An optimistic investment

by Karen Graham

There are few things in life that are as much fun as rollerskating. I learned to skate from my father whose idea of "learning" was taken from some medieval torture periodical and it involved a lot of "falling" and "tripping." Really, my father's philosophy was: You must face the worst circumstances in whatever it is you're doing and learn how to overcome them. Then you can say you've mastered something. So learning to skate meant a fair amount of time on the ground, avoiding being killed by other skaters, and learning how to bounce back. Literally.

So my father would take me to the roller rink. He loved the bouncing organ tunes, the roar of skates, and the cheap snacks. I was 8 or so and being a short guy he was not that much taller than me. He'd learned to move people around the skating rink by gently putting a finger on their waist and maneuvering them wherever he wanted them to go. It was disarming but effective. So we'd careen onto the rink accelerating from zero to 60 within a half of a lap. He'd be moving people out of our way before they even knew some middle aged guy was swatting them away like tall grass. Occasionally my dad would purposely trip me. This encouraged quick lessons in getting back on ones feet and avoiding getting killed by other, usually larger, skaters. And we would go fast. Very, very fast. So fast that it was all I could do to hold my breath and hang on to him. My hair flying straight back I had the feeling like this is what it must be like to be a human motorcycle.

Then we would dance. Skating rinks offer certain songs where couples could go out and do a Fox Trot or a Waltz. My father could do these all - I guess this is what teenagers did during the Depression for fun. Skate-dancing requires both parties to skate in many directions, so I learned to flip my skates to go backwards, sideways, all the while keeping in time to the vibrating pipe organ music. I have to admit it was fun. Loads of it.

My father stopped skating when he got cancer and had an ostomy bag. He worried about plastic pieces flying off and causing a scene. I kept skating. I Rollerbladed across campus during college. I skated up and down the lakefront of Chicago in my 20's. I skated with my children during their elementary school parties. They were horrified when I'd skate faster than their friends, using my father's waist-maneuvering technique. But I didn't care because weaving through a sea of little skaters with my hair rippling in the wake is my definition of fun living.

Somewhere along the way I forgot that people get too old to Rollerblade. I accompany my husband on his runs - he on his feet, me on my blades. Up and over the community trail avoiding twigs and brush - bouncing to tunes in my head. I used the Rollerblades I purchased after college for over 20 years. They finally broke and I decided to get new ones - blue and silver, shiny and new. My mother mentioned that she thought it was quite optimistic for a 56 year old woman to buy new Rollerblades. Yes, I have osteoporosis and arthritis. My one and only concession to safety is to wear wrist braces. Otherwise I am the teenager on skates zooming by the rest of them.  Wind in my face.

I'll do this as long as I can. There is nothing quite as freeing as doing something you've always done. Something that makes you feel young, limber, fast and slightly crazy. Something that pulls you back into that element that is and has always been you.

Clearly I'm doing something wrong

At left is a photo of what is promoted at Disney Land as a ginormous display of mind-bending lights projected on a wall of water. And it is. Except to my children who took turns not watching it (after sitting on the sidewalk waiting for the show for 60 minutes) - largely to irritate me. Much of life seems like this today.

What am I doing wrong. Although I have scads of employment experience I can't seem to focus on working at anything that would bring me some meaningful daily activity - and money.  I can't seem to feel well. Are my kids doing okay? Or not. I simply have no idea.

Mary Clark: Be Thankful for the Little Things

Mary Clark entered ALDA about eight months after we started a self-help support group in Chicago for people who became deaf as adults. One of Mary’s friends who had heard about the group had harassed her for months to go to a meeting. But Mary resisted--she was young, in her early 30s, and didn’t know anyone else who had become deaf in the prime of life. She envisioned the self-help group as a bunch of old people sitting around trying to hear one another talk about their grandchildren. But her friend kept at her, and partly to shut her up Mary came to a meeting.

That first night Mary had obvious anxiety and tiptoed into the room, sitting down near the door if she needed to flee. The rest of us were actually about her age, which must have given her some comfort, but she didn’t say much at the meeting. We tried to make her feel welcome and encouraged her to come back the next week. She did, and then the next week and the next. In a month or two she had become a fixture of the group and was well on her way to becoming the charming, talkative, and fun-seeking person ALDA came to know and love.

There are many enchanting anecdotes involving Mary from the early years of ALDA. She helped define the organization as not only a place to find personal support but also a place to have fun socially. For most of us, ALDA was the only place we could party and not feel on the periphery. We smiled and laughed together and laughed some more, and Mary was always near the center.

Those were good times--wondrously good--and I’m sure many of ALDA’s old guard will share their zany or poignant memories of Mary in the weeks and months to come. But the memories I hold dearest are more recent and personal.

Over the last few years, Mary communicated most frequently and expressively by email. She shared her life with many friends, and for whatever reason I was one of her mainstays. Almost daily I received a stream-of-consciousness email from Mary chronicling her activities, thoughts, and feelings. She sometimes rambled but her writing was always elegant and evocative, and more than not sprinkled with humor and insight. 

I (and I know others) received hundreds of engaging emails from Mary during this period. She didn’t text, so on some days the ancillary emails could amount to a dozen or more as well. And, as always with Mary, there was zaniness at times. Quite often Marylyn Howe, Larry Littleton, and I were all included on the same email thread from Mary. At one point Larry began to send me private messages wondering why I hadn’t responded to something Mary had written. “I never got it,” I replied. “Sure you did,” he said. The puzzle continued for at least a month until Larry noticed that Mary was addressing some of her emails to williamgraham@aol.com, whereas my email address was williamtgraham@gmail.com. In other words, another William Graham was receiving the uncommonly personal emails Mary had sent. We told Mary about the mistake but she continued to make it, occasionally sending AOL Bill chapter and verse about her daily activities, her bucket list, and her ALDA-centric views on life. I won’t be surprised if AOL Bill sends a donation to ALDA in Mary’s memory.

Mary deeply loved her family, and she shared that with us, too. She often forwarded long emails from her father that had stories about her when she was young. Her dad is an amazingly gifted and spontaneous writer, with an incredible memory. Although I had never personally met him, I did know him personally, if that makes sense. Mary’s writing, energy, and memory mirrored her dad’s, as anyone close to her can attest.

When her mother died Mary emailed saying that she remembered a piece I had written for ALDA News after my own mother’s death. She said she really connected with my words. I was surprised she remembered it 20 years later, and of course was greatly touched that she did. Mary asked me how long it was before I got over the loss of my mom. I told her that even five years later I’d regularly tear up. After I said that I momentarily wish I hadn’t because I thought it might make her disconsolate, but it had the opposite effect: It consoled her that the intense love she felt for her mom would endure in memory.

Mary and I had an email exchange the last day of her conscious life, apparently just a few hours before her accident. Our conversation was unremarkable, about mundane activities on what amounted to a bad hair day for her. But in the framework of what happened afterwards, her last words to me beautifully capture her perspective, acceptance, humor, and spirit, and contained the perfect exit line. She wrote:

So I take it day by day.  Will get through today.....clean up the dog mess....put some pennies aside and let the rest go.  Plenty of ice cream sandwiches in the freezer too.  Be thankful for the little things....smile.

She left with a smile. I’m sure that’s how she’d like to be remembered. Just like we remember her.