Mariella
She always wears skyscraper high heels and blouses revealing cleavage, even on bitter bone biting days. She never does her overcoat up to the top. There is muscle in her voice. She is an opera singer.
Mariella has two teenage sons, David and Adam, and a husband, Edward. He is also an opera singer. Sometimes we meet for lunch; she has the large size porridge with honey and camomile tea, and I have carrot and coriander soup and still water. A while ago she told me that ‘Edward had been a naughty boy’. They’d decided, she announced, that she would now accompany him on his travels, so that he would not be tempted.
She has confirmed since that they ‘are making a go of it’. But just yesterday she reported that the ‘go is no go, no go’.
‘Who is the lady?’ I ask with ums and ers stuck between my words.
‘There’s no lady,’ she responds, and I think of the play Sylvia the Goat, about a married man who falls in love with a goat. I tilt my head to signal confusion.
‘No, no,’ she continues, looking at her empty porridge bowl, scraping up the nearly invisible bits, ‘he has a boyfriend’ and then I understood why she doesn’t do up her coat.
The Light
When I think back to the blackout in New York City when I was a little girl I see how the dark can help you see the light. As you fumble about in the coal black for some sense of physical reality, your consciousness enters a different sphere; revelations emerge which might have lain dormant, but for the peculiarity of almost unimaginable circumstances, like people from outer space appearing.
On November 9, 1965 at 5.27 pm the lights went out all over the northeast area of the United States and a large part of Canada. Our housekeeper, Margie, had just left for her evening off and our nurse, Paddy, was expected any minute. She would heat up the stew Margie had prepared for our supper, and read us a bedtime story after we had our bath. My little brother Francis was five years old and I was six and a half. I think I can remember what I felt at the time, how I felt at the time. I think I can make sense of it; with a grown up’s logical lens make the past appear as clear and distinct as what you see through a magnifying glass. Such is the gift of time.
My mother was very busy preparing for a black tie fundraising dinner at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I had perched myself on the edge of her silky chaise lounge so that I could watch her apply her makeup and arrange her hair as she sat at her dressing table. Francis was playing in his bedroom with his wooden blocks. He was obsessed with determining how big a skyscraper he could build before it tumbled down.
My mother looked very beautiful dressed in a long black chiffon gown that revealed a bare shoulder. She was wearing diamond drop earrings and a double strand of pearls around her neck. People used to say that she looked like Jackie Kennedy. She was putting her false eyelashes on when the bedroom lights flickered and then I could barely see her.
“My goodness,” she sighed, with a puff of irritation. “A fuse must have blown. We’ll have to change it ourselves, won’t we Emily? Daddy won’t be home for a little while; I think he’s interviewing someone for the show.” Daddy was a television producer for a chat show and sometimes he went to interview famous people before they appeared on the programme. It was Daddy’s job to change the fuses.
But when I looked out the window, I noticed that not only were there no lights on in the buildings across Central Park on Fifth Avenue, but that none of the lanterns lighting the park paths shone. We lived on the tenth floor of our apartment block, and I never took the panorama for granted. Many fuses must have blown at the same time, I reckoned.
“Mommy, the whole world’s black; look at the park.”
Mommy stood up very straight. “You’re so right, Emily. How odd. Oh, I won’t be ready for Daddy. We’ll change the fuse, and hopefully I can finish with my lashes, and dear Paddy will arrive.”
“Francis will be crying, Mommy; he’s scared of the dark. He never finds it fun.”
“Well, we’ll hold each other’s hands and collect Francis and change a fuse or two and everything will be all right, bright, and in sight, and once again we’ll have light.”
“But what if it’s not the fuses and it’s something bigger, bigger, and you can’t go out and…”
“Well, Daddy and I have to go out. This is a very important dinner,” Mommy snapped.
I could see a full moon in the deep blue sky, a sky dotted with tiny diamonds, stars with secret lives of their own. I felt guilty because I wished that the blackout was something to do with something bigger, something we could not fix ourselves, something that would mean that Mommy would have to stay home and sit with us while we ate dinner and read to us while we lay in bed and sing to us while our eyes were shutting for the night. She had a voice that a concert hall audience would have applauded, shouting lots of “bravos”; that’s more or less what guests said when my parents had dinner parties and after dinner Mommy would play Broadway songs on the piano and sing.
Mommy could not spend very much time with Francis and me, as she was so busy, with all her many activities. Maybe tonight for once she could relax and be a Mommy. This would be a very special evening. So often I was lonely for her friendship. I wanted to know what it would be like to share cosy, silly times with Mommy, like my friends did with their Mommies. We had special times with Daddy, like when he took us to the carousel or to the zoo or sleigh riding on Saturday mornings when Mommy was at her exercise studio, Karnovsky’s, the one which Jackie Kennedy frequented.
Slowly, slowly we groped our way to Francis’s bedroom. Mommy held my right hand and we each patted the hallway walls with our other hand. There were no windows in the hall. The pictures were too high up on the walls for me to knock them.
Francis was sniffling and whimpering when we entered his room. Like tightrope walkers, we trod across his floor. I worried that Mommy might fall if one of her high heels stumbled on a building block. It took a long while for her to reach the window to raise the blind so that we could see the moon light. Mommy asked me to go and fetch some lavatory paper from the bathroom; she didn’t want Francis’s nose dribbles to ruin her gown. I was so scared feeling my way, and was so proud of myself when I reached the lavatory paper holder and could tear off a great wad of paper. Mommy would be impressed.
But the lights did not come on when we changed a fuse, and I wondered why Mommy did not realise that by changing a fuse, all the dark might not disappear into light. It was clear to me that something funny was happening in the world.
It took the three of us a long while to reach the telephone in the kitchen when it rang and fortunately the caller didn’t hang up. I could tell by what Mommy was saying that it was Paddy.
“This is extraordinary, beyond comprehension. Of course, I see why you can’t come back. Well, go to one of our wonderful hotels and hope that they feed you and you can stay warm. The car traffic lights will guide you if not all the saintly people like the firemen and police. We’ll be fine. They’ll have cold stew or cereal, even if the stove works. Be careful...yes, well, Mr. Adam will have to climb a lot stairs!” Mommy chuckled as she put the telephone back on the receiver.
“Fortunately, Daddy’s so fit. He’ll run up the stairs.”
“You’re fit Mommy,” I blurted, desperate to flatter her so she would be more likely to enjoy our company.
“You are sweet. But I wouldn’t try to prove it tonight by running down the stairs in the dark and then flying upwards!” she exclaimed.
“Now, listen, I have some big, big news for you, children. There’s a gigantic power failure, all over the north east of America, so I may not be able to go to our dinner, after all.” I was so happy inside when she said this, though I thought we would probably have cereal for supper, even if the stove did work.
We ventured to the dining room as if we were walking on a ridge with a very steep drop on either side. We fumbled in the sideboard for small boxes of matches and long white candles. We put one candle is each of two silver candlesticks and lit them. Fortunately, the candles did not wobble. Margie always put a little scrap of Kleenex in the holders so the candles would stand up straight. Mommy carried two into the kitchen and we followed behind as if we were in a wedding procession.
Mommy didn’t want any wax to fall on her dress, so after she seated us at the breakfast table with a candlestick, holding the other she went to her bedroom to find her dressing gown. She would wear it over her clothes. She said she felt cold too. On the way back she fetched two more candlesticks and more candles. She carried one while she slowly fetched bowls and glasses and spoons and the corn flakes and the jug of milk and a carton of orange juice. Normally she didn’t approve of cartons on the table, but this evening obviously allowed an exception. When she sat down she said she was worried about the food in the fridge going off, and of course the ice cream would probably melt.
“We could have it now,” Francis suggested. Mommy thought that was very funny and promised that we could have big bowlfuls after our cereal. She would wait for Daddy to come home and eat supper with him. They would have cold jellied madrilène or crabmeat, if she could find the can opener, and melba toast and Mrs. Grimble’s blueberry cheesecake. I wished that she would have corn flakes and ice cream with us.
“There’s certainly no television tonight, children.”
“This is more exciting,” piped Francis.
“What would it be like if we’d been ice skating, Mommy?”
“The rink would shine under the moonlight.”
“Will the animals be cold and lonely in the zoo?” I asked.
“I’m sure all the zookeepers will know what to do. The animals are used to harsh conditions, after all. And frankly they probably are living in luxury, given where their brothers and sisters live and the way their ancestors existed.”
Francis squinted his eyes and looked at Mommy, puzzled. Maybe he thought his expression would invite her to be more explicit about her comment. But she merely smiled broadly and sighed. I thought how pretty her face looked in the candlelight. Francis’s face looked very white in the candlelight. Mommy went to fetch the transistor radio from its place next to the toaster.
Mommy stood the little black rectangle box on the breakfast table and after fumbling with a knob found a station with a man’s voice. Despite the radio’s tinny tones, it sounded quite deep and calming and friendly, like Daddy’s voice.
We stopped eating to listen.
“Close your mouth, Francis,” Mommy said sternly. When my brother was steeped in puzzlement he always struck some sort of catatonic pose.
There were people trapped in elevators trying to escape through elevator shafts, people stranded in the subways and railway cars heading nowhere, people singing Christmas carols and playing charades under battery powered emergency lights on the pavements, and many were sheltering at Radio City Music Hall. Lawyers and bankers were helping the police and firemen direct traffic. Civilisation, at the mercy of darkness, was conducting itself in a most exemplary way, though President Johnson and Mayor Wagner were very, very worried.
Mommy stood up quickly from her chair when the telephone rang.
“Frank, Frank, is that you?” But the caller wasn’t Daddy.
“Yes, I am, Mrs. Adam. Who is calling? Oh, of course I know you.” Mommy was blushing. “And I do so love your films…Yes, he did say he was going to stop by and see you. Oh, what a coincidence and you were going there, too. Such a good cause. Well, it might happen, it could, but I’m stuck, I mean at home with the children; our nurse is trapped somewhere downtown.” My chest felt as if it had been socked when she said “stuck”.
“Well, that’s so kind of you…Yes, well, we are…”
“Who’s it, Mommy, a famous movie star?” called Francis.
“Just a moment, Miss Crawford, one of the children has a problem.”
She covered the receiver with her hand and glared at Francis. “Shush, Francis, I am speaking,” she scolded, in a harsh whisper, shaking her head from side to side.
“I am sorry, Miss Crawford…Oh, I would like to speak with him…
“Frank, I’m so glad to hear your voice. Are you all right? I’ve been worrying and worrying about you. Is she as frightful as they say? A dragon in a woman’s clothing? Come on, Frank, you know she can’t hear me; and she can’t be on another line, as she’s probably right next to you. I miss you. Yes, they’re being very good, perfect, and of course Paddy, poor thing, is caught down… and I love you too.”
“Mommy, did you talk to a very famous person?” Francis asked her the instant she had put the telephone back in its proper place.
“Very, very famous, indeed.”
“Tell us, please, please, please.” I was excited.
“Well,” Mommy began, “you won’t have seen her in any of her movies, but she is called Joan Crawford, and she has quite an illustrious history.”
“A what history?”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full, Francis. She has appeared in many successful films and the most famous was What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? She, the character she plays, has to stay in bed all day because she’s crippled, can’t walk, and her cruel ugly sister looks after her, but not very nicely. For one lunch she serves her a dead rat and for another a dead bird, and this wasn’t roast turkey,” Mommy revealed with a weak cackle.
“Disgusting,” winced Francis, his face then crumpling up. “So what was it, Mommy?”
“What was what, Francis?”
“The bird, what was the bird?”
“Oh, a dead parakeet. Her pet parakeet, in fact. What an atrocious tale that was.”
I was rather taken aback by the story; I would never have expected Mommy to talk about something so awful, so easily, as if she were ordering the groceries.
“So Daddy’s coming home now? Goody,” I said.
“Yes, Miss Crawford is sending Daddy home with her chauffeur. So he’ll be safe and sound.”
“Can he kiss us goodnight?”
“Can he?” echoed Francis. He was still young enough for Daddy kisses.
“Well, you might be asleep. We’ll skip a bath tonight, just this once. Now that’s a treat.”
“But maybe you could give us a ba…” and then I stopped talking as I saw her crestfallen face; it looked as if it was going to ooze down into the lap of her dressing gown.
After we finished our cereal, I was still hungry, very hungry, but I felt shy about asking for more food. She’d forgotten about the ice cream and I was afraid she’d be irritated if I reminded her about it.
“Now, you’ll be very good and slowly we’ll make our way with the candles to your bedrooms and you can put on your pyjamas and then brush your teeth and go to bed.”
Francis slept in my room, in the other bed, the guest bed for sleepovers. The room was cold and I wished that Paddy were home sitting on my bed, beside me, kissing me goodnight and hugging me, squeezing me. It would be my job to comfort Francis if he woke up with one of his nightmares. He might just do that after hearing about the movie.
I would never have told my children this story on a night like this one, and their Daddy, my husband, would never have been with a famous movie star. He would have been almost running home, impatient for the sight of us at the front door. He would have helped us eat the melting ice cream; maybe we’d have enjoyed it straight from the carton, laughing and laughing in between each spoonful, and the candles would be standing in jam jars, the light flickering to and fro. Yes, it’s funny how we can be blinded by the light of the every day, but when we’re forced to live in the dark how clearly we see the ray of truth.
