2017

When people ask how everything's going, I usually say "My life is great, but the world is coming to an end." I have the usual complaints: ten prescriptions, twenty extra pounds, not as cute as I used to be, and a life expectancy of... better not go there.

But I have a solid marriage to a handsome and smart man who puts up with me, we own a house that will be paid for when I'm ninety-five, we own two cars and a cat who loves us. The cars are six and seventeen years old, but we have them. We traveled together to Canada this summer, visiting Montréal, Québec and Ottawa. We were able to attend a wedding of the son of Joe's best friend from high school in New York, and a few days later, we flew to Memphis to spend Thanksgiving with Joe's aunt and uncle, his sister and brother and lots of cousins. We didn't have political tensions with the relatives because we are all on the same page. I only embarrassed Joe's Aunt Natalie by pointing out that Joe and I are married when she called us "my nephews." We spent time with my sister, both here and at her home in Greenbelt, Maryland, and on one visit with her, I attended my high school class's fiftieth reunion. It was there that I saw commonalities with people whose lives and views are different from mine, but with whom I shared life in a different century, a different world.

As to the world, there is climate change, there is the current President of the Confederacy, I mean, the United States. It's easy to get confused that way.

In 2016, I ran for a seat in the West Virginia Legislature. I came in eighth of eight candidates in the Democratic primary. The first five candidates made it to the general election. This year, some political people asked me about running for City Council. I found that I had more friends than I knew in the city, and not just the people who helped with the campaign. The election was at the end of April, and we were installed in early July. I have become friends with all the other Councilors, and although we disagree about some specific things, we are generally in agreement about broad goals for Morgantown. We signed on to the Paris Climate Accords, and voted for a Human Rights Ordnance that includes sexual orientation and gender identity.

I was able to continue my goal of visiting one county per month, within three hundred miles of Morgantown in any state. The cities I visited were Lynchburg, Virginia, Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, Denton, Maryland, Bowling Green, Virginia, Westminster, Maryland, Carrollton, Ohio, Galax, Virginia, Grayson, Kentucky, Olean, New York, State College, Pennsylvania and Urbana, Ohio. Although I was worried about visiting places that voted heavily Republican in 2016, I never had any problems. Part of that is that I traveled to these places alone, I'm older, I can pass for white, and can adjust my speech to a local accent. I do understand what "privilege" means.

Joe and I have both been teaching at OLLI, Osher Life-Long Learning, affiliated with WVU's School of Public Health. Joe's Bible classes are well-attended by an enthusiastic mix of seniors, as are my classes, which this year have covered pop music in 1962, 1963 and 1964. Last winter, I taught a four-week session called "Bruce Springsteen is 67." I've learned lots from my research, and my students, most of whom graduated high school in the 1960s, love going back in time.

Our life here is good. We can live comfortably on our income, Joe is healthy, I'm stable, and we are recognized in town, and respected by our constituencies, if not by everyone in Monongalia County.

Our challenge is to keep going. It's no secret that our Jewish community in Morgantown is aging, as are we, and our cars. The United States government has made itself the enemy of liberals generally, and of gay people in particular, and we must be vigilant and hopeful for the future. I make it a point to attend demonstrations about healthcare, about immigrant rights, including pro-Dreamer and anti-immigrant ban events. I spoke in Charleston last month against the EPA's proposal to scrap the
Clean Power Plan.

My usual resolutions are to lose twenty pounds, and to clean up and organize the house. I have lost a few pounds this year, very few, and I'm working on organizing paper at home. In light of the scandals this year around sexual harassment, I have promised to stop ogling HYMs (Handsome Young Men). I've been harmless for quite some time, but that doesn't stop me from checking out someone attractive from head-to-toe, or even flirting. I'm cutting that out. I can see that it is unwelcome, disrespectful to my husband, and makes me look foolish. If I can find a way, I will tell my age 70ish straight male friends to cut it out with young women as well.

I remain optimistic, at least for the short term. I might feel differently if I were twenty-eight instead of sixty-eight. We all need to work together for change.

Here are some pics:

Monument Steps, Lynchburg, Virginia, January

A nighttime demonstration at WVU, January

Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, during "Winterfest," only it was 65 F., February

Speaking at a candidate forum, February

At "Everyone Is Welcome" day at West Virginia's State Capitol, with Joe and Alexandra Kadner, March

19th century schoolhouse, Denton, Maryland, March

At Morgantown High's production of "Hello, Dolly!" with our friend and cast member, Sarah, April

The new Morgantown City Council, with the City Clerk on the far left, May

Caroline County, Virginia Courthouse, Bowling Green, May This is where the Lovings were tried for having an interracial marriage

Main St., Westminster, Maryland, June

Asking  Senator Shelley Moore Capito not to "waffle" on healthcare, June

We saw Senator Bernie Sanders speak in Charleston, June

Joe and I with my sister Robin at Cheat Lake Park on July 4

Along the Blue Ridge Parkway in Carroll County, Virginia, July

Joe in Montréal, August

Québec City, August

Ottawa, August

Prayer Service at Coopers Rock Overlook with Rabbi Joe and members of Tree of Life

With our friends Jerryl Lynn and Amanda, visiting us from Eureka, California, September

Olean, New York, September

An enthusiastic crowd on our first reading of the Human Rights Commission Ordinance, which includes sexual orientation and gender identity, October

at Woodlawn High's 50th reunion, Columbia, MD, October, with friends, some from elementary school

                         

Elk Point Lighthouse, Cecil County, Maryland, October

High Street, Bellefonte, Centre County, PA, November

With Larry Siegel in Tappan, New York. We have been friends since January 1950, November

At a formal wedding, New City, New York, November

Joe, his brother Henry and sister Martha, Memphis, November

Round barn, Urbana, Ohio, December

Joe speaking at a demonstration for gun control in downtown Morgantown, December with Morgantown's Interfaith Association

Wedding in New City, New York

This was a crazy idea. Joe's best friend from school invited us to his son's wedding last weekend in New City, across the Hudson from New York City, and just north of New Jersey. They got a rate for rooms at a good hotel in nearby Nanuet for Saturday night. The invitation said "Formal Invited." We booked an extra night Friday.

Joe wanted to go, so we did, driving 395 miles from about 9:15- 5:30 on Friday. I have a tuxedo from my brief time with West Virginia University's Community Choir; Joe rented one at Daniel's, a local men's store.

Possibly my oldest non-relative  friend, Larry, lives in Rockland County, near where we were staying. I sent him a message on Facebook before we left, asking if we could see him and his wife, Renate, Friday night or Saturday. Larry's parents and mine were best friends from early in my parents' marriage, before Larry and I were born. He is three months younger than I am.

We saw Nanuet Diner near the hotel, and, both of us liking old-school diners, decided to try our luck. It was like the old days, with bright lights, chrome and neon and a twenty page menu. The difference is that the wait staff were all men, conversing with each other in some kind of Caribbean Spanish and what I think was Haitian Creole. We ordered eggplant parmigiana, each serving enough for three, which came with soup or salad, coffee or tea, and dessert. We stuffed ourselves.

We looked around Saturday a bit in New City and in Tappan, where Larry and Renate live. The New Jersey line is an easy walk from Larry's house, and there is a historic district at the center of the town. The house is of the era and style of the identical houses Larry and I grew up in on the same street in suburban Baltimore. He is a musician and clergy in Eckankar; she is also clergy and a health practitioner. She made us a healthy, low-carb brunch, and we talked about old times and new. Larry and I always looked a little alike, both short and cute, now both bald with little mustaches. His mother, who we called "Aunt", and was more of an aunt to me than my biological aunts, is 94 and doing well. She lives in Naples, Florida. For her birthday in September, Larry visited. A call came that they had to evacuate because of Hurricane Irma. Larry was able to drive her across Florida to stay with friends. When they came back, they found a palm tree had crashed the roof of her car. Larry helped her buy a new car- at 94.. She is the last of our parents. Larry noted that he and his two brothers (one older, one younger) are all older than their father waa at his death. In December 2018, I will be the age my father was when he died. My religious beliefs, which include miracles in everyday life, is that there was some arrangement that Larry would be at his mother's side when a hurricane hit. You can take that as possible or chalk the whole thing up to coincidence. We didn't stay too long with Larry and Renate because he was driving to Trenton at 3 P.M. to play a concert with some friends.

Our history is so close. We were inseparable as small children, but grew apart when we were older. I did well in school; Larry did not. This trip, we both acknowledged that, by today's standards,we were ADD kids; Larry with the added "H" that made it impossible for him to sit still. Someone recently posted a picture of my second-grade class on Facebook. Our school, new in 1954, was mostly windows, and that clasroom looked out on a woods. I sat by the window, and I know I was always deep in my own thoughts and enjoying the view, while typically not paying attention to what the teacher was doing. Larry said "I'm grateful that we grew up when we did. If it was today, they would shoot me full of ritalin." That might help some kids, but Larry, after his family moved to Ohio when we were eleven, became a visual artist, a guitarist, singer, songwriter, playwright and actor, and also ran a small referral agency for musicians. I have great respect for him and what he does, and it warms my heart to know his mother, our last link to that generation, is thriving.

Anyway, we went back to our hotel, crashed for a bit, struggled to dress ourselves in tuxedos, and decided to drive to the wedding instead of taking the shuttle, so we could leave before the shuttle, which was returning at midnight.

The venue was the Paramount Country Club on Zukor Road. Adolph Zucker, the founder of Paramount Studios, had an estate there. Steve, the groom's father, has stayed in touch with many friends from school, including Joe, and he invited them..We walked in with a group of sixtyish people. Joe turned to one woman and greeted her ."Diane?" She looked at him for a second before recognizing him and they kissed and hugged. He took her to their senior prom in high school. There were more friends from school, including a gay man, Peter, not Jewish, who Joe said he knew from elementary school.

The wedding was lavish with donuts and champagne before the ceremony and lots of food after Both the bride and groom are Jewish; they met in college. The rabbi at Steve's synagogue, who has been there since before Steve's son, Josh was born, officiated. He sang the blessings, was warm and kind. He greeted me and Joe after the ceremony as if we were all old friends.

Weddings follow a pattern, and each one reminds me of another one. The bride and groom each have a brother, and the brothers escorted their grandmothers down the aisle. I though about my sister's wedding, thirty-nine years ago, and how I walked down the aisle with our eighty year old grandmother, I in a brown corduroy three-piece suit, a full multi-colored beard and my father's old hairpiece; my grandmother in her traditional blonde bouffant, and a pretty blue dress she had picked out. It made me conscious of how much things change, even as they are the same. Hopefully, our traditions will continue, even if we who witnessed this wedding, join those who witnessed previous weddings, in whatever world there is to come. The couple is cute enough, and I found myself rooting for them to have a great life together. Steve and Elise, the groom's parents, kissed and hugged us over and over and thanked us for making the journey to their son's wedding. We are in New York almost every year, and we always see them, often taking a train from Manhattan to their home in Scarsdale. Their son was probably fifteen when I first met him.

The food was great, the band, with three wonderful singers, and a repertoire of mostly soul oldies, was terrific. They started off with a medley of Jewish tunes, the copy of the "Fiddler On The Roof" wedding, which passes for traditional Jewish content. Everyone was into it and the band wailed, so I joined in, instead of going "Bah! Humbug!" as I usually do. Everyone was lifted on chairs, like in the Jerome Robbins choreography in "Fiddler."

We didn't leave early. We left with the van after midnight. Joe was engrossed in conversation with his old friend Peter. I chatted up two of the other women, and their husbands, who were not part of that circle. I told Diane, Joe's prom date, past sixty, married with two grown daughters, that Joe had discussed her with me, that if they had been a few years older, and his sexuality had skewed a little more to center, he would have tried to make a life with her. I thought about the girl I took to my prom, and I might have said that, on my own behalf, to her as well.

I will admit that I was annoyed with Joe, that he sat talking to his friend, when we had to get up early and drive home Sunday. I slept less than five hours, and told Joe he would have to do most of the driving home. I usually drive the two of us because I don't mind driving, and his driving makes me nervous. We were out just after nine in the morning. I drove to the Pennsylvania line near Easton; then he took a shift. I drove again, then stopped in Maryland, where I let him take over. When I awoke that time, we were in the mountains of Western Maryland, and it was snowing. We were home just after five.

This was a shlep to do this, but I was glad to see Larry and Renate, and happy for Joe that he was able to connect with his old friends. And of course, it is a mitzvah, a commandment, to rejoice with bride and groom, which we did, with gusto.

And we leave for Memphis Wednesday. Oy!

Larry and I on chairs from his parents' house when we were children

Larry, his wife Renate, Joe and me

Joe and I in our tuxes by the wedding canopy, the chuppah

Snow on I-68 in Western Maryland