Monday, November 30, 2009
Orphans Redux
It was a particularly wonderful T-day for the orphans this year. It was warm, and the walks on country roads were made without jackets. Children have grown up, and can now converse civilly with their parents. There is some indication, unconfirmed as yet, the third generation of orphans is begun. Friendships have grown, faded, mellowed and returned. Despite the absence of my own daughters (who had other fish to fry) and the illness of the hostess; and possibly partly due to the absence of Ex, it was a lovely time and I'm happy to report Harry had fun too.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Thankful
For so much...for Harry and our life together. That comes first.
There are many other things I'm thankful for, in this moment before I log off to go and cook the Brussels sprouts (with walnuts and Parmesan) dish that has been my long-standing annual assignment at the Orphan's Thanksgiving, a group of friends I've been celebrating T-day with for 20-odd years.
The Orphans originally formed (this was long before I knew them) as a group who were either far from their families or resistant, for various reasons, to spending T-day with said families.
I came into the picture when Ex (remember my EX?) was invited by a grad-school friend to Thanksgiving with his "family" who turned out to be the aforementioned orphans.
Ex and I at the time, had a two-year-old.
So my first experience with the orphans, (even conducted as it was at my Ex's wonderful familial retreat "down the shore") was not promising. The food was great. (They're all foodies and serious cooks to boot) but Maya (the 2-year old in question and the only child anyone had at that point) wanted to watch tv. (Hello? Sesame St, early in the morning?)
The other adults, (none of whom were parents) unilaterally agreed: TV: EVIL BAD TURN IT OFF.
So I spent the day after T-day (when the orphans have the lovely custom of eating leftovers and reprising DINNER at brunch the next day) switching the tv repeatedly back ON for my child and trying NOT to hear people (NONE OF WHOM WERE PARENTS AT THAT POINT) saying things like "Children need to NOT watch TV. TV IS DAMAGING..."
After this I boycotted the orphan's thanksgiving for several years. Ex and I did NOT attend the O's Thanksgiving for a while.
The 2-year old in question grew older.
Ex and I had more and more conflict over Holiday Arrangements. This was hard. In the end, we found ourselves happiest with the orphan's T-day,so we resumed attending right around the time one of the other orphans had a child.
Fast forward to now:
Ex and I are divorced, our girls are grown up.
My Harry has issues of his own ex-wise, kid-wise.
Tomorrow we (Harry and I) are going to the Orphan"s Thanksgiving, with the Brussels' sprouts, but sans any of our children. I think he is not happy about this, but he loves me and is going along.I hope it goes well.I am looking forward to seeing my friends.
Next year we have to find another way to do thanksgiving.
Not to mention Christmas.
There are many other things I'm thankful for, in this moment before I log off to go and cook the Brussels sprouts (with walnuts and Parmesan) dish that has been my long-standing annual assignment at the Orphan's Thanksgiving, a group of friends I've been celebrating T-day with for 20-odd years.
The Orphans originally formed (this was long before I knew them) as a group who were either far from their families or resistant, for various reasons, to spending T-day with said families.
I came into the picture when Ex (remember my EX?) was invited by a grad-school friend to Thanksgiving with his "family" who turned out to be the aforementioned orphans.
Ex and I at the time, had a two-year-old.
So my first experience with the orphans, (even conducted as it was at my Ex's wonderful familial retreat "down the shore") was not promising. The food was great. (They're all foodies and serious cooks to boot) but Maya (the 2-year old in question and the only child anyone had at that point) wanted to watch tv. (Hello? Sesame St, early in the morning?)
The other adults, (none of whom were parents) unilaterally agreed: TV: EVIL BAD TURN IT OFF.
So I spent the day after T-day (when the orphans have the lovely custom of eating leftovers and reprising DINNER at brunch the next day) switching the tv repeatedly back ON for my child and trying NOT to hear people (NONE OF WHOM WERE PARENTS AT THAT POINT) saying things like "Children need to NOT watch TV. TV IS DAMAGING..."
After this I boycotted the orphan's thanksgiving for several years. Ex and I did NOT attend the O's Thanksgiving for a while.
The 2-year old in question grew older.
Ex and I had more and more conflict over Holiday Arrangements. This was hard. In the end, we found ourselves happiest with the orphan's T-day,so we resumed attending right around the time one of the other orphans had a child.
Fast forward to now:
Ex and I are divorced, our girls are grown up.
My Harry has issues of his own ex-wise, kid-wise.
Tomorrow we (Harry and I) are going to the Orphan"s Thanksgiving, with the Brussels' sprouts, but sans any of our children. I think he is not happy about this, but he loves me and is going along.I hope it goes well.I am looking forward to seeing my friends.
Next year we have to find another way to do thanksgiving.
Not to mention Christmas.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Follow Up to "Amelia Indeed" Posted by Harry
As a follow up to Sally's marital post, I was going to write about my own marital experience, but for now I want to take it easy (it's Monday after all) and talk about last night, and movies, etc. Way too much to ignore.
Sally's synopis of our conversation last night is brilliant. It really irked me that I could not remember (or either of us could remember) the last movie we had seen at BMFI (which was only a mere several weeks ago), though I could certainly tell you where and when I saw "Exterminating Angel", or "Apu Trilogy" or "Grand Illusion", or even "The Graduate" (I confess I was only 15) for the first time. The movie was "Julie and Julia" (or was it "Jules and Jim?" - No). At any rate, we had both enjoyed "Julie and Julia", but unfortunately "Ameila" was a movie we didn't enjoy a whole lot. No offense to Hilary Swank, who is a favorite of Harry's, who is now talking about himself in the third person!
I intend to fill in the gaps on the books and movies list. Sally and I agreed that it would be a futile and epic list if we covered all the books and movies we'd known prior to meeting, so I will stick with what we've both seen and read together since the miracle date of 12/4/2007 (do DVDs count? They're good enough for The Times) and may throw in the Leonard Cohen concert (a thoroughly transcendent show for me) for a little variation. Please indulge me --- I'm in the last quarter of my 50s. Not all the synapses fire like they used to do.
Sally's synopis of our conversation last night is brilliant. It really irked me that I could not remember (or either of us could remember) the last movie we had seen at BMFI (which was only a mere several weeks ago), though I could certainly tell you where and when I saw "Exterminating Angel", or "Apu Trilogy" or "Grand Illusion", or even "The Graduate" (I confess I was only 15) for the first time. The movie was "Julie and Julia" (or was it "Jules and Jim?" - No). At any rate, we had both enjoyed "Julie and Julia", but unfortunately "Ameila" was a movie we didn't enjoy a whole lot. No offense to Hilary Swank, who is a favorite of Harry's, who is now talking about himself in the third person!
I intend to fill in the gaps on the books and movies list. Sally and I agreed that it would be a futile and epic list if we covered all the books and movies we'd known prior to meeting, so I will stick with what we've both seen and read together since the miracle date of 12/4/2007 (do DVDs count? They're good enough for The Times) and may throw in the Leonard Cohen concert (a thoroughly transcendent show for me) for a little variation. Please indulge me --- I'm in the last quarter of my 50s. Not all the synapses fire like they used to do.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Amelia, Indeed!
Harry and I have just returned from seeing Amelia, which neither of us liked much.
In the car on the way home we talked about how hard we are both finding it these days, to remember movies (not to mention other things but let's not go there in this post anyway) anymore.
In the seventies as I segued from twenty- to thirty- something I saw about 300 movies a year, and this is NOT counting the ones I saw on insomniac late-night TV. I was living in New York City where movies were plentiful and cheap, I was going to film school and dating a filmmaker. . .(and of course my brain was younger and much more agile.) The remarkable thing is how good my recall of these thousands of movies was, and IS. I can hear a TV broadcasting a murky copy of "Dark Victory" in the next room and I INSTANTLY recognize it.
But ask me to identify something I saw, as Harry did in the car just now; something both of us liked? - just a scant two months ago?
I am forced to Google it.
My first impulse is to blame the internet itself. After all, before the invention of movable type in the 15th Century, normal human beings were routinely able to remember all the contents of a 30-minute-long song by the roving minstrel that brought them all the news that was fit to sing, WORD FOR WORD.
Before there was Google, I remember remembering all sorts of things I learned in school. The value of Pi, abbreviations of elements, dates in the Civil War. Before I owned a cell phone that stored the phone numbers I call, I could dial most of the people I talked to from memory. Now I am helpless when my cell phone is charging.
Okay, this has all been a roundabout way of saying that I am going to RECORD on this blog all the movies I see with Harry. Mostly so that when we are not able to remember what it was or when or where, we will have someplace too look it up!
In the car on the way home we talked about how hard we are both finding it these days, to remember movies (not to mention other things but let's not go there in this post anyway) anymore.
In the seventies as I segued from twenty- to thirty- something I saw about 300 movies a year, and this is NOT counting the ones I saw on insomniac late-night TV. I was living in New York City where movies were plentiful and cheap, I was going to film school and dating a filmmaker. . .(and of course my brain was younger and much more agile.) The remarkable thing is how good my recall of these thousands of movies was, and IS. I can hear a TV broadcasting a murky copy of "Dark Victory" in the next room and I INSTANTLY recognize it.
But ask me to identify something I saw, as Harry did in the car just now; something both of us liked? - just a scant two months ago?
I am forced to Google it.
My first impulse is to blame the internet itself. After all, before the invention of movable type in the 15th Century, normal human beings were routinely able to remember all the contents of a 30-minute-long song by the roving minstrel that brought them all the news that was fit to sing, WORD FOR WORD.
Before there was Google, I remember remembering all sorts of things I learned in school. The value of Pi, abbreviations of elements, dates in the Civil War. Before I owned a cell phone that stored the phone numbers I call, I could dial most of the people I talked to from memory. Now I am helpless when my cell phone is charging.
Okay, this has all been a roundabout way of saying that I am going to RECORD on this blog all the movies I see with Harry. Mostly so that when we are not able to remember what it was or when or where, we will have someplace too look it up!
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Harry's Picture
So I have this new job, which after my recent experiences in the world of the un- and newly-employed I refuse to take for granted at least until the 90 probation period is over. For that reason I vowed that I would not bring plants, personal desk ornaments or (god forbid) art for the walls of "my" office here until they do something that convinces me they REALLY want me here, like offering me health insurance or favorable review, or a raise... It was just too awful when the job I had for a scant two months last spring evaporated and I had to lug all that stuff home on the train. . .this time haven't even changed my computer desktop picture.
I did however sneak in a small picture of Harry, which I have put where no one but me can see it. It's my favorite picture (almost only) picture of Harry, taken in our kitchen. He's looking over his reading glasses at me with the bluest, bluest eyes you ever saw.
It makes me smile twenty times a day.
(posted by Sally)
I did however sneak in a small picture of Harry, which I have put where no one but me can see it. It's my favorite picture (almost only) picture of Harry, taken in our kitchen. He's looking over his reading glasses at me with the bluest, bluest eyes you ever saw.
It makes me smile twenty times a day.
(posted by Sally)
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Getting Married
Until I was 28, I was completely sure that I had no intention, and I do mean NONE, of having a child.
Peripherally, getting married was something I didn't much think about. In my twenties, I had two cohabiting relationships that lasted several years each. In neither one was marriage or children EVER discussed. That was just fine with me, a very happy serial monagamist.
Then at 28, in the midst of perhaps my least promising relationship, I got pregnant. I know (and I knew at the time) that I was responsible. I'd been experimenting with so-called natural birth control; which involved daily assessment of vaginal mucous and counting days - it used to be called Vatican roulette.
I'd been lucky earlier when at 22 I got pregnant by a boyfriend who adored me but abhorred the very thought of reproducing. Then, I lucked into an illegal but knowledgeable and caring RN who sent me home to my life afterward without consequences and without the putative father knowing. To this day.
At 28, I was lucky again. I had this really great doctor, my OBGYN, who talked to me as if I was his own daughter: "What do you want to do?" he asked gently. I said something like I thought abortion was the only realistic option, given that the father was a neurotic I'd been trying unsuccessfully to break up with for six months, and I had no way of supporting a child...
He said, "Are you sure?" I said yes. And then he said, "We can terminate this pregnancy, it will have no bearing on your ability to give birth in the future. It is a safe, simple procedure. I will take good care of you."
He repeated "I will take care of you," touching my hand lightly, when I was drugged and readied for the procedure, just a few days later.
I woke up, briefly sick from the anesthetic, but unpregnant and basically good to go... I saw my good doctor one more time. "We'll have a different outcome next time," he said, shaking my hand and smiling at me as I left his office.
Okay, marriage is what I was on about, initially.
Well, for me, the experience of that abortion that went well, (despite the boyfriend/father who picked a fight with me because he hadn't had enough time to "digest" his breakfast) changed everything.
Almost at once I thought "what if that was my LAST CHANCE?" Twice now I have aborted potential children.
What if there will be no more?
That question changed my life.
Basically I scrapped my MO of falling in love with cute guys and living with them until I couldn't, or didn't want to, anymore. I replaced it with a policy of (I can only describe this as) finding Daddy for my child. He needed to be: Intelligent, smart, sexy (SO wish I had privledged this more)
I found the man who fathered my daughters and although I did eventually marry him under circumstances I won't go into here; suffice it to say that they amounted to emotional blackmail by a couples counselor - my view on marriage as an institution remained unchanged.
Fast forward twenty-odd years: I don't know if it's Harry, or the life place we're in together - But I knew almost right away that I wanted to be married to Harry. I remember we talked about it very early on. "Do you think you'll ever get married again?" he asked and I knew it was YES.
Peripherally, getting married was something I didn't much think about. In my twenties, I had two cohabiting relationships that lasted several years each. In neither one was marriage or children EVER discussed. That was just fine with me, a very happy serial monagamist.
Then at 28, in the midst of perhaps my least promising relationship, I got pregnant. I know (and I knew at the time) that I was responsible. I'd been experimenting with so-called natural birth control; which involved daily assessment of vaginal mucous and counting days - it used to be called Vatican roulette.
I'd been lucky earlier when at 22 I got pregnant by a boyfriend who adored me but abhorred the very thought of reproducing. Then, I lucked into an illegal but knowledgeable and caring RN who sent me home to my life afterward without consequences and without the putative father knowing. To this day.
At 28, I was lucky again. I had this really great doctor, my OBGYN, who talked to me as if I was his own daughter: "What do you want to do?" he asked gently. I said something like I thought abortion was the only realistic option, given that the father was a neurotic I'd been trying unsuccessfully to break up with for six months, and I had no way of supporting a child...
He said, "Are you sure?" I said yes. And then he said, "We can terminate this pregnancy, it will have no bearing on your ability to give birth in the future. It is a safe, simple procedure. I will take good care of you."
He repeated "I will take care of you," touching my hand lightly, when I was drugged and readied for the procedure, just a few days later.
I woke up, briefly sick from the anesthetic, but unpregnant and basically good to go... I saw my good doctor one more time. "We'll have a different outcome next time," he said, shaking my hand and smiling at me as I left his office.
Okay, marriage is what I was on about, initially.
Well, for me, the experience of that abortion that went well, (despite the boyfriend/father who picked a fight with me because he hadn't had enough time to "digest" his breakfast) changed everything.
Almost at once I thought "what if that was my LAST CHANCE?" Twice now I have aborted potential children.
What if there will be no more?
That question changed my life.
Basically I scrapped my MO of falling in love with cute guys and living with them until I couldn't, or didn't want to, anymore. I replaced it with a policy of (I can only describe this as) finding Daddy for my child. He needed to be: Intelligent, smart, sexy (SO wish I had privledged this more)
I found the man who fathered my daughters and although I did eventually marry him under circumstances I won't go into here; suffice it to say that they amounted to emotional blackmail by a couples counselor - my view on marriage as an institution remained unchanged.
Fast forward twenty-odd years: I don't know if it's Harry, or the life place we're in together - But I knew almost right away that I wanted to be married to Harry. I remember we talked about it very early on. "Do you think you'll ever get married again?" he asked and I knew it was YES.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Marrying Sally
I want to marry Sally but there is personal legal and financial business that she needs to take care of first. That is a practical matter and I admire her tenacity. I know she has been working so hard and I feel a little ashamed that recently I put some stress on her that was unwarranted. I guess sometimes I panic about money. I have children depending on me to some degree and maybe this is a source of stress and maybe just life in general --- situations like fear of a job loss that Sally mentioned in her post of 10/19. If anything Sally has been nothing but wonderful to me. Everything in the post of 10/19 she wrote is beautiful and I'm not reneging on anything she said about my unwavering support of, and devotion to her.
I will be patient and let Sally take care of what she needs to do. I know she wants to help financially. And I want to be married --- as soon as possible after January --- but whenever she feels is the right time, that will be the right time for me. The main thing is we marry and spend the rest of our days together loving and caring for one another.
I wrote an email to my brother recently who was having some of his own troubles, and in the letter I mentioned I was very happy in my relationship with Sally. Maybe I should have told her.
And we will be going to Hawk Mountain next weekend :)
I will be patient and let Sally take care of what she needs to do. I know she wants to help financially. And I want to be married --- as soon as possible after January --- but whenever she feels is the right time, that will be the right time for me. The main thing is we marry and spend the rest of our days together loving and caring for one another.
I wrote an email to my brother recently who was having some of his own troubles, and in the letter I mentioned I was very happy in my relationship with Sally. Maybe I should have told her.
And we will be going to Hawk Mountain next weekend :)
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Talk: Posted by Harry
I wanted to post a brief thought before I lose it. Yesterday I was telling Sally about some issues I was having around my ex, and some of the problems that occasionally (but too often for a divorced person) arise. Sally always listens to me and offers her thoughts in a way that isn't judgmental or annoyed. She has this amazing capacity to sum up problems, or to get to the heart of the matter. This is something that I admire and respect about her, and just another quality of hers that makes me love her beyond description.
I tend to get more emotional about human interactions, relationships, close interactions of any kind, and my anger and depression is sometimes a source of confusion to me. But even when we fight, Sally has a way of staying in control even while letting me know she's very upset, and that communicating, expressing herself so clearly, eventually brings me around to my senses.
But the real subject here is just the way in which Sally listens. Her answers or observations show me the depth of her love, her caring and understanding. I've never experienced anything like this in a relationship before --- It's beautiful. Sally is equally wise in her head and her heart. She is brilliant intellectually, but also spiritual and deeply loving, and she is an amazing source of strength to me. Sally is beautiful.
I tend to get more emotional about human interactions, relationships, close interactions of any kind, and my anger and depression is sometimes a source of confusion to me. But even when we fight, Sally has a way of staying in control even while letting me know she's very upset, and that communicating, expressing herself so clearly, eventually brings me around to my senses.
But the real subject here is just the way in which Sally listens. Her answers or observations show me the depth of her love, her caring and understanding. I've never experienced anything like this in a relationship before --- It's beautiful. Sally is equally wise in her head and her heart. She is brilliant intellectually, but also spiritual and deeply loving, and she is an amazing source of strength to me. Sally is beautiful.
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