Instints

’ve been watching Dear… on Apple TV.  I found it by accident.  While looking for another program a small square with Selena Gomez’s image caught my eye.  I clicked on her framed face and came upon Dear…  I watched the 30-minute segment and was immediately hooked. The series features individuals in the public eye, some athletes, actors, writers, or activists, as they engage with letters of those who have been inspired by them The featured famous person’s  influence has helped to change the letter writers’ lives.  

Do I speak of the unspeakable?  This past week marks a tragic low in inhumane acts.  I cannot get my head around it.  As a Jewish psychotherapist I am in a similar position as I was when we faced the pandemic.  I am going through something that I am also hearing from my clients.  The sadness, along with so many other emotions, have been omnipresent this past week.  

When I was growing up in suburban New Jersey I didn’t know anything about self-care.  The first experience I had that felt like self-care was when my mom treated me to a facial at Strawbridge and Clothier.  They were having a special promotion.  Although I couldn’t control my weigh, we could try to tackle my acne this one time.  

“If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.”  That was a common idiom of our mother’s lexicon.   She lived true to that statement.  Even when she attempted to comment on something she disapproved of, she did her best to soften it.  As a teen, I often was asked the question, “Janet, do you think that’s the most complementary outfit?“  Or it could have been make-up, pants, hair style or any other appearance-related observation.  As a sensitive teen I was crushed no matter how much she tried to say it diplomatically.   

I was ten years old.  The person who I had considered my best friend was in the Stafford School auditorium with her class, and I was with my class for a school-wide assembly.  Assemblies felt important.  Usually the principal spoke.  He was a tall, somber man who communicated in hushed tones lending an atmosphere of solemnity to childhood gatherings.  

Although this cannot be said of much of the country or world, we in New York City have enjoyed a reprieve from the intense heat of July.  It has been delightful.  Today I relished a breezy morning riding my low-to-the-ground bicycle up and down Park Avenue for the annual Summer Streets event.  The Department of Transportation closes streets on Saturdays in all five boroughs throughout late July and August for pedestrians, joggers, and cyclists as a way of promoting greener transportation.    

I set out to go to The Brooklyn Museum to see the Africa Fashion exhibit.  I had intended to see it twice before but got waylaid, so my determination to get there yesterday was fierce.  My plan was to slowly jog in Prospect Park getting out at the arch and walking the few blocks to the museum.  Once I made it to Prospect Park at an unfamiliar entrance, I opened up Maps on my iPhone and set off.  

I was tired, it was hot, and I was happy to be at MOMA, the Museum of Modern Art, on West 53^rd Street.  The galleries were crowded, but I took my time enjoying new exhibitions and old favorites. After the slow perusal of four floors, I was spent.  But I still had almost an hour before our dinner reservation down the block.  

Happy Father’s Day.  When I say that it conjures up so much for me and for so many others, I expect you included.  Many of us have had varied relationships with our fathers nothing like Father Knows Best, The Courtship of Eddie’s Father, Blackish, or even Home Improvement.  If only we could tune in for 30 minutes a week and enjoy the comical moments that focus on the highlights of the best parts of them, with a little silly thrown in.  

It was a mere coincidence that we happen to be in Split, Croatia the same day the New York Times travel section featured 36 hours in Split.  It’s about the same amount of time we’ll be in Split, which is a beautiful port city on the coast of the Adriatic Sea.    

I noticed that by the end of my work week I was short on compassion.  My go to was frustration, impatience, or barely disguised anger.  It was simple things. I was missing paperwork that had been promised me.  A pair of reading glasses broke.  And then there were a string of simple annoyances.  

The Q train came to a halting stop.  An announcement immediately came on asking “Who pulled the emergency cord?”  At the end of our car, a good citizen thinking there was a request to pull the cord, got up from her seat, pulled the cord, even as the train stood idle.  She sat back down returning to her book.  A hardcover, old school, though she looked barely 25.  

I, like many, have mixed feelings about Mother’s Day.  

As a daughter I knew that I loved my mom, and I also yearned for her acceptance, spending far too much of my babysitting money to bask in the momentary approval of an expensive Mother’s Day gift.  I’d set up Arlene’s Kitchen, honoring our mom.  It was a made-up restaurant in our home with hand-written menus for the family.  Nervous about what I might cook, I’d prep all the possibilities from eggs, any type of French toast or bagels & lox.  As down home as those brunches were, they were followed by the certainty that my clean-up techniques would be met with inevitable disapproval.  No one could make a countertop shine like my mom.  

It was a full moon this week.  I love looking up on a clear night and viewing the magical, mystical moon between the high rises.  Ever since I was a child I’ve found the moon an enchantress.  Myths have their place, and for many years I counted on myths to justify my outsized love of a full moon.  In times of feeling invisible I felt seen by the moon.  

Growing up we wore rubbers or rubber boots, gently stretching them until they covered our shoes.  It was a hassle taking them on and off.  But to keep our leather saddle shoes somewhat dry, we sported rubbers over our two-toned oxfords.  These days my low rubber boots are the only shoes I need when it’s wet outside. They keep the water from soaking my socks and allow me to walk about in the rain.  

My mom had a green thumb.  She could keep any plant or planted flower alive for years.  One of her favorite flowering plants was orchids.  She loved the dramatic curve and the delicate flowers.  She had a knack for keeping them alive and thriving for years.  A couple of times I found orchids I thought she would love.  I carefully brought them home reading the instructions and tending to them so they would make the perfect gift.  However, by the time they made it to her doorstep the blooms would fall and the sad gifts never reflected the hope I had of a lush and luxurious present. 

I came home late last night after seeing a beautifully moving theater piece by Suzan-Lori Parks.  Retrieving our mail, I saw a broken glass and a brick on the lobby carpet.  Apparently, a group of teens were told to leave the area while smoking. So one of them in anger threw a brick through the window to show ‘them.”  It created more work for the porter and super who had to clean up and repair on their weekend off, when they were nowhere near the incident.  

I grew up with three siblings.  If you grew up with siblings, as I did, you are familiar with the age-old enterprise of tattling.  My younger sister, Susan, now Chova Sara, was the tattletale.  She was the one that thought it important to report to my parents, usually our mom, whatever misadventures we were enacting.  When I was six to her four, she ran to our mom to say I wasn’t letting her play with my Barbies.  This was true, but only because she cut their hair and drew on them with crayons.  Nonetheless, I had to release more dolls to her based on “fairness.”  This made no sense to me, but she got what she wanted, and it spurred her on for years.