train left the station, there was a cheer at Penn Station. Then they put four Acela trains together, and everyone was sitting on suitcases. We were just lucky to get out of there. My niece and I had been talking about how we were going to have a Merry Skype-mas, whereby we would all sit around our computers and talk with one another over the Internet rather than gathering under the same roof.
Well, once we arrived at our destination, it was one thing right after the other. My mother had a high blood pressure attack. She had to go to the emergency room and stay in the hospital for three days. That night, my nephew, Mac, took his parents’ car to a party. At four a.m., the police were pounding on the door. The car was found in a ditch. Mac was in his room, covered with blood and mud.
My sister called me at a quarter to six in the morning from the emergency room to report on Mac’s condition. I drove to the ER in Mother’s car and picked them up. They didn’t volunteer details, and I didn’t ask, because I didn’t want to have to tell my mother. I could honestly say that I knew nothing. Better that she should hear all about it from my sister.
Unfortunately, at a quarter to ten, my drama-queen niece called and told me the whole story before I could tell her I didn’t want to know. So then when my mother asked what had happened, I had to fill her in. I could have faked ignorance, but as you know, I am pretty much incapable of telling a lie. Alas!
Wallace told me on the way back that she’d started out feeling sorry for Mac, then she felt sad for the family, and then she just felt mad. I said, “You should feel mad. Anger is good.”
At the same time, it wasn’t such a bad holiday season over all. Nobody died!
EVEN BEFORE THE HOSPITAL visits and car crashes, family get-togethers have been fraught. One year, my sister-in-law (she’s my sister’s husband’s sister, if you like the details of convoluted relationships) used Thanksgiving dinner as an opportunity to fight with her brother about who would host their mother for Christmas.
“You led me to believe that she spent three days with you, but I happen to know she was only with you for a few hours,” my sister-in-law said accusatorily.
“What?” my brother-in-law said. “We had her for three days.”
“That’s not the information I have,” his sister said.
It’s not as if this can’t be verified one way or the other, and is Thanksgiving dinner really the time to do it?
When she behaves that way, she acts like she and the person she’s speaking to are the only people in the room. I hate it when couples do that.
Quite a few years ago, when my niece and nephew were very young, old family friends joined us for our family Thanksgiving dinner. Owing to Wallace and Mac’s young age, there were knock-knock jokes and probably some references to farting and other bodily noises.
One of the invited guests turned to her husband and stage-whispered, “Bob, would you please do something to ratchet up this conversation! I’m about to fall asleep from boredom.”
I started to stew.
My sister was talking to my niece and nephew about whatever preteens are interested in, and meanwhile this lady is huffing and puffing dramatically.
Well, someone asked my sister something, and I said, “Wait! Before you answer, make sure you properly
The stage whisper is highly problematic. It’s trying to do what you want to do without taking accountability. My grandmother was a master of it, and now my mother has taken up the torch. You criticize someone in the room without saying something to their face. It’s rude. Think they can’t hear you? They can. They’re being polite enough to
There are four topics that should be completely avoided at all social events, and they are: religion, politics, finances, and sex. These things are, quite frankly, nobody’s business. There is, however, an exception in New York: money is totally fair game.
I think that’s because it’s a very expensive city, and unless you find some luck, it’s very hard to get by. On my teacher’s salary, I did get a little panicky at times. Thank goodness that for the sixteen years I spent in the West Village, my landlords never once raised my rent. I paid $1,200 a month for that entire time. (Trust me: That was an absurd bargain for what I got, especially considering my neighbor was Sarah Jessica Parker, whom I adore.) I loved that apartment for the first thirteen of the sixteen years, until the disrepair spread to the point where it seemed dangerous. I thought the windows were going to fall out.
Anyway, before I even dreamed I would ever have the means to buy an apartment, Nina Garcia was complaining about the renovation of her new place. She was talking about how much it cost to redo the bathroom. I thought she said $17,000 and was aghast.
“No,” she said,
I nearly fainted.
When I first moved to the city, I spent the first five years dumbstruck by questions about how much I’d paid for things. It’s something you would never ask in Washington. You’d be considered a heathen, raised by wolves in a trailer park. And now I ask it!
Recently I was going down the hallway to my elevator. Standing there were two women. One was a Realtor, and the other was a client. I talked about my apartment and what it was like when I’d moved in and what I’d done to it. I was
Compulsively dropping the names of fabulous people you know is another New York social sport. As part of another charity auction, I was lunching with Liz Smith and the winning bidder. Liz brought with her a friend, the former head of an ad agency. The two of them did nothing but name-drop. That stuff rolls off me, but I felt bad for the winning woman and her daughter, who could never compete. They may have enjoyed the show, but I was worried they felt left out.
Now that I at last have a roomy apartment of my very own, I should really think about having guests more often. This is the first time I’ve ever had a bed bigger than a single. I’ve actually moved on up to a double bed, and I feel very decadent about it. And yet, I confess to you that I am such a hermit, it’s hard for me to open my house up to other people. I consider my home a retreat and enjoy my monastic life. I’m a bit OCD about my environment. In New York you’re up against people all day long, and when you get home you really need to recharge.
When I do have guests, it usually goes fine, but I have to remember to do a thorough home orientation when the houseguest arrives. I imagine that Martha Stewart would say that if your house were set up properly, your guest wouldn’t need an orientation. You need to look at your house through a stranger’s eyes.
My niece, Wallace, was staying with me recently and deprogrammed my TV by trying to watch cable. Mysteriously, you have to be on “Component 1” rather than “TV.” If only she’d asked. Anyway, I was sorry that she hadn’t gotten a chance to watch her shows and also that the TV had to be reset.
But Wallace is a really good houseguest. I’ve also had some bad ones. A colleague of mine would send her husband and two kids up to their country place during the summer, and since she didn’t want to go home to the suburbs during the summer by herself, for two summers she camped with me every week—Monday through Thursday—for three months.
I was living paycheck to paycheck and buying groceries for two. I would get home earlier than she would and would cook and leave her food. She would get home, collapse into a chair, and say, “Meat loaf again?” She never even bought a bottle of wine.
She was assuming a great deal about my love life. Wouldn’t it be possible that I would want to have a guest over? She was right that I didn’t have anyone in that category, but I could have.
