Creating Order, the Old Fashioned Way

A friend's mother died last week. I didn't know my friend's mother well, but I understood how much her absence was felt.

It takes a loss, sometimes, even if it's not your own, to step back and reflect on what you have. I still have my mother. Infuriating and awe-inspiring, ridiculous and wise, tough as nails and soft as Jello. I have zigzagged through life, made plenty of wrong turns but, so far, have come out fairly unscathed. My mother has always been there, ready to offer up advice or an occasional "I told you so."  If I get it right, she takes credit. Why shouldn't she? I do the same with my own children.

My friend reminded me, after the service, to be happy I still have a mommy. But your mom sounded so perfect I wanted to tell her. Come to think of it, I don't know any perfect people who are alive; they all seem to be dead.

I remember having this urge, almost daily, long after my father died, to call him and ask him a question. Advice, maybe. Or maybe something about a plumbing issue. Maybe just to hear his voice. I saved his last voicemail as long as technology would allow. I didn't need to -- I have never forgotten how he sounded, or how it felt to listen to him. Annoyed or reassured, impatient or riveted. It doesn't matter. I'd give anything to have another chat with him, but I will always hear him. 

So far, I've had twenty more years with my mother than I had with my dad, and I know her so well I never need to ask her advice or, perish the thought, her opinion.  She tries her best not to offer it up, knowing I will do as I wish regardless.

I was out of sorts, after that memorial service for my friend's mom. Even more so because I attended an event later that day to honor my other friend's son, gone almost two and a half years. He would be twenty-nine now. Eulogize him all we want, nurture his legacy until we're blue in the face, we would all prefer to have him back here, a little imperfect but zigging and zagging forward.  He never had the chance to infuriate and inspire, to err and to correct, to have his own children roll eyes at him (as he did, many times) while they secretly tucked away his wisdom.

That night, lost in memories that belonged mostly to others,  I took out my ironing board, fired up the rusty old iron. Every evening -- or at least every other evening -- when I was growing up, my mother would iron. I would sit with my father at one end of the living room, and mom would set up the ironing board at the opposite end, cross-wise, in front of the piano. She was there but sort of not there. Each time she set the iron down for another pass, the legs of the board would creak. Then the hiss of steam, and down again, creak. My father and I would do the crossword puzzle together, or maybe just sit. He would smoke his cigar. Few words were spoken, but I was content. And safe.  

My mother once suggested I try to iron occasionally. She actually made me guess what she was suggesting, a four letter word she said. I could not imagine where she was going with that. She finally had to tell me. Iron. That wasn't  in my four-letter-word wheelhouse.  Not even close.

It was surprisingly satisfying, ironing the other day. Instantly gratifying, wrinkles disappearing in seconds. A quick fix to create order out of chaos. Tough to do these days, when it's okay to wrest brown children from their parents' arms but it's not okay to refuse to serve a useless but dangerous idiot in a restaurant. Oops, didn't mean to go there, sorry.

So I will iron more. Because I know my mother would tell me how soothing it is, and it's taken me a long time, but I know she's right. 

Theology 2018

Sometimes you need to hit rock bottom before things can start to get better. I thought we had hit rock bottom on November 8, 2016. We had not. Things have gotten far worse.

I knew it would be bad, but I thought it would end swiftly. There would be no sudden shift to presidential; I was realistic enough to know that he would become no less vile, no less egomaniacal, no less willfully uninformed, no less pathological in his lies. His inarticulateness and his schoolyard bullying would continue to dominate the airwaves, fodder for jokes and consternation all at once, all the time.

I knew -- I thought -- even if "we the people" couldn't save ourselves from this mess, the good folks in Congress would step up. Especially the ones he had attacked in so many undignified, if not un-American, ways. I never really had much patience for politicians and their pandering, but who, really, could stoop this low?

God I'm naive.

Here we are, more than a year and a half into what I always knew would be a disaster, nowhere near rock bottom -- just flirting with the unthinkable as we circle the edges of what appears to be a bottomless abyss.

Evil henchmen are everywhere. Jeff Sessions, who thought nothing of lying repeatedly through selective amnesia at his confirmation hearings, has cited the Bible (a Bible not particularly relevant to some of us who are either not Bible thumpers or thump different bibles) to command us to obey (and forgive me for a bit of paraphrasing) the laws of an ignorant buffoon because God has ordained him for the purpose of order. At least I finally understand how Hitler happened. And, speaking of Hitler, snatching children away from parents seeking asylum in the City on the Hill is qualitatively different from what Hitler did -- keeping the Jews in the country so he could finish them off there. Oh. I see. Thank you AG Sessions.

Okay. I'm not going to waste time suggesting that Bibles of all stripes are more about love than blind obedience to madmen, or noting the irony of the passage just after the one cited by Sessions, the one about paying taxes and anything else you owe.  Hahahahaha. That's rich. Far be it from me to argue with the New Testament or the distinguished attorney general, especially when it has all been the given imprimatur of that great theologian and pillar of morality, Sarah Sanders.  "It is very biblical to enforce the law." Now I really understand Hitler. God's will is God's will. Amen to that.

At least we're playing nice with Kim Jong Un. Great guy. Loves his people. Actually knows how to keep them in country, and our president wants nothing more than to know his secret. This should end well.

What's a citizen to do? I can't remember last week's atrocity, can barely remember listening to the Parkland dad and Parkland students speaking at a ladies luncheon last week. My head is spinning.

Breaking news: The president is still an asshole; an asshole with a shitload of power. His henchmen are still evil, and they will continue to lick his ring and put their water bottles on the floor just because he does (oh dear, just a heart beat away). And too many Republicans are willing to sell their souls to the devil incarnate, which means "we the people" are pretty much on our own. We aren't even close to rock bottom, but I fear that once we find ourselves there it will be too late.

The Greatest Gift

Two friends who know me well forwarded the same link to me last night -- a New York Times piece about "MSNBC moms." The once-upon-a-time soccer moms whose empty nests are now filled with the steady drumbeat of left leaning cable news. One admitted to having her daily five o'clock glass of wine with Ari Melber (though he did not know -- until now, I suppose -- that he has been her cocktail hour companion). Many of the women interviewed live dangerously close to red folks -- some sleep in the same bed with one -- and their highly intelligent and articulate like minded friends on MSNBC make them feel less alone. I live in a pretty blue bubble, but I get it. I fall asleep with the television on, wake up periodically to the endless loop of the evening line-up. Sometimes it's repetitive, but sometimes I pick up a tidbit I slept through the first time around. My dog waits patiently for Mika and Joe to appear in the morning. That's when it's time for me to start really paying attention, and time for him to pee.

The article was liberating and well timed. My youngest daughter had been home for three days, and I found myself sneaking around, changing the channel on each television to get a quick fix. I lowered the volume in my bedroom each night, but she busted me every time. Eli and I would wake confused -- no Joe and Mika to herald the beginning of our morning routine. It was disorienting. I will still sneak around -- when my older daughter calls me in the morning I automatically hit the mute button so she won't know how deranged I am. But I feel validated now, like I've been told I actually have a syndrome.

This isn't about my MSNBC addiction, though, or even about my overwhelming feeling that I live in a country I don't recognize. It's about motherhood and daughterhood and grandmotherhood, and how we move through the stages of life, together and separately. My youngest daughter is starting a new chapter, and for now, she my mother's temporary roommate in Brooklyn. In the apartment where I grew up. Both her older siblings have done a stint in New York, spending more time with my mother for longer stretches than I have in years. My relief at being able to watch MSNBC with reckless abandon was matched only, as I watched my twenty-two year old toddle off with her oversized suitcases, by abject panic. My mother is judgmental and intrusive, and my daughter is judgmental and occasionally morose. I am afraid of both of them, sometimes. I had forgotten, I suppose, that my mother told me the day my first child was born that there is no describing the joy of being a grandparent. I had forgotten, I suppose, that being a grandchild is nothing to sneeze at either.

My mother and my daughter both sent me happy texts. "I'm home," my daughter said. "I adore her," said my mother. Here I am again, the necessary but irrelevant link, the forgotten one who brought them together. The exhausted quasi-soccer mom turned solitary MSNBC mom who wonders why she exists but is gratified to learn it's now socially acceptable to consider Nicole and Chris and Rachel and Lawrence to be her actual friends, even to uncork some wine while we chat.

To my daughter and my mother, thank you for letting me know you have settled in amicably together. And, to my daughter and my mother, you're welcome, as I am the one who made this all possible. Enjoy each other. It's time for mimosas with the Rev.

Doing the Hokey Pokey

I would do it more often, sit at a bar by myself, nursing a glass of wine, if it didn't make me feel so conspicuous and inconspicuous at the same time. Conspicuous because I fear others assume I'm there to pick up something other than the chicken paillard I have been fantasizing about for hours; inconspicuous because, really, nobody notices a fifty-eight year old woman sitting at a bar.

I'm not much of a conversationalist, but I like nothing better than listening in on others. The guys to my left covered all the bases -- brilliant children, miserable and ungrateful stepchildren, unworthy ex-wives, gracious new wives who gladly took them in, as is, damaged and laden with baggage. The circle of life in suburban America, same old story, except the guys are ignoring the sports on the TV behind the bar and getting touchy feely over grilled octopus (yuk) and marinated shrimp (yum). Not that my opinion matters; they didn't offer to share. 

Then came the make or break question -- triggered by some reference to politics so subtle I barely noticed it: so where do you stand, left or right? 

If there's one thing the lefties and righties always had in common, it was a tendency to avoid discussing politics and religion on dates or with people you don't know all that well. (Not that I was listening, but these guys seemed to be casual acquaintances, politely tap dancing around shared food choices and filling each other in on pretty basic life information.) 

Left. Way left. Except for criminal justice, then I'm way right. Not sure what that means in the era of "lock her up" and pardoning of white collar folk, but okay. 

And, oh yeah, fiscally conservative. Of course. Who wouldn't be? 

The answers seemed satisfactory; no octopus tentacles went flying, nobody stormed off in a huff. leaving me to lick the remains of the shrimp. 

I used to describe myself similarly, if a bit less extreme on both ends. That was pretty much the extent of it; beyond feeling self-righteous about good and evil, I had little interest in fleshing out the details. 

As I listened to the guys to my left (physically, anyway), I realize how complicit I have been, relying on labels and over-generalizations and never realizing how gray everything is. Having it all is complicated, if not impossible. In life and in politics. Every new wife or husband is somebody else's discard. And self-righteousness and a moral high ground come at a price. A price which is, however, far lower than the price we are paying now, where the line between good and evil is being so messed with its it's difficult to even see the gray. 

We all need to listen more carefully, to the folks on the left, and the right.

Mortar Boards and Floppy Hats, and No White Flags

I'm going to tell you a story. 

Her soft voice blanketed the stadium, soothing as warm honey. It occurred to me that it was sort of odd, a writer delivering a speech. Or, as she promised, telling a story. Prose is prose, but when a writer -- this writer, at least -- tells a story out loud, it's as if she's singing a lullaby, just for you. For you, and all the others in the crowd. One person's story, true and without inflection, grounded in fact but open to anybody's takeaway.

She is an Associate Professor at Tulane, at most fifteen years older that the average graduate, and she is a rising star, a two-time National Book Award winner. She writes about growing up poor and black in Mississippi; her story is about choices -- not one seismic decision to pack up and get out -- but a lifetime of choices that have led her down a sometimes rocky path from, well, one bayou to another. Via Stanford and Michigan. She has done well, particularly if we measure doing well in academic terms. Her story -- as extraordinary as her accomplishments seem -- is riveting in its ordinariness.

Rumors flew, before the graduation ceremony, that this writer -- Jesmyn Ward is her name -- was chosen to deliver the keynote speech by default. It was the same day as the royal wedding, and all the great orators of the world were off to London, where another young American woman of color was writing a new chapter in a very different kind of fairy tale. Different beginnings, different choices, different paths, two good stories being played out before wildly different crowds wearing all sorts of wild headgear. Whether the choice of speaker for my daughter's graduation was by default or by design, it was fortuitous. As was the crowning, on the same day, of a new and distinctly American princess across the pond.

There is nothing like the spectacle of a royal wedding, especially when it mixes stiff upper lips with fire and brimstone sermons and the sounds of a gospel choir belting out "Stand by Me." My daughter's graduation came close, though, with the lyrical, soft-spoken words of a rags to riches story teller washing over our generally more privileged but similarly situated children -- at a crossroads, facing a lifetime of small choices and rocky paths. Just like the rest of us, come to think of it. Jeweled crowns and coveted book awards are hard to come by, but success comes in many sizes and many colors. With small choices, and persistence, as our eloquent speaker reminded us.

Also, at the graduation, an honorary degree was bestowed upon Steve Gleason, the New Orleans Saints hero who lives, now, with ALS. He is wheelchair bound and can no longer speak, but, with the help of technology, his words washed over us, a reminder that even when choices are taken away, we have choices. No white flags is his mantra. It seemed to be the theme of the day, on both sides of the pond.

A Big Green Wave

We sat by the edge of the pool, my daughters and I, our feet dangling into the water. I had an overwhelming urge to jump in, the three of us together, holding hands. My older daughter, the rational one, refused. My younger daughter was willing, but only if the three of us went together. I cajoled, I begged, wished I could threaten some consequence -- a grounding, perhaps? -- but that ship has sailed. I resorted to petulance. I'm going in myself, I told them. They reminded me I was wearing white shorts and a light colored tee shirt.

So we sat by the edge of the pool, my daughters and I, three grown ups -- well, two grown ups and me -- our feet dangling into the water. We watched a group of children play. We guessed they were cousins, given the age range. They waged fake wars with foam noodles, played basketball into a floating hoop, splashed us they climbed out of the pool and leapt back in, over and over.

There is something about water. As I watched the cousins play, I wondered what it was, that magic that beckons us when we are very young, telling us to just play. Like babies in a  bathtub, these children squealed with what could only be described as pure joy. Adolescents had lost their inhibitions, and the younger ones had achieved equal footing. Whatever the pecking order might have been when they were dry, eating breakfast, the lines were blurred in the water. A hotel pool -- a great equalizer, a giant cocoon, a gently undulating reminder to all of us that we need to just lighten up.

Two nights earlier, we attended the long planned graduation dinner, a chance for eight families to gather together and celebrate our daughters, eight young women who seem to have formed a bond with each other that will last a lifetime. I have known some of them since the day I first moved Nicki into her dorm room, before she had any idea how much these four years would shape her, become a part of her. Before she believed she would like it here, even a little. They are barely recognizable, even though they sort of look the same, these young women who used to be girls. They are, at once, articulate and incoherent, sophisticated and goofy, independent and hanging on to each other for dear life. Graduation. Commencement. Endings and beginnings. They are, at once, excited and scared to death.

When the time came to get ready for the meticulously planned dinner, the skies opened up and buckets of water rained down on New Orleans. Nothing like Katrina, to be sure, but it was relentless. The deluge caught the city by surprise, turning the streets into rising rivers, wiping out the annual outdoor party on campus, making a lot of us wonder why we had just spent money at blow dry bars. We got soaked just climbing into an Uber. I watched out my window, getting a little nervous as we sat, stuck in traffic, the waters seeming perilously close to the bottom edge of the car door.

The city had become a giant swimming pool, and there was nothing left to do but dive in. We were a little damp, a bit less well-coiffed than we had intended, but the torrent swept us up in its odd embrace and reminded us all that, sometimes, we need to just lighten up.

They do it up right in New Orleans, graduation, or commencement, or whatever you want to call it. Everything is set to music. It's serious, this launching of young men and women, but we are reminded not to take ourselves too seriously. Old and young, and everything in between, we all dove in together this weekend, and we played.

Let Them Eat Maqluba

They have more in common then fuzzy hair, Marie and DJT.

I was horrified, yesterday, when I saw the split screen image of two surreal spectacles, just miles apart -- the carnage in Gaza, and opening day ceremonies at Mar-a-lago Mideast. There's never an excuse for brutality or ignorance or arrogance -- much less a repulsive combination of all three -- but at least Marie lived at a time when the whole concept of enlightenment was still relatively new.

There is, quite frankly, no excuse for a person (and I use the term loosely) like DJT (I still find it difficult to speak his name). There is no excuse for the likes of Ivanka and Jared -- other than bad genes. Yet here we are, almost a year and a half into the unforeseen disaster that we should have foreseen had the rest of us not had our heads buried up our behinds, and there is no end in sight. There is still a possibility, indeed a probability, DJ will survive to run again in 2020. And don't get me started on the unctuous Mike Pence. That man just needs to get laid (though someone would need to get paid royally to make it happen).

For the most part, we seem to have learned nothing from history, even though I always thought the whole point of history is to teach us lessons. Ask any college history major; the point is certainly not to find gainful employment. Hate and "us and them-ism" and needless provocation never end well, or, if they do, a lot of blood is shed in the process. Nobody really wins except the folks we hire to drive the bus. It all kind of reminds me of divorce. The lawyers tend to do pretty well, but for everyone else, the damage is profound.

I may not be all that complicated -- certainly not anywhere near as complicated as geo-political relations -- but I am certainly as multi-dimensional as the next gal, and can see more than one point of view. Except when it comes to DJT and his minions, which would include many prominent Republicans who seem to have lost their way. At the beginning, I was chastised, occasionally, for seeming so appalled by the 2016 election outcome. I was chastised for my gloom and doom attitude, and I was chastised for being unable to accept that there is, out there, another point of view.

Some of my favorite people, over the years, have voted for Republicans. I even married one of them, and our divorce had nothing to do with that, or even the fact that he is Catholic and I am a Jew. Somebody seemed horrified, the other day, when I admitted I can no longer enjoy the music of a talented artist who supports our current president (no, not Kanye), much less have a close friendship with somebody who does. It has nothing to do with my political views or elite liberalism. It has to do with my zero tolerance for hate, and "us and them-ism" and needless provocation (the blip of my divorce proceedings notwithstanding). It has to do with my yearning for dignity and decency, and my hope that those qualities will one day return to Washington.

Maybe the end of this nightmare will come when there is nobody left to provoke. I learned the refrain early, back in Sunday School in the sixties. Am Yisrael Chai. The people of Israel live! Who are the people of Israel, and at what price? L'Shana Haba'ah B'Yerushalayim. Next year in Jerusalem! Again, at what price. Does anybody out there have a plan, much less an end game?

Let them eat cake, let them eat maqluba. The parallels are astounding, and the irony is anything but funny.