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Ramblings by Rose Mary (column archive Nov-Dec 2007)
Please refer back to the
Ramblings by Rose Mary main page for columns published in other issues. Rose Mary can be contacted via e-mail at
rwclarke@mibor.net.
The Secret to Traveling Light is in the Bag
I love pretty clothes! Beautiful, well-tailored clothing is an art form in in itself. However, being a fashion maven isn’t as important to me as cultural pursuits and travel. After Vicki was born, I became a stay-at-home mom. Bill’s teacher’s salary stretched only so far, so we learned to make choices.
We do try to dress appropriately for the places that we visit. For example, we’d never wear shorts in Paris. Skimpy tops, skirts above the knee or shorts aren’t permitted in St. Peter’s Basilica.. When we were in Rome with Jean and her daughter, Nicole, wore a mini skirt to breakfast. "They won’t let you in St. Peter’s," I said. "Aw, get outt’a here, Rose Mary!" "I’m not kidding." Sure enough, they stopped her. "Scusi, Signorina, I regret that you cannot enter." Fortunately she’d tucked a pair of jeans into her huge backpack that made her look like Quasimodo, the hunchback of Notre Dame.
Snickering, we stood in front of her in a corner while, glaring, she managed to hitch the jeans up under her skirt. Unable to remove the skirt, she had to parade through St. Peter’s, looking like a little girl from my youth when we wore snowsuit leggings under our skirts.
It was great fun traveling with gorgeous Nicole who had just graduated from college. Her dark complection made her look like an Italian. Bill and she often walked arm-in-arm while Jean and I played rear guard. We’d watch the heads of the handsome Italian males snap to attention as they passed. You could almost read their minds: "And who is that lucky man to have such a little dolly on his arm?"
Bravo television fashion guru, Dan Gunn, says that a woman needs only ten well-chosen items in her wardrobe to be well turned out. I have more than that in my fall/winter closet, but my choices are mighty slim after the great closet cleanout. Choosing what to take to Italy took thought because October weather is as variable there as it is here. Layering is the answer. We follow travel expert Rick Steve’s advice to pack light. Our mantra is, "These people will never see us again!"
For three days each in Rome, Florence and Venice. I took a crushable micro-fiber coat, an extra pair of shoes, pajamas, underwear, a tan jacket, black and cream colored turtlenecks, two tee shirts, a long-sleeved blouse patterned in black, brow, tan and white, a brown wool cardigan with suede trim and black, brown and toast -colored pants. Actually, I could have left one or two shirts at home. I also took writing and reading materials, guidebooks and maps.
To keep my clothing wrinkle free, I put each item of apparel on its own hanger inside a drycleaner bag and lay the bags carefully in the suitcase. When we arrive at a hotel I hang the bags in the closet. I downsized my suitcase for this trip and got everything into a 14 x 21 x 7 suitcase with an expandable top and a carry-on.
Leave them alone, and they’ll come home--pulling their luggage behind them!
Today’s lightweight suitcases on wheels make traveling much easier than when I was young, and everyone had indestructible but dreadfully heavy Samsonite or American Tourister. While they waited at the check-in line at the Venice airport, homebound travelers chatted with each other. The couple ahead of us had a four-foot-high stack of really huge suitcases on a trolley, pulled others and had carry-ons.
"My goodness, what a lot of luggage you have! Been on an around-the-world trip?" I asked the lady. "Nope--a ten-day cruise," she responded. "We had to dress for three formal nights." She glanced rather disparagingly at my meager suitcase and pronounced, "I could never do that!" "Mutual, I’m sure," I thought to myself. I’d go nuts if I had to mess with that much stuff.
After we got home, I called Bill’s elegant sister-in-law who is always beautifully dressed. "Esther, how many suitcases did you tell me you took on that cruise that Rick and you took with your brother, Jack, and Betty?" She laughed and said, "Twenty-six! That was for the four of us, but most of it was Betty’s and mine. We changed clothes three times a day. We couldn’t decide what to take, so we just took everything!" My e-mail address is rwclarke@mibor.net.
Beautiful Words Create Music in the Mind
"Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are dining on crumbs." -- Auntie Mame
Oh, isn’t being alive just grand? It isn’t easy to forget about my bad back, arthritic knees, sundry other ailments and the doubts and worries that are part and parcel of the human condition. However, I do try to celebrate each day the wonder of just being alive and to savor the bounteous beauty that is here for my enjoyment.
Oh dear, doesn’t my catalogue of woes makes me sound old? Inside, you know, I’m still a young, vigorous woman capable of moving heavy furniture or hiking a Teton mountain path with a pack on my back. My body may be decrepit, but my brain isn’t. Learning to cope with this disparity between what my mind conceives that I can do and the reality that my body imposes is a major frustration. Vivian Forst understands what I mean. Last week some of the Nifty Nicitinos and I visited ninety-six-year-old Vivian who’s still as bright as a new penny. She told me, "I wake up in the morning and lie in bed, thinking about everything that I’ll do today--and then I get up and can’t do much of it."
Oh my goodness! The sky was full of angry-looking black clouds when I started this. Now the rising sun is painting them a vivid orange against a backdrop of ice blue. I must put on a coat and shoes and rush outside to watch as there will never ever be another sunrise in all of eternity exactly like this one.
Beauty comes in many forms. Jessie Nay Wagoner developed her pupils’ spirits and imaginations as well as teaching them the basics. She asked her first- graders to describe the most beautiful thing that they’d ever seen. Most responded predictably about flowers and such. Her favorite answer was that of an awkward, shy boy who chuffed rapidly as if it were all one word, "Threefatspottedpups!".
Beautiful words are one of my passions. They make a sort of music in my mind. I rarely read poetry, but when I have occasion to, it sets lovely images before my internal vision. One of my very favorite poems is "Ithaca" by Constantine Cavafy, a modern Greek poet who reached back into the ancient past of Greek myth.
His "Ithaca" is written as if he’s speaking to Ulysses who wandered so far and encountered many dangers during his long struggle to return to his home island. The poem is a metaphor for our journey through life and contains messages that we would do well to heed. Here are some of his lovely words.
When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge . . .
Pray that the road is long,
That the summer mornings are many, when,
with such pleasure, with such joy
you enter ports seen for the first time;
stop at Phoenician markets
and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber, and ebony . . .
For nearly forty-five years, in every season, Bill and I have shared many a lovely morning and traveled many a road together from the high paths of the western mountains to the Adirondacks forests to the Atlantic and Pacific shores, to wild Dartmoor, to the boulevards of Paris, and to the splendor of Venice. Some roads we traveled alone; others we shared with beloved friends and family.
Time seemed to stand still during our recent trip to Italy. Watching Vicki experience places for the first time rekindled our own pleasure in them and made us feel blessed that we were able to share her new experience, joy and knowledge.
My e-mail address is rwclarke@mibo.net.
Writer Humbled by American Freedom
The changing of the seasons reminds me that I’m like Earth’s other beings: My life has followed predictable cycles with a rhythm that’s as familiar as a beloved tune. Trees such as our splendid oak that’s aflame with vivid orange have annual rings that reveal their history. .My life is marked by repeated experiences that have occurred year after year. October, November and December are a triple whammy of events that are indelibly inscribed on the pages of my internal diary.
October: Bonfires, wiener roasts, hay rides, trick-or-treating . . . Parents thought nothing of letting children go trick-or-treating after dark . . . And then came changes that made life less fun:. Leaf burning is illegal; parents started inspecting candy because some people put sharp objects in it; and trick-or-treating is limited to a couple of daylight hours for fear of molesters.
These days some say that Thanksgiving is an insensitive, hypocritical sham because of the treatment of the Indians. I revere my forebears who settled the Old Home Place with little more than an ax, determination and an abiding fath. However, their subsequent wealth came at a dreadful cost to the Indians who had lived there--one of whom is rumored to have been one of my ancestors.
Still, I’m comforted by the repetition of customs that have been carried down through the generations. On Thursday morning we’ll drive past many homes whose driveways are full of the cars of family members who have gathered. Inside turkeys or hams will be roasting, and the hostesses will be fussing and bustling around.
Before we leave home, I’ll bake Mama’s corn pudding to take to the home of one of Bill’s nieces. A simple casserole of corn, milk, salt, flour and eggs doesn’t seem of much import, does it? However, Mama’s corn pudding symbolizes my heritage and conjures up images of five generations of Hoosier cooks and their delectable, cooked-from-scratch comfort food.
When I stir it up, my ancestresses are lined up behind me: I imagine my great grandmother, Melissa, whom I never knew cooking on an iron range at the farm near Michigantown. Old Granny whom my mother called "Mama" passed the recipe on to Mother who wrote it in one of my cookbooks and later gave it to Vicki who wrote it down for me again one year when I’d forgotten where it was. Tradition may seem meaningless to some, but it warms my heart to know that all over America families will gather to share the dishes of their generations.
It isn’t the romanticized story of the Pilgrims and the Indians that’s important to me. Also, I wouldn’t want the life of my pioneer ancestresses with too many childbirths and deaths and a life of farm drudgery with no modern conveniences.
However, I’m mindful of why my forebears came to America and that people are still risking their lives to come here. So would I! I understand why a Congolese woman begged me to take one of her daughters to raise so that she’d have a chance at a better life without fear of being gang raped by marauding soldiers as happens in places like the Congo.
I should kneel down and kiss the very soil of America. I’m not only thankful for the bounty of this land upon which we feast. I am a free woman who can dress as she chooses, vote, run for office, worship or not worship as she desires, marry whom. she wishes or not marry, travel, get an education, work, and manage her own money. The press is often the first target of dictators and extremists. In America if I wish to write that a public official--and I could name several--is a nincompoop or the south end of a northbound horse, I can do so without fear of being jailed, and my publisher’s newspaper won’t be closed down.
I cannot change the past. It’s the here-and-now of America that I celebrate and for which I am humbly thankful.
I'll soon be writing about Christmas. Do you have any memories or recipes to share? My e-mail is rwclarke@mibor.net.
Indian Summer Proves Elusive This Summer
Regardless of our human calendar, sometimes nature has its own agenda. Many of the trees in our yard are still clad in the leaves of autumn, and it was around 70 degrees the day before Thanksgiving. . I hoped that it would be Indian Summer, that most fleeting and ephemeral of times, when the air is balmy and the sky is hazy. There is nothing lovelier, but Indian Summer doesn’t always happen.
I love George T. McCutcheon’s charming illustrations and accompanying story that he called "Injun Summer." It was first printed in the Chicago Tribune one hundred years ago this past September. You can find them on the Internet. Something about them reminds me of my childhood when Wanda and I built bonfires at the edge of Carey St.
The first painting is of one of those mellow, golden days where a haze lies over the land. An old man sits on a log, watching a smoking bonfire of fallen leaves with his little grandson. The haze blurs the sun. Nearby a split rail fence encloses a field of corn shocks. In the second picture it is night. The smoke has become dancing Indians, the corn shocks have become tepees, and moonlight bathes the scene.
When I read the yarn that the old man is spinning I hear the voices of old Granny and my mother in my mind’s ear. My imagination was fired by their fascinating stories of my people at the Old Home Place when Indians were still nearby and would come to borrow large kettles. My great-great grandfather always hid under the bed when they came and would tremble with fright when an old Indian, thinking it was funny, got down and peered in at him. : Here’s the old man’s story:
Yep, Sonny this is sure enough Injun summer . . . That’s when all the homesick Injuns come back to play. You know, a long time ago, long afore yer grandaddy was born even, there used to be heaps of Injuns around here--thousands--millions, I reckon . . . They wuz all around here--right here where you’re standin’. Don’t be skeered--hain’t none around here now, leastways no live ones. They been gone this many a year. They all went away and died, so they ain’t no more left.
But every year, ‘long about now, they all come back, leastways their sperrits do. They’re here now. You can see ‘em off across the fields. Look real hard. See that kind of hazy, misty look out yonder? Well, them’s Injun sperrits marchin’ along an’ dancin’ in the sunlight. That’s what makes that kind of haze--it’s the sperrits of the Injuns all come back. They’re all around us now.
See off yonder, see them tepees? They kind o’ look like corn shocks from here, but them’s Indian tepes . . . See ‘em now? Sure, I knowed you could. Smell that smoky sort o’ smell in the air? That’s the campfires a-burnin’ and their pipes a-goin’ . . .
You jest come out here tonight when the moon is hangin’ over the hill off yonder an’ the harvest fields is all swimmin’ in the moonlight, an’ you can see the Injuns and the tepees as plain as kin be. You can, eh? I knowed you would after a little while.
He explains that the red leaves on the trees happen when an Indian spirit gets tired from dancing and squats on a leaf to rest. "Why I kin hear ‘em rustlin’ an’ whisperin’ an creepin’ round all the time, an’ ever once’n a while a leaf gives way under some fat old Injun ghost and comes floatin’ down . . See--here’s one now. See how red it is? That’s the war paint rubbed off’n an Injun ghost, sure’s you’re born. Purty soon all the Injuns’ll go marching back to the happy huntin’ ground, but next year you’ll see ‘em troopin’ back--th’ sky jest hazy with em and their campfires smolderin’ away jest like they are now."
The Indians are long gone from the Old Home Place as are my pioneer ancestors, and Mother’s and Granny’s voices have been still these many years. They will not return, yet a faint essence of them still exists within me--as ephemeral and hazy as an Indian Summer day. Indian Summer did not come this year, but I shall watch for it next November.
My e-mail address is rwclarke!mibor.net.
Yuletide Guilt, Benevolence Not Enough
"Business . . . Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business. Charity, mercy, forbearance and benevolence were all my business."
The Ghost of Marley spoke these words to Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol which is surely one of the best expressions of the true meaning of Christmas. Marley repents the avaricious life that he had led.
Charles Dickens saw the vast divide between employer and worker and the haves and have-nots. Poverty can strike unexpectedly as it did when my father suddenly lost his sight Mother went to work at the greenhouse, standing her feet all day and earning $30 a week--less than half of what Daddy had made there. She supplemented her meager income by baby sitting. She was one of the working poor, but like the characters in Little Women, she helped those even poorer than she.
America is so rich! That’s why people risk everything to get here. However, it’s all too easy ignore the huge gulf between the haves and the have-nots and sweep the plight of the poor under the carpet just as in Dickens’ day. I’m a staunch believer in the work ethic and the capitalism that have brought us such plenty, but we who have so much should do more to address problems of the working poor. Here’s a modern day Christmas Carol about a hard-working 21st Century Bob Cratchit who asked me to write this story in hopes that you will donate to charities that provide gifts for the children of the poor.
She married young, became a single mother and had to take jobs that didn’t require a college degree. She worked for $6.50 an hour for a big chain and eked out a living with Medicaid, Food Stamps and help from her parents. Christmas is a hard time for the poor. She wrote that her children’s Christmas would have been slim had it not been for gifts from the "Santa’s Helpers" of a local organization.
She didn’t work a full forty-hour week because she hoped to better herself by attending Ivy Tech. During that time she discovered that her calling was to help abused women. She now works at a group home, taking care of three profoundly retarded men at night. She gets them up to go to the bathroom, cleans them up when they soil themselves and gives them showers in the morning. Only 5 foot 4, she injured her back while trying to deal with one of them when he became violent and was hurting himself.
For this she receives the magnificent sum of $8.50 an hour. One of her sons, a scholarship student at an expensive college, said, "The kids here are from wealthy families. They have no concept of what it’s like to be poor. I told them, ‘My mother makes a third of what it costs to go to school here.’"
Since her children left home, she receives no Medicaid or Food Stamps. Her health insurance hasn’t kicked in--even if she could afford it. Without warning, she became ill, and the bill was $4,000! One test at a lab was to cost $400. If she paid for it immediately, it cost only $45. Go figure that one out.
Would you want her job? I certainly wouldn’t! She is only one of the millions of America’s working poor who do our dirty work, take care of our mentally ill, tend our children, work as laborers, and clean our hotel rooms. These necessary jobs cannot be outsourced to other countries, yet these hard-working people aren’t paid a decent living wage. Our politicians need to quit squabbling and join with business and economic leaders to find a solution.
My reader is very busy: She works full time, attends college full time and volunteers at an alcohol recovery house.. Also, she’s trying to achieve her dream of starting a transitional house for battered women and their children, has become incorporated, lined up a Board of Directors, and is working on getting funding. I am very well acquainted with this idealistic woman who is tending to the business of mankind. You see, she is my daughter. I am very proud of her.
We have so much. I shall spend less on gifts for those who do not need and contribute to the United Christmas Fund to make some innocent child’s Christmas better. However, a yearly fit of guilt and benevolence where we put a few coins in the Salvation Army bucket or give to a charity isn’t enough.
My e-mail address is rwclarke@mibor.net.
Despite Planning, 'Holidaze' Unavoidable
I’m sorry for the bah-humbuggers who can’t wait for December to end because they stress themselves out with orgies of shopping and jam-packed calendars. I achieve a peaceful and merry Christmas spirit by starting preparations early and careful planning.. The week after Thanksgiving we got 200 Christmas cards ready to mail, and I knew what my Christmas columns would be.
Last Monday The house is decorated, and tonight we’ll do the tree.
Tuesday: :Set up the manger scene that my parents gave me when I was twelve. Not to worry about next week’s column, am using a hoot of a story that a friend e-mailed. Dinner with friends where we told tree stories.. One year we bought a lovely tree that reeked of cat as it became warm in the house. We laughed merrily at a friend. He was teaching full time and attending law school at night. Their Christmas tree kept falling over. Finally, our friend, a gentle man and the best of husbands and fathers, succumbed to bottled-up stress, pitched the tree out the door and chopped it up.
6:00 AM Wednesday: Instead of writing, I sit and absorb the snowscape outside that’s as lovely as the one in the movie "White Christmas." . No bird, animal or car track mars the pristine snow. Oh the blissful calm of it! What a lovely Christmas I’m having. I’ve even done most of my shopping.
Wednesday evening; We hear a thud, rush to living room. Tree has fallen over. There’s glass on the floor, and the tree is a mess. Am no longer laughing about our friend’s plight. Fortunately, the most precious ornaments aren’t broken. However, Bill’s family believe that broken ornaments mean bad luck. Also, they insist that the tree must come down before New Year’s Day. . "Pooh!" I say. "Inanimate objects have no influence on events." "I’m not superstitious," Bill replies. "Just careful!"
Thursday: We move stuff out of our home office. Technicians are arriving tomorrow to change our telephone and television systems. During the process, my writing files and notebooks fall on the floor and become a jumbled mess that I throw into a box to deal with later.
Friday: Grocery shopping. Technician says here’s a problem. They’ll come back another day.
Saturday: Early AM, I finish the grocery shopping for a couple of parties we’re having. One of my best suggestions is shop early to avoid the crowds!. Am becoming a tad concerned because I haven’t found the story for my column. Laboriously I search through masses of papers and notebooks . . . "It has to be here .Where is it? . . ."
6:00 AM Sunday: I hunt through everything again. "Where is it? Where is it? It has to be here. It has to be here!" Still no luck. 10:45: Am standing next to the tree when it tips over again. I catch hold of it and shriek for Bill. He’s in the shower and can’t hear me. When he comes out we stand the disheveled tree up again. Our friends--including the one who chopped up their tree--arrive in half an hour to go out for a festive brunch followed by a trip down memory lane at a Brenda Lee concert. Bill, wearing only his underwear, vacuums up pine needles while I take a hasty shower Next the grapevine wreath that Vicki made falls from its place above the fireplace.
5:00 AM Monday: While I’m getting my coffee a crash in the kitchen awakens Bill. The dustbuster has fallen off the top of the fridge--dunno how! No, I do not believe in poltergeists! Still no XC#$%* E-mail story. I start column. I’m no Hemingway or Garrison Keiler, but I know how they felt when they lost manuscripts. I tell editors that I’ll be late.
4:30 AM Tuesday: Am writing frantically, making corrections and inserting material. Eek! Something has gone wrong with this @#!$% computer. Every time I type a letter the next one is erased. I’m afraid to try some of the "command" keys lest I lock this thing up or lose everything. I must not miss the final, sacrosanct deadline. What to do? What to do? Help! (There is no help.)
What, me stressed during this jolly season?
My e-mail address is rwclarke@mibor.net.
Coming 'Unstuck in Time' for the Holidays
On Sunday the greenhouse window had a lovely tracery of frost and dripping. Outside, a lone cardinal sat on a branch beneath the empty feeder as if waiting for breakfast. I put on a heavy, hooded jacket and boots, then went out into the bitter wind to fill the feeder. Within minutes flocks had arrived.
Christmas is less than a week away! Of all the times in the year, it bears the heaviest freight of remembrance, nostalgia and vivid images of the people who have enriched my being. My mind becomes a kaleidoscope of brilliantly colored scenes that shift back and forth constantly from past to present to future, triggered by some memory or thoughts of the present and of times yet to come.
Christmas Past: At school, talented kids like Mardella Anderson have painted on the classroom windows, and I hear the chorus, led by Miss McKinney, caroling through the halls. Here my parents and me, stand on the sidewalk at the corner of Franklin and Carey, admiring how pretty the tree lights look through the front window. … The image and the tense change:. Here five-year-old Vicki stands on a chair, rolling out Santa Claus cookie dough. …
Christmas Eve: We're at Irvington Methodist with Sarah and her mother, my mother holding her candle high and singing "Silent Night." … Christmas morning: Our mothers, Vicki and we -- eldest first -- slowly go down the stairs and into the kitchen where the table is laid for breakfast … then into the dining room where the festive, candle-lit scene is worthy of Charles Dickens. Silver dishes and crystal gleam and are heaped with delicious treats -- fruit, candy, cookies, and chocolates. Last comes the living room, where the tree is knee-deep in brightly wrapped presents. …
After the second time that our tree fell last week, a disgruntled Bill used a coat hanger to anchor it to a picture hook. One year his sister, Joyce, and he had a row when he caught her drilling a hole in the tree trunk in order to install a bough in a gap. Deja vu! I really hated it when the tree fell over because we had to repeat the annual Is-the-Tree-Straight? debate that dates back to our first Christmas together. Bill lies on his belly under the tree, making adjustments to the stand. My job is to tell him when it's straight. "Is it straight?" "I think so." He crawls out from under the tree. "Rose Mary! It isn't straight. … (Sigh.) … I can't do it all." Back under the tree he goes. It's as bad as when the opthamologist asks, "Which is better -- A or B, A or B? -- Mrs. Clarke, you have to make up your mind!"
1963: We'd only been married since October and were still learning all of those details that you don't know until after you've lived together. We worried secretly about Christmas. "Will he choose a scraggly, prickly old tree like the one Daddy bought that scratched you when you decorated it?" "Will she decorate the tree in a slapdash fashion?" "Will she be a bah-humbugger?"
Not to worry! The Clarkes really knew how to celebrate Christmas, and Bill chose a gorgeous tree. He discovered that I am a perfectionist when it comes to decorating the tree, even though I may be slapdash, for example, about unimportant trivia such as getting down cobwebs. Some of his family threw the tinsel onto the tree. Tinsel back then was heavy, rather than this lightweight stuff that hangs crookedly and moves when a current of air hits it. Like my brother, Earl, I insist that each strand be hung individually and straight. Both of us preferred a star to an angel as a tree-topper. Bill had a star made of foil with holes pricked in it to lent the light shine through just like the one I'd had at home. Every year we taped it back together until, finally, it disintegrated. I'd pay a premium for some old-fashioned tinsel and a foil star.
Christmas Present: The house and tree are decorated, and much of the baking shopping and wrapping are done. Next comes cooking dinner for the Boards of the Benton House. This weekend we'll visit Vicki and the boys. This Christmas will be a poignant one because our eldest grandson ships out for Iraq in February. Christmas Eve will find us at Irvington Methodist, and Christmas Day will be just as it's always been at our home. My oldest friend, Sarah, will be with us for dinner. I learned when I was a child that Christmas is a matter of the heart rather than commerce. The joy of it lies in the details and in the comfort that the continuation of beloved customs brings. I wish you a very Merry Christmas.
My e-mail address is rwclarke@mibor.net.
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