Maybe it was more intimidating when dress shops had an actual name. When the boutique said it was not just fashionable, but the fashion of this woman. This LaRou. And we knew it was her choice, her idea of what to wear, because it was right there, in the name of the store, within the possessive of the “s.” With all respect and admiration, I followed my mother beneath the gentle ring of the opening door, as she stepped into LaRou’s.
She lightly touched the fabrics. Sure not to leave a trace of evidence that the money wasn’t there. Yet smiling, behind the knowledge, she was worthy of wearing.
Through the years, I watched her confidence grow. I watched her walk through the bells a little faster. A little taller. The names on the stores changed. The locations. From Alexandria, to Minneapolis, to Chicago and New York. All the “s”s that were dropped, she collected and wore them proudly. For each outfit was not theirs any longer. She added the grace. The style. And didn’t they all become Ivy’s.
I see it so clearly now. Watching people become. How extraordinary they are, you are, when you step into your grace. Claim it as your own. Walk proudly under the ringing of your own bell — your opening to this life. Claiming your apostrophe. Beautiful!
I don’t think it’s an accident, this walking up to the things we didn’t know existed, we didn’t know we needed. On our last trip to the US, I was strolling Linden Hills. I saw the bookstore. Already knowing my suitcase was full, I knew I couldn’t add the weight of more books. And yet, my feet shrugged my shoulders and I walked inside. Forever drawn to little things with feathers, (hope itself as Emily poemed us), I saw it on the table. Flat bookmarks with pens inside. It was if they saw me coming.
But maybe that’s always the way with hope, if we pay attention, it will lead us to where we need to be.
Is it hope I’m painting daily? Surely it is peace — this meditation of time and feathers. And perhaps that is where hope best lives. Not in a flurry — even birds know to rest. Secure in the flights to come. So too, I mark the daily hope, with the gentle stroll that led me here. And I am saved.
I heard of them long before I ever heard of “sea legs.” I could see them at eye level. I put my hands up like a director holding the camera to keep my mother’s legs in constant sight as she danced and weaved through the hangered racks.
I was near her eye level once we graduated from Herberger’s basement to Dayton’s in Minneapolis — getting into the rhythm of my own “shopping legs.” And never were we more tested than on Black Fridays. Some said the crowds were too much, but not my mother. She saw it as the dance floor being full. Perhaps it was from practicing each weekend in her heels of youth at the Glenwood Lakeside Ballroom. I didn’t always know who was playing in her head. Was it Glen Miller? Tommy Dorsey? But it was something to see. The pulling of the ruffled blouse off the rack. Holding out at arms’ length. The wink of admiration, when yes, it was decided, they were going to dance.
It’s not just today. There are constant crowds of opposition and misinformation. And some choose to plant their feet. But I was taught to listen. To watch. To sway. To see not the crowd, but the dance.
I used to wait until the day after Thanksgiving to begin decorating for Christmas. Of course it’s not a French holiday, but I still feel it, these precious days. And in a moment of good news, of special thanks, I began stringing lights.
Even when I take the time to put away the decorations, they seem to have the capacity to knot themselves into a frenzy — into tangles that no Johnson’s baby shampoo could tackle.
I smile, remembering how golden that bottle was, just like the lights in my hand. What care my mother took with my long blonde locks. Stroke by stroke, she brushed each strand, staying true to the “No tears,” just as the bottle claimed. But somehow I always knew, it wasn’t the shampoo that kept the promise, but the gentle touch of my mother’s hands.
And isn’t this what illuminates me still? Isn’t this what sets my table? So I make a new promise, to her, and all the loves that surround me now, to ever be gentle, never careless, with these precious days.
There’s probably a path worn from my daily trek to the hills of the Montaiguet. But I can tell you, I have never walked the same way twice. (Sure, if you’re going to count by tread marks, but my travels are led (or whisked away) by imagination, and are more like the darting of the birds to the stories just behind the trees.
I suppose I started on Van Dyke Road, dragging a wagon full of fellow wanderers — more than willing participants in the sunlit adventure of the afternoon. No rules or fences, only wonder. “I wonder if my hand could fit in there?… or if my doll could reach that highest limb? If the elephant I won tossing rings at the Douglas County fair missed its friends, and were they waiting in the North End? Could we all survive on one can of Chicken Noodle soup? Could the wagon actually take flight if pushed fast enough down the hill? How do you get grass stains out of a baby blanket? Is there a secret land in Hugo’s field? Could my mother always find me?”
My feet may not be as quick, by my mind is still as wistful as the wondering wren. The sun comes up, and I flutter.
I started out breech, so maybe it’s no surprise that I rarely lead with my head. Oh, it will step in to do the usual, like balancing a bank account, or formatting my computer, but on a daily basis, my heart is making most of the decisions — like how much sugar to add (that’s from my grandma’s heart corner); or how much trust to offer (that’s from my mother’s).
Maybe it’s because the lines of communication run clear, but my hands and feet have no trouble following. If the heart says go, they are more than willing to participate. I guess they know from experience that they won’t be judged by this leader — unlike the brain, that will question their every move. No, the heart is forgiving. Compassionate. So I listen.
That’s not to say you won’t get hurt along the way, oh, how that heart can feel. But that’s also the best thing about it — OH, how that heart can feel!
So I continue the way I started, ever believing my feet will take me where my heart needs to go.
The noise was constant. Children and pans. Even the overalls and coats that hung by the furnace seemed to hum. So it was something to hear it — how the upstairs bedroom closets whispered. I could crawl all the way inside and shut the door. Armed with only admiration, curiosity, and my grandfather’s flashlight, I opened the boxes. It wasn’t forbidden — mostly out of lack of time, I suppose. My grandmother had too many things to do. How could she keep track of every child and all those eager thumbs, thumbing through her past.
It wasn’t a lot, when you think of the years that had passed. A few coats and hats. A fox stole. I had to imagine her once this small — before her belly had grandma-ed behind the aprons. To rub the fur was to awaken the genie, and I could see her, clutching her imaginary pearls, blushing at a boy behind the Alexandria hotel.
And I thought how she must have loved us, the pure thought of us, to trade in all those whispers for the never ending noise. I closed up everything with the admiration it deserved and creaked my way down the steps to the kitchen. I got face deep in her softened belly and hugged her. “What’s that now?” She asked. I curled my pointer finger in motion, asking her to bend her ear to my mouth. It seemed too pedestrian to shout it over the din. She wiped her hands on her thighs and bent down. I whispered in her ear, “Thanks for loving me.” She smiled. Kissed the top of my head. And the spoons clanked on.
There was a certain freedom to it – being in the girls’ gym. You might think freedom a strange word for this windowless box in the basement of Central Junior High. But certainly there were no pressures to impress.
We cycled through the normal courses. Basketball. Volleyball. A simple change with a new set of balls. But when it came time for the gymnastics week, the whole pink gymnasium was transformed. Beams and mats. Horses and Bars. Certainly we should have been padded on knees and elbows. At the very least helmeted, gauging our limited expertise. Yet, we flung ourselves without knowledge or permission in unwashed gym shorts and t-shirts for the allotted 50 minutes. No guidance. No spotters. No inhibitions.
The floor exercise came with a record player. We were decades ahead of the popular saying, “Dance like no one is watching,” — believe me, no one was. Dropping the needle with a scratch, then racing to the mat, we made “routines” (completely ignoring the definition of routine, because certainly these movements couldn’t be repeated, as we made them up to the music.)
We were never graded. If you could make it up the cement stairs back to the locker room, you passed.
I can feel it sometimes. Hear the turning of the record as the day begins. And I just abandon rule and worry, and move. I get to decide. We get to decide, how to make our freedom. How to fill it. Drop the needle, and simply dance.
Before I met my mother and her cousin, they worked at the phone company. Just out of school, they were best of friends. All giggles and lipstick. Ruffles and elbows. Every ring was filled with possibility.
Lapped and fascinated, I told my mother to tell it again. Having since met her cousin, it just didn’t seem possible. Hadn’t Janet just come from the potato pit? Hadn’t she just saved her husband Joey after being kicked by the cow? I couldn’t imagine her all dressed up under the fluorescent lights of Alexandria’s Telephone Company on Broadway.
“Oh, she was a beauty,” my mother said. “Just like you,” I said. My mother smiled. “I looked up to her,” she continued. I imagined Janet, now 10’ deep in the summer crop chilling for winter and it just seemed so unlikely. My mouth open in wonder, she told me what has remained, “People aren’t just one thing.”
The thing is, we think we know. We think because we see people for ten minutes that we understand their lives. Why they do the things we do. We have to go from potato pit to coffee break. We have to see the full picture. Even then, we can’t be entirely sure. We have to leave room for change. Room for growth. Room for the rings of possibility.
I like to think of them mid-giggle. Nothing lights a person better than joy. I have to allow myself the same grace. We all do. Good morning, my friends! Welcome to the phone company!
It might surprise you to know that the best croissant we’ve ever had, was not in Aix en Provence, nor Paris, but San Francisco. We congratulated them. French butter, they said. It was perfection. Nothing added. No cookies or chocolate stuffed in the middle. No pistachio cream. Just a simple butter croissant. When things are done well, no additions are required.
And isn’t it the same with living? The best that we can offer is often without flare or fanfare. An open door. A seat at the table. An understanding that doesn’t require explanation, only a place, a presence.
We all know people who are struggling. Sometimes I think we imagine that we have to offer an answer. A solution. Most people really only want to know that you care — they want to taste the richness of your simple French butter — to step into the warmth of your heart’s kitchen, and simply sit down.
