Report to Ezra Jabez
Sacketts Harbor, 1996
Grandfather, they are taking the boats out of the water at Navy Point. In 1996. I
walked out there this morning. There was a misty rain and the wind was from the north- west, coming in off the lake. I thought of you and how you would know and expect the seasonal activity of this little harbor, so I am making my report to you.

The harbor is full of pleasure boats, Sail and motor launches. They have names and home "ports", which seem to be the domiciles of their owners, not necessarily on the lake. There was "Empty Pockets", a message I will try to remember when I toy with the idea of boat ownership. Many are for sale, beautiful clean shining hulls, up on pylons, their dimensions, year of launch, and price stuck on their bows. The dollar amount ranges from $19,000 to $176, 000. Your estate, at your death was listed at about $27,000. You would be shocked.

These boats are made of fiberglass, not much wood to be seen. They have tall aluminum masts, now lying side by side like stacked wood, segregated in another part of the boat yard. There are all sorts of navigational aids attached around the cockpit. These electronic navigators communicate with satellites, Grandfather! You can tell your position any where on the earth within a few feet by turning on these gadgets! What happens when the power fails? I hope these sailors still know how to "shoot the stars".

They are predicting a drastic change in temperature tonight. Today, October 2nd it is about 65 degrees and sunny. The flowers are blooming. Tomorrow it is supposed to be 40 F. I'm ready. I know how changeable this place is. I've got my Down Parka along.

Lots of love, your granddaughter, Sessa

The Informant, staring Matt Damon, or Name that Pathology

I had read of Mark Whitaker’s debacle with Archer Daniels Midland ten, fifteen, years ago in maybe the New Yorker? I had been fascinated and amused so looked forward to seeing the dramatization on screen.

I was not prepared for the “this is your life” experience that unfolded before me. At first I thought, "Wait a minute, this is familiar."

His story was good, believable. But then little things didn’t add up. What’s wrong here?

The main character, Mark Whitaker spins out lies and fabrications with the ease of water pouring from a jug. It became apparent that he was preoccupied with his interior life. At first I thought, “pathological liar.” Then, “He’s paranoid.” Then “to think it is to say it.”

At that point things became uncomfortably familiar. “This guy is like Ian. He can’t help himself. He even lies about his lies."

I began to feel sad and depressed. There it was before me. The charm, the manipulation, the grandiosity.

I have always struggled with my guilt, sadness, frustration trying to make Ian “like other people.” Wanting to shake him and say, “For once, just tell the truth.” I see the same frustration in the FBI handler. He always just gets more lies.

What is this syndrome? There are elements of autism, antisocial personality disorder, paranoia, secretiveness, and manipulation.

I left the theater sad and depressed. Ian was sick, from an early age. A lot of very good people tried to help him. No one really saw or understood the whole picture. It is a tribute to Matt Damon, a fine actor, that he could catch all the nuance and bring it before the audience. In the end how can we understand such complex mental illness? Poor Ian, he was his own worst enemy.

Update the Senario

Watching movies on TV these days strikes a discordant note.

Bank robbers get all excited about one million dollars

Car thieves go ballistic about Cadillac’s, Hummers, and SUVs.

“What’s wrong with them?” I think.

One million dollars was a big haul twenty years ago. Now a days is it worth risking your life and freedom ?

“Who wants one of those cars?”

How long will the new reality take to get into the story line of the script?

Misstep

It was totally unexpected. Something was wrapped around my right ankle and arrested my motion to retrieve the small watering can I use to fill my iron. The Iron came flying off the ironing board landing on the cement floor behind me.

I struggled mightily to stay on my feet feeling a terrible twisting pain in my right knee. There was a moment of confusion and reorientation. It hurt to put weight on my right leg but I didn’t go down which might have caused me to hit my head or arm or shoulder. I picked up the Iron and put it back on the ironing board.

Yipes! I was in the basement, the place I feared most of falling. I checked. I had my cell phone in my pocket, my call button around my neck. I remember thinking.

“I hope you can make it up the steps. Go carefully you don’t want to compound this mishap.”

I turned off the light and iron. Slowly and carefully, bending forward left leg up first to lift my weight followed by my right leg to the same step I came out of the basement.

I laid down and had a wee nap. I was due to go to the movies with my friend Eugenia.

“I think I can make it. I don’t want to disappoint her.”

We went but I begged off from the planned restaurant supper after ward. My knee was becoming more painful and less stable. I got home and went to bed.

I had a restless and painful night. The next day I emailed Caleb and Anita to request that they bring me a large ace bandage. Fortunately for me my son, Caleb, who is both a Physical Therapist and an M. D. called me back and said he would be right over.

He went over me carefully and said he didn’t think anything was broken. He thought I had soft tissue damage in the knee that was pretty swollen. He brought a knee support and got me a cane. He put my shower seat in my shower and showed me how to transfer to it.

I had a better night last night and today feel fifty percent better.

Having an incident like this makes you painfully aware of the losses suffered in an injury to a limb. Think of all the things you could do with out having to think about it, before this happened.

Today I’m thinking about Hillary and her broken elbow, all the important meetings she had to cancel. I’m thinking about Sonia Sotomayor and her leg caste, still going to her meetings with the Senators and Representatives. I am thinking about Eugenia and her constant pain from her hip. She is reluctant to risk a replacement after one heart attack as a result of a colonoscopy. I am thinking about the teenagers in Somalia sentenced to having a hand and a leg cut off for stealing.

At Seventy-six I don’t like joining the elderly “physically compromised”. An injury like this exaggerates all the other ageing signs and symptoms I deal with. The future looks more unpleasant this morning.

The Girlfriend Experience: Review

I just watched “The Girlfriend Experience”, my first venture into “pay for view” on TV.

What an interesting film. So permeated with the angst of modern life, recent history with its references to the Election and the Financial Melt Down. You know both are taking place somewhere off screen but you, the viewer are caught up in the lives of Christine and her boyfriend, both for hire to decorate the lives of the wealthy needy.

Christine has a hard little face that she can almost soften with her youth, at will. Close ups reveal more that is distasteful, a square jaw, a deep crease in one corner of her mouth, a scar on her nose. Your mind jumps ahead. Where is this life going? What will she look like in five years, ten?

Both characters are trying to maximize their earning power.

“Work for the night is coming.”

To wheel and deal, they have to step out of the chameleon mode and reveal themselves, which is distasteful to the people who are casting them in the image that serves their needs. The whole mood changes as you accompany them on these forays into the domain of another level of exploitation. There is the Gym owner who wants the boyfriend, personal trainer, to give up his individuality and wear the packaging of the Gym. There is the Pimp who wants to take Christine to Dubai. These folks are the real scary ones. You can tell they have seen Christine and her Boyfriend before and used them well before tossing them aside.

There is a wealth of thought and comment in this film. Are we really this far of track in modern life? Is this what we have exchanged for the life of a Farmer? Factory worker? Do we live this much in the moment? Magically?

Watch it and see what you feel, think.

The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family by Annette Gordon-Reed

I’ve just finished this book. I’m not sure if you can ever be finished with this book whether you read it or write it.

Annette Gordon-Reed takes us on her journey of discovery and revelation, a labor of love, into another time, and extended family, in another place. I’m grateful to be carried by her work and effort into this family. It must have been emotionally exhausting to go and be with these people, resurrecting them in body and personality, time travel while writing, then describing what you are seeing, feeling, discovering. I can sense the reluctance to leave your own life and go there to be with them, then leave them suspended until you return.

What a gift Gordon-Reed has given us, so many insights. I found my self thinking,

“Yes, of course.”

The author offers us Thomas Jefferson as he must have been, worts, blemishes, and polish. James Hemmings is fleshed out in all his frustration, anger and final tragedy. You hear Bob Hemmings pleading with Jefferson to understand his primary attachment to his wife and children. Martha Randolph takes form. Only Sally Hemmings remains a mystery, a shadow, a ghost. She was expunged from the written record. You can feel her presence, the importance of her role but you don’t see her or hear her voice.

This must have been deliberate on the part of the other family members. It is so sad that they made her into a “non-person.

The Dionne Quintuplets

As the Depression of 2008 deepens we survivors of the Depression of 1929 are being encouraged to recount our stories.

I was born in 1932 to an “older” couple whose fortunes were slipping away along with the rest of the country’s.

My parents had met at a Yoga Colony in Nyack New York. The members still made up a group large enough to exert some influence in the Village.

The Nyack Drug Store held a raffle to stimulate business. The prize was a set of Dionne Quintuplet Dolls. Each purchase entitled the patron to one vote. Someone at the Clarkstown Country Club, the yoga colony, organized on my behalf. I think I must have been around three or four years old. I remember seeing the dolls lined up in the store window.

Time passed and like “abra-ka-dabra” the dolls appeared at my house. It all seemed very confusing. I tried to decode what had happened. My mother was my interpreter. As I stared at the five baby dolls all identically dressed I felt very confused. This was a “good” thing, a “special” thing. The bottom line was that I couldn’t figure out how to play with 5 baby dolls at once. I looked at their identical faces, learned their names, tried undressing and dressing them. Then what?

My mother may have sensed my dilemma. She hit on a political solution.

“There are a lot of little girls who don’t have a doll. You have five. I think you should give some to children who have none.”

I remember asking if I had a choice. I had a feeling that five was an important and significant number.

The decision had been made. Two dollies disappeared and I was left with the Dionne Triplets. They seemed less appealing and I think I stopped playing with them.

The depression continued on its downward path and my parents lost their house in 1938. They couldn’t pay even the reduced mortgage they had refinanced with the Federal Housing Authority. Our little family began the series of moves that scattered toys and other possessions leaving them behind in unremembered corners. Only my doll, Sessa and Johnny Bear managed to stick with us. Johnny Bear was the most persistent. I think my mother loved him even more that I did. He is still with me.