I think you will know who you are the minute I say that we held your wedding reception in our home, almost a year ago to the day (July 1st?) in fact! You were a stunningly beautiful bride.

(Also, you are the only one who reads this blog--and this is the first time I've written in it for many months.) I've been too busy working on some other projects to write anything for a blog.

I keep losing your email address, but you are so often on my mind. I really miss talking with you and hope that we can get together soon.

With great affection,

Judy

 

 

Dear Miss Berman:

 

Thanks a lot.  I mean it.  Thanks for inflicting a neurosis on me that’s lasted forty years-- with no signs of diminishing.  Even though “neurosis” is no longer included in the list of official mental disorders, my condition is a painful, annoying intrusion into my already-cluttered consciousness. 

 

Okay, so maybe it’s just an old, weird habit.  Whatever it is, it’s beginning to bug me more and more so that I may even be accused of obsessing about it.  And obsessive-compulsive disorder (“OCD”) is very definitely a well-accepted and official emotional problem.

 

So, is it a great physical impairment that’s causing all this fuss?  Not even close. 

A grossly embarrassing gesture or grotesque tic?  No.   It is merely a mundane and miniscule bit of habit you drilled into my head and that of my classmates in the 10^th grade in our high school shorthand class. 

 

The truth is that I didn’t want to be in your class in the first place.  It was my dad’s idea.  Although he expected me to at least become a lawyer as my sister and three brothers had, he insisted that I take high school shorthand and typing—“just in case”.  Typing I could handle, but shorthand??  Arguing proved futile, so I enrolled.

 

You had to know from almost day one that I wasn’t cut out for this class.  Those weird little squigglycues made no sense—and the grades you imposed on my mostly-A scholastic record were insulting.  No matter how hard I tried, and I did try for awhile, my brain refused to get it.  No one knew anything about left brain/right brain theories back then, but I knew that something did not connect.  However my brain is designed, it does not do well with things spatial. Your course provided the definitive diagnosis:  This student cannot deal with squiggly lines read at record speed about trivial nonsense!

 

Why didn’t you counsel me out?  How could you have let me sit there for an entire semester (or was it two?) and endure such agony?  And how could you have put up with my inability to “get it”? 

 

My memory is that I never saw you smile once and I assumed it was because I made your life as miserable as you made mine. Somehow we both managed to stick it out and I finished your course.  You gave me some awful grade I can’t remember exactly, except that it was very low for my standards, but high enough so that you didn’t have to see me again the next year.  We were not soul mates, thee and me, although we did survive the class. 

 

Now here’s the question:  why did you have to do such a superb job of inflicting good shorthand practice on me?  Especially The Rule that says you must never write with the pen cap on the end of the pen. EVER.

 

 

All I remember about your class is The Rule (plus the very useful symbols for two words:  “sincerely” and “always”).  And now, The Rule has come to haunt me.

 

To this day, forty years later, although I never take short hand notes (because I only know two words), I also never, ever write anything without taking the pen cap cover off and laying it down somewhere. As a result, I have more pen caps than a stationery store has pens.  None attached to working writing instruments, mind you.  Those are scattered around and all dried out, because the pen caps are missing.

 

Frankly, it drives me nuts and it’s getting worse.  Now that I am approaching the golden years, my forgetfulness is, of course, increasing.  After automatically taking the pen cap off before I do anything else, I often can’t recall not only where I put the cap, but why I took it off in the first place!  I know I had a passionate, important thought to write down when I went to get a pen.  But now that I have the cover off, I’ll be hanged if I can remember what it is.  And when I do remember, the pen will be dried out because I stuck the top someplace.

 

A few years ago when I was visiting the town where I grew up, my mother insisted on a trip to the nursing home where she had been a regular volunteer for over half a century.  We said “hello” to several old friends, and then all of a sudden, there you were—virtually unchanged except for your wheelchair. When my mother said, “Astrid, you remember Judy, don’t you?” you patted my hand, and told me with a big smile what a good student I had been!  Truthfully, I don’t think you remembered anyone-- or even what you had for breakfast that morning.  And anyway, if you had even the vaguest memory of me, you wouldn’t have permitted a smile.  I’m sure I’d be the first one you’d forget because of all the grief I caused you.  I certainly remembered you and your unique, lasting legacy.

 

My habit of losing pen caps and leaving capless pens to dry out is not lessening with my own aging process.  It is growing.  Fortunately, my typing class was more successful than my shorthand class, and allows me to fully utilize the computer for most of my writing needs. 

 

Maybe the solution is not to write anything by hand anymore?  Not possible.

I have become totally addicted to the delicious, exquisite sensation of heavy, finest-quality writing paper majestically receiving the rich, black, glossy liquid flowing from a solid, gold-nibbed, capless fountain pen.  I couldn’t give that up-- and I can’t write with the cap on.

 

Maybe I can learn to live with my eccentricities.  Maybe your legacy was not such a bad gift after all.  Who’d a thought!

 

Always Yours Very Truly Sincerely,

 

Judy Nelson

 

 

                                                 CASEY’S TEAR

 by Judy Nelson

 

 

“C’mon guys,” pleaded Casey Jones, the director of the Lutheran Church’s junior choir.   “There’s only 20 minutes left of rehearsal and we perform tomorrow night.  You've been acting up all night. Settle down and sing!”  He give us a lead note from his pitch pipe and raised his hand to conduct.

 

My eighth grade church chums and I settled down a little and sang Little Drummer Boy.  Casey kept shaking his head and wincing.

 

“It sounds pretty bad,” Casey said when we finished the first verse. “We’ve got a lot of work to do.” 

 

Then Sally punched Greg on his shoulder.  Someone giggled.  Then someone else.  Pretty soon the whole choir was in hysterics.  Except Casey.

 

“Okay,” he said, weariness showing in his voice.  “It’s your choice.  How many of you want to make fools of yourselves in front of the whole congregation and your parents on Christmas Eve—raise your hands.”

 

Silence.  No one moved.  And no one put up a hand.  We hadn’t heard this tone of voice before from our Casey.

 

“How many of you would rather not sing with us on Christmas Eve—raise your hands.”

 

Again, no movement, no hands in the air.  All of our heads were hanging a little lower than usual.

 

“The next person who disrupts the rehearsal will be telling me that he or she does not want to sing with us and that I should inform their parents.”

 

Casey, the lovable, affable, even jolly Casey had gone serious on us.  Leave the choir?  Not sing on Christmas Eve?  The thought of facing our parents on this subject was terrifying. 

 

“You mean to tell me you got kicked out of Casey Jone’s choir?”  I could hear the disappointment in my mother’s voice as if she were standing next to me.

 

“We’re sorry, Casey,” I said.  “We’ll get down to business.  Come on everybody, let’s sing.”

 

We were serious for the last 15  minutes of the rehearsal.

 

“You've improved a little,” Casey lied.  “But you’d better come 15 minutes early tomorrow night.”  He turned and left the room.

 

At 10:45 sharp on Christmas Eve we were all dressed in our choir robes and seated in the choral room when Casey walked in.

 

“Well,” he said looking us over.  “Thanks for being on time.” 

 

We sang the first part of Drummer Boy until he stopped us.

 

“Please,” Casey said.  “When it’s unison, it means you all sing the same notes.  From the beginning.”

 

This time we made it to the parumpapa pums. When we sang the first one, Casey shushed us and gestured vigorously for us to sing more softly. 

 

We tried another parumpa pum pum but he cut us off when he looked at his watch and said, “that’s a little better but we’re out of time."  

 

As he put on his jacket, Casey said,  "Okay, we’ll be on right after Holy, Holy, Holy and we are the finale.  Remember, listen to each other, people and all eyes on me.  I know you can do this.  I’m counting on you,” and he led the way toward the choir loft behind the altar in the sanctuary.  It was totally dark except for a pinlight hooked on Casey’s music stand. The organist was already playing and the church was nearly full.

 

The Christmas Eve service was always everyone’s favorite because there was beautiful music and no sermon.  We sang along to our favorite hymns and then it was time as the congregation finished singing "Holy, Holy, Holy."

 

With the "Amen,"Casey stood and looked down at the music in front of him, the beam of light illuminating the music and every line on his face.  He looked almost ghost like.  Then he slowly lifted his head, looked into every person’s eyes and motioned for us to stand. 

 

Casey’s hands hung in front of him, poised and ready.  There was a tiny smile on his lips.  Then he put the pitch pipe to his lips and winked. We took a deep breath in unison and when he moved his hands, we all sang the first note together, on time and on key.

 

“Come he told them, parumpapa pum….”  Casey’s hands undulated, opened and closed.  He enticed, divined, wished the music from somewhere deep within us.  We sang as we had never sung before.

 

“The newborn king to see, parumpapapum….”

 

There were moments in that song when I felt as if my voice belonged to someone else and that I was not in control.

 

“I gave my gift to him, parumpapa pum…” 

 

And it was not my voice I was hearing, but all of the voices blended into one.

 

“Mary nodded. Parumpapa pum.  The ox and ass kept time paraumpapum…”

 

We were down to the finish line—the last words of the last verse.  The boys’ bass voices rippled joyously through the choir loft –pum pum. Pum….  The girls voices sounded more like chimes.

 

By now we were even breathing together.

 

“Me and my drum.  Me and my ....”  “Drummmmmmmmm” was the last note.  We landed on it as squarely as an Olympic gold medal skater ending a perfectly executed high jump. Finally, we sustained it the way Casey had taught us and more softly and delicately than we could have imagined.

 

Casey’s eyes were closed now, his face serene, peaceful.  Slowly he brought his fingers together and when they touched, the barely whispered last note ended, in exquisite unison.

 

Nobody breathed.  We stood transfixed.  Casey did not move a muscle, his hands still poised in the air with the closing gesture.  Then, from out of the corner of his eye, a single tear emerged.  Slowly it traveled down his cheek and and, in the silence, made a plopping sound on the sheet of music in front of him. 

 

Casey opened his eyes, smiled and mouthed the words, “Thank you.”

 

 

No, Mr. Jones.  Thank you!  This was the gift that lasts a lifetime. 

 

***********

[Newspaper article published May 5, 1998, Daily Breeze, Life and Arts section]

                            Complaining About How He Never Complains

                        (Original title was:  “Can This Marriage Be Saved?”)

                                                                                                by Judy Nelson

            Jim, the guy I’m married to, is wonderful in every way but one: he never complains.  I mean, never.  Now I’m not the worst in the world about complaining.  Probably couldn’t even get an honorable mention.   But periodically, I do share my aches and pains and a few choice words about the world’s idiots.  Periodically.

            But, this guy?  Never.  Oh, he’s gotten close once or twice.  Like the time at 3 a.m. when I woke up to find him doubled over in the bed with abdominal pain.  Not a word.  Not a peep.

            “Are you OK?” I asked.  Silence. Waiting.  And then, a head motion that implied a little doubt.

            “I’m taking you to the emergency room,” I said.

            A flicker.  A pause.  Air inhaled.  But no refusal.  There it was—almost.  An acknowledgment from a savvy, stoic, doc of Scandinavian heritage that he would allow me to drag him to an E.R. in the middle of the night.

            I was immobilized for a few seconds with both relief and terror.  If he was going to allow me this entrée, there was hope he wouldn’t die on me, but it meant he was hurting ten times more than I’d realized.  I was right on both counts, but it was a long, anxiety-filled night for both of us.

            The other time was on a magnificent vacation in the New Zealand countryside.  All of a sudden I was aware of a more-than-ordinary quiet from the love of my life.  It took a while for my usually hypersensitive antennae to register, but when it clicked in, I realized something unusual was going on.  I waited a few moments, then looked into his normally-intense blue eyes.

            What I saw tied my stomach in a knot.  The blue was faded, the lines on the face I loved so much looked deeper, and I knew:  What had registered as unusual quiet during the last few hours, maybe longer, was not relaxation or introspection, it was pain.  Excruciating pain.

            From years of experience, I knew how to approach this one.  Directly asking, “How are you?” would get the standard response of, “I’m fine.”  Not a lie, exactly.  Just decades of practice, heredity, nurture and genetics playing out the usual pattern.  “Are you OK?” sometimes got a different response, but rarely.  Jim shifted in his seat again, and I saw the lines in his face tighten.

            “How long have you been hurting?” I whispered.  It’s definitely not OK for anyone else to know there might be pain.

            Silence.  A swallow.  The mouth working just a tad, as if the words needed to be dredged up from some deep place.

            “Later,” he said, gently.

            Later, I learned that he had been experiencing, in his shoulder, the worst pain of his life.  For four days.

Many women I talk to about Jim beg me to clone him.  In fact, I have to be careful not to stir up resentment from women whose marriages are apparently less delightful than mine.  But early in my marriage, before I was aware of this, I sometimes shared with friends my joy at being married to this man.  Every day with him brings a re-affirmation of his affection:   A rose.  Or an article about a subject we both care about. 

A trinket.  A gemstone.  New socks for my cold feet.  A pen.  A joke.  A new magazine.  Every day.

            And sometimes he picks out clothes for me, dazzling clothes.  Holds doors open. Carries heavy things.  Washes clothes.  Touches my cheek.  Washes my car or has it washed.  Puts up with whatever nutty or annoying thing I might do or forget to do or do late or spend too much money on.  This must be well beyond what psychologist Carl Rogers meant by “unconditional regard,” and in a marriage it creates magic.

            But I still have this problem, and with my aging process, it’s getting bigger:  He won’t complain about anything.  With his decade-plus years on me, I know that if I get up with minor aches and pains, he must have major ones.  Arthritis, bursitis, vision and hearing problems, teeth, hair, feet—you name it.

            But will he admit to this?  Never.

            I’m currently in an arm brace from too much time spent at my computer, and I’m not supposed to lift anything heavier than a teacup.  It ticks me off.  Several times an hour.  But, I bite my lip.  I know he has old knee injuries from football, and that every time he bends over his back hurts from major surgery he had 30 years ago.  I mean really hurts.

            I need to share my frustrations, even though a gazillion other people are going through the same thing.

            But I try not to, because he doesn’t.  He just smiles sweetly, hugs me when I do voice the classic complaints of the post-middle-age female, and keeps going.

            Fortunately, my problem has a positive side.  While silent on the pain and discomfort issue, Jim can’t totally convince me that he isn’t noticing the onslaught of aging.  How do I know?  Not from words or groans or even sighs.  I know because we are experiencing every minute of our life to the fullest in a silent covenant to live every moment as if it is our last.

            While we can is the unspoken rationale behind every less-than-sensible or less-than-affordable action.  A trip abroad every year.  Plans for major travel for the next five years, and time with our children and grandchildren.  Working in order to play.  Playing as hard as we can and as comfortably.  Lighter luggage, fewer chores.  Jokes about sitting in our rocking chairs at the poorhouse reveling in the marvelous memories we are building.  Reveling already.

           

            Now if only….  Oh, never mind.  Maybe I can tell someone at the office about that new pain in my little toe.

 

 

 

 

A Walk in the Dark

    By Judy Nelson

 

It all seemed perfectly logical at the time.  “If you have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, put your flashlight in your right hand and hold out your left hand,” said the young female counselor.” When you raise the tent flap, Jesus will be there waiting to hold your hand and walk with you to the outhouse.” 

 

As a third grader at a midwest Lutheran Bible camp for the first time, I really appreciated that offer.  The outhouse was plenty scary in the daytime so a little company at night was comforting.  However, when I tried to follow this advice a few hours later, no one took my hand, even though I offered it all the way to the outhouse and back. I thought Jesus must be busy with another tent.

 

It wasn’t until decades later when I told this story to my Jewish friend, Martine that I began to think about the logic of my early training.

 

“Doesn’t Jesus have more important things to do?” she asked, in all seriousness.  A pause. “And why exactly was Jesus hanging out in the dark, waiting to take little girls to the bathroom?”  Good question, Martine.

 

While Martine and I do not share religions, we are alike in our lack of religious fervor.
(I am a Lapsed Lutheran from North Dakota and she is a Jew (but in heritage and culture only) from New York. We have laughed until the tears came at each other’s reactions to some of the messages we received as children. 

 

There’s another church story from my childhood that I have never told Martine. One Sunday morning after church many of the congregants gathered for coffee in a packed room off the sanctuary.  As a six year old, my view was of men’s suit pockets and ladies belts but the sugar cookies were good.  All of a sudden, a shrill young boy’s voice screeched.  “Mommmmmmm!!! I can/t find Freddy.”  Three suits away, there was my Sunday school class mate, Robert, a towheaded, freckled faced boy who was always in trouble with the teachers.

 

The hum of voices lulled and we heard Pastor Jones booming voice ask with concern, “How old is Freddy?” Robert wailed. “He’s two and he’s lost!”

 

Again, the minister’s voice, closer this time, and definite worry in his voice. “What is he wearing?”

 

“Nothing,’ whimpered Robert.  I could feel the suits and belts suck in around me. 

 

For a moment, no one said a word.

 

“What...” A pause. “What exactly does he look like?” asked the minister.

 

In between sniffles Robert said, “he has a green shell and a long neck.”

 

Silence filled the room.  “Robert, is that you?” asked Pastor Jones.

 

“Yyyyyes,” Robert said, the sobs building.

 

“Where is your mother?”

 

“She’s in the bathroom.”

 

Now I could see the minister’s shoes toe to toe with Robert’s.

 “And is Freddy your turtle?”

 

Immediately there was a group gasp. All of the grown ups around zoomed up on their tiptoes.

 

“Yyyyyes, Robert sobbed.  “He was in my pocket a few minutes ago and now I can’t find him anywhere!”

 

“It’s okay, everyone,” said the good Reverend.  “Just watch your step.”

 

“Should we pray for Freddy?” Robert asked, his sobs subsiding. 

 

“We don’t need to pray right now, son, because you know that Jesus is always watching over us.”

 

“Over Freddy, too?”  Robert asked.

 

“Over Freddy, too”. 

 

Then Robert’s mother’s voice could be plainly heard.  “Jesus may be watching over you and your turtle, young man, but next Sunday Freddy stays at home!” 

 

I can just hear Martine now.  “Busy guy, that Jesus.  Wonder what happens when his computer crashes?”

 

***********