Della's Song

Last spring, just after moving to Horn Lake, Mississippi, I met Della on the street. Sometimes she was riding her bicycle.  More often she was walking the dogs:  a sweet, old beagle named Daisy and a pug named Otis that seemed more susine than canine.

Della's hands shook.  She got stuck in the middle of conversations, when the word she was about to speak evaporated, like morning dew. She could never remember my name.

Della and I have much in common:  we were directors of liturgical music; we taught music education in Catholic Schools.  I did so periodically; Della did so for 42 years.  Differences aside, we both love making music.

Last year, Della's son took away her driving license. (Sheriff's deputy's can arrange for that sort of thing, I suppose).  She could no longer attend Mass or sing in her parish choir.  A few people offered to bring her, but you know how that goes.  

Last month Steven and I decided to pick up the slack, switching from our Mississippi parish to Della's beloved St. Paul's in Memphis, Tennessee.  How happy the people of St. Pau's were to see her.  How grateful they were to Steven and me for bringing their Della back to them.  

In a token of thanks, Della gave me a copy of her vocal CD, recorded well before the onset of Parkinson's disease. I cringed. Several people have happily given me their musical CD's over the years. Most are - well - so very average. Della's astonished me. Her voice sounded so much like Olivia Newton John in her prime. 

Della thinks we are doing all the giving in this new relationship. But that's not true. In a world ever in motion, spinning endlessly toward some unseen end, Della moves slowly and patiently through unknown waters with humor and grace.  

Della still can’t remember my name, and she no longer rides her bicycle. Her musical form has changed. She often listens quietly or hums along as the words escape her. But when she does sing, few things on earth compare.

Parkinson's disease:  a chronic and progressive movement disorder
in which symptoms continue and worsen over time.
The cause is unknown; there is presently no cure.

Longing for a Village

There is a story recounted in Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers about the city of Roseta, Pennsylvania, not far from Bangor or Nazareth. Italian immigrants settled there in the first part of the 20th century to work in the coal mines. They developed their new city along many of the lines of their beloved village in the motherland.

Scientist and medical experts became interested in the citizenry of Roseta when it was discovered that only a small percentage of the over-fifty population had suffered any heart disease.

Roseta Valfortore, by  RaBoe/Wikipedia 

Diet was certainly not the reason.  Pizza in the homeland was a flatbread with oil cheese and vegetables. The same dish in the states had thicker breads and the addition of pepperoni, salami, and sausages. Rich desserts, a rare treat in the homeland, were served with frequency. The citizens of Roseta, Pennsylvania were not known to jog six miles a day or workout in the local gymnasium. They were under-exercised, over-weight, lived on rich food and drink.  They probably smoked. They did all the things health experts say they shouldn't, and none of the things the experts say they should.

So why were they so healthy? 

The village. 

They lived as a community: greeting one another on the street, sharing meals, stopping in to tell each other news and stories. They had common memories and connections. They knew each other. They were friends.  They were family.

I turn 53 years old, this year.  

I have stage 2 hypertension. 

I am not like the people of Roseta.  I am not obese. I do not each rich foods.  I do not smoke.  I limit my alcohol.   But, having moved so often, there is one spectacularly important way that I am not like them: there is no one here who knew me as a child, no one who knew my parents, my aunts, my uncles, no one to tell stories of my grand-parents.  I do not have the privilege of sharing a meal with someone who can remember childhood with me. There are no family members, no old friends passing by the street where I live.

Steven and I move every few years. so much so that my own children stumble over the section of applications reserved for "hometown."  This tears at my heart. They, too, will have no one to sit a spell with with and re-live childhood memories, or recall the stories and the people of their lives.

The more cosmopolitan among us think families and neighborhoods with lasting roots are quaint and oh-so-charming.  I have come to believe they are essential.

Photo Credit:
//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Roseto_Valfortore_038_(RaBoe).jpg

Rainy Days and Mondays

Rainy Days and Mondays: A lyrical litany

Weather has a strange power over us.

Steven and I took a short walk in the rain. When we headed back to the car, I wondered what all my hurrying was about. 

What ever happened to the notion of the purposeful, romantic walk in the rain, one where people actually get wet? Is this an exclusive rite of very young, fools in love or  lovers in a Nicolas Sparks novel?

Perhaps it is true that rainy days (and Monday) always get us down.  But how can I claim I made it through the rain, if I don’ ever soak it in? Sure, I prefer sunshine on my shoulders, but there is something healing and humbling, and exhilarating about standing in the rain. All little kids know that.

I am not advising you rush out into an open field during a tornado, or stand under the tallest tree in a thunder and lightning storm or casually disregard a local hurricane emergency evacuation, but baby, the rain must fall.  So don't just stare out the window, get out there, let the rain fall over you sometime, and not just to see if there really is something, somewhere over the rainbow.

The sun will come out, tomorrow.  Enjoy the rain today, it washes the planet clean, and fills our lakes and streams and grows our food. It is one of the most powerful and paradoxically, most gentle sources of life.  

And always after the rain, here comes the sun.

NO, YOU CAN'T THROW ROCKS AT THAT OLD WOMAN

photo courtesy of
Abigail P. Gage

Several Saturdays back, Steven and I were strolling down the main roadway of Latimer Lakes Park, in Horn Lake, Mississippi. A sweet family walked past: a father and two daughters. The father exchanged greeting with us and we smiled at the little girls, who looked to be about 6 and 8 years-old. We were barely out of earshot when I heard one sister admonish the other, "No, you can't throw rocks at that old woman."

I howled.

That moment is certain to be a permanent addition to all the memories we have collected in public parks over the last three decades.

You could say that our "official" life together began in a state park. May 11, 1984, Steven, who had graduated the semester before, telephoned my dorm room from his apartment in Delaware (This was in the age before ubiquitous cell phones) and told me to be up at 5:30 AM. In the still darkness, he drove us out to Round Valley State Park in Lebanon, New Jersey.  When the sun came over the horizon, he asked me to marry him (I had a hunch that was what this was all about and could hardly contain myself through his speech about something-or-another-undying-love. Steven would say that I didn't contain myself).

Limestone Rock
Shades State Park. IN

Thus began our life-long love affair with national, state and local parks. In Shades State Park (Indiana), Steven picks up other people's trash; I identify wildflowers. We stop at over looks (Hawk Mountain) or on beach fronts (Galveston) and take in the view. In every state we find something somewhere to illicit a sense of gratitude for this beautiful planet.

photo by Moon Rhythm

Lums Pond, DE

Talking about this recently, we discovered we hadn't been to any of the big boys together: the Grand Canyon or Yosemite or Yellowstone or Mount Rushmore. We seem to prefer exploring nature close by wherever we call home.

I suppose we'll eventually get to the big ones, but for now we're content to watch the mighty Mississippi roll pass, and hope the kids don't throw rocks at this old woman.


Oh, a little shout out to daughter Abigail who took me on an outdoor site-seeing expedition all over the big island of Hawaii.  She's an ace at planning trips here in the US and abroad, including our fall family trip to the Great Smokies.  I love you!

Great Smokie Mountains

Betting on Love

February 16, 1985
Colton Chapel
Lafayette College

Two Weeks.  That was the longest any of Steven's SAE Fraternity brothers were willing to bet on the staying power of his newest relationship.

As Steven likes to tell it, back then we were both students at Lafayette College and both on the Dean's List. Only, I was on the right one. And it was true we did have some interesting (and at times perplexing) run-ins with professors and administrators.

February 16, 2014
Methodist Hospital
Memphis, TN

In the local supermarket, one crisp autumn Saturday, Dr Pope, Chair of the Religion Department and ironically a Protestant, greeted us with,"Good Morning, Marianne" - look of astonishment- "What are you doing with him?"

There was also that time Steven and I took a walk about the quad, and Registrar Cyrus Fleck strolled past.  He glanced sideways, tipped his hat. "Good morning, Marianne."  Then stared straight ahead. "Mr. Gage."

I suppose we were an odd couple.  But I found something fundamentally good and lovable in Steven and he returned love for love.

November 2010
Germany

Truth be told, his love was deeper and stronger.  That's why, two blinks of the eye, four children, eight major moves, richer-poorer, in sickness and in health, for better or worse, thirty years later we're still together.

Anyone care to hedge their bets on the next thirty?

Wine and Facebook

A simple Facebook post started it: continuing comments on how many bottles of wine this writer may or may not have in her wine closet.  Yes, closet.  Cellars are at a premium here on the Mississippi Delta.  The initial FB share had nothing to do with wine.  It was a Grammarly meme that read:

Dear Optimist, Pessimist, and Realist,

While you guys were busy arguing about the glass of water, I drank it!

Sincerely,

The Opportunist

(Don’t you just love how Grammarly always uses the

Oxford comma? But I digress...)

I posted the meme, but the whole how-many-bottles-of-wine-can-she possibly-own thing was started by my very own sister, who commented,”quite frankly, if you know Marianne Gage, it was not water in that glass.”  Patti followed her accusation with the ever ubiquitous “lol.” 

Well...let the FB-comment ruckus begin.

I certainly did not deny that, at the start of the holiday season, 60-some bottles of wine rested peacefully in the closet or that 59 (umm...better make that 57) currently remain.  I did not bother to tell the curious that at one time we had over 120 said bottles.

I do not blame myself for the attraction.  I blame my sister.  Not the one that posted the FB comment, but the other one.  The one in California. In 2009, we took a family trip out from Texas to see her.  That’s when Jacque took me on my first wine-tasting tour.  And I loved it.  Because, let me tell you, Texas is good at many things—mostly big things—but wine-making is not one of them (Italian food is another, but that story will have to wait).

When Steven and I moved to the scenic Finger Lakes region of New York State, it was wine-heaven. Finger Lakes (Wine Country) New York boasts over 100 wineries nestled on the graceful, rolling shorelines of the region’s four main lakes: Cayuga, Seneca, Keuka and Canandaigua. We honed our tasting skills and became amateur collectors. We even bought the Teaching Company’s Everyday Guide to Wine (but boy, if those people think $400 Italian reds are everyday, they are seriously mistaken).  We actually got to very few of the 100 wineries; our favorite was Anyela’s Vineyard just off Skaneateles Lake and a few miles from home.

But, alas, our stay in New York was short-lived and now here we are in the greater Memphis area where we mostly mix a little song in with the wine.

Cheers. 
And always remember: every box of raisins is a tragic story of grapes that could have been wine.