IslandRoar

Some Enchanted Evening

Daughter #1 is hooked on Broadway.

An expensive habit to feed. Musicals mostly. She buys tickets at student discounts, waits for the lotteries held before shows. But still...

One of the shows she wants to see now is South Pacific.

This is my father's favorite musical. He saw Mary Martin in the original Broadway cast. We had the record album when I was a kid, and it was played often enough for me to know all the words by heart.

The score contains so many Broadway classics: You've Got To Be Carefully Taught; I'm Gonna Wash That Man Right Outta My Hair; There Is Nothin' Like A Dame.

My parents met at a dance in Manhattan. Winter, 1954. They were each there with friends. The band started to play Some Enchanted Evening.

In case you don't know the words:
  Some enchanted evening
  You may see a stranger.
  You may see a stranger
  Across a crowded room.

My father spotted my mother from across the dance hall. It was probably her hair he noticed first. He had a thing for redheads. He made his way over and asked her to dance.

  And somehow you know.
  You know even then.

They danced that dance. And the next. My father leaned down close and hummed in her ear, trying valiantly to be romantic.

He says he knew.

My mother claims she went home and told her mother she had met a boy. And that he was tall, dark, and handsome.

"But I think there's something wrong with him," she reportedly told my grandmother. "He made this really weird buzzing noise in my ear."

My father is tone-deaf. He cannot sing a note.

It almost lost him the girl of his dreams.

Fortunately, for me and Daughter #1, she gave him another chance.

I told Daughter #1, if she goes to see South Pacific, to remember this story when she hears the song.

Her own family history in the making.

Spin Cycle: Cyber Santa

Jen of Sprite's Keeper very generously took the time to organize this Secret Cyber Santa Spin (say THAT five times fast). From a list of our favorite bloggers, she waved her magic wand and assigned us one lovely blogger on whom we were to post.

I get to rave about The South Dakota Cowgirl, Jen, one of my all time most fascinating bloggy buds.

I was first attracted to Jen's blog because her world is so completely different than my own. Originally from Texas, she rides horses in barrel events and lives on a huge cattle ranch in South Dakota.

Her days are filled with riding and training horses and helping her cowboy, Zach, with multiple ranch related activities, from herding and preg-checking cattle to rescuing horses stuck on wire fences.

It's clear from her posts that she's an awesome cook, but her creativity doesn't end there. Among her many talents, she makes gorgeous jewelry, plays piano and guitar, sings, and even writes her own songs. Her voice is lovely and definitely worth a listen.

I can't imagine what it's like to live on acres and acres populated with deer, antelope, rattlesnakes, jackrabbits and prairie dogs, but Jen's spectacular photographs and video give me some idea.

I may have originally followed SDCG out of curiosity, but I've stayed because of the sincere and generous person she is.

Like all of us, Jen has been through a lot, and I don't mean just upending her life in Texas to move to South Dakota. Her heartfelt writing reveals a woman who is courageous and adventurous, playful and stubborn, and very much devoted to her friends and family.

If you don't already follow SDCG, you should make a point to click on over there and take a look around.

One thing I didn't plan on when I started this whole blogging thing last May, was the extent to which I would develop actual relationships, however virtual, with fellow bloggers. Jen may be much younger than I, and our lives as different as night and day, but through her words I sense a kindred spirit.

She has been a fun and loyal cyber friend, and I truly hope she goes on sharing her world with us for a long, long time.

Jen may not know this, but it's entirely possible one day I just might show up at her door, ask her to throw me on a horse, and have her give me a personal tour of the ranch. I get the feeling we'll have a lot to talk about.

For more Cyber Santa Spins, go call on Sprite's Keeper. And give her a big holiday hug from me.

 

Winter Solstice

 
  

It's 12 years this month that The Ex and I split.

Yes, I asked him to leave in December. Nice timing, huh? But really, there's never a good time for these things, so December it was.

I hadn't thought about the darkness. How it descends the first three weeks of December and hovers like a mo' fo'.

My kids were 3, 6, and 10. Dinnertime was the hardest. For some reason, planning what to make, getting it ready and on the table, then sliding into the cleanup, homework, bath and bedtime ritual, seemed, for a long while, hopelessly overwhelming.

I had to find ways to let in the light.

I began collecting recipes, planning menus. Playing music at dinner. The kids took turns picking the CD's. One night might be West Side Story, the next, Britney Spears.

We'd raise the volume while everyone helped clear the table, even three year-old Daughter #2. Most nights we wound up dancing. I'd grab a kid and jitterbug. Or tango. Daughter #1 would tap. It was amazingly therapeutic.

Still, the darkness hovered.

I stole an idea from some woman's magazine on celebrating the winter solstice, the shortest, darkest day of the year. I planned carefully.

Each older child was allowed to invite one friend. We lit a fire and ate dinner (homemade pizzas they topped themselves) by candlelight.

Everyone had to pick a poem from one of our many books of children's poetry. Preferably one about winter or the dark or the light. But any one would do. Each child read their poem at the table by the light of the candle flames. I read Daughter #2's. Then one I wrote myself.

I'm not sure if they got it. But they listened to me, to each other, respectfully. Suddenly kids were begging to read "one more" poem. Then another.

"We celebrate because today we've made it through the darkest day of the year," I told them. "Every day after this, the sun will move a little bit closer, and there will be a little more light. The days will grow longer and longer. Right up until the first day of summer."

It became a tradition. Each year: a friend, candles, poetry. I worried there might be some grumbling in high school. Instead, 16 year-old boys shrugged, decided to stay for dinner, and pored through books, looking for a poem.

Some of those other traditions that pulled me through survive to this day. Whenever all three kids are home, they still take turns picking our dinner music. And we frequently find ourselves dancing during cleanup.

And yes, it's still amazingly therapeutic.

 

Story Time

 

A few weeks ago the librarian at work who runs Toddler Story Time was off-island at a conference. They asked me if I would be willing to fill in.

As I generally aspire to be an optimistic, fearless sort of person, I smiled and said, "Sure."

Yeah. Right.

I had about two minutes to prepare. Okay, maybe it was closer to 30, but clearly I needed more. The parents and their tiny offspring assembled in the children's room, eying me with suspicion.

Perched with only half my ass on a kiddie-sized chair, I began reading from the pile of books the children's librarian had left for this purpose.

It was a tough crowd. The kids were all under two, but they were the least of my problems. I spilled out a bag of puppets onto the floor. Passed around bells. They were putty in my hands.

But their parents? Well, they expected more. Clearly I did not know the routine. Naively, they expected singing.

"Oookaay," I exclaimed brightly. "What should we sing?"

Then I drew a complete blank.

How embarrassing. There I was, a veteran mother with three ancient children. Not to mention the thousands I've cared for in the hospital. Although to be fair, sick or injured kids don't frequently require lots of singing from their nurses.

Maybe things would've run more smoothly if I could've administered IV antibiotics or listened to their lungs?

Meanwhile, the toddlers were waiting, bells at the ready. One adorable little babe sporting round pink eyeglasses stared at me with wide-eyed expectation. My heart melted.

"How about Itsy Bitsy Spider," one grandmother not much older than me suggested helpfully. And off we went. 

"You had to sing?" First-Born Son remarked incredulously that night on the phone when I recounted my tale of woe. "Those poor kids."

Do you see what I have to put up with? And he's the nice one.

Now that it's over, it doesn't seem quite so bad. Maybe I'll even do it again some time. Although I'll definitely bone up on my kiddie songs first.

I get to see that sweet little baby with the pink glasses each week when she and her mom check out their books. She always gives me a huge grin. I'm convinced she remembers who I am.

But I'm not quite sure if she's laughing with me or at me.

 

Memory

Composing 101

Did you have any songs you made up and sang when you were little? Maybe with your siblings or friends?

A couple stand out for me. When we were maybe seven and eight years old, on a family vacation in the Adirondacks, my sister and I met some kids. There were two older sisters close to our age, Stacy and Kim, and a little brother Wally.

And they were obnoxious. Mean and bossy, they intimidated the hell out of us, but they especially teased my older sister. I felt constantly on the alert to defend her, and we spent the week avoiding them. Till one morning when we were lucky enough to have snagged the only two swings. I needed to run inside to pee, and gave my sister strict instructions to guard those swings with her life. Of course, when I came back out two minutes later, Stacy and Kim had confiscated them, and my sister sat on the grass nearby, seething in shame.

"We didn't want those stupid, old swings anyway," I declared haughtily. We turned up our noses and stalked away.

Naturally, as soon as they abandoned them, we ran back over to the swings. That's when we made up the song. It's sung to the tune of "This Land is Your Land," which I suppose we were singing in school at that time. Somehow in our minds, by their mean spirited and hostile actions, Stacy and Kim were trashing not only our rights, but the whole American ideal of liberty and freedom.

Anyway, it went something like this:
                This land is your land, this land is my land,
                from Stuart's Mountain, to the Adirondacks,
                from the Main House bathroom, to the lake and
                row-oh-boats,
                this land was made for you and me.

                This means that Stacy
                and Kim and Wally
                can't take our swings
                when we are holding them.
                This means that they-aye
                can't talk so fresh to us,
                this land was made for you and me.
(It works much better if you are on a wooden swing, pumping for your life.)

We sang it loudly and wherever we went for the rest of that week, even, I am slightly embarrassed to admit, in the presence of Stacy, Kim, and Wally, and their parents. They must have been as evil as I remember, because I don't recall my parents forcing us to stop, and they were not the type to put up with in-your-face displays of aggression.

I'm sure if I started to sing it right now in front of my sister, her face would light up with recognition, and she would sing along.

But I think my all time favorite original tune is one my cousin K and I made up one summer when I was staying at her family's lake house. I was 13 and she was 10, and again, I am pretty sure we were composing in retaliation, my cousin having been wronged by some mean older girls who also summered at the lake.

It went like this:
                I am great.
                You are stinky,
                I  AM  GREAT
                and
                You  ARE  STINKY.
            Repeat (again and again).

Let me tell you, we felt mighty empowered marching around, belting it out at the top of our lungs. I seem to recall my poor aunt shaking her head uselessly, wondering how and why she'd wound up with this combative, adolescent niece corrupting her innocent daughter.

But I'll bet K remembers it well. I'll have to ask her. In the meantime, I'd love to hear any of your original tunes. It'd be a shame not to share.

Age of Aquarius

Hair

I haven't mentioned the fact that I have a page on my blog where I've been posting some of my poetry each week. I'm still trying to figure out technologically the best way to do this, but I know most people aren't into poetry, and those that are will, hopefully, stumble upon it on their own.

I like to think the work speaks for itself and shouldn't require explanation. Still, my post today is somewhat related to this week's poem, "We Danced."

I went to see "Hair" on Broadway this past weekend, a trip with a friend to celebrate her 50th birthday. It was an amazing experience. At the end of the show, audience members are invited up to dance on stage with the cast. My friend and her two sons were among the first to head down the aisle.

I hesitated, not wanting to abandon Daughter #1, who I know would rather eat nails than hit that stage. But I also knew if I didn't go up there I would regret it. So I ran down that aisle and grabbed onto the hand of the actor who played Berger. He pulled me onto the stage with a huge smile and a "welcome," and I joined my friends, clapping and dancing to "Let the Sun Shine In."

I looked up past the blinding stage lights and out into the theater. The audience was on their feet, singing, clapping, as they watched the group of about 50 to 75 of us on stage with the cast.

I am center stage in a Broadway theater, I thought. How cool is this?

And I thought of my mother, and the poem I posted this week, which I wrote long ago. "Age of Aquarius/Let the Sun Shine In" was one of the first 45 records my sister and I owned. One winter morning we put in on and started dancing in our enclosed front porch, still in our long flannel nightgowns. We were maybe nine and ten years old, our long hair flying as we moved. I know this because my mother got out the camera and took a picture.

But then she did something that I have never forgotten. She put down the camera and began to dance. And I mean dance. My sister and I stopped, jaws dropped, eyes wide. You've got to understand, our mother did not often lend herself to spontaneous outbursts in this way. We were entranced.

"What?" she challenged us, when she was through. "You didn't know your mother could move?"

How appropriate, I thought while I was on that Broadway stage, that this is the song I should be up here dancing to. It seemed, in a bizarre way, as though it was some karmic tribute not only to my friend's big day and the past generation of flower children, but to my mother herself, and my relationship with her.

Let the sun shine in...

"Hold onto this," I directed myself. "This is one of those life's moments. You need to remember it forever."

Oh, let it shine...

I savored every second.