Brooklyn Has Bridges

Did absolutely nothing yesterday. Except scribble a bit in a desultory fashion on the Work in Progress and labor for the client who will not quit me no matter how hard I try to alienate him.

And this was bad because I did not exercise, and when I do not exercise, I have problems sleeping and lay there tossing and turning into the wee hours of the night even if I am totally exhausted.

Also I become obsessed that my cat is living a life that is not fulfilling and that it is my primary mission in life to track down cat toys that will not bore her.

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In the evening, I had a short phoner with the Number 1 Son.

It was not satisfying.

I am completely sympathetic to the reasons it was not satisfying: He is so utterly focused on passing the Bar that every neuron in his brain is overridden with torts, civil procedures and the rules of evidence (both federal and California.) There’s no room in his head for humor or playfulness. And this is a good thing! In fact, I contributed a thousand bucks to the collective effort to make this happen! Since I am your prototypical elderly pensioner scrambling to keep her cat in cat toys, $1,000 is a huge amount of money to me!

Still. When I got off the phone, I allowed myself to think something I hardly ever allow myself to think, to wit: What if I had never had children? Would I be happier or sadder?

For 18 years, your life is absolutely dominated by the care and nurturance of these creatures.

And then, abruptly, it isn’t.

And what do you have left?

Throughout most of our relationship as adult offspring/adult parent, Max and I have had a solid relationship, and as I say, I fully understand the reason for the disconnect in the present.

RTT and I hardly interact at all although it is pleasant enough when we do, and I suppose in March when the threat of snow falls to under 20%, I will trudge up to Ithaca to hang out with him.

But what if they didn’t exist? How different would my life be?

My basic assumption has always been that if I hadn’t had kids, I would be dead now since my upbringing in the House of Usher left me so self-destructive and self-involved. It was really the responsibility for those little lives that gave me the impetus to reprogram myself.

But what if I had gone into therapy instead? [Insert smiley.]

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Today’s scribbling on the Work in Progress is more backstory for June’s father who will shortly drop dead (end of this chapter.)

Not having had a father myself, it is difficult to write about a girl’s (loving) relationship with her father.

I suppose the closest thing I had to a father was my grandfather, the wonderfully named Alfred Lord Tennyson Vogel.

And I do remember one wonderful conversation Grandpa and I had when I was 19 and about to scamper off to Paris for the first time. (I had a show there. Marc Bohan, Dior.)

Grandpa took me for a walk in Prospect Park.

“Patty,” he implored. “Why do you want to leave Brooklyn? Paris has museums? Brooklyn has museums. Paris has parks? Brooklyn has parks. Paris has bridges? Brooklyn has bridges. There’s no reason to go!”

This is totally terrific dialogue!

Unfortunately, there'ss no way I can repurpose it for the task at hand since June is not going off to Paris.

But I need dialogue that has that same kind of resonance.