2018.09.02 Eighty Is Eighty

This is how my 80th birthday celebration went.  I’ve written about this in many ways in different sites, but I’m not done celebrating. 

I was born August 7, 1938. My husband Dick was born also on August 7 but in 1941. His brain is three years younger than mine. That’s helpful at my age! (Photo November, 2017)

We decided in 2018 to celebrate our one day twice—one dinner out for my day and one for his. The first dinner was at a new Indian restaurant, Nirvana in Cambridge. We love Indian food and had scheduled our reservation early, 5:30—the hour of dining for oldies and what I’d sworn I’d never do. We expected nirvana. When we arrived we were greeted by the noisy, messy chaos of a birthday party for a group of eleven-year-old boys, complete with birthday cake and a food fight. So we talked about memories of being wildly pre-pubescent ourselves and memories of being parents of seven children and a few grandchildren in the same state of explosive life.

Our second chosen restaurant is a favorite neighborhood restaurant—Italian, Dick’s heritage. We are friendly with the staff. I have learned a few Italian words and some of the wait staff speak Spanish. It’s the restaurant we went to nearly every night when we first moved to Cambridge eight years ago and were waiting for our appliances to be installed. We were sure we’d be feted and treated like the regulars we are, and especially with a high profile birthday. However, both managers were on vacation, the place was hopping with people who had spilled out and into the restaurant from an event in nearby Danehy Park, and they were understaffed and rushing around, even had the bartender waiting tables. They hardly noticed us. We talked about the spirituality of patience, finally agreeing that it was for the saints, or at least the birds.  Spoiled, privileged, entitled, yes, but not guilty. Prego.

We got off to our two weeks' vacation in Nantucket the next day. Even the ferry food tasted good, and the sun shone brightly as the sea breeze unruffled our feathers. We were almost afraid to try again at our favorite island restaurant, 56 Union. We waited till Monday, a low night we hoped, and we went at 7 p.m. As we came in the hostess asked us if we’d like to be seated in “the quiet room.”  Ah!  Aging is good.

At the end of our birthday month after we were back home, my four children, all from Connecticut, came to take me out for lunch on Sunday August 26. They had asked what I wanted and I told them I wanted to be together with them—just them, no spouses or grandchildren. They thought we could meet somewhere equidistant, but I said I wanted them to come here. One daughter had never seen where I live in retirement. And so it was. Our lunch at Artistry on the Green in Lexington, was elegant, quiet, and relaxed. No agendas, no need for deep confessions, no leftover family kvetches, no pressurized joy. It was perfect, which doesn’t mean there was no chaos in each life. That was put aside for the day. It was a ritual as holy as Sunday church or my birth day, Sunday. They gave me a funny card, a multi-colored piñata signed with little love notes from each one of them, and a gift card for the Seaside Motel in Maine where we for years have spent Thanksgiving week and celebrated our wedding anniversary, November 23.  And they paid the tab.

(Robert William, 51,III, Jill Barlow, 54, Lynda Gillespie, 80, John Thomas, 47, Beverley Ann, 55—all Brakeman)

Eighty for me is not the new 60, or 40. Eighty is quiet of soul—glory, gratitude, humor, love, and good looks thrown in. 

2018.08.19 Two Sisters In a Basket?

Here is a poster by Maggie Meredith, Nantucket artist and poet (1922-2012). I have stared at it and smiled for some years. It reminds me of a feline version of me and my sister.

The poster hangs in the living room of our little timeshare cottage in Nantucket—the one Dick and I purchased in 1985 just before we were married in November, 1986. We change, our little cottage stays the same.

My interest in this poster is that it is expressive and whimsical. The kitties remind me of me and my younger sister Laurie—our personalities and different stances towards life. It cracks me up.

The white one looks alert and ready to pounce with a purr or a claw at whatever she has to do to manage things at a moment’s notice. Sometimes she pounces or springs into action too soon. When this happens it can be, well, messy or aggressive, though always well-intentioned. She protects people or defends them against injustices. That’s her strength and can be heroic, like a “knight in shining armor.”  Sometimes her power overwhelms.

I am more like the black kitty. I am just as alert but more worried about things in general, and sometimes about my sister’s ardor, especially if she is trying to protect me, and especially if I don’t need it. My ways are more cautious, considered, wise.

Sometimes I wait too long to jump in with assertions or actions, but when I do, I am focused and persistent, like the time over 20 years ago when Laurie and I collaborated on a book, and the publisher accepted my prose but not her poetry. I knew it would hurt my sister, but, after consulting with many people and praying like crazy, I accepted the publishing offer. Laurie felt left behind and crushed, her assumptions being that we were at work on our relationship, getting closer. I felt selfish and selfish-er, assuming we were at work on a book only. Our relationship suffered great pain and wounding I imagined was inflicted by me on her. Our needs were very different, though we didn’t know it then.

Many times we have fought over our differences; broken our relationship; striven to heal; tried to understand, and wounded our relational esteem. I have envied her, and she me. We are now able to tussle and burble, giggle and grin, then, sighing, sink into old age free of the stink and stench of envy or competition—dark forces that have shadowed our love and obscured the grace of God in our midst.

Still, we are in the same basket together, so we’ve tried to fight hard—and honestly. We’ve tried even harder to reconcile—honestly. It only took 70+ years.

Laurie uses her power wisely; I use my wisdom powerfully. Both of us agree that our efforts have paid off, and both of us are grateful to the God of our Christian faith whose Love heals all wounds and cares for each of us exactly as we are.  

2017.07.27 At Play With God

When I am on vacation on this island called Nantucket, I swear my mind goes fallow, or at least I feel plowed and unsown waiting to be seeded as I sit on the beach and stare blankly into the vastness of god-ness spread out before me with no end: the sea, the sky, the stretch of beach and sparkling white sand—even the tang of salt on my sun-dried legs. When I was young I swam in the ocean. Now I wade in it.

I listen to the sounds of silence punctuated by the surf’s splash and the occasional shouts of delight from children who dash toward the breaking waves and, suddenly frightened, race back—over and over and over. This is how I behave sometimes with God—boldly approaching with my words, my prayers, my theological assertions, and then, with no warning, I feel too big and too small at once, and retreat. I feel playful. Such a Mystery where mess and blessing collide.

I’m just back home in the city and still hearing, smelling, and feeling the island landscape and its lazy mood. I would not want to live there all the time—too isolated. Even an introvert like me could get claustrophobic here in winter, though I’m not sure about that. Nantucket is 30 miles out from mainland Cape Cod, a small scoop of land in the Atlantic Ocean. Every year the beaches recede almost imperceptibly. Climate change fears jump into my mind and jump out again—fast.  Not today. Today, I give my imagination full play.

I would be sad if we couldn’t return summer after summer for our two weeks in our small cottage at the west end of the island. It is quiet there. There's little ground light, so we sit outside and look up and see what looks like every single star in the cosmos and the milky way—better than any movie or television show we could watch. We actually ate by candlelight a couple of evenings, talked, and even cried a little—not sad just, dare I say, age appropriately age- aware, stoked by the power of 40 years of memories. These surge in and out of our minds and our conversation like the waves, bearing echoes of our children’s and grandchildren’s voices. And we said I love you more that we usually do. This is as close as we get to romantic. Godde, how strikingly irresponsible. Playing.

An island, such as Nantucket, is limited space thriving within limitless sky, sand, water, and air—a very playful image of God, I’d say.

Oh yes, I know there’s plenty of garish affluence among the stereotypical  “beautiful island people” who wander from store to store in Nantucket town and never stop spending. I do that, too sometimes, and this year nearly spent $200 (Ok reduced to $189.99) on a pair of fashion jeans that actually fit my skinny legs—nearly. I’m too old, not wise just old. And too, there’s plenty of loud partying among the young. I used to do that too. They are having fun, playing. 

How little we play in this present worried culture and gravely serious church. How little we let ourselves go and revel in godness wherever we sense it—be it idyllic natural scapes or on the sooty curbs of city streets where beggars gather to chat, compare the day’s wage, tell jokes. I’ve seen them play and seem them quarrel. But seriously, beggars in Boston smile, laugh, and say God bless you more than any other passerby caught in the rush.

In all this I imagine the face of a Creator-God exploding with delight watching Creation unfold, day by day, like a child inventing a new game. In Proverbs, Wisdom is portrayed as being God’s playmate:  “ . .  . beside God like a little child, I was daily his delight, rejoicing before him always, rejoicing in his inhabited world and delighting in the human race.” (Proverbs 9)

God at play, playing like children play, and adults play when they are free enough, exploding with delight at almost anything that bounces onto the cosmic scene. It is this image I seek, it is this image I play with—not to ignore sorrow or suffering or evil or decay, but to recognize and acknowledge what deeply matters, what gives the world and its creatures energy abundant.

Well of course! It would take unimaginable—beyond nucleic— energy to pull off a Big Bang.

2017.08.13 Sincerely, the Sky

 Sincerely, the Sky

Yes, I see you down there

looking up into my vastness.

What are you hoping

to find on my vacant face,

there within the margins

of telephone wires?

You should know I am only

bright blue now because of physics:

molecules break and scatter

my light from the sun

more than any other color.

You know my variations—

azure at noon, navy by midnight.

How often I find you

then on your patio, pajamaed

and distressed, head thrown

back so your eyes can pick apart

not the darker version of myself

but the carousel of stars.

To you I am merely background.

You barely hear my voice.

 Remember I am most vibrant

when air breaks my light.

Do something with your brokenness.

“Sincerely, the Sky” from Dear Sincerely by David Hernandez, © 2016. Aired by permission of University of Pittsburgh Press.

Dear Sky,

Thanks so much for your wisdom and for being blue—or not. When I was a kid I thought the sea was blue like you, too. I know you’re just sun-mottled molecules, or my tendency to project all my dearest dreams onto every scape, but to me you’re the glory of God—divine true-blueness. 

I’m on an island now, surrounded by you and sea and sand. When I’m here I forget all about the many careful distinctions people attempt to draw between science and religion. They just don’t matter when you’re bright blue, the sea is deep blue-green, and the silky white sand sticks like glitter to my salted nakedness. 

I’m in one piece when I’m here. So is the cosmos.

Thank you, Sky.
  
              Sincerely, a Fan.


David Hernandez, born in Burbank California in 1971, is a prize-winning poet who teaches creative writing at California State University-Long Beach.

David is a year younger than my youngest son, which makes me feel old, but not old-mother old. David is four years younger than my other son who aspires to be a poet himself—which he already is. I know because poetry is soul-deep and sky-high.


Thank you, David Hernandez

2016.08.14 Sum, Sum, Summertime/Plumbertime

The plumber knocked on the screen door—thrice. It must be some bishop wanting into the sanctuary I thought with a grin. Well, that's the kind of thing you think when you're sitting half-naked under a ceiling fan, slurping a juicy peach whose juices are dripping down your cleavage.

Knock, knock knock.  "Plumber, here, someone called about a leaky faucet."

It was too late to rush in and don a less transparent garment, and besides I'd have to run past the screen door in full view of said plumber anyway, so I just opened the door and let him in, crossing my arms over my chest and thinking that this could be one of life's most embarrassing moments, or simply a summer vacation moment —weather steamy, living easy, surf salty, plumbers on call.

"You called about a faucet on your porch," the plumber said his eyes straight ahead and with a smile. "I work Saturdays in the summer here."

Enter very smart husband, Dick: "Oh, that outdoor shower faucet's been leaking for years."

"Well, a former tenant must have called, finally," the plumber said as we showed him where the errant dripper was. Sure enough it was dripping. "This will take no more than 10 minutes," he said as he came back inside and turned on the tap in the bathtub. "This will run dry so don't use any water for a few minutes while I fix this little leak."

Damn, he knew what he was doing. I followed him outside to gawk, by now in thrall but aware enough to keep my arms crossed over my chest. "Sure enough, only a gasket," he said. "You're all set now. Have a great day."

"Thanks," we said. I smiled and gave him a Namasté bow. He returned the bow, chuckled and left.

Namasté means: "The divine in me salutes the divine in you."

Plumbers are indeed the best people in the world—full of divinity.

2015.08.16 Lassitude, Spirituality Thereof

We are on a two-week vacation at our cottage on Nantucket.  We own six weeks of it, two in prime time summer and four in winter months. It is our big claim to real estate fame, after having lived in church-owned housing for years. We bought it the summer before we were married—hardly the Ritz but it's ours—along with 12 other part-time owners. We believe in community, holding everything in common like the early Christians. Well, not quite!

The word that fits my mood of the day is lassitude. Oh, I stretch my dear old body, take a walk, eat chocolate for breakfast, read the paper to keep up with the latest horrors, whip through e-mails, do my share of political angsting, keep in touch with my children and theirs, and a once-a-year Nantucket friend, obsess about upcoming sermon, write some words, and then fall into vacation lassitude—a comforter.

I intend to read something meaningful and I don't. Lassitude. I go to the beach when afternoon sun isn't too scorchy. I pick a spot apart from families and children—too noisy and occasionally loud with abusive parental ways I just don't want to confront, not now. Lassitude. All I do is gaze and drift mentally. I feel the soft velvety warmth of white, white sand between my toes. I indulge in the natural introversion that is mine. I love to watch children play and laugh as I used to watch my children. It's more than nostalgia, it's re-living and re-loving.

I miss all the activity and I value my solitude. Never did figure out how to balance these two. 

Still, life intervenes: love and grief always mingled. A friend's colonoscopy showed no cancer, thank Godde.  A granddaughter is getting her first car, such delight. Jill, the younger of my two daughters, texted family that her pug, Louie, beloved companion, always at her side for years, had to be euthanized— too painful for him to live on. Don't anyone call yet, she requested. She's having a "hard time." Jill has no children, save her animals. Louie was her baby. My tears welled up and spilled out. God, bless her in her grief for Louie whose soul is received into your expansive sacred heart. 

When I look out at the vastness of the ocean, I think that it's endlessness is divine—eternal. I feel  reverent, small and humble, oddly comforted that it's way too deep, vast and mysterious for me to comprehend or apprehend.

If the divine soul is far greater than this natural phenomenon, then there must be ample room in God's grace and glory for all living things.  Why the hell, then, are we humans having so much trouble making room for each other, not to mention our critters?

Today the Atlantic Ocean is lassitudinous—pulsating deep down.

2014.09.21 The Old Nantucketeer

In this morning moment, I try to memorize summer as it fades before my eyes. I shall miss it so, as the coldness creeps, then settles, into my bones. But for now, I memorize its every sweetness and prepare to give up berries for apples, bare shoulders for hunched, shivering ones, bare feet for double socks, clear lungs for congested ones, and soft Nantucket sands for my thick comforter. I do, however, adore the beauty of naked trees in winter—also, the glitter of new snow and the gleeful shouts of sledding kids in the nearby park. Still, my island home is kinda mystical to me—a little scary, a little awesome, like the holy.

 As an ode to summer's end, I jotted this proem:

The Old Nantucketeer

We met an old Nantucketeer
on line at the ferry dock—
there to meet a ferry pick-up,
there to pick up guests.
On the rear window of his sizable SUV—
portly as was he—
there was a familiar identifier: a white shield
with a red cross emblazoned, its
upper left corner blue with little white stars
forming an X, five from upper left
to lower right and five from upper right to lower left.
Tic tac doe, or is it toe?
Above the cross arrangement is written
The Episcopal Church.
The church calls its pretty little shield, “soft evangelism.”
For me it was recognition.
My emergent aging extroversion kicked in, “Hi...........
I saw your decal." I stuck my head part way into his window,
interrupting his snooze.
He was buckled into his seat in a reverie of ease.
He awakened and chuckled: “I’ve been coming here
since I was a child; my parental home was in Monomoy
so I know it must have been a mansion,
characteristic of Monomoy and of our Episcopal church.
With some exceptions, I thought.
“Natives fuss about tourists and the summer influx,” he continued.
“I’ve been coming here for over 50 years, summers
and sometimes in winter, “ I interrupted, noticing initials
primly embroidered on the cuffs of his white shirt.
Fancy. Sweet. I’d met a Brahmin.
"People like me, he added, "are called visitors, but we visitors
shed tears when we leave the island." (I know.)
"My brother is fatter than I am," he said. Bragging?
"I can hardly get about anymore."
The ferry horn blasted, signaling
more noxious tourist-types arriving—beloved immigrants—
and some leaving.
My new friend opened his car door and, with labor,
heaved his bulk forward and landed his feet on the pavement.
“You know what they say about Nantucket?” he said.
I waited.
“Nantucket is a chronic infectious disease
 not covered by Medicare.”
He shook in silent mirth; I laughed out loud.
True.
Then I spotted my son and his family bounding
down the ferry gangplank. Hi. Hi. Hi.
I was here when this son was conceived, or was it
when I was pregnant with his sister?

Time gets lost.

My Episcopal friend waved down his friends, turned to
me and said, “I’m devoted to St. Paul’s Episcopal here,
but I worship now at the Congregational Church.”
My irritation rose, fell, and vanished.

I thought, but didn’t say: Next year in Jerusalem.
It sounded like a psalm, more stately than what I actually said:
"Next year in Nantucket."

2013.08.18 Madaket Millie

2013.08.18  Madaket Milie

A Spiritual Lemon, as most of you know, is my sweet ‘n sour term for any person, place or thing that most people assume to be sour but that is really blessed with a special sweetness.

Madaket Millie is one such Spiritual Lemon. Here she is on one of her 80 birthdays, a local hero and legend.


Millie was Mildred Jewett, born in 1907 on Nantucket and moved to her grandmother’s farm in Madaket, the western end of the island in 1911. Millie was fascinated by the sea and would sit on top of her house gazing out to sea for hours. She became known as the “Protector of the West End” and called herself the “seaside sentinel.”

Her well trained eye earned her a vocation patrolling the beaches during World War II, watching for shipwrecks, and training German Shepard dogs for patrol duty for all branches of the military service. The Coast Guard was Millie's favorite branch, her “family.” Millie was awarded the highest honorary civilian rank, Coast Guard West End Command.

Millie had a gruff, grim, sour countenance and a sweet heart that loved animals, especially dogs, sold ice cream, and helped anyone in need. She greeted natives and visitors alike and called tourists “mop heads” because of the noisy contraptions they rode around. . . . mopeds.

Millie developed a close friendship with Mr. Rogers who had a home on Nantucket and couldn’t have been more cheery-faced to Millie’s curmudgeonly dourness. The two made a film together, and when they were around it was indeed a “wonderful day in the neighborhood.”


One summer day some 30 years ago my son John and his cousin ran into Millie near her tiny house in Madaket on the west end of Nantucket Island, MA. “What are you boy doing snooping around here?” Millie growled. The young boys arrived home breathless and terrified. On another occasion they met Mr. Rogers and ran home their eyes like saucers, breathless with celebrity-wonder.

Millie and Fred (above) stand in front of Millie’s cottage—the perfect picture of spiritual wholeness.

Today there is a terrific, informal restaurant near the west end beach in Madaket. After several incarnations that haven't lasted the name Millie's has taken hold. If this establishment is as resilient as its namesake it will thrive as long as the seas allow.

Somehow I imagine the ghost of Millie commanding the waters to back off and let this dear land live.