Moments in Montclair: The Land of Docken Part 1

 

When I turned seven I was informed by adults of all sorts that I was now the Age of Reason.  Supposedly, I could discern right from wrong. I took this very seriously and thought through the morality involved in everything.  Rules became complicated, reasons for decisions became layered, black and white became gray.

My parents were patient and talked important things through with me, the reasons why we needed clean rooms, why green beans were more important than jelly beans, why David’s bed time was nine o’clock and mine was seven-thirty.  Generally, I found peace with all of these decisions. But there was one reason that I could not come to terms with:  the reason why Mrs. Docken was employed as the second grade teacher at school.

The night before second grade began, I lined up my extensive collection of holy statues and prayer cards on my bed side table in the shape of a cross. I laid in bed with my glow-in-the-dark rosary and prayed as hard as I could that I would be placed in 2-A the next morning. I longed to be among the chosen who would spend their year with Miss Faith Daley.  Not only was her name a fitting Catholic teacher name, she was perfect. And lovely. And soft-spoken.

In the weak morning light, I donned my plaid jumper, smoothed my blonde hair into place with matching blue plastic barrettes, and climbed into our white station wagon with my three older brothers and traveled the short distance to school in a mild panic. David, Timmy and Todd all joked about my upcoming incarceration to 2-B. They had all traveled through the land of Mrs. Docken, why shouldn’t I? I had heard the stories ad nauseam over the years, how she made Todd sit in the waste can one afternoon, how Timmy had to stand with his nose to the black board. How she would ask her students to tattle on older boys who had bullied them at lunchtime and then send for them to be yelled out in front of the room. But surely, my brothers hadn’t bothered to pray so fervently in their rooms the night before the school year began.

We arrived at Immaculate Conception Elementary and my brothers dispersed in a burst of jagged laughter. I took my mother’s hand and walked, with my new book bag, past first grade to the end of the hall where the two second grade classrooms sat on either side. The class lists were typed on crisp white paper taped to each door.

A happy gaggle of smiling faces stood in a straight line outside of 2-A. Surely I would be among them.  We walked over and scanned the list.  I took my chubby index finger and pointed to each name listed in alphabetical order…  Anderson, Billings, Carson… and so on until I got to the H’s.  What??   No H’s???  I looked into my mother’s horrified face and then together we looked across the hallway to a quivering pack of students with glazed eyes and knocking knees.

The bell rang as I took my place at the end of the line outside of 2-B.  The door swung open and there she stood, a mighty block of woman in black orthopedic shoes and a patterned dress the mottled colors of a bruise.

“Straighten that line!” she bellowed. “You’re in second grade now. Act like it.”

I glanced over my shoulder at my mother’s grimace and returned her final wave. Off we shuffled in absolute silence to The Land of Docken.

Valentine’s Day

To my Valentine, my husband, my partner in crime. I love you!

(I know this is a bit long for a blog post, but if you are married, or have been,  you just might enjoy the ride )

Valentine’s Day

I placed a hesitant hand on the smooth metal door handle of the Hallmark store and pulled it open to the sound of tinkling bells. Ruby hearts hanging from the door jamb brushed the top of my head as I stepped inside and headed for the Valentine section, an explosion of pinks and reds.  Crowded with last minute lovers like myself, we had to jockey for position as we searched for the perfect card.  Studying people’s expressions with secretive sideways glances, I longed to hear the running commentary inside their heads.

I have always been a last minute Valentine shopper because I dread it.  I can only bring myself to buy something simple that says “I love you’.  All of the other cards in the store are stupid.  With every card I read, I have to add one more sarcastic sentence in my mind.  Or at the very least, a clarifier. I can’t leave it alone.  It’s very stressful.

After a quarter of a century of marriage few of them ring true.  Can we all please admit that many of these sentiments are, at the very least, stretching the imagination? I have long considered designing a line of Valentine cards that are grouped according to the number of years you have been married.

I long for little ditties like this:

Loving each other has been a long, hard road, but I still think you are cute.

Or:

Can’t wait to celebrate our love at Donovan’s Steak house because we got a $150.00 coupon from your client.

Or:

Let’s stay up past 9:00 PM and make out for eight minutes straight.

Love is damn tricky.  An enigma.  So much has been written about it that I dare not add to the rubble.  But if I had to, if Cupid put a gun to my head, I wouldn’t waste time composing an essay as it would never capture the layers, the nuances. I would take a thousand noble words and nestle them in pairs with their less than noble opposites. Then I would shake them in my cupped hands like dice and toss the whole collection off of Juliet’s balcony and watch them scatter and bounce on the cobblestone streets of Verona until they landed in a mish-mash mural of the language of love. Maybe I would even take a photo of it and sell it to Hallmark for next year’s selection.

“Excuse me,” I said to a young woman with a sparkly diamond ring. She smelled of lavender and caressed a card like it held the whereabouts of the Holy Grail.  “Just reaching for this one.” I grabbed one depicting a romantic table set for two. It unearthed a memory.

My husband and I became engaged at Papa Pirozki’s in Atlanta on the anniversary of Pearl Harbor.  Who chooses to propose to his bride in a Russian restaurant on December 7^th?  Looking back, I think he had a subconscious yearning to personalize the Cold War, to plant it as a seed in our relationship.  Though the rest of the world was evolving beyond such ideology, it was apparent that he was some sort of fan.

I hadn’t expected it to be a night unlike all other nights as we were rekindling a relationship that had been on a long hiatus. Neither of us expected the marriage proposal to play out the way it did.  But maybe that was a good thing.  Perhaps it’s the couples who do everything according to the Prince and Princess Handbook who don’t survive when the magic wears thin.  In retrospect, I think it was better to start this union with our gloves on, in a boxer’s stance. One needs to understand strategy and battle maneuvers. It is vital to appreciate humor and build camaraderie in the unexpected foxhole. These are the necessary skills that keep a marriage alive.  Flowers and chocolate are useless.

I remember sitting alone enjoying the candlelight and crystal that adorned our table for two as I held a thumb-sized glass of fruited vodka, icy and thick with raspberries. I loved the way the color matched my fingernails, the stark contrast of them against the white linens reminded me of the raspberry and cream popsicles I ate as a child. Feeling relaxed and elegant I took tiny sips as I gazed around, nodding to other couples nearby who were beginning to notice that my date had disappeared.  I wondered what was taking him so long as he had excused himself to go chat up the chef, whom he said was an acquaintance.

A black door to the kitchen swung open and Tim burst back into the room, all smiles.  At 6’8” he wasn’t known for quiet entrances.

“Ivan’s going to send out a few freebies.  Said he’d take care of us.” Tim plopped into his chair and smoothed his blonde hair into place.  He downed his fruity vodka like it was Kool-aide and motioned for the waiter to bring us another round of drinks.

“Great,” I said picturing all sorts of exotic Russian delights appearing on plates that were once served to the Romanovs.  “So how do you know this guy?”

“Met him at a radio event.  He’s from uhm,” Tim snapped his long fingers as he recalled the information, “Moscow.  Yea, that’s it.  Moscow.”

“What was the event?”

“Does it matter?”

“No.”

“So what’s with all the questions?”

“It was only one question. Why are you getting agitated?”

“I’m not agitated.” He picked up the second fruity vodka and downed it. “Would you finish your first drink already?”

“Fine.”  I threw it back like a pro.  Then I picked up the second one and saluted him.  “Let’s just relax and enjoy this. We only have two days before I fly back. I missed you.”  He took a deep breath and exhaled through flared nostrils.  I put my hand over his drumming fingers.  Something was up. “Are you okay?” I asked.

A young waiter with Ricky Riccardo hair swooped over, handed us menus and then gave a run-down of the night’s specials.  We each chose an entrée and Tim asked for another round of drinks.

“Tim. Maybe we should slow down on the drinks.”

“No.”

“Fine.”  What was wrong with him ?  It seemed as if he had left his usual joking demeanor in the kitchen with Ivan. I threw back my second drink in one gulp and choked daintily into my napkin.  We could take a cab home.

“So how are things at the airline?” Tim asked as he took a piece of bread from a silver bowl.  Thrilled to have some normal conversation, I started into an elaborate story about a new dad who tried to change his baby’s diaper on a fold down, jump seat. As I got to the part where the dad laid the baby on her back while he held the jump seat down with his knee, Ricky Riccardo came back and placed a small salad in front of me.

“Zees is from Ivan,” he announced as he stood back from the table.

I nodded to him and smiled.  “Thank you.”

“No problem.”  He beamed as he retreated to the water station.

It was ugliest, driest looking salad I had ever seen so I pushed it to the side as I continued my story.  Tim stared at the salad and then back at me.  “That’s your salad,” he said.

“There’s no dressing. And what is this stuff?  It’s not even lettuce.  It’s cabbage or who knows what?”

“Have some salad.”  His voice held an edge.

“I don’t want the salad.”  I calmly stated, the words evenly spaced and heavy on my tongue.

“Eat the salad,” he whispered through clenched teeth. Beads of sweat were forming on his brow. I gave him my most powerful defiant stare.

“Eat – the – damned – salad.”

“Fine.” I pulled the salad over and started to pick at it with my fork suddenly feeling other people’s eyes upon me.  I looked around and noticed them, whispering in hushed tones.

“What is up with you?” I could barely conceal by growing rage. “I thought we were going to have fun.”  Blood was pumping through my veins, banging in my ears.  I took a bite of one of the bitter greens and held up my fork as I chewed it. “This is disgusting. I thought Ivan was your friend.”

Then I saw it.  A velvet box of midnight blue half hidden under shreds of carrot and radicchio.  Panic gripped me like a giant hand and squeezed tight. No, no, no.  I did not want this to happen here. This was not what I had choreographed in my ten-year-old heart as I picked at my chenille bedspread on sleepless nights.  I could see our waiter going from table to table alerting the others to our impending moment.

“Honey,”   Tim leaned on his elbows and bore into me with blinking eyes, “Stop blinking your eyes like that. Take the box out of the salad.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Open the box, Susan.”

“People are staring.”  I attempted another defiant stare but it was difficult to pull off with tears plopping onto the table.

“Open – the – damn – box.”

Though I don’t remember willing them to do so, my shaking fingers pushed away the vegetables and picked up the small velvet cube.  All eyes in the restaurant were on us.  I opened the box and a diamond solitaire caught the candlelight.  I looked up at Tim and stared as his lips moved without sound.  I glanced at the staring eyes to the left and then I glanced at the staring eyes to the right, distorted faces like funhouse mirrors.

“Well?” Tim asked with a face so vulnerable and earnest that I suddenly couldn’t imagine a life without him. “Will you marry me?”

“Yes.”

The room ruptured into cheers as Tim handed me a third vodka and held up his.  And we burst into laughter, toasted each other and cheered along with them.

The whole experience did not play out the way either of us had imagined.  It was not the traditional down on one knee sort of proposal on the beach at sunset, nor was the ring magically unveiled on a covered silver dish as he had hoped.  It was clumsy, unexpected, and filled with nervous emotion on both sides. It was real and heartfelt and awkwardly expressed the way marriage often looks on a daily basis. In retrospect it was the perfect engagement.

“Must be a funny card,” Ms. I Smell Like Lavender commented as I giggled to myself.

“Just brought back some memories,” I sighed as I put the card back in its place, “But it’s not the one I’m going to buy.”

“I think I’m going to get this one,” she confided as she held up a photo of a sunrise on which was printed ‘Every sunrise means another day of loving you’.

I forced myself not to add a sardonic comment and ruin her choice.

She opened the card and pointed to a wall of poetry five inches long. “This poem says it all for me.”

“How many years?”

“One.  Well almost,” she said with a shy smile.  “You?”

“Twenty-four.”

“Wow.  So, what’s the secret?  What have you learned?”

I plucked a simple white card with a simple red heart and opened it for her to see. “This is the card I get for him every year.  Because after awhile, you learn that these are the only three words that matter.”

Moments in Montclair: Clubs Part 2

There came a moment when I knew.  Something was going on in the attic, and I wasn’t invited.  My older brothers, David, Timmy and Todd, came down the stairs in the afternoon, smug and suspicious, and swaggered into the living room.  Timmy flipped the channel to Hogan’s Heroes acting like they didn’t notice I was mid-Father Knows Best.

“Hey, I was watching that,” I said standing up and crossing my arms in anger.

“So,” David said as he smoothed his dark bangs down into his eyes.

“So turn it back,” I demanded as the three of them would laugh.

“I’m telling Mom.”

“Go ahead.”  They knew I wouldn’t.  I wasn’t a tattletale as I knew what that would get me… a mouth full of teeth. So I stormed off into the kitchen for a few Mallomars and a glass of milk with Nestles Quick.  Something was different and I couldn’t put my finger on it. Perhaps it had something to do with the red ink drawing on all of their right forearms of a sword piercing a bloody heart.

The next day I followed them up to the third floor and watched them disappear through a tiny half-door at the edge of the third floor landing.  A space I knew was reserved for Christmas decorations and dead bodies.  It could only mean one thing… a new club had formed.  And that sickening feeling of not belonging enveloped me like Linus’ cloud of dust.  I tip-toed over and placed my ear to the door. I heard murmurings and chants, something like “We Are the Sole Members of the Death Club.  Susan, Kevin, and Joe are not allowed.” I wanted more than anything, at that moment, to be in that club.  Sure I hated the thought of Death, it scared me out of my wits…  but it was cool, and I, clearly, was not.

We lived in a three-story (four if you count the basement) house that had a fair share of odd-shaped closets, dark corners and three attic spaces with separate doors  all of which were home to a secret club at one time or another. The six of us took turns declaring ownership, writing up rules, and deciding who could belong.

One year the Fireball Club was all the rage where you had to be able to suck on a fireball without any facial expression as your tongued burned in order to join. Then came the Let’s Play War, Go Fish is for Sissies club, the Dad is Mean Because He Makes us Do Chores club, the Let’s Light Matches in the Basement club, and the Our Gang knock-off He-man Woman Hater’s Club of which I was not a supporter. The closet on the stairs was home of the Hide From the Monsters club, and the other attic room off the bedroom on the third floor was the perfect spot for weekly meetings of the Seance, Ouija Board and Levitation club. But my favorite, and most memorable club, was The Dance Club.

I was about nine years old and Soul Train and Laugh-In were about the coolest shows a kid could watch.   One Saturday, noticing the house was suspiciously empty, I ventured into Todd and Kevin’s room and heard dance music coming from the closet.  I knocked and pulled on the doorknob and felt it pulled shut from the other side.

“Hey! What’s going on in there?” I yelled through the door.

Silence, the music shut off.

“Open the door!”

Murmuring on the other side.

After a few long minutes, the door opened and Todd, dead serious, stood in bell bottoms and his best shirt with the Nehru collar. His metal medallion glinted as he said, “Come in.”

Timmy sat like an Indian chief with a cassette player on his lap. Patchouli incense smoked in snake-like curls around his head. A lone lightbulb overhead shone down between clothes on hangers pushed to the side. Kevin, my younger brother sat to his right, his chest puffed up beneath his patterned vest.

“We have a new club,” Timmy announced as if the U.N. was listening. “Are you interested?”  Does Dan Rowan love Dick Martin?

“Yes!” I exclaimed with just the right amount of enthusiasm… not too much. “How do you join?”

“You have to wear your coolest clothes, then you have to pass the dance test,” he said matter-of-factly.

“The dance test?”

“We get to pick the song and you have to dance for three minutes here in front of us.  Then we get to vote if your dancing was good enough.”

“Ok.”  I ran to my room and searched for the new tangerine and cream paneled mini skirt my Aunt Catherine had recently bought for me.  I pulled it on, rubbed the six gold buttons to a gleam, and then zipped up my white vinyl knee boots and strutted my stuff back to that closet.

With the seriousness of the Pope in heaven,  the door opened. I stepped below the hanging bulb and Timmy pushed the shiny black button of the cassette player. Bend Me Shape Me  blasted and I shimmied like I was Goldi Hawn trying out for Laugh-In.

When the music ended I was politely asked to leave and the ballots were cast.  Ten minutes later I was inducted into the Closet Dance Club of ’68.  It would be one of my finest moments, a time when I knew who I was and how I fit into the family. I was a sister who mattered and a mighty fine dancer. What more could a nine-year old want?

Looking back, I have plenty of memories of trying to make it. Plenty of memories of wanting to get in. Sometimes I did and sometimes I didn’t. Sometimes I admitted people into my clubs and sometimes I didn’t.  The funny thing is that I have very little memory of clubs lasting more that the initiation phase, because, after that, we lost interest. After that it didn’t really matter. What mattered was that we made it, that we belonged; we were someone others wanted in their club. We felt like a person who counted, someone who deserved to know the secret handshake and the secret password.

And, funny, after all of these years…  it’s still what counts. That we matter to people and that we make them feel that they matter to us.

Next Big Thing

Last week, my friend Karen McCann tagged me to participate in the Next Big Thing online event. Of course, I am always up for some online fun. The Next Big Thing is a way for authors and bloggers to share the news about their most exciting upcoming projects.  Karen is the author of Dancing in the Fountain, a charming and inspiring book about her decision to move from Cleveland, Ohio to Seville, Spain.  She also writes a great blog called Enjoy Living Abroad that is chock full of information about the nuts and bolts of living the expat life.  She has a warm and honest approach, like an old friend letting you in on the secret to happiness. I can honestly say I am jealous of her Next Big Thing, a trip with her husband through the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria, maybe Albania and a few other countries.

So, what’s my next big thing?

I am quite full of news on many fronts as I have taken this year to start a business. I am happily teaching fiction/memoir to adults, hosting writing retreats (the first of which took place in Italy this past October 2012, the second will combine yoga/writing in Tucson’s famous Hacienda Del Sol in June), teaming up with a few dynamic women to start an Arizona Authors Series, and I am in the midst of rewrites for a second book. For the sake of brevity, however, I’ll focus on the book.

I am happy to answer a list of question from the NBT team:

What is the working title of your book?

Right now it is called Book 2.  I prefer an organic approach to writing and the title has yet to raise it’s hand and wave it in my face.  At some point, probably during draft #4 or so, a phrase will stand up and clear its throat.  I’ll let you know when that happens!

Where did the idea come from for the book?

Again, a story has a way of finding us when the time is right. On the eve of turning 50, I found myself emotionally wobbly and depressed. Here I thought I had already had my mid-life crisis, played out in our unplanned move to Italy, and now another was banging on my door. It just didn’t seem fair.

Feeling anxious, I sought out a few experts on midlife transition and began to read about menopause and how fifty is the new forty. The books were pleasant enough. I learned that my midsection was supposedly thickening due to some ancient pre-determined survival instinct (though I would suspect it had something to do with the huge bag of M&M’s sitting to my right).

There were a few moments of “Hell, yes, I am woman!” and the summoning of chutzpah to stand up for myself and tell people who I really am and how they needed to move over and give me elbow room so I could transform into all that I was meant to be. But honestly?  These books did not help much in the peace and happiness category. I felt manipulated by marketing. Fifty is not the new forty at all. There was a profound emotional shift going on for me, one for which I had no words.

I decided then and there to attack the other side of fifty by recommitting myself to the transformational power of surrender. The same philosophy I had come to love and understand years earlier when we lived in Liguria.  I would wait for moments to speak to me of life: where I had come from, who I was now, and where I might be going.  I would wander this unchartered territory without the rulebooks of experts in my hand.  What do they know of me?

So, with a sense of adventure, like that which had breathed new life into my soul long ago,  I headed back to Italy (I was gifted with an unexpected plane ticket… thank you God and the universe, once again.) and sought Travel as my guru and guide.  Travel and adventure are powerful teachers during times of transition. They allow us the emotional space to figure things out, to hear the whispers of our hearts, to claim our truths. Travel helps us slip out of cultural constraints for a time so we can regards ourselves in an honest way.

This book is a compilation of some of these moments abroad. How they taught me to navigate transition and feel inspired once again. They look backward, forward, and inward. They are the moments that have taught me to accept and love who I have become and look forward to the next chapter of my life with renewed vigor and sense of worth.

The process of this book has been so inspiring that I started a blog called ExPat Chat for people who have lived and traveled abroad to share their amazing stories of transformation. I love the joy that emanates from each post.

What genre does your book fall under?

Creative Non-fiction/Memoir

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

I have a great agent, Judith Riven, who will guide me, once again.  I wouldn’t do it without her!

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

It took awhile because one can’t force inspiration. That’s the hitch with this whole surrender thing… the teacher comes when you are ready. It’s about listening and following rather than leading. Quite countercultural, but worth the wait.  I’m in the midst of rewriting at this time. It is my favorite part of the process.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

The insights are wrapped around a girlfriend-y trip through Florence.  Who doesn’t want to go to Florence with her best friend?  I can’t say that the “research” for this book was torture.

And now it’s my pleasure to pass the torch on to four of my favorite writer pals, so that they can tell us about their Next Big Thing.

Stephanie Elliot is a writer, editor, a book reviewer, and has been blogging since 2004. Her first two novels almost-but-not-quite made it to publication the traditional route via her agent. She will self-publish her third novel, What She Left Us via Kindle Direct Publishing in 2013. She lives in Scottsdale, AZ with her husband of almost 20 years and their three children. Find her at Manic Mommy, friend her on Facebook. Follow her on Twitter.

Lian Dolan is an award winning broadcaster and writer. She created Satellite Sisters, a nationally syndicated radio show that won nine Gracie Allen Awards for Excellence. She created and produces The Chaos Chronicles, a humor blog and podcast about modern motherhood. She wrote regular columns for O, The Oprah Magazine and Working Mother and is now the parenting expert atoprah.com. Helen of Pasadena is her first book.

Lynn O’Rourke Hayes For more than twenty-five years Lynn has been writing and speaking about travel, technology, and family issues. From the halls of Congress to the peaks of Peru, she has combined her passion for travel and adventure with her love of family to create a varied and meaningful career. Now through her writing, photography, and consulting, she relishes sharing strategies for balancing family, work, and exploration.

She is the owner and editor of FamilyTravel.com and a weekly travel columnist for the Dallas Morning News. She has worked for two hotel companies and consulted to numerous other organizations within the travel industry.

Laura Munson is the author of the New York Times and international best-seller This Is Not The Story You Think It Is.  She lives and writes in Montana where she leads year-round writing retreats to help people free themselves on the page, no matter where they are in their writing journey.  Spaces are still available for the February 27th- March 3rd retreat.  For more info, click here: 
http://lauramunson.com/retreats.php
.

Laura’s website:

http://lauramunson.com/index.php

Moments in Montclair: Clubs Part 1

Childhood was one long parade of clubs.  Whether you call them troops, patrols, leagues, societies, teams, gangs, dens, or packs, there was always the pressure of getting in and then fitting in.  Half the time I simply hated it.  Of course I kept these feelings to myself as everyone else seemed to thrive in these atmospheres.

I was constantly battling sarcastic banter in my mind. Even as a young child, I was cursed with a sense of ironic humor that I kept to myself in fear that the devil had something to do with it. That these inner caustic remarks were somehow connected to the swirling evil whispers to which Sr. Kenneth, my first grade teacher, always referred.

It started with ballet class in some studio in Upper Montclair that smelled like mildew. I was not limber, not prone to good balance, and my feet cramped even with the thought of toe shoes.  The teacher separated our class into two groups. My section ended up in bare feet, bent over at the waist with arms hanging to the floor as we swayed and made elephant noises. That was the end of my career with The Joffrey Ballet.

Then came Scouts. I proudly wore my Brownie uniform with a little chocolate-colored beanie and smart leatherette belt. We met in the church basement and did activities that earned us merit badges that said things like “Bugs” and “Flowers” and “First Aid”. God help the person that fell on a sidewalk with a heart attack in front of me. Though I swore I’d place my hands on the sternum and manually pump blood until help came along, I knew I would just cry and stare in panic.  Give me a bleeding scratch, though, and I could place a mean band-aid.

My poor mother, after a day filled with the needs of caring for six children, would sit up nights sewing these round and triangle badges in neat rows on my sash. I was diligent in earning as many as I could because we were being lured to become full-fledged Girl Scouts with the promise of camping trips and s’mores by a roaring fire under the stars.

I dreamed of these camping trips because my brothers were in Boy Scouts and they went camping all the time. Their eyes would light up as they re-told tales of daring and adventure around our dinner table when they would return.  They even spent two glorious weeks at Camp Glen Gray in Mahwah, NJ every summer in these cool tent lean-to’s and ate camp food and paddled canoes like the Indians.

Our troop leader kept referring to the night we would “fly up” to Girl Scouts. I had visions of grand ceremony and lightness of feet. I was disgusted to find that “flying up” referred to clomping across a wobbly bridge nailed together by Mr. Parker, the church custodian and standing next to adult women dressed in pale green uniforms that matched ours.  I remember searching the crowd of twenty parents perched on metal folding chairs and locking eyes with my mother knowing that we both knew this was lame.

Somehow the allure of scouting began to fade at that moment.  We never once camped anywhere, but we learned to sell cookies, by golly, and earn a badge that said “Business Owner”.  And once I got a gold star.

Maybe I was meant to play a sport.  Pre-Title IX, our town was about boys’ sports. If you  were a girl, you were limited to cheer leading, gymnastics, basketball, and tennis. My early ballet experience told me that the first two choices were out. My tennis experience was limited to spaghetti stringed wood rackets and hitting balls in the street with my brother Kevin, so I decided to give basketball a try. I’d played a few rounds of HORSE and Around the World in my life.

I tried out for the eighth grade basketball team.  I knew I how to dribble and I had a decent foul shot, but I was soon benched when it became clear I had no feel for the game. When the coach put me in, I didn’t know what to do, so I just ran around avoiding any possible contact with the ball. I was enthusiastic, however, and good at cheering on my teammates. Back then, we didn’t get trophies for simply making the team, but the uniform was cute.

I knew these organizations were striving to help me “know myself” and build “self-esteem” by being an integral part of a group, but for me, the closer I got to high school the less I seemed to know who I was.  All I knew at that point was that I was good at joining, following directions, making fun of it all, and quitting.  The clubs that really taught me about life were the ones we created in our own home and neighborhood.  Those I will get to next time!

Moments in Montclair: The Street

We never needed a sport court. We grew up with something called a “street”.  Ardsley Rd. was a gently sloping, maple-lined, three-block stretch that connected Grove St. and Ridgewood Ave. Part baseball diamond, part tennis court, part drag strip for the trial run of the soap box derby, it was our gathering place. We didn’t need painted lines or fancy material underfoot to soften falls, we had chalk and asphalt.  We’d draw our own boundaries as was required for the game, carefully counting the footage by placing our sneakers heel to toe, heel to toe in a straight line.

As kids, we thought Ardsley Rd. was quite steep.  We’d race our bikes down it during the summer and our sleds during the winter. The gutters would turn into “rivers” when it rained and we’d compete in regattas with our small boats (sticks carefully broken into a perfect racing size) to the sewers. Fall would gather colored leaves into mounds that insisted that we run through them at high speed spattering reds and yellows and browns  like spots of paint on a black canvas.

Cars were simply a nuisance, and we were forever exasperated when one decided to drive past. Could the drivers not see that we were busy?

Games were no laughing matter. They were serious, highly competitive displays of power and cunning.  On any given day a handful of the fifty or so children that lived on Ardsley would gather, thrust their dukes into circle and the oldest would start…”One potato, two potatoes, three potatoes, four…” Soon we’d be divided into teams and deciding on a game, the possibilities of which were endless.

There was always someone who declared him/herself an “expert” in the rules though most of them were made up as we went. It was very official. And I can’t, for the life of me, remember an adult ever butting in.

Looking back, I can see that the street imparted lessons in a way that mattered.  It taught us about boundaries. We were all quite conscious of whose property belonged to whom.  My brother, Kevin, and his best friend, Martin, often ended a fight with the exclamation “Get off my property!” which would promptly be obeyed. Ownership meant something, and we respected it. Our homes were safe. Our lawns were safe. Our front walks were safe. We had somewhere to retreat, to exhale, to be in charge.

The street, however, was neutral ground.  A manageable strip of the world where we chose to engage. Competition was about friendship, about learning who we were when compared to others. About the way life went your way one day and not the next. How you were good at stick ball but terrible at frisbee. Where we realized that a peer’s pat on the back fueled you in ways that your mother’s couldn’t and, thus, reached out to others who needed a “great catch” or a “nice hit” even though it was a foul ball.

The street was a classroom. Our teacher was human nature. This is what I miss for our youth of today. I live in a small neighborhood with a large number of kids. I never see anyone.  I wonder where, if ever, they experience that freedom, that natural way of learning about the ways of the world. When they are allowed to brush up against their limits in an unstructured environment. Life is controlled now. Controlled by us, the adults. How my life’s lessons would have been different had our parents been involved in the dynamics of our education on Ardsley Rd.

It’s a different America today, they say. And they are right.  And in this election year, all I can think of is this… Who will restore the America I fell in love with?  Who can restore the trust that enables us to let our children roam free in our own neighborhoods? Who will make it possible for them to stand without fear on their own front lawns and declare to their friends, “Get off my property” but hope at the same time that they will meet them, again, in the street the next afternoon?

Regardless of party lines, I would vote for that person.

Moments in Montclair 4

Sr. Kenneth

Part 2

Sr. Kenneth Mary lived in the convent across the street from the school on the corner of Munn St. and Cottage Pl.  When I passed it, I would walk quickly. It may have been a plain brick building, but it held mystery.  It made my palms sweat.

We had all seen Sr. Kenneth and the other Sisters of Charity go in and come out from to time, but for the life of us, we could not figure out what went on in there.  Rumor had it that the sisters were on lockdown between the hours of 4:00 PM and 7:00 AM.  They weren’t allowed to leave, and they never ate. Maybe they were allowed to sleep but they wore their full habits. Just trying to picture Sr. Kenneth in a flannel nightgown made us queasy. Not once did I ever see one of the Sisters around town, and believe me, I looked for them.

Besides teaching us perfect penmanship, Sr. Kenneth loved tests. Not just spelling and math, though you could tell she thought they were thrilling by the way her voice went up an octave when she gave directions. She loved to trick us with tests of courage and moral rectitude, and we wouldn’t know she was doing it until someone was busted.

The first time she pulled it on us was after a morning recess. She sat quietly behind her desk with a stenographer’s notebook and a Bic pen. The rule was that we were to come in and fold our arms on our desk and put our heads down until the class was calm. Then she would give us the next direction. On this seemingly regular Thursday morning, we came in and put our heads down, but she didn’t say a word.  The silence dragged on to an alarming extent, at least five minutes. Though no one was bold enough to raise his/her head to see what was amiss, I could see frantic eyeballs rolling in every direction. What was going on here?

Kathy, a sweet girl with brown pigtails to my left, began to whisper to those of us within earshot that she had a few of those chocolate “Ice Cube” candies left over from her snack.  She swore that they tasted really cold. The more she whispered the more I wanted to taste one to see if it really was as frosty as something that comes from a freezer.

As Sr. Kenneth sat staring opaquely from her chair, Kathy began to slip them to her friends. My mother never bought such frivolous things for our lunch bags, so I slipped my hand across the aisle in a stealth-like fashion making sure that the rest of my body and head did not move. Kathy placed the Ice Cube, wrapped in shiny gold foil, in my hand. Continuing my stealth move to my lap, I promptly unwrapped the candy and slipped into my mouth as I fake coughed the way I had seen my brother Timmy do when he would sneak ribbon candy from a bowl at my grandmother’s house. Just as I silently declared that there was nothing even remotely cold about this chocolate, Sr. Kenneth announced, “If I call your name please stand.”

“Kathy.”

“Maureen.”

“John.”

“MIchael”

“Susan.”

One by one we stood, shaking and swallowing. Then she went on to deliver a lengthy sermon about the importance of trust and rule following and the reality of evil and its whispers all around us. Kathy and I exchanged shocked looks. Evil? The only whisper I had heard was Kathy’s.

Then later that afternoon, Sr. Kenneth entered after lunch in an even more morose mood, if that was even possible.  When an hour of The Palmer Method ceased to enliven her, she asked us to sit with our hands folded at our desks.  There was nothing odd about that as this was our “go to” posture between subjects.  After this morning’s humiliation I sat up straight and placed my palms together in the holiest way possible, lining up my fingers perfectly with those on the other hand the way she showed us.  I didn’t move a muscle and refused to listen to any evil whispers that might be swirling about.

After a few long, silent minutes she asked, “Is there anyone in the class that can tell time?”  I had no idea how to read a clock, but when a dozen other hands shot up I joined them.  Heck, I wanted to be seen as savvy and advanced. I wanted to redeem myself. There was no clock on our wall, and it wasn’t like she was asking anyone to prove it.

She looked around the room slowly, searching the faces of the proud few of us time-tellers and said, “Susan, why don’t you go out to the hallway, see what time it is, and come back in and tell us.”

“Okay,” I whispered.  I stood up, gulped, smoothed my blue plaid jumper, pulled up my navy knee socks and started up the aisle.  Faces of classmates loomed and smiled, growing distorted like those in a funhouse mirror. I was screwed, again.  There was nothing I could do but leave the classroom and figure it out.

I slipped out the door and leaned against the wall, afraid to move.  I had never been in the hallway alone, and, suddenly it was the biggest space I had ever seen.  Pale green walls the color of mucous punctuated here and there by varnished wood doors.  Only a few steps to my left was THE OFFICE. I’d never been in there either, and I hoped I never would. My brother Todd had told me all sorts of scary tales about the principal, Sr. Maria Michael. She had something he called “a hairy eyeball” that she was always giving him. Todd spent a fair share of time in this hallway ‘gathering’ himself before Mrs. Docken would let him come back into their second grade classroom.  As a matter of fact I knew he was sitting behind the last door on the left right now.

The clock was a huge white orb that clung to the wall near the ceiling, its thin black arms like those of a traffic cop when he signals the lanes in front of him to stop. I looked around in a panic.  Though I knew that time was ticking away, I had no idea how to name it.  The whole class was waiting for me to come back and enlighten them. If I said the wrong thing, I would be doomed forever.  I searched the hall for help. Nothing, not a soul.  My heart pounded in my ears, I stepped toward the wall clock as if closer proximity would reveal the answer.  I watched the second hand travel.  I bent my head back and looked to the ceiling so the tears in my eyes could pool at the corners rather than roll down my cheeks. Things were not going well for me in First Grade either. I had such high hopes when I started.

And then, just as I was about to pull the classroom door open in shame, an angel appeared. An honest to goodness eighth grader on her way to THE OFFICE with a note.

“Excuse me,” I asked timidly, my voice but a squeak in the vast emptiness.  “Can you tell me what time it is?”  She stopped, her kindness like a welcome mist in the desert, and said, “Why, it’s twelve past one.”

“Thank you,” I replied as I watched her sashay past me and disappear in a blonde swish into THE OFFICE.  Obviously, my holy hands had not been for naught.  I dried my tears with the hem of my jumper and opened the classroom door. Then I stepped before the class and announced, “Twelve past one.”

Sr. Kenneth looked at me over her spectacles, checked her watch and said, “Thirteen past. But close enough. Fine work.”

“Thank you.”  These were the moments that made God real to a six year old.  I walked back down the row, careful not to appear too proud, and resumed my seated position. Left hand against the right, lining up the fingers in the holiest way possible.

Moments in Montclair Part 3

 

The Palmer Method

I was informed, after a solemn kindergarten graduation ceremony, that I would be bidding my pals Tommy and Robert adieu and heading to Immaculate Conception Grammar School for the remainder of my elementary school years.  Excited at the prospect of joining my brothers who were already there, I was fitted for a blue plaid jumper and a pair of brand new black and white saddle shoes.

Early one brisk September morning, I set off with a baloney and cheese sandwich in my new book bag, behind David, Timmy and Todd, and walked the 1.2 miles to my new school.  Because they had been taking this trek for a few years now, my brothers ignored my mother’s suggested route to school and took me down back roads and across the train tracks at Walnut St. Station where undesirables gathered from time to time.  My education of the world outside my previous five block radius had begun.

I found myself in a classroom with freshly varnished floors and wooden desks in straight rows.  I found myself taking a seat and staring into the darting black eyes of Sr. Kenneth Mary.  She was a marvel to behold. A creamy bespectacled face, gripped by a white wimple, that floated above a mountain of navy material that fell in mysterious folds to the floor.  I was used to my mother’s face, dazed and floating above mounds of laundry that she carried up and down the stairs, but she at least she had legs to anchor her. This creature seemed to hover an inch above the floor.  And she scared me to death.

As she called roll, I tried to figure out how she could have the first name of a man. And then I noticed a shadow of darker hair above her lip. For all I knew Sr. Kenneth Mary was a Kenneth.  I decided then and there to leave that mystery unsolved. I swore on my heart that I would not make the same mistakes on the playground that I did in kindergarten.  I was turning over a new leaf. As we were read the inexhaustible list of rules for the classroom, I knew I’d have no wiggle room for anything but  holy behavior.

Sr. Kenneth taught us to sit up straight and fold our hands. She taught us how to stand still in parallel lines, to ignore hunger and fatigue and urges to go to the bathroom until bells rang. She showed us the proper way to genuflect in church, and how to fill our mite boxes with pennies during Lent. But, her greatest joy, the moments when she was most animated and excited, was when she was teaching us perfect penmanship.

She had a thing about it. The pronunciation of the letter “p” gave her a certain thrill. I can still hear that forced puff of air projected through her pursed lips.

“Please, children, take your Palmer Methods and place them on your desks,” she’d instruct as she inserted five pieces of white chalk into a brace-like object that she would use to draw straight lines across the chalkboard.  As she was lining those boards we’d scramble to find the correct page and unzip our pencil cases in search of a no.2 pencil with a sharp tip.

Then, she’d call five or six lucky students to the board and show them how to correctly hold chalk, four fingers on one side, thumb on the other, so that the arm would be free to move about in a wide circle. (If you had the unfortunate “condition” of being a lefty, you were asked to take your seat. Bumping elbows or opposite motions were not allowed.)

The rest of us at our seats would practice in our Palmer books.

“Okay people, place the point of your pencil on the black line and proceed,” she would say, a tiny spray of saliva visible with eachP. As she floated up and down the rows, she’d chant a three beat rhythm to which we were supposed to draw perfect circles with tops and bottoms that just barely touched the black lines above and below them.

“One, two, three.  One, two, three. One, two, three.”

The kids at the board, like happy window washers, would draw circles upon circles that would eventually resemble Slinkies stretched to the limit. We, at our seats, would fill page after page as Sr. Kenneth would stop here and there to lightly press ourpinkies to the paper (Pinkies were made by God to anchor and guide the hand!) or wonder aloud if perhaps poor Paul would end up repeating first grade if his penmanship did not improve. (Poor Paul being one of those leftys who never got to stand at the board.)

Weeks turned into months and practiced these circles endlessly until poor Paul had the nerve, one Tuesday morning, to ask (without raising his hand first!) when we might possibly be able to advance to an actual letter.  The room fell to a dead quiet as we collectively held our breaths to see what Sr. Kenneth would do.  A bit shocked, herself, at the audacity of such a break in our routine, she strode over to Paul, rosary beads jangling somewhere in the navy folds, and peered down at him over her rimless glasses.

“And what letter do you propose?”  she asked plainly.

“Well,” thought Paul as he chewed on his pencil and pondered. “I can write my name real well. How about a “P”?”

Sr. Kenneth actually smiled a half-smile, and the rest of us exhaled when it was apparent that Paul would would live to see another day. She picked up Paul’s Palmer book, thumbed through a few pages, sighed, and then replaced it on his desk slanted to the right to suit his left-handed technique and said, “We’ll start with “A” next Monday. Now, please, pupils, pick up your pencils andproceed with your practice.”

The Dragonflies

I just returned from four glorious days nestled deep in the evergreen woodlands of Northern Arizona.  Rim country they called it, referring to the Mogollon Rim. Two hundred miles of dramatic rock formations, deep canyons and more sky than you have ever seen at one time.  Three of my treasured writing pals and I gathered at a mountain cabin in Christopher Creek. Call it retreating, recharging, the rebirth of the muse, call it the long exhale.  Okay, call it heaven if you must.

I am well into a job transition, deciding to leave the classroom and develop a writing based business that encompasses all of my loves: writing, teaching, speaking, traveling, and more writing.  It has not been an easy road.  And though I knew, as I stepped in that direction, that few writers can make a living this way, I felt a pull toward it. A call. And if I have learned anything from writingHalfway to Each Other, it is to follow that call, no matter how absurd it may sound to you or those around you.  It is the call of your creative soul, the dwelling place of sanity, of peace. It will only call you, and if you don’t answer it…who will?

These past two months, particularly, I have been working furiously on a new book.  It has taken awhile to get started on it, but now I am in the thick of process, shaping and rewording and spilling blood. Recently the pieces were more difficult to birth. The muse was stingy, my well of words running dry.  Pulling the proper ones into place became arduous like lining up pebbles on a steep slant. They kept rolling, shifting, falling over edges. I didn’t realize that I was entering extreme fatigue, not the kind that sends you in search of a pillow, but the kind that sends you in search of a glass of wine hoping your muse is swimming in it.

When I was invited to join these writers, I left my computer at home. I found an old notebook and pen and off I went without expectation. I awoke the first morning, rubbed the sleep from my eyes, grabbed a mug of steaming coffee and ventured onto a wraparound deck that stood fifty feet from a creek, the border of the Tonto National Forest.  Surrounded by greens of every shade and texture, I felt immediately calmed. The sort of calm that comes from a mother’s hand on your shoulder. I could stand and stare into that green forever, watch the tall grasses gently bending with drops of dew, count and recount the species of trees and bushes and wildflowers that poked their heads up to greet the sun.

All of a sudden a large dragonfly with bulging iridescent blue green eyes stopped about twenty feet from me and hovered as if he was surprised that a human had appeared.  I stood still and held his gaze to see what he might do. He continued to hover, did not go about his merry dragonfly way.  Then he slowly advanced toward me, inch by steady inch, until I could hear the beating of his wings.

“Hello there, my friend,” I whispered thinking my words would scare him off. “Good morning to you, too!”  The sound did not scare him at all, he only moved closer.  And when it became uncomfortable I waved him off until he buzzed above my head and over the roof of the cabin.

I was intrigued by our greeting of each other and chewed on it all day as I went for a hike through the forest and then sat with my friends as we shared meals and writing prompts and picked apart shorts stories written by the masters of our time.  The memory of him perched on my shoulder as I fixed an early afternoon gin and tonic, that we all agreed was medicinal, for one of us who had received a deflating rejection letter that very noon. And he haunted my dreams, in a good way, as I slept the deep restorative sleep that comes when you find the courage to break open the shell of your heart and share your fears with like minded comrades around a campfire that sends red sparks to meet the full moon.

The next day, he returned, but it was not for a morning greeting and it was not alone.  The four of us were seated in folding chairs, in the shade of the bordering forest, working silently on the art of imagery. We were, if I may speak for all of us, happily lost in creative wonderfulness. The way it feels when your words are pulsing upwards like geysers and soothing hot springs. As we painted metaphors and placed poetic phrases in our notebooks and wrapped these images around our hearts, the dragonflies appeared. As we answered the knocking doors of our souls, walked toward that voice that has called us, quietly and persistently, all of our lives, to write and claim our places as true artists, they swarmed in gentle circles over our heads.

We looked up from our notebooks and remarked about the magic of that particular moment. Indeed it was. The dragonflies never landed, never bothered us in any way. They did, however, perform a dragonfly ballet to the music that only a writer can hear as he/she creates. Their dance, a visual response to our collective song of joy.

Upon my return home, yesterday, I looked up the meaning of the dragonfly and was not surprised at what I found.  A powerful symbol in many cultures it represents a number of things.  It stands for renewal, positive force and the power of life.  Because it has wings sensitive to even the slightest breezes, it represents change. Also a creature of water, it is symbolic of the subconscious, the dreaming mind, a reminder to pay attention to our deeper thoughts and desires. Lastly, because it has such a short life it reminds us of the value of living in the moment. Living life to the fullest by heeding the call of our souls and making choices to connect and give birth to that which we are called to create, whatever that means and however that looks.

Those moments with the dragonflies will inspire me the rest of my life. Those four days were vital ones that have restored me on many levels.  I share this story, this moment in my writer’s journey, as encouragement to others who may feel stuck or unsure. For those who have written themselves dry, or have piled manuscripts into a drawer afraid to share them with the light of day.

Seek renewal from those who share your creative journey. Find the courage to stand before the dragonfly and bid him a fine morning then welcome him to begin his pirouettes as you let your soul free.

Peace is a Group Effort

Kindergarten Can Be a Tough Place

Grove St. School

There are plenty of folks who claim that their first memories reach all the way back to the womb or at the very least, toddlerhood.  I am not one of them. Squeezing my eyes shut and searching my inner filing cabinet, I thumb through the folders and land squarely in Mrs. Kreager’s kindergarten class at Grove Street School. There are three memories to be exact, and I find it interesting that they were seared into the hippocampus of my brain by the driving emotions of anger, fear, and power.

It all started with my white jewelry box. Adorned with pink roses and a golden latch, it set a tulle dressed ballerina a-twirl every time I opened it.  She danced in a circle on her satin toe shoes before an oval mirror and guarded the rings and necklaces that lay perfectly arranged below her. It was my most precious possession and I had brought it in for Show-and-Tell. Dutifully, I placed it on the Special Shelf reserved for Show-and-Tell treasures that was off-limits to the class.

Mid-morning, as I carefully inserted a half-circle shaped block inside a larger one to complete a block tower of architectural excellence, I heard the familiar tinkling of a music box. I turned my head and saw two boys, Tommy and Robert, trying on two of my rings. As I charged toward them, Tommy slammed the top shut and they both ducked into the corner playhouse.  Incensed, I gently opened the box to make sure all was okay, and to my horror, my lovely ballerina laid sideways, limp and broken at her slender ankles. I carried it, sobbing, to Mrs. Kreager who decided, in the end, that there simply was not enough evidence to convict Tommy and Robert of wrongdoing. The weight of injustice and the accompanying anger covered me like my electric blanket when I turned the control dial-up to number ten.

Tommy and Robert, however, were not happy that I would have the gall to tell on them. So during lunch hour they cornered me by the jungle gym and proceeded to scream in my face and push me to the ground. I curled into a ball and protected my head as I imagined my own legs bent sideways forever like the ballerina’s. To make matters worse, they followed me as I walked home pushing me into pricker bushes and threatening death if I told anyone.  In 1964 we didn’t know about bullying, I didn’t have words for what was happening. Petrified, I endured these attacks for a week until Mrs. Powers, our neighbor, drove by one afternoon and witnessed it.  A few phone calls later, Tommy and Robert were doomed.

Suspiciously, they went missing from class for a few days so I was able to regain my composure.  When they returned, Mrs. Kreager reseated them on the opposite side of the patchwork gathering carpet that everyone knew was just a bunch of samples from the rug store across the street. I saw them whispering throughout the morning and I felt that familiar panic rise though me as we lined up for recess. As we streamed out the door onto the black top, I ran for a swing thinking I could kick one in the face if I pumped hard enough.

Then, the most curious thing happened.  To this day I wonder about the dynamic of it all as it surprised me as much as anyone else. How easy it was to indoctrinate a mild-mannered five-year-old girl into a life of crime.  Tommy and Robert grabbed my arm and then stood on either side of me creating an uncomfortable bully sandwich.  Instead of pummeling me, Tommy said, “We’re sorry.  To make it up to you, we will beat up anyone you want us to.”

“Yeah,” added Robert, his fists pumping, “just point ‘em out.”  Now, I was not the aggressive type and had no other enemies that I knew of. The last thing I wanted to do was beat anyone up.

“No, that’s okay,” I said, shaking my head.

“I said point ‘em out,” Robert repeated through gritted teeth.

“Come on,” said Tommy,”recess is only ten minutes.” They started to squeeze against my ribs and visions of the broken ballerina began to swirl around me.  The memory of pricker bushes and the taste of raw fear bubbled into the back of my throat. This was survival of the fittest.

“If you don’t pick someone we’ll do it for ya,” said Robert. “We might even pick you again.”

And then I heard these words come out of my mouth, “That kid in the red jacket.” And off they ran.  Seconds later the kid in the red jacket, whom I had never seen before, had a mouth full of dirt.

This scenario played itself out every day until it started to feel good.  It was like I was the queen of the playground. All I needed to do was point, and the girl who had taken the last snack that morning was shoved into a tree trunk, the boy who had hogged all of the Lincoln Logs was pressed against the chain link fence until diamond shapes imprinted on his cheek. I was suddenly drunk with power. I felt like a player, a somebody, a contender.  I had no idea I had become a bully myself until Tommy and Robert were apprehended once again and sang like canaries in the principal’s office.

Then the three of us disappeared for a few days to learn a few lessons about kindness and how to control base human behavior. Upon our return, the patchwork gathering carpet had been divided into three sections and each of us sat at a different one.

Looking back on this I realize the power of human emotion to override what we innately know to be harmful to others.  Powerful, instinctual emotions can rise up, like flood waters, and carry us to a place we never wanted to end up.  Anger, fear, and power rule our decisions and our world in many ways.  It takes patient and loving guidance from parents, teachers and friends to help us understand ourselves and develop empathy for others. Our schools have come a long way in educating  us and our children in the arena of bullying, but I dare to say that as a nation, we have a ways to go.