No Charm School Charmer #2

A version in poetry, in contrast to the prose version. This is a good example of how my poetry comes from a much deeper and more honest place than my prose.

Charm School

They sent me to Charm School
that graduation summer.
Each day I dressed for Park Avenue:
black high heels and gartered hose,
dress hemmed below my pristine knees.
Even white gloves, the eternal symbol
of lady-like correctness.

They sent me to Charm School
to smooth my ragged edges,
remove me from the music
and the bad boys who played it
and give me the face that they
wanted to show the world.
And I went, my last concession.

The sent me to Charm School,
where I learned to sit with ankles,
(not knees) crossed, hands cupped
demurely in a lap that never opened.
They amended my eyebrows, hair,
tried to dislodge my unpleasant
speech, bearing, attitude.

They send me to Charm School.
And the one thing I remember
is how Loretta Young could open
a door into crowded room and
gracefully turn her back
on her eager audience.

They sent me to Charm School,
but their bright fantasies and
those charming illusions,
could not defuse the dark fire
that fuels my recalcitrant soul.

While I’m Waiting

While I’m waiting for the signatures on the Improve Senior Housing petition to reach 100, I’m poking around in my old poetry. This from pre-Covid:

The Senior Center Singer

Hair white as winter,
face aligned with 91 years:

Seconds slow to match her
shambling gait secured
with sturdy black cane
and orthopedic shoes
as she moves to the mic
in the room’s easy silence.

As the soft piano tones,
her eyes glow like summer
mornings, bright and vital;
the plains of her face revive
as the clear soprano of her voice
reclaims the joys of Summertime,
recalls when living was easy
and babies hushed to the touch
of her melancholy lullaby.

No Charm School Charmer

(Reprised from a piece I wrote that was published on a defunct blog called “Time Goes By”. I found it when I Googled myself.)

When I graduated high school in 1957 at the age of 17, my parents were reluctant to send me away to college for fear that I would get even “wilder” than they already thought I was.

I wasn’t really wild – I mean, I did date a guy with a motorcycle. I did once stay out until 2AM sitting on the curb talking with a boy I knew who had just run away from boarding school. I did come home a little drunk several times. Well, I guess I can see why my folks were worried.

So they enrolled me in the John Robert Powers Charm School on Fifth Avenue in New York City, and I spent three days a week that summer before leaving home getting my rough edges polished. I took the commuter train from Yonkers, dressed 50s appropriately in stockings, heels, a dress and white gloves. No white shoes, however. These were not considered appropriate for city wear, even in the summer.

There were several other girls my age in my charm school class, but the only two I remember are a slim, athletic and naturally attractive girl from Darien, Connecticut, and a short, ill-proportioned, homely girl who lived in a grand manor on the Long Island Sound. I know that because the wealthy girl invited the other two of us to a party at her house. She came to pick me up in a limo and asked me and the other girl to stay overnight.

Coming from a middle class family, I was pretty overwhelmed by the family portraits on the walls, the tennis courts overlooking the Sound, the maid who served us breakfast in the morning, the rugs that seemed as soft as pillows. I don’t think the girl from Darien was as impressed; I think she came from a similar background.

I had nothing in common with those two girls, but for three days a week for six weeks, we helped each other get through the training that each of us was being forced to endure because our parents felt we had something lacking.

We had elocution lessons from a dramatically made-up young woman (probably an aspiring actress) who had us repeat “the little bottle is on the metal table” and “the man ate a ham sandwich” to train our ears and tongues away from our New York City area accents.

We learned to put on a fur coat without elbowing anyone nearby (I have never owned a fur coat). We learned how to sit on the edge of a chair with our ankles crossed and how to gracefully get up and down from sitting on the floor without exposing anything private.
We learned how to style our hair, what clothes we looked best in, and how apply makeup. And, yes, we learned to walk with a book balanced on our heads. I still have the ring binder with notes and pictures that I cut from magazines to illustrate what I was learning.

Most interestingly, for me, we learned how to enter and exit a room like Loretta Young did at the beginning and end of her television series in the 50s. (I have made use of that technique many times.) The trick is to turn you back on the people in the room with a graceful flourish. The swirling skirts give it that extra flair.

I never kept in touch with those two girls whom I met in charm school. I imagine that the girl from Connecticut wound up marrying a doctor or a lawyer and continued to play tennis. I thought often of the girl from Larchmont-on-the-Sound, for whom no amount of learned charm could change her acne or large nose or her odd shape. I still wonder how her life went. Maybe her parents made her get plastic surgery. Maybe she grew into a strong, self-aware woman who took control of her own life. Maybe she became a therapist who helps other awkward young women discover who they are and want to be.

As for me, I went away to college and I rarely went back home except for major holidays. I even stayed on campus over the summers and took courses. I stayed out late, drank, partied and procrastinated. I wrote poetry, danced in musicals, joined a sorority, was feature editor of the school paper, and graduated. I stayed through graduate school.

I found that I rarely used any of the techniques I learned in the John Robert Powers Charm School. And when I did, it usually was to get a laugh.

Mind Meanderings on a Rainy September Afternoon

THE MOVEMENT IS MOVING

It’s only been a few days since the petition to improve senior housing was launched at change.org/improveseniorhousing. If you haven’t signed it yet, please click on the link and add your name to this crucial effort on behalf of affordable and humane housing for our elders.

As of this morning, there were 34 signatures, many of them, I think, from Gray Panthers, the state offices of which I contacted yesterday.  They don’t seen to have a national website.  I hope they will be sharing the information I sent them among their  members.

I also contacted The View, it see if I could get Whoopi Goldberg and the other women interested in the effort — maybe even sign the petition.  Of course, I haven’t heard back from them.  In addition, I submitted a personal essay on the subject the the AARP magazine; it takes 6 weeks to get any kind of response from them. I don’t know if the Letters to the Editor I submitted to local newspapers will be published.

I hope that the notices I sent to several elderbloggers I gleaned from an older elderblogger list might prove fruitful.  I know a few responded already.

If you have any other ideas how to publicize the petition, please leave a comment.

MY MUPPETS ARCHETYPES

My blogger son just posed a piece about his Muppet Archetypes, so I gave some thought to what mine might be. While my kids watched Sesame Street, I only  gave it my distracted attention.  But I do know the major characters, so I decided that Big Bird and Kermit are my Muppet archetypes.  Kermit because, well, he’s the dreamer; Big Bird because his is flamboyant and colorful and likes to dance.

Which ones are yours?

THE STRESS OF BEING A MALE DOG

Our beautiful and sweet purebred male Golden Retriever is getting has balls removed today. Well, soon he will be able to go next door to play with his already-altered male dog friend, Darby, without having to worry that Colt might try to mount him.

When he sees me, he has trained himself to come up to me with a toy in his mouth and then he vocalizes deep in his throat in response to my saying “Hello!”

There’s Movement on the Movement

I have started a grass roots petition.  Please go to https://www.change.org/ImproveSeniorHousing  and sign.  And share by saying something like:

By 2034,the Census Bureau projects that the US will be home to more people over 65 than people under 18. Finding safe and affordable housing for this fast-growing segment of the population is becoming an urgent task, according to a new report from Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies. The Alliance for Senior Housing Initiatives (ASHI) is a grassroots movement to influence the Federal government to develop financial and other strategies to improve housing options for the elderly. Please join us by signing the petition to influence Federal support.  Go to https://www.change.org/ImproveSeniorHousing and add your signature.

SURVIVAL IS NOT ENOUGH

A Movement Requires Public Visibililty

It’s not just a matter of writing your government representatives.  Everyone does that for every issue.  You need media attention and a way to get it. We seniors can’t get out and protest, like folks are doing for the environmental  movement; we need another way, and technology offers options.

One way is an online petition, and there is a free site to enable that.  Back in the day, when the Internet was threatened by government, my son and his cronies began a “Hands Off the Net” petition.  Ultimately, they printed out the thousands of names and hand delivered the pages of printout to the appropriate government official.

When we have enough signatures to start, we can see if we can get our local television stations to publicize what we are trying to do. Speaking at senior centers and giving them an onsite chance to sign the petition is another way of generating support.

If you can share the idea with other bloggers, or even share my posts, that could help as well.

To begin an online petition, we need a catchy phrase, like “Survival Isn’t Enough: Better Housing for Seniors.  I’m open to suggestions.

I have joined the online petition site and will start providing the information that it requires.

Again, I’m open to suggestions.  I hope that you will give this some thought.  If we start now, we will be ready when Harris begins her tenure.

 

My Fan Crush and Why

I have a fan crush on young Vincent D’Onofrio.  As I lay in bed tonight, I finally realized why.  He reminds me of an old flame.  Something about the tall body type, the surrounding air of intense creative energy. 

Ed was an artist.  Well, he still is, since he is still alive.  Lives in Bangor Maine and still teaches art. D’Onofrio no longer looks anything like the young man he once was, although I still watch the old “Criminal Intent” reruns from decades ago, in which he plays Detective Robert Goren.

One summer weekend, Ed and I drove out to Boston. We stayed at Copley Square and roamed the surrounding streets of Boston, meandering galleries and shop windows, never at a loss for conversation and delight.

That night, as we prepared for sleep, he asked me to get up and pose, with my arms out, in the light from the window. He pondered the pose for a minute, and that was it.

So, when I saw this painting on his website, I wondered if that image of me stuck somewhere in his subconscious and wound up in this painting.

Probably not, but I can fantasize, can’t I?

If you’ve the mind to, check out the paintings on his website.  His spirituality (he’s an ex-priest) comes out in his paintings, capturing the very essences of his subjects.  His paintings are full of the kind of beauty and energy with which he lives.

Here are two poems that resulted from that weekend in Boston.

Stone Cold Demon

I hear the silent scream
of the demon in the shop
on Newbury Street,
teeth bared, hunkering in
some primal isolation.
I want to hold him to my heart,
warm the stone that molds him
in his place, sing him
soft with lullabies
and promises I will keep.

I taste his fear in the tears
that mark my cheek.
“Love me, love me!” he cries.
“Love!”
“Me!

 

Pan Makes a Personal Appearance

To think it was you I summoned!
All those incantations,
those spells dispatched
to shift the stars, returned
as this immortal face,
this ancient tale.

To think the gods still answer prayers!
Make bright, deft-handed landings
right before my eyes,
fall haloed and goat-footed
deep into my mark,
breathing mischief and mayhem,
and bold bewildering dreams.

Angel, satyr, shepherd,
your music stirs the skin.
Play your syrinx now
for me, my kin.
We will dance, dance
to your tune.

September Sunflowers

Valley Time

Easterly,
the winds tease the sun
toward morning
brushing aside the easy showers
of early summer clouds.
Time follows the way of the wind
through this dawn-misted valley,
filters through the blue unfoldings
of fragile morning chicory,
flows through the slow, green seekings
of those low growing vines,
breathes honeysuckle and wildrose rain
into the season’s drifting light.
Westward,
the sun leaves the high horizon,
draping a dry autumn night
over the tired faces
of September sunflowers.

© Elaine Frankonis

So, I Want to Start a Movement

I have a logo and a name, created with the help of  my talented daughter:

© Elaine Frankonis

But I’m one little old lady sitting at her computer.  I did write to Jane Fonda about the idea, but haven’t heard back.  How does one organize support for elder housing when most elders are not going to band together and go out and protest.  And, anyway, the most important support would be from Boomers who are facing the issue in their futures.

There is one site I found that tells how to start a movement.  I have contacted them. My earlier blog post is the beginning of a “case statement”.  The next piece would have to be the goals of the movement, and I’m open to suggestions.  I would think the ultimate goal would be to have one of the President’s Cabinet members take on the challenge.  Housing and Urban Development?  Health and Human Services?  A combination of the two?

How would we begin to work toward the general goal of improved senior housing?  Petitions at senior centers that would get sent to the relevant new presidential cabinet members?  A website that someone has to design for the movement? (I would host and pay for it.) How does it get publicized?

Or maybe it’s just a pipe dream.  Thoughts?