I Enjoyed Being a Girl - 2

Girls at Play
or
Giving the Milk Away for Free

My girlfriends and I struggled through decades of discrimination, so that future generations of young women could be free of the narrow, oppressive attitudes that prevailed during our formative years.  We were often in the front lines of every battle.  The changes we fought for rarely benefited us, personally, but our younger sisters and eventually, our daughters, enjoyed the results, like paid maternity leave, improved admission opportunities to professional faculties, fairer hiring practices and more equitable pay.  

And, of course, the miracle of “partners” who helped out!  Male and/or female.

While I didn’t found any feminist magazines, go underground at the Playboy club or wear outrageous hats, like some of my role models, as a teacher for 25 years, I did stand in front of about 200 teens a year, subtly and not-so-subtly, endeavoring to steer their cultural attitudes in more egalitarian directions, in spite of the mandated, often irrelevant curricular material. 

So when I watch a TV series like ‘Girls’, it is with some dismay that I note that Lena’s characters have not exactly ‘Come a Long Way, Baby’, at least, not on the path upon which we pioneers set forth, long before they were born. 

Unfortunately, it seems the world they navigate is not much better for them than the one I floundered through …just in different ways.

For example, the goal, in those pre-liberation days, was not 'self-actualization', freedom from unplanned pregnancy or the possibility of heading up a Fortune 500 company.  It was marriage, and to that end, we were discouraged from giving any 'free samples' to any prospective partners.  

I recall this oft repeated admonition: 

"Why should they buy the cow, when they can get the milk for free?"  

Should you begin to analyze this offensive homily, in our PC climate, you could find yourself agog, wondering things like....
who are 'they'?
who, exactly, is the cow?  
why a cow?
what is the milk?  
how much does it cost? 
why should the cow sell the milk instead of giving it away for free?
what can a cow do with money?   
does the cow ever get to enjoy any forbidden milk?  etc. etc.

When I asked for my husband's reaction to this statement....
"Can you believe this sort of thing was what we were indoctrinated with when we were young?"....
he calmly lowered his iPhone and replied,
"Sure, I can.  I was the one trying to get the free milk!"

Back then, if a young woman had not yet managed to earn the degree commonly referred to as her ‘MRS.’ by graduation (a goal now pushed ahead, if even considered, at least 15 to 20 years for Hannah and her posse) an extra year in the College of Education or the School of Social Work was deemed appropriate.  A nurturing, ‘social-servicey’ job like teaching, nursing or dental hygiene was considered acceptable….’something to fall back on’ when the inevitable 2.5 kids went off to school in a few years.  You’d get your summers off or make your own hours.  

If you couldn’t find a man to support you right away, you were still expected to earn money while you awaited deliverance from singledom.  You lived with your parents since there were few acceptable alternatives other than running off to Israel.  Single young women could read about other single young women enjoying life in, say, New York, in steamy novels like Rona Jaffe’s “The Best of Everything”, but they certainly couldn’t emulate their daring escapades in dull old Toronto. 

No parent in his or her right mind (they came in pairs in those days) would support a daughter, either financially or emotionally,  while she 'found herself', living in a downtown hovel, traipsing around at late-night clubs and having indiscriminate sex with questionable prospects, like the young ladies in Bushwick.  When one of my associates expressed an interest in 'moving out', her mother immediately redecorated her bedroom so she would feel obligated to stay.  Another friend had the courage to 'move in' with her boyfriend after university, and was written off by her family.  It's still too painful to remember the young woman who fell in love outside her race, whose parents 'sat shiva' for her.  

Even if and when these women eventually married, the disgraces were difficult, if not impossible, to forgive and forget.

Admittedly, there was some sex.  Cars and their back seats were available for furtive gropings. (I hasten to say I read about this in the Romance magazines popular at the time...I cannot personally attest to this pastime.... for lack of opportunity).  Birth control pills had yet to be marketed, so, if you were single, you weren’t likely to need a place to have sleep-over sex, which, as everyone knew, led inevitably to pregnancy and back alley abortionists.

Popular films from those years, which scarred us for life: 

“Love with the Proper Stranger”, one of my faves, in which Natalie Wood makes a terrible mistake on a vacation and succumbs to a 'one-night stand' with Steve McQueen, a free-wheeling, irresponsible...(ie. not a 'good catch'), albeit, cute musician (oy!..or whatever is the equivalent in her traditional Italian family) and spends the rest of the movie alternating between searching for an abortionist and trying to seduce Steve into marrying her....

or “A Summer Place”, another stern warning about the wages of sin, where teen idols Troy and Sandra, in spite of shrieking parental guidelines,  'go all the way' at the first opportunity, with the predictable dire consequences.  

Even “Gidget” had a heavy moral discussion about the difference between ‘good girls’ and ‘nice girls’.  (If you had told Sandra Dee that 'hooking up' was on the horizon, she'd have collapsed in shock into her crinolines....all 85 pounds of her!).  

Pregnant girls, or, as they were referred to…girls ‘in trouble’, were shunted off to prenatal institutions, hidden from polite society until they could slink back, almost always alone, having placed their babies (who they were not even allowed to see for more than a moment) up for adoption.  With no social or family acceptance, let alone financial support from your friendly social service safety net, they had little alternative.  

“Out of Wedlock” was a stigma, not a lifestyle choice. 

Today, I have several youngish colleagues who have made the conscious decision to conceive, carry and mother children without the personal involvement of the sperm donors, but with the total participation and approval of their families and friends.  'Mr. Right', as he used to be known, has not made a timely appearance, so 'Mr. Right-Now' has taken his place.  

These women probably think I’m making all this 'herstorical' stuff up.  

They enjoy a certain amount of freedom from censure hitherto unknown.  Before, a married teacher had to resign as soon as she began ‘to show’ lest her students suspect she may have had sex (even married sex!).   Nowadays, my 'single-parent-by-choice' staff-mates feel quite comfortable carrying on in their jobs till the week before their due dates. 

Their students give them  baby showers!  
What would Dear Abby think?

Speaking of quaint sociological customs, in the 50's and early 60's, since actual sex (as opposed to simulated) was off the table, so to speak, at least until the engagement ring was on the appropriate digit and the shul/church was booked, the mandatory premarital visit to the gynecologist, to make sure that everything was relatively functional, offered the opportunity to ‘prepare’ the bride for the wedding night.  I'm not exactly sure what it entailed, but I had a few friends who absolutely refused this service.  Some had even rejected the use of tampons, on the grounds that they would compromise their virginity….a concept that was entirely foreign and perhaps, even bizarre, to women born even just a few years later.

Hannah's visit to her gynecologist was for an entirely different, more contemporary condition that sometimes results from very 'casual sex', a term that had no meaning 50 years ago.

I Enjoyed Being a Girl - 1

The Devolution of ‘Girlhood’ 

from Gidget to Hannah Horvath

By the time I was 16, I was well-immersed in the new teen culture that had developed, in all its glory, by the 1950's.  I yakked all night on my Princess phone and collected 'Seventeen' magazines, envied Sandra Dee her freedom to ride the surf in Malibu with Moondoggie and wished I could be a cheerleader like my friend, Randi.  I had a couple of girlfriends whose mothers had started assembling their trousseaux, selecting silver and china patterns, storing them in large, carved wooden chests, that resembled coffins, at the foot of their beds.  

These were called "Hope Chests" and I did not have one.  Or any....

The social media of that era...chick flicks, novels and, of course, gossip, narrowed the possibilities for female empowerment by pronouncing that girls were either 'good' or 'nice'.  'Good girls' saw themselves as precious commodities who traded themselves for the best outcome, a large engagement ring and betrothal to a 'lovely boy' whose family status and/or professional path would determine their destiny.  

'Nice girls', on the other hand, had no thought of their future, lost their minds and 'went all the way', got 'knocked up' or 'ruined'.  Unmarried sex always led to disaster. 

Whenever I think I've dreamed up this entire peculiar scenario, I just revisit one of those great 60's film classics like, "Where the Boys Are," for a reality check.  In it, poor, sweet Yvette Mimieux tries to kill herself after she realizes that she's traded her virginity to a 'Yalie' to no avail, while Dolores Hart survives the battle of the sexes with George Hamilton, an admittedly weak opponent, but consider his role as a rich, very entitled boy named 'Ryder' (if you need a brick house to fall on you) who wears a suit to the beach and pilots his own yacht up and down the Intercoastal Waterway, symbolically speaking, so the temptation to yield is great, especially since 'Merritt' (I'm not making that up, either) has been practically expelled from college for questioning the value of virtue in her Sex Ed. class.  

She is a woman, torn!  

The struggle was so traumatic, that it drove Dolores into a nunnery within a couple of years!

Speaking of the dire consequences of even thinking about sex, try sitting through that 1962 classic, "Rome Adventure," wherein  Suzanne Pleshette plays a young teacher, NAMED PRUDENCE, who is asked to resign from a tony private girls' school for lending a student a book, not exactly on the curriculum.  ("Marjorie Morningstar", mayhaps?  No, it's a potboiler called, "Lovers Must Learn" but it doesn't tell us.... from whom?).  She heads off to Italy, alone, to the horror of her parents, to see if romance is all it's cracked up to be. 

We all know Italy is a much better place to look for love than New England.  

On a holiday with Troy Donahue, who just happens to be staying at the same 'villa', and in spite of many golden opportunities in tiny pensiones, with no separate rooms, she manages to stay pure for an entire road trip through Tuscany, holding out for marriage. She must wait till he tires of his older, more promiscuous mistress, played by no less a woman of the world than Angie Dickinson.


Of course, virtue being its own reward, he does.  

(In fact, Suzanne managed to marry Troy in real life, later that year, but since it only lasted a few months, she might have been well-advised to try him out first!)

Helen Gurley Brown had not yet let us in on the news that "good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere", so I didn’t see the stirrings of the sexual revolution around me, yet, but every once in a while, I’d read something seditious or meet someone rebellious who would get me wondering, in anticipation of the soon-to-be standard, “Is that all there is?”

Then, at 17, I read ‘The Feminine Mystique’.  My eyes popped open.  Perhaps there could be an alternative to the scenario stretching out before me: a few years of primping myself out to   aspiring dentists and accountants, holding back sexual favors for a frat pin and then, if I played my cards right, an engagement ring, wedding at the shul and a lifetime of catering to a spoiled prince…It might not be so inevitable after all!  

So, I became a feminist.  And so did many of my friends.

And, as they say…”Woman plans, God laughs” (but that is a story for another time).

Chinese Food 2: Dim Sum..."to touch your heart"

 I have no recollection of anyone eating Dim Sum when I was growing up.  Do you?

It seems to me that this lunchtime ritual began in Toronto sometime in the 70's or 80's, but since I'm not a food historian, I'll have to leave that sort of research to the pot sticklers among you.  The important thing is that it did begin and only improved in the early 90's when the Hong Kong emigrés, to whom I referred in my previous entry, shipped their children and their chefs to our town for safekeeping.
For a while, Toronto was Dim Sum heaven!

Eventually, a lot of those chefs returned to Hong Kong, but the popularity of Dim Sum grew.  How to keep up with the demand?  I personally believe there are hundreds of indentured drones quietly and competently pleating rice dough around assorted fillings in sweatshops all around the city to supply the numerous  restaurants now offering this 'patchkaray'.

In fact, a friend discovered such a place just around the corner from my very own house.  In a nameless storefront, in a nondescript strip mall, a covey of ancient women of Asian persuasion, huddle around a long table churning out dumplings by hand, all day.  There is nothing else in the room except a couple of huge white freezer chests filled with bags of frozen nuggets which you can purchase, in volume, for a pittance.  You never know what you're going to get, since there are no signs or labels on anything and no one speaks any English.  This leads me to believe that the stock is mainly 'to the trade'.  No one is ever seen going in or out....but I bet a big truck backs up late at night and loads up and makes its deliveries by morning.

But I digress, as usual.

In the 70's, a friend of ours had a father who invested in a Chinese establishment and we were all introduced to this lovely way to spend an mid-day hour or two steeped in Jasmine tea and constant anxiety, wondering when the next little cart would wobble by our table already, and whether or not it would be laden with delectable dumplings or dreaded, rubbery duck feet.  Since those days, we've tried it all and have determined our favourites, both dishes and restaurants, that specialize in Dim Sum.

Our regular go-to place is in suburban Scarborough.  Are you surprised?  As is typical in this part of Toronto, politically incorrectly referred to as 'Asiancourt', due to the preponderance of Chinese residents, the restaurant is one of the anchor businesses in a large Asian-themed shopping mall.

On weekdays, we are pretty much able to get a table immediately, but have come to realize that some specialties are only available after noon or on crowded weekends.  If we arrive too early, we die of hunger waiting for the carts to come rolling out of the kitchen, so we've wised up and place orders for specific dishes with one of the employees in the black jackets.  Not the pink jackets....those are worn by the lovely hostesses who efficiently wrangle the crowds and keep everything moving.  These two young women have been working there forever and never, ever, seem to get a day off.  The older women who push the carts around the huge banquet hall have gotten to know us and make sure we get our favorites.  The also make grimaces and shake their heads knowingly when they have something they know we won't like, like gelatinous extremities, and glide right past us.  Knowing they are looking out for us helps reduce the stress and worry that we might miss something should we relax our vigilant surveillance over the exit doors from the kitchen.

On weekends, we hustle out of the house by 11 am. at the latest, to avoid the long lineups that are inevitable by noon.  The extended Chinese families who fill the dining room require huge tables to accommodate the many generations that share the meal together.  Babies are toted to the tables in carriers and grandparents are shuttled in on assorted walkers or leaning on canes.  Men sit at tables casually reading newspapers while women chat with each other and children play on their Gameboys till the food rolls by.  As in most cultures, teenagers are conspicuously absent.

The adventurous among us might try something exotic-looking while the 'play-it-safer's stick to our Har Gow and Shu Mai, served in bamboo steamer baskets.  Items come in multiples of three or four so it's important that you dine with co-operative companions who are willing to share the leftover portions with the proper deference to age and appetite!

My personal favorites are the delicate seafood and watercress dumplings freshly made at the steam table by a team of skilled 'poachers'.  These are 'special order', as are many other goodies, but no one will tell you about this....you have to figure it out for yourself and fill out the little paper lying on your table and flag down the correct staffer among the countless busboys, waiters, supervisors, managers and troubleshooters.

My husband, although stuffed to his gills, cannot be persuaded to call for the bill until his beloved Char Siu Bao makes an appearance.   It never comes.  We wait and wait....he mopes.  He finally makes a special order.  Just when it arrives, the cart bearing stacks of steaming baskets rolls by.
"Char Siu" sings the cart lady.  He is in Dim Sum heaven.

Our friend, Larry, the host at that infamous New Year's banquet, introduced us to these delicate and delicious noodles which are only served on the weekends at "our" place.  He calls them 'Ah Chit Chow Mein', or something to that effect.  No one ever understands what he means but he persists,  attempting to describe these simple, thin lightly fried egg noodles tossed in soy sauce, garnished with bean sprouts and shaved scallions and a dusting of sesame seeds.  I think I detect a sliver of fried egg, too.  Often, he has to explain this to several people before someone realizes what he's requesting.  "Oh!  Ah Chit Chow Mein!"  and the language barrier disappears with mutual relief.  It's well worth the effort.


Interesting thing about Dim Sum:
Although you may be tempted to over-order so you can take some home for later, they don't warm up well at all.  Fried goodies get rubbery and the dumplings just don't recapture their freshness when reheated.  Even so.....

???????

Sign in bathroom stall in Ladies' Room of the adjacent mall.

Chinese Food 1: First is Best

"What is it about the Asians
That fascinates Caucasians?"

lyric from "Message from a Nightingale", The Drowsy Chaperone

During the tense years running up to the "Red Chinese" takeover of Hong Kong in 1997, a wave of rather prosperous Asian immigrants flocked to our shores and nested in Toronto and Vancouver, "just in case".  I had the pleasure of teaching many of their children, some of whom were often left to fend for themselves while their parents flew back and forth across the Pacific, maintaining a perch in each camp, to mix a metaphor.  Back then, there was a genuine concern that prosperity, enterprise and even fine dining would be eradicated at the 'handover'.  It seemed like a logical theory, given the austerity suffered on the mainland during the previous decades.

(Who knew that, instead, 'consumption' would become the new mantra (do the Chinese have mantras?) and we would all soon be eating out of the rice bowls of the revolutionaries? But enough politics).

Back to the menu for today: Chinese cuisine.  Toronto has always enjoyed an excellent roster of Chinese restaurants.  Back in my childhood, we devoured what was later described to me by an esteemed Asian Maitre d' as 'railway food', cuisine favoured by the many exploited Chinese immigrant workers who built the railways that gave Gordon Lightfoot inspiration for his moving ditty, "Canadian Railway Trilogy". Delicacies like chow mein, barbecued ribs and sweet and sour anything, deep fried in batter and drenched in a gooey, sweet red sauce, were available in almost every neighbourhood, not just way downtown at Spadina and Dundas, Toronto's very own Chinatown.  Many Jewish families would often dine together regularly at a local spot.  For example, every Sunday night, lines of starving Forest Hillers formed outside China House or the House of Chan, two establishments which faced off from each other across Eglinton Avenue.  (In spite of their lengthy popularity, they are falling under the shovel of developers, even as I write).  On very special occasions, like the day you came home from summer camp, you might trek all the way downtown to Lichee Gardens to celebrate your return to civilization. (Civilization, to Jews, meant Chinese food, of course).

So I heard.

Not my family!.....we were too poor (or cheap) to go out to dinner much in those days.  My father was a musician and, between the daylong rehearsals and live evening TV broadcasts, the poor guy had to dine out almost every night with his bandmates at assorted steak houses downtown, so he was never interested in anything but a home cooked meal on the occasional night off.  My mother rarely had the initiative or even the cash to take us anywhere....and besides, in those olden days, we only had one car, so how were we to escape our suburban tract in the hinterlands of North York?

Fortunately, there was still 'takeout', so while my friends gave me reviews of such delicacies as honey garlic ribs and shrimps in lobster sauce, I had to content myself with watching for the delivery guy from the Cantonese Terrace, ripping open the heavy brown paper bag and battling for my share of cooled off egg rolls, beef chow mein, sweet and sour chicken balls with pineapple, steamed rice and the occasional won ton, all tasting predominantly of the small paper containers they came in.   Same menu, every time.  After dinner, we'd all break open our tasteless fortune cookies, read the puzzling contents and toss both into the garbage.

As with many other things about life, I suspected I was missing out on something significant.

Imagine my delight when, as a young bride, we were invited by my husband's agent, a Chinese food aficionado, to literally, round out his table at a banquet in honour of the Chinese New Year at Toronto's renowned "Sai Woo", in the heart of Chinatown.  A dozen assorted actors, actresses (they were differentiated in those days) and writers...and me, settled like a Caucasian island in the China Sea around a huge circular table.  In the centre of this table was a Lazy Susan to facilitate the distribution of the various dishes to the surrounding vultures. After a few multi-lingual welcomes and a fundraising pitch for a senior's home, the first dish was paraded in, with great reverence and ceremony.  It was a lobster extravaganza, and, as it spun around the centre of the table, each guest took a tiny amount.  The rationale was 'to save room', as the meal was rumoured to be composed of many courses.

My inclinations were, however, somewhat different.

"Lobster!"  I thought.  "What could be better than this?"  I took a generous helping and then, when  Susan spun around again to offer seconds, and the rest of the party shook their heads with regret, I graciously offered to clean the platter so it could be removed for the next course.
Platters piled high with shrimp prepared several ways followed and, again, portions were meted out delicately, followed by another round of comments expressing restraint.  Once again, I pitched in and, not wanting to insult the chefs, polished of what was left by the experts.

I was starting to lose my appetite.

To make a deliciously long story short, each subsequent course, although delightful and nutritious, seemed to be less unusual and, frankly, more economical, proceeding downwards from mundane chicken and pork to ubiquitous noodles and rice.  I was only able to snack on these dishes, while my table mates grabbed what they could, since, as I previously noted, they had 'saved themselves'.  They were ravenous.  I didn't like the way they were looking at me, remembering, I suppose, that I was stuffed with lobster and shrimp.

From this experience, I learned, early on, that when you see something you like, you shouldn't wait for something better to come along.  Sometimes, things don't improve with age.

Except me and you, of course......

The Right to Bare Arms

It seems to me that the older I get, the less adaptable I have become to what is

deemed fashionable. With increasing age, not to mention lack of exercise and

any sign of metabolism, I have lost that thing called 'tone'. Replacing it is

superfluous poundage and the tendency to 'hang loose' in potentially

conspicuous places, so there is a reluctance to rejoice in the recent reemergence

of the upper arms as a fashion focal point thanks to Michelle Obama

and all the female hosts on MSNBC.

It was not always thus.

As I insinuate my voluptuous body into my Definitely Not My Daughter’s Jeans,

and search, in vain, for anything in an elbow length, I pine for the good old days,

when I took my tiny torso and shapely upper arms for granted and thoughtlessly

hid them away under shirtsleeves, shoulder pads and crinolines.

As children, my sister and I were often dressed alike, (see above and please

ignore the footwear). In summer, we were often dolled up in white pinafores with

bows perched, like butterflies, upon our bare shoulders. We were only 14

months and an inch apart with platinum blonde curls and adorable dimples (well,

she had the dimple, right in the middle of her chin, like Kirk Douglas….and my

father…now that I think of it). We were, naturally, mistaken for twins. In

matching plaid skirts or identical mauve chiffon flower girl gowns with puffed

sleeves painstakingly trimmed by my mother in ribbons and lace, you could 'eat

us up', as the saying went. We even got ‘hired out’ to march at the weddings of

total strangers, we were so adorable.

Way back when I was an adolescent schoolgirl, the height of style was the cotton shirtwaist

dress, with its full, gathered skirt, tightly belted waistline, perky collar and

masculine shirtsleeves. Arm coverings, buttoned at the wrist or casually rolled up

past the elbows and fastened in place with a tab, were an integral part of the

overall 'shirt' effect. I started out in the morning, all 100 pounds of me, crisp and

starched, with both my crinoline and hair, fluffed and teased, ready to take on the

world. By the end of the un-air-conditioned school day, my gingham was as

droopy as my curls, but I was secure in the knowledge that although my elbows

and wrists may have been exposed for all to see, my square shoulders and damp

armpits had remained a mystery.

Later on, the mini-skirt appeared on this side of the ocean, and in the late 60’s

attention, formerly focused on the torso, migrated to the thighs. I was just the

right age to take advantage of its risqué appeal. The original mini, of which I

possessed several versions bought right on King’s Road in Chelsea on my

London honeymoon, had none of the seductive, body-clinging tendencies of

today’s ‘bandage’ version. My authentic Mary Quant mini dresses fell

perpendicularly from the underarms to the crotch in what would come to be

called an “A-Line”, reminiscent of body-concealing maternity toppers. (My sister

wore these duds into her 9th month and no one was the wiser). My chubby thighs

may have been exposed for all to admire, but my slim, shapely 110- pound torso

disappeared under yards of boldly patterned, flouncy fabric.

Occasionally, in those daring days, there was an acknowledgement of the body

beneath the garment, particularly after the designer, Rudi Gernreich, exposed the

top half of the female form in a scandalous series of “monokinis”, (although to be

strictly accurate, there was always a pair of suspender-like straps, purely

decorative, on either side of the actual focus of attention). I was not a total slave

to fashion, so I did not supplement my own wardrobe with a monokini. To

everyone’s relief!

In my mid- 20’s, I succumbed to a brief fashion flirtation with transparency.

Barbra Streisand, a personal idol of my bevy, made an instant impression when

her tush ‘peek-a-booed’ at the Oscars and I took up the challenge. I wore a

strange, but lovely, pale grey unlined chiffon blouse with two transparent breast

pockets to a friend’s wedding, where I attracted as much attention as the bride.

All of it unwanted.

In my still-slim 30’s, or the planet’s 80’s, power dressing, began in a very big

way. This was typified by the shift towards humungous artificial shoulder

enhancements in everything from parkas to pajamas. Not since the good old

days in the 18C, when women strapped panniers around their waists, was the

female form so horizontally exaggerated. Plump, foamy pillows were ‘velcro-ed’

beneath the shoulders of every garment, so that women instantly achieved the

appearance of linebackers. Breasts and arms disappeared behind the curtains

of superfluous material created by this ‘broadening of the broads’, so to speak.

Men went into mourning.

It became necessary to re-proportion the major body part hovering over it all, so

upon the head, long, wavy pre-Raphaelite manes of expensively ‘permed’ hair

were devised to cascade down over the epaulettes. This necessitated a constant

head tossing if you wanted to see where you were going. There followed,

logically, the invention of the ‘scrunchie’, an elasticized hair accessory which

could capably encircle this mane and pull it back from the face when feeding.

Family pictures of me from this era show a tiny face peeking out from behind

massive curls perched atop a wide, shelf-like tee shirt or sweater. Sadly, no

visible signs of the still somewhat svelte 118-pound body, beneath the oversized

layers!

Yes, that was when I had straight shoulders and slender, shapely upper arms, all

god-given without the slightest effort of rigorous exercise or magic potions, to

enhance their loveliness. I had a perpendicular spinal column (with no little hump

where it meets the neck), and a tummy so concave that my pelvic bones

protruded more my breasts.

But you’d never know it if you had seen me clothed, which is, of course, how

you would have seen me.

A Life Deductible

“Living the Good Long Life” by Martha Stewart

 Back with a vengeance comes Martha Stewart, the “Nemesis of the Nineties", to maximize her cultural influence and bottom line for the edification and expense of our generation. This, her latest of 77 books she claims to have written and published with Random House, is an encyclopedic tome about “living well is the best revenge”. In it, she ‘transitions,’ as they like to call it, from ‘Aspirational Lifestyle Queen’ to ‘Caregiver Extraordinaire’ for the aging demographic she has served (and milked) for over 25 years.

 I’ve got to hand it to her….Martha is always one step ahead of everybody else. Well me, at any rate. While my parents were aging precipitously, did I bother to make time between chauffeuring them to countless medical appointments and tests, shopping for their groceries, picking up their prescriptions, interviewing caregivers, checking out retirement homes, visiting long-term care facilities and, inevitably, planning funerals and shivas - to found and fund a Center for Living at my local Mt. Sinai Hospital? Did I even consider addressing the Senate Committee on Aging, like Martha did? (Do we even have one of those committees here, in Canada, or are those geriatrics in our Senate part of the problem, not the solution? Admittedly, either Senate is the logical place to start any discussion on the decrepitude and expense of supporting an aging generation).

 No, I didn’t. Not even once. I did think, however intermittently, about writing humorously about this stage of life, maybe for my blog, which I hadn’t written in for months because of the way life had of interfering with such worthier activities. I suppose I only have myself to blame if, when I wake up at the ungodly hour of 4am, I don’t just hop out of bed and give myself a facial and do an hour of yoga with my trainer, like Martha does. No, lazy moi, all I can bring myself to do is reach out for my iPad and play an athletic round of WordsWithFriends with my buddies, who can’t sleep anymore, either. And then stare off into space. (If you want to know how to waste what little time you have left, read MY book. When I get around to writing it!)

 Not so, Martha. Martha has lots of time to do everything and she encourages you to follow her lead in this all-inclusive ‘Death-Style’ guidebook for boomers. In order to do so with the utmost efficiency, which is necessary, since time is definitely running out, you might want to consider employing a staff of, well let’s just call it, in Martha’s own words, “a small army” of helpers. If you are wondering where she finds the time to write a book of this depth and dimension while attending to all her many chores (managing her many estates…or even finding time to visit them, starring on her daily television shows…are they still on? her frequent promotional and guest appearances, grooming her herds of Friesian horses, showing her beloved Chows at Westminster, icing cakes and creating paint colors, weaving broadloom, pruning her orchards, and kibitzing with the countless great and the near-great suitors besieging her on Match.com) the answer is simple.

 She doesn’t. Her army does it for her and she puts her name on the cover, the ‘Brand’ she has so assiduously developed and nurtured for over 30 years (with a little time off for bad behavior).

 Martha’s graciously acknowledged inspiration is her powerhouse of a mother, a woman often referred to as ‘Big Martha’, who is duly credited as the honoree in whose name the “Martha Stewart Center for Living” was established by “little Martha”(?) at Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York City. I can’t help but think, “It’s a good thing” that the daughter is named for the mother, in this case, or there might have been a crisis of conscience over the billing! There is a faint hope that by ‘doing good’ and ‘giving back’, as rich people like to, with their leftover money, she will forever erase the taint on her ‘good’ name by helping to fund a center for the study and care of the newest disease sweeping the nation…. aging.

In Martha’s world, old people can be successful, productive and pretty healthy well into their 90’s, like her own mother, or could be if they’d only take her advice! She comments that most of her relatives lived long, healthy, useful lives, never complaining, (as if they’d dare!), and that she certainly expects to do the same. The idea that good luck or even good genes might be a factor is not really considered….Martha seems to believe in that good old American recipe for success: hard work and self-determination, and regular appointments with your colorist!

Anything less and you deserve what you get. Anything less is your own fault. All well and good, I suppose, but tell that to my friends with cancer, heart disease, worn out hips, Alzheimer’s or MS. They won’t be consulting her bible to research which wrinkle fillers to try, anytime soon. Documentation is a big part of Martha’s plan. How else to keep track of such a full life? (Her lists and charts sometimes remind me of the ones Jay Gatsby formulated as his life plan, and we all know how well that turned out for him!) The best part of this book, however, is not her self-satisfied musings of a life well lived (if you don’t look too closely at the trail of personal destruction left behind), but the excellent resources culled together by the many expert advisors (and co-authors?) in medicine, gerontology, social work and nutrition.

 Maybe I’m being a little harsh. The book is actually an excellent compendium of ‘what to do until the undertaker comes’ kinds of things, most of them constructive, logical and life affirming, especially for those with the wherewithal to provide a comfortable dénouement for themselves. Advice from leading experts in every field remotely connected to an aging life, as it is lived by the healthy and wealthy, abounds. We are spared those familiar, all too horrifying conversations about what to do when catastrophic illness strikes at the family savings (if there are any) or when you suspect a loved one might be losing his mind in bits and pieces, never to be whole again. This book of advice is not for the terminally ill or (cringe) lower classes, but rather for those who can afford to buy it and stash it on their library shelf beside the dusty Funk and Wagnell’s Family Health Encyclopaedia for occasional consultation.

 For the rest, there is always ‘Google’.

 Afterthought: Martha is now making the Media Circuit/Circus rebranding her image as a lonely single woman seeking love in all the wrong places. Match.com? I have to wonder if she owns it? Surely, with her resources, she could afford to hire a full-time Shadchen (matchmaker) on her staff. I could volunteer. Why would she (or her staff) want to sift through the thousands of mis-Matches lurking out there in cyberspace when she has so many other better things to do? And all this recent publicity about ‘sexting’ and ‘threesomes’? Is she so loathe to give up the post-menopausal spotlight to Paula Deen? 

This smells of desperation to me.

Back to School!

My family chipped in and bought me an iPad for my 'special' birthday this month.

I haven't talked to anyone since. Or puttered around the house, or gone to a movie or even cooked a meal.
(Well, maybe one, when some special friends arrived from across the continent and I picked my head up to make an effort).

I even wake up in the middle of the night to play with it. It gleams in the darkness, lighting the way to knowledge. It also has terrific solitaire games!

Along with the new iPad came lessons at the local Apple store. I was very wary. I had taken 'computer courses' before, in my previous incarnation as an educator.

They were terrible. And I should know, because I know about learning.

As far as I'm concerned, there should be a corner in Michelangelo's 'Last Judgement' reserved for computer classes. What could be a more brutal torture than to find yourself sitting for hours looking up at a large, blinking projection at the front of a lab while the teacher/facilitator (there's an oxymoron) stammers and apologizes,
"I don't get it. This worked before. Wait a minute. No, ignore that....sorry." etc., etc.

To cover the instructor's tush, in one such week-long course on photoshop, everyone was given a certificate of proficiency anyways, even though none of us could demonstrate anything of much competence. Since many of my classmates were actually paying big bucks for the course (unlike moi, who, in the interest of full disclosure, was subsidized by my board) it was the least the 'school' could do.
And...after all, if people didn't pass, where would future clients, oh, excuse me, students, come for?

It's strange to admit this, especially since I spent the last 25 years teaching others, but I actually hated school.
Most of the time. Once in a while, especially in the primary years, I managed to enjoy myself and pick up a few things, but later on, I cringed. I was educated in the days of what they used to call 'teacher-centered learning', so much depended on the competence and personality of the teacher. The pickings were pretty slim. Do I really have to expand on this?

We had no 'google', of course, so our curiosity was severely hampered. Oh, we could visit the local library, undergo a background check, get fingerprinted and be allowed to take out a couple of dusty books for a week or two from their limited and highly guarded resources. Or, if we were lucky enough to find one in our family, we could try to eavesdrop when the occasional intelligent person was expressing a new idea, but the opportunity to participate in a meaningful discussion was often curtailed by the universally-held belief that children should be 'seen' but not, of course, engaged in actual conversation.

So I've spent a lifetime being a self-taught kind of learner. And I believe I've leaned a lot.
(As a matter-of-fact, I have heard myself flatteringly referred to as a Miss Know-it-All on many occasions!)

And I just love learning. I can't stop myself. For me, the best thing to come along since my university stack pass has been the internet. The concept that I can have a question about something, anything, and touch a couple of keys or a pretty glass screen and 'ta-da' there is the answer, or a link to it, is mind candy for me.

I'm actually quite addicted. To wondering about stuff. And then, finding out. If I had my way, school would be kids with wireless laptops searching for answers to facilitator-posited questions on a variety of subjects. The questions would not be things like, "If Johnny has ten candies and three friends, how many candies does each friend get? but rather, why/why not should he give them any? or, how many are left for him and how will he console himself with the remainder? Answer with reference to at least three religions. Then, are you satisfied with these explanations? If not, why not? Suggest an alternative for bonus marks!"

So the chance to expose myself to more school was a little unsettling. But one of my friends, who had skipped many a boring class with me in high school, a retired teacher of gifted nerds and a formerly very late adapter, assured me that going to the Mac Store school was a completely different learning experience and that I'd love it.

Although 'Trust' is not my middle name, I decided to give it a shot.

More on this later. I have to drag myself away from the keyboard and get dressed. I have another lesson in half an hour.

Those Who Can - Waiting for Superman

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that the new film documentary, “Waiting for Superman” lays most of the blame for the current crisis in education at the feet of teachers and their horrible unions. According to filmmaker David Guggenheim (whose own offspring, he confides, are safely ensconced in private institutions) they are sucking all the money out of the system for living wages and harboring tenured reprobates in their bosoms. Without them, we could just get on with the joy of infusing the young with intelligence, proficiency and skills for success in life, just like we used to before they took over.

(Who ‘we’ are is never really disclosed).

It’s an easy shot. Who, among us, hasn’t had at least one (or ten) teachers we didn’t like, who made us suffer, picked on us just because we didn’t do our homework, made us throw away our gum, took away that note passed across the desks from the friend across the room, or, worst of all, gave us a detention for speaking out of turn? Depending on our own ability to adapt to the classroom, we might easily look back and recall a few names we’d like to see scratched out of the ‘Book of the Living’.
And yet, here many of us are, relatively well-educated, competent, at least, in what is referred to as ‘Basic Skills’, ‘Literacy’, ‘Numeracy’ and acceptable table manners, able to earn a living, manage a mortgage and raise a family and even survive the little challenges of life, like divorce and taxes, without too much calamity.

Casting his eyes around for a suitable subject for the successor to the controversial but highly popular sensation, “An Inconvenient Truth”, Guggenheim tells us he was struck by the sad state of the local public school he passed by daily when carpooling his kids to a much better private school. The fact that the American middle class (and increasingly the vanishing middle class up here, in Canada) has, over the years, withdrawn its support for, participation in and commitment to public education, like he has, himself, is a logical point he never acknowledges. There is an uncomfortable condescension to the ‘disadvantaged’ in the thesis of this film, which the nobody in the media seems to be noticing or commenting on as they hop on the bandwagon of praise for its shallow analysis.

Checking all this out is a big job…..say, it’s a job for….wait for it…..”Superman”!!!

Leave it to Mr. Simpleton, make that Guggenheim, to choose, as a name for his movie, a popular iconic metaphor, where kids are rescued by a ‘deus ex-machina’, instead of plain hard work. Everything about this documentary screams shallow cliché, from its throwing around of random statistics projected on the screen (in case you want to jot them down for future reference), tacky graphics, and the corny, time-worn doc convention of following a selection of sad-eyed child-contestants as they vie for some prize or other. In this case, unlike the excellent film “Spellbound”, which unfolded in a charming narrative structure accompanied by clever visual design and delightful music, where the parents and kids actually exhausted themselves working for their reward, or the outstanding documentary of several years ago, “WarDance”, which unfolded dramatically in the most gorgeous footage ever shot, the child/victims and their hapless parents in “Waiting for Superman” suffer under poor lighting, sitting passively by, waiting for their fates to be randomly decided in heartless lotteries while the cameramen hover like vultures, picking at the corpses.

You have to ask yourself why, in the course of this movie, no one asks the obvious questions….who thought this ridiculous system up? Why hasn’t anyone rebelled? You might also ask why there is no honest examination of the majority of those Charter schools which fail to measure up even adequately, or which narrow their curricula solely to readin’ and math and teach only to the test or hire (and fire, as needs be) uncertified, underpaid ‘teacher-facilitators’?

With all this emphasis on testing, what happens when a school does really well, year after year, scoring so well that there is no dramatic ‘improvement’? I’ll tell you. First of all, the school administration cannot draw favorable notices from on high, since their scores are static. They get less support, which, in education, means money and staffing. Resources are thrown down the bottomless pits while the tall poppies, as they are called, get lopped off. I taught at such a public school and the pride we felt for the success of our students was quickly shifted over to the parents and the community. After all, how could we teachers take any credit, when they gave us such excellently raised and motivated kids to work with? (But never seek to blame a community for poorly prepared pupils, on pain of PC death!)

There is no question that all is not well in the American educational system. In “Waiting for Superman”, most of the people with all the answers, have never really taught school at all, or if they have, it was brief step on the way up to academic bureaucracy, well above the ‘fray’. Some authorities are, themselves, the products of private education with ingrained prejudices about public schools. The irony is that a few, who pulled themselves up with hard work, now believe they must work outside the system. For profit, by the way. (There is no mention that the private sector must generate a profit or else it goes out of business!) This film would like you to forget about the many dedicated and sincere public school educators trying their best, every day, to make things better for their students.

Putting the blame for society’s educational ills mainly at the feet of the teachers’ unions and mocking due process for grievances is disingenuous, to say the least, especially when you can’t resist editing in some archival footage you’ve dug up showing ‘olden days’ schools and tell the audience that unions were first a ‘good thing’ since most of the staff were mere women who were being terribly exploited. (Hey, Mr. Guggenheim, that’s what usually, happens when workers have no contracts or agreements and can be terminated at will. Brush up on your Woody Guthrie songs). A highly respected, award-winning Science teacher I know was terminated at a prestigious private school because they could hire two starter teachers for the salary they were paying her! At another private school, a teacher/friend was told to keep her big mouth shut about how the sociopath in her Grade 9 class was interfering with the learning of the other high paying students. When she insisted his removal be considered, she was told, "You don't have a Private School mentality, my dear." She was 'let go' shortly thereafter.
Let's not even start about the 'credit mills' that popped up everywhere as soon as private school tuition became deductible. One of my students told me his father was told if he paid a little more, the marks might be more impressive!

Nothing is perfect, but to suggest that employees have a nerve to expect to be paid a living wage, have some job security and work in safe and decent circumstances is very 19th Century, if you ask me. Especially when you are entrusting, to them, the care and education of your most precious possessions.

The ‘inconvenient truth’ here is that when you insist on using a business model, refer to students as clients and treat staff as expendable if they don’t generate a ‘profit’, (ie. high test scores) no matter how poor the raw materials might be, you are setting yourself up for failure with a capital ‘F’.

Festivus for the Restivus

Once a year, Toronto springs to life for the fall film festival called TIFF.

This year, it falls between Rosh Hashanna and Yom Kippur, an unfortunate bit of timing, considering many of the participants on both sides of the screen are 'chosen people'. This puts a lot of pressure on serious attendees who have a lot of cookin' and prayin' to do on choice screening days, but as a casual participant, I have been able to sandwich in more than enough movies to satisfy my appetite for standing in long lineups for hours and chatting with total strangers as if we've known each other forever, comparing notes on obscure foreign films that will never be released in the Cineplex.

I will review a couple of films in future posts, but for now, as I take a well-deserved break for a couple of days, I will make a few observations about the Festival itself.

You either get it or you don't. Or, like me, you sort of get it but then you sort of don't get it at all.

If you are the kind of person who would wake up at dawn and stand in a line at 7 am. for a couple of hours in hopes of getting the last ticket to the new Mike Leigh movie, then you amaze me.

If you can't wait to utter a growly 'arrrgh' as soon as the anti-pirating slide appears on the screen, you are obviously, a regular.

If you have driven up from Toledo for the past 8 years, toting your bicycles on your car roof so you can dart quickly between the Scotiabank Megaplex on Richmond St. and the Isabel Bader Theatre across from the ROM, to get a good spot in line for the next film, you've earned your tee shirt that says "I like to sit in the dark with strangers".

If you like to see five or six movies a day for ten days and don't care if you remember anything about them, enjoy hanging around Yorkville hoping to see movie stars and like living on popcorn and Lindt chocolates (the only food allowed in theatres), you are not alone. You are in good company.

I may join you, once in a while, in that long lineup, to converse for a few hours, take turns going on coffee runs and let in our friends, but just our best friends, while we wait for the chance to see a shiny new movie and maybe, if we're really lucky, have the time to stay for Q and A with the creators before we dash out, unceremoniously, to the next one.

For the Birds

“Black Swan” is one of the creepiest movies I have ever sat through. I’m not exactly sure whom Darren Aronofsky had in mind as the audience for this overwrought poultrypalooza, but it sure isn’t middle-aged Jewish mothers of young women. Anorexic and self- harming teenage girls, perhaps, but are there enough of them out there to fill the mega-plexes? How much popcorn would they buy? Would their boyfriends join them? I doubt it. They’d have to sit through a lot of port des bras and plies before the not-so-hot, skinny girl-on-girl sex scene and that is, thank god, fleeting. If that’s what they’re looking for, they can find it elsewhere for a lot less trouble.

Too artsy to be a horror film, yet still pretty horrible. Certainly, the film is not for balletomanes, like moi, who come for the dancing but soon find out that they have to shut their eyes quickly on too many occasions.

And not for naps.

The dancing, (and editing), is, admittedly, quite well done, even better than in other dance films where movie stars pretend to be dancers. Ms. Portman trained for many months (which is supposed to be impressive, but I thought ballerinas trained for years). She does an acceptable job of twirling around in the close-ups and you can keep yourself quite busy trying to figure out who’s arms and legs those really are, flapping around on the stage in the long shots. There is, however, something missing, as her “artistic director-on-the-make” (Vincent Cassel) constantly reminds her. He calls it passion but we aren’t fooled. We all know he just wants to get into her tutu.

What’s really missing, from my perspective, is an inability to convey the pleasure of dancing. The tortured look on Natalie’s kisser in every shot strips away any enjoyment you have watching her graceful movements from the neck down. Granted, this is endemic to the character she plays, who never has any fun, or cake, but it gets pretty tough to watch after a while.

Apparently, what she and of course, we, must learn is that what is actually required to interpret the role fully, is not dedicated hard work or excellent technique. The story, and the ballet director, both suggest that her innocence (ie. virginity) prevents her from fully interpreting the role of the seductive black swan. This is the greatest come-on rationale I’ve heard in a long time. Even Natalie knows to resist this line, at least for a while. When it takes hold, however, it lures her right off her perch into a downward tailspin of insanity.

It seems our little dancer must incinerate her stuffed animals, trash her ballerina music box and leave her mother’s suffocating nest with her 'dark-swan side', Mila Kunis, who has just flown in from San Francisco, (boy, are her arms tired). Mila can afford to arrive late to class with no need to ‘warm up’, go clubbing the night before a performance, wash assorted drugs down with hard liquor, flirt with boys and still compete for the lead role because she has a big black tattoo of wings on her back.

And, it goes without saying, she has had S-E-X.

It turns out, however, that what's good for the goose, isn't necessarily good for the other goose.

There isn’t a female in this movie, be she human or avian, who couldn’t use a decent meal. I know ballerinas are supposed to be thin, but if Natalie Portman hasn’t been digitally altered, then she needs to ask herself how much she really needs to suffer for her art. Why is it that when male actors have to adapt their bodies for ‘a part’, they invariable get to beef up, while females have to waste away? I acknowledge the rare exceptions of Tom Hanks in ‘Swept Away’ or ‘Overboard’ or whatever the movie was where he ends up talking to a beachball on a deserted island and Rene Zellweger in the Bridget Jones epics, where everyone fretted about her transformation into what used to known in the culture as a woman. In most cases, you hear about guys like De Niro fattening up as Jake LaMotta or Stallone chomping down the steroids to bulk up for his customary oeuvre.

Of course, there is Oscar buzz for Natalie, who gets to starve, fret, self-mutilate AND experiment with her sexuality, not to mention that great indicator of real acting chops, yell at her horrible mother. She also gets to dance up a storm, looking about as carefree as Moira Shearer at the end of ‘The Red Shoes’, another dancing film that traumatized me as a child and convinced me to give up my ballet classes.

The rest of the cast also pecks at the scenery with relish. I saw the film cold, so to speak, at TIFF, knowing only that it was by Aronofsky and with Portman. I'm a sucker for dance movies. There were no credits at the beginning, so it took me quite a while to realize I was watching what was left of the formerly beautiful Barbara Hershey as the mother hen, alternately smothering or pushing her fledgling from the nest. I recognized the voice, but was thrown by what passes, in Hollywood, as cosmetic enhancing surgery.

You shouldn’t really be feeling sorry for the bad people in a movie. It distracts from the plot.

The presence of Winona Ryder escaped me completely until I saw her name in the credits. What a comedown. Not only is she the older washed-up dancer, but she gets shunted off her perch pretty early in the plot. No Anne Bancroft scene-stealing for her. Unless it ended up on the cutting room floor. If they still have cutting rooms.

The leading man, Vincent Cassel, was, to be gracious, not my type. He is very strange looking. Kind of ‘beaky’. You might think this fits right in with the bird imagery, but even though he thinks he's the cock of the walk, he's not conventionally appealing. But then, I have to admit that no man, in my humble opinion, will ever outdo the magnificence of Barishnikov in ‘The Turning Point’ - a much better ballet movie. When he seduces the lithesome young ballerina in ‘Romeo and Juliet’ both en pointe and au lit, it is a much more enjoyable transition from innocence to experience for everyone.

Granted, there are some stunning effects and powerful avian images and sound effects, most of which I am hoping will eventually dissolve from my memory with the passage of time and leave me with few permanent emotional scars.

I won’t go into them here, since I’d hate to spoil their shock value and deprive your own eyes of the opportunity to bleed, like mine and Ms. Portman’s, for themselves.