tucked it away with all the other things in life that are not my problem. Another death, close to home, but anonymous.

Anonymous until this morning, when a Facebook post popped up, about Billy. The picture took my breath away.

I had heard Billy long before I ever really paid attention to him, narrating his thoughts, seemingly to nobody, early one morning in my new local Starbucks. Other than an occasional grunt, nobody really responded to what he was saying, which didn't seem to faze Billy. I saw him almost every morning after that, and he would stop to tell me about his day, or whatever he was thinking. Sometimes I nodded politely; sometimes, I asked him questions; sometimes, especially at the beginning, I walked away quickly, thinking about all the unimportant things I had to do. I hate that I did that, even once.

Eli and Billy took to each other immediately. Eli loves attention, and Billy loved Eli's slobbery kisses. It's an acquired taste, and most people have yet to acquire it. It doesn't bother me that Billy didn't know my name; he thought of me as the lady who brought him Eli, which was really all that mattered. It bothers me that I never knew Billy's name, though, never thought to ask. Billy would be referred to, I suppose, as a "special needs" adult, but -- as far as I could tell -- Billy was special but not needy. He seemed to find joy in everything and in everybody. He appreciated the things we all take for granted, and couldn't wait to share his joy, even if some of us, sometimes, were too preoccupied to listen. If he needed anything, it was to make sure every person he met could feel the kind of happiness he felt.

We all need a little bit more of "Billy" in life. I will miss the sight of him riding his bike in the neighborhood, greeting everyone. I will miss the sound of his voice, a reminder of how he saw every small thing as a gift, the way a lot of the rest of us do not. I will miss watching him receive Eli's kisses, and I will miss having one more opportunity to ask him to tell me more about the cubs game, or his "Olympic" games, or his family. To let him know I shared his joy.

Postcards from the Bubble

Yesterday, I joined a group of women in my old neighborhood for a postcard writing and phone banking party. I knew many of them, from the days when what drew us together was the dream (and the toil) of raising kids in a safe place with good schools. Our property taxes were high, the carpooling schedules were grueling, but we seem to have, as a village, launched some pretty good citizens.

What drew us together yesterday was the collective state of shock and outrage that has overtaken the bubble, festering as the months tick by and the indignities and atrocities go on, unchecked. We women don't like feeling powerless. I turned in my hand wringing for hand-writing desperate pleas on postcards to folks outside the bubble, imploring them to vote. If I were to receive such a card, it would go directly into the recycling bin, as does much of my mail. If I were to receive a phone call, I would let it go unanswered. It felt good, though, to do something. I stayed the course, kept writing.

Was it any different when we were raising children? I often think -- and admit, out loud -- that I believe my three turned out well in spite of me, and not because of anything I may have done right. As they grew, so too did their independence, and, it seemed, my irrelevance. I wondered, sometimes, if it would make more sense to just sit back and hope for the best. But I stayed the course, and did what I could, as pointless as it might seem.  Not just because I loved them unconditionally, but because was my responsibility, my job.

The night before Stanley, my "grand pup," had a bit of a freak accident, I had a dream that something happened to him. I have since decided that I am possessed of some mystical powers -- and promise to warn my friends and loved ones to be careful if they ever appear in such a dream, rather than wait for the confirming phone call. Stanley, thank goodness, has lived to tell the tale.

Last night, I had a dream that there was an earthquake in D.C., a quake that measured over 100 on the Richter Scale. Whom do I warn? An earthquake in D.C. is highly improbable, but I take comfort in the idea that a seismic shift is afoot, creeping up on us as slowly but as surely as the imperceptible changes that led us to where we find ourselves, now.

Most of us did not see it coming, the train wreck. Just as when my pediatrician told me, when my first born would not relinquish her pacifier, that one day her preferred form of plastic would be a credit card, the thought seemed preposterous. I never saw it coming, for any of my children, as they moved through toddlerhood and adolescence and the teens. I never saw it coming, even when I had already seen it happen twice. And I never saw "this" coming, the racism bubbling back up from its latency, the lure of crassness and indignity and an "us versus them-dom" the likes of which I never thought possible. I didn't even know there was a "them."

The shift is coming. Even if nobody reads the postcards, or answers the phone. I have lived it, and I have dreamt it. No warnings necessary; just rest, assured.

Thoughts About Nothing in Particular (So What Else is New?)

An acquaintance recently suggested I write something more useful than my self-reflective bullshit. That's not a direct quote, but it pretty much captures the spirit of the advice.

Two possible  responses sprang immediately to mind -- the third, to heed the advice -- didn't come into play until days later. I resisted the first option, which was to to simply tell him to fuck himself, and went with the other, my "go-to," which is to get defensive. It is useful, damn it. Even if only to my small handful of loyal readers. And, if not to them, it is useful, to me.

I'm not big on handing out suggestions, even worse about taking them. I cringe when someone questions me. And, by cringe, I mean I shrivel up into an amorphous and blithering little ball and remind myself I have never done anything right, ever. Maybe I should have asked the psychologist about that, the one I dated, once. I told some friends, the other day, that I've come to look at dating as simply a pathway to lots of free meals. The psychologist only sprang for a drink though; I should have extracted some therapy before scratching him off the list.

My son-in-law suggested I write a book about my dating life, pepper it with little vignettes about the man I sleep with on a regular basis (my devastatingly handsome castrated boxer) and the new gentleman in my life, Stanley, the bull dog, my grand-pup. He's recently castrated, but has yet to feel the full effects, and humps my leg whenever he gets the chance. It's annoying and a little painful, but I admit I kind of like feeling irresistible.

Dating, in my early 50's, was bad enough. Now, as 60 looms large, it's awful. It seems less about physical attraction than the absence of revulsion. Chemistry morphs into practicality, something certainly more complicated than a swipe left or right; it's a constant weighing of each other's baggage, assessing whether the two lifetimes' worth of wear and tear can coexist without disturbing whatever precarious balance we've each achieved. Only then do you even wonder whether, if you dim the lights enough, there might be something better than indifference or resignation.

If there's anything useful in here, I suppose it's only apparent to me. I know that dinners out are sometimes more fun than dinner at home, alone, and sometimes it's just better to hang on the couch, smothered by dogs, covered in dog hair. At least the dogs don't talk. If I had anything profound to say, I would write something useful, advise women coming down the pike behind me, divorced, approaching 60.

But you're on your own, ladies. Again, I'm not big on handing out suggestions. Or taking them.

The "Keeper" Pile

No worries. I'm struggling too.

I had a vague sense of somebody behind me, even though he had not said a word. Not until I glanced over my shoulder, and realized I had been weaving, tracing erratic figure eights over the center line on the bike path. I was mortified. Sorry, I mumbled, inching back over to the right, keeping my head down.

Could he tell, I wondered, that it wasn't just my legs that were struggling to get me up the incline. There are no real hills in my neck of the woods; the anomalous upward tilt in the path had caught me by surprise, after two hours of pure flat.

I was so caught up in my daydream, I had barely even noticed my labored breathing. There are plenty of mountains in my daydreams, those "over the hill" kind of mountains that seem so daunting, the kind that take my breath away just by being there. I've always relied upon my solitary runs or bike rides or, more commonly lately, long walks for some productive deep thinking. I would compose lectures in my head, when I taught, figure out how to juggle three kids and a job and a flailing marriage. My work has changed, my children have left, and, well, the flailing marriage failed. These days, it's tough to find solutions when I can't even put my finger on the problems.

It's kind of like peering into my overstuffed closet, wanting desperately to clear it out but having no clue where to start. Someone told me, the other day, that she starts by pulling out the things she loves. It's easier, after that, to figure out what to toss. Forget about the discard pile, it's the "keeper" pile that matters. It seemed so radical. So brilliant. Focusing on the good stuff I already have is a skill I have yet to master, and my closet seems as good a place as any to do a practice run.

I'm struggling too. His smile was kind, and he was decent enough to keep the pass slow, lingering a bit in front of me so he could leave me with a shred of dignity before he left me in his dust. I pedaled furiously, determined to prove (to whom, I couldn't say) that I was doing just fine. At least my legs were.

It's one of the hazards of an afternoon ride on a summer Sunday. Norman Rockwell's America rolls by -- picnickers, leisurely paddlers in the lagoon, couples chatting away on their bikes. Life in the suburbs, built for twos, and threes, and fours, as I ponder the universe on my bicycle built for one. Forgetting, momentarily, that I actually have a bicycle, and the wherewithal to go out and ride it on a beautiful summer afternoon.

No doubt, the nice gentleman who passed me has his own struggles, as do the picnickers and the kayakers and the chattering couples. But out on a sunny afternoon, we are all the "haves," and not, by any stretch of the imagination, the "have-nots." The discard pile can wait.

Learning from Lives Well Lived

I was at a small graveside funeral the other day, for the uncle of a good friend. I had met him several times over the years, but never really knew him. I knew his story, though -- at least the pivotal piece -- which is that he spent the better part of his early childhood hiding and running from the Nazis with his older brother, my friend's father.

Nobody is anywhere near as perfect as they seem to be in their eulogies, and I'm pretty sure Uncle Freddy is no exception. Still, I tend to feel inadequate at funerals (because, of course, as with everything else, it's all about me.). I wonder who will step up at my own funeral one day, attesting to my unique brand of perfection.  If only my dogs could talk.

The man standing behind me at the graveside tapped me on the shoulder. "Do I know you?" he asked.

"I don't think so," I said, certain I had never seen this elderly gentleman with an extraordinarily long salt and pepper pony tail.

"Well I'd like to."

We all cracked up, the small gaggle of outsiders standing along the back edges of the makeshift chapel. Who knew my odds would be so much better at a cemetery than on a dating site. I thanked him for the compliment, even thought about giving him my card (if I had one). But this was about Uncle Freddy.

Uncle Freddy was, to say the least, quirky. Kind of a know-it-all, though, as his oldest friend pointed out, he had a right to be.  He was voracious about reading, voracious about discovering food and drink and other glorious mysteries of life. I enjoyed hearing about the things that shaped Uncle Freddy. About how, when he was a little boy, hiding in the mountains, his only friends were his books, which explains why he so loved to read. How, as an adult, he always preferred staying home to going out. Understandable, when his formative years were spent not knowing what a home felt like. How he never asked "why me?" when he was so plagued by illness later in life. He had never expected to live past the age of six. The next 75 years were a huge windfall.

A few hours after Freddy's funeral, I found myself on an impromptu "date" (I use the term loosely) with someone four years younger than I. After an hour, he looked at me as if he had just noticed me, and he asked me why I have such nice teeth. Do I know you? Why do you have such nice teeth? It was certainly a day for weird questions. He explained that people my age tend to have rotten teeth. I laughed. Not in the kindhearted way I laughed at the funeral, but more in the why don't I ever learn kind of way.

I thought about Uncle Freddy.  Unkempt, unconventional, largely unknown Uncle Freddy, who nevertheless made an enormous impact on the people who crossed his path. Had we spent an hour together, he would have been curious about a lot of things, least among them my un-rotted teeth. And I would have come away better just to have spent that hour.

Uncle Freddy was buried in a simple pine box, and would have preferred that there be no pomp, no ceremony, no hyperbolic praise. I'm glad nobody listened to him, and I'm glad I got to hear more of his story. Worth telling, and worth hearing.

Tragedy in Tajikistan -- A Mother's Perspective

Twenty-nine years old. Georgetown graduates. Believing with every fiber of their being that people are essentially good. Dead on the side of a mountain road, somewhere very far away. Tajikistan.

I am the mother of a twenty-nine year old Georgetown graduate. They had walked the same streets, maybe even lived in the same dorm. I have a son, who will turn twenty-eight tomorrow, who lives somewhere very far away. Not in a place that ends in "istan" -- that suffix that, well, I can't help it, automatically touches a nerve. My youngest now lives in New York. Some might think of that as a dangerous place, or even a place far away. I do not. Every day, though, I worry about all of them. I am their mother, and that's what I do.

I vaguely remember hearing the story a few days ago, about the random killing of some tourists in a place far away. ISIS had claimed responsibility. No, that's not right. That sounds too much like remorse, like holding oneself accountable for a horrible deed. They were not claiming responsibility. They were taking credit. I had heard the story and tucked it neatly away, in that safe place where I can ignore horrible stories about things that happen to other people, things that have nothing to do with me. It might very well have remained there, had I ignored the brief New York Times teaser that had popped up on my phone yesterday, something about a dream ending on a mountaintop.

The story stopped me in my tracks. The nameless and faceless victims were no longer tucked away. They were idealistic. They were in love. They had shed their creature comforts and their good jobs and were living out their world view. A world view that was populated by good hearted people and beautiful vistas and serendipitous encounters that could never happen if you spend your life in a cubicle staring at a computer screen. They probably held onto that world view until the end, even as the  band of thugs, in cars packed with guns and knives, bore down on them and mowed them down, then came out to finish the job.

Somebody's child died, brutally murdered, on the side of that dusty mountain road in a place called Tajikistan. Only a few days earlier, some local folks had brought the bikers flowers, entertained them with some music. It was enough, despite the grueling trek, the occasional unpleasant incidents along the way, to reinforce their optimistic and maybe slightly naive world view. As a mother, I'm torn. I would love to know that my own children have that kind of outlook, that people are good, that there are impossibly beautiful views that should not be missed, that it would be a shame to miss it all, or any of it. As a mother, though, I want to shackle them to their computers, move them into a house a stone's throw away from mine, somewhere close where I can know, every night before I go to bed, that they are safe. I admit it. I want them to be jaded and cynical and conventional and bored. If it means they'll be alive.

"And in the end it's not the years in your life that count; it's the life in your years." Abraham Lincoln said that, and lots of other folks have repeated it. A piece of me believes that to be true. As a mother, though, I can't quite shake the idea of the shackles.

Bananas Republic

We the people. 

I try to confine my morning anxiety attacks to the garden variety stuff, like having procrastinated on a few too many work deadlines or wondering whether I remembered to let the dog in before I fell asleep. I'm trying, really hard, while I work, to find an alternative white noise source to MSNBC.

This morning, relieved that Eli was safely curled up on the couch, I sat down with my mega mug of coffee to get right to work. All is right with the world, I suppose, when you set the bar that low.

Aargh. I was so close, except I couldn't unsee the video of some twisted version of "we the people" at a Trump rally in Florida the other day, spewing venom at the press and thrusting fingers at them and calling them liars and uttering various obscenities that had to be bleeped out to protect the "we the people" being treated to the spectacle in our living rooms. Oh, yeah, it was "our" president right there at the helm, stoking the mob. Why the bleep? Whatever they're saying, it's got the presidential stamp of approval.

So much for getting an early start this morning. My fingers wandered aimlessly on the keyboard, and I opened some new tabs, scanned a few articles about James Madison and the Bill of Rights  and separation of powers and freedom of the press and all that other nonsense those folks fought so hard for so long ago. America then and America now. I search in vain for some vestigial resemblance. The best I can come up with is odd hairdos on the men in power. And even that's gone haywire.

Mobs and revolutions are nothing new. It's how a lot of modern democracies earned their footing, toppling iron-fisted rulers who did as they please. But mobs attacking the press? The messengers? While they dance merrily around an illegitimate leader who cares about nobody but himself, cares particularly little about the obscenity spewing deplorables dancing around him and kissing his ring.

At least the folks in Congress are doing their job, protecting us from unfettered executive power. A bunch of them even called our president's behavior inappropriate. Glad they're not holding back. Deplorables. Yes, I said it again.

We the people are having an identity crisis the likes of which most of us -- certainly our founders -- could not have imagined. We are a republic gone bananas, and I don't think we can sit back and wait for God or anybody else to bless America. November is approaching, and "we the people" have a lot of work to do.

Movin' On Up....

As my youngest child prepares to move into her first "real world" apartment and pay her own rent, I am confused. Even more confused than usual.

With a strange mix of excitement, relief, and melancholy on all sides, she will be moving out of my 87 year old mother's Brooklyn apartment, my childhood digs. For a couple of months, she has walked the same streets I used to walk, stood on the same dusty subway platforms, arrived home late at night through the same deserted lobby while my mother, her grandmother, lay half awake, waiting. In the mornings, she sips coffee at the same tiny round kitchen table where my brother and I used to sit across from each other reading the backs of our favorite cereal boxes, with an occasional break to launch a gratuitous insult.

For two brief months, we have all had at least one foot firmly planted somewhere familiar, with the other testing new waters. My mother was enjoying the rare treat of seeing one of her grandchildren on a daily basis, and relearning how to walk the fine line between parenting a child and enjoying the company of a fellow adult. She was struggling to balance the joy of the closeness with the annoyance at the intrusion. My daughter, at once appreciative and put upon, endured her own juggle. I worried from afar, tempted to intervene and micromanage with advice and assurances, knowing that silence was my best option. My mother marveled, regularly, at how wonderful and responsible her youngest granddaughter is, as if it had happened suddenly, certainly in spite of my parenting.

Next weekend, we all start a new chapter. For my daughter, it will be the official launch, different from the somewhat illusory independence she enjoyed at college. For my mother, it will be a return, yet again, to the comfort of life on her own terms, the rigid and unimpeded schedule she has relied upon for so long. As relieved as she is, her space will feel empty, at least for a while. For me, I will adjust to what it feels like not be anticipating the return of a child. It is time, I think, to finally get rid of the bulky bags of tee shirts and old clothes I have stubbornly clung to as reminders of their childhoods. It is time, I think, to clear out the closets and just tuck the memories away where they don't take up so much space.

A friend told me, recently, that she and her husband cracked open a special bottle of wine to celebrate a job well done when their last child went off the payroll. Three children, well-raised, well-educated, ready to make their mark. I, too, might crack open a special bottle of wine (I hardly need an excuse), but I like to think that though my job description might change, my work is never done.

Limping Back an Awkward Truth: My Story

One evening, long ago, my husband and I hosted a party at our home for some summer associates at his law firm. I spent a good deal of time trying to figure out why one of the young women looked so familiar, until I finally had my "eureka" moment, and shared it with her. I won't go into the details, but it involved my prefacing my revelation by saying something really nasty about her doppelganger -- and being very specific about why I knew her -- only to find out that this young woman indeed had a twin, one who would have been exactly where I said she was when I knew her.

My misstep (and I'm being generous here) was horrifying enough, to me, my husband, and the smattering of others who overheard the conversation. My "walk back," which was instantaneous and seemed brilliant to me, at the time, was worse. "Oh yes, I knew her, but that's not who I was thinking about." Color drained from faces, eyes popped. One friend burst out laughing.

I felt vindicated, years later, when I found out the twin was just as bad as the one I had known, and was eventually fired. Vindicated, that is, about my assessment. As to my "walk back," I remain horrified -- even if it is kind of funny. A lot funnier, say, than treason. I have tried, since then, to to be more truthful, certainly to not assume people are that stupid. I've had some slip-ups, of course, but it's never worked out well.

There are lots of bad things to say about 45's, um, Helsinki "misstep," which I view as both unsurprising and, like all his absurdities, immune to consequences. So, too, is his "walk back." But what is truly telling about his "walk back" is his utter disdain and lack of respect for his audience which, I assume, is Republican lawmakers. And, truth be told, they have earned it.

I don't get what motivates them, other than this mystical "base" that supposedly justifies condoning repeated departures from democratic norms. For this, they are willing to accept something as absurd as the no, the person I thought looked just like you was a person other than your identical twin who happened to be someone I knew. Whether it's stupidity or abject whorishness remains to be seen. Maybe, one day, there will be a price to pay.

Whistlin' About Dixie Cups

Central Park, NYC, circa summer 2018

Our Good Humor ice cream man's name was Smitty. I remember thinking what an odd name that was, until my mom told me his last name must be Smith. Ahh. So no first name at all then, which seemed even odder. I wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed.

Every summer evening, Smitty showed up, in his white pants and white shirt and white truck, to serve us our chocolate eclairs and toasted almonds and jet stars and, for the truly unimaginative -- like my brother, as I recall -- vanilla dixie cups with the little wooden spoons that didn't really look like spoons. Smitty was all but forgotten by the time he secured the big shiny lever on the tiny freezer door, tipped his white hat, and went on his way. Except for the one evening that Kenny from the sixth floor and some of the older boys on the block threw eggs from Kenny's terrace at Smitty's truck as he drove off. I could never figure out why anyone would throw eggs at anybody or, for that matter, any thing, much less Smitty and his truckload of treasures. 

Eventually, Smitty and his little white truck were replaced by a bigger truck and a driver whose name none of us bothered to learn. I have rarely thought about Smitty, or even Kenny, whom I had thought was kind of cute until I saw him throwing eggs. Older boy or not, I at least had some standards. 

In the suburban neighborhood where I raised my own kids, a lifetime and just as many miles away from my girlhood home, there was an ice cream truck, I think. Occasionally I would see parents and their small children gathering on the appointed corner at the appointed time, but it never seemed anything like those summer nights in the sixties on the quasi urban streets of Brooklyn. Our moms never came out to wait with us; they threw us little purses filled with change from the terraces -- dropping them straight down so they wouldn't land on anybody. Terraces were handy launching pads, I suppose, back in the day, both for good and for evil. 

This morning, I watched my daughter run a race in Central Park with her co-workers. The race had a retro theme -- people wore bright sweat bands and leg warmers and psychedelic sun glasses and afro wigs. It was adorable, but I fretted to think that's as retro as folks get these days. Until I saw the little Good Humor truck drive up into a clearing, with the guy in the white pants and white shirt and white hat looking exactly the way Smitty used to look. Mostly, everybody seemed to ignore the truck. I just stared (and snapped a picture). 

I thought about Smitty, about how I simply expected him to be there, every evening, even after the egg incident. Serving up sweet treats, but, more than that, an invaluable thread in the fabric of my childhood.  Thank you for your service, Smitty, wherever you are. 

23 and Mommy

I complained to a friend the other day about how stubbornly independent my mother is. Okay, well maybe I just said stubborn, and he suggested independent. And then he had the gall to remind me I probably had 23 of her chromosomes, which I suppose he meant has a compliment but when you've spent much of your adult life pretending you are the opposite of your mother that kind of thing can sound like an accusation.

While it's all the rage now to send off saliva samples in the hope of discovering the mysteries buried within ones DNA, I have neither the need or desire to spit into a vial. I have enough trouble fighting off the genetic predispositions I know. 

My mother is 87 years old. Seven years ago, we were in a car accident together, and she got broken in several places. I, on the other hand, endured a few coffee stains on my dress and a little bit of a stressful entrance to my daughter's graduation ceremony. For the next year, my mother fought like hell to recover. She had to learn to walk again, and -- just as importantly, I think -- build up the strength to once again carry her two-ton "pocketbooks." Not even an intervening spinal collapse could stop her. She fretted. I snapped at her constantly. Her injuries and her negativity were infuriating, not to mention inconvenient.

She walked again, a bit more slowly. She tried her best to leave some of the designer accessories at home so she would not have to suffer the indignity of carrying an ordinary purse. I continued to snap at her about the ridiculousness of it all -- her refusal to lighten her load, her refusal to take a wheelchair ride to speed things up at the airport. Those are for old people, she told me.

Last year, she broke her hip. Again, extraordinarily inconvenient for me. I finagled and cajoled, and got the doctors to agree to release her in time so she could make it to Chicago -- in a wheelchair -- for her granddaughter's wedding two weeks later. The doctors were easy. Mom was not.

She did not make it to her granddaughter's wedding, but she is walking again. And carrying her pocketbook. And doing all kinds of things, for herself and by herself, that nobody in her right mind would be doing at 87, especially after so many broken bones. Stubborn. Crazy. Infuriating.

Independent. On the outside, my mother is beautiful and impeccably dressed and, to the casual observer -- and, to me, when I'm feeling particularly nasty -- all about appearances. My younger daughter, living with her grandmother temporarily, assured me, yesterday, after she overheard our somewhat heated telephone conversation, that my 87 year old mother was happily ironing her St. John suit before heading out on an "errand" I deemed wildly unnecessary and reckless. I had to laugh.

It is all about independence. I like to think, somewhere in the 23 chromosomes I can trace back to her, that "stubbornly independent" gene slipped in. My own children have already threatened to put me on a leash. They need only look at their grandmother to know that's not going to happen.

No Lobster Bisque for You, Professor Dershowitz!

I've been berated for being so dark, encouraged to post a happy tale.

Tragic news abounds, but there is indeed a comedic lining. Alan Dershowitz was shunned on Martha's Vineyard.  Move over, ghost of Mary Jo Kopechne; the esteemed professor might still be alive, but if he wants to stay on the island he's just going to have to eat fish sticks in a Red Roof Inn. Maybe, if he's lucky, someone will sneak him some leftover lobster salad.

Almost always, there are two sides to a story, more often three (with the first two being matters of plausible perspective and the third being closest to the truth).  I'm open-minded enough to acknowledge there are two sides to the story of America in 2018 as well. One is, let's see, how should I put this, RIGHT, and the other is, um, WRONG. SO WRONG.

There is no gray area here, on what we, collectively, are allowing to happen. Somehow, the darkest and most insidious rocks have been overturned and long dormant malevolence has been given the green light to crawl out and be heard. Somehow, a narcissistic thug has risen from the depths and it's not just the so-called deplorables who have lifted him up and carried him forward.

Come to think of it, the Dershowitz story is a happy tale. I am guessing the folks on Martha's Vineyard -- at least the summer folk -- enjoy their money and their tax breaks and their kelly green whale pants, and I would bet more than a few closet Republicans have cracked open some lobster claws with the liberal elites without anyone peeing in their terrines of melted butter. But it's encouraging to see that higher principles can trump (pardon the term) all else, and when anybody tries to rest on his laurels or supposed principles to use his own well positioned soap box to lend credulity to what is, in every sense of the word, an abomination, a line in the sand is drawn. No lobster bisque for you!

Professor Dershowitz, whatever your "principles" might be -- and I have a hunch they might even be noble if you weren't such a publicity hound -- you have become an enabler. There is little difference between you and the folks who rely on a twisted notion of religious freedom to  claim a constitutional right to shun homosexuals or, say, folks who believe in a woman's right to choose. Actually, there is a difference, and much danger. If a baker doesn't want to bake a cake for a gay couple, the gay couple can find another baker, and the local market will determine the fate of the local baker. If somebody's religious faith prohibits abortion, that person can choose to raise an unwanted baby or put her up for adoption. But when the people who have somehow grabbed the reins of our government and hijacked our democracy are doing everything they can to keep themselves in power while they chip away at everything we here have long taken for granted, people like you need to tread carefully when you wield your influence.

Professor Dershowitz, it's funny that, this holiday weekend, you didn't have melted butter on your hands. What's not funny is the blood that could replace it.

Independence Day, 2018

Life goes on in the bubble.

Here's the thing.  I have never been poor. I have never been raped. I have never regretted a pregnancy. I have been lucky enough to be thrilled about the prospect of meeting each of my unborn children, without reservation. I grieved when an early miscarriage took that chance away from me; I grieved, not for a life ended, but for a life never begun. 

I am thankful I have never had to make the choice, but I have never understood why it would be someone else's choice to make. I have never understood why the party of small government makes an exception when it comes to marching into a woman's womb. As if the personal decision isn't heart wrenching enough without a bunch of middle aged white guys scrubbing in. 

Oh yes, we've come a long way baby, which means we have so much farther to fall. The same folks who don't seem particularly interested in pushing back on a president who is slowly chipping away at the entire world order are literally giddy about the prospect of finally being able to push unwanted fetuses back in, no matter what the consequences. And separating children from their parents and putting babies in cages is okay as long as you're trying to keep them out, not in. I am so confused, here in my bubble. 

Tomorrow is Independence Day. It gives me pause. For the first time in my life, I feel shackled. Even while life goes on as it always has, in the bubble. While I sit outside at my neighborhood Starbucks, enjoying a relatively work-free Tuesday. While I decide whether to go to Pilates or take a bike ride or just spend the day waiting until it's a n acceptable time to switch from coffee to wine. While I still feel somewhat naively comfortable knowing that, here in my bubble state, my daughters will never have to resort to coat hangers to defy the intrusions of a bunch of white men who just don't get it. 

I cannot get this movie out of my head, a recent sleeper called "1945." The summer of 1945, somewhere in eastern Europe, where the war is over but people have not necessarily changed. A collective morning after, for the criminals and the accomplices and, mostly, for the ones who stood by, powerless, and did nothing. I wonder what 2020 holds for us, or, worst case scenario, 2024. Or, if I'm cautiously optimistic, 2018. I yearn to see the active collaborators get their due, but what of the rest of us? 

On Independence Day, 2018, I hope we all remember it's not just about the burgers and hot dogs, although I wouldn't give those up for anything. I hope the fireworks remind us all of how far we have come, and how far we can fall. There is much more at stake, this year, than a chance of rain on our parades.