The Wood Elf's Open Salon Blog

The Greatest Generation Swings

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 18:08:17 -0400

Moving masterfully among the throng of thirty somethings gamely trying to remember Cotillion lessons and the young dads with toddlers, the Greatest Generation men commanded attention. They stood out like a starched shirt among rumpled collars.

When a song began, they took hold of their partners with decisive firmness. They led. Their khakis tonight easily transmute into the khakis of the 1940s, their partners move and twirl and transform into the impossible slim beauties in pleated skirts and rolled curls.

These old guys simply dance the youth around them under the table.

It occurs to me that dancing somehow makes the body transparent and the soul visible, like a bright light through the gauze of a moth's wings. The souls of the graybeards on this dance floor are bold, assured, sure of themselves and strutting it. They move through the twirls and hand-offs, the step backs and swing throughs on autopilot, but there is that extra, the little twist of the hip or lift of the shoulder, the smallest of moves that are the most seductive. These couples rise above the chaos around them, the young souls that stumble and search awkwardly for the rhythm, missing a beat, flooded with evident discomfort.

It occurs to me that the 70 and 80 year olds who are dancing to the Glenn Miller Orchestra tonight lived in a time when moral uprightness was black and white. Duty, honor, discipline. And dancing.

My generation stopped dancing as couples. We let go and moved independently. Somehow, we have lost something intangible and important in that change. There is some connection between the moral certainty of this dancing generation's greatness and the moral crisis of my America toying with the methods of evil to see how far we can push, blurring the lines of interrogation and torture.

Dad and I went back for a second dose of Glenn Miller Saturday night, along with over 6,000 others Hoosiers. We gathered around the bandshell on a cool starlit night and soaked up the warmth of the swing. I watched the dancers and reflected.

The minute these seniors step off the dance floor, they shuffle, their backs hunch, they shrink. They look old. What is the magic of the music that lets the young souls shine through? And how can we get that magic back?

Cracks in the Culture: Part 1

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 18:08:54 -0400

I grew up in a green leafy suburb of the Crossroads of America, a moniker I came to terms with thanks to Eric Clapton, and in spite of the fact that Indianapolis city center is actually a traffic circle and its most famous monument an oval. I tell you this to demonstrate my willingness to not only stretch the bounds of logic to include those gray areas around the fringe, but to let its band break, to fling open the double doors of logic and let in the wild winds of what if. I am that elastic, that forgiving, that faithful. I allow magic and mystery.

What baffles me is the American cultural obsession with lawns. Of course, my youth was funded by the Green Monster, Dad’s big bad, the mower with a clutch and throttle behind which I sprinted and with which I routinely mowed down the wild prairie grasses of home and of my grandparents’ property which almost adjoined. I also mowed down Grandpa’s plum tree, but that is another story.

I never understood the whole process of fertilizing and nurturing lush growth in order to more frequently mow it down. What is the beauty of it? Where is the logic? What is the force behind this American rite that justifies the billions of gallons of water and the millions of gallons of gas, the hours of labor and the guilty look over the shoulder to see how one’s lawn compares to the neighborhood norm?

I confess that I am not a fan of the crew cut. This is pertinent as it may in some measure explain the lawns. I prefer the wild wonder of flying curls and flowing gold to the crisp neatness of hair mown. The importance of this will soon be apparent.

Another factor in my un-American attitude may be my exposure to the gardens of Europe, the mini-front yard lawn that the Amish mower snips quickly, the lush flower and vegetable gardens around and behind. Oriental gardens also maximize the bloom and leaf and minimize the wide unblemished stretch of grass. Except in Mongolia, but they don’t mow much. I confess to a life long interest in the world outside Indiana, which of late is somewhat less of a federal offense but still suspect in patriotic circles.

Given this dark blot on my character, you can see why I wonder if the passion that motivates the American icon to rise early and toil late, to trim and to tame acres of rolling short grass (which have been amputated to prevent their ever joining those amber waves of grain), stems from Biblical roots? Can God’s gift to man of power over the beasts of the field and birds of the air explain this compulsion to demonstrate control? Fact it, this is a step on the path to world domination.

It has come to this. Logic would suggest that lawns are a part of the neo-con religious right conspiracy to permeate all life with the Old Testament laws, which of course would logically make us all Jews, but I digress. We are now back to the crew cut connection. The military and political conservatives share the crew cut with the lawns. Are all the sweating masses riding their gas guzzling machines actually albeit unwittingly in the service of the military-neo-con public relations department? If they have no family plans for croquet or volleyball or lawn bowling or touch football (no, the last Kennedy brother has left us), no romantic notions of a picnic on the grass with 150 of their close friends, then why are they clearing and owning and mowing those acres of lawns?

The logic escapes me, even with my wide flung door to mystery.

I have not mowed since June. The grass lies over meekly, silky, and sparse under the woodland of my front yard. I’ve pulled the occasional tall weed and overlook those that escape my notice. There is an edge along the boulevard that grows higher and attracts notice. I plan to mow it today, but may quit after the visible violence is done. I have better things to do, like plant a rose bush, cook spare ribs, move Dad’s firewood.

And blog.

I submit for your judgement these specimens: judge on the criteria of beauty, of utility, of efficiency of maintenance.

Finally, check out my front and side yards and tell me what you think. I'll listen to reason.

In the mean time, I say, down with the cult of the lawn. Vive le grass, the garden, the rosebed, and the woodland.

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes

Sat, 29 Aug 2009 15:08:25 -0400

Last night I took Dad to the Glenn Miller Orchestra on the prairie, leaving home at the last minute after waiting to hear if the steady rain would cancel the concert. We took jackets and snacks and a flashlight, the equipment loading being a large part of the entertainment for the engineer.

At Conner Prairie, we found a place in the grass near the stage, right behind the expensive seats at tables, and made camp. We sat in folding chairs under Dad's huge umbrella, propped on my leg or on the chair. The damp and the gripping cramped my neck, but the discomforts all faded into the glory of Dad's pleasure.

I watched him revel in the familiar music, Moonlight Serenade and Pennsylvania 6-5000, to which he cheered and joined the band's refrain of chanting. He turned to me after each solo to say, "I could hear that!"

We both took pleasure in the swirling couples dancing on the apron in front of the bandshell. I followed one young man and his various partners all evening, mesmerized by the way that the music moved every part of his body, sliding and swinging in every fiber. He embodied the music as his feet flew and his hands danced through the jitterbug motions.

I lost myself in the pairs of dancers, each anticipating each other's moves as if to shout out the long years of dancing together. Their celebration of dancing that life without stepping on each other's feet filled me with the longing for a partner and the regret at the years of solitude.

Dad said once, "I can't dance anymore." I asked him if he had danced like those swinging couples and he demured, saying that he had danced slow but never that jitterbug. Couldn't move that fast.

I asked Dad where he learned all this familiar music. Was it at high school dances? On the radio? On records? How did he know which records he would like? He said, "There were dances at Purdue. In high school, they all just came over to the house to listen to music." I think it was all his older sister Phyllis' friends that came to visit, the ones that he made corsages for.

It was my mother's birthday. At one point, Dad turned to me to say, "It's the 28th. What does one do?" I struggled with a lame suggestion of flowers on graves or in church, but I was thinking, "You're doing it."

Dad stood up immediately at the end of the first set when the band leader asked all veterans to rise for a tribute playing of the Navy Hymn. His compliance was surprising as he rarely accepts accolade or attention, and especially for his army air force service. He was a conscientious objector until Pear Harbor, and after graduation, he enlisted so that he could choose a branch that would not require him to bear arms. He looked around at all those who stood with him, and seemed to feel a part of the moment. He rarely feels a part of any group. This was magic.

He cheered and clapped at each familiar tune. The band leader asked if anyone was from Michigan, and Dad called out, "Kalamazoo!" Sure enought, that was the next song. He grinned wide at the familiar strains of a soaring sax or a clean shrill clarinet, soloing right into the mic so he could hear.

He asked me once if there were any middle aged couples dancing. I think he meant of his age. He considers hmiself at 87 to be middle aged. When an 86 year old friend of the band was recognized for his birthday, Dad looked on as if they were honoring some old guy.

I feel his disconnect. I periodically have to stand in front of a mirror and repeat to myself, "I am 57 years old." My soul is not. Only my body. I get that from my Dad, maybe.

As the second set wound down, there was a commotion in the Sunday School Class group seated at the tables in front of us. At the same time, a red light pulsed behind the stage. Dad commented on the light and something about no lightning with the storm. I told him I thought it looked like a police car light.

It was an ambulance whose paramedics trucked behind us with a stretcher, started an IV, put on an oxygen mask, and wheeled away an elderly gentleman, followed by a gray wife leaning on the comfort of friends. He was awake and talking to them, so I told myself that he had had a bad spell but was recovering. We watched the ambulance scream up the road as we were leaving.

Dad did not see anything but the need to clear out the chairs to make a better path for the paramedics, the crew of bulky, muscled, iconically sturdy young men obviously needing Dad's help.

As we left the concert, Dad commented wryly on his slow walk. "I don't know why I'm so slow. Women even pass me. I used to walk faster." Dad covered my hand with his to hold the umbrella together with me. He said, "I've never held hands with an umbrella." He doesn't often express sentiment, certainly not gratitude or affection. I felt loved in that silence.

I saw my Dad walking away from the big band toward the far off parking lot, and felt my soul swell with song, with gladness and relief, that he was getting there on his own two feet without the scream of the sirens.

We were good last night, In the Mood. I love you, Dad.

All I Ask

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 12:08:11 -0400

The cell phone cut through early morning torpor, a welcome connection at any time. My friend Sue checking in; odd, usually it would be me calling her on the way to school. I was baffled but delighted when she handed the phone to another former colleague and then to the high school custodian. Bless my soul, MaryBeth and Penny. What a treat. It wasn't until I had asked Sue what prompted her to call that I heard her shrug and reluctantly add, "I thought it would help," that I realized she was calling purposefully on August 26. The sledgehammer hit the house of cards and I wept the rest of the way to school. What a blessing, the embrace of friends!

Twelve years ago the 26th was a Tuesday, a week into Sarah's senior year, sharing a locker with little freshman sister Emily, finding the energy to get through senior English, government, and the Advanced Speech performance before driving to Dad's for the evening. It was my freshman English students watching her performance of House of Blue Leaves, boys in the habit of scorning holding their collective breath in hushed admiration. It was Sarah's after school hug and last request, "Are you sure it's all right to go to Dad's?" I still writhe when my snapped reply whips through my memory. Why couldn't I have reflected on the reason behind her question? Asked why she shouldn't? Could I have wheedled the confession out of her, the late night of William Carlos Williams and Emily Dickens in Spanish hidden from my bedtime rules? Shouldn't I have known and offered to drive her? This film runs on continuous loop once it starts and always ends with the sleepy girl drooping, the little car sliding left, the truck tractor trailer, the broken metal, the severed spine.

Twelve years ago the sheriff's car came to my door to announce the amputation of my magical child's life from ours, to bring her brother and sister home from universities, to traumatize her classmates.

This year I seek the daily news article from Le Monde for my French classes to read and discover the death of Ted Kennedy in the French headlines, "symbol of an America open to the world." Sarah was open to the world, I think. He was 77, she 17. Life flings such ironies in our faces! I remember Princess Diana dying the day we buried Sarah and Mother Theresa later that week.

In the 6th grade, we read about the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty, discussion quickly degenerating into "when I was in Paris" anecdotes by eager children who may or may not have noticed that instead of my usual waltz around the room I am draped over the podium, clinging to support. I have to jump up to tell them the story of Sarah's first glimpse of the tower, coming from the métro behind it, and her extraordinary knee-buckling terror at its size. Emily and I laughed pitilessly at her shock. "Well, all I've ever seen is the tower on Mom's desk!" was Sarah's only defense. It helps to laugh, to act, to watch children appreciate the humor of the moment. It keeps the moment alive.

After school I held the call-out meeting for Speech Team. Sarah joined debate and speech as a freshman, earning immediate honors and as a junior qualifying for the national tournament. When her coach left the year after her death, no one wanted the job. In the end, I took it, to keep her team from dying. It felt like something I could learn to do. After five years, a senior champion made it to nationals. And then I moved home to be close to my parents. There was no speech team in this middle school, but there was a high school team and a team at the other middle school, so I started a team here. First year, three speakers. Second year, a dozen. Yesterday there were 60 students in my room. Sixty-one, if you count Sarah. She was there as clearly as I was there, in jeans and a green plaid shirt, giggling with Missy, sparkling, all curls and freckles and joy.

During the day there was an email from my cousin, journaling her week at her father's bedside, far from my embrace, in a Seattle hospital. She wrote about death, about living. She radiated the active verb that is loving.

Last Sunday the Mass included a hymn I'd never heard. It's refrain reached out and choked me, strangling me with the oncoming anguish of this week: "All I ask of you is forever to remember me as loving you." I remember you loving me, Sarah. I remember your milky way birthmark soft on the line of your jaw, the frizz of hair framing your face, the glow of your joie de vivre, the updraft of your laughter, the snort that came just before, and the brilliant insight into me and all who came into the laser beam of your perception.

Your legacy was a body of writing that would make an octogenarian proud. I vow to bring it back to life, to find a publisher for your stories, and to pick up your will and your craft to plunge back into my novel, my poetry, my stories.

It has been a long voyage on a wintry sea, much of it rudderless and simply nose above the waterline. I vow, Sarah, to crawl back to the rudder, sheet in the main, to take control of the craft and to sail hard for the lee shore. I feel your breath by me and know that you live in me.

We love you. We remember you.

Chapter and Verse

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 19:03:48 -0400

All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated; God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another. John Donne Meditation XVII

I understand that I can hardly speak for boys and their dads, but it seems to me that you fellows are the flip side of my recent mother daughter reflections, so stay with me as I muse on becoming that from which I have fought so fervently to differentiate myself.

I am unashamedly and unequivocally Daddy’s girl. I have been for as long as I can remember. When Mom stood firm on her fiscal restraint when I didn’t really need a new blouse in third grade, Dad lobbied for a discount store and slipped me money. Of course, it was transparently evident that the same thing was happening on the flip side for my brother, so there seemed to be a balance in the system.

The fervent goal of much of my adult life was to be as little like my mother as possible, forging a busy routine rather than the patient and methodical rhythm of my mother’s impossibly slow life, answering quickly and directly to avoid the endless wait for an answer to the simplest question. Where she complied with every directive, actually, required a directive in order to function, I sought creative solutions and purposely found my own way.

It seems to me that girls declare their independence by differentiating themselves from their mothers while relying on their father as the home harbor. Boys have to beat Dad at one-on-one to declare their independent manhood, while flying home to Momma for their safe haven.

In the end, we are established as autonomous adults and a girl’s mother may become her friend. As I have lived far from home, well, 3 hours by car, most of my adult life, it has been interesting to move in with my aging parents for several years, then settle in the house across the street to be nearby as they age. The dynamics of the relationship moving back into my old room as a 57 year old woman – well, I hardly want to go there, but let’s say that it was both a blessing and a curse. I have a flexible nature, so found ways to see the value of learning to live without my own familiar home environment.

My relationship with my mother grew and changed as I saw more of the parts of myself that are a page from her book, parts of me that I value. Our evenings together over Scrabble games and papers to grade or knitting or a book to read (because she takes that long to find the best word) gave us endless pleasure. We prayed and sang in worship together, laughed and cried at movies, hers and mine, kept Dad awake at the symphony, and dined together. She felt she was taking care of me, cooking my dinner, offering leftovers for lunch. She insisted on getting up early to breakfast with me – the perk being my fresh ground French pressed coffee – right up to her last weeks.

As Mom’s health declined, I both focused in on her needs and distanced myself from her diminishing abilities. I found it hard to watch, frustrating not to be able to fix her ills, and most agonizing of all, I found myself walking the woulda coulda shoulda path. When she died 3 weeks ago, Dad turned to us with tears in his eyes and asked, “Will they arrest me for murder for starving her to death?” She had not eaten her last day, as much as we coaxed her. She had drunk her protein supplement, but no amount of Dad urging had put food in her mouth.

He and I both took that dark journey, one that others bemoan but which must be travelled to finally come to peace with the death of one in your care. He worried over feeding her, I worried over her medical care. Had I missed some telling symptom, something treatable? Could I have better dealt with some other issue? It’s a long walk to be taking at the same time I was feeling such remorse for the faults I found in my mother, the ways I tried to not be like her.

In the end, I see my mother as the human gift that she was, the imperfect woman doing her best for those she loved in a world that rarely stops to value what she embodied: gentleness of spirit, compassionate love for all God’s creatures, patient forbearance, attentive and solicitous listening, generosity, and loyalty. She knew no stranger and had no enemy. I miss you, Mom.