Summer Vacation

My sister and I have returned to our childhood home. We are accompanied by our spouses and our cousins. While we were born here, our cousins were not. The were born to the sister that left and never returned. My sister and I grew up on an island in the middle of Narragansett Bay. It is nine miles long and one mile wide at the widest point. Our mother and our aunt grew up here, daughters of a native who came from a long line of islanders. Our mother married a navy man, moved away for a while, but returned to where her heart had always been. Our aunt also married a Navy man, but moved away and never came back to live, she raised her family in California. I think part of her heart was always here, but not enough of it to come back to this little rock.

We grew up in a house overlooking the ferry landing and the bay. From our front porch we could see Newport and all the boats that sailed by. The Navy was big across the bay, so there were always Navy ships in the bay and the sailboats that so many friends had. Today as I sit here and look out at the same view there are no longer Navy ships chugging by on their way to wherever they would go. There are still sailboats, lots of them. Small ones, big ones, beautiful ones. There are also super sized power yachts tied up at the marina at the end of the street and I have to wonder who is on them and where does all this money come from?

We have returned, not to our childhood home, but to a house around the corner. We have almost the same view and we have the same neighbors we had growing up. What I don’t have, cause I can’t speak for my sister is a sense of belonging. I thought this would be a good idea, but truthfully, as beautiful as it is here, it makes me sad. This is no longer the little sleepy island I could not wait to run away from when I as a kid, not sure what I wanted to run away from, but just knew I did not want to stay here. Today this little island is full of people that have a lot of money, people that are tearing down the history of this island to build their own history, I guess.

That leads me to the house we have rented, we rent because we no longer have family to stay with. As I said, we have rented a house right around the corner from the house that was filled with six kids, one and a half bathrooms, no heat in the bedrooms and in hindsight was the best place I could have grown up and wonder now why I wanted to leave to badly.  

The house we are in is an old house, built around 1900. It is one of those great New England shingle houses, a Victorian with the big front porch and the gingerbread trim and a view that has been changing everyday for the last hundred plus years, it changes daily, actually moment by moment and yet somehow it stays the same. A bridge replaced the ferry over 50 years ago, yet I still hope to look up and see that ferry boat chugging into the dock ready to take you across the bay. But those days are long gone, ok there is a little boat that calls itself a ferry and for 20 bucks will take you across, but it is not the same.

Anyway, sitting on this porch will never grow old, however this house is growing older and older by the moment. She - I always think of houses as female - has fallen into a bit of disrepair. The roof over the porch leaks, the kitchen floor has a sinkhole in it, which we have been told is not structural (here’s hoping), the windows need updating, there is a piece of rope holding together a spindle on the staircase (where you want to automatically hold onto as you pull yourself up the stairs), the gutters need replacing, she is decaying as I sit here and this makes me want to grab her and hold her and fix her up.

Perhaps part of the sadness I feel is that I can’t do that. Sure we might be able to swing buying her (if we sold all we own) but then what? In addition to fixing the sink hole in the kitchen we would have to put in heat. Yes, this house is a summer cottage and was built without heat. Sure it has three fireplaces that might warm you up in the fall or on a crisp fall day, but could not help in the dead of winter in this place.  

She is called the middle sister and she sits right between two other houses that you could reach out and touch. Legend has it that she and her two sisters were built by a man for his three daughters. While the one we are in (the middle sister) and her sibling on the left are basically the same as they have ever been, the sibling on the right has been transformed into something that while beautiful and tastefully done seems to have left her sisters behind. She is the shining sister that went off and made a fortune and came back and needs to show her new self to the world. And truthfully I am jealous of her beauty and her air conditioning, I am not sure I would dress up the middle sister to try and be as grand. I might put in heat and maybe air conditioning, but I like to think if I had the means, she would stay basically the same, just with a little giddy up in her step.

Travel Time

Travel is never fun.  Well, travelling is fun, but getting from point A to point B is not.  For example, a few days ago I left San Francisco bound for North Carolina and now I sit in the Charlotte airport going the other way.  Why does it seems that every airport you travel thru is under construction?  I don’t care if you travel thru it once in a lifetime or on a regular basis, there is always something going on.  People watching at an airport can be so head scratching and putting up with your fellow travelers can be down right frustrating, but I try to keep in mind that we are all on a journey and who knows why the people around you are travelling except those very same people.

Oh except, the ones that tell you what they are doing and where they are going.  Keep in mind they are not really tellling you, they are telling the person on the other end of their phone call.  Yup, when are people going to learn that you don’t have to scream into the phone so the people at the other end can hear you.  Your modern cell phone is not a tin can with a string attached to it that goes to another tin can.  It is finally tuned piece of technology that has a pretty sensitive microphone and earpiece that can actually send and receive voices.  Imaging that.

Then there are the people that use their personal device to watch a movie or video.  That is great use of your device, catching up on something you missed or just something you are interested in watching.  You know what else is a great use of your device, using the fucking earphones that most devices come with.  While I really want to see the Green Book, I really do not want to listen to it while you are sitting in front of me.  Put those earphones on people.  Everyone around you will be happy you did.

Then there is the dressing for travel.  I have noticed the past few times that I have flown the desire to be comfortable.  We all want to be comfortable, trust me, I want to be comfortable.  Now I am all for the comfort of yoga pants and leggings, there is no woman on the planet that would say they are not comfortable.  Little women, Big women, tall and short women love them.  However, some woman wear them better than others and if you are showing me your camel toe, those fucking yoga pants don’t work for you.  Please...

There is always one person that sticks out in my mind while getting from point A to point B.  Today it is a woman travelling by herself with 3 small children.  How does she do it?  I have a hard enough time keeping track of myself going thru security, imagine two young boys with backpacks, a little girl that does not seem to want to walk by herself.  Your bag, her bag a blanket.  Yikes I give her credit.  I sure hope there is someone on the other end meeting her and giving her a break.

Connections

As some of you know I love France.  I have spent as much time as I can there.  I have been blessed that while my beloved might not like to go as often as I do, she has no problem with me going without her.  One of the things I have dreamed of is buying something and renovating.  So when the book L'appart by David Lebovitz came across my radar, I ordered it.  David is a chef that moved to Paris years ago to write cookbooks.  He fell in love and decided to put down some roots by purchasing an apartment to call his very own.  It took 10 months to purchase the place and months and months to renovate.  As I was reading, I mentioned the book to my friend, Frenchie mom and how David had been a chef at Chez Panisse in the 90's and she said maybe my mom knows him.  So I fired off an email to David and Frenchie mom asked her mom and sure enough they knew each other.  I thought small world.

Then I got my monthly newsletter of Secrets of Paris - a newsletter that I have been getting for years and always recommend to anyone travelling to Paris.  It always has some great little secret to explore.  So this month the author was talking about this vegan Nutella that her friend, pastry chef and author David Leibovitz!  

Now the it's a small world song is playing full blast in my head!  So now I just have to put 2 and 2 together and arrange for a face to face at some point in Paris.  Consider yourself warned David.  

A new year - a new blog resolution!

Since I am going to be leaving Facebook I am making a plan to blog more.  Blogging is strange, all day you have these things happen and you think, I should blog about that.  Then you sit down to blog and nothing comes out.  This coming year 2019 - how did I live this long - is a new start, a new beginning and a chance to change what I don't like about myself and the world around me.  So wish me luck, follow me here after I delete my facebook page and make this year the best you can.

A little rain and a little hope

Tonight I attended a protest against Brett Kavanaugh.  I truly believe that Kavanaugh is the wrong choice for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court.  I thought this before Christine Blakey Ford came on the scene with sexual assault allegations.  Kavanaugh is wrong because of his stance on abortion, birth control and the fact that he had lied to congress about other things.

I stood on the corner of First Steet and Neal in my little town of Pleasanton.  Pleasanton is a pretty affluent community, I can't even tell you how many Tesla's and Mercedes drove by this corner in an hour.  One of the things that amazed me the most were the women that drove by and did nothing.  They looked straight ahead and pretended not to see our signs.  

There were the usual honking of horns from both men and women.  There was the old white man that drove by in his 30 year old Mercedes wearing his MAGA hat that yelled "you are all stupid".  Or the young man in his Lexis SUV who told me I was being duped.  Or the man in his mini van yelling "go trump.  Thanks for the tax breaks!  Yeah".  Then there was the one lone woman that screamed "you people look fucking stupid".

I guess when you stand on a street corner you get the good with the bad.

The hope?  Two young girls walked up and asked what was going on.  A woman standing next to me says "we are protesting Kavanaugh.  Are you old enough to vote?  You need to register"

The girls said they were not old enough to vote, but still wanted to know who this person was.

So I stepped over to them and said " we are protesting a man named Brett Kavanaugh that has been put up to be on the Supreme Court. He is a man that does not believe in birth control - he thinks it is a form of abortion.  He does not believe in safe and legal abortion.  He has had multiple accusations of sexual assault leveled against him and he will not take a polygraph test to address these accusations and we do not feel he should be on the Supreme Court."

They listed and as I watched their eyes get really big - especially when I mentioned birth control - they thanked me and went on their way.  Hopefully to go home and ask questions and learn more, but maybe if they just think about it, that is enough for now.

And then it started to rain.  Really rain.  Not just a sprinkle or a shower, but a downpour and we continued to stand with our signs until it got dark and we had to leave.

Unforgettable

Last week I was in Rhode Island, lets just say it was not for a happy occassion.  However, being able to spend time with my mother is always good, frustrating sometimes, but good.  Jackie lives is assisted living with many other elderly people.  On one particular day after taking her home, they had a musician performing for the residents.  We went down to listen and he had a beautiful voice and would sing the requests from his audience.

One request was Unforgettable.  He started to sing and many of the people around me started to sing with him.  Most softly and whistfully.

I watched one woman across the way.  I have seen her around but have never spoken to her.  She was a small woman with totally white hair that she wore at about shoulder length that she held back with a headband that matched her outfit.

She sat there and swayed and I could see her mouthing the words to the song.  I could see a change in her, I swear I could see her feel sad.  I wondered who she was thinking about as she sang

"Unforgettable, that's what you are"

I wondered about her life and where her Unforgettable you was.

So Long - Farewell

I spent this weekend in San Diego.

When I was a kid, it seemed so far away and hearing from my aunt and her family was a rare treat. While I was a baby and we lived in California for awhile, we spent time with them all, but it was not until my uncle and aunt and two cousins drove across the country that we became close.

While we were geographically distant, we still are, we were drawn to each other. I love my cousins and I loved my uncle and I loved my aunt. We said goodbye to JoAnn Helen Hogan on Saturday.

There was a lovely service in a Catholic Church, even if my aunt was not Catholic. There is a story there, but it is not mine to tell. After the service was a luncheon at the local VFW. My aunt had been an auxiliary member and spent many Sunday mornings there having breakfast. And if you were visiting, well you went along.

Many people came to pay their respects and while my aunt did not understand why people cared so much for her, we all did. It was repeated over and over again.

I spoke, but not eloquently and I did not say what I wanted to say. I'll admit I was crying and speaking was much harder than I had thought it would be.

This is what I wanted to say.

Hi, I am Margaret Fuquea. I am the daughter of JoAnn's only sibling, her sister Jackie. My mom really would have liked to be here, but she does not travel well these days.

Jackie and JoAnn grew up on a small island in the middle of Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island. Jamestown. Their father was born there, their grandfather was born there, and back until I don't really know when.  

They were raised, mostly by our cousin, Beanie and a housekeeper, named Ann. My mother was convinced that Ann liked Joey best because there was never any frosting on Jackie's hot cross buns, because Joey got it all. She used to speak of how when they were young she was always being told to let JoAnn tag along and how much she resented that. But then they grew up and married Navy men and went their separate ways, there were many ports of call for all of us but and thru it all there was a bond that was never broken. 

When we found out Joey was sick, I was talking to my mom, she was afraid to call. She said, I just don't know what to say. I told her that she just needs to hear your voice, so call. She did and she was so glad she did. On the morning of June 28th she called me and said, I just called your aunts house and there was no answer. Something is wrong. Find out.

So, I called or texted, I can't remember which and learned that my mom had called at the same time JoAnn was drawing her last breath.

My Auntie Jo was a force. She was funny. She could drink you under the table. She always welcomed any one of us Fuquea kids whenever we showed up at her door. Every time I called she would say "Mags, when are coming to visit?" Every time I walked thru the door at Hogan's Hut is was like I was coming home. She was the rock of so many people. She was my rock when I could not talk to my own mother about things, I could talk to her. 

She was my mother's rock when life did not go as planned.  

They loved each other. They were confidantes. They kept each other's secrets. And my mother knew the moment that JoAnn left this earth. 

My mom will miss her. I will miss her.