"Open Letter to All Imperfect Parents:

By Camincha

Father, you are the trunk of an enormous tree. Your children, blades of grass frolicking about you.

To Favorite Daughter you gave hand-knitted-robes made to order. Tiny jewels on which to sharpen her baby teeth. The trip to Magic Land. Her every wish your command. But one day you fell. Became less than godly than wise or enormous. Favorite Daughter spoke up: You are callous towards her, my mother, you are uncaring. Miserly. How righteous Daughter felt.

Time passed. And now knowing how imperfect she is, the one who knew it all. She realizes what a disservice she’s done you both, you and her, how she considered you perfect for so long. For all those first 13 years of her life. And you grow more perfect, human in her memory as she grows older.

Mother, petite, brown-soft-skin, brown-velvet-eyes, sensual lips that pulled Favorite Daughter into worlds of sensual images. Mother opened her horizons with unprejudiced teachings. Carried daughter by the hand against her childish desire to retreat into the familiar. Gave her a world where strangers jumped out of the books that populated the house, taking her to other worlds, where planets circled 'round her, and stars beckoned.

But when Mother began acting like just another woman, Favorite Daughter was confounded. Who is this Mother who celebrates her sensuality? Daughter is curious about the ways Mother displays it. What is romance? Who is this woman who lets herself be carried away by passion? Who is this woman whose cheeks flash and eyes shine like jewels? Who is this woman who is not just MOTHER? How can she be anything but MOTHER?

Too soon it was all over, you were both gone. Now, after all these years of missing you, I know you were just being human. I know now that being imperfect means, just that, you were just totally human: Loving. Selfish. Disgusting. Thoughtful. Beautiful. Ugly. So imperfect! So human!!!

Favorite Daughter has this to say: I LOVE YOU! not in spite of, but because of your imperfections.

With Love From Your Daughter

Camincha is a pen name for a Pacifica, California-based writer.

"Finding the Center," Part Two

By Mel Waldman

VIII

In the sprawling mansion of my mind, my old friends exist. Mother is there too. She died 42 years ago. And when she passed away, my soul was broken, lost in a black hole of despair and unbearable grief. Neither I nor Father could tolerate her absence. After her death, we could not heal each other. Indeed, we could not live or even, be together. Our grief was cutting, fiery, and chilling, compelling us to separate and sever all ties for a while. Later, when we finally got together, we were separated by a vast, soulless wasteland, watching each other from a distance in mutual unreality. Without mother, we were strangers in a barren universe.

Mother died in 1965, two years before I began working at the Coney Island senior center. Looking back, I realize that a significant part of my healing process occurred at that mysterious center ensconced in Coney Island. There, I rediscovered how to love and learned how to mourn for the departed and be one with the divine universe. According to Kabbalistic practice, I had discovered the principle of tikkun --or repair-- the process of restoration and redemption.

At this mystical center, I found Mother again. And by repairing myself, I was able to find Father too. Now, Mother and I continue to have loving dialogues. During our shared existence, she empowered me. Even now, she fills me with faith. But sometimes, she is silly. She makes funny faces and I laugh uproariously. She rolls her eyes back and forth, her cross eyes launching me into a fit of laughter. Such joy! Such power! With each new dawn, the crepuscular insects rise and Mom, who is eternally resurrected in my soul, empowers me once more.

IX

Father sits next to her and holds her hand. At last, they are reunited. They look like two teenagers madly in love.
Father died 19 years ago in a nursing home in Florida. He had Alzheimer’s disease. But he died of a heart attack.
A year before he died, he stayed with me for almost two months. He had problems with his third wife. (Eventually, he returned to her. Such was his choice.)

I took him in. At that point in time, we empowered each other. How? How did this happen, for almost two months, at the end of one lifetime, between a father and son who never saw each other?

X

At my father’s funeral, I stayed with him in the synagogue for a few eternal minutes. We were alone, the coffin open.

None of the others looked inside the box. I had to look! He was buried Israeli style. Like Mr. Murphy, he looked majestic.

I looked closely. He was really dead. And so very much alive! His gold-filled teeth glittered.

Inside the silence, we spoke. In those unmoving moments of death, Dad was more real and alive than in all the deadened, soulless years of life we shared.

“It’s a miracle, Dad!”

“Yes.”

“How did this happen?”

“I don’t know.” (Dad gives me a big, childlike smile, his gold-filled teeth illuminating the darkness.)

"It doesn’t matter, Dad. We love!”

But now I truly believe that the miracle began at the Coney Island senior center where I discovered the mystical principle of tikkun. According to Kabbalistic teachings, before the beginning of our universe, the Divine light contracted.

And the vessels that contained this Divine energy shattered. Holy sparks were scattered and hidden within every thing. With tikkun, the repair of the self, the shattered universe is mended. And the holy sparks are reunited with the vessels of Divine light.

XI

At this mysterious time in my life, I am enchanted by the power of being, the source of my creative energy and healing power.

I remember the late 1980s and 1990s when I worked in Brooklyn nursing homes in Bensonhurst and Canarsie as a therapist/consultant. I believe I rediscovered the divinely-inspired power of being, originally found in the Coney Island senior center, in those lonely Islands of Oblivion.

Yes, I remember…the power to be! My presence is powerful. My presence heals. On the third floor of a Brooklyn nursing home near Coney Island, I sit with old ladies and men who drift in and out of reality. I reach out to them. I talk to them-my abandoned children! I tell them what day it is, and the date and time and place and what is happening in the world.

Slowly, my old children come out of their cocoons. They emerge and reveal themselves. One precious lady, who hasn’t spoken in hours, recites a poem about a flower which hides from the world.

“And you too are a beautiful flower,” I announce. “Don’t hide my lovely flower! Reveal yourself!”

My youngest child is 78 years old. My oldest, 100. I sit with them and feel their presence. I feel beautiful. They make me feel like the most powerful man in the universe. And I empower them too. What is the source of such power?

XII

I discovered the power of being many years ago in the center. I was a young man then and open to new experiences. I allowed the old folks to enter my soul and they filled it up with beauty, faith, and old-fashioned enthusiasm. They knew the secrets of life and fed me an endless supply of creative energy and love.
Even now, when I sit with my patients ages five to 70 plus in the South Bronx in an underground office within a community health center, where we disappear into the mysterious Labyrinth of the Human Mind and travel across a barren Waste Land of rage, hopelessness, and despair, the eternal center empowers me. It is a place where the dying breathe life into the living, a place where a young man is blessed by a rabbi and destined to find his bride, a place that some men call home.

Dr. Mel Waldman is a licensed New York State psychologist and a candidate in Psychoanalysis at the Center for Modern Psychoanalytic Studies. He is also a poet, writer, artist, and singer/songwriter. Part One of "Finding the Center" appeared on Friday, August 17, 2007.

"Finding the Center"

By Mel Waldman

I never hung out in poolrooms until 1967. In ’67 I landed a job in a senior citizen center in Coney Island working as a Housing Assistant for the Housing Authority. I was sent into the geriatric center to be a recreation worker.

Strange things began to happen in this Coney Island hideaway. And although I had looked forward to a rest and an easy going lifestyle, there was more action there than in Peyton Place or any of the soaps on TV.

The center stands a block from the boardwalk and the Atlantic Ocean, but after my first day of work, I wondered if I had landed on Mars. Months later, I realized I was the Christopher Columbus of Coney Island. I hadn’t discovered America. Still, I had found my new home for the next two years. Welcome home, Kotter!

II

I hid in the poolroom where the old men taught me how to shoot pool and protected me from spirited old ladies in search of a dancing partner. The slick old men taught me how to hold a cue, to chalk up, and to play a smooth game of eight ball. And when lascivious old ladies found my secret hiding place, the wise old men formed an impenetrable fortress: “You can’t have him now! We’re in the midst of a serious game of eight ball. Come back later.”
“I’ll be back!” said one old lady who smiled sardonically at me. “We’ve got a serious fox trot to do!” And she scurried off.

III
Looking back, I realize there was more life in the center than in most places for younger folks. A few times over the years, I returned. I walked past the familiar oasis, but did not walk in. I suppose I wanted to keep the sacred memories intact. Re-entering the center would have severed my poignant ties and holy images.
In the castle of my mind, I see the little building whose structure is long and low and labyrinthine, flanked by tall buildings. Magically, it empowers me.
But can I walk through Yesterday’s door and share a nostalgic journey with my old buddies? Almost 40 years ago, I said goodbye to the gang. It was my time-a special time for a young man. A time of new beginnings: love, marriage, family, and career.
Yes, four decades and invisible boundaries separate us now. Where are they?

IV

Mr. Murphy, Jimmy, and Mr. Polanski were my mentors in pool. And of course, there was the tall cripple with the twisted torso. I can’t recall his name. The skeletal man frightened me but warmed my heart too. Nameless possessed a demonic laugh, played a wicked game of pool with his trembling hands and a mean game of checkers.

The three wise men and cripple empowered me. How? What was the source and nature of their power? And what did they pass on to me? The gift of the Magi?

V

“Hello there,” says Mr. Murphy in a lilting voice, as he pirouettes across the room like a young James Cagney.
“Hi, kid,” says little Jimmy, about five feet tall, with the voice of Humphrey Bogart and the lonely eyes of James Dean.
“Get your cue stick! We ain’t got all day!” roars Mr. Polanski, a gentle lion of a man who might be John Garfield in disguise.
In the corner, Nameless grins sardonically. He’s really the scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz.

Mysteriously, they empower me. And the old ladies bewitch and enchant me. They are the white witches of Coney Island. Their power is beautiful and magical.
“It’s time to do the Peabody, young man. Are you ready?”
“Well…”
“Of course, you are!”
“Of course, I am!”

In those antediluvian days, I was endowed with the power of the universe! I miss those early days. Yet they exist even now within the private theater of my mind. And sometimes, when I breathe in the ocean at Coney Island or smell the scents of the passing seasons, gentle memories of that lost era emerge.

VI

I miss the magic. One day, an old sorceress said: “You must get married! I’ll ask the rabbi to bless you.”
I suppose the rabbi blessed me (cursed me?), for I got married a few months later to a woman I hardly knew but loved. Such magic! Such power! (I never found out who the rabbi was.) Such joy! (And such sadness!)

VII

I miss my old friends. Murphy died a few months before I left. I went to his funeral. I’d never been to an Irish wake before. I looked at him in the open coffin. He didn’t look bad. Indeed, he looked majestic.
Now, he’s back in the poolroom. “Hello there,” he says to me.
“Good to see you,” I answer.
“I’m always happy here.”
“I know.”
“Of course, you can’t feel other wise. Not here.”

Stay tuned for Part two of Mel Waldman's piece next week!

Dr. Mel Waldman is a licensed New York State psychologist and a candidate in Psychoanalysis at the Center for Modern Psychoanalytic Studies. He is also a poet, writer, artist, and singer/songwriter.

"Grandma Stumph, Bent"

By Al Stumph

Grandma Stumph was bent. The more proper term would be stooped but I always saw her as bent. Most of her life she bent over rows of vegetables in the fields or over a washboard or engaged in other activities that caused her to stand bent. When I was born in 1940 she had nearly reached her 59th birthday. She died at 77, still bending over crops in the field and doing laundry on a washboard.

For more than 40 years she and Grandpa worked the farm together. But she and Grandpa had this one sacrosanct rule: except for meeting the needs of the animals, they did no physical labor on Sunday. That rule remained in effect even when Uncle Freddie took over the farm after Grandpa died in 1948.

The only winter coat I remember Grandma wearing had this great fur collar. How much, as a toddler, I enjoyed scrunching into it during church services or in the unheated back seat of the Model A!

Tom and I joined Grandma in the fields from the summer of 1951 to her death in 1958. Until her last year, I was unable to equal her working pace. In spite of failing eyesight she could always follow Tom and me when we picked beans and find those we had missed. She never criticized us; she simply tidied up after our sloppiness.

Grandma always returned to the house around 11:30 a.m. to prepare dinner, a large mid-day meal, for herself and Uncle Freddie. The radio was tuned to her soap operas before, during, and after the meal. When we came together on Sunday afternoons I could hear her, Mom, and Aunt Chris in the kitchen exchanging perspectives on the latest twists in the lives of Ma Perkins and Helen Trent.

Although she had been long dead, I saw Grandma one day in 1980. I was watching Dad walk between his house and the patio. Obviously I had seen him take this walk hundreds of times before but this time I was struck by how bent he was when he walked. Now Kathy tells me that when I take out the compost each evening I too walk bent. Bent is good.

Writer Al Stumph lives in Chatham, New York with his wife, Kathy. A former priest, he worked for years in social services agencies.

The Road to Motherhood (Part Two)

(PART ONE of "The Road to Motherhood" APPEARED ON JULY 26, 2007)

By Rose Ross

A few days later, my husband had gotten a photo assignment to travel around the U.S. His schedule would take him all over the country for a month with weekends home. His being away would give me the time I so desperately needed. I spent most days at the movies. Sometimes I watched two or three movies a day. I spoke to no one other than my husband, except for my mother who checked in on me every day to make sure I was still alive. My friends respected my wishes for privacy and left me alone. One night after watching T.V. for hours with the sound turned off, I started to cry and I could not stop. Two years' worth of tears came pouring out. I was soaked with sorrow and self-pity.

The next morning I sat outside on the marble steps to my doctor’s office waiting for them to open. By the time they opened up I had a complete mental melt down. Although, I was unsteady on my feet, I managed to walk into the office where I immediately crumbled to the floor. A nurse lifted me up gently and held onto me until I stopped crying. When I was back in control and stable, my doctor, suggested I see a female therapist that was treating women who were having emotional difficulties dealing with infertility.

I was scheduled to meet the therapist on Friday at 5:00 p.m. I had four days to think about what I wanted to say or not say. I was hopeful and set about making some changes. I opened the fridge and dumped out all the Ben & Jerry ice cream and threw out the bottle of Vodka.I cleaned the apartment, took clothes to the laundry and started making lists of the things I needed to do. I decided that I was going to stop smoking...but not just yet. I would hold off on that one until Friday. I called my husband and told him of my plans.

"I am so proud of you. I love you," he said.

Friday came and I was already beginning to feel like my old self again. I spent the day at the Elizabeth Arden Spa and treated myself to a full day of beauty. I got a new hair cut, bought new makeup, had a manicure and pedicure and polished my finger nails and toes in a sexy shadecalled "Plum Passion". I walked out of the Spa at 4:30 and magically a cab appeared before me. The driver made it to 90th and second in no time with ten minutes to spare before my session. I asked him to drop me off at the corner, where I decided to light up one more time. When finished smoking my cigarette, I proudly threw the pack on top of the ash can on the street. It was a new beginning.

As soon as she walked into the waiting room, I knew I was in trouble. My therapist was the spitting image of my husbands ex wife. When she spoke I almost broke out laughing.She had the same voice and Jersey accent. "You’re not related to the Licht family are you?" I asked her. "No," she said, "Do I remind you of someone?"

I decided not to say anything. The session was going well until she asked me the question I was dreading. " Have you and your husband thought about adoption?"

I told her yes we had, but it was not a priority right now. She asked me about my relationships with my husband and my parents. I rattled on and she listened. Then she looked at her watch and said "we are almost out of time, but I want you to think about something and we can talk about it next week."

We both leaned forward in our chairs. We were practically nose to nose. "Yes?" I said.

"Well, based on Freud’s theory, it seems to me that you really have always had the desire to have a child by your father and therefore, that is why you have been so reluctant to explore adoption." She sat back, glanced at her watch again and with a smile, she said, "Same time next week?"

I was astounded. This was the most absurd theory I had ever heard. If she had said that I wanted to have a child with my mother, I might have listened. But my father? No way! I started to laugh uncontrollably. She looked at me strangely.

"Thank you," I said. "But I don’t think I will be coming back."

Outside the building, I ran straight to the ash can on the corner where my pack of cigarettes was still on top, just where I had left it. Without shame, I put them in my bag and walked all the way back to my apartment on 55th Street and Beekman. By the time I entered my apartment I had made the decision to adopt a child. I called my husband right away and told him. He was thrilled. "Wow!" She must have been a hell of a therapist", he said.

A year and a half later my husband and I went to Seoul, South Korea to pick up my daughter. One year later, our son, also from Korea, came to us. When I look at my children today I realize that if I had to do it all over again, I would not hesitate a second. It was a miserably hard and long ordeal but it was all worth it.


Rose Ross is a resident of Old Chatham, and is working on her first stage play.

The Road to Motherhood Can Rock Your Soul (PART ONE)

By Rose Ross

All I have to do is glance at my children today -- the way my daughter's straight dark hair falls to her shoulders, the way my son laughs, a real deep belly laugh -- and I realize it was all worth it. As tortuous as the road to children was for me and my husband, if I had to do it all over again, I would not hesitate a millisecond.

It was the summer of 1980 when we decided to start a family. In the beginning it was all so romantic: weeks and weeks of love making accompanied by candles and wine. But when weeks turned into months and I still wasn't pregnant, we began to wonder. We had several discussions assuring ourselves that everything was all right but decided --just in case-- that I should visit my gynecologist. I took all the tests offered and was given an all clear.

Next was my husbands turn. He willingly had his sperm count tested and was found that he was a giant among men. "Oh, yes, Mr. Stern, you will be able to have many children", the doctor said. Luckily my husband knew better than to boast and insured me that we were going to have our baby. We just needed to be patient. However, patience was never my strong point.

Each night unable to sleep, I retraced the steps of my past, trying to remember if there was anything I had done that could have been responsible for my not being able to conceive. And then it hit me! It had to have been the glorious years of the sixties and seventies when, Hendrix, Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, Dylan, Woodstock, free love, LSD, came on to the scene and changed my life as it did many others. I had been right in the thick of it and loved every second of it. It had been an amazing ride. And now, I was paying for it. I became convinced that it was all my fault!

The experience of infertility is pure agony. The sudden envy and dislike that I experienced every time I saw a baby, child, or a pregnant mother, poisoned my mind and body for almost a year. Something as simple as looking at a magazine ad showing a perfect smiling, baby would make me reach for a bottle of Valium, a pack of cigarettes, or a fifth of vodka, and sometimes all three. And pity the person that out of pure kindness or concern asked me how I felt.

I went through months of finding the right specialist . . . and then when I did, I walked into a office where twenty other women sat, looking as miserable as me. The only hope I had during my visits with " The Miracle Worker," that’s what the gossip columnists called him, was, that every once in a while, a woman would walk out of the examining room with a euphoric smile on her face and you knew that she had hit the jackpot. She was pregnant! I and the others in the waiting room would look at her in awe hoping that we would be next. Before any of us could congratulate her, the new expectant mother would run out of the office for fear if we wished her good luck it might be a bad omen. So we sat there, each in our own thoughts feeling hopeful but also jealous.

The worst part of that year was the process of having to calculate the moment of ovulation. After the first few weeks I gave up on any lengthy foreplay. The hot and heavy passion my husband and I had always enjoyed, was now equivalent to a warm glass of milk. On the days that I was ready to ovulate, we would warm up as if we were going to the gym. Once we were relaxed, we would position our selves in various gymnastic poses which normally would have been thought of as erotic, but this was pure business.

After the deed was done, I would do my headstand, get a headache, pray that sperm would meet egg and wham, I would be pregnant. I also prayed forgiveness for all my sins and promised that I would be the best mother in the entire world and if I were to win the lottery, I would give it all away to all the starving children in the world. But, after a few minutes, my legs would start to get wobbly and with the help of my husband , I would slowly ease my self down. Exhausted, I would just lie down and fall asleep, while my husband went into the other room and watched TV. Most nights I would wonder why he was still with me.

Then there were the jars of semen that we had to bring in during ovulation. One time, I carelessly threw out my Gerber baby jar the night before. The next morning I handed my husband a 16-ounce Hellman Mayonnaise jar. He looked at me as if I had lost my mind. " I can’t fill that jar" he said, "I am not an elephant!" I tried to explain to him that no one expected him to. I just needed him to give me his best shot. After all, remember what the first doctor said, " A giant among men".

Not convinced, he sat on the edge of our bed and sulked. "This is not a big deal, it’s just a jar." I said. My husband looked at me with exasperation and walked into the bathroom, muttering to himself. After that day I bought a case of Baby Gerber jars.

After one more year of failing to conceive, I decided that I could no longer go on this way. I had become a total self involved, depressed bitch. I was afraid of ruining my marriage and losing my friends. My husbands constant support and patient behavior only annoyed me. I was miserable.In the past my husband and I talked about adoption, but I was no longer interested. What I wanted was time to figure out how I was going to define my role in life. If, I wasn’t going to be a mother, what was I going to become? How would I fill my life? How would I make a difference? I had assumed that I could have it all, husband, career and motherhood. Maybe it was not meant to be. I called my doctor's office and told them that I would not be back.

Writer Rose Ross lives in Old Chatham, New York and is writing her first stage play. Stay tuned for PART TWO OF her essay on infertility.

"I Am"

By Jen Wilson Lloyd

I am 'supposed' to be exercising, but I feel like I just took a shower and I never know where the next one is coming from. My twin two-year-olds are napping, thrown into a deep somnambulism by the air conditioning after I walked them through an entire zoo this morning. It was a plan born of the sole intention of achieving this very peace and quiet. So now, triumphant, I am checking my email and eating Thai peanut sauce with a spoon. The latter is a habit taken up in lieu of any Bangkok market vendors set up outside on my absurdly white bread suburban street. I used to live in the city, and I used to eat a diet made up predominantly of Thai take-out, sushi, goat cheese and wine. Now I eat the crusts left over from peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I had once actually believed that you could convince your kids to eat crusts; that people were indulgent in cutting them off and so children developed these wild habits of avoidance. Now I know better. You can as well force a two-year-old to eat something they are set against as talk a cat into water.

I became a cat owner when I moved in with my husband. I never felt much affinity for cats, and whiel this one is as good a cat as you can find, I often find myself treating him with my own dose of reserve. I pet him, because he meyowls and tells me to, but it is usually with some resentment. Being a mother has made me bad with plants, and detatched from many animals I used to care deeply about at first sight. I am hoping this is a temporary state based on a depletion of energies and that once my children get older I will again be the warm pet adopting woman vegetarian I started out as. For now I am a mom who wears black and plans trips to Mexico to be taken as soon as school starts for them in 2011. I can only hope the world will not expire a year later as everyone is predicting. But that would excuse my lack of hours spent on a recumbant bike, I suppose.

Jennifer Wilson is a Pennsylvania-based writer, and the mother of twins. Check out her website and other writing at: www.jennifermwilson.com

"An Evening With Sandra Cisneros"

By Camincha

She was tiny, looked nervous. For her appearance at the San Francisco bookstore, she wore a short-sleeve, skin-tight, shortest of shorts, black mini dress. Her hair, cut almost to the scalp, was a disappointment. I had been looking forward to the Cisneros who appeared on the cover of her book My Wicked, Wicked Ways, where she wore only very, very long hair and a pair of boots.

This "wicked,wicked” woman kept us waiting while she picked lint, real and imaginary, from her dress. Slowly she concentrated on placing a watch on her left wrist. But when she finally faced her audience, smiling, the fun began.

She started by saying she had traveled throughout the world. She had lived in several countries of South and Central America and in Europe. She had been back in the United States for three years, before coming to California. And at the moment she lived in Berkeley where she was teaching at the University. Some of her students had come to hear her read, and they applauded enthusiastically.

She told us she had written her book of poems So Many Things Frighten Us while living in San Cristobal, Chile. She wrote it in both Spanish and English:

"Frightens us/The infinite Goddesses/that always were and always will be/What frightens us most? to be alone/or to be always with someone?"

When she said Ass in another poem loud laughter filled the bookstore. Then she took a postcard from a nearby rack and waved it in a semicircular movement saying, "visual aid." The postcard showed the backs of two persons, arms around each other, wearing leather jackets. Their butts, however, were naked. She read: "Sometimes a woman/needs a man who loves her ass ..."

Her poems continued to heat up. The temperature in the store was reaching red-hot levels. Everyone was hanging on her every word. Accompanied by exclamations and whistles we laughed out loud again. She came to the end of her repertoire. We gave her with sonorous applause. She thanked us and joked with her students, promising an A to those who had come to listen to her. But at that moment they didn't look like they were worried about grades. They looked transfigured, their eyes bright, enlarged. Their cheeks flushed. Without doubt they dreamed of a moment when they could write like Sandra Cisneros.

Always smiling, she directed her attention to the long line that had formed in front of her. I rushed to buy one of her books, The House on Mango Street, and carried by the same enthusiasm joined them to have it autographed while mentally revising the current story I was writing, Oh, I was energized!

Cisneros was very warm and with candor and generosity gave me the information I asked for, Where to submit my stories? Write for grants?

Yes, yes. Write to this organization and this one. And take my phone number in case you need me. She actually said that.

Thank you. A thousand thank yous Sandra.

Camincha is a San Francisco-based writer.

"Being an American, according to my Italian Grandpa

By Joni Daidone

Ever since the days, weeks and months following 9/11, when our government’s so-called leaders declared war on the followers of Islam and all those who shared the same religion and culture as the handful of disturbed men who bombed the World Trade Center, I have hung my head in shame.

When the patriarchal cowboy reactionary otherwise known as the President of the US of A flipped the switch and started bombing innocent Afghani and Iraqi woman and children and their country men in the name of freedom and justice and family values, I felt that I could no longer consider myself an American woman because I could not comprehend or endorse the anger, the bloodlust, the ignorance and the greed that would empower such hate and destructive words and actions.

I have tried to understand what being an American woman meant to me, even as I listened to newscasts and read newspapers where those who shared my views were called traitors and anti-American fanatics.

It has been six long years of numbing pain at the loss of my country, and my identity. But now, after much contemplation and prayer and countless conversations with my countrymen, the taxi drivers, news stand vendors, train conductors, cleaning women, bodega clerks, token booth operators, farmer’s market vendors, and my cohorts at the dog run, I am finally ready to lay claim to my country again, and to my place in it as a woman, and a daughter of first-generation Americans. It is by way of channeling the voice and the image of my grandfather, my mother’s father, a lover of America and a man who adored and honored women, that I can once again feel a sense of compassion and affection for my ancestry, and their investment in the American character.

My grandfather, Joseppi Tucciarone, epitomized the heart, the soul and the very essence of the American character. Born in a small hill town northeast of Rome, he emigrated to the U.S. in 1920 at the age of 22, with only the clothes on his back, about 1000 lire, (the equivalent of $50), and a small canvas sack filled with a change of clothes, a rough wool sweater handknit by his sister, two loaves of bread, some canned sardines, a few jars of olives, a bag of pipe tobacco, a one way ticket to Ellis Island, and enough hope and dreams to fuel an ocean liner around the world twice over.

One of his cousins, my great aunt Ray, was already living in Brooklyn, so he had the guarantee of a blanket and a spot on her living room floor for a few months until he found work, and a place to live for him and his wife to be, my grandmother, who was still in Italy waiting for a ticket and the money to join him in New York.

Joseppi was a wigmaker and beautician by trade, and would walk the streets of Myrtle and DeKalb Avenue going from shop to shop looking for work, any kind of work. In those days, not many women went to salons to have their hair done. Only school teachers and well-heeled wives of doctors and professional men. But with his bright green eyes, contagious smile, and disarming charm, he found a salon in Manhattan that was willing to bring him on for tips. No salary, no pay, but tips from those generous enough to spare some extra change.

Each day he would walk across the Manhattan Bridge and up Park Avenue to 52nd Street to save the cost of the subway or bus. He called it his walk of love, for he was walking for his fiancée Teresa, his little flower, my future grandmother, walking to save the money to bring her to America.

As much as he loved Italy, he considered himself an American from the very first day he stepped onto Ellis Island and his heels kissed the shore. This was the place that had fueled his imagination and ignited his optimism. This was the dream that he had held in his heart from the days of his boyhood, reading stories of cowboys, of open prairies and majestic mountains, sparkling rivers, of pioneers, and native spirits, the land where people of all nationalities, and religions and classes and politics came together and shared the same soil.

In Italy, you were born into a class of society and you lived according to the unspoken rules of that class for your entire life, no matter what your talents, ambitions, education. But in new York, in America, the poor and the rich, the Illiterate and the educated, the working class and the aristocrat, old and new money, Italian and Irish, Chinese and African, all collided together, loved and fought together, shared food and recipes, stories and tragedies, and strove to claim their little piece of hope and paradise.

In their four room flat on Knickerbocker Avenue, he never quite realized the stereotypical American dream, but he did manage to bring over his bride, raise four daughters, become the unofficial mayor of DeKalb Avenue, and eventually, on one of the proudest days of his life, became an American citizen. Becoming a passport-carrying “official” American citizen, to my grandfather, was akin to a degree from Harvard or Yale, or a nest egg in the bank. It did not mean rejecting his Italian ancestry that ran deep in his blood, in his senses, in his soul. For him America was not a nationality, or a place, or a country of origin, it was a state of mind, a state of liberation, a way of looking at the world through a lens of hope, of optimism, of youthful potential.

In Italy he would always be tied to the earth, to the rich soil, to its scents and sounds and tastes. But in America, he was free to let his imagination run wild, to go beyond the earth to the mystery and the promise of the heavens.

Writer Joni Daidone lives between Millerton, New York, and New York City. She lives with her husband, Brian, and dog-child Miles. She writes advertising copy to pay the mortgage and short plays and stories to keep her sanity. “Being an American” is part of a longer series of essays on Daidone’s Italian American heritage.

MARTI ZUCKROWV "Dance on Paper"

"Breathe, Sky Blue"

We were somewhere over Texas. Turbulence was turning our smooth journey into a bumpy ride. The woman in the center aisle was close to a panic attack. Tall, African American, and stunningly gorgeous, this woman looked ready to leap out of her seat and run through the cabin screaming.

The man seated near the window made light of her nervousness, and tried joking. His humorous words landed on deaf ears. Defeated, he buried his face in a book.

I reached for her hand. She wrapped her fingers around mine greedily. Her palm was icy cold. “It's OK, it's just turbulence,” I tried to reassure her. Her pleading eyes met mine, begging me to make it OK. In her terror, I recognized a state I have experienced more often then I care to admit.

“Just take a few nice deep, breaths,” I suggested, aware that my own breath needed tending to if I was going to help her. We sat there and suddenly I became her coach.

“OK, so breathe in, and breathe out, nice and slow.” I began to breathe with her, centering myself as I guided her.

The choppy ride continued a few minutes longer.
The captain's voice came through the cabin promising smoother skies as soon as we reached a higher altitude.

I sat back in my seat and encouraged the woman, Chandra, to do the same.

Reluctantly, she leaned back and looked over at me. “I have panic attacks,” she whispered, her eyes dark with shame. Her jaw unclenched and her grip on my hand loosened.

“I get them, too,” I told her.

“Really?” she murmured, biting her lip and clutching her purse. She was staring at me with disbelief.

I nodded. “Really, although flying doesn’t trigger them. Other things do. There are lots of us out here with anxiety. The cool thing is that unless you are in the throws of anxiety, nobody knows. The sad thing is that unless you are in the throws of anxiety, nobody knows. And our secret keeps us ashamed.”

I remembered the first panic attack I had. I'd been starving myself for months, slave driving my body and demanding it to perform the physical feats of a 30-year old (I was 60 at the time). I was over exercising and ignoring the chronic fatigue and pain I was experiencing. My digestive tract was beyond spent and the acid reflux I had developed was serious enough for medical intervention. No matter, though. I continued to refuse to listen to my body. I continued to punish myself, giving into the brutal dictates of my eating disorder: thinner, thinner, thinner, hard, harder harder, no mercy.

Given the physical, mental and emotional stress I was subjecting myself to, is it any wonder I was diagnosed with hypertension? It happened during a routine appointment with my doctor and it should not have come as a shock.

WRONG. Disbelief. Denial. Panic. Me, Ms. Fitness, a woman whose blood pressure had been that of a teenager even in my late 50's. Oh no, doctor, you must be mistaken. At my request, the doctor took it again. My blood pressure climbed higher and higher. My body began shaking uncontrollably, my legs went rubbery and I was sure I would collapse. I was freezing, I was burning up, and I couldn't catch my breath. My heart was pounding, I was dizzy, nauseated, I felt totally out of control. I didn't know what was happening to me. All I knew was that I was about to die. Or so it felt.

The nurse gave me a blanket. She turned down the light. “You're freaking out,” she said. “But it will pass. Try to calm down.” Alone in the darkened room, fear washed through every cell in my body. The 20 minutes I lay there jumping out of my skin felt like 20 years. Eventually, the adrenaline shooting through my body tapered off and the pounding in my chest lessened. Bathed in sweat, I felt lifeless. But I was still breathing. I was alive.

The fasten seat belt signs went off. Flight attendants resumed their beverage service and the pilot promised smooth skies for the duration of our flight. He kept his word. Chandra's body relaxed and she released my hand. We ordered water and pulled down our meal trays. We talked about our kids, my grandkids, and the visits ahead of us. We landed at the Jacksonville, Florida airport and said our goodbyes.

“Thanks again,” she mouthed back at me, heading toward baggage claim.

“Take care of yourself,” I yelled back, knowing the work she had ahead of her. And rooting for her, because I know the long road so well. Learning how to manage anxiety ain't easy. But it is possible.

If you are prone to panic –and so many of us are—you might want to try this simple exercise.

Close your eyes. Just sit there, wherever you are (except of course if you are driving a car, you might want to pull over :).

Let every muscle in your body go ragdoll limp. Let your arms dangle from your shoulders. Let your head hang. Let your tongue loll. Let your thighs sink into the seat beneath you.

Take a long slow breath in. And out.

Now repeat that. But even more slowly. While you do, start to watch your breath. Picture it coming into your nose. Give the breath a color. Fill it with pink light. Or make it sky blue. Or gold and orange like sunset.

Now watch that beautiful color slide into your nose, down your airway.

There it is now filling filling filling your chest. Watch it go out to your shoulders. Press it against your back. Force your belly out like a balloon and make air go there too.

Then when you are filled to the brim, release the breath, very slowly. Watch the breath empty from your lungs. Watch it pass out of your lungs, nose and mouth.

Repeat this. See if you can do this breathing thing five times in a row. Very slowly.

So are you calmer now? Can you think more clearly?

When your heart starts hammering, and your palms go sweaty, go back to the breath. It helps bring your body floating back down to earth.

Writer Marti Zuckrowv is a California-based writer. A lifelong dancer and performance artist, she now teachers movement classes to people with disabilities.