HILLARY’S NIGHTMARE OF LOVE

When Hillary Clinton becomes President, she may not be able to deliver on anything she stands for. The Hillary Haters believe the most heinous things about her; they find her dishonest and not to be trusted.  They are never to be dissuaded (believe me, I've tried).  They may continue to obstruct her efforts, having become well skilled at that during the Obama Administration.

Having said that, I still have hope and believe in her ability to be a fine president, and I believe she will win, despite the “Bill problem” that is and always has been the monkey on her back, that is in my opinion, the source of all her image problems.

I am not naïve.  I’ve known since my first day working to elect Bill Clinton that he had always had a serious woman problem – which later became clear is an addiction.  His supporters did everything possible to keep that from ruining his political path. It was a struggle from the day he entered public life.  Anyone who understands addiction knows that part of the profile is engaging in crazy and dishonest efforts to hide the behavior and keep the secret.  Those who loved and believed in Bill as a leader (first and foremost his wife) took sometimes extreme actions in order to shield him from the consequences of his bad behavior.  It may have been wrong; perhaps his wife and all his accolytes should have refused to help him in his political career because of his private behaviors.  However, in actuality, no one really knows, or knew then, the actual extent of those behaviors.  Hillary, especially, was lied to many times, I am sure. 

She is a smart lady; perhaps theirs has always been an open marriage.  Despite the stories, she stayed, some will say it was because she wanted to ride his coattails to power.  To those who do not know her biography, I would add that her path to political power began long before she met him; she was on a fast track on her own, and she sidelined her career to follow him to Arkansas.  Why?  I can only point to the blindness of love.

How unfair that she is tarred with his transgressions.  The distrust that dogs her always comes back to her tying her wagon to the handsome and charismatic young man from Hope.  Over the course of her life, she has been caught up in scandal after scandal that always goes back to her initial efforts to keep a “zone of privacy” around her relationship.  Does no one believe that love can blind a person to their own personal best interests?  When it all came crashing down in the most public way, perhaps her biggest mistake was keeping her marriage together.  She could have jettisoned him then, and many wanted her to.  But I choose to believe that their marriage works for them in their own way, the details of which are no one’s business. 

If she had divorced him at any point in their almost 50 years together, would that have satisfied the Hillary Haters?  I think there would be no haters at all had she never got mixed up with him to begin with.  Such is the power of love; to change a life for better or worse.  When she is elected President of the United States, will it be because of, or in spite of, her marriage? Does it really matter?

NOT OFFENDED BY OFFENSIVE BEHAVIOR?





When I was a young office worker just out of school, I experienced what I have come to understand in 2016 would not be tolerated or excused.  In fact, it might be litigated.  It was sexual harrassment.  To me, it was just life.

I felt jealous when I learned that the married boss was having an affair with a coworker and then promoted her. I giggled when he passed my desk on the day before my wedding and said, "We should hang banners and balloons around your desk."  Me:  "Why?"  "Tomorrow's the grand opening!"  When I was leaving that job, I was called into the boss's office after my "confidential" exit interview with head of personnel.  He was in possession of all my comments, and he was furious.  He screamed at me:  "I never asked you to sit on that couch and...do things.  I could have, you know!  And you criticize me on your way out????" I burst into tears and apologized profusely.

His behavior was offensive.  I should have been offended.  I should have been outraged.  But.  I was young.

Now the New York Times does a front page story about Donald Trump's treatment of women.  I am not surprised at his crude behavior, but I do find it makes him look further unqualified for office in background and temperment. What I find more interesting is the backpedaling by one of the women quoted in the article.  The story describes her as a young model attending a party in Mar-a-Lago; Trump took her on a tour of the mansion and asked her to put on a bikini, then showed her off to other guests as a "Trump girl."  They began a dating relationship after that.  Today, she is angry that the Times portrayed this event in a negative light, part of a larger impression that Trump objectifies women.  She says, she was not offended by his behavior.

She should have been offended.  What I wish she had said today:  "I was young and impressionable and he paid attention to me.  It didn't occur to me to be offended.  In hindsight, his behavior was inappropriate."

Cancer: Load your Rifle and Charge….?

“Under no circumstances is anyone to say that I lost a battle with cancer,” she told him. “Or that I bore it bravely. I am not fighting, losing, winning or bearing.”

Jenny Diski, author, from her obituary in the NYT

I like to read obituaries.  I don’t think I am alone, nor am I morbid, or obsessed with death.  In fact, if anything I am obsessed with life, and want to peek inside the lives that others have lived.  I had never heard of Jenny Diski until I read her obituary today.  Now that I know what I have just learned about her life, I want to read this writer.  But more, finally I have found someone who says what I have always thought about how to describe a person’s death from cancer.  Too many obits of people who have died from cancer say it was a brave battle that has been lost, as if they were a soldier charging the enemy on the battlefield.  

Cancer is a disease, as difficult as many others, like AIDS, or Parkinsons, or diabetes. For some reason people don’t feel compelled to describe Alzheimer’s as something to courageously fight until the last.  I have never read an obituary that says a person died from heart disease after engaging in a courageous battle to fight it.  Cancer sucks, like all serious illnesses, and the treatments require the sufferer to become sicker than the illness itself.  Surgery, radiation, chemotherapy; too many needle pricks and visits with medical people, all is a nightmare to endure.  But that doesn’t mean other illnesses aren’t just as horrible, that the suffering associated with cancer is somehow more admirable. 

The worst concept is that it is somehow in the power of the patient to heal themselves if they fight hard enough.  See that word “fight”? As I am writing, I have to resist the urge to describe an illness in battle terms.  Part of the treatment of cancer is giving the patient a kind of brainwashing; “if you believe you can get better, and you are willing and tough enough to suffer the treatments, you will be cured.”  Excuse me?  That is a vicious manipulation to lay on a sick person.  So, if you die from cancer it is your own fault for not being brave enough?  Not fighting hard enough?  Not thinking positively enough?

Since I am a cancer survivor, I am qualified to be a bitch about this:  I cringe at every obituary I have ever read that says the person died of cancer after “fighting a courageous battle.”  So, let me be clear:  if I should die from cancer, just see what Jenny Dinski told her husband he should not say, and do not say it. 

LOVED This Book!

Here is a book for anyone experiencing that challenging life passage called parenthood, especially for those who are overparenting, overhovering, overpressuring, overscheduling, overwhelming your kids - yes, you know who you are.

This sometimes cranky political journalist and pundit has written a touching personal book about his relationship with his son Tyler, diagnosed at age 12 with Asperger's syndrome, a form of high-functioning autism.  It is honest, loving and contains some poignant lessons for all parents, not just those with kids with unique challenges.  Some of the best:  parent for today, not the future; make being different cool, and most of all, love the child you have; let go of the perfect fantasy child you imagined when he was born.  As Ron says, "Tyler isn't my idealized son, he is my ideal one."

I, too, have come to the same conclusion, having raised two children with challenges -- one with learning disabilities and mental illness, and the other with anxiety driven addictions.  I have written about my experience in my upcoming book, Swimming Lessons:  a mother's tale of navigating the mental illness tide.  An excerpt from my book on this issue of accepting and loving the gift that is your child:

Like any parent of any child, I take on each situation as best I can.  With a child who has special needs like this, I have to bear in mind that there are good times in between the hits.  I try, only sometimes successfully, to remember what a wise friend told me:  don’t miss the wonder and enjoyment of the child you have, while wishing for a child that doesn’t exist.

AGING:  does it have to be depressing?
The following short story was a hit at my writers group last night:

TIME, REMEMBERED AND FORGOTTEN

Abel Arnett celebrated his 82^nd birthday alone.  He wanted it that way. He made a wish before blowing out the single candle on the chocolate cupcake he’d bought at the Stop N Shop.  His wish was to die, and die soon, so he could be with his now-dead wife Sarah. He simply couldn’t stand to go on, deteriorating in body and mind in the house they had shared for more than fifty years.  It had been seven months, yet he could still feel her, still smell her perfume.  He hadn’t changed a thing in the house, but everything had changed. 

He missed so much about her. He missed the evenings when they would walk through the neighborhood holding hands.  He missed how she would sing Patsy Cline’s “Crazy” while folding laundry or washing the dishes. He missed talking about politics with her; Sarah would listen to him rant about Nixon even long after the disgraced president had died.  Sarah was kind and patient. Abel needed that.

They never had kids.  Something in the plumbing didn’t work, but they never looked into it.  They never discussed it.  They just lived their life. When he retired from the insurance company, she talked about taking a trip to China.  He didn’t want to go to China, but he let her talk. She talked about moving to Florida.  He let her talk. 

She died suddenly.  Abel found her on the kitchen floor.  In shock, he fell and hit his head on the counter and didn’t notice the gash until the blood flooded his eyes.  He dialed 911 and the EMTs bandaged up his head and took him to the hospital for evaluation.  The kindly woman doctor who treated him in the ER approached the topic of assisted living but Abel wouldn’t hear of it. He did his best to assure her he was well enough to return home.  The doctor told him he was going to need help, and he promised he would get someone.

As soon as the doorbell rang on the day he expected his first visit from a caregiver, he almost didn’t answer it.  Standing on the front porch was a woman who smiled brightly and told him “I’m Helen, your visiting angel!”

Abel said, “I’ve changed my mind.  Don’t need you.” As he tried to close the door in her face, but Helen stopped that with one determined orthopedic shoe.  “Please, Mr. Arnett, just let me in for a moment and give me a chance to tell you how I can help.”

“Can you bring Sarah back?” he growled, looking at her as though he really expected her to answer.

Helen winked at him.  “I can try.”

Over the next months, Helen came four days a week to help Abel with household duties, medications, and preparing meals.  Abel accepted her help, but rarely spoke to her beyond monosyllabic grunts.  Most of the time he ignored her as she would prattle on and on about her life, how she grew up locally, went away to nursing school, then returned to New York and married, divorced and remarried.  Abel didn’t listen. If he had, he would have known something that even Helen hadn’t yet realized, a connection between them that would change his life.

His birthday was a day when Helen was supposed to come, but she cancelled the day before for a vague reason.  It was six p.m. when he finished his dinner and his cupcake and just as he was about to sit down to watch the Yankees game, the doorbell rang.  Annoyed, Abel trudged to the door.

Helen stood there holding a bouquet of colorful balloons.  Next to her was a short  elderly lady.  “Happy birthday!” they said together, then sang the song off key.  Abel noted that the white-haired lady had a big smile and still had all her teeth.

 “Abel, this is my mom, Millie.” said Helen, pushing Millie into the house.  “I think you’ve met before!”  She tied the balloons to a chair.

Millie gently touched Abel’s hand.  “Abel Arnett!  Abel! It’s been years!”

Abel stared at her, then he remembered.  “Millie?  Coney Island Millie? Is it you?”

She giggled.  “It’s me.”

The fog of so many years fell away.  Abel now clearly remembered a girl with freckles and dimples and soft hands.  The smell of popcorn and the sound of calliope music and the roar and shrieks from the roller coaster.  A sunny day at Coney Island.  The sea breeze messing her auburn hair. It was only a first date, but he envisioned a future with this beautiful girl.

But the gods did not cooperate.  He had been drafted and was to be shipped off to Europe.  He expected to die in the war.  It would not be permissible or acceptable for him to propose or even kiss her.  And so, he went away and Millie disappeared from his life.  

He was one of the lucky ones.  He never saw combat.  He was still in training in Dover when the war ended.  He was off duty reveling with the crowd of Brits in Trafalgar Square in London.   Like everyone that day, he was overcome with joy and relief, and when he noticed an attractive girl in a plaid coat standing next to him holding a faded British Union Jack, he impulsively kissed her.  They laughed, kissed again, and jumped in the fountain with others gone wild.  It was that kind of day.

He returned to the states with his war bride, Sarah.  

And now, Millie stood before him. Without knowing it, the widowed mother Helen had been prattling about for months was his Millie from 1945.  Now he saw that Helen had her mother’s dimples.

For the next several weeks, Helen would bring her mother every time she came to do her Angel duties.  Millie and Abel would sit on the porch or in the TV room.  Millie didn’t talk much, but she listened.  She hated Nixon too.  It seemed they could actually recapture the magic of Coney Island so long ago. 

As long as they didn’t look in any mirrors. 

After a few months, Abel asked her to marry him, but Millie didn’t want to get married, saying ,”I’ve done that already.”  It didn’t seem right to Abel to live together in sin, but it was what she wanted and he wanted her to be happy.  So he sold the house he’d shared with Sarah, and they rented a nice apartment together.

He still missed Sarah every day, but he no longer wished to die.  He felt lucky to have found love twice in his life.  He was amazed that he and Millie found ways to be intimate with their old bodies that was energizing and joyful.   He was convinced it was right and meant to be one day while they were in their sitting room.   He was reading the newspaper and she was knitting a hat for a friend who was going through chemo.

  He looked up and watched her pale fingers moving her needles.  He smiled with comfort and contentment.  And then he realized that she was absentmindedly humming a  familiar song.  Patsy Cline’s “Crazy.”