October 3 2007 Wednesday 7:05 am "Eleanor, Cindy, Day in a daze"
Communicated by my Higher Self
OK let’s see where we are. It is most beautiful day in world after 3 days of cloudy skies and on and off light, and not so light, drizzles. The Sun is pure gold. The sky is pure blue. The leaves are pure green. It looks like a fairy tale out there. And the light has flooded back. And the clarity.
Annie actually jumped out of bed this morning. Sure when she first woke up her first thought was “I don’t want to face life,” but it was just an instant of anxiety. The next thing she knew her legs were on the floor, she was standing up and heading into kitchen to put up the coffee.
Bill woke up at practically same time, so she poured him coffee and heated an apple turnover for him. And put up toast for herself. Then she went to the truck to find the huge orange plastic bowl she had bought at supermarket yesterday, not knowing why she bought it. But yesterday she had boiled up all that chicken for the dogs, and she realized if she can get the huge orange plastic bowl to fit in her refrigerator, she can put all the chicken in that.
So she spooned all the chicken into it, it is a lot, and found some way to shove it into her refrigerator, and thought “that’s that!” It was relief to finally have it in the frig, she didn’t want to leave it too long just sitting on top of stove. Then she noticed it had boiled over on stove. And she wondered “how was it possible?” It had been lowest flame possible, the water had not reached the top, it was well covered. But she got out paper towels and sponges and got it all up. Both of these things relieved her, because she woke up thinking “how can I deal with food when I first get up?” Then she buttered her toast, dipped it into her coffee, and ate her toast and drank her coffee standing at the counter.
By the time all of this was over, she realized Bill would be ready for second cup of coffee, so she offered it to him, before she came into computer. He gratefully accepted. He is sitting at chair in sun parlor by open screen door, reading his book “Eleanor and Franklin.” He is fascinated with what he is learning. And Annie learns about it on car ride to pool in early afternoon, or while she accompanies Bill when he has supper, he has supper late.
Bill has taken Eleanor into his heart. Eleanor’s background (prim, proper, repressed) made her the least likely candidate to be a liberated woman in anyway. Plus she now has 5 children. But finding out about Franklin’s love affair with his secretary has been an earthquake. At first she wants a divorce, but she doesn’t go thru with it. But she does declare her independence from Franklin’s monster mother who had totally bossed her around. “Your paragon of a son is not a paragon, he is a philanderer” she said.
Plus Eleanor has become friends with two independent professional women, for first time in her life. The first independent professional women she has met. They live on 11th Street. One is a lawyer, and one is a professor at Vassar. And the whole idea of independence has entered her mind. That she could be an independent woman.
Annie finds it totally endearing that Bill has adopted Eleanor. That he is so sensitive to her feelings, and gets so excited about her growth. Bill’s whole life is sports, it is not that often that a woman has emerged as someone he is interested in and cares so much about. Bill loves Eleanor, and loves all the history he is learning.
On an emotional level, Annie is doing OK. She was nervous she would not be able to do the supermarket shopping after swim yesterday, she was still having problems associated with the huge energy and big shift. But to her happy surprise, the shopping went easily happily smoothly and fairly fast. She enjoyed it. And the plan was for Bill to go to a movie in the late afternoon, which she was glad about. It was his birthday, she wanted him to have a nice day. And she thought if he was gone all afternoon, it wouldn’t matter how out of it she was.
So she put the groceries away, and put up all that chicken to boil on very low flame for doggies, had lunch, and went in to be dazed all afternoon on her bed. In and out of sleep, in and out of reading her mystery. She pulled herself awake when he got back from the movie, and told her how much he loved it. But then said he is going outside to take the air and listen to game on the radio. So she went right back to dazed sleep till he came in to fix his supper.
He told her all about the movie as he ate his supper, and it sounded absolutely lovely. Like a fairy tale. But when Bill ran out of things to say, and he wanted her to talk, she had nothing to say. Her day had been dazed sleep, there was nothing to say about it.
Altho actually her morning yesterday was flurry of emails with Marilyn (her friend from women's liberation days). Which interested and excited Annie. She had never been on email with someone as communicative as Marilyn, or prolific in emails. But nothing she found out would have interested Bill. Because he didn’t know the people. If she had said “I found out where Cindy is now and what she is doing now,” she would have had to tell whole long story about Cindy. And how she had been homeless.
Actually Bill would have been interested, but it was too long a story to tell at that time. There are parallels between Cindy and Teresa, Annie realized. In the course of their lives. Altho their starting points are so different. Cindy was architect trained at Yale, and Teresa was modern dancer in NYC, she had not even gone to college. Cindy is also a warm wonderful generous kind girl, just a different type than Teresa. And out of it like Teresa too. What saves both girls is their totally loving generous heart. They give so much love, that it returns to them.
Marilyn’s report on Cindy was quite melodramatic and Annie was shocked. But when Nancy, the lawyer, answered the email, she was much more judicious and accurate. Irene had told Marilyn, Cindy has gone mad, she is incarcerated, etc etc etc. But Nancy said Cindy is living on the shore in New Jersey, around Atlantic City, and is living in low-income senior housing. Nancy is upset that is where Cindy wound up, and said “if only we could have saved her NYC apartment for her. We just didn’t know in time.”
But I told Annie it is not so bad Cindy is in low income senior housing. Because after 20 years of in and out of homelessness, this is totally secure housing. There is no way Cindy can be evicted. And it is fresh that it is near the ocean. And Cindy needs freshness. And her training is in city planning, and she is interested in the city planning of the town she is in.
Nancy said Cindy won’t speak to her now, even tho she has spent so much time and money helping Cindy. But these snafus happen. Nancy does not have to feel so bad. Nancy says she sends her yearly subscription to feminist theory magazine. And I had Annie delicately hint to Nancy that a used computer costs practically nothing now, and what Cindy would really like is a computer of her own. One hour at the library is not enough.
Love and kisses, Annie's Higher Self
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