My Uncle Jimmy died years before I was born. His given name was James, but I never heard anyone call him that. He was the 'gold star' of the family. Literally. Jimmy died near Okinawa when a Japanese plane slammed itself into his Navy ship. In 1989, "Reader's Digest" published a story about The USS Mullany and even added a photo of the kamikaze pilot. My family bought every copy of that month's "Reader's Digest" from every magazine stand in Queens. My dad and my uncles gave the magazines to everyone in the family. "Here... read this.... read what they did to our Jimmy."
During World War II, my grandparents' four sons were fighting overseas. Jimmy and Carmine were in the Navy, my dad was in the Army, Tony was in the Marines. They all came back except for Jimmy. The gold star stayed in the front window of my grandparents' house for nearly 20 years after the war ended. After that, one of my aunts hung the gold star in the window of the third floor room where Jimmy slept as a boy.
When the War broke out, Jimmy didn't have to serve because he had a wife and two sons. He insisted on going, however, and his wife Mary had to sign a consent form because of the children. The family begged Mary not to sign. Jimmy begged Mary to "Sign! Sign! Dio mio, please sign!"
Mary signed the consent form. She became a widow, her sons lost their father, the family never forgave her. She stayed within the family circle, she never re-married, she was invited to every family party until the day she died, but the family never ever truly forgave her for signing those papers. I think my grandfather was the only one who understood why Jimmy wanted to enlist. His brothers had enlisted.... Jimmy didn't feel right not going. Grandpa said that Jimmy wanted to "Be an American all the way," and that meant enlisting with his then-unmarried brothers.
When the Japanese plane slammed into Uncle Jimmy's ship near Okinawa, there was no body to send back to NY for burial. The men who died on that ship were "buried" right there, and there has since been a memorial erected in Pearl Harbor for all the soldiers who perished. My Uncle Tony went to Hawaii and took pictures of the memorial, but his brothers and sisters didn't want to look at the photographs. I remember my dad saying "That fancy memorial won't bring Jimmy back."
Jimmy's two sons (Anthony and Frankie) have both passed away now, and so has Jimmy's wife Mary. Frankie was my godfather when I was baptized. He didn't talk much about his father because he was such a young boy when his father died and he probably didn't remember much. Jimmy's wife Mary had a photograph of her smiling Navy husband... she kept it in her bedroom always, as if he had just gone into service and would be coming home on leave in a few months.
Mary was always aware that the family never really forgave her for "letting" Jimmy enlist in the Navy. Aunt Mary always went to the family baptisms, confirmations, birthdays, weddings.... she would sit at the table with her sisters-in-law and try to make herself invisible for the most part. My mother invited Aunt Mary to my birthday parties when I was a little kid, before I started first grade. In my parents' house, my mother made sure to give Aunt Mary a place of honor at the dining room table. She made it clear that she didn't blame Mary for Jimmy's death.
It was always hard for my aunts and uncles to talk about Uncle Jimmy. When Reader's Digest published that article, it brought World War II right into my grandparents' kitchen all over again, as if it were still going on. A copy of that magazine stayed open to the article and was left on the dining room table for almost five years, only being moved when the family gathered for a Sunday dinner or a holiday get-together. After everyone went home, the magazine would once again be put on that table. One of my uncles had given Jimmy's wife Mary a copy of that Reader's Digest. Her sons said she put the magazine in a little plastic bag and set it in front of Jimmy's Navy photograph, never once opening the magazine to read the article. When my dad told me that, I said Mary didn't have to read the article, she was living it every day.
My dad gave me a copy of that issue of Reader's Digest when it was first published. I've read the story a few times over the years.... I've looked at the photograph of the kamikaze pilot. The pilot looks very young in the pictures, and was probably about the same age as Uncle Jimmy and all the other young sailors on the USS Mullany.
Aunt Mary passed away nearly 45 years after her husband Jimmy. For all of Mary's years as part of the family, she tried not to be too much trouble, not to say anything that would upset my grandparents. As Aunt Mary got older and some of her church friends started to pass away, she decided not to cause the family any more grief than necessary when her own time came.
With that in mind, Aunt Mary got a big flat dress box that would fit under her bed. Into that box, she put the dress she wanted to be buried in, complete with slip, stockings, shoes, gloves, even a small hat and her favorite Rosary beads. She told both of her sons, and all of her sisters-in-law, that the box was there and all ready "when the time came." Mary made it clear that everything in that box was to go with her or on her when they put her in the casket.
When Aunt Mary passed away, peacefully in her sleep, her sons took the box out from under her bed. They found all the clothes and the shoes and the Rosary beads........ and they also found the Navy photo of their father, and her copy of that Reader's Digest all wrapped up in a little plastic bag.
Everyone in the family went to Mary's funeral. I'd like to think that they had finally, blessedly, forgiven her.
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
The Family's Senior Moments.... Larry.
The first thing I can tell you about Larry is that I was named after him. As soon as my parents found out they were expecting their first baby, my dad told my mother that the baby would be named after his brother Larry, whether it was a boy or a girl. My mother probably told my dad that he had nine months to figure out how to give a baby girl the name Larry. With a tweak to the spelling, daddy came up with Larrie. My mother wasn't too thrilled, but I can imagine daddy telling her "Larrie it is, and that's that." (My dad went to the Ralph Kramden Charm School.)
Larry was a favorite of my grandmother's children. He was the third born, in what eventually would be a family of 12 children.... with 8 of the twelve growing to adulthood, and just 7 of the 12 getting to Senior Citizen status.
The first two of my grandmother's children died very young.... in the early 1900s, in the over-crowded tenements of Little Italy, germs spread quickly and spared only the very strong. Larry was hearty and strong, and lived a happy life until pneumonia struck him down when he was barely into his 20th year.
My grandfather always said that Larry was a happy boy.... always smiling.... always dancing or singing. "He was the life of the family," grandpa would say. "And he could dance..... he loved ballroom dancing and he won a lot of First Place prizes at the dance halls." When I asked what the prizes were, my dad said that he won "A dollar here, three dollars there, which was a lot of money back then." Daddy told me that whatever the prize was, Larry would "bring it home to mama."
When Larry got pneumonia, my grandmother sent for the doctor. In those days, doctors made house calls, and some of the doctors called on the well-to-do patients first, letting the poorer patients wait. Living in their small NYC apartment, and trying to save every penny and every dollar they could for a plot of land on which to build a house, my grandfather was on the doctor's "poor patient" list. Little did the doctor know that my grandfather did indeed have money saved and could very well have paid the doctor in cash for one of his high-priority house calls.
The doctor finally came to the apartment, but it was a day too late for Larry. The pneumonia had already settled into his lungs and the medicine prescribed by the doctor was too little too late. Larry died a few hours after the doctor left my grandparents with the medicine and his bill. The entire family carried a grudge against that doctor for decades, and the grudge didn't end when the doctor himself passed away in the 1960s. Up to the doctor's dying day, and forever after, the family said that "Dr. A....... killed our Larry."
My dad told me that my grandmother was devastated when Larry died. My grandfather and his friends had to restrain her at the wake in their living room because grandma kept trying to climb into the coffin beside her son, in total disbelief that he was no longer alive and breathing. According to my dad, grandma kept screaming "Lorenzo! Lorenzo! Dio mio!"
Decades after Larry's death, his sisters and brothers, as well as his parents, talked about him as if he had died the week before. When I was born in the early 1950s and my dad named me after his brother Larry, the family said that a new light came back into grandma's eyes because she got to say the name Larry again with joy instead of sadness.... even though it was spelled Larrie, and in Italian, she would call me Laurencina. Every time I walked into grandma's house, she would sing out "Laurencina.... my Laurencina...." No one else in the family called me that Italian version of my name. When grandma passed away in the late 1970s, the name Laurencina went with her.
When I was three, the family decided that I needed to take dancing lessons. "Larry was a very good dancer. Larrie needs to dance.... she'll be like her Uncle Larry and win prizes." Off I went in ballet slippers and a pink net tutu but the dancing school didn't teach us ballroom dances...... they taught us to dance like Shirley Temple. What followed was that my mother would roll my hair into curlers every night and then brush it out in the morning so it looked like a brunette version of Shirley's hair.
The year before I started first grade, I contracted pneumonia and was put into an oxygen tent in the local hospital. The family went nuts. My mother had gone to nursing school, and she hardly left my side when I was under that tent because she and my dad didn't trust the nurses. My dad said "Who knows if they all got good grades in nursing school." My aunts and uncles took turns coming to see me... at any given time during the afternoon or evening visiting hours, one of my dad's sisters or brothers would be there, along with my grandmother, who insisted on going to the hospital each time.
I was in the hospital for nearly two weeks.... and under that tent almost the entire time. I distinctly remember my mother and my Aunt Dolly saying "How do you feel, Larrie?" My answer to them, and to all the other aunts and uncles was "I feel fine. I want to go home." While I was enclosed in that oxygen tent, at least one aunt or uncle would tell me the story of my Uncle Larry every day..... "You were named after him.... he loved to dance.... he was always so happy.... he was your grandma's favorite...."
No one ever told me that Larry died of pneumonia until I was nearly 13. When I asked my dad why everyone kept that from me, he said that the family didn't want to "jinx me." My dad said it was bad enough for everyone when I got pneumonia when I was little. Out of everyone in the family (which was a considerable number) only my Uncle Larry and me had ever contracted that illness.
I wish the family had told me more about my Uncle Larry. When I was little, they did tell me who I was named after, and my aunts showed me his picture.... he looked very much like my dad, enough for them to have been twins, but they weren't. They basically told me that Larry loved to sing and dance, loved to be happy, and that Dr. A.... killed him when he got pneumonia. Usually, when anyone got to that part of the story, they would make 'the sign of the cross,' shake their heads, and stop talking so my grandmother and my aunts wouldn't start crying.
Larry was a favorite of my grandmother's children. He was the third born, in what eventually would be a family of 12 children.... with 8 of the twelve growing to adulthood, and just 7 of the 12 getting to Senior Citizen status.
The first two of my grandmother's children died very young.... in the early 1900s, in the over-crowded tenements of Little Italy, germs spread quickly and spared only the very strong. Larry was hearty and strong, and lived a happy life until pneumonia struck him down when he was barely into his 20th year.
My grandfather always said that Larry was a happy boy.... always smiling.... always dancing or singing. "He was the life of the family," grandpa would say. "And he could dance..... he loved ballroom dancing and he won a lot of First Place prizes at the dance halls." When I asked what the prizes were, my dad said that he won "A dollar here, three dollars there, which was a lot of money back then." Daddy told me that whatever the prize was, Larry would "bring it home to mama."
When Larry got pneumonia, my grandmother sent for the doctor. In those days, doctors made house calls, and some of the doctors called on the well-to-do patients first, letting the poorer patients wait. Living in their small NYC apartment, and trying to save every penny and every dollar they could for a plot of land on which to build a house, my grandfather was on the doctor's "poor patient" list. Little did the doctor know that my grandfather did indeed have money saved and could very well have paid the doctor in cash for one of his high-priority house calls.
The doctor finally came to the apartment, but it was a day too late for Larry. The pneumonia had already settled into his lungs and the medicine prescribed by the doctor was too little too late. Larry died a few hours after the doctor left my grandparents with the medicine and his bill. The entire family carried a grudge against that doctor for decades, and the grudge didn't end when the doctor himself passed away in the 1960s. Up to the doctor's dying day, and forever after, the family said that "Dr. A....... killed our Larry."
My dad told me that my grandmother was devastated when Larry died. My grandfather and his friends had to restrain her at the wake in their living room because grandma kept trying to climb into the coffin beside her son, in total disbelief that he was no longer alive and breathing. According to my dad, grandma kept screaming "Lorenzo! Lorenzo! Dio mio!"
Decades after Larry's death, his sisters and brothers, as well as his parents, talked about him as if he had died the week before. When I was born in the early 1950s and my dad named me after his brother Larry, the family said that a new light came back into grandma's eyes because she got to say the name Larry again with joy instead of sadness.... even though it was spelled Larrie, and in Italian, she would call me Laurencina. Every time I walked into grandma's house, she would sing out "Laurencina.... my Laurencina...." No one else in the family called me that Italian version of my name. When grandma passed away in the late 1970s, the name Laurencina went with her.
When I was three, the family decided that I needed to take dancing lessons. "Larry was a very good dancer. Larrie needs to dance.... she'll be like her Uncle Larry and win prizes." Off I went in ballet slippers and a pink net tutu but the dancing school didn't teach us ballroom dances...... they taught us to dance like Shirley Temple. What followed was that my mother would roll my hair into curlers every night and then brush it out in the morning so it looked like a brunette version of Shirley's hair.
The year before I started first grade, I contracted pneumonia and was put into an oxygen tent in the local hospital. The family went nuts. My mother had gone to nursing school, and she hardly left my side when I was under that tent because she and my dad didn't trust the nurses. My dad said "Who knows if they all got good grades in nursing school." My aunts and uncles took turns coming to see me... at any given time during the afternoon or evening visiting hours, one of my dad's sisters or brothers would be there, along with my grandmother, who insisted on going to the hospital each time.
I was in the hospital for nearly two weeks.... and under that tent almost the entire time. I distinctly remember my mother and my Aunt Dolly saying "How do you feel, Larrie?" My answer to them, and to all the other aunts and uncles was "I feel fine. I want to go home." While I was enclosed in that oxygen tent, at least one aunt or uncle would tell me the story of my Uncle Larry every day..... "You were named after him.... he loved to dance.... he was always so happy.... he was your grandma's favorite...."
No one ever told me that Larry died of pneumonia until I was nearly 13. When I asked my dad why everyone kept that from me, he said that the family didn't want to "jinx me." My dad said it was bad enough for everyone when I got pneumonia when I was little. Out of everyone in the family (which was a considerable number) only my Uncle Larry and me had ever contracted that illness.
I wish the family had told me more about my Uncle Larry. When I was little, they did tell me who I was named after, and my aunts showed me his picture.... he looked very much like my dad, enough for them to have been twins, but they weren't. They basically told me that Larry loved to sing and dance, loved to be happy, and that Dr. A.... killed him when he got pneumonia. Usually, when anyone got to that part of the story, they would make 'the sign of the cross,' shake their heads, and stop talking so my grandmother and my aunts wouldn't start crying.
Friday, October 11, 2013
Sisters Under The Skin.
The two 13-year-old girls were early for their first day of 9th grade. Classes weren't due to begin till 10:00 that morning, but both of the girls had come from private schools and they were accustomed to not only being on time, but getting everywhere way ahead of time. Just in case. They never really understood what 'just in case' meant, but eight-year-habits are hard to break, and they were both standing in front of the high school before 9:30 in the morning.
One girl had just completed eight years in a Catholic grammar school; the other had completed her elementary education in a Greek Orthodox school. Both of them had dark hair, dark eyes, and brand new first-day-of-school clothes that looked good enough, but their outfits wouldn't ever have been advertised in "Seventeen" magazine.
This particular high school building was made of brick and stone.... set up on a hill overlooking a park with a large pond that froze in the winter-time. The cool kids would go ice-skating as soon as the pond froze over.... cute little skirts and sweater-sets on the girls, and of course brand new skates. The not-so-cool (not-so-rich) kids would watch from a distance, all the while pretending they didn't care that their parents couldn't afford the ice skates and the outfits with the matching scarves and pom-poms on the sweaters.
The two girls stared up at the high school building.... there was a clock in the middle of the center tower.... more than half an hour to wait till the bell rang for their first period. What would they do to not appear nervous and out-of-place in front of that huge building that they'd been inside of just one time? On orientation day, they weren't given enough time to learn the lay-out of the three floors.... they would have to look in the school handbook and try to map out their classes so as not to waste time and not be late in arriving at each class.
The girls smiled at one another at the same time.... and each began walking in the other's direction. Somehow, they both understood that they were 'new girls,' that they wouldn't really fit in with the public-school-savvy teenagers that would be filling up the steps and the lawn in front of this school before the ten o'clock bell rang.
"Are you new here?" "I graduated from the Catholic school down the hill." "Are you a freshman too?" "We just moved here from The City... I graduated from the Greek school connected to my Church."
And so began a friendship....... the girls had some classes together, but not homerooms..... they would meet in the mornings down the hill and then walk up to the high school together. They exchanged phone numbers and would spend most of every evening talking to one another, telling each other everything that they didn't get a chance to say during the school day, even though they met after school and walked back down the hill together. There was just always so much to say. When the first snows fell, they watched the ice-skaters for a little while, then walked down the hill towards their homes. "Have you ever been on skates?" "No." "Me neither." "Who cares!"
In their freshman year of high school, their friendship grew into a trust that allowed other girlfriends in, but kept the two girls united in their best-friends friendship. The girls became the mainstay of their larger group of friends. What they didn't get to talk about during school was discussed at night on the telephone..... one sitting in a quiet corner of a hallway in her house, the other pulling the long cord of the phone into the pantry... they talked incessantly about everything.
In sophomore year, after spending nearly every day of the summer together, their friendship grew even closer. They saw one another every day, sometimes walking along the Avenue and window-shopping, holding a small transistor radio tuned to WNBC and Cousin Brucie. They would meet for lunch (always the local pizza place) or for shopping (searching for bargains on 45s and LPs and clothes for school that looked more expensive than they were). The girls would get together for trips to the Library (mysteries, the latest best-sellers, biographies, classics from the English class reading list). As always, what they didn't have time to discuss during the day was saved for the night-time phone calls.
In their junior year, their friendship matured a bit. Instead of discussing The Beatles or the clothes that were on sale at Lerner's, they discussed family matters... small hurts and big disappointments.... tiny scars and life-altering changes in their family dynamics. Nothing was left unsaid...... everything was discussed with love and respect, judgments never entered the conversations. They were best-best friends, and nothing would ever change that. Sisters under the skin, for always.
In senior year, they both found part-time jobs after school.... one worked at a retail store, and the other in a local lawyer's office. They had the same hours at school, and some of the same classes, but their work hours were different. As always, whatever they didn't get a chance to discuss during the day was saved for the night-time phone calls.... the hallway and the pantry became their safe zones, or as safe as they could be from siblings and parents.
Senior Prom came up on the school calendar..... the cost for the dinner, the dance, plus getting a really nice gown and shoes and having special hair-dos....... all of that just wasn't in their budgets. And did they want to go to that Prom anyway? All those fraternity and sorority students..... even after four years in that school, did they really fit in with most of those kids? Not really.
The girls came up with a plan to celebrate with a small group of their friends...... they'd go into The City on Prom Night.... they'd be dressed up nicely, but not all dressed up in gowns.... they arranged a dinner at a family-owned Greek restaurant.... they would have a special Prom Night of their own. And so they did.... Greek food, Greek dancing.... it was a memorable night and they talked about it for days afterwards.... long telephone cords stretching into the hallway, into the pantry.
Graduation day came...... and it rained and rained. The huge outdoor ceremony had to be held in the auditorium of the high school. The senior class was so big that they had to split it into two ceremonies..... they divided the alphabet down the middle, the A's thru L's in the morning, the M's thru Z's in the afternoon. The two girls weren't in the same part of the alphabet so one graduated in the morning, the other in the afternoon. "At least we had Prom night together," they said.
After graduation, they both had jobs for the summer...... different locations, different hours... but there was still the telephone. When September came along, one girl went to college, the other went to work. College studies took up most of one girl's time, after-work responsibilities took up most of the other girl's time. The phone calls were still there, but they weren't as long. There was still so much so say, but just not enough time.
In their twenties, their lives got busier..... family responsibilities, college classes, 9 to 5 jobs. One of the girls got married and moved out of state. Long-distance calls were so expensive then, so they wrote letters. Weekly letters turned to monthly letters... which turned into every-other-month letters..... but still, they were Sisters Under The Skin, weren't they?
In their thirties, the girl who stayed in their home state moved out of the old neighborhood.... a new job, more family responsibilities..... less time for letter-writing. By the time the other girl moved back to their home state, the one who had stayed there was now married and she had moved to another state. The two girls weren't in the same zip code, and they weren't even in the same time zone. They lost touch.....and they lost one another for almost three decades. They both tried to find the other from time to time..... the friends they both knew in high school had also lost contact with the two girls, and the whereabouts of each one remained a mystery.
In their 40s, their high school had a 25th Reunion..... both girls were living out of state at the time, and neither one of them went back to the high school for the party and celebration. The ones who did go to the reunion didn't know how to find either of the girls when they were asked. Everyone was busy, everyone had jobs, kids, responsibilities.
Their 50s went by in a blur, sort of like their 40s, only the time seemed to pass more quickly. Jobs, husbands, families..... everything took up so much of their time, but they still talked about each other to anyone who would listen. "My best friend in high school...... we talked on the phone for hours.... we were like sisters.... we could tell each other everything..... we were closer than family...."
Internet searches began...... first names, last names...... previous addresses...... neither of them were on Facebook, which would have helped...... but.... more searches..... and....... one girl's daughter was on that site..... and as the other girl looked at the photo of that daughter, right there on the computer screen was the face of her mother as she looked during high school years. Could that really be her daughter?
An address was found....... a letter was mailed from Texas to Maryland........ "Are you 'my V....?' If so, please contact me......"
The telephone rang within days....... as soon as that first "Hello" went over the phone lines, there was no mistaking those voices.... they were the same sisters-under-the-skin voices that burned up the phone lines in Queens so many many years ago. They talked, they laughed, they caught up with one another's lives since the last time they'd seen each other. The girls exchanged eMail addresses and promised to keep in touch now that they'd found one another again.
Within six months of that 'first' phone call, the girls made plans to visit....... one flew from her state to the other's state...... they hugged at the door, introduced their husbands, and then hugged again. And they hugged at the start of every morning and at the end of every evening... they were indeed still Sisters Under The Skin. "You look the same!" "You look just the same too!" "I would have recognized you anywhere!"
They talked about other friends who had moved away and passed away.... of parents and siblings no longer in their lives........ they talked, and talked, and talked, as if no time had passed at all. And when the one girl's daughter came into the house to hug her mother's best friend, time seemed to stand still because it was like hugging the high school girl of so many years ago. How could you not love the daughter of your best friend as if she were your own as well?
Their lives are still busy...... homes and families, jobs and responsibilities...... there's always something. But they take the time to keep in touch..... more eMails than phone calls, because they're not in the same time zone and their schedules are so very different. They're both in their early 60s now, and they realize that the one thing you can never get back is time...... and time in your 60s seems so much more precious than time in your 20s and 30s.
They have discussed the magic and the closeness of their friendship...... they've come to the conclusion that it was so easy to pick up right where they left off because of their history together. Each of them knows everything about the other.... every blessed thing..... nothing was ever left unsaid all those years ago, and the same holds true for now. When you can tell a person anything and everything, and not be worried about being judged, then you have a true and meaningful friendship that can stand the test of time.
Sisters under the skin... for all the time back then, for all the time we have now.
One girl had just completed eight years in a Catholic grammar school; the other had completed her elementary education in a Greek Orthodox school. Both of them had dark hair, dark eyes, and brand new first-day-of-school clothes that looked good enough, but their outfits wouldn't ever have been advertised in "Seventeen" magazine.
This particular high school building was made of brick and stone.... set up on a hill overlooking a park with a large pond that froze in the winter-time. The cool kids would go ice-skating as soon as the pond froze over.... cute little skirts and sweater-sets on the girls, and of course brand new skates. The not-so-cool (not-so-rich) kids would watch from a distance, all the while pretending they didn't care that their parents couldn't afford the ice skates and the outfits with the matching scarves and pom-poms on the sweaters.
The two girls stared up at the high school building.... there was a clock in the middle of the center tower.... more than half an hour to wait till the bell rang for their first period. What would they do to not appear nervous and out-of-place in front of that huge building that they'd been inside of just one time? On orientation day, they weren't given enough time to learn the lay-out of the three floors.... they would have to look in the school handbook and try to map out their classes so as not to waste time and not be late in arriving at each class.
The girls smiled at one another at the same time.... and each began walking in the other's direction. Somehow, they both understood that they were 'new girls,' that they wouldn't really fit in with the public-school-savvy teenagers that would be filling up the steps and the lawn in front of this school before the ten o'clock bell rang.
"Are you new here?" "I graduated from the Catholic school down the hill." "Are you a freshman too?" "We just moved here from The City... I graduated from the Greek school connected to my Church."
And so began a friendship....... the girls had some classes together, but not homerooms..... they would meet in the mornings down the hill and then walk up to the high school together. They exchanged phone numbers and would spend most of every evening talking to one another, telling each other everything that they didn't get a chance to say during the school day, even though they met after school and walked back down the hill together. There was just always so much to say. When the first snows fell, they watched the ice-skaters for a little while, then walked down the hill towards their homes. "Have you ever been on skates?" "No." "Me neither." "Who cares!"
In their freshman year of high school, their friendship grew into a trust that allowed other girlfriends in, but kept the two girls united in their best-friends friendship. The girls became the mainstay of their larger group of friends. What they didn't get to talk about during school was discussed at night on the telephone..... one sitting in a quiet corner of a hallway in her house, the other pulling the long cord of the phone into the pantry... they talked incessantly about everything.
In sophomore year, after spending nearly every day of the summer together, their friendship grew even closer. They saw one another every day, sometimes walking along the Avenue and window-shopping, holding a small transistor radio tuned to WNBC and Cousin Brucie. They would meet for lunch (always the local pizza place) or for shopping (searching for bargains on 45s and LPs and clothes for school that looked more expensive than they were). The girls would get together for trips to the Library (mysteries, the latest best-sellers, biographies, classics from the English class reading list). As always, what they didn't have time to discuss during the day was saved for the night-time phone calls.
In their junior year, their friendship matured a bit. Instead of discussing The Beatles or the clothes that were on sale at Lerner's, they discussed family matters... small hurts and big disappointments.... tiny scars and life-altering changes in their family dynamics. Nothing was left unsaid...... everything was discussed with love and respect, judgments never entered the conversations. They were best-best friends, and nothing would ever change that. Sisters under the skin, for always.
In senior year, they both found part-time jobs after school.... one worked at a retail store, and the other in a local lawyer's office. They had the same hours at school, and some of the same classes, but their work hours were different. As always, whatever they didn't get a chance to discuss during the day was saved for the night-time phone calls.... the hallway and the pantry became their safe zones, or as safe as they could be from siblings and parents.
Senior Prom came up on the school calendar..... the cost for the dinner, the dance, plus getting a really nice gown and shoes and having special hair-dos....... all of that just wasn't in their budgets. And did they want to go to that Prom anyway? All those fraternity and sorority students..... even after four years in that school, did they really fit in with most of those kids? Not really.
The girls came up with a plan to celebrate with a small group of their friends...... they'd go into The City on Prom Night.... they'd be dressed up nicely, but not all dressed up in gowns.... they arranged a dinner at a family-owned Greek restaurant.... they would have a special Prom Night of their own. And so they did.... Greek food, Greek dancing.... it was a memorable night and they talked about it for days afterwards.... long telephone cords stretching into the hallway, into the pantry.
Graduation day came...... and it rained and rained. The huge outdoor ceremony had to be held in the auditorium of the high school. The senior class was so big that they had to split it into two ceremonies..... they divided the alphabet down the middle, the A's thru L's in the morning, the M's thru Z's in the afternoon. The two girls weren't in the same part of the alphabet so one graduated in the morning, the other in the afternoon. "At least we had Prom night together," they said.
After graduation, they both had jobs for the summer...... different locations, different hours... but there was still the telephone. When September came along, one girl went to college, the other went to work. College studies took up most of one girl's time, after-work responsibilities took up most of the other girl's time. The phone calls were still there, but they weren't as long. There was still so much so say, but just not enough time.
In their twenties, their lives got busier..... family responsibilities, college classes, 9 to 5 jobs. One of the girls got married and moved out of state. Long-distance calls were so expensive then, so they wrote letters. Weekly letters turned to monthly letters... which turned into every-other-month letters..... but still, they were Sisters Under The Skin, weren't they?
In their thirties, the girl who stayed in their home state moved out of the old neighborhood.... a new job, more family responsibilities..... less time for letter-writing. By the time the other girl moved back to their home state, the one who had stayed there was now married and she had moved to another state. The two girls weren't in the same zip code, and they weren't even in the same time zone. They lost touch.....and they lost one another for almost three decades. They both tried to find the other from time to time..... the friends they both knew in high school had also lost contact with the two girls, and the whereabouts of each one remained a mystery.
In their 40s, their high school had a 25th Reunion..... both girls were living out of state at the time, and neither one of them went back to the high school for the party and celebration. The ones who did go to the reunion didn't know how to find either of the girls when they were asked. Everyone was busy, everyone had jobs, kids, responsibilities.
Their 50s went by in a blur, sort of like their 40s, only the time seemed to pass more quickly. Jobs, husbands, families..... everything took up so much of their time, but they still talked about each other to anyone who would listen. "My best friend in high school...... we talked on the phone for hours.... we were like sisters.... we could tell each other everything..... we were closer than family...."
Internet searches began...... first names, last names...... previous addresses...... neither of them were on Facebook, which would have helped...... but.... more searches..... and....... one girl's daughter was on that site..... and as the other girl looked at the photo of that daughter, right there on the computer screen was the face of her mother as she looked during high school years. Could that really be her daughter?
An address was found....... a letter was mailed from Texas to Maryland........ "Are you 'my V....?' If so, please contact me......"
The telephone rang within days....... as soon as that first "Hello" went over the phone lines, there was no mistaking those voices.... they were the same sisters-under-the-skin voices that burned up the phone lines in Queens so many many years ago. They talked, they laughed, they caught up with one another's lives since the last time they'd seen each other. The girls exchanged eMail addresses and promised to keep in touch now that they'd found one another again.
Within six months of that 'first' phone call, the girls made plans to visit....... one flew from her state to the other's state...... they hugged at the door, introduced their husbands, and then hugged again. And they hugged at the start of every morning and at the end of every evening... they were indeed still Sisters Under The Skin. "You look the same!" "You look just the same too!" "I would have recognized you anywhere!"
They talked about other friends who had moved away and passed away.... of parents and siblings no longer in their lives........ they talked, and talked, and talked, as if no time had passed at all. And when the one girl's daughter came into the house to hug her mother's best friend, time seemed to stand still because it was like hugging the high school girl of so many years ago. How could you not love the daughter of your best friend as if she were your own as well?
Their lives are still busy...... homes and families, jobs and responsibilities...... there's always something. But they take the time to keep in touch..... more eMails than phone calls, because they're not in the same time zone and their schedules are so very different. They're both in their early 60s now, and they realize that the one thing you can never get back is time...... and time in your 60s seems so much more precious than time in your 20s and 30s.
They have discussed the magic and the closeness of their friendship...... they've come to the conclusion that it was so easy to pick up right where they left off because of their history together. Each of them knows everything about the other.... every blessed thing..... nothing was ever left unsaid all those years ago, and the same holds true for now. When you can tell a person anything and everything, and not be worried about being judged, then you have a true and meaningful friendship that can stand the test of time.
Sisters under the skin... for all the time back then, for all the time we have now.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)