A List for Mom

This is a list for my Mom.

She will understand why.

1. "I would like to porch sit with you."
As a kid, we used to spend late warm summer evenings on the front porch of our city home. We had webbed and plastic tubed lawn chairs. My mom had a glass of wine. We would sit quietly and listen to the wind blow softly through our cheap wooden owl windchime and wave languidly to neighbors as they walked or drove by us. That thermally pleasant sundown time, in the sticky air, pre-bath, but post-events of the day, was the most relaxed I have ever been, then or since. In yoga class, when the instructor tells us to go to that place in your mind where you feel most at ease, I picture myself on that porch, with unwinding braids and dirty feet, smelling of slightly soured suntan lotion, with the sweet whiteness of the wine, hearing the chirpy hum of crickets and the tintinnabulation of slow moving vehicles. That was bliss for me.



2. "I would like you to hem my pants."
My mother was a first class seamstress and corrector of ill fitting hand-me-downs. We'd spend hours in the fabric store, me looking at the shimmery rhinestone buttons on slick white cards as she methodically thumbed through drawers of patterns, looking for something suitable for me. One of my most vivid memories is my unfeigned impatience at standing near the sewing machine, my mother kneeling in front of me with lips full of silvery straight pins, mumbling (and occasionally glaring) at me to stay still. I used to like the fact that she couldn't fully express her disdain with my fidgeting in that compromised position but I also was scared to death of the idea of her suddenly choosing to and mistakenly swallowing a dozen tiny swords, effectively rendering her a human pincushion.  I would like to stand in front of her again so that I could be the model child that would have appreciated her efforts instead of begging her to hurry so that I could go throw the ball around outside.



3. "I would like to model clay, draw fashion plates, and play checkers with you."
These are the three most fun activities we did on the regular before I became a teenager. I was not artistic, and couldn't seem to get the hang of three dimensional animals so while I made ugly flat black cats out of clay, my mother would make romping frogs, cheerful lions, and sleek seals, all so realistic that I would carefully carry them in my hand to school to show my friends. Then, on the way home in my backpack they would flatten and smoosh so that they looked less like her creations and more like mine.



4. "I would like to collect for cancer and work for the census with you."
My mother constantly described herself as painfully shy when I was little. She used to tell me all the time to go out and be social and focus intently on not being like her because her tendency toward reserve was a nagging problem in adulthood. When it came time for charity, though, my mother would summon some sort of shyness-defying strength within when the call came and she'd put on a pretty plaid shirt, her flared jeans, purple Avon eyeshadow and her chunky wooden clogs and we'd clomp up to people's doors singing "Collecting for cancer, would you like to give?" It's like a 40 year involuntary tic that runs across my mind every time I get tagged for a fundraiser. I can still see her holding the envelope in case we were lucky enough to find someone who was kind and generous. A couple times we haphazardly said it in unison, and people seemed charmed by that. Around that time, Mom was also a census worker and we'd take photos of homes with a Polaroid camera which she was given for the task. It was my job to jiggle the damp pictures dry and keep them from sticking together as we drove around. I miss singing charitable jingles and flapping plastic house pics in my little hands.



5. "I would like to hang off your float in the lake."
Mom was employed by a local manufacturing company which made paper and foam products. Back in those days, employees were able to buy inexpensive "seconds" so we had Christmas napkins in shades of green that weren't quite the right shade of holly and ivy and we had 25th Anniversary napkins printed in gold on cream that should have been silver on white; but the day Mom arrived after work with the huge snowy rectangle of pressed foam flake was the best. Her company was trying to make some sort of dense product, for what purpose I don't know, but it was created in substantial sheets about 4 inches thick. One of the product runs was insufficient and thus, seconds were available for take-home. Mom procured one and when she arrived home with it, we both squealed with joy. It was a never-flatten, no blowup required, queen sized pool float! That weekend we brought it up to the family camp and she pushed it out to waist deep water and climbed on. I kicked my feet and propelled her out further, away from the splashing smaller kids and we just hung there, her relaxed and quiet, me humming and fluttering my toes, but just barely...ever so slightly so that the fish didn't bite me. She a siren, me a mermaid.



6. "I would like to watch a variety show with you."
I love variety shows more than any other television format because I watched them with my mother. Donny & Marie, Sonny & Cher, Tony Orlando & Dawn, The Mandrell Sisters. We'd watch and I'd ooh and ahh over the costumes. We'd toe tap to the music. However, if one of the characters, in slapstick style, fell over something unseen and rolled around a little, my mother would laugh hard enough for the two of us. She'd howl and then laugh in a high pitch and then howl again. She adores physical comedy: pratfalls, foul-ups, bloopers and blunders. I used to spin around to the ice skating and the little bit country/little bit rock and roll ditties but when the comedy bits began and someone was about to fall down, I knew to go sit on the couch and try to mimic Mom out of the corner of my eye, taking cues as to when to laugh even though I wasn't sure why tumbling was so side-splitting. As I grew older, I understood. There's a complete lack of pretense. A total surrender to the craft. There's an element of danger. There's a feeling that suffering can be made into humor. Comedy and misfortune rolled into one.


#1970s #1980s  #fashionplates #Valcourpaperproducts #varietyshows #mushroomtumbler

"All We Had Was Old Men" - Q&A with my Moo Moo about WWII

"All we had was old men."

This was one of the answers to a series of questions I asked my 93 year old Moo Moo when I spoke with her last week about living in the US during the 1940s (wartime).

I'm writing this on April 14, 2020 at the height of the Coronavirus pandemic, our cases arching upward, peaking like a small boat on a big wave while we watch it hoping, daily, that it begins to flatten or, even better, sail down the other side.

I haven't had this much daily tutelage in bell curves since graduate school...not a big fan then, not a big fan now.

I called my beloved grandmother, one of the rocks in my life, for a number of reasons. I checked in to tell her that hubs and I are okay. Also, I had told her a few days prior I would be calling to pick her brain about tough times, about being in a multi-year state of want/need/lack/despair/tragedy/grief/longing/etc. Honestly, I really wanted to talk about all the directives we are being asked to adhere to, all the civil liberties we are being asked to reconsider for our own safety and the safety of others. Kind of like arguing with your spouse about who left the butter on the counter overnight where the cat would invariably find and lick it and then getting an unexpected call from a relative who is filing divorce papers and trying to figure out where to live, I wanted a serious reality check and a huge kick in the ass guaranteed to help me feel better about this uncertain time in life.

Plus I wanted to write a good blog post.

So I asked her 8 questions. Her answers, some surprising to me, are herein.

Q1: V: "What was the worst thing about World War II and living in Rensselaer, {NY}?"
M: "All we had was old men."
V: "Umm, what?"
My Moo Moo then went on to explain that in a square city block, during her teenaged years, every boy around her age, some as young as 16, went off to war. The only people she saw for 3 years whether home or out were young girls and older couples. There were no school dances, no proms, no lindy hops. 
At family weddings, my Moo Moo always danced the jitterbug with her sister, my Great Aunt Ginny and not my grandfather. As a child this was curious to me but now I understand. They grew up dancing together as teen girls.

Q2: V: "What did your parents tell you about what was going on?"
M: "My mother told me to pray, especially for the families who sent all their boys away."
Moo Moo clarified that during WWII, many families in Rensselaer sent ALL their sons to war. My grandfather and his brother, the only sons of my Great Grandma and Grandpa Hamlin both enlisted. "Pray hard for the Hamlins." is what Moo Moo remembers most about what my Great Nana taught her. 

Q3: V: "What items were scarce?"
M: "Oh! Gosh! Many things. Coffee and sugar for sure!"
I'm not surprised she remembered those first. Pity the fool who gets between my grandmother, her coffee and her sweets. Moo Moo observed that you had to shop only at your neighborhood grocery store and at your particular store things were rationed and available only on certain days of the week and/or in limited supply each month, for example: if you bought two pounds of sugar the first week of the month, you couldn't get more until the first week of the following month. During this time, her brother was off to war, so that left 4 girls and my great grandparents in the family household. She excitedly recalled a very special dessert made from bread, canned milk, and sugar pressed into a cast iron frying pan and cut into triangles. It was a delicacy in those times. 

Q4: V: "You mean you couldn't go to East Greenbush to get groceries if you wanted to?"
M: "No, no, no! You had to stay local. I can't remember how but if the grocer didn't know you then you had to prove you lived around the corner or no farther than Columbia Street."
As strict as that seems, Moo Moo didn't seem to think that the grocery boundaries caused too much of a ruckus. She harkened back to those at home being generally accepting of what was going on and carrying on; coming together for the good of the city, country and world. 
Edit: There were ration books that proved your location. I learned this after a Google search a few hours after writing this. 

Q5: V: "Did your parents keep their jobs during wartime?"
M: "Oh yes! My father worked as an auto mechanic and my mother was a nurse for Doctor Wilkie. Both of them were very busy during those years."
She also informed me that when townspeople came in with, say, cars that needed fixing or an ailment that needed tending to but had no cash on hand, both the auto shop and doctor's office would float a personal loan to people who had sons or spouses in the service, knowing that soon a paycheck would be received and the bill immediately rectified. People offered and kept their word with a simple handshake. Business owners felt comfortable having known and trusted everyone within their towns or neighborhoods for the entirety of their lives. 

Q6: V: "Can you tell me about where you worked?" (This is a favorite story I've heard dozens of times. It never gets old.)
M: "I welded bombs for the American Meter Company at 80 State Street in Albany with my sisters and my girlfriends. It was a great job. We felt like we were doing something very important for the boys overseas. We would take the finished ones and write messages to the boys in CHALK on the shiny surface telling them we loved them and missed them and couldn't wait for them to come home. We drew hearts."
She apprised me of a little secret this time: these girls knew the boys wouldn't see the messages because these were shells that needed to be filled with explosives and by the time they actually went through the additional manufacturing processes and got to the troops the chalk would have long worn off...but the idea of chalked love letters made the girls feel giddy, and giddiness felt good after standing on your feet and crafting cold steel weaponry all day, so they did it. 

Q7: V: "I expected sad memories. This coronavirus is making people so depressed and it's only been a month and a half that we've been isolated. Don't you remember WWII as a time of great sadness?"
M: "Well you know I try to keep everything happy. I try to only think about the good memories. And, we were lucky because all the boys in our neighborhood came back home."
She added that some were never the same, including my Great Uncle Bill, but they made it back...and that was something to be happy about.

Q8: V: Do you remember victory gardens?"
M: "Oh yes! I remember families planting all sorts of things and sharing. My father planted onions and tomatoes, specifically, and my mother had no room for her beloved flowers because he took and used every one of her flowerpots for green onions! {scallions}"
Victory gardens are making a comeback, which is why I asked. We plant veggies every year but this year we'll make an even greater effort.

I really expected Moo Moo to tell me of great hardship, of great sacrifice, of wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth, but instead she shared what was good about the time: neighbors praying and looking out for one another; sharing and caring; moments of laughter during long days of uncertainty; sugary bread as a dessert families could look forward to once in a while.
Bringing the boys back home.
Weddings and babies. (Gratefully, that's where my Dad comes in.)

Reflecting on her spirited replies, I will, if asked about this crisis in years to come, try my very best to recall the good things that happened as a result of having to pause our lives: taking stock of what really matters; eating more clever and homecooked meals together; an appreciation for the wonderful lives we have; exponentially increased respect for our freedoms; a renewed focus, for some, on prayer and God; and learning to find enjoyment in the moment. For me, in particular, it's also been a creative boon.

Please feel free to share in the comments what good things you are learning or taking from this uncertain time.

Thank you for reading and please be well.

#1970s #1980s #thegreatestgeneration #victorygarden #americanmetercompany #rensselaerny #mushroomtumbler

Easter in Connecticut

I know, I know...it's supposed to be Christmas in Connecticut, right? Well, we had to travel 3 and a half hours from our home to my Great Aunt and Uncle's place in Connecticut so we went at Eastertime, not at Christmastime; better roads, and more daylight for sure!

My father texted me this morning suggesting that I craft a post about Easters in Connecticut with my mother's family. So, here goes...thanks for the suggestion, Dad.
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As a child, I spent my Easters in New Britain, CT at the estate of my Great Aunt Nelly and Great Uncle Edvardo. I use the word "estate" because their brick house felt huge to me when I was little. Nelly and Ed had no children and utilized a downstairs bedroom for their own, so the entire second floor, consisting of three large bedrooms and a bathroom was akin to an underutilized wing within a English country home in one of my little girl books, resplendent and bourgeois. Excusing myself to wander from room to room, peeking in and snooping around, I can remember re-decorating the well-heeled enclosures in my mind, updating them from their conservative 1950s style to more modern day colors and textures.

But wait, wait, wait - I'm getting ahead of myself here - let's start at the beginning.

Late Easter Sunday morning, my parents and I would take off in our car, en route to New England. We dressed up in a pleasant style back then, me usually in a beribboned hat of some sort which I'd hold on my lap in the car to keep the elastic from pressing uncomfortably against my throat. Upon arrival Dad would park in one of two sprawling cement parking spots in front of a large white 2 car garage. A generously sized, pristine garage was sort of an anomaly, at least in my family, in the 1970s but my Great Uncle had one. The garage held his large vehicle, always an American-made Dodge 4 door sedan, always in a generic shade of blue.

My Great Uncle was a practical man, born in 1920 and nurtured during the depths of the great depression. He eschewed any item or process other than those completely utilitarian in nature. His snow white hair was tinted a more youthful buttery shade with the water from cooked yellow vegetables. Proud to grow and grind his own horseradish root by hand (always outdoors - never EVER inside the house); he'd color it with hot pink beet juice and if we didn't cry tears of pain and snort pitiably from deep in our sinuses due to its pungency on Easter Sunday he considered that year's batch a miserable failure.

Uncle Ed grew rows and rows of organic vegetables which, when we visited in the summer, would be plattered and served naked so that we could taste their earthy goodness. My Dad's (and my) favorite crop was the raspberries, an entire acre of them, which Uncle Ed and Aunt Nelly would pick and freeze. They were mostly used for ice cream, hand churned utilizing salt, ice, a wooden bucket and a steel crank. That homemade ice cream was used for Easter dessert, scooped out aside fancy fruit shaped marzipan candies and a festive basket cake which my mother would make using a round bundt pan and the same faded pastel handle off of an old Easter basket from years gone by.

No one dared buy rainbow Paas tablets for the Easter eggs. Brown eggs, bought from a farm family down the street, were dyed with the skins of two dozen crimson onions, peeled off and saved in a paper bag for weeks prior to Easter. The water was boiled, the skins were thrown in for an hour or so, and then the eggs, a pinch of salt, and a splash of vinegar were added. Upon completion, their hue was one shade lighter than what you might describe as Indian Red, which, not coincidentally, but rather pointedly, has always been my very favorite Crayola crayon.

All of the guests at Easter dinner looked forward to and were delighted by our egg tapping game which we were told, by Aunt Nelly, originated in her mother's native Poland. The rules were simple, whomever won the previous year would hold a hard boiled reddish egg and the person next to him or her would attempt to break it, point to point, without breaking one's own. One egg would break. The other would stand tough. This went 'round and 'round the table until a new winner was crowned. My Nana (sister of my Great Uncle Ed) had a well known knack for tapping and winning, nearly every year. She would then declare that the prize was a long, long life. There may be some divine truth to that as Nana only recently died at the grand age of 95.

I never saw my Great Aunt Nelly in pants. Honest to God, I don't think she owned a pair. Every Easter she handily rolled up and hairpinned her waist length Gibson girl style hair, naturally a shade of deep sooty silver and donned a fancy dress which she smoothed repeatedly beneath her plain white apron, bleached and tied at the waist, until someone noticed it and complimented her. Wearing a smile that was both wide and unsure, she'd begin to tell us where she bought it (always G Fox) and before she could tell the details pertaining to what day it was bought or what she paid for it, my Great Uncle would interrupt, sternly instructing her not to brag. She would wring her hands and stammer, "Oh well, yes, oh well..." before returning to the kitchen to check the meal, recollecting that a once a year dress was a privilege and not something to be flaunting before others. I wished that just once she would have told us the whole story of a new expensive dress, from soup to nuts.

Our dinner fare was traditional - ham, potatoes, green beans, bread, eggs, horseradish, wine. We also had homemade Polish kielbasa which my Nana and Papa would transport and present with great aplomb directly from Schenectady, NY. In preparation for the feast every year, we would gather a week before Easter at their house and work as a family to make it ourselves. This is not the kielbasa found in the grocery store. This is kielbasa made from well marbled boneless pork shoulder, bought at the Avon Meat Market on Van Vranken Avenue, a short distance from my grandparent's home in the Stockade district. My Nana would select the meat along with about 30 feet of hog intestines which she politely referred to as "casings". It was my job as a small child to pull the stomachy guts from the 3 hour old rinse water and cut them with sterile kitchen scissors to just the right length. Then I'd pass a casing to my mother and she would thread it on the spout, extremely careful not to pierce it unintentionally. Whosever's turn it was to crank the grinder would grab a fistful of meat, accented with garlic, marjoram, (no) salt* and pepper, and shove it down mightily into the metal receptacle. Crank, smooth the intestines, gently guide and pull, then slide it off and pass it to Nana to knot when it's full. Grab a new casing and do it all again. I had no idea as a kid that not everyone did this. I thought the whole world made Polish style sausage for Easter.

After dinner, depending on the weather, there was either Anisette, coffee, dessert and gathering time in the living room to hear about Uncle Ed's job at Pratt and Whitney where he made airplane engines or if it were nice out, we'd first wander around the outside of the property, listening to him describe what would be planted in the early Summer, where and when.

The end of the evening was always difficult for Aunt Nelly. She'd scurry about putting glass jars of homemade horseradish into paper lunch bags for all of us. She would hug and hold us, forcing the breath from our lungs in an embrace which felt like love tinged with loneliness and peppered with frenzy. I recognized this sort of embrace within myself years later as a childfree woman who said goodbye to her "adopted for the season" camp kids at the end of every summer, knowing I'd see them again in 8 months and grasping onto them, weighty and breathless in my heart, tying to capture the moment and sustain it until the next time.

Easters in Connecticut stopped when I was a sophomore in high school due to a changing family dynamic that made me less available on holidays. For a while thereafter I enjoyed the newness of simpler Easters with my other grandparents and our family friends. It wasn't until college when my Nana invited me to her apartment for a small and intimate evening of pre-Easter kielbasa making that I felt the hole in the belly twinge of traditions that had been lost, never to be recovered.

Life moves forward and our paths, if we are lucky, move us across and in between the paths of other wonderful people. I have been blessed by 35 additional years of inclusion in others' Easter customs, including my husband's family which introduced me to my very first plastic egg hunt and bodacious decorations like 5 foot tall plywood bunnies on the lawn painted in florescent colors. Hubby and I have tried a few Easters at our house over the years. I think we've done all right.

My Great Aunt passed away in 1993, my Great Uncle in 1997. I Google Earthed their home tonight to look at while I wrote (because I have a mind replete with addresses I very easily recalled it) and was saddened to see that it wasn't quite as palatial as I'd recalled. The grand old garage is still standing. There appear to be no raspberries on the property.

What a shame.


* No Salt was special salt for Papa. You might recall reading about it in my Shelter in Place post here: https://mushroomtumbler.blogspot.com/2020/04/shelter-in-place.html

#1970s #1980s #mushroomtumbler #NewBritain #GFox #PrattandWhitney #polishtraditions #kielbasa

Godwink #4

It occurred to me this morning that I haven't blogged on Godwinking in a while, despite the fact that 

God 

winks 

at me 

all the time. 

So here goes:
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I am finishing up the last few pages of a perfect read-while-quarantined-in-a-pandemic book. It's called The Valley of Amazement by Amy Tan.

I borrowed it from my local library in preparation for a trip because I love a walloping thick book for vacation reading. This did not disappoint at 589 pages.

I keep an electronic list of books to read that I update and add to weekly. Currently, it has 335 titles on it, so when picking what to devour next, I have a broad index from which to choose.

So here is where the winking comes in...I am reading this book during the Coronavirus pandemic. The Valley of Amazement spans a period of 40 years in China and heavily features the Spanish Flu which occurred between 1918 and 1920 (I did not anticipate this when selecting this book to read). Known alternately as the Influenza Flu Pandemic, the Spanish Flu infected, per data I found online, 500 million people - a quarter of the world's population at that time. The death toll loomed large, and although appears to be no perfectly definitive number of those who succumbed to it, the high estimates point to around 100 million making it one of the deadliest pandemics in human history. One source even called it a 'medical holocaust', making me shudder.

Amy Tan's book describes what it's like to be sickened by the Spanish Flu. Medically, there was no hospital, no magic bullet, no cure; people stayed at home and dealt with the symptoms as best as one could, with sparsely arranged visits from a doctor if you were wealthy or had connections. In Amy's book her characters employ both Western and Chinese medicine.

Her account not only astonished me with its level of detail and undeniable comparisons to today's sufferings, but as I read, I also took stock, gave thanks and prayed hard for all of the medical personnel which we have in our country fighting for the afflicted so that we don't end up like Amy's late characters.

A Facebook pal of mine named Katie lives in California and she and I have been in touch more than usual lately because we both have underlying health conditions which make us rather vulnerable should this hit home. I used to think meeting people on Facebook was sort of sketchy but Katie has been an exceptionally good touchstone for me over the last four years. She has Lyme disease with Anaplasmosis and I have Lyme disease with Bartonella and Babesia.

Amy Tan also has Lyme disease, so we are in fine company.

I deal with my sickness in a number of ways, some healthy, some not. It helps me to write. I also walk and brood and cry and read for escape and keep a startlingly delicate balance between activity and rest because much of what I love to do physically has been taken from me. My friend Katie suffers wretchedly but manages to remain calm and refined. I swear it's because she is English by birth. She sends me breathing exercises. She has a ribald and wicked sense of Lymie (how serendipitous) humor. Just yesterday she rattled off four different ways to say "died" in less than a minute:

he ceased to be,
he popped his clogs,
he's pushing up daisies,
he ran up the curtains to join the choir invisible...

This sort of quirky jocularity helps both of us deal with the fact that we are regularly repulsed and scared by what, bacterially speaking, lies within us.

Neither Katie nor I are able to work in the traditional sense but she has a home based business which started out as a way to keep herself from going mad while fighting in the trenches of her illness. It's called Insulting Pillows. Yep, you read that right. She has a business Facebook page which you will want to "Like", because she posts hilarious things on the regular and her latest project for shits and giggles is defacing children's books with her witticisms. Laughter is good for the soul. Her designs are, as she describes them, "delightfully offensive".

So, God, thank you for shrewdly guiding my book selection this month.
This web of 'winking' winds around me, Amy Tan, Katie and now, you, the blog reader.

Thank you for honoring me with your presence.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here are a few of Katie's creations that I find irresistible:
You can see more at her website: https://insultingpillows.com/

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Speaking of Asian books, I can't get enough of them. Me in the library...with Asian books at my disposal...well, I'm like a koi fish in a well stocked pond.

Here are some goodies (and several of my reviews):

The Chinese in America by Iris Chang: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3050157660?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Bone by Fae Myenne Ng: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2581392855?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Mona in the Promised Land by Jen Gish: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2581392295?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Street of Eternal Happiness: Big City Dreams Along a Shanghai Road by Rob Schmitz:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2331865462?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua:  https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2189053905?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Snow Hunters by Paul Yoon:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2160980789?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Peace is in Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2123712675?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40727626-free-food-for-millionaires?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=1Am6VxRzer&rank=1

The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2011103378?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Falling Leaves: The Memoir of an Unwanted Chinese Daughter by Adeline Yen Mah: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54529.Falling_Leaves?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=D130Z76nC8&rank=2

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1800393820?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

The Last Chinese Chef by Nicole Mones:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1790260743?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Sisters of Heart and Snow by Margaret Dilloway:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1669398656?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Mambo in Chinatown by Jean Kwok:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1737865311?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/118944.American_Born_Chinese?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=Rf6grDoGk1&rank=1

The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507319125?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507314703?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

China Dolls by Lisa See:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507319213?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Peony In Love by Lisa See:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507306582?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Dreams of Joy by Lisa See:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507316961?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

On Gold Mountain by Lisa See:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507306576?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

The Samurai's Daughter by Rei Shimura:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507306557?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Face by Aimee Liu:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507308504?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Cloud Mountain by Aimee Liu:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507307595?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Eating Chinese Food Naked by Mei Ng:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507304768?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

Flash House by Aimee Liu:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2794057-flash-house?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=x8wukNCB7b&rank=1

Shanghai Girls by Lisa See:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5960325-shanghai-girls?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=noDT8JFrOW&rank=1

The Concubine's Children by Denise Chong:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/231573.The_Concubine_s_Children?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=5Yp7mxP4Zr&rank=1

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40873273-snow-flower-and-the-secret-fan?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=0zmaB4gWD3&rank=1

China Dog and Other Tales From a Chinese Laundry by Judy Fong Bates:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/155055.China_Dog?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=eJQhuq2jJD&rank=2

Trail of Crumbs by Kim Sunee:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507309152?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

The Interpreter by Suki Kim:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507304759?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

The Love Wife by Jen Gish:https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1507304954?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1

The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12555.The_Bonesetter_s_Daughter?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=SUF5kuf95K&rank=1

The Kitchen God's Wife by Amy Tan:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12557.The_Kitchen_God_s_Wife?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=Xx2KbqtMDM&rank=1

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan:https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7763.The_Joy_Luck_Club?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=swcteKBPPV&rank=1

Women's QuiGong for Health and Longevity by Deborah Davis: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/727734.Women_s_Qigong_for_Health_and_Longevity?ac=1&from_search=true&qid=HUKuimFCet&rank=1

#1970s #1980s #amytan #asianlit #insultingpillows #goodreads #spanishflu #pandemicreading #lymedisease #bartonella #babesia #anaplasmosis

Shelter in Place

I am writing this in early April, 2020, during a time of coronavirus pandemic in the United States and around the globe. There are, for many states in our nation, orders from governors to "shelter in place". This terminology and our ensuing thoughts makes some of us totally and understandably ill at ease, for we have heard it associated with horrible events in recent times. Shelter in place conjures up images of school, shopping mall and workplace shootings. It makes some think of weather-related emergencies like tornadoes and hurricanes. Because I have never experienced, in person, either a mass shooting or the practice of having to hide in a closet or bathtub as mother nature brings forth angry devastation,  I think of my grandfathers, who both became disabled from health conditions early in their lives and had to find solace, refuge and comfort "sheltering in place" at home almost 100 percent of their time.

My Papa had a bad heart and my Grandpa had the double whammy of a stroke followed by a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis. For the purpose of this piece, I will tell you about Papa.

I never knew my Papa as a healthy and robust man, although I know he was at one time because I combed through photo albums and boxes of black and white pictures relentlessly as a kid, fingering the wavy edges of images of him with muscles and broad shoulders and a smile so big it made him squint. By the time I was born he had become the grandfather with ankles that would swell unmercifully because his heart didn't pump properly. I knew the sight and smell of an ever-present green and white Sinex nasal spray in his shirt pocket, useful for when he couldn't breathe (which was a lot). I knew his coughing fits, completely wracking his body, at which times I would stand near him and look on, scared that he wasn't going to be able to stop. My Nana, seeing the concerned look on my little face would say to Papa, "Oh, stop it, just stop that." as she averted her eyes from mine alternately rubbing and thumping on his back. She did her best to make me think it was only drama when it was actually dreadful bodily trauma.

Papa was either relegated to home or, on warm weather weekends, to camp. This was the 1970s and medical advances with regard to his condition were not happening, at least not in Schenectady, New York. There were no medicines, no accoutrements, no gadgets to assist those who had only a quarter of their heart in working order. What Papa had were ten dense feather pillows to sleep on at night, propped up at a perfectly geometric right angle so that he didn't drown in the fluid in and around his ticker. What he had were moccasins so that when he swelled up he could easily slip his feet in and out without messing with pesky laces or ties. What he had was a seasoning called "No Salt" so that he could have flavor without consequence. What he had was a ration of shit that he lived with through sheer will and determination. I was told more than once, during the tender decade that I knew and loved him, that he hung in far longer than anyone, medically or otherwise, anticipated.

One positive thing Papa had was television. It was a large contributor to his joy, and eventually my Grandpa's too. When you are required to sit and shelter in place for the rest of your life based on your health and what it allows or prevents you from doing, entertainment becomes tantamount to the quality of your day.

As a small child, I understood very quickly that I wasn't to make any programming requests around my Papa. The tv was his and his alone. These were the days of one television households; when children were absolutely required to stay within the same room as their parents and gracious hosts when visiting a relative or friend. There was no handheld device, video game or finished basement area in which to escape and play. What my Nana and Papa had was a very small living room with a three seat sofa and my Papa's chair. My parents and Nana sat on the couch. I sat on the floor. The house faced a parking lot with train tracks and a regularly scheduled locomotive running behind it. There was a hefty and wide concrete stoop where I was permitted to crouch, but I was not allowed to leave it and explore the blocks of the Schenectady Stockade because of the jakey bums. Every city dweller knew that jakey bums were undesirable men who traipsed down the streets heading toward the local bars with their paper bag covered pints and odorous clothes smelling mostly of sweat and urine. Jakey bums scared little girls, that much I understood.

So, shelter in place we did. My Papa liked game shows during the day and I became pretty adept at Match Game. Gene Rayburn was like a member of the family, I saw him so often as a preschooler. A master of the double entendre, I can recall paying close attention when Papa snickered aloud to questions like "Did you see Dumb Dora? She was sitting at the table putting peanut butter on her BLANK!". Betty White, Charles Nelson Reilly and Richard Dawson were my Papa's favorite guests. They often held up answers, written on large white cards, that got censored; presumably because they made reference to things prohibited on daytime tv in those days, or...genitalia. What the heck was Dora putting peanut butter on? Well, this kid learned pretty quickly what the audience found a lot more amusing than 'bread' and Papa and I would chortle loudly each time one of those placards got buzzed for impropriety.

Papa also enjoyed soap operas. Another World was one that my mother and he would watch together. Rachel and Mac were their favorite characters on the show, and I'd stretch out on my belly in my grandparent's living room on warm summer afternoons, Crayola-ing in my Cinderella coloring book while my mother and Papa discussed whose life Rachel, a most lovable villain, would ruin next.

In the evening, Ironside was the show which my Papa reveled in most. I don't know if it was the entrancing writing or Raymond Burr, or the fact that Chief Ironside, despite being in a wheelchair and unable to walk, solved the cases for the San Francisco PD that Papa loved the best, but when that horribly pitchy, synthesized theme song began screeching from the television set, I knew to pack up my things. It was time for us to leave and make the hour long drive home because there was no talking to Papa once that show started rolling.

Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom was the one bone Papa would throw my way. Marlin Perkins and his crew showed us nature and wild animals we would never otherwise see. I don't recollect ever watching that show at home but at Papa and Nana's it was our Sunday night tradition. As a kid, I didn't know what Mutual of Omaha was but I felt a sense of comfort knowing it apparently was available when we needed it.

If you're reading this, I'm sure you remember that there were no VCRs, DVD players, cable television, or streaming on demand back then. You watched what you watched when it was on, and that was it. There were three main channels, 6, 10, and 13 and one public broadcasting channel, number 4, which was mostly known, at least in our home, for children's television programming and yoga with Lilias.

Sheltering in place right now for us includes lots of ESPN for hubs, and even though they are replaying professional sporting events from years ago, he finds solace in the everyday banter and discussions surrounding what will happen to the Masters golf tournament, our country's major league baseball season, and the Olympics. Sheltering also includes the news, a new season of Ozark on Netflix and an old movie or two each week, streaming. We are lucky to have so many choices at our fingertips. Papa would have been a pro at what we are currently being asked to do and he would have been most thankful to have the opportunity to return to a more everyday existence when all of this is over...an existence where you can go where you want to go and do what you want to do.

With him in mind, I will not complain. I will be grateful.

#1970s #1980s #anotherworld #ironside #matchgame #mutualofomahawildkingdom #schenectadystockade #mushroomtumbler