Scarecrow

When I lived in Mexico, I envied the people their special relationship with Santa Muerte.  I could never warm up to a holiday where there was grave-dancing and celebration.  Death was fearsome for me;  Edgar Allen Poe and Edward Gorey gave me nightmares.  I had no living grandparents (well, none we were allowed to acknowledge) and little intimacy with the elderly.  There was a white bridal gown in a box in our old attic that my sister insisted was used by the spirit of our deceased Grandma on the occasions she visited.  I shivered.  

The first actual death in my young life was my best friend's mother.  She died during the summer-- of cancer.  I could not imagine losing my own Mom-- the thought absolutely terrified me, although I often wished my father would disappear and leave her eligible to couple with some random prince or even a kind carpenter or fisherman.  My friend's Mom had these downturned eyes and permanently worried brows.  I felt safe in her home-- sleeping over, on little trips; she was the leader of our Brownie troop and she was kind and soft-spoken.  I was devastated by the news of her death; her daughter had to leave the summer program where they'd put us to distract from the fallout of her advanced illness.  I had to stay behind where I wept and tried to process the concept of 'gone-ness' in my 8-year old world.  I offered to lend my own mother-- to trade places.

Not long afterward the widowed husband remarried a woman with three children.  The new mixed family was buoyant and festive.  He seemed to blossom with a new wife... and that was that.  But I carried my friend's mother's memory like a badge-- like a missing tooth when I smiled.  No one seems to notice, and it's inappropriate to be weeping daily like a drama princess when the immediate family has made great effort to recover.  It put a wedge between me and my best friend; I missed her Mom when I slept over-- the milk and cookies, the way she braided my hair so it wouldn't pull... her soft sing-y voice calling Good night, girls! when we were up past midnight whispering and giggling.

I'm not the poster child for Life Goes On.  The losses and griefs take their toll.  Besides Jesus, there is a litany of saints and angels in my nightly recitations-- all of whom are conspicuously missing from my life.  The past year or two has had its own version of pain; the fact that the world seems to be grieving does not comfort much.  I remember my aging Mom complaining there were so few left of her acquaintance-world-- crossing out in red the date-book names that no longer required birthday cards.  Her Christmas list was down to single digits.  

October has always been a sad month for many reasons... I also dread the ambivalent celebration of Halloween.  I've never been a costume-enthusiast... and while I appreciate the parade, the souls of the departed give me no incentive to party.  Thirty-two years ago I went into false labor on October 31st and prayed I would not be giving orange and black birthday parties for years to come.  As it happened, my son waited a full week, for which I am grateful.  Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater my mother used to recite as we carved teeth on our Jack-o-Lanterns; she was a late October baby.  

A week ago I walked back from Harlem along the East River... for a while I was shadowed by a man who pulled out a knife and asked me for money.  As it was, I had none-- food stamps, which I offered... he blinked his red-rimmed eyes and decided not to hurt me.  Was there a guardian angel behind us? It occurred to me that I was not even frightened. A few blocks later,  the sun set and produced a vivid double rainbow which truly merited the 'arc-en-ciel' nomenclature... I can't recall ever seeing anything that compared in New York City.  The Hunter's Moon this week-- has had an exceptional performance-- a soloist among choruses of clouds.  

Late last night-- almost dawn... I took out my guitar, as is my habit... and the lights in my living room began to blink.  That would be Alan, I said out loud.  Spirits.  Ghosts... I am approaching a point where absent friends will soon exceed the ones who are here.  The pandemic has whittled down my circle of intimates to a very few.  It is a kind of limbo... I feel more connected to those who have passed.  We speak, we exchange.  I sing to them.  My own daughter walks among them.  

I haven't visited my mother's grave for nearly three years; she'd have turned 97 this week... this seems uncanny.  I celebrate her pumpkin-carving hands when they were still manicured and elegant-- me, in my uncostumed non-finery, like an old scarecrow with arms extended,  ghosts and spirits perching.  

November Reign

It occurred to me Thursday, having stayed up all night after a late gig, facing the massive cooking-marathon with equal parts of anticipation and dread, that I hated Thanksgiving as a child.  I don't have those warm Kodak-memories of family and holiday cheer.  Like most children, I didn't particularly care about food, especially unfamiliar things.  Even playdates, besides beloved milk and cookies, brought strange smells and styles of cooking that made me customize schedules to exclude mealtimes.  Family structure in those days was rigid; parents forced children to eat, made few concessions to aversions and allergies.  We sat at table and absorbed dysfunction without having the skills or permission to process these dynamics.

How things have changed... mothers and fathers seem super attentive to their kids' food preferences.  They experiment and compete.  Even the cooking shows on the Food Channel have under-12 contestants who can not only prepare but know about food chemistry and cuisine.  In the 1950's we had unsophisticated palates.  My mother became a better chef as time went on, and lunch progressed from grilled velveeta-cheese to salads and wider nutritional choices, but our childhood food experiences were limited.

Thinking back, most Thanksgivings were at our aunt's.. not our 'blood-aunt' but one of those women in my parents' circle that we referred to that way.  She had her actual relatives crammed into an expanded dining dais-arrangement that was always uncomfortable and anxiety-provoking.  One of her sisters was super fat and had married a blind man; my sister would make weird faces at him and whisper to me that he can't see her anyway, but I was halfway between suppressed giggling and actual fear of his disability.  I hated the food.  Rolls were safe.  Milk.  Even the pie was awful.  Back then my mother would sometimes let me have a peanut-butter sandwich before we left.  And it wasn't the food-- I just wanted to leave, to go up to my cousin's room and look at her strange dolls and books.  To go home-- back to my little easels and looms and library.  My lair.

Once I reached teenage years, I could do volunteer work-- serve at the local shelter, cook for the poor and sick; this was a relief.  During college, these holidays were for reuniting with old mates-- for football, for some-- the meaning changes.  Newly married, I wanted my British husband to experience American tradition-- despite the fact that I had to invent mine since most of my extended family had 'fallen out' by this time from divorce or petty dramas.  And once my son was born, well.. I reinvented the day for him-- there was the Wednesday night visit to the inflating of the floats, then the parade... and I learned to cook turkey and host my musical families with joy.  I'm an adult now, I repeated over and over when my own family began to leave us out of their inner-sanctum invitations.  Me the single Mom-- perpetually hung over from lack of sleep and late-night gigs-- the annual Hendrix tribute foremost on my mind every late November; I checked the Head-of-Household box on my tax return and appreciated the one perk of being a sole parent.

For a time in the 90's and early 2000's, my annual dinners were all-night parties; I hosted people who hated their families, European transplants who simply enjoyed the food, my son's friends who escaped their own dinners, strays and band members.  My house was full and my cooking skills impressed even me.  There was music... there was joy and great conversation.

This year, for the first time in decades, there was no Hendrix tribute.  There is no more BB King's; Iridium closes down before 10 PM... even the Cutting Room seemed not welcoming.  I struggled to find the motivation to plan a dinner.  So many friends have been ill, have lost family members and parents, lost their personal mojo to the crushing daily reality of Trumped America; the holiday reminder of an increasingly distant past and pending future isolation grows a little more palpable.  My son's relationships are in flux; many of his closest friends are married and have started their own families.

My usual guests have seemed less enthusiastic than in the past.  I have dropped a couple of them along with the more challenging dishes-- the sweet-potato/green-apple casserole which requires hours of prep-- the pies.  I still do a huge turkey with my well-loved stuffing-- the cranberry, the other fixings... my building staff waits patiently for their plate-- my son eats up a storm, but my own enthusiasm has shifted.  I keep diagnosing the start of this as the 2016 post-election shock.  It's hard to believe that by next November we will have chosen again, god-willing we are able to survive one more year and have the collective sense to do something about this.

Nevertheless, this was the smallest table in a long time.  I didn't even bother changing into my traditional dress.  We sat and enjoyed one another at an intimate meal, and I finished clean-up at a reasonable hour.  Of course there are a few days' worth of leftovers and sharing, an extra reason for my son to come uptown and help me with my Christmas tree... but the shift in time is apparent.  Maybe I will have grandchildren before long and these traditions will regain their magic.  I'm not sure.  Watching this cartoon president pretend to honor the confused military ranks certainly took the air out of our Thanksgiving balloons.

I thought this year about the 1963 holiday-- how profoundly, post-assassination, our world had changed... how in 2001 I felt so conscientious about giving and appreciating, about generosity and post-9/11 understanding... the second generational loss-of-innocence for us baby-boomers: we re-set  our sense of compassion... humility, humanity.  But Thursday night the football game was blaring from the back room-- nothing on my turntable; halfway through eating I realized we hadn't lit the candles.  And just this morning, on the last day of a sad month, I can't seem to recall saying my usual Thanksgiving grace.  Amen, November.