MountainMornings

On the drive up to the Jersey Shore to see Parlor Mob debut their second album, we listened to an interview on NPR of a Harvard Psych and Public Policy Professor. Paula Caplan wrote When Johnny and Jane Come Marching Home and her message on this weekend was to speak to a Vet about his war experience. Allowing them the space to talk, and listening with an open mind and heart, can do more than any therapist or drug regimen combined could do to help them cope with life after war.

So when we arrived at my in-Laws, I asked Hudson if he had seen combat on his ship, the Zaniah, during WWII. He told us he was up on the deck one morning in Okinawa, when he saw a plane coming low, straight toward him. He thought it was “…one of ours,” there was no “general quarters” alarm.  At the last minute, it swerved and crashed into another ship. He looked at me with such wisdom, and it made me think of my brother Jim’s story. About being in Saigon at the Officer’s Club and the siren’s blowing and this guy who left and took cover under his bunk and was killed by a stray bullet.

That may be the hardest existential question of all. Why did I survive, when other good men and women perished? And each Johnny and Jane has to answer that for themselves. At our Wedding, in my kitchen, my step-brother Eric and Jim talked for the very first time about their Vietnam experience. Jim was an Intelligence Officer, Eric a med-evac helicopter pilot. My teenage self thought Eric would be safe with a big Red Cross on the side of his Huey; later he told me they were targets for the VC. He was one of very few pilots to survive.

Jim and Eric on Right

To all our veterans, and active-duty service men and women, today and every day in every part of the world, thank you.

Women of a certain age have experienced “Consciousness Raising Groups,” where as young feministas we learned to ask for what we want and be assertive, without too much aggression. We refused to take typing tests, carried around Our Bodies Ourselves like it was the bible, and some of us burned our bras. This is why the TV series Mad Men does not appeal to us, we were Mad Women! Then we married and had children and joined “Play Groups” with our babies, where we’d discuss our lives and continue learning from each other. If one of us was sick, we’d stop by with soup (chicken was my specialty). We nursed each others babies if need be. When my toddler went on a hunger strike, I remember thinking, really, I can cut up peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and she might eat that? We supported and nourished each other.

And now I have “Book Club” in the Blue Ridge. I moved here almost 7 years ago, when my youngest, the Rocker, took off for college.  A wonderful neighbor, Kay, asked me if I’d like to join her Book Club. I love reading and missed my old book clubbers. In my Shore town, we all knew each other from our children’s school, so our time was spent about halfway on literature and half on gossip. I was a little down, thinking I’ll never have friends again like the ones who knew me “when.” But the smart Southern women of Ivy Farms Book Club have stood the test of time: through moving – when we left Ivy Farms and built our ‘not so big’ house on the hill a 25 minute drive away – and through illness, divorce and even the death of a spouse. Some are sending their children off to college, and some are moving their parents into assisted living close-by, but we are are all still in it together. We are rock solid, we are here for each other. Or as Oprah just put it, “I see you, I hear you, And what you say matters to me.”

The book we discussed last night was Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson. It was a resounding success. It’s so nice to read about love at a certain age, and the possibility of change, of redemption. Oh and we hit a few hot topics, like the powerful Strauss-Kahn who thought he was above our rule of law. Thanks to our hostess, Virginia, who served us an Indian feast to honor Mrs Ali. And goodbye Oprah, thanks for the memories.

Not being one to believe in the end of days, Rapture, mass hallucination craze, I decided to stay up late and watch Lady Gaga on SNL. But if you think about it, the fact that Oprah is leaving her daytime spot and according to Forbes, Gaga is already surpassing Ms O in her business model, well, maybe we should start stockpiling food. Before taking on the Mama Monster, here is  a shout out to my Jersey Girlfriend, a stunning performer with an incredible voice. Nicole Atkins is a woman with pipes! Her second album was just released “Mondo Amore.” Do yourself a favor, and listen to her croon.

Nicole Atkins

I have to just say it, I don’t get the Gaga thing. Maybe it’s that I’m not 12? I was really trying to get her, but watching her performance last night convinced me – Madonna does it better. My Mother had Mae West, my sister had Marilyn, and we had Janis. And they had talent, with a capital T. Bob took the Bride to see Madonna at Madison Square Garden when she was doing her Blonde Ambition Tour. It was akin to seeing Janis Joplin on his college campus, and taking this picture – Epic!

Janis at Duke 1968

But the Grammy egg thing? What’s that all about? Last night Gaga nailed the comedy sketches with Justin Timberlake. But her dancing and voice leave a lot to be desired. I’ll give her points for spectacle, but I’ve got a feeling Lady Gaga is going to self-implode; she doesn’t seem to have the chops. And who am I to critique this phenomenon? Remember my Adelaide and her Hot Box “Take Back Your Mink” routine?

The dogwoods are done blooming, but limos are seen driving everywhere about town. It’s not Lady Gaga on her way to SNL that has those ubiquitous black sedans pulling up outside restaurants, or this weekend’s UVA graduation with its influx of celebrity parents. Nope, it’s time for that teenage angst or rite of passage known as Prom!

Nathan and Adelaide

I went to my Senior Prom with my future husband and co-star in Guys and Dolls (aka Nathan Detroit). Real life vaguely resembled that Runyonesque musical comedy because it actually did take him 13 years to propose. So naturally when the New York Times asked its readers for their own prom pictures I was happy to oblige.  Noting we should only add a few sentences, I took them at their word. After a few rejection letters from this publishing giant – ps, I never thought they’d print us, page 5 – let me elaborate here. http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2011/05/19/us/20110519_PROM_USERGEN.html

Back then, in 1966, we didn’t drink or do drugs, well at least I didn’t. We also didn’t “go all the way” in high school, imagine. Strangely enough, we still managed to have fun. We drove down to the Shore afterwards with our geeky/drama club friends, the same people we still celebrate Thanksgiving with almost every year – the Big Chill group. We spread out blankets on the beach and we swam and buried each other in sand till dawn. We were heady with the freedom of it all. Thinking back, I had a pretty progressive flapper Mother!

Big Chill at Holden Beach

We made our own dresses and drove our parents’ cars. Granted I inherited my big brother’s teensy Renault, but having one’s own car in high school was unusual. Skipping ahead to the Bride’s Prom, she refused to go with a gaggle of girls and waited for the formal invite. I never had any pictures, but heard it was great fun. She found a beautiful white Calvin Klein dress, that she managed to wear at her sorority formal too! By the time the Rocker was Prom material, I was serving on the School Board, making things a bit dicey. He wasn’t interested in proms, he had his metal band holed up in our garage day and night. Luckily, Title 9 extended to outdated notions of who should ask who to prom, and we actually had to buy him a tux since he was invited to so many.

Blonde Rocker on Right

I love having a vivid dream that wakes me up with an “Aha” moment, propelling me to either: book a dental cleaning; cut my hair; get a divorce; or say, start walking. Last night I dreamed I was dropped on a mountain with two Corgis and had to herd them downhill to a field. OK, there was more that included a rabbi and a priest but I won’t delve too deep into our collective unconscious. I’m pretty sure I know where this doggie dream came from.

The week before, I was making my usual excuse at a party for no longer taking a daily meditative walk – my dogs just can’t handle it. For years I would head out the door with two dogs and walk two miles across the little spit of peninsula we called home on the Jersey Shore. It was a perfectly flat, beautiful road appropriately named Buena Vista Avenue. I’d catch sight of egrets nesting in the trees, greet my fellow walkers and bikers, and generally feel as if I did something right, even if that’s all I managed to accomplish in a day. Stress melted away, like a Calgon commercial. My Welsh Corgis loved to walk – I remember a Vet telling me once that walking your dog was like taking a kid to the circus every day!

Now I’m almost two miles from a paved road, on a long, gravelly, mountainous driveway, with a 15 year old 100 pound dog (Buddha) who can’t walk well, or even get in the car anymore, and his two year old, little housemate (Miss Bean). Bean starts heaving and gagging as soon as I manage to corral her into the car; she has been car sick since the day we brought her home from the great no-kill shelter in town, Charlottesville Albemarle SPCA. She should have come with a warning, “Beware, cute but barfs in car.”

The constellation of events that triggered my dream include my recent excuse-making ploy, followed by my cousin Anita recounting her tragic hiking tour through Provence while I was tasting my first Absinthe (yes, it’s legal now), and then reading in June’s Real Simple magazine that three 40 minute walks a week can lead to a 2% growth in the Hippocampus. Yep, we can prevent brain shrinkage and presumably memory loss if we would only hike a little! I swear, it’s on page 12, “The Simple List.”

So, I’m off to buy hiking boots, and maybe a Taser, just in case I meet up with a bear on the way to the street. Tasers are legal, right?

The Driveway Beckons

As most of you already know, I started this here blogging thing to help me make sense of my daughter, the Bride’s wedding. Like any good writer, I kept at it long after the last bill was paid. Managing not to even mention a certain Royal Wedding that just took place across the pond, while tornadoes and now floods here at home became footnotes to the Royal Couple’s honeymoon plans. Well, this morning I awoke to the news that the Governor and First Lady of California are separating. Maria Shriver, niece of JFK, is a part of the family we Americans call home-grown royalty…and now she’s joining the ranks of the Baby Boomer’s final hurrah – the Grey Divorce (pronounced ‘dee-vor-say’).

The single largest age group with increasing divorce statistics, Boomers ranging in age from 45 to 65, have never done things the conventional way. After all, we participated in Love-Ins, pushed for the Pill, and dared to institute the “No-Fault” divorce, aka irreconcilable differences. Before us, women had to prove their man was a philanderer or a wife-beater to break free. Now, marriage is on the decline and grey divorce is on the incline, what’s happening here?

My first clue about this trend was the Tipper and Al Gore break-up. People married for 30 plus years are calling it quits for a variety of different reasons: women’s financial independence; we’re living longer and were never meant to be monogamous, like geese; and wait for it, one day after the kids leave home, we turn to each other and ask the age old question, “Who are you?” My in-Laws have been married for thirty years, the Bride was their Flower Girl. They found love later in life; the widower (H) found A after a messy divorce. A is still a marriage and family counselor, at age 87; and H is a woodcarver, a WWII veteran who used to be a Baptist missionary and pastoral counselor. Here he is at the Bride’s wedding rehearsal.

H - Grandpa and Officiant

I don’t need to ask them what they’re doing tonight. They’ll be meeting their friends for pot pie at a diner, cause that’s what they do on Tuesdays. Growing old gracefully takes tending, just like friends or a garden or a marriage.