THANKSGIVING DAY, 1981

THANKSGIVING DAY, 1981

by Mary Pat Kane

            I take the Greyhound bus along the road you traveled to see me just a year ago.

            It was a long trip for such a sick man, the grandchild in the back seat with computer football game ‘beeping’ all the way.  You said --- “I thought he’d get tired of it but he never did!”

            The thermostat on my oven had broken and burned the beautiful fresh turkey but you didn’t care.

            You had come to my house, as you would say later, knowing you would probably never come again.  You loved my house which made me so happy; I did too.  The day after Thanksgiving, I found you in my kitchen with all my cupboards open wide --- just checking, making sure your daughter would never starve.

            I think of your nervousness waiting for Jim and Casey to pick you up, your normal nervousness about the weather, would it snow on your way down? --- A long trip, 7-hours at best and you a nervous driver and worse passenger always.  And, you worried whether you brought the right kind of wine (you had spent a long time asking opinions in the wine shop but, still, you worried).  We are such worriers, both of us --- wanting so to please, wanting everybody to be happy, to make it all work.  Yeah, wanting to make it work.

            In the back of Jim’s station wagon, there were so many brown paper bags full of food that it looked like you thought they didn’t have food in Philadelphia, though you were not eating much by now.

            Pumpkins lie sunken and rotting in the fields and I wonder which farm houses you might have seen just a year ago today.  But, I pray that you didn’t see the deer hanging in back yards, you who loved animals so, deer our special family bond.

            The hills are golden beige at this time of year, a bit of snow dusts the leafless trees --- a barren but beautiful landscape.

            Today I wanted to be between where I once lived with you, my only father, and where I now make my home.  I wanted to be between all the turkey dinners and fun banter of jostling tables in both cities.  I wanted to ride the route you took to my home for that one last brave time and to celebrate who you were ---

Your generosity of spirit, your inestimable kindness and consideration, your shyness with affection --- the kind of kiss you gave me the last so many years of your life --- putting your two fingers to your lips, then, putting your fingers to my cheek. 

I give those fingertip kisses to my friends now and tell them why and where it came from.  And, I always add --- “My Dad didn’t go in for big displays of affection but you always knew he loved you; there was no doubt, no, no doubt.”

Thank you, Ollie Kane.  Thank you so.

Mary Pat Kane

As taken from the original, Thanksgiving Day, 1981

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Have a wonderful holiday, one and all.

mpk

AN EVENING WITH HARRY BELAFONTE

I went to a talk at the glorious public library on 42nd St. last Wednesday night where Harry Belafonte was the interviewee.  His new book, My Song --- a Memoir, came out last week.  The room is beautiful and the Emcee, Paul Holdengraber is always good, though that night I saw him as superb and, besides for my artist friends, it’s a reasonably-priced ticket --- yey!   

When I arrived, wonderful music was pumping out across the room; I had forgotten the largeness of Harry Belafonte’s repertoire.  I think we tend to remember ‘Day O’ immediately but there’s a lot more.

When the music stopped and Mr. Belafonte was announced, I found myself jumping up immediately to applaud with most of the audience doing the same and when I did, I noticed I was shivering.  It was a profound moment. 

He wore a softly-colored pale yellow sweater, his voice was a bit raspy but the stories that came out were phenomenal --- tough, touching, very funny at times and he so depicted the life of an artist --- you have nothing one second, something the next. 

A few things stand out --- like Harry Belafonte had a 9^th grade education and enlisted in the Navy and was in a segregated unit where he was surprised there were so many different types of black people --- their colors, languages, accents.  He hung around with a more formally educated core of men and picked up many reading ideas from them and read and read.  There is a touching library story, too long to include here --- you’ll have to buy the book!

I hadn’t known the extent of Harry Belafonte’s acting career, nor how he hung in the West Village evenings after classes at The New School and heard the great jazz people of his time.  He had long followed Count Basie, Ella, Miles, Thelonious Monk and Charlie Parker.  But, in the old “Royal Roost” near school, he heard many more jazz artists and, in time, they gave him a chance to sing (at first during intermission!).  He had to talk his way into college because he didn’t have a High School degree.  Many of his finest theater teachers there were German Jews, recently escaped. 

In the whole over-two-hour interview, Harry Belafonte came off as fully open to people, interested, and, as such, he received great riches from them.  Some of his colleagues in theater class were Marlon Brando whom he loved, Rod Steiger and Bernie Schwartz who would later become Tony Curtis.  They were just young students in school together and, of course, Marlon mumbled.

I left before the talk was over, I had to.  I was overwhelmed.  As an artist what I can tell you is that Harry managed a building and took out the trash (something I do!);  he had a lot of things go wrong, and he had a lot of people out of nowhere (sound familiar???) support him and, mostly, he heard what they said.  They proffered advice and he was open to it.  Once someone helped him totally change the order of songs for a raucous and unresponsive audience and he did it and it worked.

What a great night at the New York Public Library and there are many more nights to come in this delightful series. 

Mary Pat Kane, October 20, 2011

http://www.nypl.org/events/live-nypl

OF CLEANING --- what do the rich do when the demons attack?



I read this in a class last week and got a positive response, so I'm passing it on to you on this gloomy first day of the week, maybe it will make you smile.  I hope so.  Mary Pat 

I used to feel sorry for Jackie Onassis, no not for what you might think of --- like the tragic death of her husband or her brother- in- law, not that.  I used to feel sorry for her because I wondered what she did when she was upset if she didn't have to clean her house?

I mean there are days I would give anything for help, HELP, help of any kind and especially household help, so much of my time is spent on nitty gritty housey things that I don't have time for much else.  But, when I get down, when I get blue, when I find myself alone on New Year's Eve and about to feel sorry for myself, I go to the greatest therapy. 

One New Year's morning, I awoke with a clean oven, don't laugh, I really did.  The shower curtain was still soaking in its bath of various things and just had to be scrubbed a little more and rinsed.  Then it would be like new and to think I used to throw them out and buy new ones.  Of course, I hate to tell you how much I hate the color of this particular shower curtain and how many times I've wanted to throw it out but now it’s resplendent in its cleanliness, a little too resplendent for someone who doesn't favor an ‘orange crush’ color. But, I love knowing that once it was really really grody and now it’s wonderfully clean and beautiful.  Although, again, it clashes with the red of the geraniums blooming on the windowsill.  Ouii.

Hmm --- yet, another thing to attack --- the plants ---  prune them, water them, soak them from underneath, rid them of ‘toxins’ for the grand new year, oh, there is so much scrubbing to do, so much therapy to be had.  I know I only buy shower curtain liners at discount stores and they only cost a dollar or two but what a feeling of accomplishment on New Year's Eve to clean that baby up. 

New Year's Day will be the floors, a huge closet, more of the insides of the stove etc., etc.  How did Jackie do it???  How does anyone who doesn't clean get through those times when your stomach is sitting on top of your not very well-polished shoes?  How do women who have ‘help’ get through the blues?  I guess they go buy things or have time to jog around the Reservoir (that would help) or go to a really good play and eat at the 21 Club after. I guess there are other things that hold people together but cleaning is a tried and true one.

Many ethnic cultures have long known that when the demons come crying --- work, work, work and scour, scour, then scour some more.

I'm sure it's what happened on farms of yesteryear when people just fell into bed at the end of the day, too tired to be depressed.  Work, work, scrub, scrub, dust, dust, sweep, sweep --- oh, it will all come back again, that’s disappointing.  But, for the time being, the demons sit back down; they leave the pit of your stomach and stop burbling.  Until, of course, you get into bed and remember about them, until you have time to think.  But, while you move around swinging various implements, while you run the water and experiment with various forms of foams and sure-to-work cleansers, they’re quiet, quieted, quelled.

MPKane

Monday, October 3, 2011

GOODNIGHT --- did I remember to look?

(I wrote this about the night of 9/10/01 a few weeks later.  I just remembered it as I was trying to sort my thoughts about what to do tonight and tomorrow, ten years later!!!  There are so many feelings.  I thought you might want to see this.  I wonder where you were and what you were doing the evening 'before?'  I'd love to hear.  It all seemed so much simpler then, didn't it?; I was just getting emergency checks at the bank until my new checkbook arrived, stuff like that.  MPK)

Did I look at them that last night, did I remember to look out the window, oh, I must have but I’m not sure, there was a time when I first moved here that I couldn’t get my bed close enough to the window, wanted to make sure I could see the view all night long, I don’t know how I thought I could see it while I was sleeping.

I loved that view; I spent hours looking across the river at it; in the beginning I photographed out my windows every morning.

When company came, they were forced to look out and admire, if they stayed overnight, they had to look at the skyline in various lights, shades, mists, by day and night.  If the company wasn’t wildly enthusiastic about the view, they probably wouldn’t be asked back.  (Same as with my cats, a certain amount of attention must be given).

But, over time, as with anything --- if you live on the ocean, if you live in the Alps, you stop noticing.  Oh, it isn’t that the view is any less fabulous but it is matter of fact to you now, sad but true, maybe if you are married to someone very handsome that happens --- “oh, him” you say when someone comments on his good looks, but I don’t know about that.

Eventually, it seems, we take everything for granted.  More than that, we assume we will be able to see it or him tomorrow or the next day.  Ho, hum, oh, look at my beautiful view.  On Lake Como at the top of Italy across from the Alps, people that live there seem shocked at my obsession; my eyes can’t work hard enough.  But, this is what they know, this is their view constantly; they went to grade school up on the hill above the lake.  This is normal to them. 

So, did I look out at them, the tall lonely towers, that Monday night, or, that Tuesday morning before I went to vote? I hope so.  Did I look out with wonder at the skyline of downtown Manhattan, right out there through the trees, past that one splendid church spire on my side, the Brooklyn side.  I loved the shape of the skyline then, the jaggedness of it, the two tall pillars, setting off all the rest, the irregularity of it, in hindsight, was what made the view so powerful  --- now it is so similar, too neat.  I loved it on bright days and more so on pale muted ones; I loved the way the skies changed, wound around, clouds rose and swooped.  In the rain, you couldn’t see at all and then the mists would slowly rise.  And, I loved the view in the dark, all twinkly and jewel-like, winking at me.

But, that last night, I was working on a story in the other room; I answered phone calls there too.  It was late; I was tired and daydreaming about my story, the way I do when I get into something.

Did I just fall into bed across from where they quietly stood or did I remember to look out and say ‘GOODNIGHT’?

by Mary Pat Kane, written somewhere after 9/11/01

posted on the evening of 9/10/11



GOODNIGHT

BEES

            When we were little, we used to catch bees behind the house next-door, bees that sat on pears that had fallen from the tree and were rotting.

            We would quickly sneak up on a bee, lower a glass jar over the whole pear and, if we were lucky, catch it.

            We were only five or so, Jerry Baumann, my next-door neighbor and I.

            The bees would then rush and hit against the sides of the jar, they would try to get out the top, but in time they would crumple up and lay down at the bottom, their wings flapping ever so slightly, their breathing labored, the exuberance of their former flight --- no more to be seen.

            Then, we'd quickly create schemes to save the bees --- punch holes in the top of the jar for starters --- that was always a good idea.  We’d put in bits of grass and flowers and dandelions, things we thought they would like to eat that would make them move again.

            But, invariably the bees would get weaker and weaker ---in spirit if not in strength, and we'd watch as the bright, yellow, fluffy things that had been flying around enchanting us, batted up against the walls of the jar a few more times, then dwindled there before us --- no matter what we did.

            Usually, we were lucky enough to let them out in time and, at first they'd be quizzical, but then they'd gain strength and slowly fly off --- to the sky, to the trees, to the flowers where they belonged.

---

            I've been thinking lately about the catching of bees when I was five or so, thinking of the bees as an analogy to the people we say we love --- how we are attracted to them because they are yellow and fuzzy and free and because they FLY but, then, we try to put them in a glass jar, confine them to a small space, throwing in odds and ends of food and air we think they'll like; how we watch the very person we were attracted to just dwindle away and dry up, laying quietly on their side on top of a few tufts of grass

            Slowly losing the life and the flight that was theirs ---

            The life we said we loved them for.

Mary Pat Kane

THE ONE MORE TIME KID --- ON LEAVING THE ADIRONDACK MOUNTAINS AS A YOUNG GIRL

On the last day of a 2-week vacation every year in the Adirondack Mountains, a Sunday, we had to clean like crazy for the people coming in.  It was an old family camp and each part of the family had two weeks there.
 

My ritual as a young girl after cleaning was to go down the stairs to the lake and dive in and stay as long as I could with my mother constantly hollering down to me that I should get out and get dry or I’d "catch cold with my hair all wet" while we were driving home.  But, I never got out of the lake early. I’d just dive 'one more time, one more time,' until I would finally have to get out, clamber up the hill behind the camp and get in the back seat of our car.  Then, it was up and down the hills of the driveway, turn left onto the main road, through the small town of Eagle Bay, NY with me crying all the way.  The family story was that I would cry straight to Old Forge, a nine mile trip from Eagle Bay according to the road sign, then I’d stop.

That was until the year after I had stopped crying on entering Old Forge, that there, just outside the town, stood a beautiful deer to the side of the road.  The glorious animal got me started crying again.  I don’t know how long it lasted.

Mary Pat Kane

IT’S OKAY TO USE A GOOD BOWL FOR SUPPER

 

I think a lot of us do this, I can’t be the only one --- protect our ‘good’ things so they don’t get hurt or broken.  When I was little and I’d get a new blouse or dress, I’d leave it hanging for weeks, maybe months.  My mother couldn’t understand it; she’d have had it on immediately.  But, I didn’t want to get it dirty, wrinkled, whatever.

But, years later, I’m still doing that --- holding off, not using things that are beautiful because they are beautiful and could be hurt, broken etc.  I will only use my Writing Retreat mug on Sundays as I’m so afraid of breaking it.  Why Sunday should make me any less clumsy is anyone’s guess.

How long is this going to last?  How long do we have to live? --- None of us know.  I’ve lost many friends younger than I am, so, what am I waiting for?

But, if I wear the pale pink tee shirt (instead of the dark gray), it could get stained.  If I use one of Tommy’s bowls (Tommy was a guy in my old neighborhood in Philadelphia who is long dead; he was in his late 80’s when I bought the two bowls from him), I could break it. Every time I see the bowls, I think of him and, though I love them --- the color, the strength, the weight, the age of them, I end up protecting them, for fear I could hurt them and, instead, use the thinner, bright white, no-magic-in-it-bowl left behind by my neighbor.  It has neither the beauty nor character of Tommy’s bowls.

Am I afraid if a bowl breaks that I will break Tommy, break his memory, and lose him?  And, what about the pink tee shirt?  Sure I’m frugal to a fault and don’t want to buy another one and don’t always do too well with stain removal techniques.  But, there is no Tommy involved here, no memories of a sweet older man in his funny little shop, cluttered with treasures.  Who would I be hurting? --- The chain sneaker shop that sells the tees at 5 for $20? 

Once, I threw away a pair of terribly grubby sneakers into a barrel on the West Side Highway as I neared work.  They were gross. But, I then walked back and pulled the sneaks out; it was my 2^nd or 3^rd year living in New York, ‘pounding the pavement’ as they say.  I stood on the West Side Highway during morning rush hour with tons of traffic whizzing by and held those sneaks and cried.  Look where they had taken me, look where I had come.  I had moved to this wonderful city, I had walked and walked to find my first apartment, and to quickly find another when that fell through a few days after I moved in. I walked to many a temp agency in these sneaks and explored it all --- Central Park, Prospect Park, Coney Island, Jones beach, Oyster Bay, Seacliff, Chelsea, Soho, the Lower East Side, Harlem, the Bronx, Queens and marvelous Brooklyn.

So, it wasn’t just sneaks I was throwing away that day on the West Side Highway, it was a legacy.  They had carried me far, they had been my friends.  The sneaks had helped introduce me to places and people and scenery I would never forget.  They weren’t just old grubby sneaks with not a speck of tread left, though they were definitely that.  They were an institution, they were venerable, they should have been framed, covered with gold gilt like baby shoes and shown in a gallery.

 

Mary Pat Kane