No answer, no flutter of wings, no sprinkle of fairy dust. Oh well, guess I’m on my own. At noon the station wagon is waiting on the corner of Ninety-sixth Street. “Don’t anybody give me a cigarette today, even if I beg,” I announce to my fellow actors as I climb into the backseat of the station wagon. “I’ve quit smoking as of early this morning so don’t give me one no matter what. Okay?”
“Well, we’ve heard that before,” Randall says with a snort.
“I mean it this time. This is it,” I counter.
“Great. No cigarettes from me. My pleasure. And don’t bitch when I refuse you. So everybody in? All arms and legs? We’re not missing anyone?” Randall asks as he pulls into traffic and heads for the Westside Highway. Dee-Honey is with Pied Piper today so Randall is acting as camp counselor for this group. “How about a line run-through? I haven’t played Gepetto in a year.”
“Can’t we wait until after we’re on the road a while? I’ll need a second cup of coffee before I can focus,” Eddie says from the far backseat, brandishing his Superman thermos. When you’re a sixty-five-year-old Pinocchio, you need all the help you can get. Eddie’s been playing the wooden puppet for thirty years. He has his own set of rubber noses, which he had designed by a Broadway prop master back when dinosaurs roamed the earth. He had them made in three different lengths, signifying the first lie, then the second lie, and then the third lie that lands him right in the belly of the whale. The noses travel in a custom-designed wooden box with red velvet lining. Once, after a show, in a moment of anger, Randall, who’s been playing Gepetto for at least twenty years, threatened to throw the noses, case and all, out of the car if Eddie didn’t stop referring to Randall’s Gepetto as “my old man.” They didn’t speak for three years. Eddie and Randall, I mean. Not the noses—they never speak.
Forty-five minutes into the trip we stop at a Dunkin’ Donuts for breakfast. I get three chocolate donuts and a large coffee.
“Careful, Mags,” Helen says. “I gained twenty-five pounds when I quit smoking.”
“I know,” I say.
“Well, I’ve managed to lose most of it, but it hasn’t been easy,” Helen says, nibbling on a toasted bran muffin. “It’s not easy at all, that’s why I have to be so careful.”
Helen doubles as Jiminy Cricket and Tommy the Tuna in the show. She’s adorable as the Tuna, but her Cricket looks like a freak of nature. The audience often gasps when she enters. She thinks they’re surprised, but I think they’re scared.
“How did the Agnes of God audition go?” I ask.
“Great, really great. I’m still waiting to hear,” Helen says. “You know how slow they can be getting back to you.”
“Sure,” I say, finishing the first of my chocolate donuts. We do a line run-through when we get back on the road. We arrive at the civic center in plenty of time. Frank is in the parking lot, lounging in a beach chair, catching rays. The civic center provided him with three union stagehands, and the set for the show was up and ready to go in about twenty minutes. The center also provided a buffet in the wings backstage. Coffee, more donuts, bagels and cream cheese, and fresh squeezed orange juice. I get a coffee, two donuts, and a sesame bagel and head for the dressing room. Helen’s right, I’m going to gain fifty pounds by the end of the week if I don’t watch it.
The show goes pretty well. Eddie has trouble getting his nose off in the blackout before the last scene, so as the Blue Fairy I have to come on, tap his head with my magic wand, declare him a “real boy,” and rip his nose off all in one graceful swoop. The spirit gum that the nose is attached with pulls off skin as well and Eddie lets out a yelp. Puberty is painful even for a wooden puppet.
I fall asleep on the trip back to the city. We get there about four o’clock. So I’ve had no cigarettes and no alcohol for about twelve hours.
“Good luck with the no smoking,” Randall says when he drops me off on the corner of Eighty-sixth Street. “Think of all the money you’re saving.”
“Thanks,” I say and lean back in the car. “Sorry about the nose, Eddie. I didn’t mean to pull so hard.”
“It wasn’t your fault. I used too much spirit gum on the last one. I’m sure it will heal in no time,” Eddie says, touching the Band-Aid on his nose. “Be brand-new in a day or two.”
I get home and check the clock. I have a therapy appointment at six. That will be good. I can’t smoke there, and then it will be just a few hours before I can call it a day and climb into bed.
GEORGE IS ENCOURAGING about the smoking. He tells me he gained only ten pounds when he quit. I don’t mention that I’m also giving up alcohol. I don’t think it’s any of his business, and besides, I don’t want to label it a problem in case I decide to go back to it when I get things under control.
“And I haven’t heard from Jack. I guess we’re finished and I think it’s just as well,” I tell George.
“Why is that just as well?”
“Because it wasn’t going to last. He was too young, or rather I was too old. He should be going with someone more appropriate, someone he could start a family with.”
“You could still have a family. You’re not over the hill.”
“No, I can’t. It’s not my thing. You know.”
“Why?”
I shrug my shoulders. This subject keeps coming up. It’s the biological clock syndrome. It seems the last of my viable eggs are kicking up a fuss and sending messages to my brain and to everyone else’s too.
“Well, that’s it for this session,” George says, getting up and heading for the door. “Think about the family thing. You’re not out of the running. And good luck with the smoking. Lemons help. Cut them into quarters and suck on them.”
On my way out of the building I remind myself that not all women are destined to have children. Look at Katharine Hepburn, Georgia O’Keeffe, Virginia Woolfe, for goodness sake—brilliant and talented women, and not a bundle of joy among them.
But I know there is something going on for me. The other day I was in Macy’s looking for housewares and found myself in the baby department pricing cribs. It’s last call at my fertility factory. The foreman does one last sweep of the eggs and then locks it down, system over and out—estrogen drops, skin shrinks, closing whistle sounds, and the old factory grinds to a halt.
Standing in the checkout line at Gristede’s recently, I read an article in Ladies’ Home Journal written by a woman who claimed in spite of winning a Pulitzer Prize for literature, earning two advanced degrees, nursing the sick in Calcutta with Mother Theresa in the late ’80s, and single-handedly navigating the English Channel in a one-person wind skiff, that it wasn’t until giving birth to her son, Malcolm, at the age of forty-eight, that she felt she had done anything worthwhile with her life. I usually avoid those kinds of stories, but lately I’m drawn to them, like fingernails to a scab. I walked out of the store without my groceries and headed straight for the intersection planning to impale myself on the hood ornament of a speeding BMW. Fortunately I ran into Marge Meghin on the corner and she told me what a great job I did on the last voice-over I booked with her. Sometimes flattery can save your life.
I stop at Dunkin’ Donuts and order a tea with lemon. I put the lemon in my mouth and suck like crazy.
I call Patty from a pay phone on Christopher Street.
“Hello?”
“Patty, how are you? How’s the cold?”
“Better, thanks.”
“I’m in the Village and I wondered if you might be free for a bite to eat. We could have that gab.”
“Hmm that’s an idea. I’ve been cooped up for three days. I’d love some of that homemade soup from Caffè Sha Sha on Hudson Street. Meet me there?”
“Sounds good.”
Caffè Sha Sha is a wonderful little restaurant that has an outdoor garden in the back. I get there first and settle into a table next to the fountain, which is an adorable little boy carved out of stone, taking a leak into a fishpond. The owners have an interesting sense of humor. I or
der another tea with extra lemons.
“How are you?” Patty says, arriving in a flurry. “I’m not going to hug you. I’m still full of germs. No fever, just a runny nose and a bit of a hacking cough. But it’s great to be out. So what’s going on? I love your hair. Is that a new color? Why are you down here? Did you have an audition or something?”
“Not exactly,” I answer. “I’m seeing a therapist.”
“Really? Who?”
“George . . .”
“George McMann?”
“Yes. How’d you know?”
“Just a guess. He’s good. Jim saw him a few years ago for a while.”
“Your husband Jim?”
“Of course.”
“That is so amazing. I mean there must be thousands of therapists in Manhattan and I end up with the same one as Jim. It feels incestuous,” I say.
“Not unless you and Jim are having an affair. Which I don’t think is happening,” Patty says with a smile.
Patty and Jim have been married for almost twenty years and have a teenage daughter and are one of those couples who seem like they were made for each other. Of course, you never know what goes on behind closed doors, and I have to say I’m curious why Jim was in therapy, but I think by any standard they are the real thing when it comes to two people in love and in it for the long haul.
The waiter stops at the table. Patty orders a bowl of the homemade chicken soup and I get a grilled tomato and cheese.
“Oh, and could I get some bread right away to nibble on? I’m starving,” she asks.
The waiter nods and heads to the kitchen.
“Jim was having trouble with his work. He was completely blocked and Tom Hansen . . . do you know him?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Anyway, he suggested George. Turns out it all had to do with Jim’s mother and her suicide when Jim was a teenager, and within a couple of months he was back on track. That’s exactly the time he got the commission to design the new shopping mall in Akron, Ohio. Remember?”
“Yes.” Patty is a talker, that’s for sure. It’s nice to let someone else fill the space. All I have to do is suck the lemons and listen.
“Anyway, I know you were curious about Jim. I didn’t want you speculating something deep and dark. Really it was the midlife thing. He was despondent. And, of course, it was the mother thing too. She was forty-nine when she offed herself. Sorry, but there is no better way to say it. Devastating for the whole family and between you and me I’m sure that was her intention. She was absolutely stunning and apparently couldn’t face everything going south. Our Sarah looks a lot like her. So why are you seeing George? Midlife thing?” she asks, back to the subject at hand.
“You might say I’m having a bit of a midlife thing.”
“Well, it happens. I’m going through that short-term memory loss they talk about. I can’t remember what I did ten minutes ago, but I can still recite all of Beowulf in Old English.”
“I’d love to hear that sometime.”
“Sure, the very next time we’re in front of a fireplace on a long winter’s night and all the power lines are down. So what’s the story with you and therapy? Is this your first time?”
“No, but it’s been a while since my last fling with it. It’s just stuff, you know. For instance, career, as in I’m still playing Dorothy and Snow White. Still the ingénues, but I’m getting heckled and the last time I played Miss White, I went onstage with a cigarette in my hand!”
“That’s brilliant,” Patty says.
“Well no one else thought it was.”
“Those kids need some reality. Did you know teen girls have one of the highest percentages of smokers? It’s shocking.”
“These were six and seven years old.”
“It’s still brilliant.”
“And relationships,” I say, “or rather relationship.” Then I hesitate.
“And?” Patty coaxes.
“And babies keep coming up.”
“For you? Babies for you?” Patty asks, incredulous.
“Well, I do have the equipment. It might be a little rusty, but . . .”
“I don’t mean you can’t, I just never thought you wanted to,” she says.
“I think it’s the biological clock thing. It’s starting to sound the alarm.”
“Well, haven’t you heard?” she says. “The biological clock is of no consequence now with all the new scientific options. There is no alarm, no more ominous ticktock.”
The waiter plops a basket of bread on the table.
“Thank goodness. I’m so hungry,” Patty says. “I haven’t eaten a decent meal in days. This cold knocked me out.” She grabs a piece of bread, lathers it with butter, and takes a big bite. “Hmm. That’s better. There is nothing like a big wedge of carbohydrates to make me feel better. Warm bread and butter. It’s like mother’s milk. Speaking of which, did you read that article in the magazine section a few weeks back? About a sixty-year-old woman giving birth to a newborn. I say newborn because it is so hard to imagine. I find it easier to imagine a sixty-year-old woman giving birth to a twenty-five-year-old somehow.”
“No, I didn’t see that,” I say, sucking a lemon wedge. I am dying for a cigarette. “How did she manage that?” I try to stay focused on the conversation.
“Artificial insemination—really artificial. They got an egg from some farm in Jersey and a sperm off the Internet and combined them into a kind of Baby Gap designer ovum and planted it in that antiquated womb and presto—pregnant at sixty! Amazing. Can you imagine? I guess the good news is eventually kids won’t have to worry about housing for their aging parent because a lot of them will be in their teens and still living at home when their mothers are eighty.”
Our meal arrives and we chow down. Our conversation moves from babies to recent movies to the price of produce.
“Broccoli is almost two dollars a head at the Union Square Farmers Market. And forget the cauliflower. I might as well be buying truffles.”
“Isn’t it because of a drought or something? Isn’t that what drives the prices up?”
“Greed is what drives prices up,” Patty says between slurps of soup.
“Well, everybody has to make a living. We’re not all trust fund kids.” The minute I say it, I realize it’s the sour chord that could end this friendly meal. Patty’s grandfather made a fortune in ball bearings. I’m not sure what they’re used for, but apparently they’re essential to something.
“I’m not going there, Mags, because I’m too happy to be out of my sickbed to let anything offend me. But, yes, I have money and, no, I didn’t work for it in the traditional sense, but that doesn’t mean the price of broccoli can’t get my dander up. Okay?”
Patty and I have known each other for fifteen years. We met in a pottery class at the School of Visual Arts. I was there preparing for a role at the suggestion of Pauline Letts.
I had been cast as Hedda in Hedda Gabler, and I was so nervous because the part is huge and a classic and I was going to be doing it at a prestigious regional theater in Minnesota. Pauline and I were doing a Peter Pan together about a month before I was to leave town for the start of rehearsals and when I told her how nervous I was she told me to take a pottery class and forget about the acting and concentrate on the clay. I did and it helped and that’s when I met Patty. She was six months pregnant and using the clay to prepare for her role as mother.
“I’m sorry. I’m a mess lately and, of course, you can complain about the price of broccoli. I can’t believe how expensive toothpaste is; it’s over three dollars a tube. I’ve gone back to using plain old Arm and Hammer baking soda.”
“I’m sorry too. You know it’s my Achilles’ heel,” Patty says. “And since I’m going to pay for our meal because I’m so filthy rich . . .”
“You don’t have to, please,” I protest. “I won’t let you, absolutely not.”
“I insist,” Patty says. “And for dessert I’m ordering us a round of napoleons and cap
puccinos.”
We sit and gab for another hour. The napoleons are fantastic. We order seconds. I have been living on sugar for days. I might as well accept the fact that I’m going to weigh two hundred pounds by Thursday. Patty walks me to the subway.
“That was fun,” she says.
I give her a big hug. Screw the germs. Friends like Patty are worth the risk.
“A baby might be the right thing for you,” she says. “But remember, it’s a long-term contract. Did you know Sarah is going to be fifteen next month?”
“That’s amazing. I always think she’s eight.”
“Well she’s not. And we’re all coming to your show,” Patty says as she waves and heads down Seventh Avenue.
I get the train uptown. The local stops at Times Square and the conductor announces it is going out of service.
Damn. Everyone grumbles and then exits to wait for the next train.
On the now-crowded platform a fellow is playing guitar and singing “Sittin’ on the Dock of the Bay.” A large black woman is sitting on the bench with two huge Kmart bags at her feet. She starts scatting along with the guy on guitar. She has a drop-dead voice. For a moment I think it actually might be Aretha Franklin. A guy in a tie-dyed T-shirt starts whistling. A young black kid improvises the percussion section on top of a metal trash can. I catch Aretha’s eye, she nods and invites me along for the ride. We sing an improvised counterpoint through the chorus. The guy on guitar sings the last verse in a deep rumble of a voice and Aretha and I and the whistler back him up in a tight three-part harmony, and then the whole place starts to jive for the final chorus. The whistler takes eight bars followed by the trash-can percussionist, who whacks out a sixteen-bar riff that sets the whole platform rocking. It’s Times Square, New York City—smack dab in the heart of the universe. Then the train pulls into the station, the tune ends, and we subway rockers disperse. Just the guitar player remains, sittin’ on his dock of the bay.
Dorothy on the Rocks Page 17
