I have often said that my life has no meaning until I tell it to at least two of my friends. These are some of the people who give my life meaning. Because I haven't permission from all (or any, actually) of them to use their full names, I shall refer to them (and everything else I can) as I do in my journal: by their initials. Some of those pesky married women who now have four initials (or five; you know who you are)....
CLHDEW3SKMEWNHPV, REBD, EA SMS
PGN
My sister, my soulmate, the one person I can tell anything. Sometime recently I told one of my parents that no matter what else they think of their marriage, at least it provided me with the best friend I'll ever have. We didn't get along very well until she went to college, but that's changed. She'll have her own page or linkage to stories at some point; this section is only supposed to be an introduction. What can I say? There was the time our father wanted to photograph us decorating the tree as if we were Norman Rockwell's grandchildren in our sweats and growing-out hair: "Come, let us hang the ornament together, sister." Or the time we were tangled up together on the couch telling each other all about various men. Our mother, who's never been demonstrative or comfortable with others being so, commented, "Ooo, lesbians" (she's so witty), and considering the subject matter actually at hand and the fact Elvis Costello was simultaneously quavering "Oh what would the loved ones say, what would the loved ones say?", I thought we did well not actually to pee on each other as we broke up into hysterics.
We're both so used to gossiping about our parents to anyone who'll listen that when we talk to each other about them, one will say things like "My mother said that..." and the other will ask--just to make sure--"You mean your mother, don't you?"
971010: Of course, enjoying Bioré
strips together just proves that whatever sick habits we have, we share them
happily.
990309: Another CLH story.
Through CLH I met BHM, through whom I learned one vital thing
about homosexual people, and it's the same thing that whoever said about rich
people, that their difference was that they had more money: "They are different
from you and me. They are gay." And that is mostly all, although his taste
in sweaters got me talking with SLH for the
first time.
(top)
My maternal grandmother. She loves cats and all other living things, used to grow championship African violets, now has a cat named Squeaky, and writes me frequent, chatty, cheerful notes. She has been through a lot, and she has honestly and courageously tried to forgive both herself and her world for the bad things and to concentrate on the good things. I aspire to that, and I admire and love her. She gave me Morse, whom she had bought for herself, just because I liked him. Stray cats gravitate toward her door, no matter what house she lives in (the house in Old Lyme never had strays until she moved in), because she exudes kindness. I reread Madeleine L'Engle's The Summer of the Great-Grandmother more and more frequently these days; it gives me strength.(top)
Okay, my initials get tedious, but
the system makes sense to me. CKC, MAC,
and RKC were my primary baby-sitting victims, now all brilliant
and beautiful young women, and just listen to me make noises like a grandparent.
Their mother, AAC, a charitable soul, has listened to my woes
for years now, and understood when I forgot an after-school baby-sitting commitment
when my first kiss dumped me. She still understands, or at least tolerates,
the tedia of my life, like when
I have to invent a new word. The family's baby-sitting wages contributed to
my college education, as did the father's nepotistically and
repeatedly finding me summer employment. And their dog is one of only three
in the world who remember and love me (In Memoriam: this beautiful pale-gold
golden retriever died in June 1997, at ten years old). And their mother paid
them to recite Shel Silverstein ("Mrs. McTwitter the Baby-sitter")
at my wedding. (Only one accepted.) What's not to love?
(top)
I don't remember what I had heard about Charles Wolfe before I was to have
him for tenth grade English, but he showed his true colors soon enough--on the
first day of school, to a girl he knew was a new student (even if the school
hadn't been small enough for him to know anyway, teachers did get student records).
A new student who looked unusual enough that a humane teacher would have at
least ignored her instead of joining in the boys' teasing. How bravely MEWN
stood up to this treatment was the first thing that drew me to her. The next
thing was, and is, simply her. She cracks me up. She used to infuriate me, too,
which was probably mutual. We each thought we were the cleverest gits yet to
walk the planet. I saw her in August of 1996 at LOLHS 86's ten-year reunion
for the first time in five years, and we were immediately friends again. Artistic,
creative, willing to live on the edge (the Pacific edge, spacifically [sic,
set pun-lasers on stun] Seattle.
(top)
HPV was my best friend when I was little. My mother theorizes this was because of geographical proximity rather than any affinity, which explained (to my mother) why we barely spoke to each other after sixth grade. HPV's attending another school didn't help the situation, nor whatever fight we had, nor our other two best friends moving away. AAC had said to drop in on her (AAC) at work sometime when I was down in Old Lyme, so I did. Then AAC took me home and we had lunch with CKC and that year's AFS student, and then we went back to work. "Do you want to see HPV?" she asked. I'd known HPV worked at the same place, but I hadn't seen her since an inadvertent dog-walking meeting in early high school. "I guess so. I don't know what we'll say to each other." Three hours later, AAC returned to HPV's cubicle to invite me to dinner that night. I guess we did have something to talk about. HPV is brilliant, working for a doctorate in instructional media and technology at Columbia--actually studying a lot of what RDC is interested in.
There is something about being reunited with someone, having whatever it was
resolved or forgotten or forgiven or whatever. I believe we could be friends
again, if we wanted to be; but just knowing that we could be, even though now
we're only casually intermittent correspondents, is peaceful.
(top)
REBD moved to Old Lyme in third grade. At eight, I didn't understand how fast
she had grown up or the choices her family had made. One memory that always
makes me cringe is being in the tiny bedroom she shared with her sister and
asking if she had any toys. She hadn't. What she had was a marvelous imagination.
And we both read. One winter we were penguins on the Lieutenant River when my
ice floe broke off and began to float upstream on the tide. We each feared parental
retribution if I fell in the winter river more than we did physical danger.
At the last possible second, she seized my hands and hauled me across what I
remember as miles of water, safe on her ice floe still anchored to the bank
(and thick enough that it didn't break under our sudden combined weight). I
loved the riverbank behind her house, even though in summer it well deserved
its epithet "Tick Valley." She went to the private school HPV went
to, and then she and her family moved away. At twelve I wasn't the correspondent
I am today, and we lost touch. I've received a few letters over the years and
sent a few less. When RDC and I went to Old Lyme around
Christmas of 1994, there were two amazing presents for me besides the gifts
my sister had mailed home: from BJW, Mrs. Plimpton's
co-authored book, The Lieutenant River, and a letter from REDB, the first
in I think seven years. It took me a long time to write back because, as I maybe
shouldn't've told her, I had so many memories and not all of them good ones.
She is now an art teacher--another of my friends doing admirable and worthwhile
work while I search for my niche.
(top)
EA moved to Old Lyme in fourth grade. She always insisted on her full first
name. So now when it comes down to it, I can't bring myself to assign her a
nickname even just for a middle initial. For fourth and half of fifth grade,
there were the four of us, reading, playing imagination games, playing in forts
in the woods, having to deal with Girl Scouts, staking out the jungle gym as our
particular territory in the school yard. I had always read and liked to read; EA
inspired me to love reading. She owned books, which I thought was
amazing--my parents thought that a library meant that owning books was
unnecessary. PGN was amazing, but so was owning books. I plucked Are
You There, God? It's Me, Margaret from her shelf the year before the fifth
grade Talk and thus first learned that periods aren't always punctuation. Anyway,
we spent hours in trees and in the library reading and climbing both the trees
and the library (patient old PGN), sometimes combining the two processes and
climbing the trees at the library. I don't know about REBD, but HPV and I both would like to find
EA. If you're reading this, you must know who we are, you cannot have forgotten
us. Where are you?
SMS
If I have aspired to be anyone, it has been SMS. Growing up in Old Lyme might have warped me much more if I had not known someone personally who challenged convention as much as she did. She was the first person I knew who did not shave her armpits, did not change her name when she married, and deliberately, unashamedly, had no children. Plus she lived in a great old house at the top of a hill, was a reference librarian at PGN (which is how I first knew her), and wrote aspiring author things including children's books. She and her husband act like the most laid-back people you'll ever meet. I no longer think their life is perfect, but they do always present the best attitude about everything.
BMA
The first of three men I call my first boyfriend, depending on context. He was my first kiss, the first that I wanted even if I didn't have the guts to initiate it. Anyway, I'm glad that I didn't initiate such a laughably pathetic osculation. Wherever he was aiming, he achieve about half mouth and half cheek. Perhaps I shouldn't've moved, if I did? Perhaps he aimed expecting me to, and I didn't? Anyway. The awkwardness that ensued from that lasted really far too long; his gang was the most interesting all through high school. He married yet another high school classmate; they live in Old Lyme still with their son.
I really wish I remember when we had a history class together at UConn--I remember the class but not her presence. At our class reunion, she said I totally ignored her all semester long. This I can easily believe; however much I have always loved Old Lyme I long tried to live without acknowledging any association with my classmates. I can assuage my conscience only because I know that if I had deliberately ignored her, to slight her as a person, I would remember my evil campaign. Regardless, it was mean, considering she was the nicest to me of anyone. Of the dozen or so times throughout high school that I went out with my classmates, she figured in at least half of them. Also she remembers that when I would flee sobbing from a classroom (as happened numerous times), she would join me in the bathroom either to soothe or share my sorrow. I'm a selfish cow, I readily admit; though I don't doubt it I can remember this only as an impression. Anyway, at the reunion she seemed to forgive me for any past grievances and to be pleased I had suggested such an event at all. And I happily observed her happy marriage and motherhood.
PGN
Until I make my Libraries page, PGN belongs here. My hometown library counts as a friend, as one of the best friends I'm likely to have in my life. In 1898, a library remarkable for its very existence in such a small town opened on Lyme Street, named in honor of the founder's mother-in-law, Phoebe Griffin Noyes. In the 1930s, the town took over more financially for the 'brary, so it is now the Old Lyme-Phoebe Griffin Noyes Library. I call it Phoebe.
New in fifth grade, she was my pal in the earlier part of middle school until our interestes veered so sharply that we found the other boring or scary. My dishwasher reminded me of her one day.
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