Leaves & Memory

So, this afternoon, as I walked to the mailbox, the wind blew all the leaves across the driveway out of my path. 

As if there was something waiting for me.

Nothing in the mail.

But a memory.

Of getting up early, climbing onto my bike, & riding the streets of The Meadows.

Not quite the same as sneaking out of our house in El Paso, climbing a rock fence, crossing a desert, & hiking up a hill to watch the sun rise.

But, like those treks, secret & safe & alone.

A time to think.

Sometimes when I contemplate those mornings, I think, why does the trek to thinking need to be secret & safe & alone? 

Of course, my memory of those bike rides & treks across the desert have been too influenced by experience & education.

I rode my bike around the neighborhood for the same reason I snuck out of our house in El Paso to watch the sun rise. 

Because I could.

Because it was safe, & a different time.  

And on more days than not, the milk man  (yes, Virginia, milk used to be delivered in glass containers to the front door)  would give me a frozen treat.  

And I would continue my ride around the neighborhood, guiding my bike with one hand,   sucking up fudgecicle, a creamcicle, a popcicle held in the other.

And feeling so incredibly, so inexplicably free.

Leaves clearing a path brought that feeling back to me.

So it is raining. . .

Again. 

 

Even after the drought of these past months, rain is familiar here in the swamp.

Somethings we know, somethings we understand.

Sometimes things we know, things we understand, don't take away from the rain.

In the end, in the swamp, the rain wins.

It washes away everything we know, everything we understand.

Everything we love.

Rick Santorum & Radical Feminism. . .

. . . are without a doubt mutually exclusive.

Of course, I don't know what Rick defines as radical feminism. 

 

Women who dare to think that they are an entire, whole human being?

Women who dare to think that they should have access to the same education, scholarships, participation, promotions, positions, compensation as a phallus bearer?

Women who dare to think that they can have a career & children & be as full a participant as their male counterparts?

Women who dare to insist on a justice system that will protect them & their children from brutal, senseless violence at the hands of anyone of any gender?

Women who grow weary of a boss who directs them to "dress to the nines" for a meeting, & want to scream:  I can give this presentation without dressing to a phallus bearer's taste?

Women who dare to claim responsibility & control of their bodies & their reproductive systems?

Women who just stand up & say:  I don't fucking think so, boys?

I grew up in a household where no one ever told me I had to do something because I was a girl.  Where no one ever told me I could not do something because I was a girl. 

I thought I could be a princess & a mother & a lawyer & a writer & president of the United States.

So I went through elementary school without a doubt that I could be a lawyer or a writer or an accountant or President of the United States & still be utterly female. 

I might have even been able to pull off princess or dancer or singer.  At least in my dreams.

Imagine my dismay, in college, when a friend advised me:  More boys would ask you out if you just did not appear so smart.

Imagine my dismay, when the man I married decided to discipline me.  Because, he said, my father had not done his job.

Imagine my dismay, when a supervisor locked me in a room & told me he was in control. 

And when I went to the men in charge to complain of sexual harassment (a new term at the time, without any laws to back it up), I was told it was just a misunderstanding.  A joke.

Misunderstanding, my ass.  I told them.  This man asked me to work late, locked me in a room, came at me & touched me & told me he was in control.  

My dismay at that time had nothing to do with feminism, radical or otherwise.  

My dismay had to do with my parents, with their kindness & love & belief in me.  With the disparity of what they taught me & what I found in the world.

Imagine my awakening, years after, when I returned to college as a single mother of two sons & chose a course called Women Writers.   

In that course, I learned a different way of reading, I learned about feminist literary theory, about Luce Irigaray's rewriting of Jacques Lacan's rewriting of Freud's rewriting of the Cartesian Ego. 

I began to question the whole, I think, therefore I am.

I began to believe that I am, because I question.  I am, and I am able to think. 

Radical feminism?

No.   

During that course, no one questioned a woman taking on the traditional role of a stay at home mother.  No one questioned the role of a working mother. 

Mothers, thinking & caring & gifted mothers, are to be found at home & in the workplace.

In all sorts of places.

As I said, we talked about a different way of reading, about looking in spaces & words left out or gaps – about how women write differently than men.  How women write about women  differently than  men write about women.  As if men get it.

Radical feminism?

Rick Santorum claims that his wife wrote the now much quoted passage in his book.  Blaming radical feminists for making her feel inferior,

Mrs. Santorum made a choice.  She stayed & home & home schooled her children (for which, I have read, her husband billed the state).  

No one coerced her, no one forbid her that choice.   

And I suspect, no one disparaged her for that choice.  Certainly no one in Rick Santorum's world. 

And no one in my world.

All I am saying, Rick, is give women the same choices over their bodies that you gave your wife over your children & their education.  

Give women the voice & respect you claim your wife did not have (she did publish a book).

Because of all those radical feminists.

Choice.

Not radical.

Not feminist.

Choice. 

Excuse me while I slip into something blue. . .

Excuse me while I slip into something blue  . . .  

I promised my friend Sue a story about villes & villages & the most romantic evening I ever experienced.  In a little place outside Paris.

It is a funny thing, that one travels across the Atlantic to celebrate the end of a relationship.  In my case, a marriage.  

A friend  & I took a trip to London & on the air voyage, over wine & dinner, learned a great deal about one another that we never knew before deciding to travel with another.

But it was a great trip – I had been to London once before, with the man I had left & my friend & current traveling companion Mary  offered a different view & experience.

After our week in London & its environs, Mary flew back to Houston & I took a flight to Paris, to meet up with girl friends who were embarking on a Francophile  voyage & to retrace my steps with the man I had left in divorce court & leave those steps behind.

And do some other things.  To see the Impressionists. 

After a few days with my girl friends, who moved on to their nest destination in France,  it was just me in Paris in my pension.  And a strike by the Museum workers.

Not visiting the Orsay was a huge disappointment.  Not being able to visit the other museums in Paris was bitter.  I should have been depressed.

Except that my friend Elizabeth put me in touch with Bill Baldwin, one of her youngest brother Doug's friends.   Bill Baldwin was on a European jaunt, with an end goal to visit his childhood nanny in England, & was in Paris.

So Bill Baldwin & I took a train to Versailles (where we could look at the grounds), ate lunch at a quaint cafe & when we returned to Paris, we settled ourselves outside of a little bistro near the pensione where I was staying.

Bill Baldwin ordered oysters & beer.  

And I learned that there are oysters, & then there are oysters.  French oysters taste nothing like Gulf Coast oysters.  Accompanied by mignonette, a combination of shallots & red wine vinegar, lemons for the Americans & buttered rye bread, the waiter opens them up at the table.  And they are divine.

Bill Baldwin was younger, well educated & traveled & charming.  So we ate oysters & drank beer & talked.

At some point during our conversation, I looked across the street at the Metro stop & watched a very tall, very handsome young man descend.  A man I recognized.

I grabbed Bill Baldwin's arm & said:  I know that man.

No you don't,  he replied.  You are hallucinating from too many oysters & too much beer.

I insisted.  I know him.  I told him I was coming to Paris & where I would be staying.  

Eventually, Bill Baldwin,  a very well-mannered young man, escorted me to my pensione & waited until the front desk gave me my room key & note.

Someone left you a note.  Bill Baldwin said.  

I know, silly.  I know.  

A very tall, very handsome man left his note at my pensione & then descended into the Metro as I watched, consuming massive quantities of oysters with mignonette & buttered rye bread & beer with Bill Baldwin.

I read the note, right there in front of the front desk & Bill Baldwin & read:

Jaki, welcome to Paris. 

I guess you didn't get my message.  I suppose you are having a good time since you're still out. 

Give me a call tomorrow 759-6228.  I'll probably be moving into a new place tomorrow evening so I'll be tied up for a while but we could arrange something. 

Thank you for your birthday card!  

I called.  He moved.  And we did arrange something.

Well, one or two somethings.

And then he rented a car & took me outside Paris to a village.  With cobblestones & a small ancient church of stained glass & a hill overlooking both.

We toured the church & sat in its pews, silent.  Looking back, it was lovely, just sitting there & soaking up the moments.

We climbed the hill, watching the sunset, drank wine & talked & talked.

And then we descended the hill & he walked me over the cobblestones to a very tiny space without any identification,  just a door.  He knocked.

A tiny Frenchwoman met us, happy to see Per.  No doubt this was not his first excursion into her establishment.  But it was my first visit.

The bar was about the size of an average closet – no stools.

The very tiny Frenchwoman led us to the left of the bar into the dining room.

Beautiful room.  No doubt original to the house.  Four tables, max.  A hearth with a fire burning lined the back wall.

 

We were the only ones in the room.

 I don't remember Per ordering our meal.  Tiny Woman brought out bread,  Per ordered wine. 

In  French, of course.  Great wine. 

And we dined on filet mignon grilled on the fireplace, white asparagus, little potatoes & that very fine wine.

Still one of my favorite meals.

We talked & talked.  I had never been (or since) in such a lovely place where a man ate & talked & talked & ate.  And stilled talked to me.

We left after dessert, walked across the cobblestones, back to the car & Paris & his new place.

Excuse me, while I slip into something blue . . .