If conventional wisdom had a face, it would surely frown upon the way I conducted myself throughout the second part of my life. In response, I would stick out my tongue like an impetuous child. Yet since the hypothetical face of conventional wisdom could only belong to a conventional, read, boring person, I feel no need to justify my actions. After all, my spiritual, physical and emotional adventures have been a tradition in my family for generations. Who I am to break a family tradition?
The anonymous body of know-it -alls; commonly know as “they,” say that everything happens for a reason. However, reason has nothing to do with events that happened in my life. In fact my life, as well as my family history, has been influenced by some of the most unreasonable acts in the history of the world.
This is my story.
Sept. 11th 2001
They could not have picked a more beautiful day.
It is the kind of day that inspires poets and songwriters. It's a Chelsea morning, or rather, a Battery Park morning, it is OH what a Beautiful Morning.
It's a clear day, and you can see forever.
It's a day to reflect on the glory of being alive.
It is not a good day to die.
Look out your window. Along the Battery Park waterfront, you see a woman walking with her noble white greyhound. Her long hair falls towards her waist. She wears a long dress with a laced up bodice that seems out of place amongst the stiff gray suits that characterize "business wear" for the yuppies of Lower Manhattan. Watch her walk with her hound. You are transported to an era in time where castles and carriages were the norm. Neither skyscrapers nor airplanes belong in this picture.
A jogger, in passing, calls out "Hey, Lady Godiva! Ya' gonna ride that horse?"
The woman smiles uneasily. His attention both flatters and frightens her. But today, she will have lunch with the one person who is always able to calm her fears. If the jogging GenXer would look a bit closer, he would realize he was flirting with a 43-year-old woman, and a somewhat eccentric 43-year old woman at that. Do normal people chat with their dogs in public? "Whistler" she says to her dog.” Do not let those ski fanatics know how much we are enjoying this day. If it were up to them, we'd have snow already!"
Her cell phone rings. She fumbles through a bag filled with papers, cards tissues and other items that have long ceased to be useful. She answers on the last ring.
"What's up, Dad?"
"Mariel darling." I've arrived early for our breakfast date, but no need to hurry. I'm sitting here at Windows on the World taking in this marvelous view."
She laughs. "Don't get too drunk, Dad. I'll see you at 10:30 as planned."
She ends the call and turns to her dog. "You're gonna' see grandpa today. Are you excited?"
Whistler responds with a whine. “Hey, what’s up, boy? I told you we had to take Tribble to the vet to get fixed, unless you want him pumping your belly all day. Honestly, it’s bad enough you rescue stray kittens, you had to find one with gay tendencies!”
The hound begins to whine persistently. Looking up at the sky, he tries to get his mom to turn in the opposite direction.
“Oh don’t worry, sweetie! It’s just an airplane flying a bit too…. OH MY GOD, DADDY, DADDY OH NO, PLEASE NO!!!!
As he did three nights earlier, Whistler begins to run, taking his mom away from the danger. Being a gentle hound, his rapid retreat is the only way he can bring me to safety.
Often, when I tell this story, I speak of myself in the third person. Somehow, it makes it seem like it happened to someone else. Yet reality eventually sinks in, and I am confronted with the awful truth. On September 11th, 2001, I lost my hero. I lost a man who, as a member of the 10th Mountain Division, had fought the Nazis on the hills of Italy. Who could have known that years later, when he arranged to meet his daughter for breakfast at the World Trade Center, that he would be killed because a bunch of religious fanatics wanted to sleep with a bunch of virgins after they die? And “they” call it reason? Well I say, to Hell with reason!
If I had listened to reason, I would have listened to my dad after the 93 bombings.
"This is Kristallnacht all over again, Mariel. They are already implying that this was a Jewish plot. You need to get out of that neighborhood. Something much worse is going to happen."
These were strong words from the man who defined the shelter drills of my elementary school days as "ridiculous." In retrospect, they probably were. Did people who worked in the offices at the World Trade Center duck under their desks when the planes hit? A lot of good that would have done them!
Anyway, my dad went as far as contacting my school and yelling at my teacher for allowing one of the boys to terrify me with his rantings about the Russians and their "Adam bomb," as he called it. In my confusion, I thought that this bomb would destroy the world and bring us back to the days of Adam and Eve. Wasn't that why they called it the Adam bomb?
In those days, we were so inundated with the threat of communism, that I would confuse the contents of two TV commercials. The Castro Convertible commercial went like this:
Who was the first to conquer space?
Castro Convertible!
Meanwhile, newscasters spoke of the "Race to Space" against the Russians. Somehow, at the ripe old age of five, I knew that both Castro and the Russians were both Communists. One morning, my parents awoke to the sound of my singing:
Who was the first to conquer space?
Castro the Communist!
Fortunately, Dad's family had the sense to realize a real threat, when rocks were thrown at their synagogue on a Saturday morning. They moved out of France before the Nazis invaded. But in 1993, my husband and I had just moved to Battery Park City. I was too stubborn to leave my new home.
Now, I had lost everything. The Physical Therapy clinic where I worked was destroyed, as well as the corporate fitness center where I moonlighted as an aerobics instructor. My mother, who was already balancing on the precipice of insanity, fell over the edge, as did I. We stayed at her place in Brooklyn Heights for a while, and watched her cry crocodile tears for a man she never seemed to love while he was alive. Eventually, we needed to return to the hellhole we had once called home.
Upon our return, we were horrified to see that there were tourists everywhere, craning their necks so that they could catch a glimpse of the graveyard that used to be the World Trade Center. Wherever we walked, we were subjected to the frantic sounds of rapidly clicking cameras, trying desperately to record this tragic piece of history forever. Yet those of us who actually lived through it need no cameras. The "incident" is forever ingrained in our memories. To this day, I still remember the smells, as well as the sight of the charred and dismembered bodies, sometimes clutching cell phones in an attempt to say one last goodbye to someone they loved.
You could not walk through New York without being reminded of what was lost. The subways were filled with photos, placed by members of the various families, who refused to give up hope that their loved ones would suddenly appear, as if nothing had happened. Have you seen him, have you seen her? Then, there were the reporters. "How does it feel to be displaced? Did you lose someone on September 11th?"
The radio and television did little to help me regain my sanity. Over and over again, I would hear that Enya song, Only Time, which was played with a background that featured a newscast of the tragedy. Can you say manipulative? I used to love that song, but it began to annoy me. “Time” is like “they” and like “conventional wisdom.” It’s an abstract concept. Somehow, I just can’t seem to believe in its healing powers.
Nonetheless, one month later, I tried, unsuccessfully, to seek solace in cyberspace.
Do you think that history would have been different if Al Gore had “invented the Internet” during the days of the Holocaust? I recall the stories from members of my family. Relatives would arrive in the States with rumors of a crazy dude named Adolph Hitler, who wanted to exterminate Jews, Gypsies and other “subversive” groups of people. Since the stories appeared to be “hearsay,” nobody believed them. Yet nowadays, if something is on the Internet, everyone believes that it’s true , even if the information makes no sense whatsoever. In fact, the Internet has replaced the New York Times as the ultimate source of what is “true and accurate,” whatever the heck that means. Perhaps the “Internet” is the quintessential “They.”
In fact, after 9/11, the Internet was a major form of communication for people throughout the entire world. On September 12th, the New York Times wrote "More than news, what people all over the world craved in the wake of yesterday's terrorist attacks was connection to each other, and many of them found that most easily achieved by going online."
My husband and I were fortunate enough to be a part of a strong international cyber community called Ski-Chat.com. As such, our circle of friends extended around the entire world. In fact, we had met many of the forum members at gatherings and ski clinics. Most people knew that we lived right near the World Trade Center.
My “elite status” on the forum is the result of my family history. My father, an iconoclastic French Jew, was a well-known writer about the history of the 10th Mountain Division. However, his fame extended beyond the circle of ski and military historians. As chairman of the Anti-Defamation League, my dad was a world famous do-gooder, and like Anne Frank, who I portrayed in school play, he believed that people were ultimately “good at heart.” Given that he had seen and experienced some of the worst evils committed in the history of mankind, I found his optimism somewhat astonishing. Dad believed in the power of communication. In fact, he was quite pleased with my Italian instructor when I recounted my story about my summer at the Universita di Stranieri in Perugia Italy.
Flashback to the summer of 1980: This was also my summer of political intrigue and promiscuity.
Perhaps I should explain. I had always been infatuated with Italy. My "crush" began when I was 10 years old. One day, when I was walking home, I noticed a boy from my school. I only knew him by sight, but I smiled and nodded politely. It seemed like the right thing to do. He took it as an invitation to approach me. The next thing I knew, he grabbed my arm. What was that in his hand? Holy shit! It was a hypodermic needle! I wasn't sick. Why was he trying to give me an injection?
I screamed at the top of my lungs. Suddenly, a boy I recognized as one of the six graders at my school came running up. He grabbed my assaulter from behind, and tackled him to the ground. "If I ever catch you hurting this little girl I will kill you!" Then, he turned to me and said, "C'mon. I'll walk you home."
Rumor had it that Tony Lombardi's family was involved with the mafia. I didn't care. From that day on, Tony was my hero. As I grew older, I still associated Italian guys with safety. There was more truth to this than fantasy. In my neighborhood of Brooklyn, the Italian boys were the only ones who would defend a girl who was being hassled. Sometimes they went out of their way to look for a fight, but that's a whole other story. My mother was worried that I would owe the mafia a favor. I'm still waiting for them to ask. I guess I got a "freebie."
Seeking out Italian men for protection is another one of my family traditions. About 20 years after the war, my father was curious about what had happened to other members of his family. With a bit of research, he discovered that his maternal Aunt Isabelle was living in Rome. Anticipating a warm reunion, he promptly called Pan Am Airlines and bought a ticket. When he reached the elegant building near the Spanish Steps, he asked the concierge to call her apartment.
The concierge looked at him with tears in his eyes. "Signor, I am sorry to inform you that La Contessa passed away last month. "La Contessa? What do you mean?"
"Your aunt Isabelle was a bella donna. During the war, the Count Giovanni fell madly in love with her. He married her to save her from the Nazis. I always thought that this was the most romantic story in my family history. How great it must be to be rescued by an Italian count. Unfortunately, there were no counts on the horizon, so I had to settle for the Brooklyn mafia!
Because of my rather quirky tendency to turn my infatuations into academic pursuits, I eventually became interested in Italian language and culture. My father had his own infatuation with Italy, but for different reasons. He had spent his glory days fighting the Germans in Italy's Apennine Mountains. When I graduated from college, he presented me with an amazing gift. I would spend the entire summer studying Italian in Perugia!
Once I arrived in Italia, my infatuation for the country was amplified to the point of obsession. Yet only a fool would believe that she could make love to a country. So instead, I deviated from usual "one-man woman" philosophy, and made love to its men. But the first in this uncharacteristic succession of lovers was, good heavens, an Iranian!
That year, the Iranians were America's "enemy du jour." The medieval town of Perugia, in addition to its "university for foreigners," has a well-known medical school, which is known to attract Iranian students of wealthy families. That summer, tensions between the Americans and Iranians were obviously high. At night, as groups of American girls walked through the village, we would subject to taunts by the Iranian boys. Some even resorted to throwing rocks. I still remember the first day that we walked in to class with my Iranian boyfriend. Groups of students of every nationality on the globe sat chatting with each other. Some spoke in their native tongues. The braver ones tried to communicate in Italian with people from other countries.
That day, when Jihan and I entered the classroom holding hands, the babble suddenly ceased. The Americans looked at me with unconcealed hostility. If you were to play a movie soundtrack, you would hear A Boy Like That from West Side Story.
Meanwhile, Georgio, our Italian instructor was sitting at his desk. As he observed the silent hostility brewing amongst his students, he decided to deal with it in a typically Italian manner. Italians love to argue politics. Georgia simply encouraged his students to argue about the American/Iranian political situation in Italian. After this, as if by miracle, a state of détente existed between the American and Iranian students. I wrote to my father, who in turn contacted the University and composed a letter to Georgio praising him for his diplomacy. Since I had an enormous crush on Georgio, I was totally embarrassed when he showed me my father's letter. That summer, Georgio was the only Italian man that I failed to seduce. Unfortunately, I had not inherited my mother's ability to seduce any man she set her eyes on.
Even if you have no interest in skiing, ski history or liberal politics, you have surely heard of my mother, the once famous Ziegfeld Girl, who was disinherited by her wealthy parents for marrying, good heavens, a Jew! As a humble physical therapist/aerobic bimbo, my life that was far less extraordinary than the life of my parents. I am not courageous and brilliant like my father. In fact, much to my embarrassment, my skiing skills leave much to be desired. Had I inherited my mother’s beauty and talents, it would have compensated for my average intelligence and mediocre skiing skills. Unfortunately, after a many years of studying dance, I discovered that I was more suited as a therapist for dancer’s injuries, than as a dancer myself. Ironically, many well-known athletes and dancers have attributed their successful careers to my therapeutic methods, but somehow I missed out on being a star. As far as beauty is concerned, many men, who longed to fondle my voluptuous breasts, have used that word to describe me. However, I am more frequently described as “interesting looking,” a phrase that I consider to be at best, a left-handed compliment.
Nonetheless, when news of my father’s death hit the Internet, much to the relief of my companions on Ski-Chat, it was reported that I was alive, if you could possibly call it that. Jonathan told me of the various well wishes and concerns for my well being that were posted throughout the forum. However, it would be a month before I decided to pay a visit to my cyber-friends.
I logged on and browsed through the various topics. It was October, when people would usually be planning their upcoming ski trips and purchasing new gear, yet a good number of the topics still centered on September 11th.
SKI-Chat.COM Sept.11th 2001
We’re Under Attack!
Conan Looks like Osama Bin Laden is up to his
old tricks again. A plane just flew into the WTC!
*******************************************************************
Alta-Maniac
Hey, maybe Ivan the Troll is trying to get
Back at Ski-Geek and Ski Gypsy
*******************************************************************
Ivanski Hey, A-M. Do you have to be such a
freakin' a$$hole. This stuff is not funny.
Has anyone tried to get in touch with
Ski Geek and Ski Gypsy?
*********************************************************************
Ski King Phone lines in NYC are dead.
Ivanski was a supporter of the Harold Harb Primary Movement System, a method of ski instruction that involved teaching people to ski without the use of the “snow plow.” Although there was some validity in the technique, its supporters treated Harb as if he was some sort of guru. They often started message board “flame wars’ that bordered on ridiculous, and occasionally became downright nasty. The forum member known as “Ivanski,” whose real name was Joel Parker, was a particularly verbal Harb supporter. Unfortunately, he was also clinically, and admittedly schizophrenic. When he was “on his meds,” he was actually a really sweet guy, but when he neglected to take them, watch out. Joel always reminded me of the Nicholas Cage character in the movie Leaving Las Vegas. A heart of gold lay beneath the insanity, but you had to dig through a whole lot of rubble to find it.
My husband, the “Ski Geek,” had gotten himself into some pretty intense flame wars with Ivanski. I should probably tell you that Jonathan’s flame wars with Ivanski were partially my own fault. Ivanski had a way of antagonizing my ski instructor, Chris. Since I worshipped the snow that Chris skied on, nobody could attack Chris without invoking my wrath. When Ivanski implied that Chris and I were probably sleeping together, Jonathan stepped in to defend my honor. Rumor has it that Ivanski had made death threats to Chris. Death threats over ski technique? In light of recent events, the idea seemed even more ridiculous.
I looked through the other topics, and found one with a rather odd title.
Boy did he Blow It!
Dave_L
Reported in the "NY Post," October 2:
An investment banker with an office at the World Trade Center was comfortably tucked away at his mistress' apartment, out of touch with the world, early on the morning of September 11. At 10 AM, his frantic wife finally got through to him on his cell phone. "Where are you?" she screamed. "In my office, where else?" he replied testily.
Oops.
*******************************
Jesus! Can you say “humor in bad taste?” Dave_L or David La Vecchia was a former New Yorker who had recently moved to Colorado to teach at the Loveland Ski School. I did not know him well, but he seemed like a nice enough guy. Perhaps his humor was a coping mechanism. I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt let it pass. My reputation for over-reacting was well established. Although it might, in this case, be justified, I decided that throwing one of my classic Ski Gypsy hissy fits would be inappropriate. Then, another topic caught my eye.
Jews told to Stay Home on September 11th
Ski God
High-ranking public officials and prominent columnists in the Middle East are promoting a claim that Jews perpetrated the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York City and the Pentagon. A number of sources say that Jews were warned against coming to work on September 11th.
Wake up, America! While George would have you believe that this was an Islamic plot, it’s clear to anyone with half a brain that this was an American and Masad plot.
Okay, that did it! Ski God was a guy from Australia who seemed to have joined the forum around the time of the September 11th attacks. I looked at his user profile. Jesus Christ! Every single post was about politics, and about the “evil American government.” Despite my liberal upbringing, naively liberal remarks have a way of turning me to the right of Ann Coulter, but before you decide to dislike me based on what you think are my political opinions, keep in mind that I don’t really believe the things I say. However, sometimes the temptation to play Devil’s advocate is more tempting than sin itself. I started to write a caustic reply, when the phone rang.
My caller ID told me it was Father Esposito, from the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine. I should probably explain my involvement with the Cathedral. As a child of a mixed religious heritage, I grew up celebrating both the Jewish and Christian holidays. One might translate that to mean that I was essentially a spoiled brat. Not only did Santa manage to get down our urban chimney on Christmas Eve., there was a present for each of the eight days of Chanukah. Come Easter, there would be Easter egg hunts and visits from the Easter Bunny. There was also a considerable amount of money to be made at the Passover Seder by stealing and ransoming the afikomen, which is the middle matzah that is broken off and served for desert. My own elementary school education was also somewhat unique. I attended an experimental half Christian/ half Yeshiva school: It was called Our Lady of Perpetual Guilt… I had you going there for a moment, didn’t I?
Anyway, my parents bless them, never pushed me to make a choice about my religious affiliation. However, a few years after I was married, circumstances influenced my decision to become baptized in the church of both my mother and husband, the Episcopal Church. When I was in my 30s, it seemed inevitable that I would become a typical New York City statistic. There was a saying at that time that is no longer humorous. If a New York City woman has not been married by the time she is 35, she has a greater chance of being killed by terrorists. Fortunately, I beat the odds. I met the love of my life shortly before my 35th birthday, and was married one year later. Jonathan wanted children, but given that New York is home to some of the most beautiful women in the world, vanity kept me from allowing my well exercised body to become pregnant. I feared that my protruding belly would be a turn off that would send him running to the arms of another woman. This may sound paranoid, but my husband was quite a hottie. The carnivorous corporate types, armed with tight skirts, high heels and more makeup than I would wear to a disco were constantly after him. Early in our marriage, on a business trip to, where else, LA, he had an indiscretion with one of these female vultures. Eventually, I forgave him, but it would be years before I trusted him. Of course, there was still Adrianna, the Russian corporate goddess who spoke like Greta Garbo. She and Jonathan seemed to have a few too many after hours "office meetings," where she bemoaned her husband's anal retentive tendencies to make her put every expense into Quicken. Since the thought of a possible affair between the two of them was far too painful to deal with, I chose to believe that it wasn't happening. Besides, Jonathan was painfully honest. If something was going on, he would tell me about it.
Of course, my somewhat distant relationship with my own mother contributed to my doubts about becoming a mother myself. She treated my childhood as an inconvenience, and hurried me through it with the impatience of a woman who had been waiting on a long line at the bakery counter. One day, I came home and discovered that she had thrown away all of my stuffed animals, which had been, by the way, presents from my father. When she came into my room and found me sobbing on my bed, she looked at me and said in her perfect WASP diction, "Mariel you are nine years old. It is time for you to grow up and start acting like an adult." There endeth my childhood.
Mom always acted as if my birth was the end of her career. To this day, I fail to understand her logic, since my brother Damien was born first, and she absolutely dotes on him. Perhaps it's because, unlike me, he inherited her beauty, and as if that were not enough of a waste, like many male children who are doted on by their flamboyant mothers, my big brother Damien, who spent many years as a professional jazz dancer, is as gay as a summer's day!
Of course, my mother blames my brother's "gayness" on his association with our great Aunt Sylvie. Tante Sylvie, as we called her, is my grandfather's youngest sister. Since she is only 10 years older than my dad, he thought of her as a sister, rather than an aunt. Sylvie did not come to America with the rest of the family. She stayed behind and worked with the French underground. After the war was over, Sylvie was ready for a new adventure. When she moved to the states, like many other Jews of that era, she decided to move to Harlem.
In France, Sylvie had been an actress. She was noted for her preference for unusual hats. Unfortunately, when she moved to America, she was never able to master the language. So much for her acting career. Instead, she decided to open a fancy hat shop.
Her French language skills made her immensely popular with the local Haitian population, particularly the prostitutes and transvestites. According to my dad, on any given Sunday afternoon, one can find Sylvie in the back of her store, serving tea or chicken soup to a local hooker, are comforting some poor broken hearted transvestite whose lover has decided to leave him. Sylvie was quite a character. A bit of a socialist, she believed in selling her hats at affordable prices. But if someone drove up in limo, dear aunt Sylvie would double the price.
Tante Sylvie never married, but she had a succession of lovers. Damien and I loved to watch her do her make up before a big date. She had this beautiful makeup desk with a big-lighted mirror. When we returned home, Damien would sneak into my mothers draw and get out her makeup box. "Come here, Mariel. Let me make you beautiful like Tante Sylvie." Sometimes he would even do his own makeup. I guess you can say he was gay at an early age.
In the autumn of 1979, Tante Sylvie was living in Buenos Aires. We received a letter urging us to come visit. A teacher strike at Emerson College meant that I would not start school until October. What the heck? This was the chance of a lifetime!
Since the musical Evita was playing in London, we decided to go there first. We arrived at Tante Sylvie's place singing Don't Cry For Me Argentina. It turned out that Sylvie was a big fan of Evita Peron. She even looked a bit like her. Sylvie was the type of woman who would dress up to go to a grocery store. In a sense, she was always dressed up to the nines when sixes or sevens would do.
If you know your history, you see the irony in Sylvie's Evita fixation. Historians accuse the Peron regime of being sympathetic towards the Nazi war criminals that chose Argentina as their hiding place. As a former member of the French resistance, you would think that Sylvie would not choose an idol that supported the very people she fought against. Yet trying to find any logic in Sylvie's behavior was a useless endeavor. Perhaps that's why we got along so well.
Of course, she just had to take us to the Evita museum. We all cried when we learned how Evita's body had been stolen and desecrated. Tante Sylvie was wearing her hair in an Evita type bun. Damien decided that style would look great on me. We got back to her place, and he convinced me to let him do my hair. A few hours later, the strands began to fall. So much for sophistication. In my aerobic bimbo days, I used to make some feeble attempts to put my hair into a ponytail. My students had a betting pool. How many songs would it take for Mariel's hair to fall down? Eventually, I said "to hell with neatness," and simply wore my hair free.
On Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Mourning, Tante Sylvie, who usually enjoyed eating too much to even think of fasting, decided to make an exception. She dedicated her fast to Evita Peron.
We were sitting outside her building chatting with a few of Sylvie's gay compardres. One of the guys noticed one of their friends getting into a cab.
"Where is he going?"
"I think he's going to the synagogue to blow the shofar," Sylvie replied.
Her gay friend looked at her with a mischievous grin. "Wow! That's a nice side benefit!"
Like most of the eccentric women in my family, Tante Sylvie eventually moved west. Last I heard, she was living the ex-patriot's life in San Miguel D' Allende. I always thought that I would be like Tante Sylvie, and go through life with a succession of lovers but no husband. When I finally married, it was a surprise to everyone, including myself.
By the time I was 40, Jonathan had finally convinced me that he would not run off with one of the “office girls,” no matter how much my belly protruded with his child, and that just because my mother was, to put it politely, out of her damn mind, it doesn't mean that my offspring were doomed to a life of insanity. I agreed to become pregnant, but the outcome was a disaster. A miscarriage caused me to be hospitalized. As if fate had not dealt me enough bad luck, the doctors happened to discover a tiny tumor on my left ventricle. If the tumor fell off, it would cause a stroke. Open-heart surgery was the only option, yet I refused to believe it.
At the time, Jonathan and I were sharing my rent-controlled studio apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. A few days after I got out of the hospital, we were taking a walk up Amsterdam Avenue. Suddenly, I began to feel a bit dizzy. The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine was nearby. In case you didn’t know, the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine is the world’s largest gothic cathedral. Unlike the other great cathedrals throughout the world, Saint John’s is not located in an elegant section of a grand city. In fact, its location on 112th Street and Amsterdam Avenue is part of the reason for its nickname, Saint John the Unfinished. Somewhere in the historical archives of St. John’s there is information about the original mission that states that if there is economic strife in the Cathedral community, fund to relieve that strife would take precedent over the completion of the Cathedral. Economic strife would be a fitting description of the neighborhood that surrounds Saint John’s. Thus, the great Cathedral remains unfinished.
I first visited Saint John’s when I was in my 20s. It was Christmas Eve, and I was dating a Wall Street banker, the one who used to describe me as “interesting looking.” We had smoked a few joints before heading up to the Cathedral for Midnight Mass. Unfortunately, as we entered the Cathedral and saw the statue of Christ on the Cross; my reaction was to burst into a fit of giggles. However, I became so mesmerized by the service, that when it came time to take Communion, I decided to partake, even though I was not baptized. Little did I know that this incident would foreshadow what would later become a deep relationship with the Cathedral.
On the day I visited the Cathedral with Jonathan, I felt as if I was on the verge of death. Within fifteen minutes of sitting in Saint Martin's chapel, I felt better. Perhaps it was the statue of Saint Joan that contributed to my healing. In a junior high school performance, I had played the role of the somewhat crazy saint.
Yes, they told me you were fools, and that I was not to listen to your kind words, nor trust to your charity! You promised me my life. But you LIED!
Perhaps the good saint was so impressed with my performance that she decided to aid in my healing.
The next week, we decided to attend the Easter services. Once the incredible organ, for which the Cathedral is famous, began to play, I was once again mesmerized by the drama that characterized the services at the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine. Suddenly, in the middle of the service, the priest sang out
Shema Yisrael Adonai Elohaynu Adonai Echad.
Hear, Oh Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.
Of course, my reaction was to put my hand over my eyes, which was what Jews do when they recite the holiest prayer, the Shem Yisrael. "What are you doing?" Jonathan whispered.
"I'm covering my eyes. This is what you are supposed to do when you say the Shema."
"But this is a Christian church."
"Christian, Shmistian. I don't want God to get mad at me!"
To make a long story short, Jonathan and I became regular members of the Cathedral congregation. The gold menorah that was placed on the alter, along with the regular insertion of the Jewish Shema, made feel as if I was honoring both of my religious traditions. Since I was feeling better, I continued to delay my open-heart surgery while getting second, third and fourth opinions from different cardiologists. Two days before my final testing procedure, we volunteered as ushers for the annual Martin Luther King Ceremony at the Cathedral. As we were escorting some of the members of the local community to seats in the front row, a member of the steering committee came rushing up to us.
"You can't sit these people here! These front row seats are reserved for contributors!"
"And just where are we supposed to seat "these people?" I challenged him.
He looked at me as if I was an idiot. "In the back of the Cathedral.'
"In the back of the Cathedral." We were supposed to tell the black folks of the community that, on their holiday, they would have to sit in the back of the Cathedral, while the rich white folks who arrived in their limos were escorted to the front. No thanks!
I was so angry that I shouted out, “It would take a miracle to ever get me back into a church again!”
Jonathan informed the Cathedral priests of my decision. The night before my testing procedure, I had the prayers of the entire Episcopal Diocese of New York City. The morning of my test, Jonathan sat in the hospital waiting room, rosary beads in hands. Suddenly, a doctor came out of the room, wearing a yarmulke. He looked at Jonathan and said, “Your prayers have been answered. Your wife’s tumor has disappeared.” One miracle, coming right up! Of course, after that incident, I returned to the Cathedral.
When I saw Father Esposito's name on my caller ID, I was reluctant to pick up the phone. However, he had been good to me, so out of courtesy, I answered. In his familiar Caribbean lilt, he said, "Mariel, we have been worried about you.'
"I'm okay," I lied.
"You don't sound okay. Why don't you come back for Sunday service?'
"Because I don't believe in God anymore."
"So your love for God was conditional?" He was challenging me.
"Sure it is. All love is conditional. If God could make the friggin' waters of the friggin' Red Sea part, why couldn't he divert a few planes?" I knew it was inappropriate to use even colloquial swearing around a priest, but I didn't give a damn. Father Esposito was nonplussed.
"It's not that simple, Mariel.
"Well it should be!"
“I will pray for you,” he answered.
That and a dollar fifty would get me on the subway.
The next day, I received a call from Sister Felicity. The good Sister was a member of the Community of the Holy Sprit, an order of Episcopal Nuns whose convent was on 113th St.. They were an odd group, not your typical nuns. Sister Felicity was my spiritual advisor. If you lived on the Upper West Side, you would know who she is. People refer to her as the jogging nun. On any given day, you can see her running down Riverside Drive, habit robes flying in the air. My spiritual advisement sessions happened when we were out for a run.
My choice of a nun as my spiritual advisor was just as ironic as my choosing my ultimately choosing the religion of my less than affectionate parent. My brother Damien has a story that to this day, he loves to tell. When I was very little, we sat home one evening watching Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo. If you recall, in the final scene of that film, the Kim Novak character is standing inside of a church tower. Suddenly, a shadowy figure appears at the top of the stairs. The Novak character, believing that she is seeing a ghost, becomes frightened. She backs away from the approaching shadow and steps off the tower ledge, plunging to her death. The shadow turns out to be a nun, who begins ringing the church bell.
Since I was too young to really understand the film, I believed that the nun was really a ghost who had caused the girl to die. A few weeks later, our family went to visit Saint Patrick's Cathedral on 5th Avenue in New York City. When a group of nuns entered the Cathedral on masse, I began to scream at the top of my lungs. My mother said that she had never been so humiliated in her entire life. Dad thought it was hilarious.
The sisters at Saint Hilda's house were anything but scary, especially Sister Felicity. On Wednesdays, when many of my liberated female colleagues were attending consciousness-raising groups, I was having my spirits raised at the Community of the Holy Sprit. I would go for a run with Sister Felicity, then return for Evening Prayer and dinner with the sisters.
Sister Felicity had not seen me since the death of my father, and somehow, she coerced me to join her for a run. Reluctantly, teddy bear in hand, I took the IRT to 110th Street to meet her.
It was a sunny day, so we decided to run near the river. I was silent for the first few miles. Fortunately, she knew that she should respect my silence. Finally, she said, “You need to honor his legacy. Why don’t you move away for a few years? Visit France. Or even better, spend some time living in Colorado.”
“Are you insane?” I replied. “How can I give up everything I have…oh.”
“Exactly,” she smiled. “And of course I’m insane. I’m a jogging nun!”
When I arrived home, there was a message on my answering machine from Chris.
“Pack up your cats and dogs and come out to Maine to stay with us. You need to get away from that hell hole!” It didn’t take much convincing, although I knew I would have to listen to one of Chris’ famous “I hate New York” rants. When we left, he said one thing that I will remember forever. “You’re mountain people. You need to get out of the city.”
Almost three years later, at the advice of both my ski instructor and my spiritual advisor, we decided to do so. On December 18th 2001, a fire broke out in the north transept of the Cathedral, thereby providing justification for my increasing agnosticism. Perhaps it was time to devote our affections to Ullr, the God of Snow.
Ski-Chat
September 12, 2001
Ivanski
Originally Posted by Chris:
"If Mariel wasn’t 10 years older than me and already married, I would definitely hit on her. Heck, I’d probably hit on her even if she were 20 years older than me. The woman is hot, even if she doesn’t know it. Especially since she doesn’t know it. But the city is going to destroy her. Gotta, convince her to get the hell out of there."
What? You want her to come out to Maine to live with you and your wife? Going back to your Mormon roots, a$$hole?
Jonathan
Although she lived, on September 11th, I lost my wife. Mariel had lost her hero, a hero that is so much larger than life that there was no way I could possibly compete with him. However, I think that I began to lose her three nights earlier, when she returned from walking the dog. She was uncharacteristically quiet, and when I questioned her, she simply said that she was tired. Yet, although I may have been imagining things, she seemed to be shaking, as if something had frightened her. Since my attempts at getting her to communicate failed, I simply let it go.
In the years that followed, her depression was almost unbearable, as well as her frequent panic attacks. Not to say that it wasn’t understandable. Hell, we lived in Battery Park City. Every time we walked out the door, we were reminded of “that day.” Mariel was a rare phenomenon: a native New Yorker. A streetwise girl who was raised in the Italian neighborhoods of Brooklyn, she was accustomed to riding the subways at all hours of the night. Yet after 9/11, she was even afraid to ride in the daytime. One evening, she returned to our apartment, accompanied by two police officers. When I heard the doorbell ring, I was apprehensive. This was New York City, and despite what you see on the ridiculous sit-coms such as Friends or Seinfeld, people did not just drop in on each other unannounced. The sound of the doorbell ringing usually meant bad news. I looked through the peephole and saw the familiar blue hats of the two members of the NYPD. When I opened the door, Mariel was standing between them. Although it was only the middle of October, she was shaking as if it was the dead of winter.
"Yes, officer?'
"We found your wife sobbing on the staircase of the IRT."
"Why were you crying, Mariel?" I asked her.
"I was afraid to go on the train."
She was afraid to go on the train. This was the brave woman, who after the 93 bombing dragged the oxygen tanks through the World Financial Center in order to help the victims. The muscle bound beef head trainers at the corporate fitness center went running back to New Jersey, crying for their mamas, but my wife had to stay and play Florence Nightingale. Go figure!
I brought her a small teddy bear to take along for security. Mariel has a thing for teddy bears. Yes, there's a story behind it, but I'll let her tell you about it. It helped for awhile, but then she got annoyed at the people who would stare at the sight of a woman in her 40s riding the train and clutching a teddy bear, as if that was weirdest thing you could see on the New York City subway.
There was one thing I was able to do that would occasionally bring back her beautiful smile. When I took her skiing at Vail, Colorado, once again, she would become the Mariel I used to know. There is, of course, a reason for this. Mariel’s dad trained at Camp Hale, which was near Vail. We would sometimes meet some of his old friends from the 10TH Mountain Division. It’s amazing how these old geezers keep in shape. Kind of puts me to shame, actually. Come to think of it, I really should be spending more time at the gym. But I digress.
On one of our trips, I happened to be looking through the local paper, The Vail Daily. The ad seemed to jump out at me:
Physical Therapy Clinic/Fitness Studio for Sale
Great Location in Breckenridge Colorado
In the past, Mariel had made sacrifices for me. I always knew that she was ambivalent about motherhood, yet she agreed to try to have my child, and almost risked her life in doing so. She even gave up her rent controlled Upper West Side apartment in order to move downtown. In New York City, that is a major sacrifice. There would be some tricky details involved with buying the clinic for her. Yet I was never one to be afraid of a few pesky details. I recalled what I said to Mariel when I proposed to her on the beach at Block Island (when I was not yet divorced from my first wife) "We can work out the details later."
The clinic seemed to be the perfect way to get back my wife, or so I thought.
Suspenseful and close to home, Rain of Deception 2 will leave you in Tears. Much like Part 1, this will shocking sequel will keep you on the edge of your fingertips.
A poignant story about letting go of a narcissist in your life. Have you ever been attacked FULL force by a narcissist? It's the closest thing to being stabbed over and over in the back.
Chapter One
