Sue Katz: Consenting Adult

Wordsmith and Rebel

My books are available on Amazon here or for an inscribed copy, write to ConsentingAdultPress@hotmail.com. Enjoy all of my low-priced books:

A Raisin in My Cleavage: short & shorter stories

Lillian in Love (a novel)

Lillian's Last Affair and other stories.

I'm available for interviews, readings, visits to book clubs, being the entertainment at your party, talking about senior sex at your senior center, talking about love in senior housing, and any other creative ways to get the word out about my work.

Some of these stories are 5,000 words long, some of them are 100 words exactly. Some protagonists are old and some aren’t.  Several stories feature gay men or lesbians, while several do not. So what unifies this collection? It is the interplay of heart and smart, facing off against the dangers of a viral wedding smooch, a scary staircase, a runaway supermarket cart, a disastrous online date, and a stolen sausage. Of course, you'll also learn about the raisin that falls where it shouldn’t.

Lillian’s life at 84 is tumultuous. She is moving to Manor House to be near Sarah, abandoning the demands of her own home, which has been colonized by her children. How will she and Sarah deal with the reactions of relatives, ex’s, and neighbors to their romance? How do two old women negotiate new love? Will slow-dancing, vibrators, and pot brownies help smooth the way?

 

“If I’m going to go after one more affair of the heart at 84, I’d better get my ass in gear,” says Lillian, speaking for all the characters in these six stories.

Ruby has a run-in with a waterbed and Catherine tokes her first joint in the bathtub with Victor. Elegant Anna’s introduction to kinky sex is bittersweet. And then there’s the neighbor with the strange attachment to the grocery cart. Sue Katz’s hilarious, tender, and impeccably written stories confirm that age fails to erode our eccentricities or dull our ardor.

Kindle Me! Now you can have my blog Consenting Adult (Kindle Edition) pushed directly to your Kindle in real time! Just click here for a 14-day free trial

On Facebook? 'Friend' me at Facebook.com/sue.katz. 

David Brooks Wins the Mediocre White Man Weekly Prize

There are so many nasty things I could legitimately say about David Brooks, a NYT “opinion” writer and TV pontificator who has used his status as a quintessential mediocre white man to annoy me every Friday night when he is asked to comment on the week’s news on NewsHour, our public broadcasting show. Brooks has honed his qualities to a dull blandness. He is banal. He is conservative. He states things others have been saying for years as if he has just invented the color beige. He asserts his backwards views without bothering with facts and figures.

This year he has been declaring in his arrogant and errant way, week in and week out, that voting restrictions are not a particular problem as anyone in the US who wants to vote can vote. Is he just dumb or simply the slimebag he appears to be? One critic wonders if he is “deliberately deceptive or recklessly ignorant.” Brooks’ politics suck: he opposes the legalization of marijuana, considers The Squad loonies, and deems the Right “wholesome.”

Of the many profiles on Wikipedia that I’ve seen over the years, Brooks’ is the first in which the classic sections – Political Views and Social Views – are followed by a big fat section of Criticisms!

I thought I couldn’t find him more distasteful than I always have until last week when he Zoomed into NewsHour with his bookcases behind him. Although it's hard to underestimate this fool, I was shocked. He has organized them by color! Nuff said.

Being the Ricardos – a review in 100 words

I sure have seen better films. Nicole Kidman’s version of Lucille Ball, famous for her physical comedy, is awkward and emaciated. Aaron Sorkin’s rat-a-tat dialogue and depiction of the writers’ room keep the film alive, although it’s too long at over two hours. Kudos to Javier Bardem for his sexy, graceful portrayal of Desi Arnaz. But (spoiler alert) in the end, it is Desi’s penis that provides the main tension and resolution of the film. He is a lying philanderer, but even worse, he gaslights Lucy throughout. It is infuriating that his banal dickery is more centered than her brilliance.

Trailer

 

The Christmas Boyfriend

This short story was the result of an exercise this morning which allowed 10 minutes to write a story in response to the PROMPTS below. It's loosely based on an experience I had in the 70s.

 

 

• Depression
• Window
• Better

My dad was scarcely speaking to me because he had forbidden me to go out with Jonesy, who was a Gentile, as anyone could see from the cross he wore around his neck. My mother had saved the day by insisting that stopping me from seeing him would only end in me sneaking around and not telling them much.

I was in seventh heaven, such a handsome blond boyfriend, and that afternoon I sat by the window watching for Jonesy to arrive. I was sure he was going to invite me to his house for Christmas dinner. He hadn’t stopped talking about it. All his cousins, even the ones from other cities, would be there. It would be wild. It would be delicious. He’d get great presents.

Finally he arrived, almost two hours late. I had fallen into a depression, afraid that he wasn’t going to come at all, but little did I know he was bringing bad news along with a pretty, wrapped box.

“Sorry,” he said, “you’re not invited. My parents said it wouldn’t be right to have a Jew at the table during Christmas. That it would piss off Santa and that Jesus would never have allowed it.”

“But, but, Jesus himself was Jewish!” I said.

Jonesy’s mouth dropped open. “What the hell kind of thing is that to say?! Why are you insulting our Lord?”

“No, really, Jonesy, it’s true.”

He grabbed back the colorful box – I hadn’t even had time to open it – and asked me, “So tell me, why did you people kill Christ, anyway?” He didn’t wait for an answer, just stomped out, shouting, "Never mind. Merry Christmas!”

 

Parker River Wildlife Refuge on Plum Island

The year I was born, 1947, Rachel Carson wrote a 23-page piece for the USA Department of Interior titled Parker River: A National Wildlife Refuge. You can access it here.

The first line reads: “The Parker River Wildlife Refuge is New England’s most important contribution to the national effort to save the water fowl of North America.” During my recent visit to the Refuge, nature proved Carson’s point. And as we drove down the main route, a flock of huge black birds suddenly occupied the leafless branches of the trees around us. A birder passing by identified them for us as crows. Crows apparently are not shy and were happy to be photographed. Later we saw blue birds and red birds and other migrating birds on their wise way to warmer climates.

The Refuge makes up much of Plum Island, which is 11 miles (4,662 acres) of barrier island north of Massachusetts’ Cape Ann. Conservation became a priority in 1679 when settlers’ livestock were stopped from ranging free on the island, eating up all the vegetation. The first house was built in 1752, but a bridge over the estuary separating it from the mainland was established in the early 1800s, mainly to service the new hotel. There is no longer a hotel on Plum Island, but the level of construction is slightly insane.

It used to be a neighborhood of beach cottages and as the years passed people added a room or a second floor or a big porch. Today, there is an alarming proliferation of McMansions, the more recent ones built on stilts, most of them massive and ugly, some of them four stories high. But the kicker is that many are built on the edge of the marsh, cutting off the view of the traditional cottages, throwing unwelcome shadows over multiple houses.

However, Parker River Refuge is the Island’s jewel and, in my opinion, should be considered one of the wonders of the world. Its undulating dunes, dramatic beaches, four rivers, bog, swamps, and the magnificent Great Marsh sit under a Big Sky. I first encountered a Big Sky when I was in Kenya in about 1996. Of all visual and physical experiences I have had while traveling, the Big Sky over Kenya’s Masai Mara ranks as my most euphoric. Likewise, here at the Refuge, the great expanse of over 3,000 acres of salt marsh with its waving grasses, crisscrossed with tidal pools, met the changing sky in an exhilarating view. I realized with a start that I was downright happy. I was breathless with a visceral joy that contrasted with my feelings these last years in which I’ve been living in basically one room watching the world suffer.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service has done a sublime job in making this huge Marsh and the acres of dunes accessible. They have built many handsome boardwalks, the majority with explicit accessibility, but all with smooth faux-wooden paths elevated above the marsh and the dunes. Some of the boardwalks climbed over the dunes and descended to the sea. Some wound through the high grasslands, with creeks underneath turning into puddles, and black water nourishing reeds. All of these boardwalks are beautifully done and took me to places I would never otherwise consider climbing up or scrabbling over. Even the observation tower was only three flights of steps and I was easily able to mount it.

The rolling dunes were decorated with thickets of beach plum (thus Plum Island!) and grasses. Between the dunes are black pines and eastern red cedar trees, which reminded me of eucalyptus trees with their shedding bark. The brilliance of the walkways is that they allow visitors to be closer and deeper in the dunes and marsh than one anticipates, without any damage to the environment.

On the other hand, the Joppa Flats Education Center and Wildlife Sanctuary, apparently operated by the Massachusetts Audubon Society, offered an unpaved road and heaps of garbage at its entrance. We turned around and went back into the Refuge instead of visiting it.

Another absolute treat was staying at the comfortable, luxurious Airbnb which the owner titled “My Dream house with views of the marsh and sunset.” I am a literal person and that is also literally my dream view. The apartment did not disappoint. It was a bit too cold to use the marsh-facing porch, but when sitting in the living room chairs, I looked straight out the sliding glass doors to the marsh and its sunsets. These are so stunning that car after car of locals pulled up to watch the sunset before going on their way.

A late November trip was just what the doctor ordered. There were few folks around. Even more important, we avoided the infamous summer greenhead flies. We didn’t have to deal with ticks, mosquitos, or poison ivy, all of which flourish in the summer. Plum Island is known as a gorgeous beach destination and becomes heavily congested, I was told. I’m not a big beach lass, but now I can’t live without the Great Marsh. So let the others stretch out on the exquisite plum sand. I’ll be visiting when I have these wonderlands more or less to myself.

Celebrating the Life of Is Szoneberg

Today I got up at 5:00am in order to be fully ready for the funeral of my dear friend Is Szoneberg in Hawick, Scotland. I joined the funeral by Zoom, with a perspective from the rear of the hall, and even without the intimacy of sitting among loved ones, I was profoundly moved by the service. It opened with Elvis singing “Only Fools Rush In.” Is requested we wear pink, her favorite color. Our colleague and friend Jane told me that she wore pink under her scrubs at work this morning, since she had to miss the service.

It was conducted by a Humanist celebrant, which means no mention of any gods or religion – just to my taste. The facilitator is a lesbian and she was able to convey an accurate and authentic impression of our Is (Isobel; Isabella) and of her commitments to her sweet wife Anne (“my best girl” she always said) and to the community of women. It was an exquisite, heartfelt celebration.

Is and Anne pushed past every obstacle to social recognition of their love over decades. When civil unions were finally available, they got a civil union. When marriage was finally available, they got married. They were fully committed and they wanted the world to know.

Is got a form of cancer that is a silent killer and by the time it was found, it was much too late to do anything about it. She was sent home to receive palliative care and to say her goodbyes. Is wrote to tell me the bad news and Anne facilitated a phone conversation between Is and me that lasted three quarters of an hour. I thought I’d be able to have one more call with her, but she was already unresponsive the following week.

When I got the job as London Manager at CSV (Community Service Volunteers) in 1991, Is was then Scotland Manager. We bonded very quickly, being the only two lesbian managers in this large UK non-profit. Her wit and her sincerity won her great popularity on the Management Team. Everyone appreciated her remarkable ability to use good humor to calm down disagreements in the Team.

Is and I socialized outside of work when she was in London or when I visited her in in the north of England, where she was living when we first met. My first experience of karaoke was when Is, after some liquid encouragement, was persuaded to take the mic in a bar there and let loose.

Fast forward a decade, during which both of us earned multiple promotions, when due to some so-called “re-structuring,” all middle managers were let go, myself included.

Because I was in my 50s, it was hard to find another job and I began to freak out. I had been supporting myself since the age of 17 and it was terrifying to be out of work. Is began to call me daily. I mean every single solitary day. She called me without fail for almost a year until I finally accepted a job in the States and flew to Boston. I will never forget that profound act of kindness and support, her sense of solidarity and friendship, her generous love. I will never forget Is.

 

The Greatest: Burns was not up to the challenge

Ken Burns, his daughter Sarah Burns, and her husband David McMahon, were not the right people to make the lengthy documentary on Muhammed Ali for PBS. I felt the long series had a subtly hostile tone to Ali and a more explicit hostility to boxing. Despite having the resources to access piles of stunning archival footage and despite having a massive eight hours of airtime, the entire work was devoid of emotion. Muhammed Ali was a passionate, emotional figure, but this was not reflected in the deadpan commentary, not the least by the guy they presented as the biographer of Ali, who seemed barely conscious.

This is not to minimize the insights of the brilliant writer and Ali fan Walter Moseley, the inside view of Ali’s brother Rahman, and the expert blow-by-blow from former boxer (and now actor) Michael Bentt. In fact, if it weren’t for Bentt, the series would have been stumbling around the ring helplessly.

If you have been a fan of Ali, as I have been most of my life, then there isn’t much new in this chronological series – other than wonderful clips and images. I appreciated that Burns allowed the women in Ali’s life to talk about his obsessive cheating and need for conquest after conquest, while they provided a home, a haven, and a family. But I was irritated that Burns acted like he had single-handedly discovered that people get hurt boxing and that Ali could be mean during a fight. Burns brought no real insight into Ali’s relationship to Elijah Muhammed and the Nation of Islam. We see his involvement, we see his betrayal of Malcolm X (which he regretted his whole life), and we see that his connection with the group’s leader was a bit of a roller coaster. But Burns provided no depth, no clarity, no understanding of Ali’s experience of Islam. And then there was the way Burns twisted Ali’s unique charisma into some sort of manipulation, when in fact Muhammed Ali widely inspired love. I adored him myself.

The most profound deficit was a total lack of appreciation of boxing throughout the series. We were shown the worst moments of every fight, the blood, the broken noses, the pain. Thankfully, we were also shown some of the spectacular conditioning and training the pros went through. But the filmmakers seemed to have only the most rudimentary grasp of the degree to which Ali brought rhythm, motion, and dancing to the fight. No one ever moved in the ring the way he did. Before Ali, no one ever imagined the sweet beauty a fighter could bring to such a brutal sport. Before Ali, no other boxer floated like a butterfly.

I grew up following Ali, starting with his 1960 Olympic win when I was 13 and was just becoming aware of the civil rights movement. He was only 18 and won all four of his fights in Rome. Over the years, I kept my eye on him, as if we were growing up together. His later struggle against the war in VietNam meant everything to those of us fighting the cops in the streets to protest that vile war. His ability to connect oppressions – “I ain’t got no quarrel with them Viet Cong… No Viet Cong ever called me n****r.” – was an education for us, as was his example of civil resistance to the draft. And all the time he was the most fluid, graceful fighter we had ever seen.

My exposure to the fight game began early. My parents were big on sports, almost any sport that involved our hometown Pittsburgh. Once we got a black and white TV, we would eat dinner sitting around a card table watching Studio Wrestling on Saturday nights. It originated out of Pittsburgh, and we were as familiar with Killer Kowalski and his main antagonist local boy Bruno Sammartino as we were with our relatives. My dad knew Referee Izzy Moidel, a local ex-boxer. Each of the wrestlers had a schtick and a script – it was fake fighting. Obviously. But I got a taste for the give and take of the fight from those weekly broadcasts. (And went on to become a Tae Kwon Do master for my first career, but that’s another story.)

When Muhammed Ali turned up, he had his schtick too, but he was for real. Boxing was for real. Ali gave shape and meaning to one-on-one combat, not only by being brilliant in the ring, but also by being brilliant out of it. He harnessed his charisma and his pronouncements to his beliefs and became one of the most influential athletes in history.

The Burns group seemed to think that Ali was “interesting,” a celebrity, entertaining. But I didn’t feel the love. Of course, they pointed out his athletic and political contributions, but I was left wondering if they had any feel for the depth of his influence. They stayed, it felt, on an unexcited, slightly aloof level of exposition, more interested in the count than the fervor: one, two, three – Ali won the heavyweight championship three different times.

There’s been a lot of discussion about why Burns (white/male/straight) has the total indulgence of PBS, which for 40 years has broadcast some 200 hours of his work! Meanwhile, there are generations of filmmakers who can’t get their toe in the door, not the least directors of color and women. A long-term Boston PBS tv host, the racist, reactionary Emily Rooney (yes, the daughter of –nepotism is becoming a theme in this piece), retired from her show after her disgusting dismissal of the very idea that a filmmaker of color could reach the heights of Burns. Over 300 film and TV professionals wrote a complaint letter to PBS asking “How many other ‘independent’ filmmakers have a decades-long exclusive relationship with a publicly-funded entity? Your commitment to diversity at PBS is not borne out by the evidence.” The privileged position of the Burns group impacts everything about their work – and in the case of Muhammed Ali, makes them the wrong group of people for the job.

Want to get an intimate sense of Muhammed Ali? Do yourself a huge favor and watch Billy Crystal’s hilarious, moving 14-minute tribute at Ali’s funeral. I’ve seen it a dozen times and have never failed to tear up. Eight hours of Burns’ presentation and I never felt much other than annoyance.

 

The Lipstick Assault in Serene Manor,

I am SO thrilled to see my short story The Lipstick Assault in Serene Manor, about being an old dyke in a nursing home, published in the September issue of the fantabulous Gertrude Press!!

Click to read and feel free to pass it on.

 

Ifé Franklin: The Slave Narrative of Willie Mae

Ifé Franklin has produced and directed this remarkable short film entitled The Slave Narrative of Willie Mae. These moving 20 minutes represent just three out of 17 scenes of the book, of the same title, on which it is based. The depth of the collaboration among multiple talented artists is impressive. Letta Neely, who edited Franklin’s volume of historical fiction (Wild Heart Press, 2018), also wrote the script for this film. The actors are riveting, not the least Qualina Lewis as Willie Mae, the young enslaved woman whom her mother, an elder aunt, and a sister field hand are preparing for escape. The multi-talented Michael Gordon Penn provides a frightening threat as the overseer. Their cooperative work together on this film mirrors the joint efforts of these women to save the youngest amongst them from the brutalities of Lenox Tobacco Plantation in 1852.

Ifé Franklin has combined community activism and a rich and outstanding variety of artistic expressions since high school, when she began to study photography. Over the years she has added many layers to her arts education and has produced an impressive range of installations and visual arts. Watch her short film here. Her hope is to bring the full story to the screen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xSdDfMfcI4&ab_channel=If%C3%A9Franklin

 

Acton Arboretum

The Acton Arboretum is yet another jewel sparkling locally in Massachusetts. Two decades in the Boston area, and I only discovered it rather randomly on Google maps. It is like a condensed, human-sized version of Harvard’s world-famous Arnold Arboretum. Well cared for and diverse, it offers a spectrum of trails and types of gardens. The Butterfly and Pollinator Garden was obvious by the cloud of butterflies hovering over it. We ate nice little apples, piled on rocks for passers-by, from Crabapple Allee. There’s a Hosta Garden, an Herb Garden, a Fragrance Garden, a China Trail Garden, more gardens, bogs, ponds covered in florescent algae, wooden bridges, and most of all, copious benches.

The solid teak benches were placed with frequency and in scenic settings, making the whole place more accessible and pleasant. All the paths were easily walkable; none of the inclines were too steep; and although there were lots of folks out, there wasn’t a shred of garbage anywhere to be seen. The Acton Arboretum promises to be special in all seasons and I’ll be back.

For an extra treat, stop at the nearby NARA Park where non-Acton seniors can swim for $3 or rent a paddleboat for $10, where the outdoor amphitheater features cover bands, and where the tiny library is on a stand so tall that I would need a ladder to see any titles. In a conversation with the groundskeeper, who has done an amazing job, I had a sense of the loving creativity that has gone into the explosions of flowers around the property. There were a gazillion kids there – clearly the pond is well-used, even though the summer season formally ended in August.

 

 

Travelogue - Lake Champlain, Vermont

GUILFORD, VERMONT
We start our first long vacation since the inception of the pandemic with a stop in Guilford, VT, to visit with some of my dearest friends, including the special treat of seeing three generations of my oldest friend Verandah’s family. Gilbert and Susan feed us with Gilbert’s famous (indescribably tasty) chicken thighs, corn he has obtained from a gay-owned farm in a different town, and a remarkable bounty of beans and of tomatoes from Susan’s luxurious garden. We sleep in their renovated historic schoolhouse.

BURLINGTON, VERMONT
The next morning drive a couple of hours to Burlington, where the key architectural elements are originality and color. Every house is quirky and each is different from the next. One common theme is what might now be described as attached town houses, but which were once, I assume, workers’ row houses. The outside of the Airbnb was a riot of greens and the inside appeared to have been designed by Escher and decorated by Mondrian.

To me Burlington has the vibe of Portland, Oregon, without all the baggage of Oregon. Until, that is, I learned about its size. At 42,000, Burlington is what passes for the most populated metropolis of Vermont. It runs entirely on renewable energy, and has done so since 2015. The beautiful, wide open University of Vermont campus anchors the town, and the splendor of Lake Champlain adorns it. We have dinner overlooking the Lake at The Shanty the first night and a picnic the next evening at Perkin’s Pier with my dazzling friends Valerie and Mark, who have returned to live in Burlington. At Valerie’s suggestion, we get ahold of the weekly Seven Days news magazine, with complete listings, stories, and love ads, one page of which is for people who prefer letters to online communication. I thought that was sweet.

SHELBURNE, VERMONT
We take a 7-mile detour to Shelburne, but the Museum campus that houses 29 historic buildings of Vermont is closed for the day. We go to the non-profit Shelburne Farms where the store is open and I buy some jam and some maple syrup. The land, which they call their campus, is a 1,400-acre working farm, forest, and National Historic Landmark. The lane to the seashore is closed to most cars and people are asked to walk because of Covid (I guess to keep the crowds down). Two miles in 95’ heat through a flat field? Not happening. I wave my disabled parking placard and we are given a smile, a map, and a welcome to drive through. It seems like more than two miles of flat farmland until we turn a corner and come upon the lake shore and as beautiful a landscape as I have ever seen. I really feel transported to another realm of being as I stare at this piercingly refined view. I have fantasies of planning a stay at the Farm’s 19th century guesthouse with views of the Lake when it re-opens post-pandemic, hopefully in 2022, until I learn that it has no heat, a/c, TV, or wireless in the rooms.

NORTH HERO ISLAND, VERMONT
My Guilford friend, Lana, was the first to recommend The North Hero House Inn & Restaurant and then it turned out that several other friends who had visited at her suggestion were equally enthusiastic. First, a bit of geography. North Hero is one of four islands in an elongated archipelago in the middle of Lake Champlain, a scenic body of water that separates Vermont and New York and reaches 100 miles up to the Canadian border. The Lake and islands were carved out by receding glaciers. Today over 200,000 people get their drinking water from the Lake.

There are many working farms on the islands – corn and apple and grape vines especially – but the main economic motor is tourism. Numerous state parks and swimming, boating, and water sports appeal in the summer; ice fishing is popular in the winter. The population is 803 people, including Bernie Sanders who has a summer home there, and it is 97.5% white. There is an avalanche of tourists in the summer – and many of them looked to be 60+. The commercial hub of the Island is the complex called Hero’s Welcome, where you can pick up a “Feel the Bern” sub sandwich, a joke keychain, a kayak, home-baked pastries, housewares, sporting goods, and picnic equipment. It’s got everything.

The North Hero House Inn & Restaurant comprises a central building where we went daily for a fulsome complimentary breakfast (don’t miss the potatoes). It was built in 1891 and bragged of the island’s first flush toilet. There are three two-story guest houses with screened-in porches on the water. I stayed in the Cove House, built as a private residence in 1811. It’s the far right building in the photo; my room was last on the right on the 2nd floor. The porch hung over the water and was equipped with a table and two chairs plus a hammock. I got a little fridge on request, and would have been fully content if only the room had working wireless. Turns out that it is the worst room for wireless in the complex. I had called twice to ensure internet access and they bullshitted me. It’s not that I wanted to be on Facebook or play with Tik Tok. It’s just that when you are traveling, a tourist needs the interwebz to find the address of a particular restaurant or to check which days a museum is open. In the end, no biggie. Still, I woulda had liked to know.

We visited the Farmers Market on South Hero one day at the recommendation of its charming organizer Liz, whom I met through Verandah. She knows her islands, which she proved by sending us off to the Blue Paddle restaurant, where I followed her instructions and ordered the filet mignon. It was out of this world. The kick-ass owner and the French-speaking server were gracious and amiable women. The duo performing music were melodious, and it was clear – as greetings flew among the tables – that everyone knew everyone in town.

I could never live in a town of 800 people without exploding the social fabric. Rural living requires continuous compromise, tongue-biting, forgetting and forgiving, and excusing questionable behavior. These are not, unfortunately, skills I ever developed. But they are necessary in order to build and maintain community in small places where neighborly support is vital to survival. If you fall out with the librarian or with the leadership of the reproductive rights group or with the owner of the only restaurant big enough to hold events – you’re up shit’s creek. They may be the only game in town.

Speaking of the library, there was a new one in South Hero, but we visited the old public library in North Hero, built in 1907. A volunteer was sweetly forthcoming about what it was like to retire to the island (she’s on at least a half dozen committees) and about the politics of the library. She sent us downstairs to a massive collection of used books for sale, where I bought one by Anais Nin. You can tell so much about a place by looking through such piles, and my conclusion was that this was truly Bernie turf, with a healthy dose of feminism.

We traveled one day to Saint Anne’s Shrine on Isle La Motte, on the spot where Vermont’s oldest settlement was built in 1660. I was put off by the huge statue of Christ nailed to the cross – a disturbing image I have never been able to look at unruffled. There is a chapel and some cabins for spiritual retreats and a big gold statue of Saint Anne.

We hit several of the state parks, but I was most delighted by Sand Bar with its gorgeous 2,000 foot beach. The park was established in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps. Copious picnic tables make it just the place to spend the day at the Lake. We also drove down many roads marked “private” – I often feel compelled to do so – and saw some of the more expensive lakeside homes. But what we couldn’t help notice was that throughout the islands, the architecture was thoroughly unremarkable. Uninteresting. Kinda ugly. There was no particular style (like the Capes on the Cape) and in fact no style at all. Most of them were relatively new and all were abjectly bland. What a contrast with the beautiful nature all around, not the least the copious willow trees.

QUECHEE GORGE, VERMONT
After three nights on the Island, we headed home, but stopped overnight in a boring Airbnb in Lebanon, NH, which was the halfway point on our return. We visited the Quechee Gorge, often called a Little Grand Canyon, formed by melting glaciers about 13,000 years ago. One stands on either/both sides of the bridge 168 feet above the Gorge, and looks down. I was surprised at how dry the river at the bottom of the mile-long chasm was. There are trails down for hikers.

To my surprise, we drove past Fat Hat, a clothing company I’ve been ordering bright thick cotton jackets from online ever since I discovered their twice-a-year 50% sale. It was right on 1 Quechee Main St. I just had to stop and say hello. There were tons more garments than are featured online, but I ended up buying the same sweater/jacket as always – but in a sky blue color. Behind the store was Chef Brad’s Food Truck, the summer version of his Crazy Stop Café. The whole property was draped in greenery and bamboo skirting, full of baubles and bangles and bits of decoration and a school bus turned dining car and picnic tables and tomato plants and myriad signs about controlling children and trash disposal. I had potato and chive soup and a side of fries.

The next day, we drove through impoverished rural areas to Woodstock, Vermont, a wealthy shire town full of exquisite historic buildings, handsome tree-lined boulevards, shops with expensive this and that, and a long wait for our late lunch at the highly organic Mon Vert Café. We stopped at the well-known Village Butcher Shop where I failed to stop myself from buying a fresh cherry pie. Before you judge me, it was a little one. It was truly the cherry on the top of a magnificent week-long escape.

Photos from Barry Hock, Dr Random, and me

3 Novels: The Vanishing Half, Notes on a Scandal, & The Dream Lover

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

This recent novel became an instant best-seller and it is a compelling read indeed. Twin sisters grow up in a small Louisiana town predominated by light-skinned Black people. When the sisters strike out on their own to New Orleans, one sister “accidentally” passes for white and marries her white boss and has a blond daughter, while the other weds an abusive dark-skinned man and births a very dark girl. The divergence in their lives, in their fates, deprived of contact with each other, motors this story.

Bennett’s gorgeous prose provides a path into her subjects of sisterhood, separation, choices, and privilege. Differences around race, class, and gender abound when the daughters meet fortuitously – and figure out their connection. The passing daughter, who hasn’t a clue about her own background, is a spoiled, privileged, obnoxious wannabe actor; the dark daughter is a patient, open-minded, high-achiever who finds love with a transboy.

The Vanishing Half is downright remarkable.

Notes on a Scandal (What Was She Thinking?) by Zoë Heller

Bitter Barbara, a long-time London teacher, lusts after best-friend status with the new art teacher Sheba, as do a number of other teachers at the school. Sheba is more artsy than she is an educator and Barbara bides her time, awaiting the moment that Sheba realizes that it is Barbara who should be by Sheba’s side.

Instead, Sheba falls for a 15-year-old pupil, Steven Connolly, who is a bit of rough, utterly unlike her middle-class husband. Barbara manipulates the situation and becomes Sheba’s only confidant, and then things get crazy.

Notes on a Scandal (2003) is a remarkable page-turner, although it has shades of “The Children’s Hour” and other “sad lesbian” stories. Nowhere is the word lesbian used nor any hint of sexual desire between the women, but the whiff of frustrated mean-spirited obsession infuses all that Barbara does.

A best seller and an award-winner, Notes on a Scandal was made into a film in 2006, starring Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett. But never mind that. The novel is gripping and flows in fast and furious emotion.

The Dream Lover: A Novel of George Sand by Elizabeth Berg

Elizabeth Berg is a prodigious popular writer who has turned out dozens of novels, only a few of which I have as yet read. But The Dream Lover was just exactly what the pandemic called for: a riveting fictionalized account of the multi-layered, free-wheeling literary and love life of the author George Sand. Berg manages to balance her copious writing skills with a story every reader wants to hear to produce this exciting novel.

It wasn’t easy to be a gutsy gender-bender in the 1800s, but Sand managed to combine her daring life of drag and lust with her commitment to writing. To convey the complexities of Sand’s life, Berg chose a complicated first-person double narrative – (1804–1831 and 1831–1876), which merges at the end. There may be a few too many relationships stuffed into this narrative, but a good read is a welcome escape from cooties and wars.

 

Kahlo's ‘Pose’ at Brandeis University’s Rose

I’m on a mission to check out the many small museums in this area of Massachusetts. This rainy Saturday was the perfect timing for my first visit to the Rose Art Museum. Their modern and contemporary permanent collection is extraordinary – every piece of the highest quality. Stunners from one wall to another, with women and people of color now heavily represented.

Let’s talk first about the traveling exhibition of “POSE” which classifies it’s images by and about Frida Kahlo into these categories: “posing; composing; exposing; queering, and self-fashioning.” It includes a not inconsiderable array of photos and paintings, with captions that do an excellent job of contextualizing her courageous, if painful, life. It highlights her youthful cross-dressing, her bisexuality, and her radical politics. Available at Rose until December 19, 2021, it is sufficiently comprehensive to both introduce the uninitiated to Frida and to satisfy the hunger of her fans.

The rest of the surprisingly large exhibition halls are filled with a self-tribute on the occasion of the museum’s 60th anniversary. Although the original selection of work included only one woman six decades ago, the curators have used the juxtaposition of the best-known pieces with work by emerging artists. In their words: “Displaying well-known, iconic pieces from the Rose’s permanent collection alongside artworks created by emerging and historically underrepresented artists, this major, museum-wide exhibition recontextualizes the familiar while introducing the new. The show features a multigenerational, international cadre of stellar artists…”

The entrance floor, in particular, featured radical work by Black artists that was new to me, but blew me away. These were juxtaposed with select masterpieces by such artists as Louise Nevelson, Yoko Ono, Cindy Sherman, Pablo Picasso, and Andy Warhol, to name a few. The pedophiles among superstars were named clearly, including mention of the 14-year-old girl Gauguin called his “wife” and used as a muse.

Beauford Delaney got only a fraction of the attention received by his contemporaries Picasso and Gauguin. An admired member of the Harlem Renaissance whose mother was born into slavery, Delaney was a mentor to James Baldwin. Both were gay. I felt lucky to be able to see his jazzy, vibrant piece “Abstraction,” set aside and contrasting with Picasso’s “Reclining Nude.”

“I Gets a Thrill Too When I sees De Koo” is a big, exuberant work by Robert Colescott, a frequently satirical African-American artist who studied in Paris with one of my very favorite artists, the Cubist Fernand Léger. He returned to the States determined to put Black images into art history. Meant to mock the famous “Woman” by de Kooning, the title also contains a reference to an Arabic swear word for a woman’s vagina. Colescott had spent several years living in Egypt. His original introduction to art as a teenager was watching Diego Rivera, the muralist husband of Frida Kahlo, paint a mural in San Francisco. Which brings us full circle.

In 2009, when the Recession seemed like the end of capitalism and donations to Brandeis’ constricted, the then-President Jehuda Reinharz announced that he was going to sell off some of the 7,500-piece collection and close the Rose Museum. People associated with the University went nutters, not the least those who had donated art. Litigation halted any sale of the artwork and the Rose Museum has spent the time since then healing the wounds from that controversy.

Throughout my entire visit, I felt super-aware of the profound wealth this collection represents and how copious are the privileges of students and teachers at these elite private colleges. At a time when most higher education institutions are in a kerfuffle over reduced enrollment, dealing with Covid, keeping angry professors as “adjuncts” with little security, these universities with massive endowments are, ironically, offering us artistic delights.

Danforth Museum in Framingham, Massachusetts

If I have learned anything during the pandemic, it is that eastern Massachusetts is filled with wonderful hidden pearls, especially the many parks and ponds I have discovered during my weekly Saturday explorations. Now that I am able to go inside museums, I’m trying to identify and visit the variety of little museums in surrounding towns.

The Danforth Museum in Framingham is housed on the second floor of the arts building of Framingham State University. Among the 3,500 objects in the permanent collection are the works of Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller (1877 –1968.) Fuller was an African-American sculptor who was a protégée of Auguste Rodin and initially built her reputation in Paris. (Her self-portrait is above.) A contributor to the Harlem Renaissance, her work centers around injustice and struggle. Even her very studio is displayed at the Danforth along with about 100 pieces of her work.

There were other exhibitions to see as well. A recent acquisition by Mia Cross called “Another Girl Who Sat on the Couch Too Long” tickled me. Dana Filibert, one of the featured artists in a special exhibition called “Wonderscape,” showed many collaged pieces using repurposed objects, epoxy, carved foam, and paint (see below). Her unique art, she says, aims for “playful mischief.”

We were the only guests on a summer Saturday. Entry was $6 for seniors. The bathrooms were convenient and the air-conditioning was pumped way up (take a shirt or sweater to put on). I recommend searching out these little museums and galleries, especially if, like me, you are feeling that you have been heavily deprived of art for over a year.

New Bedford & Mattapoisett: Art & Nature

We are continuing our pandemic tradition of going somewhere beautiful every Saturday. We’ve easily identified this past year’s worth of discoveries, and now that we are in the most exquisite Spring I’ve ever experienced, there are plenty more treats out here in Eastern Massachusetts.

Yesterday we set out to New Bedford, about an hour south, towards Cape Cod. I ordered tickets ($5/seniors) for an exhibit at the New Bedford Art Museum entitled “Uncommon Threads: The Works of Ruth E. Carter.” Carter is the costume designer who won the Academy Award for designing “Black Panther.” She’s designed clothes for many important films, from “Roots” to “Malcolm X” to “Amistad” to “Selma.” She is a local talent, born in Springfield, MA. It is a small exhibit, and I was particularly interested in the pieces from Malcolm X. It was, though, disappointing to learn that the museum could not afford to include clothes from Wakanda.

There was a plethora of Pride flags everywhere in New Bedford. Around the corner from the museum, the Alison Wells Fine Art Studio and Gallery was flying the flag. The charming and talented artist/owner, Alison, gave us a quick education about being an artist in New Bedford. She said it was an art-friendly town, with reasonable rents, attracting artists of all sorts who have dominated the town’s cultural landscape. Alison’s gorgeous work is a combination of collage and paint. Here is a photo of a painting I particularly loved. She is prolific and impressive and no trip to New Bedford would be complete without a visit to this gallery.

New Bedford was a whaling town at a time when whale oil was the equivalent of fossil fuels today. So executives and owners of whaling businesses made a pile of dough and their former mansions reflect that wealth, although they are now surrounded by shabby neighborhoods. While New Bedford was considered the richest per capita city in the world during the 19th Century, it now has twice the number of people living below the poverty rate than the rest of Massachusetts,

Only one of the big houses has been fully preserved as a museum. We explored the Rotch-Jones-Duff House & Garden Museum, with its exquisite formal rose garden of 350 rose bushes and traditional pergola. The roses are at their peak right now. Then we took the self-tour of the house ($6/seniors).

Finally, we drove eight miles to the 1837 Ned’s Point Lighthouse in the harbor of Mattapoisett. This town started as a ship-building and whaling town, but soon became a resort for the elite. I must confess to love a good drive around beautiful old homes – although too many rich neighborhoods are now full of nasty McMansions – but these were tasteful Cape-Codders with lush landscaping and a certain unity of grey shingles. The Lighthouse is situated in a very large grassy circle surrounded by huge rocks and just feet from the rocky shore. There is a launching area specifically for windsurfers and they were amazing to watch.

I returned home to a broken elevator in my apartment building in 94 degree weather and a car full of stuff to bring up eight stories. I chose the strawberry rhubarb pie and the two bouquets – none of which would have a chance to survive, and abandoned my laptop, two loads of wet laundry I had done at my friend’s place (I don’t use dryers for my clothes), and many other sundries. After the sun set, I went back down to retrieve the laptop, as who knows when the elevator will be fixed and we’re expecting the heatwave to continue in the mid-90s for the next few days. The bad news is that my knees have lodged complaints about the climb of eight stories, but the good news is that my air conditioning is working just fine.

Photos by Barry Hock

Mid-Cape Cod Redux - May 2021

For my first vacation after 14 months of staying home, my pandemic partner Barry and I recreate our last trip to the same Hyannis Harbor Hotel, eating (outside) at the same nearby Black Cat Tavern, and driving to some of the same beauty spots. But it feels like a very different trip. We are figuring out when to mask. People are declaring themselves fully vaccinated before engaging in conversation. And we are experiencing a refreshed post-pandemic sense of freedom in the outdoors.

Heritage Museum and Gardens
We get advance tickets ($20) to the annual rhododendron festival – 100+ exquisite varieties! – at the Heritage Museum and Gardens in Sandwich. Besides the picturesque landscaping and the explosive colors of the blooms, my favorite amenity is the people-mover that continuously circles the 15-minute loop around the 100 acres of soft hills and steep inclines. There are seven stations to hop on and off which makes the entire Gardens accessible for those of us who want to save our steps for the “good parts.”

Dunbar Tea House
From there we go straight to Sandwich’s famous Dunbar Tea House where a crispy tender Duck Leg Confit has been added to the menu. The bad news is that the strawberry/rhubarb pie is sold out; the good news is that there is a pudding-like strawberry/rhubarb layered concoction to substitute. Barry’s Guinness Braised Short Rib Stew isn’t as tender as he would like, but we are both gratified by the outstanding service we receive at the hands of our server Elaine.

Bass Hole Boardwalk
Another day we return to perhaps my favorite spot on the Cape, the Bass Hole Boardwalk at Gray’s Beach in Yarmouth Port. Each plank of the long sturdy boardwalk is playfully inscribed – from celebrating a kid’s graduation to a 50th anniversary; from honoring a favorite pet to blowing kisses to a beau. On one side of the suspended boardwalk is an exquisite green salt marsh, unusually lush and grooved. On the other side is a long stretch of sandbars leading to the ocean, where fowl and kayaks intermingle. (Photo by Tammy Nolan)

Scargo Tower
Last time we tried to visit it, our drive up to the Scargo Tower was blocked for some sort of renovations. This time we actually see it. First constructed in 1874 by the Tobey family who hoped that its location atop the highest mid-Cape hill would turn it into a lucrative tourist attraction, the wooden structure was soon blown over in a gale. Once rebuilt, it burned down. Finally in 1901, a 30-foot version was assembled from cobblestones and surrounded by a parking lot, which the town of Dennis manages. They say that from atop the Tower the views reach from P-town to the Sagamore Bridge, but it looks like the Tower hasn’t been open for a long time. Stuck up there like a sore stone thumb, it seems quite the folly.

Hyannisport
I love driving around places I don’t know, sneaking up the “private, no trespassing” lanes of the one-percenters to see their mansions, sometimes gorgeous and often gross, and then winding through the streets of the neighborhoods of those who clean those mansions. Although I have never been an environmental activist of any sort, I do know about the problems of clean water faced by many on our planet, not the least the people of Palestine. So the acres and acres of bright green lawns surrounding the bloated homes in Hyannisport make me considerably crazed. Blocked access to the sea and security guards in giant pickup trucks telling us to “move along” when we try to momentarily stop near the yacht club for the view add to my irritation.

Spohr Gardens
We drive the loop to Falmouth before our departure in order to stop at the Spohr Gardens – I had never heard of it before. It was developed on 6 acres along Oyster Pond for over forty years by the owners Margaret and Charles Spohr. He was a high-flying civil engineer; she graduated from the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing and served in the Army Nurse Corps. Charlie and Margaret, who were the ages of my parents, evolved these Gardens together.

Charlie added his growing collection of items he thought of as “decorations” – “planting” them throughout the gardens. Big metal bells, massive millstones, and giant old anchors predominate. His prized possession is well-displayed on the edge of Oyster Pond: it is reputed to be the 1760 anchor meant to be used on the H.M.S. Bounty (i.e. Mutiny on the Bounty), but left on shore for repairs. It is 14’ long and 2,476 pounds.

We run into a Trustee named Bill who talks to us for a long time about Spohr Gardens. He tells us that their old renovated cottage is rented out by the year – usually to rich city folks. His particular job at Spohr Gardens is preparing the Butterfly Habitat, and he points out the varied plants that serve as breeding grounds for the different butterflies. The whole estate was donated by the Spohrs as a Trust with funds to maintain it on the condition that it remain open every single day and be free to the public.

As we are leaving the Spohr Gardens we run into a couple who live nearby. They are watching an eagle’s nest on top of a tree on the other side of Oyster Pond and they lend us their binoculars (“We’re fully vaccinated,” he says as he hands me the binoculars) and tell us about the eagle and its wingspan of six feet! Then he tells us something spooky. That for the first time at the nearby Otis Airforce Base, bunches of paratroopers have lately been seen parachuting from low-flying military planes. The locals are mystified by why that is going on.

We climb the exit path lined with azaleas and hydrangeas and vow to return for the daffodil festival next April.

 

Photos via Barry Hock