Veterans Day

This is SO how i remember my young cousin Joel, gentle, and funny, but so handsome!!! and proud to show up in his uniform!!!

I mean, look at THIS tender face!!! he was going overseas “OFF TO WAR” with our other cousin, Edgar, also VERY “cute “ but more assured - jokes more rugged in notes to his Mom , Aunt Lil . When a note or telegram would come, from “ Over There “ my father would read it!! then breathe easy when we knew they were okay.

Joel and Josh were like heroic brothers to my brother, sister and me and I want to put my arms around this picture... I WILL (masked) hug Josh, my cousin, soon!!!!

Astonishing how one picture sends you right back to the sounds, the scent, the images and deep feelings of long ago... Joel was a touch shy , his humor light and almost wary and gentle as this expression: he loved his accordion.... and the occasional “furlough“ dinners , rationed “deli” from Nate’nAl’s very little meat, etc....

THANK YOU!!! Jeff, for bringing us memories, so fulfilling during this “current WARTIME!! BATTLES LIKE WWII, on two fronts! i mean EXACTLY.....

SHIRLEY CHISHOLM

We’ve needed Kamala Harris for quite a long time.

In 1971 I became part of a group of determined women who gathered every Thursday around Betty Friedan’s big kitchen table on the Upper West Side. For those of you who don’t know, Betty Friedan wrote The Feminine Mystique, an uplifting, powerful book that charged up our feminist movement. The stunning novelist Lois Gould was part of our group, as was writer Alix Kates Shulman, Barbara Seaman who wrote The Case Against The Pill, and a bright young poet wearing hot pants, Erica Jong.

And Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm.

I remember the day the magazine MS. arrived at one of these gatherings. We sat looking at the illustration on the bright red cover—the East Indian Goddess, a baby in her belly, and in each of her eight arms she's clutching the wheel of a car, an iron, a mirror, a phone, a clock, a duster, a frying pan, and a typewriter. Up on the top left corner was the headline “MS. RATES THE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES.” The one who came in first in every category was our friend Shirley.

Hubert Humphrey was negative in every category and Richard Nixon came in last (of course.) It’s a great chart to look at today. The candidate behind Shirley was Gene McCarthy. You've all heard of Joseph McCarthy, reviled for blacklisting. But there was also Gene McCarthy, wise, dry, interesting, with style and polish. He was tied with McGovern, who a lot of people liked. But McGovern didn't have McCarthy's wise cool charm. McGovern was a nice salesman. Shirley, on the other hand, was going to make history. She said, “I've suffered more discrimination as a woman than as a black.” This even startled us.

The issues then were Red China, ecology (before it was called the Environment), the wage-price freeze, offshore oil drilling, and abortion rights. The latter was not discussed on TV. We were looking for Independence, “the courage to challenge the status quo.” Wilbur Mills, also running, had a Forced Work bill requiring a welfare mother to put all her kids over the age of three in Childcare Centers. She would also have to accept any job, and if she refused she'd lose all her welfare benefits. This was known as the “southern fried chicken” Program because President Nixon had talked to Chicken Delight about franchising the children's centers. Needless to say, Wilbur Mills didn't give Ms. an interview.

Like all the great Civil Rights leaders, Shirley believed in the power of prayer, and insisted on reform in convention rules. She challenged any delegation to the convention that wasn’t 50% women. I think it was her birthday, when she turned to me and said, “I want these words on my tombstone: ‘Shirley Chisholm had women running her campaign.’”

You’d feel the bolt of electric energy when Shirley would walk into our gatherings. She took bold stands. “I will vote ‘no’ on every bill that provides money for the Department of Defense until our values and priorities have been turned right-side up again.” Cheers went up on that. She also said, “As long as they keep fighting this Vietnam War, I’ll keep praying on my knees fifteen minutes a day to get us out of it.”

Shirley had fought for women's rights all her life. She died in 2001.

I know she’s glowing today.

THE WILL OF THE PEN

I woke up this morning with words clear: “One needs one’s parents even more at the end of life than at the beginning.” An unattractive irony; perhaps this is the “amends” for not being there for THEM when they were kitting up for THE END. But it’s my generation which is reaching the end now in record numbers, and we wear the mask which reminds us with every breath that it’s coming. (And, given the plague, we are beeping like an open refrigerator! “Keep distance!!! At risk!”)

My excellent trainer walks me round the block. I am the small dog. Or the child, for life IS a circle, not a line, and some of us truly are desperate for the familiar Real Life Gatherings. The Steps, like eggs, a dozen, full of protein, guaranteed to keep us on our steady trail to our cherished Home—the Log Cabin, the small Palisades place above the Bank. (For the record, even Real Banks are over. And it’s passé to write checks.)

I reread three of Joan Didion’s books this weekend. Joan has always been, after Mary McCarthy, the one I write UP to. I love the dry power of her Northern California voice. I knew her and her husband, the brilliant writer John Gregory Dunne. We’d meet at gatherings in the late Fifties and Sixties, and I longed for a marriage like theirs, where we’d BOTH be driven and excited by each other’s work. Their marriage had a solemn dedication, very much like my parents’ marriage.

A graduate of the Academy for the Arts in New York, my mother was a great painter and an extraordinary pianist. She had her studio where she painted portraits. My father was a screenwriter and a producer who went on to head a major studio, mainly because he didn’t treat stars like merchandise.

But like all things now, the language of marriage has changed. And I live in dread solitude.

When the machines we have do not work, we must remember the will of the pen. It needs no charging. The pen is always here, waiting like a real live husband or two loving parents, to take you where you want to go. Or maybe more like the family horse. You just buckle up, hop on, and there you are with your beloved companion. Maybe husbands aren’t like that. The roles of man and woman are changing like music. When I hold my pen, I become a conductor. Like the notes of music, words sweep me into the rhythm, the tune of a story. I play the music my mother loved when I am writing.

I used to lie under the piano when she came in from painting. While she played, I would draw strokes and shapes in my notebook, gestures and expressions of people, horses, dogs, and shapes of the crystal perfume bottles which my father bought for her, and I’d look over her shoulder to the big window and see the olive and the pepper tree dancing with each other in the breeze.

Batman Part 1

“They” are building a subway in L.A. now. I started this as “We are,” but 𝘐 am not part of “We” which is continuing the transformation of L.A. from a cowboy town of some true charm and character, into a slick paradigm for how the Moon City will look when we’re done destroying our once-engaging planet. The Red Line will be a minimalist traffic jam for Millennials “heading out” to somewhere. The Red Line is going to be reliable because L.A. roads no longer go the same way twice. Which is fine, you can’t park when you get there anyway. The Red Line has not thought about parking.

The Red Line is the one you want to take from Hollywood Boulevard to Downtown. In fact, last night Barri, a ukulele player who writes novels, said that it will be the best way to get Downtown today.

So the other day (mask and gloves in place) I sojourned to the subway construction in Hollywood, looking for Kale the Green Giant, a fan’s favorite who hangs out around Grauman’s Chinese Theater. He passes out thick green smoothies, nutrition guides, and cards for his yoga class. His leaves are pure silk. But when I got there, it seemed like his shift is over.

Suddenly I see Batman. He’s parked his gleaming Batmobile right on the Boulevard, of course, providing distraction from the minimalist panels of shutdown stores and cafés. He’s come out from an open nail salon. He regards the perfectly polished, deep chrome, pen-point spurs jutting from the frame of his wings. There is a cloak fluttering behind each shoulder. The polish is perfect—he lifts his pointed brows like arrows on his alert jet black ears.

“I’ve seen you before,” I tell Batman. His body suit is a thing of mobility, sleek as my editor’s Porsche.

“Green drink?” he says.

“Not interested,” I say.

“No problem.” He lifts one brow. Does not smile.

Sullen guys are alluring, dedicated as they are to the roles they’re playing. I am glad he does not talk. I like watching unsuitable men. He pulls up the long sloping back of the SUV, revealing a smaller shape, covered with a night-sky velvet case which reveals the interior vehicle; snake eyes for a windshield. The original Swarovski! He pushes another button: The Batmobile—YES!—moves out as the case folds away and the car says, “STEP ASIDE.”

Wings rise. These are true bat wings. This is no customary ride. I take my seat. (One does not say “No” to Batman.)

“FASTEN SEATBELT.” The mobile delivers a gleaming belt. A helmet with small wings pops up, commands “PRESS BUTTON ON LEFT.” A mask flips up, clicks into the helmet. (Perhaps I’ve time traveled? I’ll be late for dinner. But then, my dinner guests are used to Breaking News.)

“SHALL WE HAVE A FLIGHT?” The car has a chilly British voice. Did he play Phantom of the Opera? Has he had a rough time getting work lately? Will he sing “The Music of the Night”?

Batman clips on a blue-black mask. Nods.

“Thank you,” I say. So not all bats are trouble. The top of the Batmobile folds back like my grandmother's convertible, and a pole shoots up. Batman is shifting buttons—the spinner whirls out on top, and with a jolt we are airborne!

“This is REAL!” I say (but I peer above my mask and scan the skies for other bats.) Maybe this episode was pre-recorded to keep us safe. I see no bats, but love the rush of speed, the dash of three-dimensional distance. The touch of fear. I am in The Batmobile Top-Down! And Batman is singing behind his mask. As he moves around in his body suit, I see mighty muscles; his haunches prowling like Brando’s in the short Marc Anthony’s Toga, 𝘵𝘩𝘦 get-off image of my first twenty years.

The squinted windows now are hooded by a sort of iPhone thing he points at each one, turning it empty, fast and slick as you turn off your TV. The seats lower way back now. I’m seeing as I lie next to him, bodies of ultramarine light; this may not be so simple. Maybe this “Batcopter” will fly me off to wherever Batman lives. Wasn’t it a rather grand Manhattan apartment, upper Eastside? Cuomo cut the curse way down. I’ll like that. But am I really what Batman wants? I mean the Hollywood stories and so on. Be still, I tell myself looking up into those eyes. Pretend this is some wild dream. Dreams do go like this, don’t they? He’s cool of course. He’s another kind of a bat I guess. A cool customer, like Joan Didion. Cool is fine by me. It is/was/has been/once was where I lived. The night is hot. He is kissing me! But these lips are mine; oh, did I ever dare to consider a kiss again. Do not think in that direction—his hands are silky smooth as French kid gloves. The seat has spiraled! I am flying under him, my legs wrapped up under his wings. They are true wings and I have to keep my shins down low enough not to bruise the center core, from which the wings do spring. When, I want to ask him, did you decide to be what you are? To play yourself? And when you go back to New York, do you undo the wings and become the elegant bachelor again? How does it really go? Do NOT think, Do NOT distract him. He’s no kid. Men need you to be still, to concentrate on the energy they crave to bring it off wild, and, well, I do send those rays to him; he cries out; the wings flap over me and I’m grateful—I lie still and hold my legs soft and steady around him.

“And…now,” he says, quiet, “and now,” yes. Now. And this is different indeed, for as he caresses me with wise authority, I see it truly is night outside. I have lost all time, all that I call reality. His wings lift high; the seat belts pop free! He grasps me firm to his gut, gripping me with his arms. I lift off. We fly up together into that comic strip dark blue universe, winging high over a baffled planet, slowly gazing up at us as we fly through the Universe. Taking Off is what this is. Do not ask if we can do this forever.

As we whirl around the Crescent of the Moon, I see They were Wrong; the Moon is not always round; and now we are looping through Saturn’s rings, all framed, all riding to the supreme of galactic silence.

“Ah Padre,” he says to Jupiter as we turn, lowering now, down, down, down…can I bear this to end?

“I cannot lose you, too.” Do not say this aloud. (I do not want my husband’s soul to hear any of this.)

Batman folds his wings closed now, the spinner slows as we lower back into the top-down car. The skylight closes. He strokes my face. He rises, returns to his costume as I dress. Then he taps his iPhone and the windows go light. I put my watch on. I’ve only been here five minutes! It felt like a week of midnights. He gives me a look of gentle satisfaction, easy to return. Do not overwhelm the elegance of this exchange.

“I must meet my friend–for the subway,” I say.

“I’ve shown you everywhere I know,” he says.

We walk to the front of Grauman’s. He is suddenly gone. My friend Barri is here.

“Where were you?” She’s frowning.

“I was just casing the footprints at Grauman’s.”

“I don’t think so. I’ve been here over five minutes.”

“Sorry,” I shrug.

“And what the hell is that on your shoulders?”

“What?” I felt nothing—but I lifted my hands; soft light fabric. Black.

“You’re wearing a cloak? Where did you get that?”

“Gift from Batman,” I wink.

“Yeah,” Barri frowns. “Sure, come on—we’ll be late.”

We walk down the steps to the subway. The plain grey walls are already crumbling.

“We’re taking the Red Line,” she says.

“Oh good.”

An announcement voice declares, “THIS TRAIN IS THE BLUE LINE.”

Then it announces “THE NEXT TRAIN WILL BE THE RED LINE.”

We get on it. Are told “THIS IS THE PURPLE LINE.”

We get off at the next stop to wait for the actual Red Line.

“You can’t ever get where you want in L.A.,” Barri says.

“Not exactly.” I touch the cloak. “But there are lots of places you never knew you wanted to go.”

Dining With Anderson & Friends

These days, as my friend Lucero taught me, I nestle small ice cubes into the root of the tall white orchid plants on the coffee table. I’m having dinner with my reliable friends, Anderson Cooper, Don Lemon, Rachel Maddow, and Lawrence O’Donnell. I set out five plates, five silver forks from my parents’ house, and a drawing on each plate. Food is “nutrition” now, and has lost the amusement of creative action. I sit down on the chair by the coffee table, facing the TV set above the stone mantelpiece. My father's antique toy banks parade up there, with a brass horse and a scarlet fan. In the curious format of this time, imagination serves solitude well. I do not go out, of course. I live on my own. Laurence often invites the most interesting guests and pays special attention to their literary skills. I have come to know these guests well during the curve of the COVID. We agree upon most matters.

The commercials are like appetizers. I get hooked on some, such as the recent Infinity car commercial. This features a lusty dark woman with the most alluring expression I've ever seen. She is lounging in the back of the car. I am crazy about her sullen nod to music, a certain hostile look, like a spicy hors d'oeuvre. (On America’s Got Talent, Simon would give her a golden buzzer.) All the commercials grow on me. I worked in advertising long ago, and our ads were conceived with the same creative drive, mystique, and detailed attention that my father gave to his movies. So, when I bring my “reality” plate to the table, I set illustrations of the dinner they’re having for each guest and fill their crystal goblets with Perrier water. I have become accustomed to my dinner guests' familiar gestures and voices, Rachel's riveting expressions, her classic neck, and, yes, I look at Chris Cuomo, softer, wiser, since his recovery—and all his brothers (or does he just call everyone “brother”?)

The other night however, Anderson, even livelier now since the arrival of his baby son Wyatt (who I can't wait to see, Yes!) had a special story introducing Bats and their involvement, let us say, with the COVID-19. We see these Bats visiting mass outdoor markets. There were maybe several dozen close-ups of Bats, some with big noses, sort of ruddy complicated faces, as if they'd had “bad work done.” So many Bats flying around in Mr. Cooper's enormously unsettling well-done surreal documentary. My asthma clutched into low gear, sensing activity of some concern. Since two bouts of scary pneumonia I’ve been cautious around all flying creatures. Has one of these Bats come from Russia or was this gang sent to Trump, to share the cage Putin’s building for him?

The Bats, here, interrupt the format of what has come to be my dinners, reliable adaptations, with vintage cowboy napkins and butter plates to hold our masks. One creates details to put concern in its place (i.e. no knives at the table, keep anxiety at bay.) But tonight—this array, this study if you will, of Bats defines distress. They wear no masks, unlike Batman, who recently appeared to me in a wild hallucination, another of the semi-fictional experiences I suspect many actual humans are having as we react to what seems an upcoming leap of evolution.

I was not at ease—even with the Häagen-Dazs bar—as bats flew, swept and spun across from my dinner table. It would have been rude to leave. And I never crack the fortune cookie till I finish dinner. And I was learning so much: Did you know Bats love tequila (had not occurred to me.) They eat moths! (Which is why they wear leather wings.) There are bats who mate for life; they “shave” before they bite!? Yes, really. (I had boyfriends who never did that…but that was the Sixties.) Now, here’s something to consider: Bats are good mothers (Batman story coming soon.)

Anderson is directing the documentary perfectly. There are, it seems, flying foxes who get mistaken for Bats. A foxy way to take flight. Anderson introduces “Claudia,” an advocate for bats. She calls them fascinating. “They can eat 500,000 insects.” There seems, in the film, nothing encouraging about the Bats who have drawn our attention by destroying our societies and families, draining medical resources, and, let’s just say, taking our planet and turning it upside-down (an action aided, abetted, and abused by the current government).

Somewhere in the Bat documentary, I think I learned that Bats cannot hum while eating, because (and this may not be precise information, but we have little patience for that) “they can’t locate the echo!” I also need to convey that they eat moths to protect corn crops. Not, as I thought, to protect wool jackets. We just never know each other's special skills.

Then, as I was watching the Bats on the screen, I think I heard the rise of the protesters, appalled by the news that 13 million Mexican free tail bats spend hours in the summer looking for a place to sleep. Sort of like long ago in NYC, when we used to put together plans for the Hamptons. Now it’s, “Where will the Bats be?” Those were the days, my Friend. And my gratitude for the remarkable dinner guests: Always here. They never say “We’re going out tonight.” They never let me be alone.

Over There

The fearful isolation and shocking upheaval of these last months reminds me of the years before World War Two.

My grandmother was living with us then. She and her friends were concerned about their families in Europe. Jews like us were being kidnapped. I was five, but I found my parents’ friends more interesting than my own. Their sense of alarm was scary as cowboy movies. Mr. Lindbergh said that the Nazis was a Jewish hoax. I did not want to be Jewish. Everything was our fault. It wasn’t much fun being Jewish anyway. Christmas and Easter weren’t something we could believe in. In America it was best to be like everyone else, meaning white and Christian. My father said it was harder to be colored or Chinese or Mexican. We had a big house and many dinner parties. My mother was an artist and pianist, she had no interest in the kitchen. In those days dinners had many “courses.” There was an appetizer, then soup, then meat and vegetables and dessert. Often Jello. Disliked.

Like eating neon.

It took a lot of work. We had seven people running the house, all African-American. They raised us and comforted us when doctors came to give us shots. You had to have a whole row of shots along your arm. What you were allergic to swelled up. I was allergic to chocolate, dogs, horses, and cats (not a problem, we didn’t like them). But there was always someone to talk to, even when our parents went to Palm Springs on weekends.

My room had a window seat looking out over a curved driveway on the hill. Just to the right were three birch trees which I loved. One for me, my sister Joy, and my brother Jeb who had a special flag with his name on the flagpole. He was named after the song. Jeb and I got along especially well because we both had asthma. All the doctors had keys to the house.

From this window, I’d watch my father driving away in the wooden station wagon, my mother sitting close. They’d gaze at each other like movie stars in love. You couldn’t have a better story than someone loving you back just as much. That was my dream, to fall in love. The end.

I watched my parents dance when Hoagy Carmichael came over and played “Stardust” on the piano. It was his big song.

One night when my parents were home, I woke up and saw a fire, not on the hill but in our own driveway. Four men in white hoods had dug in a big white cross there and lit it on fire. I ran to my sister’s room shouting and banged open the door to my parents’ wing of the house. My father was already throwing his robe over his nightshirt. My mother was wrapped in her robe. Donovan, who really ran things in our home, was talking to the police on the phone in the den.

The police took notes. I heard them say that Brentwood did not permit colored residents. My father said, “That will be changed tomorrow.”

“That was the KKK,” my father later explained, “the Klan.”

“Do they crucify people?” Jeb asked. No one answered.

Donovan had his arm around Mable’s shoulder, she was crying. We were all in robes. Ethel made cocoa for everyone except me, but I got tea with honey. After things settled down, Dotty put on a record in her room. She wanted to be a jazz singer. She poured me a little bit of Scotch. “So you’ll sleep this ugly thing out of your mind.”

There was a guard hired from then on to patrol the land around the house and keep us all safe the whole night.

Most evenings my father saw rushes and dailies after dinner in the projection room. He made notes to the film editor. But on some nights he’d sit with screenwriters and reporters, discussing news—meaning what was happening “over there.” There were tough talks about why we shouldn’t go to war, and some guys said Russia was changing. My father reminded them that we are here because our families fled Russia. Their talks were more exciting than watching tennis or polo games, even when I didn’t understand. It was better than sleeping.

They loved President Roosevelt even though all people thought he was too Liberal. But those weren’t my father’s friends. They’d eat deli sandwiches and listen to the late news coming in on the big dark wood radio standing by the table in the den like a severe warden. I never slept well then, wheezing always, and so I’d sneak downstairs and listen. Tonight was serious. My father sat me on his lap and said, “The Japanese have bombed Pearl Harbor.”

“Not Grandmas friend Pearl”? I said.

“No,” my father whispered.

Then Mr. Roosevelt said, “This day will live in infamy.” The screenwriters nodded to each other. We’d be all right. I heard that voice.

Where is such a voice today?

Memorial Day

Yes I am writing. I will deliver pages each week. Writers require deadlines, therefore write faster when older. I always wanted to be a Columnist (No, not Communist!) Maybe for one of the newspapers, like the Chicago Tribune, the Washington Post, or of course the New York Times. I am 84 years old: A proud part of a new and forceful generation. Do not, I warn you, call me widow!

The word "Blog" is unattractive. I am therefore posting words to be called “Veteran.” Google definition: “A person who has long experience in a particular field.” My column is about living now with occasional notes from the salty golden age of Hollywood and the ripe alluring years of publishing in Manhattan. I’ll write about the writers I knew and columnists I admired, such as Studs Terkel. (I’d take the train to Chicago for every book tour so I could have lunch with him each time.) I’ll also be introducing you to particularly talented new writers.

I’ve been writing a memoir since 1990. A book about how much love can cost and when it’s worth every cent. My sister reminded me that Charles Dickens used to send his books a chapter at a time to newspapers. “Right,” I said. I thought to myself, this way I can simply post these stories that have no end.

“No one reads love memoirs anyway,” an editor recently told me. During this plague, I don’t celebrate birthdays. And, as it is, “we” are all away…

Once upon a time, my birthday was always on Memorial Day. The American flag was lowered halfway down to honor the young men, including two of my cousins, who went overseas to war. They came back.

Mickey the Marine, handsome as Superman, did not come back.

Milly, our governess, had been waiting so hard for him. After she got the news, Milly drove us way over to the Veteran’s graveyard, a field of white crosses, plunging and rising like a harsh surf. I was carrying the marine doll Mickey gave me when he was on furlough. We gathered around a grave and all sang, “I’ll Be Seeing You.”

Growing up we were all worried almost all the time. The war, like now, had ruined everything we thought we knew. Nothing has ever been simple, even long ago. I held my marine doll tight. By each grave there was a small gathering of people, heads lowered like sad trees.

Father's Day

Never use the same word twice in any Thank You note,” my father said. He was sitting at the big wooden desk in his bedroom in his pajamas and robe. My parents were deeply in love. They had a powerful allegiance to each other’s talents and ambitions. But my father’s most profound devotion was to spiritual and political causes. Every script he wrote, every picture or play he wrote and produced, was about a cause. From Oscar-winning Boys Town about Father Flannigan who rescued abandoned boys, to Sunrise at Campobello, about FDR’s rise from polio to the Presidency. Each story was about accountability and commitment.

On weeknights, writers would come for dinner, then gather in the den to edit and work out scripts. And on Sunday evenings, it was all family and close friends. Everything in this time of my life now reminds me of my parents. Last night there was a powerful wind conducting the palm trees, the branches waving with a smashing rustle. Reminding me of the sound of my mother’s long full emerald green taffeta skirt. She’d reach and pound at the piano keys until it was time for dinner.

Her nights really began in her room where she’d sip at sherry, read books, and tell me stories I was never supposed to know.

My father’s day began early. As screenwriter he’d be in his robe finishing scenes to give to Lucy, his secretary at the studio. He wrote the way he taught me to write, on yellow legal paper pads with palm tree green lines. You wrote on these pads because whatever lawyers said was meant to be true. And you wanted a scene to be true. Even if you made it up, you felt you were there. He also wrote with yellow Ticonderoga pencils with the double green band by the eraser. He had a big sharpener and because he wrote fast, he’d start the morning by spearing six or seven pencils right away.

“Isn't it faster to type?” I’d asked him once.

“Yes but a great writer told me, when I interviewed him for the New Jersey paper I worked on, to write with a pencil or a pen, because your brain picks up the rhythm, the beat or voice of a character, the pace and feel of where you’re going. It gives your work action and character.” He loved the word character.

Writing by hand made sense. I couldn’t imagine Gene Kelly dancing on a motor boat.

My godfather Leonard Spigelgas was also a screenwriter. His best friend then was Gore Vidal. They both were sleek and funny in a crisp and stylish way. If I wrote three pages of a story, I could sometimes read aloud to them at dinners. My best friend Josie had that sharp voice like her father Herman Mankiewicz. This was the New Yorker magazine voice you could not fake. I tried to practice writing a story about Jane Fonda and Maria Cooper who rode horses to school, but Mr. Vidal said “I’d rather hear a story you’re not supposed to tell. Maybe something about your friends’ parents.” He lifted one eyebrow and gave me quirky smile. I could’ve written about how Josie and I had spied on Marlon Brando changing into his toga for his role as Mark Anthony. We saw him without any clothes on at all.

My life goal each day was in some way to please my father, to get his attention, to be the object of his smile. My father was sometimes distracted, but he listened well, a rare gift in Los Angeles. He was deeply private and capable of keeping secrets, which is why many stars trusted him; he fought for their rights, something very unusual. Stars were often treated as merchandise. My father was more of a consultant, someone you could confide in and turn to. I remember his top five message pictures. He was taunted for making them definitively liberal. Part of my father’s appeal was the way you felt at ease with him. He had a certain shyness. He was embarrassed by four letter words and rough guy jokes, horrified by prejudice and immorality.

I never slept well as the asthma medication kept me awake, so the nights were of more interest than school. On one night I heard the furry heft of a Chrysler limo coming up the driveway. I ran down the hall to the wide steps and opened the front door. There was Montgomery Clift struggling out of the car in a white terry cloth robe covered with blood. I felt my father’s hand on my shoulder.

“Jill,” he said, “I’m here.” As I turned to go back inside I saw my father put his arm around Mr. Clift. “Monty, what’s happened, come inside.”

This was how my father was. As an esteemed storyteller he never turned away; he was a caregiver and listener. I remember watching as he’d get ready and go to MGM as a writer or to RKO, running it for Howard Hughes. He'd dress with a sports coat and a tie and his manner was easy and open. He'd smile as I watched him in the mirror. But when he became head of MGM, he was a different actor. He wore suits and combed his hair in the strict manner of command for this office. He’d see me watching and smile over his shoulder. It was a new role, but it never changed him.

When I was at Stanford to study design, so I could write for Vogue one day, I called my father and told him I hated the rules, the structure, the control of having to work a sewing machine.

“Jill,” he said, “Go sit under the redwood trees and write a story you need to tell.”

I wrote and wrote, turned in three stories and was accepted into the writing class.

“When you feel helpless,” my father said, “you pick up a pen or a pencil and start to write.”

When I was writing my first novel Perdido, I lost the sense, the voice of one of the main characters. I called my father.

“So,” he said, “tonight, write the character a letter, tell her what you’re missing. Put the letter under your pillow with a pencil, a Ticonderoga of course, next to the bed, and a yellow pad. Then,” he added, “when you wake up, don't wait. Write down what you feel, what you see, all you have from that last dream. And what you need will be there.”

He was right.

A couple of years ago, someone suggested I should write about my father. I wasn’t sure how to write real; to go into the deep devotion, the gifts he’d given which I find in my son and daughter, in my grandchildren—the inspiration of an eternal compassion.

My father had passed away forty years before, but I wrote him a letter.

“How would it be if I write about you? Tell your story?”

I put the letter under my pillow. The next morning I woke up from a dream: I was in this huge auditorium, the kind where my father would address the ACLU or the ADL or the Academy…one of his favorite causes.

He was walking from the podium toward me wearing a grey herringbone sports jacket I had never seen before. It was unbuttoned, his arms wide, a fine smile on his wonderful face!

I laughed as I caught the dream close. A new book needs a fresh “jacket.” I can tell my father’s story. Yes.

Dream Of Fields

It’s one of my usual wandering over hillsides dreams, looking for my father. I’m carrying a basket of vegetables, don’t know how long I can do this. Everyone is wandering. No one talking. I see Stephen Colbert. Not sure I should talk to him or say I’m glad to see him since I don’t watch him or know anything about him, but he smiles at me and thinks I might need help with the vegetables. He’ll find someone and I’ll be ok because he’s famous. Famous people aren’t lonely which is a lie. They sometimes get lonely too, we’re talking about this, I admit I like being with famous people because then people ask if you are famous too. They’re doing this as I wander over the hillsides. No one is in groups.

I keep saying, “I do know Stephen Colbert.” I see him again on this next rise of the hill. He’s busy but says hi. We’re wandering again, no one feels it’s strange, it’s like a huge series of old-fashioned empty fields. Like high above Bel Air near Mulholland. I ask Stephen if it’s rude to ask if he’s gay or straight. “A little rude,” he says, but he laughs, “maybe a little of both. Don’t you want help carrying that?” he looks at the basket which is bigger now with pieces of old quilts, lots of pieces of kimonos and raggy wipes among the big vegetables. “No,” I tell him, “I’m not old, don’t worry about me, I want you to notice me not because I’m old, but because I’m still “known” if not for why. (because my father was famous or, as she said in his book “when Mr. Vosek told him he was fired, “Now I’ll be ‘once was’ or ‘used to be’ you want to die while you still ‘are’.”

Sublime Burger

I’m waking up. Sunshine’s here on balcony, nasturtiums swinging up the lattice and rosy pink daisies whirling under the family of palms.

These things have happened in this new chapter. My granddaughter brought me armloads of pharmacy stuff. Then a neighbor I love texted. They were picking up supper from the good burger place around the corner. Is there something that I would like? I laughed, “I’ve been longing for one of those cheeseburgers since lockdown, and “oh,” I text back, “You’re a miracle! I do not like making dinner for one.” I put Elvis on, dancing! They left this sublime burger right there in a chic tawny box, and with fresh crispy fries! (Will do a portrait of that burger). During tough times you need the food of funny lively carefree times. I listened to music from shows I loved and sang along. So grateful to my neighbors, reminding me loving people are alive.

Then, this morning I woke to sunshine (the glow was like it had a t-shirt saying “SPRING”). Phone ticked: “message!” And then, here was a collage on phone of voices, instruments, and musicians from all over the world, singing of love. The roots of our planet go deep. No demons, no bat plague can dig us up. We have the spiritual tools to rise up high, breathing deep, grateful for the sun, a roof – chair, a way to hear the voices of hope as they lift us fresh up, beyond new views, way beyond the sullen grip of hate. We’re here to heal. We do not have to touch to embrace our souls. A magical Zoom across our entire world of music.

Action Plan for The Duration

1.    Detox from News. Whips up anxiety

2.    Do Yoga stretches. Action good for all of body.

3.    Dance to Elvis, Johnny Cash, or 20th century musical favorites. Or Beatles!

4.    Do not go into deep psychological exploration of anxiety, etc.

5.    Watch comedy stuff on Netflix.

6.    Eat whatever you want. Future is not option for me. Do not consider.

7.    SERENITY PRAYER essential. Stay in RIGHT NOW.

8.    Really read great book you say you’ve read.

9.    Eat something that is not nutritious once every week. Something that reminds you of fun.

10.Write list for who gets what. (And who is not to get what.)

11.Write any story you know, or you’re not supposed to ever tell; this will ease tensions (we have to have some outlet.)

12.List 12 Gratitude things or thoughts every morning.

13.Keep pen and paper by bed. (Write note to Dream keeper for dream you’d like (or someone you miss maybe) write image of dreaming and have as you wake up. (You’ll be surprised.)

Round Table

By Jill Schary Z. Robinson

What makes Trump so offensive: his fear, childlike anger, and insecurity generate accusations. His “wall” is built of resentment. The ego cements it.

            I watched the debate – serious trouble when even the candidates I think are smart and would be good leaders were behaving like rowdy sixth graders. Allowing themselves to act like Trump: expressing fear and rage, roused up by abrasive questions about the past. There is hardly any successful man from the 50’s and 60’s who wasn’t “coming on” to women, and we let them because it meant we were beautiful. Corporations encouraged women to be “seductive”! Betty Friedan and other women talked about this game—so did Helen Gurley Brown—and so did I. We broke down the rule, “Act like a lady.” We wanted to be men, to have our own powerful man; we have the power now: I watched Bloomberg’s face, frozen, the world he was raised in is gone. A good man would make money, “admire” women (even Trump knows that.)

            Women have changed. Powerful men have not. But this, as last night’s debate revealed, is all about yesterday.

            The concept of president may be archaic. What we need is a united nation. We need a unifier; a circle of wise experts who are not looking for what “I” can do, but who are willing to agree, it’s gotten too big for its britches, as in fact, has our planet.

            The time has come, if “life” is to continue for our grandchildren (or ourselves) that screaming debate was a sign: we are done with the way democracy worked. One human cannot lead.

            No human driven by rage and fear to explode and attack can be expected to maintain the reason and balance the steady perspective wise leadership requires.

            You cannot get rid of Trump by acting like Trump.

            The candidates should form a fresh coalition, run as a team dedicated to a positive, balanced program for America’s recovery.

            We must hear each other.

            We must talk of the present.

            We must stop screaming at each other.

            Anger and fear saves no one, creates no hope.

            America has changed.

            Watching the debate showed we have caught the contagious disease of every power in history. Example: “There will always be an England.” The young English writers who visited recently confirmed, “there is no England.”

            We cannot “Make America great again.” It had some great moments, but always maintained a firm class system.

            What happened last night had nothing to do with getting rid of Trump. It was far more harrowing: we have become Trump, screaming, rowdy, name calling. Even debate moderators aced like sixth graders, shouting out accusations which have no relevance to today. Trump is driven by fear which generates resentments, self-loathing, and thrives on uproar.

FAME

I’m returning to my blog after some time away. Ultimately, I must write for my own sanity, especially when I lose my mind every time I turn on the news. I plan to have a piece uploaded every week, shared here on my website and social media. Cheers!

            I’ve been watching Britain’s Got Talent, and also playing Word Blitz (everyone loses to my cousin Gabriel, who finds 1800 points on a set of letters which includes no vowels). If you don’t know what this is, don’t find out. It does not find friends. It’s like intravenous speed. They blast “Amazing!” when you come up with a six-letter word. And you know all you need to know about me when I tell you it’s a fine game at 2:40 AM when you wake up and can’t go to sleep. A rational person would read a novel. But the LIGHT UP blast when I find a word makes me feel so crazy. If I get over 200 points I’m good for the day.

            I’m glad that Facebook or Apple or “something” scores my online hours (says I “did better last week.” Better to them means spent more of the not endless amount of time I’ve got left on the planet tapping up images and music and games on a vibrating thing not much bigger than a card (but just as addictive). Maybe more so: because the demonic minds creating the machines know their audience, their customers well. We don’t feel like customers; we don’t “buy tickets,” or hand over cash or credit cards. We give “points,” we “sponsor” products by companies who pay for the shows.

            What we really pay for are the priceless hours spent yearning for the lissom bodies, the voices, the passions we now spend missing what is long gone or never was. Fame for most creatures on the planet seems a whimsy you can pick up with luck, I’ve known, and been really close to, a lot of famous people. Fame is a short ride: the top of the Ferris Wheel is a thrill. But the view makes you forget the hours and years spent practicing, avoiding easier options than dedication, isolation, grit, and the build of Talent’s unique muscular structure. You feel it as a child, whatever the gift. But you’d rather play than practice; so you’ll miss the rehearsal, big deal, friends are going to the beach.

            There is no luck to fame: it’s a far cry from prowess—from honor, from accomplishment, distinction—like most wonders, it doesn’t last forever. On the “…Got Talent” shows I love watching the young women and men trying out, shaking. “How are you?” the leader (who looks like my cousin Paul) asks. This leader is a master of expressions. You get hooked on all the “Board,” as hooked as the uneasy person on the stage who answers, “I’m nervous.”

            Thousands of fans in the audience love watching this. The crowd’s anxiety, every dab and heartbeat goes to support this unlikely little (or very large) awkward talent. “Awww,” they wipe tears, rock back and forth, and think, “Why wouldn’t my great-niece try this? She’s lovely in the choir.” When you’re here—seeing the magic arrive for some people—there’s no reason that can’t be for me! To go back I did watch a ninety-five-year-old woman dancing with a cute guy who slung her body fast through his legs, grabbed her arms, flipped her over his shoulders and hopped her, smiling around into a jazzy strut; crowd young and crazy. Even me, trying to swing myself from yoga crouch to somersault (chair to sofa) was laughing. Thing is, you get fame—I’ve had a moderate touch from writing when books were as big a deal as movies were, day before yesterday.

            I always knew my friends Jane Fonda, Brooke Hayward, Maria Cooper, and Sue Sally Jones would be famous. They were very cute and rode horses. This was when horses also understood their options and significant presence in any credible L.A. family. There were bridle paths then; horse races, some Maypole dancers rode horses usually at restricted girls’ schools.

            Boys rode horses and could play cowboy kids in movies. Race trades had a lot of class. Not like now when we see what fame does to the life of the horse, they never saw what was coming when mounted by movie stars had lights shining in their eyes and human directors (who did not ride) were telling them how to play the next scene, how to flip the guy on his back hard into the gully. “He’s the villain, jolt him hard!” They were all villains and show-offs. Horses never thought the big races were fair. They smelled the casino brew and whiskey, felt the weight gain on their backs and didn’t understand what all the yelling was about and why the hell it mattered on a cold night when your buddy Gary was aching in the next stable, holding himself steady, knowing he’d be ground for feed—his horseshoes hooked rusty on Harry, his old trainer’s wagon! So much for bloody blue ribbons.

            You don’t want to be a person who cares about fame. But I do. It was the thing to be when I was growing up. Even more than beauty, although beauty was the clear track to fame.

The New Sense

This was very long ago: Nature called the Gods together, regarded the new planet. Very pleased, after a few thousand hours, they chose shepherds, farmers, flyers, dreamers, dancers, painters, music-makers, and storytellers who would care for the land, charm each other and preserve the seas, glide the lakes, explore the woodlands, the mountains and jungles, the prairies, deserts, canyons, meadows, all lit and shadowed with seasons so no one would get bored.

It took far more time to agree that each inhabitant would have five senses. Five seemed a nice decent number with no harsh edges.

“Don’t give them too many skills,” Nature warned.

“Or too much time.” The Gods agreed Time was their own property. They would own Time: Forever—(whatever that means.)

The Gods understood Time was an unmanageable force. No point telling the youngsters Time hears no prayers.

Most of what we call “us” are usually fortunate to be born with these five senses: sight, touch, sound, smell, taste. So put down the cell phone: make a list of what each sense gathers. Right now. (The winner is…?)

This could be now. My back feels cold on the floor of a convention center. I hear a jam of sighs, sobs, coughs, cries. I see huddled strangers. I smell wet clothes, the sog of old blankets. I taste the dry old breath of my own imagination, and now the feel of a young girl’s rage. “Phone dead.” She hurls it into the deep vat below. Who can anyone call? Under water now, the city here has been hurled to the ground. The land outraged. Children lie broken under a crumbled steeple. How to: Your world is gone. There is no TV. NO empanadas, no pizzas. No games or screens. It is just us. Look at our hands. There is a tree. Still there. And standing still. Rev up those senses. Please God—and someone bring a guitar. Start some singing or will music unleash more grief?

I begin thinking of this in an Uber car on the way from my loft near the Veteran’s graveyards, to UCLA Medical Center, just north of Westwood Blvd. Here, in this Uber—I panic. I’ve left my cell phone at home!

Be still. The acres of white crosses remind me. They never imagined cell phones. Only the sound of a mother’s voice.

In 2008, when I moved back to L.A. from London, I felt as baffled by the cell phone as I had been by the computer. But then, as a young trainee at an ad agency in the Fifties, I had trouble learning to type. I had always written by hand. So, why now, suddenly, this panic over not having the cell phone? It seems we are committed to making our senses, if not irrelevant, almost archaic, rather like what once were called manners.

I realized I felt as uneasy as when I had eye surgery and had only one eye to see with or when I lost my memory and could not find words. Is memory, perhaps, filed wrong? Is memory, in truth, a sense? I recall when I could not name a flavor nor decide when the association was pleasant or not. How frustrated I was when the sound was off on the T.V. Maybe the cyber thing is no longer a kind of optional convenience, but I fear, for young people, as significant, as vital as the other senses.

It’s one thing to just look at the images of ruins and terror, in broken worlds of Mexico, of Puerto Rico, and the mellow islands we took for granted as colonies devoted to our holiday visits. Quite another to be a survivor, a reporter, a doctor, a Red Cross worker or “first responder” with young children who are accustomed to games, TV, and plugged in cyberspace tools. Are there squads from Lakeshore Stores bringing in games, drones to entertain and distract? What does a parent in Puerto Rico do if a child’s asthma inhaler runs out? CVS is under water. It is unique to be a parent today, unique as one’s own child, as profound as the dreams and hopes you feel as you hold that child. The great expectations turn grave these days as the gift of being able to see around the world shows us the latest variations of evil. Maybe the persistent reach for information to be “up to date” on disaster is evil itself, is this charged up state equivalent to the condition of military action.

Long ago, this was how my mornings used to be—I turned pencils by my bed into the little sharpener. I loved the smell of the filed bits of wood just as much as the scent of the jackets my Grandma crocheted to send orphaned baby refugees in England. She’d give me a lemon drop before I left her room to get ready for school, and I’d roll one of the candies around in my mouth as I wound up the music box in my room. Then with the pencil I’d sketch the ballerina on top of the music box trying to get the twirl right. So: Sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste—all the five senses, awake in action!

Now. I turn to the iphone: check the messages, and mail. Sometimes (not every day as I sometimes say I do) I tap into the list of Weapons of Mass Instruction: The meditations, the gifts of peace, consideration, and reflection which I’ve been given by wise founders of the last century (one which already—with some exceptions—seems rather enlightened—here and there).

We might consider this 21st Century as inspired by the nightmarish geniuses of 20th Century science fiction writers. Robots, yes. Everywhere. Unimaginable Monsters ruling what will be left of the Universe—after they complete the destruction of the planet. And, then, on a more modest level of arrogance, we have come up with that what out to be the Sixth Sense: the Cyber connection, the phone—the wifi—the instruments which feel as profoundly required and essential to any human as sight, sound, smell, touch, and flavour. (Maybe they mean more to some than other once essential elements of human experience.)

“LOL” at the bottom of a three letter “msg” is about as affectionate as it gets.

But—then—there is the matter of Time. And we cannot assume there is more than this very moment.

Read more at the Huffington Post.

Trick Or Tweet

October drapes gauzy cobwebs, witches’ broomsticks through well-groomed trees. Pumpkin lanterns bob along fencetops. Children in “go go” boots prance in costumes, gleaming “tattoo” stickers pasted on arms. Gargoyles, ghosts, and scarecrows are out of closets longing to be the scariest, wildest one of all. 

That role is filled. I need no eerie celebration of suspense. I tap the nightmare apps, go to sleep. Last night’s opener had a chilly voice saying, “There won’t be Thanksgiving this year.” The voice of a school monitor: “Thanksgiving is over.” October used to be the quiet month, the time to stay inside and read by the fireplace. Thanksgiving was the savory, gentle non-denominational holiday, where the East Coast family would come to celebrate Harvest, the idea of gratitude for the land. However, this November guarantees no visions of peace and gathering together.

Haunted now by the No on Thanksgiving proposition, the next nightmare sent me shopping for flowers to bring my son’s family. Of course, they would still have Thanksgiving. I’d bring burgundy sienna and gold chrysanthemums. The dream’s barren unsteady street was made of curious tracks. The flower shop at the end, next to a shuttered bookshop, had no branches of autumn leaves, no chrysanthemums, no golden lilies. But there were hampers of long-stemmed sweet peas. “These are spring flowers,” I tell the longhaired blonde girl in the shop. “They won’t do for Thanksgiving.”

“Thanksgiving’s dust,” she says with a smile. 

“The flowers don’t smell sweet—or at all!” 

“No. They don’t need to. Smell is so last year.”

I turned away. The bookstore was being pulled out by its roots on an iron hoist. I woke up. 

Like the ghosts drifting above suburban front yards (does anyone see front yards behind the security gates?) there’s been a pall throughout the Land—we have created a Monster to take the stage—as the Kardashians and so forth have taken over the TV. Is this some mode the Networks have created? A ratings war, a circus, a floor show, a bullring? The Hard Right declares it wants America back as it was. Really? Then get rid of the techno-robots which have taken away the jobs. That is what no one talks about. There could be lots of jobs. But everyone wants the big jobs. The Lives of TV families: funny, wild scenes with okay endings every night. And the house you live in is always there. 

But now the sun is rising. It has been Halloween forever. The Hoaxster promises treats, bagsful of jobs. The tricks will come. You’ll see; he dangles whimsies and promises of jobs—but we need no more hotels and casinos. The clever billionaires have designed a program of extinction, just as the auto industry and oil companies created the End of the World for the Horses, who once held proud positions on the planet. As did the elephant (which was why the Republicans chose it.) Now, in Thailand, where elephants, thousands of them, worked the deforestation program, the elephants are out of work. Instead of going with a where-do-we-go-from-here depression like some horses I’ve seen, the elephants, I learned, from a brilliant documentary, have gone mad; they’re violent, raging, raging “against the dying of the light.” Every kid learned to care for these family animals once. 

However, the Technopolies will not inherit the Earth. They are killing it, even as they design the space pods where they’ll exist in their rabid disconnection. Like the Americans who believe in this creature who defines their rage with every expression. He is the face of terror, the face of the bitter victim, the feudal mode of a Fifties brute, the garish bully stamping on the cafeteria tables. He clenches the empty clamshells of his hands. Offers plenty—but cannot give us chowder. 

Fear drapes me in ghost cloak. I am powerless over the media’s grim show. No measured voices. As archaic bullies watched boxers, so I watch CNN’s dreadful little blonde Trumpette, to raise my indignation to the perfect level of confidence required to slice and tailor her costume of fearless hostility dumbed up with just a frill of lissom insecurity. Exactly the look. 

Tonight will be a feast of terror. I hunger for the balance of our once-honored system. I heard it in Hillary’s speech at the end of the Al Smith Dinner and every word the Obamas say. Let’s pretend Halloween’s over. Yeah. And agree to have a real Thanksgiving: Let’s say this was all a sort of Game of Thrones and we’re giving Barak and Michelle a third term with an open-minded Congress. And Hillary will be on the Supreme Court. Yeah. I knew it was only a Nightmare. 

Sunday Morning Drive

This is a Sunday morning. I have heard the New York Times has a new column called Sunday Routine. People send in reports of how their own Sunday mornings go. I can do that in L.A. 

I try to edit my week’s pages on Sunday mornings. I don’t like walking on the streets where I live. Couples are out with each other, dogs, or small children. Only the dogs acknowledge each other. Children learn fast you do not talk to other people. When walking, you keep your eyes on your cell phone, and raise your hand as you cross the street.  

On Friday night this week, the writer Romey Keys came for dinner. (See DESERT HOUSE chapters on Wimpole Street Gazette.) The night before he’d been to a reading by Don DeLillo of his new book ZERO K. Romey had brought me a signed copy. I had read some of the novel Saturday night. I wanted to rewrite a piece I was working on. DeLillo’s pages would inspire me. I could read some on Sunday morning. But I’m supposed to walk every day for fifteen minutes. Three times a day. I would rather read. 

ZERO K is set in a place which feels “futuristic” in the style of old science fiction movies where Michael Rennie was dressed up in smooth silver robot costumes. There were no ornamental touches anywhere. No “Early American” with antique mechanical toys and masses of books, like the house I grew up in. Some people in Hollywood were wary of futurist houses. (Lean style was possibly subversive.) Don DeLillo deals with this issue—the eerie feel of the unadorned. 

Sunday, I sorted out my eyedrops (another story, coming soon.) I listened to Brahms on cellphone. And remembered other Sunday mornings. If you’ve been around this long, there are many Sundays to refer to.

I live in West Los Angeles on land that was once part of the Japanese American citizens’ internment camps. Now it belongs to the Veterans’ Administration. There’s a park where wild nasturtium grow. Then, a couple of blocks west of that, there’s the 405 freeway. Homeless people settle under the bridge. During warm days, they visit the park and lie under the trees looking up at the sky. It’s reassuring after the heavy dark of the 405 ceiling. The 405 has had several mentions for being the worst freeway. Before I walk, I take Friday’s mail out from the post box. (I say post box so you recall I lived in England for 30 years.) Sometimes, in the mail, there’s a dressy catalogue to go with campaign requests. Today there’s a copy of Ralph Lauren’s latest “zine.” I am sent copies of this sleek zine because my son gave me a Ralph Lauren watch which I love. Made of hefty silver, the watch gives me a strong-arm look and it has a stirrup-shaped frame around the face. The watch reminds me of the time when L.A. was a Western town, the Valley was all orange and lemon groves. You got there by driving Sepulveda, a graceful highway which sidles by the 405. It used to be bordered by acres of poinsettias. Those acres became graveyards for young soldiers after World War II. No one would have imagined the 405. That was part of the uneasy future, a conception designed by science fiction writers. “Ralphie” is what we called Ralph Lauren in the decades when we could just about afford his clothes. The gutsy style was worth it. Now, the magazine is a touch of Town & Country and features stables of adorable young men, including his son Andrew, wearing clothes that cost as much as major surgery. Elective: Would I rather have those trousers than surgery? They’d likely last me longer.  

I haven’t seen the Times Sunday column. My Sunday morning began with the clinical depression. (Yes: one of my several doctors said that I will be depressed for some time after this triple bypass surgery I’ve mentioned somewhere else.) If I were truly depressed would I have noticed that, in all the photos in Ralph’s zine, the trousers are now wide as skirts, whisking around like Kate Hepburn’s “pajamas”?

I’d like to mention here that the first time I heard the word “zine” was downtown at a zine expo, featuring my young writer Suemi Guerra and her zine, “Suicidal Goldfish.” A zine, I learned, is a little magazine you print out on a Sunday morning in a friend’s filing cabinet room. Everyone who comes downtown to celebrate this independent printing process carries a plastic vessel with foggy water in which are floating the lemons you saw last week, a few leaves of kale, and maybe remains of goldfish, just a sentimental touch. They bring these vessels to my writers’ group which makes me feel cool.

And how depressed can I be if I jump out of bed to see if I still have my wide old linen trousers? They aren’t exactly as elite as the new silk Ralph ones—but they’ll do in case I go to a place where what I have on matters. This, I tell myself, is how I’m moving into my Sunday morning dive. I’m standing at the edge of the diving board—do I jump?—and wind up in one of God’s cool new drinking vessels? The issue of death is big in DeLillo’s ZERO K. What if there was a place where I could die and then be brought back? But where? I stand on the well-meaning diving board of my Sunday cliff (soon I’ll have to sit down.) What to relive? Not entire decades—but moments like “short subjects.”

I take tea and one shortbread biscuit to my writing table—the one by the easel. I have several writing tables in this loft to remind me this is who I am. Perhaps if I could return to a time in my life it would be when my first child was born. I would return to the Sixties and the years of my son and daughter’s childhoods, I would do those differently. I would take many pictures and draw them at all ages. I would set aside everything else—this is because my son asked me again if I have pictures of him during his boyhood. I have pictures when he was little. I don’t—now I’m going into a long, slow dive—I don’t have pictures of that time. Here’s a new Sunday morning tradition, going through the decades of pages, of scrapbooks, of envelopes and albums, and seeing the impact of my generation’s self-driven passions made on their children’s futures—and on their grandparents’ lives. 

I couldn’t pay the rent in those days, but I managed to buy myself a Ralph Lauren shirt now and then—he was giving us rustic Western style, clothes for posh cowboys. I bought the children clothes so the parents of other kids would think I was doing well, and, being divorced, I kept my eye out for the next guy, how he’d see me and my adorable family. I don’t remember many of us taking pictures then. You did not have a cell phone. My first husband was gone. Maybe to Long Beach which seemed as far away as Arkansas where he wound up. I saw him last year with my son, who flew his father out to see his grandchildren. I heard they were having breakfast together at Nate ‘n’ Al’s. I called my son and asked if I could come. His father and I happened to be wearing similar Navy and white checked shirts. Gap. Not Ralphie. We laughed over old moments. He knew he was going home to die. His heart was truly broken—they were trying one more surgery. The adornments of familiarity were present: The corned beef sandwiches and the rugelach, and his laugh. Sunday morning. I’m looking for a picture. Why didn’t we take one? 

And why are there no pictures of the Sunday morning trips to Nate ‘n’ Al’s with my father driving his wooden station wagon? We’d pick up the stuff for Sunday dinner, bring it home, windows open, singing Western songs and looking forward to when it would always be as good as now. 

Sunday mornings then were about what we loved. We were looking forward to what was coming. Not what was gone.