April showers and memories

It's been raining and showering off and on these last few days, but today the sun is shining and all is right with the world.
Summer is on the way; the flowers are beginning to bud.
I can't wait for my knockout roses to bloom. They bring a smile to my face every time I see them from my living room windows.

April brings memories of friendship and love.
Doris Cahoon Perry, the first counseling psychologist at Trenton State College, was born in April and died in April, too, some 73 years later. I think of the hours I spent in her company with sheer joy, remembering her infectious laugh, her beautiful blue eyes and her gift of empathy, which she showered on me during some of the neediest days of my life. I remember her in April and cherish the knowledge that she gave me the gift of her friendship.

April brings memories of mothering and unconditional love.
Catherine Rossette Rubba Caroccio was born on April 24, 1916 and died on December 3, 1972. From my earliest memory, she was the one constant in my life, the person who never judged, always supported and ever opened her arms to me, no matter what. I never imagined her not being with me well into old age (hers and perhaps even mine!), so her death at 56 was such a blow it left me bereft and feeling totally alone in the world. I look like her...in fact, last week when I came home sporting my new haircut, I passed her picture which hangs in the hallway of our home and had to stop to stare in amazement at the resemblance. We have the same oval-shaped face, the same eyes, the same smile and, thanks to my hair stylist, even our hairdos are alike!

Unlike my mother, whose friends considered her to be a saint, I am not such a mild-mannered, soft-spoken person. My mom, it has been said, never raised her voice to anyone, never was given to fits of temper. I, on the other hand, am prone toward letting my feelings, positive or negative, show and no one I know would ever describe me as saintly.

Still, I am proud to carry her resemblance so that anyone who knew her would give a quick intake of breath upon meeting me and say, "Oh my goodness! I thought for a minute you were Kate!" Sadly, those people are also leaving this world, probably to sit for a cup of coffee and a good laugh with my mom, wherever she is.

April also brings some anxiety over the health of a dear friend, who will undergo surgery on my mom's birthday. Knowing my mother as I do, I know she will, at my request, be watching over Carole and guiding the hands of her surgeon on April 24th. Mom's goodness will bring a blessing to Carole, just as it did to everyone who loved her.

April is a warm, happy, loving and compassionate month.

Waiting for summer

The end of March.
The end of winter? Millions on the east coast fervently hope so.
Seems it's been cold, snowy, windy and/or rainy/icy forever.
Only visions of sparkling ocean water, hot, burning sand and brilliant sunshine has kept me going.

As a kid, I wasn't much for the beach. My mom didn't like it at all and my stepdad, ever conscious of the club foot for which he hadn't been treated as a child, didn't go barefoot. Ever.
So the few times I got to the beach was in the company of my aunt and uncle or with the parents of friends who had a house somewhere along the Jersey shore.
I never learned to swim.
I was always terrified of water being too deep to touch bottom.
Maybe I'd drowned in another life.
So I sat out the beach trips lying on a towel or blanket, people-watching or reading, always nursing the hope of a gorgeous, even tan at the end of the day.
Naturally, a painful, red sunburn was the reality, along with humidity-flattened hair that screamed to the world that I'd been at the beach, without any of the glory of it.

Then I grew up.

When my girls were young, I was in a relationship with a man who had a house at the shore.
We took our kids and often their friends for weekends at the beach and on the boardwalk.
The beach was the best. It didn't carry any of the scary memories from my girlhood. No, it somehow became a place of refuge from stress, where behind my eyelids I could envision the waves and hear the squawking of the seagulls as they swooped down to steal a piece of popcorn, hotdog or potato chip from a dozing sun worshipper's hands.
I could never get enough of it.

Now the girls are grown.
They still love the beach and we gather there regularly to feel the sand between our toes and the sun on our faces.
Only April to survive...perhaps with the assistance of some tulips and daffodils, even warmer temperatures and sunshine.
Then will come May, June and the true summer months.
We are waiting, although not patiently.
Is it beach weather yet?

Mourning Mitzi

She was a foundling... a little grey striped tabby kitten with no whiskers, dragged out of a storm drain by firefighters I called at the behest of a neighbor who'd heard her crying.

After a sincere but futile attempt to leave her at a no-kill shelter in another town, I walked out of the AWA with tears running down my face at the thought I'd just condemned her to death.

Seventeen years later, I did make that decision. She'd developed severe kidney disease and suddenly, on Friday morning, July 4, I realized she had lost her sight. Sunday night, in an unusual reversal of her habits of the past few months, she found my bed, clawed her way up the spread and laid down, her little white paws crossed delicately in front of her white chest.

I laid down next to her and we talked. It was full circle, that chat, because it began in my car as I drove her to the shelter in 1997. She put her paw out between the slats in the carrier and talked to me, in her most plaintive meow. When a few days later I went back to adopt her, I did most of the talking.

I promised her I would give her a happy, safe and warm home. I promised her she would never suffer if it were in my power to prevent it. I promised her that, some day way down the road, when her life was not happy, when she had lost the sparkling personality I loved, I would help her find peace.

So, when we laid on my bed Sunday night, July 6, I reminded her of our first conversation. She couldn't blink her eyes because of the blindness, but once in a while, she would reach out a paw and touch my arm or my face and use what little voice she still commanded to respond to what I was saying.

The next morning, I called our vet to arrange to take Mitzi in. Not for a thyroid or sub-Q treatment, but for her final visit. The doctor knew how upset I was and gently promised to send Mitzi off without suffering. I held her head, both hands on her face, as the tranquilizer quickly took effect and she slipped into unconsciousness. Mine was the last voice she heard. Howard and I stayed with her for a while before we left the room so the final injection could be given. When we went back in, she was gone... her little face still, her eyes open, but no life shining from them.

I knew it would be hard. I'd fretted over it repeatedly during those 17 happy years. How could I possibly say goodbye to Mitzi when the time came? The decision was easy, as it turned out. I simply watched her for two days as she struggled to find her way around the house she'd lived in for eight years. I knew she wasn't eating much and she rarely ventured out from under the chair where I'd placed an afghan my mother made for me over 50 years ago, so Mitzi would always have a soft and warm place to rest. How could I have asked her to endure that life any longer?

But what I haven't counted on is the lingering grief. Mitzi is everywhere in our little house. When I come home from anywhere, I open the kitchen door and call out "Mommy's home!" before remembering that she isn't going to come running to greet me. Sitting in my favorite TV-watching chair, I feel her presence on the arm next to mine or her paw on my head from the back of the chair.

But nights are the worst. For 17 years, Mitzi came to bed with me. Usually she waited untilt he lights went out before jumping silently up at the foot of the bed and then making her way to my side, her paw seeking out my face before she stretched out, purring, and went to sleep. Now, without her, I lie in bed and remember and it makes me unbearably sad.

Someone who doesn't cherish their pets or who doesn't believe pets have souls and can give and receive love unconditionally will probably smirk and dismiss my loss with the "C'mon, it was only a cat!" comment I have often heard.

Others, knowing the bond that develops between pet and human, have expressed condolences and sent expressions of sympathy on Facebook and through the mail, both e and snail. I feel like I should be getting over this, at least getting to the point where I can remember Mitzi without tears.

I'm not there yet. Don't know when I will get there. I've lost many, many pets over the years, but none has touched my heart like my little Mitzi. Perhaps that's why this is taking such a long time. She captured my heart when I first saw her and she tightened her hold on it gradually, over the span of 17 years, until it belonged to her. Perhaps our connection and all the happy memories she gave me were meant to ease the sadness and allow me to think of her and smile. That sounds good to me. Now it's just a matter of putting it into practice.

Scanning through the years

It's been an interesting winter in more ways than one.

Sure, we've had more snow than we've had in many years... more than I hope to see again for a long time.

But the bad weather, a nasty fall I took in January and an ingrown toenail have proven to be providential.

During my downtime, I have been able to delve deeply into a project I thought would be put off for months, if not years, until I finally got around to it.

I've been scanning photos, emptying albums as I go, dropping the pictures into albums in my Dropbox and sharing them with family. To date, I'll bet I've scanned well over 500 photos beginning from my babyhood to the present and then, recently, from Howard's babyhood to the present.

His late mother, Ann, left four photo albums and a wicker basket filled with miscellaneous photos, many of which are pictures of people even Howard doesn't know. But as long as someone in his family is portrayed, the photo gets scanned.

I'm well into his family now... wicker basket empty, four albums to go.

The journey into my past was bittersweet.

Seeing myself as an infant, a toddler and then a little girl, almost always with a sober face and big, sad eyes, brought back tales of the unhappy childhood I endured. When I was smiling, it was a professional photo and a viewer could almost hear the photographer saying "Smile!" So phony.

There are three years missing, the ones during which my mother and I lived with her sister and brother-in-law, Louise and Frank. No one took my picture in those days... I was part of the landscape... best either ignored or ridiculed.

But at age 11, after my mother remarried and we had a new home, the photos begin anew. And I am more relaxed, though never self-assured. Not then, not now.

I would recommend this exercise to anyone. Not only will it preserve family heritage but it will walk you through parts of your life you might have consigned to memory, accurate or not, pleasant or not.

For fun, I change out my Facebook profile picture about once or twice a month. Friends seem to enjoy the glimpses they get into the me of long ago.

You should try it.

Horrific conundrum

Now is not a good time to be president of the United States.

In fact, I can't think of a good time, except perhaps when a staff member does all the cooking, cleaning and housekeeping. Those are the only perks I envy.

Last night, I watched the incredibly awful footage of the carnage in Syria. It was on the BBC news channel, not on one of our mainstream, corporate-ruled networks, so the video was unedited, raw and deeply disturbing.

I couldn't help but visualize the faces of my children and grandchildren superimposed on those suffering people, burned over 80% of their bodies by some toxic agent, something resembling napalm, the narrator said.

It left me near tears. How, I asked myself, could we stand by and watch this without stepping in to at least render the chemical weapons useless? How can the world see the carnage and ignore it? How can Assad be allowed to flaunt his ability to defy international law without grave repercussions from every other nation on the planet?

That was my gut reaction, the first solution I descended upon in my urge to punish Assad for these atrocities.

Looking at the whole picture, though, US involvement in this crisis might prove more costly than otherwise.

Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons on the Kurds after the Iran/Iraq war. We didn't take him out for that. We didn't even intervene or send missiles to cripple his ability to continue doing so. Instead we invaded Iraq after 9/11 on the flimsiest of excuses, on a lie, to be exact, and the war dragged on for ten years.

Bashir al Assad is a mass murderer of his own people. We've seen the outcome of the chemical attacks and we know the UN inspectors are close to releasing a report that, in all probability, will indict Assad as the authority behind the chemical attacks.

Our president is weighing the appropriate US response to Assad's criminal activity. So far, France has joined our resolve to render the chemical weapons undeliverable, although destroying them outright isn't possible without troops on the ground to find and obliterate them.

But the British Parliament, after listening in rapt attention to Prime Minister David Cameron's case for outside involvement, voted against allowing its country to take part. The vote is non-binding, of course, but it's highly unlikely Cameron will ignore the will of his government and join any US-led attack on Syria.

I've listened carefully, too. I've considered the point of view of those who are adamantly against US involvement in Syria's civil war. I've considered the point of view of those who would bomb Syria off the planet for what it's done to its people.

And I'm glad I don't have to make that decision. I am leaning heavily toward the argument against US involvement, at least not unless the UN and our allies are onboard and participating in whatever action is taken.

I, like so many Americans, am tired of war. Tired of not having enough money to take care of our needs here at home. Tired of watching the gravely wounded struggle to find peace and wellness after fighting in someone else's war. Tired of being the world's policeman. It's time to turn our resources and our attention homeward.

The other side of me, though, can't get the images of those suffering Syrians out of my mind. Shouldn't the world be aghast? Can the world allow this conduct to go unpunished? If nothing is done, Assad is free to use those horrible weapons again and again with impunity. We shouldn't even be considering allowing that.

So what do we do? We wait for our president to make the critical decision and we hope other countries will back his decision wholeheartedly. Not a satisfactory outcome, but the only one open to us.

Writers in the family

I love to write and would do nothing else if I could. My daughters are both terrific writers.

So was my dad, a dentist by trade and a writer because he loved to do it.

All three of my half-sisters are talented, gifted writers. And now, I've found another writer: my godson and cousin, Matthew Cairone, whom I have not seen in many, many years.

I found Matt's work when I put his name into Google to try to find contact info so I could wish him a happy birthday. No contact info, really, just site after site listing him as an author of short stories, songs and novels.

I remember Matt as a kid... the little boy playing baseball in the back yard with my stepdad... the cute kid who acted as surrogate big brother to my older daughter, shadowing her as she toddled around, making sure she met with no harm.

While I was busy with my own convoluted life, Matt went to college, law school and eventually moved to Michigan, then Pittsburgh. I heard he'd married and divorced and had children. I thought about him a lot, but never took the big step of trying to contact him.

Now I will. I sent him a Facebook message and have a phone number I will use to give him a call. I need to tell him how surprised and pleased I am that he, too, is a writer, on a far wider scale than I, but a writer nonetheless.

It's all in the family.

Going back to 1954

I was thirteen and a trip to Connie Mack Stadium in northeast Philadelphia was an unheard of treat. Although we lived only about 45 miles from the city, it was rare to be able to actually travel there, let alone to witness a baseball game with my mother and stepfather.

But it turned out I witnessed far more than an athletic contest that record hot August day. Although 58 years have passed, I still have a vivid memory of what happened when we left the stadium and sat in traffic waiting to get to Broad Street and on our way home.

The row homes that bordered each side of Lehigh Avenue contained people everywhere... on the steps, in rocking chairs on the porches, hanging out upper story windows. Unlike my own neighborhood, there were no air conditioning units visible and most of the residents waved papers or magazines to try to ward off the stifling heat.

I had never seen anything like it...misery on every face, often downright hostility in the eyes of many who watched the cars snake by, heading away from the way they lived every day.

I remember telling my parents I would hate to live that way, to be doomed to a life in the city, in the heat. Fresh from listening to the news coverage of the fight for freedom in the segregated South, I suppose I was an idealistic kid, whose sensibilities were offended by the thought that an entire race was treated as inferior and that the laws were only then beginning to recognize the injustice and move to remedy it.

As the years went on, I never forgot that seminal moment in my human rights education. Living in a small southern New Jersey town, where the few black citizens lived outside the town limits and there were no colored faces in our Catholic school classrooms, I still managed to grow into adulthood feeling a strong sense of the unfairness faced by so many of my fellow Americans.

Not even the passage of all sorts of new laws designed to help eradicate the decades of injustice...equal rights laws,  Affirmative Action laws, all of them... could succeed in changing the nature of race relations in America, where a seething racism seemed to lurk just below the surface of civil society.

So I shouldn't have been stunned by the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial. I should have been prepared, as African-American mothers and fathers prepare their sons, to expect that justice would turn a blind eye to the provocation, stalking and ultimate murder of Trayvon Martin. A friend explained to me how her husband instructed their son, as soon as he became old enough to understand, how to behave on the street or in his car should he be approached by a law enforcement officer, how to conduct himself so as to avoid anything further than a harsh look or comment.

Had I been the mother of a son, I would not have been forced to teach him the same lesson. My son, unlike those of many of my friends, would never have to contend with racial profiling. They could walk, run or drive on any thoroughfare they chose without fear of being singled out because of their race.

That same feeling of despair and anger that I experienced in 1954 rose to the surface of my consciousness again as I thought of the sorrow and pain being endured by Trayvon Martin's mother. She'd probably told her son the same thing...be careful out there...but certainly had no reasonable expectation that he would breathe his last at the hands of someone who singled him out, followed him and challenged his right to walk home from the store.

George Zimmerman could have stayed in his car. Should have. George Zimmerman could have pulled his gun and told Mr. Martin to leave the neighborhood. George Zimmerman could have waited for the police and let them discover that Mr. Martin's father lived on that street. And, as someone so eloquently posted on Facebook today, George Zimmerman could have pulled over and offered Mr. Martin a ride home, out of the rain. Unlikely, but in an ideal world, oh so wishful.

I won't live to see a world where something like that might occur. My children and even my grandchildren probably won't either. It will take generations yet for the minds of Americans to be educated to the fact that we are all one people. When one among us suffers injustice, so do we all, and I am deeply saddened to see it, again, again and again.