The LAST Swim!

Yesterday was the last balmy summer-like day and I spent the entire day indoors working at a desk, crunching numbers, with an air conditioner blasting on my forehead. As I glanced out the window, from time to time, I began to pine over the last days of summer. I never was this way: obsessed with the endings of things. My husband did this to me. After 33 years of living with someone telling me, “This is the last day of summer,” and, “This is the last day of our vacation,” or, “This is the last time we will be sailing until next summer,” it’s no wonder I was fidgeting all day to get out on the water one last time.

At 11:00 AM, I shot a quick e-mail to my husband: What do you say if I make some sandwiches for dinner and we take the boat out to that little spot we found last weekend? We could take one last swim. His immediate reply: Absolutely. I’ll try to be home by 5:45.

And so, the adventure began…

I hurried home and slapped some leftover chicken between two slices of bread, packed a cucumber and some cherry tomatoes to dip into hummus, boiled water for a thermos of tea and brought some cookies for dessert.

“Do you want to bring a bottle of wine?” my husband asked.

“Nah, let’s just throw in some beers and get out before the sun goes down,” I replied. Bringing the wine would have meant taking precious minutes to gingerly pack two wine glasses because my husband won’t drink wine from a plastic cup. In hindsight, we should have packed a few bottles of wine.

Upon arriving at our “little spot” on the Great South Bay we began eating our sandwiches and laughed at the wonder of being alone like this anywhere on Long Island. “I won’t throw an anchor,” my captain said, “because the tide is going out. We’ll just drift into deeper water until we reach the channel and then we’ll head home. By then it will be dark.”

“It seems awful low here,” I said. “Are you sure we won’t get stuck?” My captain, an auxiliary Coast Guard member, chuckled and assured me that he knew what he was doing and I should just relax and enjoy the last sunset. I should have known something was wrong when he finished his sandwich in a hurry and jumped up to look for the one oar he keeps on the boat. He stumbled and landed his big toe in the hummus and I threw my cucumber overboard to the fishes.

“It was just my toe,” he said, “the rest of this hummus is still good.”

“No thanks,” I replied.

I stretched out and relaxed while he went up to the bow and began rowing and testing the water’s depth with the oar. It was still too low to run the engine. I was enjoying the sound of silence interrupted occasionally by the gentle ripple of the oar in the water, a distant call of a lonely seagull, the soft chirping sounds of crickets on the island.

“We’re a lot farther away from the channel than I thought,” my captain called out from the starboard side.

“You know we’re going in circles,” I informed him, “and the mosquitoes are starting to bite.”

I covered my head with my hood to keep the little buggers out and closed my eyes. I was in a gentle reverie imagining that we were teenagers again, stranded out here in the warm dusky evening in a low tide on the last day of summer. I was thinking how differently we would be responding to this situation if we were 18 again, when I was awakened by the sound of a clumsy splash.

“Move up to the bow,” my captain called to me from the water. “I need your weight up front while I pull the boat.” Happy to accommodate him, I lounged in the vee seat in the bow observing how much lower the depth had become and how much darker the sky was and how little progress he had made with his one oar.

“Why is it getting lower?” I asked. “I thought you said we would be drifting into deeper water.”

My captain’s quick response was a firm command: “You’ll have to get out of the boat now and help me push or we’ll never get out of here until the tide comes up at midnight.” It was dark now and I couldn’t see what was in the water – jellyfish? crabs? weed? Did he really expect me to jump in the water beside him? Did he take me seriously last weekend when I playfully called him, “my captain,” and assured him that when we were boating he was "my commander" and I would follow his orders – no matter what? The alternative was to sit out here on this dank dark night and get eaten alive by mosquitoes.

I pushed while he pulled, then we both pushed. I’ll admit that I was faking it at some point, making pushing sounds and not exerting much effort until my foot landed in some mucky mush that pulled me down like quicksand. I screamed and let go of the boat and moved back a few paces.

“What happened?” my captain called out.

“Mush! I stepped into a pile of mucky mush!” He continued to push the boat without me, ignoring my cries and I stumbled after the boat screaming, “Don’t leave me out here alone!”

Then my heart sank at the sound of sand pressing into the hull as the dead weight of our 17 foot boat was in front of us. We were now firmly beached in the pitch black dark in the Great South Bay. I remembered the old joke my brother used to tell my mother when he went boating as a teenager. “Don’t worry so much, mom,” he would reassure her. “If we get stuck out there, we can just walk home.” Har! Har! Har! I was now living that joke. I thought of the wine bottle we left at home and longed for a swig.

For a split second I saw the look of defeat pass over my captain’s eyes. “NOW WHAT!” I screamed. He quickly snapped out of it and began shimmying the boat from left to right and I followed his lead. We were slow dancing with this boat, creating a rhythm of motion as I was whispering endearments to it under my breath, “come on, baby, let’s go, let’s get out of here, we can do this!”

At last! I felt it loosen and the water was up to my knees. “Can I get back in the boat?” I asked timidly at first, and as the water inched up to my thighs I was almost in tears as I cried out, “NOW?? Can I PLEASE get back into the boat?” And then those beautiful words, my captain’s orders: “Get back in the boat.”

The engine started up in deeper water and I saw the green and red buoy lights ahead. We were home safe in the state channel. So why was my captain heading away from the buoys? The engine stalled when we hit bottom again, and then I remembered, the captain was color blind. The oar came out again and I guided him back to the colored buoys. I heard him click the switch to turn on the boat lights but saw no lights. He tried over and over, and I realized all the clicking in the world wasn’t going to turn those lights on as I panicked and called out to alert the captain of an approaching boat. “Don’t worry; I see him!” he shouted out above the roar of the approaching engine.

“I see him, too!” I screamed, “but he can’t see us because we have no lights!” I grabbed a life jacket and clumsily fumbled with the strap to adjust it to my girth. Worst case scenario, I thought, at least they will find my body after the crash. I saw my grandchildren’s faces flash before me. I thought of all the people I loved in my life and gave each of them a two second farewell hug in my mind. I closed my eyes and prayed.

I kept silent for the remainder of the ride home. My life jacket was so tight I could hardly breathe, let alone speak. My heart took awhile to get back to a normal pace. Before my captain could finish tying up, I jumped onto the dock, and in a final gesture of farewell to the summer of 2009, I flung my ruined wet, muck covered sandals across the lawn. That was the last time I would wear them. That slow dance with the boat was, undeniably, my last swim of 2009. As for my captain, those were the last commands he would issue me and the last time I would call him “captain” -until next year.

The Cookbook In My Head

My grandmother’s cookbook was a 3 x 5 inch spiral notebook with recipes that she wrote in broken Italian-English. Here is one of them in its entirety:
2 fico
la flour
12 egges
1 patata bollita

Before my grandmother died, she instructed me to go to her house and take anything I wanted before the vultures got there. (Those were her exact words, not mine.) I didn’t want anything except that cookbook. I thought I would find the secret recipe to my favorite cookie in there – the one that she made for me every Christmas. It was a cookie made with a soft dough in the shape of an empanada and filled with sweetened ricotta and tiny chocolate chips. I had asked her for the recipe many times but she never gave it to me. Instead, she would tell me to come and watch her make it. I thought she was holding out on me, but, in reality, she didn’t have the recipe written down. It was all in her head.

My mother’s best recipes are also written in her head. But, luckily, I grew up watching my mother cook, so her recipes have been passed down through my genetic code and my personal observations. I enjoyed being in the kitchen with my mother. It was our place, the one place in the house where the men in my family kept out. As a child I would stand with my nose level with the counter and watch her methodical chopping. As a teen, I would help her with the chopping and mixing, not realizing that I was also learning to cook. The meditative rhythms were soothing and, inevitably, we would open up and talk about anything and everything. There was no conversation that was off limits in the kitchen. It was there that I learned some of the family secrets that only we women would share.

Like my grandmother and my mother, my favorite recipes are also in my head, but I’ve written down a few too. When my boys went off to college, they asked me for a cookbook of recipes that they had eaten all their lives – the ones in my head. I put one together for them, as best I could, in my own language. It consists of a list of ingredients (measurements are approximated) and my instructions, which are more like essays rather than directions. They know a good cook doesn’t follow someone else’s directions. A good cook works with their senses by seeing, smelling and tasting. In a lot of ways, my boys have already surpassed their teacher.

I listen in rapt attention as my son, James, explains how he roasted a chicken in fresh herbs and played with a white wine basting sauce to produce the most succulent meat that fell off the bone. My son, Peter, amazes me with his robust tomato sauce with lots of “meats” in it. And even my youngest son, Paul, surprises me when he produces his favorite meal: breaded chicken wings with white rice. Who knew the kid was paying attention to my activities in the kitchen?

My husband is another story. He wants to learn, and he may be my biggest challenge. He insists on measuring and timing everything according to the recipe. I tell him cooking is not a science, it’s an art. We read the recipe and then we do what we want. But nothing ever tastes exactly the same, he argues. That’s what makes life interesting, I counter. It’s a basic philosophical difference between us. He likes assurances, I like uncertainty. He likes consistency, I like excitement.

I guess he doesn’t want a repeat of the time when I was having 15 people over for my mother’s birthday celebration and I ruined the rice. I calmly instructed my sister-in-law to hold the back door open and I walked the pot of rice across the yard and dumped it into the garden. I then proceeded to throw together one of the best serendipitous pasta dishes with a creamy mushroom sauce. We were having leg of lamb and the recipe I threw together was actually a better choice for the menu.

The recipe for “Mushrooms in Sour Cream” was taken from The New McCall’s Cookbook by Mary Eckley, Food Editor of McCall’s. (Yes, I measured everything) The book is out of print, but I will share the recipe with you now. This recipe has a lot of liquid, so I thought I would stretch it by pouring it over a pound of pasta. It was delicious! It would be a complete meal with some leftover lamb added to the mushroom recipe below. The entire dish only takes about 20 minutes to prepare.

Mushrooms in Sour Cream

3 Tablespoons butter or margarine
1 cup chopped onion
1 ¼ lb fresh mushrooms, sliced ¼ inch thick
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon paprika
½ teaspoon pepper
¼ cup chopped parsley
1 cup dairy sour cream

1. In hot butter in medium skillet, sauté onion until golden – about 5 minutes.
2. Add mushrooms and ½ cup water; simmer, covered (adding more water, if necessary) until mushrooms are tender – about 15 minutes.
3. Add salt, paprika, pepper, 2 tablespoons parsley, and the sour cream. Heat very slowly, stirring until thoroughly hot. Before serving, sprinkle with rest of parsley.
   Makes 6 servings.
   
   Other ingredients you can add to kick this up a notch: frozen peas, cubed leftover lamb, or cubed leftover London broil, some fresh minced garlic.
   
   Boil a pound of linguini (or other pasta of your choice), drain and toss with Mushrooms in Sour Cream and any or all of the above ingredients. Serve with some crusty Italian or French bread and a salad.
   

Why Are Republicans Always So Angry?

I noticed it during the campaign. Republicans were always so angry. I'm noticing it again now with the health care issue. Why is it that Republicans always seem so angry? Seems like you can't have a discussion with them. It always turns into an argument. Is it just my family, or are Republicans, in general, a mean spirited group of people?

The recent outburst by South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson was the perfect example of what I am talking about. Did you see those Republicans holding up papers, making remarks during the president's speech? They were acting like a bunch of disrespectful ill mannered elementary school kids. What an example to show our children. If these guys in high office can't behave in front of our president, how do you expect the children in our classrooms to respect their teachers? Come on, guys, let's try and set an example here.

I try to avoid conversations in the workplace that have anything to do with the current issues of health care and the economy. I don't want to start any arguments or polarize myself from people that I have to work with every day. But, I wonder, why do I have to be the one to back off? Why are the people with the most irrational ignorant statements the ones who get their opinions heard? I usually let them grunt and groan and turn red in the face while I stand there and nod like a bobble head, stirring my coffee, walking backwards toward my desk - all to avoid an argument, to keep the peace.

I can usually weed out the Republicans by asking, "Did you watch the president's speech the other night?" The Republicans will laugh and reply with an adamant, "NO!" I don't argue with those folks and the conversation ends. Funny, they are never interested to ask me if I watched it. When George W. was in office I watched all his speeches on TV. I wouldn't miss an opportunity like that. I had all my shoes lined up and I would toss them at the TV yelling obscenities until my face turned red. But first I made sure that all my windows were shut tight - just to avoid an argument with my neighbors in the morning.

September 11, 2009

Every year, at the beginning of September, I feel a sense of doom. The weather is cooler, dryer, the sky is crystal blue and my mind makes the flash connection to a similar day eight years ago. I remember that morning. I had the day off and I was getting ready to go shopping with my mother. My husband called to tell me he was alright. I didn't know what he was talking about.

"Why are you calling me?" I asked. "Did you have trouble on the train?"

"You didn't hear?" Then, "Turn on the TV; two planes went into the World Trade Center."

As I watched the images on my television I felt as if someone had punched me in the stomach. I couldn't speak as I held the phone to my ear and listened to my husband's breathing. I wanted him home safe with me. Was I safe? Where was my other son? Had he gone to work in the city that day? My hands began to feel tingly, staccato thoughts flew through my head. Were there other planes flying across the country dropping bombs? My oldest son was in the navy, stationed in California at the time; was he alright? My youngest was in high school. Would he make it home safely? Why did we have to be so scattered?

My mind raced frantically trying to think about all the other people I knew who traveled to the city to work: my son, my uncle, cousins, my friend. I began calling my son and couldn't reach him; same with my friend who was seven months pregnant. I began to feel the rise in my throat, the panic and tears at the thought of losing them.

I remember going around the house locking all the doors and windows, as if that would keep me safe. I pulled the shades down around the house. I wanted to crawl into a safe place and stay there until the reality could penetrate. What was happening? My legs were shaky and I felt as if the ground was shifting under my feet.

My son finally called from his ship to make sure everyone was safe. The navy was on high alert and he wouldn't be able to call again for a while. He asked about his father and brother. Did they ride the subway today? He had been warning them for weeks to take alternate transportation to work. Did he know something that we didn't? I told him I loved him as silent tears fell and I grabbed the phone with white knuckles. As long as I could hear his voice, hear his breathing, I felt some sense of relief in his safety. When he hung up I kept the phone to my ear as if this could hold him to me a little bit longer.

The silence after that phone call was palpable. I broke down and buried my face in my hands and cried. I had flash memories of all of my children as babies, then toddlers, teens and now young men. Had I told them I loved them enough throughout their lives? I wanted to go back in time and hold them safely in my arms to protect them from the evils in the world. Had I prepared them enough for this new world to come?

Long Island Woman Publication Disses Women

I picked up a free copy of Long Island Woman the other day from my local library. There was a picture of Patty Duke on the cover of the September issue. You may have seen it in your local library or on the window ledge of your local Chinese restaurant. I urge you to grab a copy and look through it sometime. I'm interested in your opinion as one woman to another. Did you find it as offensive as I did? Am I overreacting? Please forgive me as I rant on a bit about this...

For one thing most of the articles are about self improvement - but only in a physical way. Here are some articles and advertisements you will find in the September issue:

"Fall Into Shape " - an article by a male doctor outlining all your options for cosmetic surgery
"The Mommy Makeover" - an advertisement. Here is the first line: "Children change everything but that doesn't have to include your figure." (incidentally there is a comma incorrectly placed after the word "but")
"Why a Mommy Makeover?" is an advice column written by another male doctor.
"Breast Surgery Combined With Tummy Tuck and/or Liposuction" is another "Good Advice" column, but this time it is written by a female doctor.
Other advertisers include: The Women's Imaging Center, Botox Clinics, Lumiere hair removal, laser medicine and dermatology doctors, weight loss centers, plastic surgeons, cosmetic dentists, medi spas that offer an underarm laser hair package, bikini laser package, Botox, Evolence, Perlane, Restylane, Juvederm, Permanent Fillers and Chemical Peels. The Naturapathic Solutions company can help you "Get Your "Sexy" Back!" by offering relief from hot flashes, mood swings, low libido and vaginal dryness, fatigue, weight gain, hair loss and poor concentration.

More Good Advice columns follow with headlines like:
"Not All Facelifts Are Created Equal: Understanding Different Types of Lifts" - authored by another male MD
"Consider This When Choosing Your Cosmetic Dentist"
"Weight Loss: A New Way to Achieve Your Goal"
"Resolving Stress to Heal your Body & your Life!"
"Know Your Options When Considering Divorce"
"Do You Need to Avoid Probate?" an empty article that ends with the author's phone number and firm name. Yes, the author is an attorney looking for business.

There is a two page article about handbags and all the frivolous non-essentials that we women need to carry in them. Here are some quotes from the article which is actually a two page advertisement for cosmetics to carry in the handbag:

"Adding a little more blush on your cheeks will also make you look awake."
"Ditching the Blackberry in favor of evening cocktails is a mid-week must for busy girls about town."
"Date night hair and flat hair just plain don't mix."
"If you decide to break out the blow dryer during a weekend, make sure it is a ceramic dryer which cuts down on frizz as well as drying time"

The feature story about Patty Duke focuses on her abusive lifestyle, her multiple unhappy marriages, sexual molestations, her stay in a mental institution and other negative elements in her life like her battle with weight gain. If only Patty Duke had read the Long Island Woman during her life. She would have solved all of her problems. She would have had an array of spas and cosmetic doctors to change her look and her mood. The divorce lawyer could have handled all the divorces and the probate lawyer would have written her will correctly to ensure the ex-husbands wouldn't be arguing about her assets after she is gone.

It's no wonder women today have self image issues. My question is, why are libraries - promoters of education and the printed word - allowing rags like Long Island Woman to be displayed at the entrances and exits of their buildings? As far as I can tell the Long Island Woman is just a big advertisement for insecure women who probably sit with a mirror beside them as they read the advice columns for liposuction and face lifts. I found this publication insulting to my intelligence and disrespectful to women.

The message of Long Island Woman is: "You aren't good enough as you are. Make yourself beautiful, lose weight, tighten your skin to hide your age (because getting older is a bad thing in America) and you will be happier and fulfilled in life. You just have to look like Barbie to be happy.

My message to the editors of Long Island Woman is: I'm going to burn your rag publication in my fireplace and ask my library to remove it from their building. The Chinese restaurant can use it to line the cardboard box that they put the food in. There's always a greasy leak at the bottom of the box when I get the wonton soup delivered.

There's Another Duggar On The Way!

Big surprise announcement on the Today show this week: the Duggars are expecting child #19. Hey, Jim Bob, maybe it’s time to get a hobby. And, Mrs. Jim Bob, once in a while you can just say no! I mean, come on, 18 kids weren’t enough? Can you even remember all their names? I only had three boys and I got their names mixed up all the time. I still get confused. Every phone call starts with me trying to guess which one is on the other end of the line. James? Peter? Paul? Which one are you? I even get the facts of their antics blurred from time to time. Which one of you burned a hole in the sheets playing with matches? I can’t remember. I do remember the night two of my boys had one of those “high-low” stomach viruses and I slept on the floor outside the bathroom door with one child on each side of me and a puke bucket balanced on my chest, just in case they couldn’t make the three foot crawl to the toilet bowl. How the hell can you do that with 19 kids? How can you run through the house with a thermometer checking fevers all night long? Or keep track of medications and doses for all of them?

I don’t buy it: the posed photos with the children all smiling, some holding musical instruments, as if the photographer interrupted their practice session. Others are holding younger siblings, all of them smiling – even Jim Bob and the Mrs. have frozen smiles on their faces. Are these people real, or has Sesame Street made some gosh darn amazingly lifelike puppets? Were those strings I saw above Jim Bob’s head?

I did some figuring. I averaged time throughout the day that it took to take care of personal hygiene, cook meals, home school the children, pick up the house, do laundry, empty the trash and sleep a minimum of 6 hours. I figure, on a good day, Michelle Duggar must only have about 20 minutes left to spend with Jim Bob at the end of the day. If you already had 18 kids and you only had 20 minutes to spend with your husband at the end of the day, would you spend that time trying to make another child? I think I would do something more creative and fun. I would invent games like, “Let’s see if I can tie you up, honey.” Then I would string him up from the ceiling joists, and leave him there suspended in mid air, like Tinkerbell, so I could get a solid uninterrupted 6 hours sleep. Let’s see if he’s still smiling in the morning when we lower him down for the photo op.