Riding Fury Home

by Chana Wilson

  On the anniversary of my mother’s death, Dana and I drove up the Berkeley hills to Tilden Park. We took a long walk on a trail that looped over a ridgeback, through stands of eucalyptus and bay laurel, their fragrant leaves crunching underfoot. As we hiked, I calmed and loosened, the hills under my feet grounding me, the pungency of eucalyptus in my nostrils bringing me into the present. I felt how I loved my life, my life with Dana.

  On the drive back, we pulled into an overlook and shut off the engine. The city and bay spread beneath us. We were quiet for a long while, just looking down at the Bay Area pulsing below, the sun lowering toward San Francisco Bay, sky glowing orange, lights just on the edge of blinking on.

  The hills here were steep, dropping to the flatlands of Berkeley and Oakland. I sat wondering if the warm air currents called thermals rose up these hills, as they did in Calistoga, as they had that time they held me aloft. And then I was lost in memory:One year, after Gloria’s move to California, she and I are driving north to the Napa Valley town of Calistoga, known for its hot springs, to celebrate my birthday. Along its one main street are the spas boasting various treatments—mud baths, hot whirlpools, massage—but we have not come to seek the waters. I long to soar, to lift into quiet far above the world’s din, and my mother is giving me the gift of flight: a glider ride in one of those motorless little planes.

  My mother has never gotten over her fear of heights. She no longer goes into the panic that would overcome her driving when I was a child, but any precipice, cliff, grandstand, or steep balcony seat makes her hyperventilate, stiffen, and sweat.

  Nonetheless, my mother wants her daughter to fly. At least, she makes a brave show of it, smiling at me before I walk off toward the plane. I know her fear lurks underneath, but we both ignore it as she says cheerily, “Have a great time!”

  I walk onto the tarmac, where the pilot waits next to the glider. It looks like a blown-up toy, a narrow white fiberglass body with long thin wings and a domed clear hood. The pilot adjusts something in the tiny cockpit, then ushers me into my seat directly in front of him, gets in, and closes the Plexiglas lid that bubbles over our heads. The clear nose of the glider encases my legs. After I strap myself in, I can’t even turn to see the pilot behind me. It’s just me and this tiny bubble of plane.

  The small twin-engine aircraft that will lift us aloft taxis into position in front, and with a rough tug pulls us down the runway. I watch the tow plane lift, and then we rise. Just before the hills, the plane cuts us loose and banks away. We’re catching the thermals that let gliders soar, those warm pockets of air that rise from the valley up the mountainsides. The noisy plane disappears, leaving us in the quiet, the hills green and brown below me.

  The whoosh of the air currents over the wings is the only sound. I know my mother is down there on Earth, waiting for me, but as the glider dips, sensation roars through my capillaries—drowning out anything but the moment. To be free to forget my mother is her greatest gift to me. She has reclaimed her own happiness, and I have let go of constant vigilance toward a depressed mother. Now, she’s been well for over ten years, though her phobia of heights remains.

  Hawklike, we swoop and glide, taking in the hills below, the tiny rows of vineyard grapes, the dots of houses. I am filled with wind, sound, and light. I must have laughed, the joy bursting out of me. The pilot, who has been respectfully silent, asks, “Would you like to do some stunts?”

  “Sure,” I blithely respond.

  Barely a beat passes, and the pilot puts the plane into a full dive. The Plexiglas nose in front of me is now headed directly for the earth. Nausea lurches in my stomach. My intestines are both jelly and hard knots. If my chest belt is digging in, I don’t feel it because I am screaming like a middle-schooler on a roller-coaster ride, full-out roaring. When I find words, I yell, “Stop, stop!” The pilot pulls us out of the dive.

  “I guess-that’s-why-I’ve-never-been-on-a-roller-coaster,” is all I manage to choke out. I think of my mother then, her breathless terror of heights, the silence of it. There were never any screams. I have a sense of it now: how it must have felt in her frozen body, stiff and sweating, with her choked breath, her panicked eyes. I remember the sour smell of her fear. Oh, Mom. My banging heart regains some of its steadiness as the glider resumes its gentle arcs. I release my own breath, come back to pleasure in the soaring.

  Mom is waiting for me. She is standing next to her car in the parking lot that butts right up against the airstrip. One hand is shading her forehead, as if she has been squinting into the distance for a long time. A lit cigarette dangles from her other hand. When she sees me coming toward her, she drops the cigarette and stomps it into the gravel, then smiles at me. I can tell from her smile that she did not see the plane suddenly dive toward the earth.

  “How was it?” she asks.

  I hesitate, just for a moment. Then I tell her the truth: “It was the most amazing thing ever.”

  Her face breaks open, fully lit, and we stand there beaming at each other. “I’m so glad, sweetheart.”

  Across the bay, the skyscrapers of San Francisco were backlit by the last vestiges of the sunset. The lights of the Bay Bridge were sparkling against an indigo sky. Late in life, but not too late, my mother had arrived, fed me meals, listened to my troubles, and, with her joy, launched me into a realm that was further off than she could go.

  I emerged from my reverie. “Dana?”

  “Yes?”

  I started up the car. “Let’s go to Saul’s for dinner, and eat soul food for Gloria.”

  Dana reached over and touched my arm. “Sure, let’s go.”

  Epilogue

  IN THE YEAR AFTER my mother died, my father had what I’ve come to call a transcendental stroke. Perhaps it was the struggle back from near death, the complete loss of speech, and a paralyzed left side that spurred his transformation to a self more openhearted than before.

  Miraculously, after months of rehab with his wife’s support, my father got on a plane and came for a visit. He was so much more expressive now. Everything delighted him; it was all “terrific.” He let me know how much he enjoyed being with me. And some closed-down part in me softened to this changed dad.

  When I started to work on the memoir a couple of years later, my father and I began a new dialogue: talking about our family and all that had happened. He believed in my writing and was willing to excavate the past, as he’d never been before. It took time for us to process, many years of going into it bit by bit.

  Together we came to a more complex understanding of how Mom, Dad, and I had all suffered. I realized how painful the marriage had been for my father, what it must have been like to be told by your wife, “Let’s live as brother and sister.” Dad saw how trapped Gloria had been, how society had offered her no possibility for happiness. I braved telling him what it had really been like for me the year he left me with my suicidal mother and went to England. It was radical for me not to protect him anymore.

  Some years into our new phase, on my visit to New Jersey, I was surprised and touched when Dad took me to a gay-themed art exhibit. Dad was an art hound who loved museums, and this was a way of showing me his acceptance. As I was flying home, he called Dana. “I just want to tell you how happy I am that you have each other,” he told her. He went further, “I think you have a wonderful relationship. I love you.”

  On May 15, 2008, the very day the California Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage was a constitutional right, Dana and I booked our appointment to be married at San Francisco City Hall. We chose the day in August that would be our twenty-fourth anniversary. Same-sex couples were jamming to fill the slots before the November elections, when Californians would vote on Proposition 8, which, if passed, would ban further unions.

  The day we arrived at the marble rotunda of city hall, ceremonies were taking place simultaneously on the stairs, in corridors, on the second floor. The hall vibrated with tremendous elation, radiance glowing on the faces of the marrying gay men
and lesbians, that jubilation mirrored in their children, friends, and family gathered around them.

  During our ceremony, I looked into Dana’s face, feeling our love and something larger: how profound it was to be welcomed into a common humanity. I wished my mother could be here to see how far we’d all come. Could she have even imagined this?

  By then, my father was ill and unable to fly to our ceremony, but he’d kept getting my reports as the day neared. The day after our wedding, he called.

  “Are you married?” he asked, delight in his voice. “Did you get the flowers I sent?”

  “They’re beautiful, Dad. Just beautiful.”

  Reader’s Guide

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  1. What do you think are the different meanings of the title, Riding Fury Home?

  2. Gloria has a secret underlying her depression that Chana won’t know until she reaches age twenty. What was the impact of keeping the secret on the mother, the father, and the daughter?

  3. What is the difference between secrecy and privacy? In your family, were there any stories that were kept secret and later revealed? If so, how did that revelation help you understand your life?

  4. What were the historical and cultural forces at play in Gloria’s depression? In what ways do you think an individual’s mental state and cultural forces interact?

  5. How did social stigma, taboos, and shame play out in the Wilson family? Is there anything you somehow knew you weren’t supposed to talk about without having to be told? What have you been able to speak about in your life that was formerly taboo?

  6. How did you respond to Chana’s childhood struggle to take care of her mother? In what ways do you think this role reversal affected Chana?

  7. When Chana’s father went to England, he made a choice to leave Chana with her troubled mother. Gloria chose to put Chana’s beloved childhood dog, Happy, to sleep because Gloria was unable to deal with him. How did you react to these actions? Have you ever been torn between your own well-being and that of your child or someone who depended on you?

  8. Both mother and daughter became involved in the Women’s Movement of the 1970s, whose slogan was “The personal is political.” How did the interaction of the personal and the political play out for Gloria and for Chana? Are there ways in which the personal and political interact in your life today?

  9. The narrative covers the time period from the mid-’50s to the’90s, with the epilogue continuing up to 2008. Discuss the cultural changes that happened in those eras. How have those changes influenced your life?

  10. Throughout the story, Chana describes herself from childhood on as an outsider. In what ways? How does her sense of being an outsider shift over time? What are your experiences of feeling like an outsider?

  11. As Gloria becomes ill in her sixties, first with rheumatoid arthritis, then with cancer, there are instances in which her illness recreates the dynamic of Chana’s being her mother’s caretaker. How were the interactions between mother and adult daughter similar to those in the past, and in what ways were they different?

  12. How much do you think mother and daughter resolved in their relationship with each other? What remained undone?

  Acknowledgments

  RIDINGG FURY HOME was shepherded to completion by many.

  I am indebted to the teachers who helped me hone my craft. First and foremost, Monza Naff, in whose classes the book took shape. Her teaching offered the potent combination of rigor and support. She dared me to write beyond the safe and easily known with challenges such as: “What’s the thing you most don’t want to write?” Monza welcomed me into a community of writers and saw my project through as writing coach and editor, encouraging my unique voice all the way. Over time, our connection deepened into a lasting friendship.

  Gracias to Andy Couturier and his classes at the Opening. Andy’s in-class exercises gave me permission to take risks and play, adding richness and emotional depth to the narrative. Sandy Boucher’s autobiography class was among my first stabs at the memoir. Judith Barrington, who taught memoir at Flight of the Mind, the writing workshop where I crafted the first chapter, insisted it was good enough to read onstage in front of all those real writers. Joelle Fraser, workshop instructor at the Truckee Meadows conference, gave me critique that solidified the structure of the memoir. Ani Mander, in her creative writing class at Antioch College, ushered me through my writer’s block.

  My long-standing gratitude to the writers who’ve been so generous with their feedback. My Sunday writers; group: Teya Schaffer, Helen Mayer, and Susan Schulman who’ve been with me since the very beginning. The Tuesday writer’s group: Jeanne Courtney, Camille Escudero, Chantal Rohling, Helen Greenspan, Rose Wood. Thanks to Jayne Schabel, writer friend and partner in our weeklong writing retreats, whose crazy ability to sit in the chair, writing for umpteen hours, helped me stay the course. Helen Zia, who encouraged me after a rejection to stick with and believe in my narrative. Thanks to the members of Redwood Writers for warm camaraderie and lively salons.

  Thanks to my fellow therapists for their support, especially Esther Lehrman, who believed in the story’s relevance to healers and nominated me to present at the Psychotherapy Institute. And to Rebecca Silverstein, who invited me to give a dramatic reading from the memoir-in-progress at Gaylesta’s conference Queer Families = Healthy Families. Much gratitude to Laura Pilnick, who accompanied me on the healing path.

  Deepest thanks for help along the road to publication. Caroline Pincus, who practiced midwifery on my manuscript through the proposal process with her book-biz wisdom, good cheer, and belief that books that matter will find a home. Judith Cope, the brave editor who tackled my behemoth and wrestled one hundred pages out of its length. The path-to-publication support group: Julia Hutton, Martha Snider, Katrina Alcorn, and Phil Lapsley. Thanks to Linda Wattanabe McFerrin for her fierce advocacy for fellow writers, and to the members of Left Coast Writers, Linda’s baby. Gracias to Book Passage Bookstore in Corte Madera for hosting us, and to bookstore manager Tina Vierra.

  Appreciation and thanks to Brooke Warner, my editor at Seal Press. Her keen eye for what was chaff and her astute insight into what was missing so enriched the book. To the staff at Seal Press and Perseus Books—thanks for believing in the relevance of the narrative and for getting behind it with zest and skill.

  Thanks so much for the sustenance of friendship: Iris Stallworth-Grayling, Rebecca Silverstein, Linda Gebroe, Frayda Garfinkle, Vicki dello Joio, Joyce Wermont, and Doug Beaton. Thanks to Carolyn Brandy, maestra of Sistah Boom, for the wild joy of polyrhythms. To all the Sistahs as we drum in the streets and chant, “Work for peace in the belly of the beast.”

  Most of all, thanks to my wife, Dana, who, in addition to all her other endearing qualities, is a terrific editor. She knew me and the story deeply enough to read a piece and say, “It’s not there yet; go back and do it again.” I would sigh and trudge back to the studio, knowing that in the end, her loving push would get me there.

  About the Author

  CHANA WILSON IS A psychotherapist and a former radio producer and television engineer. She began her career in broadcast journalism as a radio programmer with KPFA in Berkeley, California. Her work hosting the KPFA program A World Wind—in which she interviewed poets, musicians, writers, and activists—sparked her desire to work with people on a deeper level. Now a psychotherapist for twenty-four years, she credits the extraordinary courage of her clients for inspiring her to write.

  Wilson’s writing has appeared in the print journals The Sun and Sinister Wisdom, in the online journal Roadwork, and in several anthologies.

  Since the mid-’80s, Wilson has been playing percussion with the women’s samba band Sistah Boom. She resides with her wife in Oakland, California.

  Visit Chana online at www.RidingFuryHome.com.

  Selected Titles from Seal Press

  For more than thirty years, Seal Press has published

  groundbreaking books. By women. For women.<
br />
  Something Spectacular: The True Story of One Rockette’s Battle with Bulimia, by Greta Gleissner. $17.00, 978-1-58005-415-7. A piercing, powerful account of one woman’s struggle with bulimia, self-image, and sexuality, set against the backdrop of professional dancing.

  Big Sex Little Death: A Memoir, by Susie Bright. $17.00, 978-1-58005-393-8. In this explosive yet intimate memoir, Bright recounts the adventure, sacrifice, and controversy of the first five decades of her extraordinary life.

  Different Daughters: A History of the Daughters of Bilitis and the Birth of the Lesbian Civil Rights Movement, by Marcia M. Gallo. $15.99, 978-1-58005-252-8. The story of the world’s first organization committed to lesbian visibility and empowerment, and the foundation of today’s lesbian rights movement.

  Here Come the Brides!: Reflections on Lesbian Love and Marriage, edited by Audrey Bilger and Michele Kort. $17.00, 978-1-58005-392-1. Uplifting and thought-provoking personal stories, essays, and images from women who are blazing trails in the brave new world of same-sex marriage.

  Dear John, I Love Jane: Women Write About Leaving Men for Women, edited by Candance Walsh and Laura André. $16.95, 978-1-58005-339-6. A timely collection of stories that are sometimes funny and sometimes painful—but always achingly honest—accounts of leaving a man for a woman, and the consequences of making such a choice.