In the fall of 1968, I was in ninth grade at Munich International School. Nixon had just been elected president and the Apollo 8 astronauts were about to orbit the moon. I was obsessed with Romeo and Juliet, having just seen Zeffirelli’s movie with Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting. For December break, my family drove to Rome via Florence, Siena, and San Gimignano. Not too shabby as school vacations go.
In these excerpts from my memoir-in-progress, Where Is Luv? A Teenager’s Diary of Hope, Passion, and Total Confusion, it's clear some things have changed . . . and some most assuredly have not. Happy New Year, 2009! I hope it is a year of love and peace.
December 27, 1968
(2 months till 15)
Visited Sistine Chapel and the whole bit. It was OK. Fantastic work and realism but TOO much! Sculptures are nice, though. Watched a marvelous and exciting Apollo splashdown and recovery on TV! Wow! The moon!! It’s really a great breakthru!
4 days till 1969. 62 days till my birthday. 9 days till Munich. 10 days till school.
December 29
Went to impressive Baths of Caracalla, with little kiddies running around and to Palazzo Farnese. Nice frescoes. And to these fantastic ruins at Ostia Antica! Wow! Buildings, paintings, bathrooms, tunnels, statues, palaces, theaters, warehouses, stores. A real civilizazione! 100,000 people!! (200-300 AD?)
December 30
Slept latish, took bathio. Visited statue of Moses and San Sebastian mosaic. Walked to Pantheon. Saw USA sailors who “wowed” at me. Wow! Gotta goa toa bedda. Yeah? Bene! Molto bene! Buona sera!
December 31
Well, this is it! The end of another year. So what? It’s just 366 days gone by with 365 more to come! But it’s traditional to make a big thing. So I will. Today we saw some church, which was lovely, and the Catacombs—ancient and smelly but interesting.
News: Triumph of Apollo 8; release of Pueblo crew; Israel and the Arabs clashing; Paris peace talks moving along. I hope 1969 brings more peace to earth, although I doubt it.
Resolutions? Let’s see:
1) Resist smoking. (Build feminine willpower.)
2) Try to establish better relations at home, especially with mother (be less close?).
3) Work hard in school.
4) Grow, damnit!
5) Quit swearing so much!
6) Ultra-femina: looks, attitude, actions
7) Continue interest in world.
8) Write a book.
We’re heading off now for a New Year’s party. I’ll see you next year! Arrivederci!
January 1, 1969
2:07 a.m. after really boring, wild, icky New Year’s party at Dover Hotel with a bunch yucks and fakes and icks. Last word I said in 1968 = LOVE. First word I said in 1969 = LOVE. I hope it is a year of love and peace.
Later: 11:15 p.m. after a long day. Visited San Pietro and saw Pope Paul VI and got “blessed.” Beautiful church! Climbed to top (ugh)—utterly fantastic view! Beautiful sunny chilly day and just perfect! Saw Oliver. I’m still determined to act/sing.
Back at 10. Sang songs and fooled around. At 11, I started to wash, and out from under the towel crawled a HUGE hairy spider! UGH! SHIVER! UGH!!! Donnie shivered too so Daddy (my hero) killed it! Ugh Ugh YUKH!! I itch all over.
Song from Oliver:
Where is love?
Does it come from skies above?
Is it underneath the willow tree that I’ve been dreaming of?
Where is he who I close my eyes to see?
Will I ever know the sweet hello that’s meant for only me?
Who can see where he may hide?
Must I travel far and wide
Till I am beside the someone who I can mean something to?
Where is love?
Fantastic song! It not only means so much but it fits me perfectly. Goodnite, goodnite. Parting is such sweet sorrow that I shall say goodnite till it be morrow! Romeo and Juliet is fantastic! Will that ever happen to me?
Friday, December 26, 2008
Friday, December 19, 2008
Wishful Thinking
When my cable provider switched over to digital last summer, I thought I’d never get used to a whole new channel lineup and an imposing remote with 59 buttons. Now I click up, down, left, right without even looking: 311 for MSNBC and 305 for CNN, or 221 for TV Land and 117 for Comedy Central (to escape the depressing effects of the first two).
However, even with the fancy gadgetry, I can still tape only one show at a time, which requires my actually remembering to leave the TV on the channel I want to record before I go to work. No DVR. No Tivo. Maybe Santa will surprise me this year. Ho ho ho.
My ritual is recording the final few minutes of Deal or No Deal, followed by Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! That’s Channel 11 here. Shouldn’t be too hard to forget. Same time, same channel, Monday through Friday, at least when I’m out, which is most weeknights. As I unwind, stretch, and get ready for bed, I love zipping through my shows.
On Wednesday, I got home around ten, changed into my fleece pajamas, fed Sophia and Sascha, and hit the rewind button, eagerly awaiting my nightly game-show fix. PLAY. The screen displayed a green-and-white announcement: Due to power outages in your area, there is no service on this channel at this time. We regret any inconvenience. New Hampshire Public TV, Channel 9.
Channel 9? No! I meant to leave it on Channel 11! FAST FORWARD. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe it was just a glitch. I continued to fast forward through what must’ve been a half-hour’s worth of the same green-and-white message. Was I expecting the channel to have changed itself while I was out? Kind of like when I thought my dust-spewing vacuum cleaner would’ve repaired itself after three untouched months in the closet?
Nope. No Deal or Wheel or Jeopardy! tonight. I felt bereft. The empty, sad, pit-of-the-stomach-type feeling that comes when you know that what you wished for simply will not happen. No matter how hard I pressed the button, no matter how hard I wanted it, it wasn’t meant to be.
I lingered in the feeling, trying to understand it. It felt familiar and utterly unwanted. In the space of three or four minutes, I’d gone from a sense of fun anticipation to frantic denial to mournful acceptance. Over TV. But it wasn’t the content of the loss, it was the feeling of being helpless to change the reality. There was nothing I could do. What’s done is done.
Three years ago, on a regular Sunday morning, I woke up and headed outside to retrieve my Boston Globe. I saw my kitty, Jolie, lying on the living room rug, all stretched out. “Allo, Jolia! Good morning!” I said. I stepped closer. She didn’t move. She’s sleeping, I thought. Funny. Usually she greets me, nuzzling, head-butting. I walked past her and bam, it hit me, a fierce punch in the stomach, a rush of adrenaline and nausea and truth.
No. No. It can’t be. I approached. Her eyes were fixed in a stare and her tongue slightly extended from her mouth. Next to her was some food she'd vomited. Maybe she was choking! Maybe I could revive her. I knelt beside her and touched her. Her body was cold. I tried to pry her mouth open to give her an airway. Her body was stiff. Untrained in CPR, I tried to apply kitty-size compressions to her calico chest, at regular intervals. I tried to blow in her mouth, very softly.
No, Jolie, no. I didn’t want to know, but I knew. And yet I didn’t. I called my vet and left a message for the on-call doc. After a few silent minutes, I called Angell Animal Hospital and said, “I think my cat might be dead!” I asked about kitty CPR. I asked about opening her airway. The woman listened and said quietly, “She’s gone.”
“But . . . how? How? She’s only five. She wasn’t sick!”
She said, very kindly, as did my own vet who called later, that sometimes cats die suddenly, same as people. Aneurysm, cardiac arrest, stroke, random act of God. She was gone.
Numbness followed and flooding tears and, slowly, acceptance. I still think of Jolie, every day. And I thought of her on Wednesday, when, unbidden and unwanted, missing my game shows, of all things, I felt that feeling in my gut that tells me I am helpless to change reality. No matter how mundane or profound.
Every day brings a new sadness, it seems—illnesses, diagnoses, in my family, among my friends, among my friends’ families. And every day brings another reminder of the only lesson that seems to make any sense, at least to me, at least today: Life happens. Death happens. Let go. And breathe.
However, even with the fancy gadgetry, I can still tape only one show at a time, which requires my actually remembering to leave the TV on the channel I want to record before I go to work. No DVR. No Tivo. Maybe Santa will surprise me this year. Ho ho ho.
My ritual is recording the final few minutes of Deal or No Deal, followed by Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! That’s Channel 11 here. Shouldn’t be too hard to forget. Same time, same channel, Monday through Friday, at least when I’m out, which is most weeknights. As I unwind, stretch, and get ready for bed, I love zipping through my shows.
On Wednesday, I got home around ten, changed into my fleece pajamas, fed Sophia and Sascha, and hit the rewind button, eagerly awaiting my nightly game-show fix. PLAY. The screen displayed a green-and-white announcement: Due to power outages in your area, there is no service on this channel at this time. We regret any inconvenience. New Hampshire Public TV, Channel 9.
Channel 9? No! I meant to leave it on Channel 11! FAST FORWARD. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe it was just a glitch. I continued to fast forward through what must’ve been a half-hour’s worth of the same green-and-white message. Was I expecting the channel to have changed itself while I was out? Kind of like when I thought my dust-spewing vacuum cleaner would’ve repaired itself after three untouched months in the closet?
Nope. No Deal or Wheel or Jeopardy! tonight. I felt bereft. The empty, sad, pit-of-the-stomach-type feeling that comes when you know that what you wished for simply will not happen. No matter how hard I pressed the button, no matter how hard I wanted it, it wasn’t meant to be.
I lingered in the feeling, trying to understand it. It felt familiar and utterly unwanted. In the space of three or four minutes, I’d gone from a sense of fun anticipation to frantic denial to mournful acceptance. Over TV. But it wasn’t the content of the loss, it was the feeling of being helpless to change the reality. There was nothing I could do. What’s done is done.
Three years ago, on a regular Sunday morning, I woke up and headed outside to retrieve my Boston Globe. I saw my kitty, Jolie, lying on the living room rug, all stretched out. “Allo, Jolia! Good morning!” I said. I stepped closer. She didn’t move. She’s sleeping, I thought. Funny. Usually she greets me, nuzzling, head-butting. I walked past her and bam, it hit me, a fierce punch in the stomach, a rush of adrenaline and nausea and truth.
No. No. It can’t be. I approached. Her eyes were fixed in a stare and her tongue slightly extended from her mouth. Next to her was some food she'd vomited. Maybe she was choking! Maybe I could revive her. I knelt beside her and touched her. Her body was cold. I tried to pry her mouth open to give her an airway. Her body was stiff. Untrained in CPR, I tried to apply kitty-size compressions to her calico chest, at regular intervals. I tried to blow in her mouth, very softly.
No, Jolie, no. I didn’t want to know, but I knew. And yet I didn’t. I called my vet and left a message for the on-call doc. After a few silent minutes, I called Angell Animal Hospital and said, “I think my cat might be dead!” I asked about kitty CPR. I asked about opening her airway. The woman listened and said quietly, “She’s gone.”
“But . . . how? How? She’s only five. She wasn’t sick!”
She said, very kindly, as did my own vet who called later, that sometimes cats die suddenly, same as people. Aneurysm, cardiac arrest, stroke, random act of God. She was gone.
Numbness followed and flooding tears and, slowly, acceptance. I still think of Jolie, every day. And I thought of her on Wednesday, when, unbidden and unwanted, missing my game shows, of all things, I felt that feeling in my gut that tells me I am helpless to change reality. No matter how mundane or profound.
Every day brings a new sadness, it seems—illnesses, diagnoses, in my family, among my friends, among my friends’ families. And every day brings another reminder of the only lesson that seems to make any sense, at least to me, at least today: Life happens. Death happens. Let go. And breathe.
Friday, December 5, 2008
Short 'n' Bittersweet
I’m headed to Connecticut in the morning for Uncle Addy’s 85th birthday party. It will be good to see family and friends, but I’m sad because Addy’s struggling with health problems. We will sing skit songs and eat good food and dance and laugh and hug and cry and cherish the time we have together.
And we need to laugh. So for this week I’m posting a short diary entry from the extraterrestrial world of fifth grade, Milton School, Rye, New York. All names have been changed to protect the formerly pubescent. I’ll be presenting a longer piece that includes this entry at MORTIFIED BOSTON on January 8, 2009. Check out www.getmortified.com. Details to come!
And we need to laugh. So for this week I’m posting a short diary entry from the extraterrestrial world of fifth grade, Milton School, Rye, New York. All names have been changed to protect the formerly pubescent. I’ll be presenting a longer piece that includes this entry at MORTIFIED BOSTON on January 8, 2009. Check out www.getmortified.com. Details to come!
January 6, 1965
Linda admitted that she loved Ricky. Vice versa. They said they’d kiss each other. Darn Ricky chickened out. What a double crosser. I called up Ricky and he said, Hello. I said, How could you? Now Linda hates your guts. He said, Good. I said, You love her, why don’t you kiss her? He said, Why don’t you hang up? I said, Make me. He said, Okay, I’ll hang up. I said, Go ahead, I don’t care. He did. I love him.
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