Valley Girl

Figgy is leaving for Frost Valley YMCA sleepaway camp in the Catskills tomorrow morning! Moey and I are driving up together to deliver our girls.

Tiny but Mighty
In the spring of third grade, Figgy came home begging us to go to FV. Her friends E. , D. and Y. were going for the first time. E.'s older brother had gone the summer before and really liked it.

No way, I said to her in our breakfast nook, when she was having an after-school snack. You're not going to sleepaway camp! You're too young. I could not picture my little rumpled redhead away from us at camp. We were so close! She was only 8! And a session at FV is 13 days and 12 nights.

But H., who had gone to sleepaway camp for two weeks a couple of summers, thought Figgy would really like it. They wore me down. But boy, was he ever right.

So off she went, determined and happy, with a set of twin sheets, some towels, new socks and underwear, PJs, shorts, tops and a swimsuit. It wasn't until years later that she revealed that she and D. had cried so much that first night. They couldn't remember what their kitchens at home looked like. But D. could remember ours, and Figgy could remember D.'s, so together, they found the comforts of home. They learned to be resourceful and lean on each other for help.

The Kleenex Brigade
Maybe not that first year, but every year after that, Figgy would get into a funk when she had to come home. She'd cry and sniffle in the back seat of the car, or sulk. She wouldn't talk to us.

It would take a while, and then all the stories would spill out. The tales about the castle, the opening campfire, the closing campfire, the waterfront, the pita pizzas, the ghost stories, the overnight [where they all sleep outside], the hash browns, how much water the counselors make them drink, how Figgy ate five apples one day, spaghetti night, the dance, and a game she loves called ultimate sicko ball, which she says is like capture the flag.

You don't understand, she'd say in a pitiful little voice from the back seat of our car. I will probably never see some of these people again in my life. [True. Her counselors have come from all over, including Holland, Ireland, Cape Cod and California. And I gather that the bonds that are forged, the secrets shared, the fears confronted during those two weeks can be life-changing.]

This is Figgy's seventh year in a row, and her last year as a camper. This is not a pretty picture. She will apply to be a Counselor in Training [CIT] next year, but we hear the competition is thick.

I'm warning you now, she said yesterday, That I might sulk for twenty-four hours, because I'm going to be so sad.

You Go, Girl
Dear Figgy, go forth and be happy. We will hold down the home front, and let's all cross our fingers that Grandpa will be okay. I am so delighted for you.

I can't wait to go home, she said to us tonight. Home meaning Frost Valley. And Dad said from his hospital bed [day 6] today, I want to get out of here. I just want to go home.

Seventy-three years separate them, but the wants overlap. The 14-year-old girl will go home to pure fun, to jump the fences of regular life. The 87-year-old man will go home, we hope soon, but will be fenced in by the limitations of being older and weaker.

May they both travel safely, the wind ever at their backs.

P.S. I heartily recommend FV for kids of all kinds. They even have special programs for campers with Down syndrome, kidney problems, and more. The website is frostvalley.org. The camp is located in Claryville, NY, about a 2.5 hour drive from Montclair. It's kind of in the middle of nowhere, except pretty mountains. I was sold on the place when Figgy was 8 and I stopped at the pediatrician's with her health forms. Dr. Rigtrup told me he had been a counselor at FV!

P.P.S. The photo above is so lovely; check http://www.rapha.cc/part-4--frost-valley. I know it shows a tree in fall, but this is Figgy's fall in her span as a camper.

Not Myself

I'm not sure who this person is, the one who looks sad and lifeless when I see her in the bathroom mirror at our friends' house--after burgers and birthday cake for Michael--or in the dressing-room mirror on the second floor of Bloomingdale's. [Figgy had to hit Willowbrook Mall for camp--she headed to H&M for socks and bras, and I was drawn to the magnetic force of the most upscale store I could find. But did not overspend. Just $33.15 on a ruffly Lauren top in optimistic fuchsia, deep sale.]

This stranger is not even wearing a lick of lipstick, or a dab of trendy nude gloss. Doesn't she care?

In any case, am about to brush my teeth, get a big glass of ice water and curl up in bed with Vogue Magazine [Gywneth is on the cover] to escape her dull gray wash. Confronting her with these deliberate keystrokes, these candid words, these honest sentences, is another way to face off and fight her.

Good night. May the brush strokes on our days--yours and mine--be vibrant and rich going forward. May we see ourselves in living color.

Angels in America

On my way out of the hospital tonight, I stopped in the chapel in the lobby. It's small, empty and lonely, and built to please four different faiths, from Catholicism to Judaism. [To tell you the truth, I'm unclear on the other two--Episcopalian and not sure what else? The little altars seemed pretty similar. I know I was at the right one because I saw Jesus on the cross and motifs of wheat and grapes, symbolizing bread and wine.]

There was a sheet of lined paper on the wall, to write down names of people to pray for--underneath, a slot to pay for the prayers. What is this, putting prayer on the same level as bowling for dollars? Can you buy peace and good health? Even though Catholic churches have metal money boxes under the candles you light for special intentions, seeing this in a hospital turned me off--either pray for my Dad or don't, but do you have to put a price on it? That doesn't seem very graceful.

Mothers
As I prayed at 10 P.M. in the ordinary chair [no kneeler to sink into], thoughts of my mother and my father's mother pressed into my mind. I thought of their faith, and how grateful I was that they passed that onto me. I have something to hold onto. My mother said novenas sometimes, and my grandma brought us back delicate sterling silver rosary beads from her trip to Rome.

All I did was think of them and say Hail Marys and Our Fathers. Dad is doing pretty well. H. went to see him this morning, while I worked most of the day and evening. Dad said the doctors told him that the kidney function is improving. I talked to tonight's nurse, a pretty young brunette named Diana, in the dim light and she told me about a new prescription.

Angels [the word is interchangeable with mothers sometimes and in some ways, right?]
Sitting in Dad's third floor room by his bed tonight--chatting, asking about his day and how he felt, standing to lean over and give him water from a plastic cup with a straw--I kept remembering Angels in America, and the angel that descends above the dying character's bed with a flutter of giant, realistic wings. It was scary and dramatic. To see that on a Broadway stage with H. at my side is an image I will never, ever forget. [Emma Thompson, above, was also gripping in the TV version.] Dad says he's been having nightmares.

I am tired and need to get some rest. My knee is still really smarting from my Cape Cod fall in the dark a week ago. It stings like the dickens. I better put some Neosporin with Pain Relief on. It is hard to care for ourselves when we wish we could be by someone else's side all day. The hospital is a lonely place, for big and small. And it really saddens me that Dad started out in diapers as a baby and is in them again.

Is there no dignity in life?

Skies Clearing

As I walked into Englewood Hospital tonight at about 8:30, the skies were clearing. The brooding clouds were shifting, passing right before my eyes like slides in a slide show, the fast way they do. All evening, I'd heard on the radio that there was a "severe thunderstorm watch" until 9 o'clock. We were threatened--the dark sky was brewing up what looked to be a menacing storm on the Garden State Parkway North near the Route 4 exit. But, amazing grace, we were spared.

And Dad is doing better tonight, too. His kidney function hasn't improved, and he has a burning, painful rash and another infection, but he is much more himself, in much better humor. And almost completely lucid. Sis also found out when she visited today that his regular doctors will be back tomorrow. She said the woman doctor in charge has been acting like we're just waiting for Dad to die or something--writing him off.

Monday night in the ER and last night in the hospital, it was scary. He was saying really strange things, like:

Did you tell Anthony? Does Anthony know? [Anthony was his oldest brother, who died in New Haven in September 2001. He was very close to his two older brothers.]

Where are we? Who are those people out there? [The people beyond the curtain were the bustling ER nurses and doctors.]

You can sleep over. It's okay. I can sleep on the couch and you can sleep here. No, really, Al. And Maureen can call Ted and tell him she's sleeping over.

Do you have scissors? Did you bring a pair of scissors so I can cut this thing off? [Referring to his hospital bracelet and the catheter. He did manage to pull his IV out the first night.]

What about Jim and Gloria? Did you call them? Why not? At any rate, I haven't seen Jim yet. [Jim is the oldest of my mother's three younger brothers; he and my godmother, Aunt Gloria, live up in Connecticut, and we don't call them regularly. But for many, many years, they and my five cousins lived right down Bedford Road from us, and my Dad and Uncle Jim shared a tall ladder instead of each buying his own. When one needed it, the other would walk it over.]

Last night I was at Jim and Gloria's house. So....what else....Jim wasn't there. Gloria cleaned my pants. I couldn't believe it. Who ever does that? But they said Ernie was living there. He's somebody from my old neighborhood.

But tonight, it was so much better. Everything made sense. My Papa came back. Sleep well, Papa. We all love you.

The Man I Met at the Algonquin

More than 20 years ago, I took H. to the Algonquin one evening--where writers and literary lions like Dorothy Parker and New Yorker editor Harold Ross had famously lunched from 1919 to 1929 as part of the witty Algonquin Round Table--for a glass of champagne. H. had published his first article in The New York Times. It was something about school health clinics. The lovely painting above [by Amy Stewart, amystewart.com] portrays the hotel's lobby, the Oak Room, where you can pull up a chair and have a cocktail.

Since then, we've both had successes and failures--soaring and sinking. He wrote regularly for the Times Science section for a time, and I published a couple of smaller pieces in the paper's Living section, in the now defunct At the Nation's Table. But as old as we are, we're still young in the pride in our craft. Things are rough with my Dad again--Sis and I have strategized on the phone several times already this morning, and called the doctors and nurses, our info lifeline, until we can get back to Englewood Hospital. But a happy spot in the day is H.'s essay in today's Health section of the Times. Here's the link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/20/health/20essay.html?ref=health
I'm proud of him for managing his diabetes so well since it descended on him when he was 18, far from home and family at a Wisconsin college. Now that Figgy is almost 15, I see how young he really was!

P.S. I really love the photo with H.'s essay, too--the lady's hat looks like something from a Norman Rockwell painting.

P.P.S. Sis introduced me to the oak-paneled Algonquin! And drenched my life with many other things I love in NY, such as the Museum of Natural History, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the well-heeled New York Yacht Club [her husband Don, who sailed for much of his life, is a member], Broadway shows, theatre in Central Park and more. It's not that I hadn't been to the museums and some shows before, but it's that she took me again and again as an adult, which is a gift I can never repay. For my part, I dragged her to the Jersey Shore, Rumpelmayer's for hot fudge sundaes, the Palm Court at the Plaza for high tea, and renowned restaurants like 21 for upscale burgers and people watching. As for H., he took me to cool-cat things, like the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center for some alternative music, Tower Records, Mamoun's Falafel Restaurant near Washington Square Park, and more.

The Latest Object of My Affection

Oh, the Copper Top from Tory Burch. I really want it...but it's $165. Just not in the cards for me right now. I'll keep my eye out, though, for sales on toryburch.com and nordstrom.com.

It's soft recycled cotton, in elegant black with "copper top" gold sequined cap sleeves. I saw it in person at Nordstrom in Paramus in white, but that doesn't hold a candle to this chic black one. [I guess brick-and-mortar stores will never be totally phased out by the internet, since there's definitely something to be said for touching and trying on.]

Plus, it was featured in the May issue of Glamour.

I have gotten three assignments in one week....but still, debt to dig out from.

Will keep you posted. Meanwhile, will settle for my fashion fantasies. They help me get through nights like tonight, when I cried almost the whole 35-minute ride to the Emergency Room at Englewood Hospital, because my Dad went there by ambulance. I just worry so much about him. But I was glad to be there for hours, to just be there for him. They're treating a urinary tract infection, enlarged prostate and fluid in the lungs. I pray he'll be okay. Moey met me there, and that added some levity. My Dad always likes seeing her, too.

I get by with a little help from my friends--be they human, canine, caffeine or fabric.

Coffee-Colored Memories

I don't like ordinary hot coffee, not like Moey and H. and my mother, who always start/started their day with it. But I do like it if it's cloaked with thick foam or mixed with milk in a latte. Or made into a mocha, of course.

Today I yearned to stop at Café Angelique, this really cute place in a converted train station in Tenafly, near my Dad. But I didn't have enough time before or after, so I skipped it. [I ate dinner with my Dad and we had a nice long visit, including fresh air, then I hurried back to catch a movie with H., Figgy and L.] I know I'll be back there Wednesday, so can grab some iced Joe then.

Coffee Places That Define Me
1. Café Angelique, not just because I love the iced coffee to go--it's so rich and deep, just delicious, and I like the motif on the cup--but also because I have been there with Dad, Figgy and H., and even Moey when she met me once to visit Dad. Having this near Dad softens the blow of going to visit sometimes. I like getting it on the way home. I once went for lunch there with Dad after one of his doctor appointments, and we both had these giant cups of cappuccino, the best I've ever had the privilege of spooning into.


2. La Colombe, in Philly. Funny, I've only been there once, on a Sunday afternoon this June, but it was to meet my cousin, Linda. And I can't explain how wonderful it was to just sit there and talk for hours with a good iced coffee. Linda and I were at the same family gatherings for years but she was Sis's peer, not mine. She was my older cousin who wore mod makeup, sewed her own dresses, worked at Gino's, was an artist, had a boyfriend, and got married--the first wedding reception I ever attended. We reconnected thanks to our blogs and to those iced coffees--our dads were brothers...it means so much to me.


3. Beans, on Church Street in Montclair. The little shops smells heavenly, thanks to all the coffee beans for sale. But the iced coffee is a special blend of mocha beans and another flavor--the owner told me, so I could buy the same mix and make it at home, which was good of her. Pricey--I think $3 each. But so, so good. I'm crestfallen when summer ends and they stop making it. 42 Church Street, Montclair, NJ 07042-2702 (973) 783-7175

4. The Hot Chocolate Sparrow, Orleans, Cape Cod. The Iced Mocha Sparrow with whip is my favorite. But the iced coffee is also very good.


5. Whole Foods in Paramus. Excellent iced mocha but maybe four bucks. I like it better than the one at the Whole Foods in West Orange. But these days, am trying to have less sugar, so have been sticking mostly to iced coffee.


Tomorrow I have a very busy day between life and work. Alice runs on iced coffee [usually decaf, with half and half and Splenda, maybe a shake of cinnamon too].

Photo by pyl213 at flickr.com.