Me: I needed to take a break from counseling. And I think I needed to come back to it too. Perhaps I needed to be needed, since my husband of twenty years clearly no longer needs me. My clients do. My children do. Returning to the chair opposite the couch illuminated for me just how much progress my clients have been making, which I can interpret as an indication that I have indeed been able to help them; I’ve made a positive difference in their lives. And knowing that I can and do make a difference is one of my greatest rewards.
On the home front…while Dr. Lee and I just grazed the tip of the iceberg in terms of my owning my anger at Eli and being able to take control of a part of my life that is spinning dizzily out of orbit, at least I don’t feel like a hypocrite. Despite all my fears of inability or unwillingness to put into practice in my own life what I preach to my clients, I did not play “ostrich.” I’m not now in denial about the deterioration of my marriage and I am not trying to run from the consequences. Okay, I’m not convinced that I’m seeing the right analyst for me, but I knew I couldn’t go it alone; I did need to talk to a professional.
I’ve learned a lot from the events of the past few weeks. I’ve learned that my clients are grateful for my presence in their lives and the ongoing counseling I can provide them. I’ve learned that my children, particularly Molly, are strong kids even though they’ve been blindsided and betrayed by one of their parents. Molly was right: she should be allowed to be very angry at her father. What I won’t allow her to do, however, is to become self-destructive. Thanks to Faith and Sylvia Plath, my daughter is coming into her own; though I was thrilled to hear from Molly’s lips that she believes I’ve been a good mom…because there have been plenty of occasions over the years—particularly where Molly has been concerned—that I’ve had my doubts! And I’ve learned that I can in fact take control of my life (or begin to pick up the pieces), even after the worst has happened. And…as I type this, I have to acknowledge that Eli’s departure is not the absolute worst thing that could happen. I have my health; my children have theirs. And so do my parents. We all have roofs over our heads and enough to eat. My children are being afforded the best that our educational system has to offer. We live in a society that (on paper, anyway) permits us to express ourselves freely. And every day I am privileged to spend time in the company of strong, fascinating women who broaden my own horizons.
So maybe Mala Sonia was right when she “predicted” that I would be able to slog through the hell of my disintegrating marriage with the support of my women friends. Although my laundry room clients are hesitant to cross the boundaries between our professional and our personal relationships, I am keenly aware of their…well, their love, I guess. Without expressing it in so many words, they’ve let me know that they’re here if I need them. They are my safety net.
RINSE
19
ALICE
“I apologize for being totally bleary-eyed,” Alice said, ensconcing herself in a corner of the couch. “When Gram started getting really affected by her Alzheimer’s, she used to tell me that there were ghosts who lived on her air conditioner outside her bedroom window and they would moan and knock against the window next to it trying to get into the apartment to steal her soul. I had no idea what she was talking about; just that what she kept telling me was both deeply disturbing and deeply disturbed. I mean, ghosts? C’mon! But then I gave Izzy my bedroom and moved my stuff into Gram’s room—the role-playing you had me do way-back-when really enabled me to finally categorize and chronicle and clean up Gram’s things. I had no choice when it was clear that Izzy wasn’t just going to be a houseguest for a week or two. So I moved into Gram’s room. It has a very odd shape; there’s really only one wall where you can put a queen-sized bed without turning the rest of the room into an obstacle course. So my bed had to go right near the window. And I’ve recently figured out who the ‘ghosts’ are.” I waited for the other shoe to drop. “Pigeons! Every morning, the same damn pigeon alights on the air conditioner and begins cooing. I swear to God, it’s like the urban version of a cock crowing in the morning. And now that I’m no longer working an office job, I really have no need to get out of bed at seven A.M. But he’s there, like clockwork—except for this morning, when he decided to put in an appearance at 4:17. Do you have any idea how loud a single male pigeon’s mating call is? It’s like a low gargle that becomes increasingly higher pitched the longer they sustain it. And it’s making me crazy! I dive under the pillow. I yank the covers over my head. And I can still hear this fucking pigeon just as loud. It’s like a torture out of Edgar Allan Poe! I get up and bang on the window, but these birds have chutzpah. It doesn’t scare them; they just look at me as though they’re fully justified to invade my sleep and camp out on my windowsill; it’s like they’re saying, ‘You lookin’ at me?’
“Back when Stevo was around—oh, sorry, I probably shouldn’t have brought up his name. If I hit a nerve, I really apologize for that.”
“I’ll be all right,” I assured her, “this isn’t my therapy session.”
“But still, I feel like shit for even unintentionally raising the subject. Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.” I put on my resilient face. “Scout’s honor.”
“All right…well, I’d complained to Stevo about the pigeons and asked what he could do about it. Naturally, he did nothing. He said he’d ‘get to it,’ but of course, he never did. I thought birds flew south for the winter, but I guess on the Upper West Side pigeons consider it a migration when they come down from 125th Street.
“They’re having sex on my air conditioner too. The other morning there were three birds there, and I think they were going for a ménage à trois oiseaux or something. You should have heard all the noise, and feathers flying, and scrabbling of little pink pointy pigeon feet on the air conditioner…and the noise…I guess that’s where we get the word ‘squabbling.’ I’m being awakened by fucking pigeons fucking! Dan thinks it’s funny—”
“Oh-ho!” I grinned. “So how is your love life these days?”
Alice rolled her eyes. “A bit like one of those dreadful reality TV shows where they throw a bunch of people in a house and audiences are expected to get a kick out of watching them interact. It’s been hard with Izzy there for so many months. Plus, we’ve had an infant there for the past couple of weeks, because all of Izzy’s baby stuff was at my place, since none of us knew how long she’d end up living with me. So it was kind of a major prophylactic, actually,” Alice added with a blush. “But…soon it’ll be over,” she sighed, “I mean having Izzy as a roommate. Moving day is Saturday. You saw how blown away Dominick was in the hospital when he got to hold Valentina?! He was weeping and going on and on so much about the miracle of birth, you’d think Izzy was the first woman ever to become a mother. Usually, when couples are having problems, they think having a baby will solve them, and it never does. It usually does the opposite, in fact, and creates even more problems. But Valentina’s birth ended up being the clincher for Izzy and Dominick’s reconciliation. You know they’d been talking about getting back together, and Izzy asked Dominick to read a whole stack of baby and pregnancy books, which, wonder of wonders, he really read. And he told Izzy that she was still a pain in the ass, but now he understood a bit more about the biology of the whole pregnancy-motherhood thing; and then again he realized he wasn’t exactly God’s gift to anything and sometimes he couldn’t believe she’d stayed married to him for as long as she did—he was always running off with his motorcycle buddies and coming home—or not—at all hours—he really tested the limits of their relationship sometimes.
“So, now Izzy—and Valentina—are moving back home, and we can get all the baby stuff out of my living room. Dan’s kind of thrilled about that, I have to say. In order to make room for the crib, we’d moved aside Gram’s antique settee that he’d worked his ass off to restore, so now it will have pride of place again. He suggested that we celebrate by making love on it, but I’m not sure he’s up—so to speak�
�for another major repair job: somehow I have a notion that it wasn’t built for active nookie.” Alice laughed. “We can always go the old-fashioned route in the bedroom and compete with the pigeons!”
“Sounds to me like you’re getting your house in order in more ways than one,” I said. “Now, what’s up with your acting career these days? I remember you told me that the Actors Equity tribunal decided in your favor.”
“Gosh, we’re really wringing the most we can out of every one of my issues today! My head is spinning!” Alice adjusted her position on the sofa. “Right. The union sided with me, which, to be honest, I hadn’t expected; but my happiness was kind of short-lived.”
“What do you mean?”
She expelled a puff of air. “Well…I got to keep my job in Grandma Finnegan’s Wake, but Bitsy Burton—I told you about her; she’s the actress who originated the role I was playing—continued to make things pretty miserable for me. She also hired an intellectual property attorney and took the producers to court, claiming that she had rights in the development of the character of Fionulla Finnegan; and if she wasn’t going to continue to play the role, she wanted financial compensation for her creative input during the production’s developmental process. The producers got scared, looking at bad P.R. as well as huge legal bills, so they called me in and said they were going to have to let me go and let Bitsy play Fionulla from now on. They said it was their most viable option in terms of resolving their dispute with Bitsy. So I got canned, and we all agreed that I just wasn’t appropriate for the other role Bitsy had been playing while I was doing Fionulla—the part of cousin Megan, the unsexy psychologist—sorry, again,” she added, blushing and stealing a glance at my purely functional ensemble, if you could call my denim jumper and red cotton turtleneck an “ensemble.”
“Still, I was really worried that the Grandma Finnegan producers would dispute my claim for unemployment benefits, and I would have to end up crawling back to my Uncle Earwax’s law office. Well, his real name is Uncle Erwin, Erwin Balzer, but anyway, I would rather have slit my wrists than gone back to being a legal secretary—”
“Alice, don’t even joke about suicide.”
“I wouldn’t really slit my wrists—you know that…? Don’t you? I was just…I was just indulging in hyperbole. Don’t worry, I may be a bit neurotic, but I’m not mentally unstable. So, anyway, I came to the conclusion that since I’d gotten fired as an actress, I deserved to collect unemployment as an actress, and I should continue to look for acting jobs, as opposed to office jobs. I mean that’s not who I am anymore. I AM A LEGITIMATELY UNEMPLOYED ACTRESS! YAHOO!” Alice yelled. “I AM NOT AN UNEMPLOYED LEGAL SECRETARY! I do see the humor in all of this, you realize, Susan. So I’m going out on as many auditions as I can, given that I still don’t have an agent. Later today I’m going to send my head shot and résumé to the casting director at an advertising agency. They’re doing an international ad campaign for a dust rag. Don’t laugh! It’s like the Swiffer. It’s called ‘Snatch.’”
“Isn’t that a little, well, dirty?”
“Not in England, apparently, which is where they’re launching the product. What’s a snatch over here is a fanny over there. Which creates a whole other set of problems, linguistically speaking, when you think about it.”
“Not that I don’t want you to get the job, but why are they looking for an American to be the spokesperson for an English product?”
“I think they want people to get the dirty little joke. At least subliminally. The Brits seem to love that kind of humor.”
“Well, break a leg at the mailbox!”
Alice grinned. “Thanks! Just don’t tell me to break a…never mind!”
ME
“Welcome to No Problem. Table for five?” Meriel asked as Molly, Ian, Faith, her date—renowned jazz pianist
Elijah Loving—and I entered William Robertson’s Jamaican restaurant. It was a Saturday night early in March; after a blustery few weeks the weather was beginning to show signs that spring was indeed just around the corner and we could move the shearlings into storage.
Meriel had been playing hostess at her son’s restaurant when she wasn’t working for Amy and Eric. “So, how do you like my decorating?”
The walls were a bright lemon yellow, trimmed in black. Chic paper lanterns in Jamaica’s official colors hung from the ceiling. Yellow and green madras plaid cloths graced the tables. “I want de red restaurant guide to call us ‘casual and classy,’” Meriel told us. “William didn’t see de need for de tablecloths, but I didn’t want de place to look like a fast food restaurant or a cafeteria. So he listen to Mama because he know Mama’s right. And you notice de music…? De reggae not so loud daht people can’t hear demselves talk.” She seated us and told us that her son would come out from the kitchen to greet us as soon as he had the chance. I felt a bit sorry for them because it was prime time on a Saturday night and the place was doing only a modest business; it wasn’t exactly hopping, as Meriel and William had hoped. The odds of success in the restaurant business are so iffy, and I really wanted them to have as good a shot at it as possible.
There appeared to be more trouble in paradise than I might have guessed. From where we sat, I could hear Meriel criticizing her son’s recipes for having too little of this or too much of that or the portions not being large enough, or that they were too generous; she even found fault in his presentations. With few patrons to seat, she had nothing but time at her disposal, and she couldn’t help entering the kitchen to “supervise.” I watched her either moving or removing a garnish, or decorating a plate with little squiggles of sauce she squeezed out of unlabeled plastic bottles in order to give it “a dash of elegance.” William, naturally, was not taking kindly to his mother’s interference, and I felt sure that this night was just like all other nights of the year since he’d opened No Problem to the public.
Molly was trying to get a rise out the rest of us (just as she had done when she pierced her navel and subsequent body parts) by ordering the oxtail stew. She only picked at it when it arrived, which Meriel chalked up to the recipe not tasting exactly the way it really should. I wanted to tell her that there was probably nothing wrong with William’s cooking; Molly was just finding that exiting her epicurean comfort zone was riskier than she’d thought, and that oxtail stew was no doubt a bit of an acquired taste for her palate. Faith raved about her jerk chicken entrée, although Meriel kept whispering in her ear that she wished William would use her recipe instead of insisting on cooking up his own.
Ian wanted to know if the dishes did “taste the way they were supposed to,” and figured Elijah might provide the answer.
“I can’t tell you, my man,” Elijah said, shaking his head. “I grew up in North Carolina. Ask me anything you want about pulled pork but I’m no connoisseur of jerk chicken! I’m a pecan pie expert, not a black fruit cake one. I’ll tell you this: it all sure tastes good to me!”
“Faith, your boyfriend rocks!” Molly whispered.
“So, how did you enjoy everyting?” Meriel asked graciously as we insisted on paying the check. If they’d been doing a land-office business I might have accepted their offer of a complimentary meal, but under the circumstances, it didn’t seem like the right thing to do.
“Everything was delicious,” I answered, speaking for the table.
“And we wish you and William all the luck in the world,” Faith added.
Meriel looked around the room. Only four of the sixteen tables were occupied. “Tank you,” she sighed, then leaned over the table and whispered, “I hate to tink we gonna need it!”
Progress Notes
Alice Finnegan: Since she first began her therapy with me, Alice has had to deal with so many major issues that occasionally I felt we were neglecting some of them, or giving them short shrift, because there just wasn’t enough time within a given session to accord each issue an equal degree of attention. To Alice’s immense credit, she has kept these plates spinning with remarkable dexterity
, and has not allowed setbacks to paralyze her or send her into a panic. In times of crisis, she’s resisted the urge to actout or indulge in self-destructive behavior. With her career, especially, she allowed herself to be pushed way out of her comfort zone and took the calculated risk that she would be all right. Rather than revert to old (and damaging) behavior by returning to the safe and familiar (though toxic) territory of her uncle’s law office after she lost her job in Grandma Finnegan’s Wake, she accepted and embraced her unemployment situation, using it as an opportunity to grow her career as an actress. Taking in her friend Izzy as a roommate ended up being emotionally and mentally beneficial in ways that Alice had never imagined. Having a dear friend around all the time reminded Alice that she was still lovable and appreciated, even though her grandmother had passed away; and I believe Izzy’s constant presence helped Alice avoid the loneliness and depression that can come with grieving. Izzy’s presence also compelled Alice to slow down in her blossoming relationship with Dan Carpenter. Restrictions on privacy within her apartment had a way of ensuring that Alice didn’t rush into anything. Her relationship with Dan had the chance to unfold on its own time, which gave it a more stable foundation, and also lessened Alice’s chances of getting emotionally disappointed, or even hurt, by pushing for too much too soon. In future sessions we’ll work toward solidifying her self-confidence and patience so that they become second nature and she isn’t tempted to revert to old behavior now that she no longer has all those metaphorical plates in the air.
Me: I should take a leaf from Alice Finnegan’s book. When the universe asked her to cope with so many big changes simultaneously, she discovered that she was able to navigate through them in an emotionally healthy way. If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years, in case after case, it’s that we are much more resilient than we believe ourselves to be. I’m referring primarily, of course, to people like my laundry room ladies, not to people who are clinical—who require medication in order to stabilize the chemicals in their brains.
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