Village Elders

My encounter with Tom, the pool guru, got me thinking about my elders.

The African proverb, made so popular by Hillary, claims that it takes a village to raise a child. That can be taken to mean that lots of people contribute to a child's well-being, in fact to the well-being of... well, anyone's being. But there's more to this than meets the eye.

I've always been fortunate to have lots of older people in my life. They say in some of the "birth order" literature out there that only children will develop the strongest relationships with people years younger or years older than themselves. This has been true for me. As a young girl, I loved to visit Mrs. Margie, who taught me how to make sugared violets. In college, most of my friends were 3rd or 4th year, even when I was a freshman. When I graduated and moved to the mountains of north Georgia, I befriended the "blue haired" set because of my work schedule, and delighted in their company as much as they delighted in mine. Today, even as a young adult, I spend a fair amount of my time with adults old enough to be my grandparents.

And if you don't do this, I caution you. I think you're making a mistake.

I don't think it's healthy to surround yourself only with people your own age. This is why I've never felt comfortable in social settings geared to Young Professionals or Young Singles or Young Adult Catholics. These people are all in the same boat I'm in. Heck, some are a lot worse off than I am, so the only real satisfaction I get is in knowing I'm not quite as screwed up as the guy sitting next to me.

I prefer the multi-generational approach to living: people much older than myself, people younger than myself, people my age and people from all walks of life. People in different stages of life are interesting. They have things to teach you.

One such couple befriended me in the north Georgia town I lived in prior to moving to the Atlanta area. I first met Rita when I began taking instruction in the church. Because I worked 3-11, I could pop by the church and help her and the other "Garden Angels" tend to the church grounds. She was a silver-haired, practical woman who despite living the last 2 decades in the south had still managed to retain her Minnesota accent. She and Gordy lived on the lake and had made a hobby out of adding onto their house. They were healthy and industrious people, and by now it was the size of the Pentagon.

By the time I entered the church, they had both become good friends, and once a month or so I was invited to their house for dinner. Those were some of the most enjoyable evenings of my time in that town. We'd talk about everything from history, politics, religion, dating, work, you name it. In fact, we often covered all those topics in one night, until we were all tired and yawning, and they were still reluctant to see me go. Keep in mind, these were not lonely elders. They had 6 kids who were regular visitors to the river house. They were constantly on the go, involved in both their community and their church. Gordy had taught himself how to design web pages "just to keep myself out of the bars."

They were interesting. They weren't like me. They had things to tell me about how to live my life. They were interested in what I had to say. They respected me, and I respected them.

What makes that different from friends your own age? Well, that's hard to put into words. Maybe it's because you aren't in the same stage of "figuring things out." They have seen things you haven't, and they listen with a relatively neutral ear.

The other thing is that they teach me to be a little less harsh on myself. Older people like to take breaks. They don't tackle the whole day at one time. They get where they are going by pacing themselves, but they get there nonetheless. Sometimes, I forget that I should stop for a while and rest, refresh and renew myself between projects. Much like the observation that "you always will have the poor with you," there will always be a task set ahead of us, with things to take care of. Your ability to do this hinges on the time you take for yourself, to restore yourself, to keep yourself physically and emotionally strong, and the time you take to learn from your experiences. Otherwise, life stays pretty much the same, and you become a mindless cog in the wheel, endlessly repeating the same behaviors and getting the same results.

Sitting a spell, talking it out with an older friend who wants little more than your company is insurance - against turning your life into an endless assembly line of duty and responsibility.

I heard this once: Yankees will spend thousands a year to sit on a couch and talk to a stranger, calling it "therapy." Southerners spend an afternoon with friends, sitting on a couch and call it "just visiting."

If that's just a southern thing, I'm sorry, it's time to expose the secret. The economy is bad these days, people, so take advantage of this tip. Consulting with the village elders is free, and the rewards are immeasurable.

--Laura

You've Been Extremely Helpful!

I will never forget parallel parking on Folly Beach.

Saturday night was the last night of my Charleston vacation. Stacy and I decided to drive to Folly Beach for dinner. If you’ve never been, it’s the last island in a cluster of islands surrounding Charleston, and locals call it the “Edge of America”. We located the restaurant on the corner of a prominent intersection.

Right next to the flashing lights of the Ambulance and the Fire Truck.

Stacy’s expression implied she thought that was a bad sign. “They don’t appear to be coming FROM our restaurant,” I observed.

The center of town was a cross between a carnival and a bike rally. The breezes blowing from the beach were fierce and the last street vendors of the day were taking advantage of them to display all manner of flashing and blinking, whizzing and whirling wind toys. Stacy found a parking spot near the restaurant and started to parallel park, but got stuck because she was used to parking her mustang and not my RAV4. I got out of the car and stood on the curb to direct her in.

While I stood there, I was mildly distracted by the conversation going on behind me. Two residents, male and female, were walking on the sidewalk behind me. Suddenly the man stopped and said, “I can’t wear these, they are too big!” His female companion stopped next to him and said, “Here, try mine.”

His slurring told me he was drunk, but I had to turn around to determine that he was referring to his flip flops. I was relieved. There were so many other things he could be taking off. The two twirled in a boozy dance as they held onto each other, coordinating the exchange of flip flops while maintaining their compromised sense of balance. They perfectly balanced the whizzing and whirling wind toys across the street.

Stacy commanded my attention from the car. “Am I close enough to the curb now?” she wondered.

“I don’t think this is the place where we need to worry about perfection. Looks good to me.”

We reached the restaurant and had our names on the waiting list before Frick and Frack arrived. Their conversation soon included us as a matter of course.

“It’s all your fault,” the man told Stacy. She apologized. “That’s how it all starts,” I said. He immediately agreed. The woman then spoke up to tell us she wasn’t speaking to him. He didn’t seem to mind.

“You know what I’m talking about,” I told him with just a little gangster bravado. I had no idea what I was talking about, but he laughed knowingly. Stacy says he only had one tooth, but I didn’t see that one, so I think it was just wishful thinking on her part. He looked like a pirate who’d lost his crew and his way.

“Ladies, you’ve been extremely helpful!” he shouted abruptly.

We watched him walk off with his female companion. They both swayed like island palms in a stiff breeze. “I hope they stop when they hit water, or they’re both going to drown,” Stacy said.

The restaurant was a hole in the wall. The food was served in plastic bowls. We ate with plastic forks. Our drinks were in plastic cups. The food was great however and we giggled most of the night. It was just one of those “you had to be there” moments.

And I’m really glad I was.

--Laura

Help yourself. You're family.

There’s a stage to every friendship, where a person stops being a guest in your house. If they ask for a glass of water, you reply, “Help yourself. You’re family.”

Some people reach this more quickly than others, and while it sounds like a title you bestow on a person when you’re too lazy to get up and get them a glass of water, it’s really a much more delicate arrangement than you might realize. Without being aware of what has happened, an agreement has been established between the giver and the recipient of the “you’re just family” title.

First, the giver is comfortable enough with the recipient of the title that they don’t rush to the kitchen to make sure the glass is actually clean before filling it. This is either because they know they washed the dishes last time instead of their children or significant other, or they realize that if the recipient of the glass doesn’t think it’s clean enough, they’ll wash the glass themselves without giving the dirty glass a second thought. And that thought doesn’t give you the shivers the way it might with random folks, because family won’t tell your business out in the neighborhood.

Second, the recipient actually does know where the glasses are kept, because they’ve been in the kitchen plenty of times and over the years they’ve washed the glasses a few times to boot. They may have even washed a few forks. And they know where the ice is, and they know that there’s a bottle of wine chilling in the fridge for after one of “those days” at work, because that’s the way it always is.

It’s always a bit of a balancing act in relationships: when does someone hear “you’re just family” for the first time? Don’t be too stingy with the title this year, okay? Connections these days are tough. People are so busy keeping families healthy, companies satisfied and their summer lawns mowed that it’s harder than ever to reach out, connect and form friendships. And friendships, once established, are difficult to maintain under those daily pressures.

This weekend my parents updated me on a couple they know. When my mother was in the hospital undergoing heart surgery, one of them stayed with my father and me in the waiting room the entire day. He just took off work, so that dad would have a masculine voice in his ear keeping him distracted the way I did not have the strength to do. Now, he and his wife are so busy that my parents rarely see them, and they are struggling to maintain connections.

The same evening my friend Stacy told me about a neighbor having marital problems because she’s on call so much with her government job that her husband only sees her when she’s rolling into bed.

Another friend of ours lives with her boyfriend, yet sees him less than three times a week because he is caring for his ailing father.

Many people I hold dear are so busy that I’m lucky to see them at all, or only in passing. And these are just my friends, so you can imagine that they hold the same complaints against those they share beds, vows or genetic material with. It’s just hard to stay intact when so many responsibilities pull you in so many directions. No one has an ideal situation. You rarely know when you sign up for a relationship just what kind of challenges it will face. In fact, I think if you know them upfront, you might just be one of the lucky ones. You might just need to feel grateful that you had some advanced warning, because plenty of other people get caught up in the first blush of romance, and the challenges just sneak right up on them.

So this summer, when anyone bothers to check in on you and there’s even a little hint that they might want to see you face to face, worry a little less about the state of your house. Toss everything embarrassing in the spare bedroom and tell them to come right on over. You never know; you may need them as much as they need you. This summer might just be the start of a beautiful friendship. Don’t miss that opportunity to tell a previously casual friend, “Help yourself. You’re family.”

--Laura

In Remembrance - Margie Boulware, 2006

My friend Margie died in the spring. I find myself thinking of her this time of year.

Mother called me when Margie died. As chance would have it, I had left the cell phone in the car, vital piece of technology that it is. I listened to the message the next morning. When she said she had something to tell me, but didn’t want to say over the phone, I knew someone had died.

Dad answered when I called, so he was the one who told me. “Laura, Mrs. Margie died.”

I was surprised. Things like that are supposed to happen of course, but sometime in the future, when you’re expecting it. She had been in my thoughts recently. As I was looking through some old Christmas cards, I realized that both my mother and Mrs. Margie had sent me a card with a polar bear on the front in the same year. I laughed when I realized that they’d both been on such a similar wavelength. And with that came the thought that on my next vacation to Savannah I needed to devise a way to sneak over to Okatie for a visit.

I remember the last time I dropped by on my way home from the Savannah Irish festival in February. Ann was there, and I didn’t have long to stay, but a visit to the area wasn’t right without a hello to Mrs. Margie. And as usual she’d been full of plans. She was a little thinner and a little slower in her steps maybe, but she was the same vital, interesting person I’d always loved. It is difficult to grasp that she is gone. That will take some getting used to.

When mother told me the circumstances of her death, I said, “Well mother, if you could choose how you would die, I think that’s what you’d pick.” Mrs. Margie wasn’t a person for nonsense, so it struck me as particularly appropriate that in one breath she was here, and then a few breaths later she was not.

The Margie I knew had an open door policy with me. And she really seemed to love listening to any nonsense that came out of my mouth on any given day and at any time I wished to share it. Since I was a kid, I tried not to let on how important that was to me. Growing up, you can be really dumb sometimes.

But I loved being in that house in front of the fire or sitting at the kitchen table and talking for hours about nothing special. I spent more time talking to Mrs. Margie than I spent with my own grandmother, who thought I was too quiet and bookish “just like” my mother. I don’t know that I had more in common with her, but with her I came fresh and without that genetic baggage that comes with being “just like” someone you raised. And her gift was to listen to me chatter on like I was just the smartest, most fascinating person she ever knew, when I was really just a loner and a kid. I in turn thought she hung the moon. Really.

I always kept an eye out for her truck on Camp St. Mary’s road because I knew she’d wave if she saw me. Being on the river was always better if we managed to spot her in the boat or fishing on the dock with her mother. And there always seemed to be at least one excuse to turn down the dirt road leading to the Boulware Place, so that I could pick up our conversation where we left off.

And I can remember vividly that when I got my college acceptance letter, and no one else was home, my first thought was to walk straight from the mailbox in front of my house over to tell Margie, because I knew she wouldn’t mind one bit. That’s the best kind of adult there is.

I regret that these are the kinds of things you always save up to say about someone after they’re gone. I think about all the good it would do just to have it all said while everyone is alive and healthy and can still appreciate the heart that went into saying it. What I hope is that through all the chattering I did back then, by the fireplace or out in the barn or at the kitchen table or in that hulk of a truck or out in the boat on the water, that she knew already that she was the best kind of adult a kid could have as a friend. I will miss her.

--Laura

On spring

Oh, I'm gonna fry you up. I've got your eggs and bacon right here, baby!

Her voice was terse with another of the many threats she'd made today. I walked to the end of my house quietly and tilted my head around the corner so I could watch her unobserved.

Mama Rose is my friend's mother. She's 75-years old. With one hand gloved and the other bare, she was stooped over my bed of Irises, pulling at a weed while striking it with an evil looking machete.

Not my machete. She'd brought it from home. It's her favorite tool. When I could coax her to put it down, she'd help me pull weeds from the flower bed in front, replacing the weeds with cypress mulch. Unlike me, yard work was something she'd rather do than just about anything. At the end of our first day together, she left her machete and work shoes, so in her words, she'd have to come back for them tomorrow.

She called the next morning at 7:30. She'd been up since 6. Her daughter and I say she's crazy. It's the good crazy though, not Power-of-Attorney crazy.

She lends just the right spirit to spring yard work. I love spring and I'll tell you why. There's a crazy kind of risk in it.

When I started the working in the yard earlier in the week, I was going solo. It was warm outside and sunny. I burned fallen limbs, I cut grass and I pulled honeysuckle vines. When I came inside that night, I had a light sunburn. I invited Mama Rose over the next day because I felt behind the season already and knew I needed help.

The next day, the picture changed. The skies were overcast. A light drizzle coated my burn pile. But the weather was fine for listening to stories from my companion.

I say, don't tell me not to do something, just tell me why I shouldn't do it.

I played along. Don't do it because your mother told you not to and you'd get a whipping.

Shoo. A whipping only lasts a minute. Did I ever tell you how I started a fire with a match and a rock?

And the next day the picture had changed again. Tornadoes came through during the night, passing just south of us but still setting off the county warning sirens. I savored my coffee the next morning, waiting for the weather to clear. Finally, I drove through the fog to pick up Mama Rose again.

Look how many churches there are between your house and ours. Don't you know people just keep building all these churches to have more ways to make money off Our Lord? It's just disgusting.

When Mama Rose's New Orleans accent wraps around this word, I believe even those who don't understand English can get the meaning from her inflection.

DEEZ-GUS-TIN, baby.

Three days. Three kinds of weather. By Friday, I realized my yard work wasn't going to be finished by the end of my vacation. And I realized I wasn't behind the season at all.

I also realized that if I gave Mama Rose cuttings from my flower beds, she'd have something to plant at her house, and I'd get a day off.

There are plenty of lessons to take from spring. They repeat every year and every year they feel new because I've changed from this time last year.

First, I hear change is inevitable. People can pretend that change doesn't happen, but they are just denying the reality of spring, which comes each year with wind and sun and tantalizing activity. My yard is in bad shape because I ignored it two springs in a row. Ignoring it didn't stop spring's invitation from reaching me, nor did it stop weeds from overtaking my flowers. This week I tugged weeds out of my yard, revealing all the lovely flowers underneath. I could almost hear them beginning to breathe again.

Change is dirty. I can't pull weeds or dig soil without getting dirty. In fact, digging is best done when it's been raining, making the ground soft enough to release the weeds and soft enough to mess up my shoes. Participating in spring means making messes and cleaning them up. Not getting dirty means letting messes creep up unplanned but never quite unexpected. You can retreat from that, or you can get in the thick of things. It's okay to choose retreat sometimes. I've chosen it in the past. But the task isn't mysterious or insurmountable. Pull the weeds and toss them out. Leave the rest.

Spring also teaches me that the right tools can make a difference. Recently a friend did repairs for me and in the process put a slash in the finger of his pigskin gloves. We didn't throw them away and after he left I found them tucked away in a utility drawer. I'd never worn pigskin before, but I tried them this week, and I have to tell you, they are the most comfortable gloves I've ever worn. They saved me blisters from the rake and cuts from the thorn bushes. I'd have never justified the expense of fancy gloves for garden work if my friend hadn't left the pair. That's a good friend.

Which is another thing about spring, if only for this year's lesson. I learned that accepting help from friends enriches me in ways pride can't. It may go against my upbringing to ask for help cleaning up a mess I made through my own neglect, but none of my friends saw it that way, so I decided to stop seeing it that way myself. I discovered that I got a lot more done when I did. Mama Rose may not have done any heavy lifting in my yard this week, but she was so determined that she inspired all my heavy lifting. Meanwhile, instead of focusing on what hasn't been completed, being with her let me focus on our accomplishments. I enjoyed the yard through her eyes, like a parent appreciating their child's first snowfall.

When the rain finally moved us to pack up our tools for the day, we stood under the carport, reluctant to go inside. I brought the dogs in from the backyard to play at our feet.

This cold weather has got to go. Mother Nature will take care of it.

Not Jesus? I asked quietly, concentrating more on the rain and the streams of yellow pollen flowing down my driveway.

Sometimes he holds out too long. Mother Nature knows when enough is enough.

She sent the rain then, to tell us we're done for today.

Are you tired, darlin'? I could hear the smile in her voice.

Yes, I am. You whupped my butt, old woman. She took this as high praise.

We only have two hands, darlin'. If we did it all today, what would we do tomorrow?

I will get a call on Sunday. You can take that to the bank. My legs and low back are so stiff I have to sit funny as I write this. But I'm looking forward to the call.

The risk that comes with this yard work is that high winds would damage what we'd done. Or that frost would kill the new seedlings we'd put down in hopes of having vegetables this summer.

Or that personally I'd get tired of the effort, that something new would come to upset my applecart and distract me. Two years ago it had been my mother's bypass surgery and months of recovery. I didn't have any energy left for risky behavior those days.

But I like spring, and I'll tell you why. There's hope in it. And that's something I'm planting this year.

--Laura Burke

On dreadful parties

Recently I was at a party with a friend. Most of the people were strangers, in and of itself not a bad thing.

The party was a bit of a train wreck.

There were good things, don't get me wrong. The house was lovely and the reason for the get-together was wonderful. After lots of hard work, a friend is going to become a teacher. She looked great that night, and really happy. So we got together with great food and plenty of beer and enjoyed her generous hospitality.

That was the good part.

And at first blush, the fact that so many were single was also good news. As the beer flowed however, it became obvious that I was surrounded by walking wounded.

Divorced singles outnumbered those who'd never been married almost two to one. And before you comment, this is not a rant about divorcees. I have a number of divorced friends, so let me compare. My friend Stacy wants to recover from her divorce, not just to move on to another prospective relationship, but sincere recovery. She has confidence that she can and will, and that she deserves to find a partner.

Therefore, I think she really has recovered. While she may be lonely at times, she has patience that a person who also wants to be her partner will enter her life. She's even willing to put some effort into that person when they show interest in her. She projects confidence. It is something you can't fake, at least not for long.

But there is the fake confidence. It is a brash kind of loud, tough confidence that sounds intimidating and a little sexy when people are sober. The mask then begins to slip when people are drunk.

As the party wore on, the false confidence began to slip away on these who were in the walking wounded category. What began to show was their deep loneliness. They were people who have settled. By settling, I mean they've not found someone they can share intimacy and partnership with, so they've decided that sex purely for physical closeness is enough. "Just sex" has an allure to it, but watching these people, I realize they aren't happy with the consequences.

What are the consequences? Well, from my perspective, they've put a price on their happiness, and it's been set lower than it should be. They've advertised the price to the public in hopes of getting a buyer. Well, maybe a renter.

Because of that, hooking up doesn't end up feeling all that glamorous. Well okay, it just doesn't look all that glamorous to me. It doesn't even seem to bring much pleasure.

I spent an evening with those people. I felt smothered by their sadness.

But that wasn't all. There were also the ones who didn't even pretend to be confident. In fact, they carried their loneliness around like a badge. One man was in the MIDDLE of a divorce. Right in the middle. All he could talk about was the Soon-to-be-ex-wife (STBX). He had two children, but he seemed much more concerned this evening with how miserable he was.

Strangely, he felt he could solve this by developing, in short order, a "relationship" with a woman. "Friends with Benefits." He polled the assembled womanhood in the room. How does that even work these days? Do you think I'm ready for such a relationship? I haven't gotten sex in so long.

I thought you said you'd slept with your STBX two weeks ago, I offered. He grimaced, but ignored me. What is your opinion on Friends with Benefits, he asked me.

No sex is free, I answered.

This was roundly rejected by the others. If there's an agreement between consenting adults, they reasoned, what is the problem?

It doesn't come without a price, I say.

How many times do you lie to yourself that sex is all you need? And then, when you know you want more, what do you say to convince yourself that you like the person enough to make a relationship out of what began as just sex?

I didn't win anyone over to the idea of befriending someone prior to sleeping with them. Several were too busy looking like heat-seeking missiles for sex and comfort.

So what had I been looking for? I had gone there thinking I was looking for the same. I realized I wasn't. I was looking for a friend. Hopefully someone who'd become my best friend. I rode home that night with Stacy, who unfortunately isn't a boy.

That party was depressing, I said out loud. She agreed with me. I found myself wondering how many of those people had best friends somewhere who were lonely because those people had settled for less. For comfort that was temporary, and happiness what wasn't all that happy.

I felt bad for us all.

--Laura Burke