On carrying all the books home.

Today, I remembered with fondness the day that I was commanded to bring all my books home. I was in second grade. I remember the loud pounding in my heart when I found out that I had forgotten my religion book at home. O boy, o boy, am I gonna get it. Maybe Ms. Peterson will spank my hand even. Nope, Mom saved the day. She appeared out of no where with my book and no spankings followed. You are completely disorganized, was the diagnosis of my father. I want all books home everyday. Until when? Until, I say so. I did too. Enoch and Evy were deciding which books were right to carry to school on a half of day and I got a flashback.
4th Ave. all my books. socks around my feet and 89 stairs to get to the F train after a whole day of school. That is tired. Step 47, 48, I think I will try to pull my socks up and take a breather. Don't drop the books! Don't let them slip back down the stairs. {I do remember dropping them back a time or 2} builds character? I don't know, builds muscle, that I do know. Ding dong. Never mind let that one go there is no way that I am running for that train with all these books. Sometimes, I ran up the steps and definitely by step fortysomething I was winded and ready to faint. Just slow down, what are you rushing for the next train will come and you will get a seat. Anyway all my books in tow, was a recipe for knowing and memorizing all the books that were in my bag. Set, 2 hours each way on the train with no comrades but my books... Go figure. Ju didn't have such a plight. There is no way she would let them tell her how many books to bring home. Just me.

Snowdays.

86th Street was a shopping area, so I heard.

It was 5 or so stops from the last stop where I got on the train to go home from school. It marked the first leg of the first lap of my commute home from school. I had just gotten my nightcap on for a long ride, when any of the stalwart travellers who got on with me were getting off to shop. The skirts would be wheeled up and the things that made us look like Catholic School girls were shed by the time we got to 86th Street. I was too much on a mission to concern myself with the style of things, in those days. I had a long, long ride to go. There were no photo ops on 86th Street for me. Anyone who stayed on after 86th or got on after that point were usually the real commuters. They weren't doing riding the subway for fun, they were doing coming from work. Why was I commuting? It wasn't money, that was for sure. It wasn't fun, by that point I was whipped, tired. I had had a long day of school and was heading home for alot of drama, most days. I can't tell you how many times I fell asleep and found myself in some unknown stop, where the lights were not bright and from where I didn't know how to get home.
Are you going to 86th today? I would overhear them say. That meant they had money and would be shopping. I could not even imagine such a thing, nor, if I had money would it have woooed me to get off at 86th St. I had the fear of Dad upon my heart and soul and would no more veer off the beaten path on purpose, than jump in a lake.
Not one of the "good girls" who were imitating the naughty on 86th St., there was no category for me, in those days. I had one uniform skirt and I kept it at or below my knees. I walked and lived in the fear of my father all of the time. Other girls could relate with that. They all had fathers who would "kill" them for this or that. I guess that is what it meant to go to private school, it was a father's intense investment in the life and education of his daughter. It meant that he loved her enough to beat her to death, rather than let her get taken advantage of by someone else. He loved her enough to discipline her mind and heart before she got grown. In that way, we were all good girls. We were all carefully aimed to be good wives and mothers and workers and politicians and thinkers and we mostly got to where we were aimed, but for that brief moment we were children. Children attempting to test the bounds of the bars of the prisons that we were in. How far and what can we get away with? The people who got on at 86th St were grown already and I had absolutely nothing in common with them. But the girls who got off at 86th St were the girls that we were being groomed to a common goal.

Once, we were verbally accosted by some public school girls. You girls think you are something, don't you? (more words followed, with threats and pushes). In my day, I would have taken that challenge to street fight. Not now. Now, I had a higher challenge. We let them do their threatenings and it never went past their 10 or 12 black girls on the train in "civilian clothes". I am sure that they were loved and aimed, just as much as I, but the only time we were in proximity to them was, in their threatenings. This doesn't make for good PR for public school people. They didn't have an identity to uphold, it seemed. No one would know where they went to school, if they got into trouble. Our clothes marked us that we had to be "good", or try to be "good", or somebody would be telling the school that we were wreaking havoc.
We all wanted to be bad, or look like we were bad, but we could get put out of school for representing the uniform poorly and our fathers would-- as it were "kill" us. So we had to try to be "good". I was the only "good" girl still on the train, after 86 St. it felt like.

These cold wintry mornings remind me of the beauty of the Brooklyn Bridge in the snow!

During our Christmas vacations, we always would have Sportsnight practices. Practices that we held at various and sundry schools and churches to get ready for our yearly competitions between the class years. It was a very important thing to us to be the champions. To work hard within our class and vanquish the other years. From Freshman year in 1975, we made our mark as a very competitive class. We had the Freshman Candyland as our theme and came very close to beating the Seniors. We came in second in the whole event. I remember traveling to Sportsnight practice and being the only person on the J train, because it was above ground on the bridge and the train stopped on the Brooklyn bridge and the snow was everywhere. The bridge was swaying and I declare, we were ready to fall into the water. It would have been the conductor the engineer and me on that day. We were the only brave or stupid souls braving the mounds of snow, into Brooklyn. Sportsnight was always the end of January, sometime. Always an excursion for us Queens people to travel there. Our family never had a car that could brave the elements and there was always a story of safety being taken into question and the craziness of my family supporting my scholastic adventure. I do appreciate them for that.
The first Sportsnight, when we nearly won the crown. I was flying like a kite on the way home. Dad said let's go the opposite way and see if we can make some time going on the BQE instead of going on the Belt. {What did I know about those things?}
Sure DAD, lets. Me and him and Mom traveled around the turn and were under the Fort Hamilton overpass and CABOOM, we hit the first pothole and the lights on the dashboard went bright and then dark. UH OH! We are stuck, it is dark and the snow is up to our kazoo. If we stay in the car, someone will come and hit us. If we get out of the car we have no where to go but up the trestle. We can do it, Dad said. We can? I was still in my volleyball shorts and a coat. We mountain climbed up the trestle to the street above and walked to the subway and took it home. What an adventure it was.

Good Girls Get off at 86th St.--1975

Chapter One –
The voyage-

The voyage-
It was going to be a long summer before my adventure into the unknown. I had won the general excellence medal and no bells or whistles had accompanied this as I had hoped. More responsibility, more children in the home, more conflicts to deflect; still, there was something to look past. It was all a blur when S. Lucy asked me if I would like to take an adventure and travel into the far reaches of outer space and go to school. She may as well have said that. Bay Ridge? Brooklyn? Verrazano Bridge? That was just about as far from home as I could imagine at that ripe old age of 14.

We will leave this decision completely up to you, they said. Would you do something like that and leave your home and go 2 hours everyday both ways for High School? I would, I will. Tony Boy screamed and cried, when we told them. “She’s leaving us.” He said, at 3 years old. I am not leaving Tony, yes you are you are going to that bridge place. No, I am not I will be home everyday. He was more right than I knew.
Now, we had the summer to brag and talk about Jayne’s upcoming adventure into the deep! The clear blue sea was the distance that seemed to be between me and the bridge.


The talk of the family, advice was flowing about the subway and how to stay away from strangers and derelicts and bums. I couldn’t imagine what they were talking about at all.
I remember trying to picture the masses of people getting into the train like they talked about and I had nothing to compare it to. Stay by the door, follow the groups of people and they will know where the door is so that you can get in and get a seat. You should be able to get a seat because you are going from the first stop on the train to the last stop on the train so, everyday you should have a seat. People will bump and the train lights will go out and all sorts of advice was flowing from people who heard that I was headed for such an adventure.

Somebody should have said that is stupid. Nobody said that in those days, no distance was long enough to send children for the cause of integration. What is integration? What is busing? What is a child? What is the purpose? Are we integrated yet?


I did believe in integration and I believed in all of the civil rights that they told us that we were fighting for and integrating for. What they netted, all toll? I am not sure.

Anyway, S. Lucy had gone to the school and she painted it as a magical and beautiful place and when I visited, I could see myself there. S.Lucy gave me a vision, outside of my life. I don’t know if that was a gift or a nightmare. Some of both, I suppose.

The first day in the subway after the testdrive. I walked down the stairs and there were lights and arrows and people, who all seemed to know where they were going.
I was dressed in my new, new uniform and floundering through the seas of people, in a dreamlike state. I was absolutely unsure where I was going. All I knew was the F train to 4th Ave and the RR to the last stop. That seemed easy enough. Darkness.
Every window had lines and levels of darkness passing by, darted with signs of street names that I had never seen before. After a while, they would become as familiar as the faces at home. Not now, now they were darts and images of the dark and unfamiliar. Blackness and grayness and lights and shadows, mixed with signs of street names.
All of a sudden light started coming through the windows and I remember the feeling of complete horror at the sight of the sun, the first time, after being underground for over an hour. Am I in the wrong place? How come I don’t remember this? Should I get off? Where am I? Finally the place that I was looking for, 4th Avenue. Whew! This is right.
I looked around and everybody still knew where they were going. I forgot. I had done this once with mom, but she talks the whole trip. I didn’t remember anything and nothing looked familiar except the sign 4th Avenue. Where is the RR train? Where is the RR train? I probably would have layed right down there and had a temper tantrum, if I were anyone else but me. I was exhausted and I had all of my books and there were only the sight of over 100 steps to go down to anything and everybody was going that way. Don’t ask and never talk to strangers, of course.

I couldn’t count the steps there that day, I was too tired. It was 8 oclock and I was due at school at 8:45. I could not imagine making it to school in that time. Of course, the thrill of a new school was still ahead and I believe that that was the only thing that kept me from barfing. What was I in for? This? Everyday? It was an adventure and you are on a mission. That was the plan, I suppose?
Down, down,down,down… it was 10 after 8 when I got to the RR train platform. It was a small dark platform way under ground. More darkness. More signs and trains and klikety klack. Finally 99th st and the last stop. I may have fallen asleep. There was a sigh that there really was such a thing as 95th st . exit. 7 blocks more. I do remember this part, because it was above ground. I climbed upstairs and started walking. How do the streets go, down here I think it was the 95 st exit and I was going to.


Everyday, no matter what I did my knee socks would be around my feet, by the time I got to the deli. I pulled them up when I was coming up the steps into the sunlight and then when I got to the corner of the deli, they would be around my shoes. I would put all my books down and look inside for the time on the clock and pull up my socks. If they came down between there and class, it was too bad. I was not putting my books down again for something so silly. Dad said every book home every day. Every book home everyday!
What a beautiful place! It was like a fairy land. The hedges were always impeccable, later on they would be Ju’s tissue when she sneezed everyday. I couldn’t imagine how fond of the hedges we would become. Then the view of the Bridge. My favorite place in the entire world. It was worth the trip. One look at that immense and beautiful structure, with the sun shining in my eyes made it worth every moment of darkness. I was scared of the people, for sure. But the bridge was just beautiful and peaceful and protective even. I loved it.
I looked around at the new class. Nobody looked at me funny. Nobody made fun of my socks. I felt somewhat safe. This was going to be home for a while.

I had occasion to swim in the moat of maternal/child experience with my mother.

I cannot pen the intimacies of umbilically challenged 49 year old with her mother.
I can just note the general theme.

--- I really think that Eve herself gave those Hansts,Bowen,Christie women their knowledge of child development. I don't agree with their tactics, most times, but it is a preservative to our culture to have had them in the world. I do respect the years of experience and the methods of passing those maternal observations to their children. They are like God's secure safe of mothering. Other families may have something like it, but if you learn the combination and can get past the hard exterior there is, seemingly, an infinite wealth of child rearing experience.

I hated them, growing up. I hated all of my business being fodder for the family table. Do you know what she did this week? Do you know what she said to me? Everybody knew everything. All my business? What business. When I was sassy, how I cut myself and almost cut myself... No privacy inside the home and none with the extended family. I didn't realize that I was the eldest grand, the guineapig.
Now, I miss the sense of extended family that I ran with diligence to get away from. Now, that I am trying to weave the maternal knowledge into my own potential maternal/child experts, I miss the contributions.


This time, my mom and I observed the connection of nursing and the nursing hormones with the child development. If grief and pain is passed on to the children, what is passed when we work outside of the home and are passing those anxieties to our children? We spoke about that among the other spiritual observations on how God uses pastured Mothers in the world around us. Is our job passe'? Does God want us to hermit ourselves and just pray for the kareening world around us? He plugs Mommies into the kareening world to slow the pace of disaster and inhumaneness and spotlight the importance of the little things that delight. The sparkle and gleam in the baby's eyes when they are full of baby milk. The importance of what you sensitize them to, in their early days. The baby that learns early not to bite mommy, has human sensitivities.
The greater distance between mommy and her baby is a recipe for hardening of our souls. What do we want in the next generation? Life-giving practices or life-taking practices?
Can a woman forget her own son? Yes they may, But God never forgets.

The Pruning of the Butterfly Bush

I am half done pruning my butterfly bush. I still have alot of cutting to do. Butterfly Bush had gotten so very large and plumulous, {if that is a word}. I was cutting and cutting and imagining myself, had I the time to make baskets out of the precious many stalks that delighted me so, in the summertime. I want to keep them for ever, for the many butterfly and moth visitors that they attracted. It is Autumn, now. Time to bring it down so that it can grow more attractive in the next season. I had intentions of moving it to the backyard, but that would be too large a chore. I'll be happy, if I can take it down another half before snow fall. I may need a stronger pruning instrument. We'll see.

Now the leaves are off of Ginger and snap is half mast.

The okra is growing its last few beautiful veggies and my beets and beans are just popping their heads above the ground. Not really a garden, or a fruitful garden, but I learned alot and loved looking at my few plants in my veggie patch. Certain plants do very well and eggplants are not one of them. I didn't get one eggplant. I got a bunch of okra, but no eggplants. I will try again next season on my patch. The temperatures are still medium and I keep thinking that I can just throw the seeds out there and they'll do alright. But it is freezing at night and that is a problem. Well, Next year I may try broccoli.

I do fall so short of my mentor for gardening-- Rabbit, from the 100 Acre Woods.

Although he is a figment of AA Milne's imagination he is always calculating and always growing something. I keep getting distracted by the calculations of things when it comes to gardening. I have so much else to distract me. The other day I was admiring the handiwork of God in the persperation glands. The coiling and imaginitive way that those glands sit under the surface of the skin and do what they are intended to do. Were they always intended to look so confusing?









Sweat, persperation was a result of the fall. The sweat glands seem to look like that, {a confused afterthought of the fall}. As I was walking through Lowes, some brown eyed susans looked exactly like the sweat glands to me. They were coiling. I said I must have them. They are just what the sweatglands look like under the skin. I must see why they came up that way. The expensive flowers were straight and nice, these were in the bargain bin because they were, coiled up. I didn't get to put them into the ground until today and they were nearly dead, once I got them into the ground.
My hypothesis is that our bodies were cooler, before the fall and heated up as a result of the eating of the forbidden fruit. There was something about those brown eyed susans that made me look again at my pictures of the sweat glands. I plant flowers and God planted sweat glands. That is my small contribution to beating my swords to PLOWSHEARS.

Ginger and Snap, both have baby pears.

I do love my pear trees. I love the little fruit that they are both touting with pride today. The birdies love them too. This morning was about getting the weeds out of the front yard and cooking for the using of stuff that was going bad. I found 2 maple trees trying to bogard my red fern. I will not have it! I pulled them out and will pot them, until I find the right place for them. I really don't get over to spend time with my lamb's ears, like I wanted to this season. This evening will be time for the lamb's ears and Diva and Prima, who are crying for want of attention. For now it is time to clean the inside of the house in the heat of the day. Thank God for Central Air!