GERI, LARRY AND GWEN

Larry (not his real name) and I were mutually – and instantly -attracted to each other the first time we met, at a train station in New Jersey in 2002. Responding to an ad I placed in The New York Times personals section, he called me one morning as I was leaving my Manhattan apartment for a meeting in Jersey, where he lived. We agreed I’d get off the train on my way back to New York. We’d have dinner, and then he’d drive me home.

I learned over dinner that Larry’s beloved wife of over 40 years had died of cancer a few years before. Ten years my senior, he had three grown children, a few grandchildren, and owned a successful business that stored legal records. We had an animated and comfortable conversation. He also looked so much like a well-known – and sexy – actor that it was downright eerie. And exciting! 

So began our hot and heavy relationship. And then I learned about Gwen, the best  friend of Larry’s deceased wife, who was divorced. Gwen and Larry had been “dating” on and off since his wife died. He claimed to be ambivalent about her, but she seemed to be “hovering” around us most of the time. Not literally, of course. 

Larry took me to his home for dinner and a sleepover about four months after we met. Things were getting serious. During dinner, I casually asked: “Do you love Gwen?” He mumbled, “No.”

I called my sister from the train the next morning, during my trip back to Manhattan. It was a dreary, rainy day, but I was happy. “I think Larry’s the one,” I told her.  

The week was intensely busy at work. I didn’t hear a peep from Larry, which increased my anxiety with each passing day. I finally called him on Friday. “Why haven’t you called?” I asked.

“When you asked if I loved Gwen, I realized I need time and space to decide,” Larry answered. “We should take a break for a few weeks.” It was inconsiderate of him not to have called the whole week, I said. I was distraught as I headed to a meeting for a big summit I was planning. 

Larry and I spoke on the phone frequently, and I started dating another man who I liked, but not nearly as much as Larry. I told Larry about him.  

After a few weeks, Larry asked if he could take me to the theatre and dinner. We had a wonderful evening, and the next morning during breakfast, Larry told me he had decided he wanted to be with me. I turned him down. “I think I’ll continue seeing the man I met when you were taking a break,” I told him. I wasn’t convinced Gwen was completely out of the picture. 

And that was that. I spoke to Larry a number of times during the next six months, and he kept asking if I was still seeing the other man. I told him I was.  

Larry didn’t wind up with Gwen. He and I lost touch. 

GERI, CHARLIE, AND BELINDA

After a former close friend died four years ago, her husband Charlie told me she had thought he should become involved with a close friend of theirs after she was gone. They had known Belinda for decades. The dying woman knew Charlie would have a hard time being alone and she felt Belinda would take care of him.

During a lunch date, Charlie said he wasn’t entirely sure Belinda was right for him.

They’re living together now, and Charlie recently sent me an email about how happy he is. He intimated, however, that he and his lady love have different values about crucial issues that affect our lives. (BTW, I’m generally dubious about anyone who feels the need to tell you how “happy” and in love they are.)

I met Belinda once. She physically resembles my former friend, and from our brief conversation, I observed other superficial similarities. 

Unlike Larry, Charlie didn’t do much soul searching about his new relationship. He’s not as emotionally secure or as physically fit as Larry was, so perhaps he wasn’t up to playing the field in his seventies. Although I fail to see how he would want to be intimately involved with someone with opposing fundamental values, I’m not surprised that he is. 

At one point I actually thought I could become involved with Charlie but realized how wrong I’d be for him, as I would have been for Larry. I loved many things about both of them, but would have found it terribly difficult to overlook others. 

Thank goodness for a woman’s best friends. They can make you see things more clearly. 

GERI AND DOUGLAS 

Now I’m with Douglas, the father of my two children to whom I was married for 30 years. We share  a great deal of history, and we’re best friends. We may not be lovers, but we love one another. We’ve also grown to accept each other’s many foibles, more or less. Before Covid crashed onto the scene, Douglas would come to Brooklyn from Manhattan to spend three nights a week at my house.  

We’ve been together constantly since the beginning of March, sharing three meals a day, lots of laughs, conversations, and perhaps a handful of arguments. We met when we were juniors at New York University, over half a century ago. 

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”― Søren Kierkegaard

Hi FOFriend,

Nora Ephron wrote a book “I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman.” Katharine Hepburn covered her neck with scarves and high collars. Helen Mirren looks like she had plastic surgery on her neck.

Whoever thought our necks could cause such consternation?

Please tell us what you think about your neck by completing this quick and anonymous survey.

 

Although I’ve had my share of unequivocally unlovable neighbors, now that Mina Stone is my neighbor, it’s easy to follow the well known Biblical commandment. Mina is charming. Caring. Classy. Smart. Attractive. Engaging. And, Mina is a superb chef who is working on her second cookbook. Incredible aromas often waft through the air when I’m sitting on my back deck, which is feet away from her kitchen.  

As a mother of a daughter who is Mina’s age – 38 years old – I’m intrigued by how young women today are leading their lives. I admire the way Mina is leading hers. Besides her passion for cooking, she is devoted to her handsome and talented partner, Alex, an artist; to their adorable 3 ½-year-old-son Apollo, and to her sharp 13-year-old stepdaughter Sophia. 

Born in Cleveland, OH, to a Greek mother and an American father, Mina’s family moved to Greece when she was two years old, then to Boston a few years later, where she grew up. At 18, Mina became a fashion student at the renowned Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, which is less than one mile from where she and I live.

“When I graduated I realized my personality would get lost if I worked for someone because I’d get wrapped up trying to please him or her and I wouldn’t stand out,” Mina told me. “I had all these interesting, artistic friends and I could see the differences between their personalities and mine. They threw caution to the wind and had their own voices. I knew I could find my own voice alone, but if I had a boss I’d surely work harder trying to get his voice out than my own,” she explained.

Her self-awareness at only 22 years old inspired Mina to launch her own fashion line, a small collection of dresses inspired by five vintage pieces that she loved. “You could wear them during the day and dress them up for the evening. It’s nice when you can put on something in the morning that’s so awesome you’re happy to wear it at night. You don’t have to go home from work to change,” Mina said.

Besides getting a sizable order from a fashion retailer, Mina’s patternmaker willingly waited for her payment until the retailer paid her. “I was lucky,” she added. 

THIS IS WHERE COOKING ENTERS THE PICTURE

As orders increased, Mina needed more money to keep her business going. Dating a private chef at the time, she loved  watching him cook. “I didn’t know rich people hired chefs to come to their houses to cook their meals, and I thought it would be a perfect part time job to bring in income while I ran my fashion business,” Mina explained.  So what if she never cooked professionally. Mina was in her twenties and thought she could do (almost) anything!

With the help of her boyfriend, she landed a job cooking two to three times a week for a young family on the upper East Side of Manhattan. “I was forced to learn to cook and I learned a lot,” Mina said. “The family would ask me to prepare dishes like goulash – which I’d never make of my own accord – and I’d look up the recipe.” She loved cooking. “I was like a kid playing dress up or house, but I played chef for my friends,” she laughed. Strictly following recipes at first, Mina started altering them as she became more confident. 

Mina also began cooking for fun shopping parties that her retail fashion clients threw for customers. “This was before internet shopping and right before Project Runway. Stores were supporting young indy designers and it was a really exciting time for us in New York,” she explained. 

When the director of a cool art gallery at one of the shopping parties asked Mina to cook a casual dinner for 40 at the gallery, that marked her official entree into the world of professional chefs. Singer-songwriter Debbie Harry was one of the guests at the dinner who ate Mina’s chicken bouillabaisse with saffron and aioli on the side, accompanied by green rice with herbs. “I was starstruck,” remembers Mina, who still cooks for the gallery.

When dinners for 40 turned into dinners for 100 and then 200, Mina gave up her fashion business. The choice to switch careers entirely was seamless. “I was curling up in bed with cookbooks. My heart has switched paths. Besides, cooking was a simpler business model than fashion,” Mina said. She also started to cook for Urs Fischer, an artist, who had his own book imprint, so in 2010 the two of them began working on a cookbook together.

THE COOKBOOK AND THE CAFE 

Cooking for Artists, a 2015 journal documenting the recipes Mina created for non-stop gallery events, has done well and is sold in every major museum. Drawing on Greek, Mediterranean and Middle Eastern cultures – and adding her own spin as a New Yorker –  Mina calls her dishes “simple and accessible, featuring ingredients you can get from your corner store.” She uses olive oil, lemon juice and salt in most everything she cooks. “People love that I use five ingredients at most in every dish. They say, ‘Hey, I can make that cabbage salad, for example. It’s easy.’ They really use my cookbook,” Mina added.

The title of her cookbook represents Mina’s tribute to the creative communities with which she’s been involved since her days as a student at Pratt Institute. “Artists have always supported my creativity and desire to find my own voice. They don’t control what I cook, but let me shine and let me have fun. I never would have continued cooking if it was for a family on the Upper East Side,” Mina noted. 

A few months before the pandemic hit, Mina and partner Alex opened Mina’s, a cafe in MoMA PS 1, a contemporary art museum in Long Island CIty, New York. It served  “really simple and delicious food you could have with a glass of wine,” including Greek Mezethakia (appetizers) such as Greek sausage with leeks and orange, white anchovies with thyme and lemon, whipped feta and Muhammara, a Syrian red pepper and walnut dip.  

AND THEN, THE QUARANTINE 

Quanatining has given Mina a chance to be together with Alex and their son Apollo. She and Alex have been cooking together since they met in 2008. “He’s a good cook, a natural cook,” Mina said. Being at home has also given her time to work on her second cookbook, which will be a continuing journal of her cooking life. Documenting the opening of Mina’s and bits and pieces of events she and Alex produced at PS 1,” the cookbook will be published in spring 2021. 

If you’ve never much been into cooking, Mina recommends preparing something “that has meaning, such as a recipe from your mother, grandmother or another family recipe you can pass on to your kids or grandkids,” she said. “That’s huge because it’s an oral history being passed down. If you want to eat it, you can learn how to make it.”

Mina loves to make good food and have people eat and enjoy it. “I like to tap into what I think someone would want to eat. It’s like a weird psychic thing,” she explained. Unlike the slow-moving fashion business, cooking “feels very fast.” she added. “Chop. Chop. Chop. You cook it. People eat it. Then you start over again. I find it freeing.” 

THE SCRUMPTIOUS RECIPE: REVITHIA (Chickpea Stew with Rosemary, Lemon, and Olive Oil)

“This is my favorite stew, recipe courtesy of my Yiayia (grandmother). The day she told me she thought my chickpea stew was ‘nostimo’ (tasty), I felt I had really accomplished something in life. 

“The chickpeas cook until they are meltingly soft, and then they are drowned in olive oil and lots of lemon juice. After you have had this you don’t ever want to eat anything else. It is a perfect example of Greek food at its best, transforming only a few ingredients into a luxurious meal. 

Serves 8–10

THE INGREDIENTS 

1 16-ounce bag of dried (not canned) chickpeas 

1 tablespoon baking soda

2 yellow onions, peeled and left whole

2 bay leaves

2 sprigs of fresh rosemary

4 tablespoons all-purpose flour 

1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

salt and freshly ground black pepper

THE STEPS 

1. Soak the dried chickpeas in plenty of water overnight, or at least 6 hours. 

2. When you are ready to make the stew, drain the chickpeas in a colander and rinse them well. Leaving them in the colander, dust the chickpeas with the baking soda (which serves as a tenderizer) and then toss to incorporate, using your hands. 

3. Let the chickpeas sit for 30 minutes and then rinse very well, 3 or 4 times, in order to remove all the baking soda.

4. Place the chickpeas in a large, heavy pot filled with enough water to cover them by an inch. Add the whole onions, the bay leaves, and a generous pinch of salt.

5. Bring the stew to a boil, and then reduce the heat to low and cover.

6. After about 20 minutes, the chickpeas will start to give off a white froth. Skim this 2 or 3 times, and then don’t worry about it. 

7. After you’ve skimmed the stew a few times add 2 sprigs of fresh rosemary and simmer until the chickpeas are very tender, about another 40 minutes. Remove the onions and the rosemary sprigs. 

8. To thicken the stew, place 4 tablespoons of flour in a mixing bowl and whisk them with 1/3 cup olive oil. Slowly drizzle in 2 cups of broth from the stew, whisking to remove any lumps.

9. Bring the stew to a low simmer. Add the flour mixture back to the pot, stirring well for about 3 minutes until the stew is thick and velvety.

10. Taste for seasoning and add more salt (you will most likely need to add another generous pinch or two) and freshly ground black pepper.

11. Ladle into bowls and drizzle with olive oil and fresh lemon juice. This dish is best served on the day you make it.

Variation: During the last 10 minutes of cooking, add 2 cups of cleaned and coarsely chopped chard or kale.

You can also purchase Mina’s book, Mina Stone: Cooking for Artists, here.

A 40-something mother I know sent me a photo of her daughter’s three teachers, who had come for a visit. They were standing around the child, inches away from her and each other. None of them was wearing a mask. When I commented on these two obvious facts, the woman texted that “masks are not required anymore. Not a law. You don’t even need to wear a mask in a store.” 

I wasn’t quite sure why the woman was defending these careless teachers. I don’t think they’re smart. It’s also not a law to cover your mouth when you have a bad cold and sneeze or cough on a crowded bus. But, any fairly intelligent person would agree that shielding your mouth is a mighty wise way to avoid passing your cold to fellow bus passengers. 

Four facts about COVID-19 are incontrovertible, at least to those who don’t think it’s a ‘hoax’:

⇒ It’s highly contagious.

⇒ It can kill you.

⇒ There’s no vaccine to help prevent it.

⇒ Wearing masks and social distancing have helped prevent millions of us from contacting it.

Oh, there’s a fifth fact: COVID cases are rising  in over 20 states that opened too early and where people no longer social distance or wear masks. (BTW, the woman to whom I referred at the beginning thinks these reports are “fake.”)

People like these teachers frighten and distress me. This virus is not going away until we have something to help protect us. Wearing a mask and social distancing are the least we can do to help curb the spread.  

It may not be “a law” to wear a mask, but disdaining the health and safety of others is inexcusable and unconscionable. Ignorance may be bliss to some. When it has the power to harm me and you, it can be living hell. 

Fifty-two years ago, young people protesting the war in Vietnam at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago were assaulted by the police at the orders of Mayor Richard Daly. Daly’s only provocation was the mere existence of the protesters. 

“As the Democrats gathered in Chicago that summer, their party and the nation were in turmoil. President Lyndon B. Johnson had announced that he wouldn’t seek reelection, and an obvious alternative hadn’t yet emerged to lead his party. The country was reeling from the assassinations of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in April and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy on the June night he won the California presidential primary. Major cities were rocked by riots, college campuses were gripped by peace protests, and the Vietnam War was raging toward its peak,” according to a 2016 article in The Washington Post recounting the horrific events. 

Prior to the start of the convention, thousands of antiwar protesters flocked to Chicago, where city police, Army soldiers, National Guardsmen and Secret Service  were armed and waiting. As the protesters marched toward the convention site, they were struck with clubs and hit with tear gas. Even innocent bystanders — including reporters covering the scene and doctors trying to help — were brutally beaten. 

As a recent college graduate, employed as an assistant editor, and about to be married (yicks, at 21 years old!), I was horrified to see the news each night during the convention.  I distinctly remember crying while I watched the police brutality attacking my peers from the TV in my parents’ bedroom.  I remember shouting at them through the  TV. 

Now I am witnessing events in the United States that remind me of those that unfolded in Chicago over half a century ago. Granted, the police aren’t beating today’s protesters until they bleed, but they are sending them on the run with tear gas and rubber bullets. Without a single provocation, except their existence. 

I am not talking about the ‘protesters’ who are looting stores and setting fires. They are indefensible, no matter how much they may despise the way George Floyd and other black men died at the hands (and feet) of the police. Fighting violence with violence may be how soldiers operate on the battlefield; it has no place off it. These people should be arrested, however, every last one of them. 

I mean the protesters who are gathering peaceably in cities across the country, just like the young people did in Chicago in 1968. They may be angry and shouting, but they aren’t hurting a single person or piece of property. And, their right to protest is clearly and concisely stated in the first Amendment of the United States Constitution:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

The police today aren’t acting arbitrarily in regards to the protesters; they are taking their orders from others. And, the majority of police in our country are dedicated to protecting us. As in every single profession, there are bad cops – sometimes really bad cops. But, the fact that any of this happening in our country today speaks to problems that go far deeper, from centuries-old prejudice and inequality to a broken criminal justice system. 

So much needs to be fixed in the US, and for most of us, it wouldn’t be easy to know where to begin. But we have the resources, talent, passion and brains to figure that out. Now is the time to start. 

I am in the final innings of my life and  I want to feel hopeful about the world in which my children and 7-year-old grandson (plus other potential grandchildren) will live.

If you’re at least 45 years old, this survey is for you. It’s anonymous!

“Who knows himself a braggart, let him fear this, for it will come to pass that every braggart shall be found an ass.”  – William Shakespeare

 

We all enjoy sharing our successes with those we love, and sometimes with those we may not even like (come on, be honest, you do!) But, I’m always astounded when people blatantly – and prolongedly – brag about themselves and their families. What’s their goal? Surely, their close friends know what’s up in their lives. And why do they have a need to impress their acquaintances? Are they actually insecure about themselves, so sharing their accomplishments makes them feel more confident? 

A man I know has been a braggadocio from the day we met, many moons ago. He recently went so far as to compose a lengthy email that included the following information:

He is now living in a “14-room apartment, but with one less maid’s room” than in the apartment where he used to live. (ed note: Why do two people need a 14-room apartment, especially with one less maid’s room?)

One son lives in this man’s old apartment, and also owns the penthouse above it, so it’s “a beautiful xxx* Avenue Duplex Penthouse with wonderful, huge terraces” (ed note: notice that Duplex Penthouse was capitalized in case the reader didn’t grasp the significance of the property.) 

This son also has a “very impressive, full professor, gorgeous, blonde spouse and two very smart (as though they stepped out of a Ralph Lauren advertisement) sons.”(ed note: notice the wife is smart AND blonde).

And if all that doesn’t impress you, the son is head of what is “considered the most prestigious (and probably profitable), largest, independent xxxxx broker in the xxx xxxx metropolitan area.”  

His younger son is also “a continuing success” in the “extraordinarily difficult entertainment field,” lest the reader think that kid takes a back seat to son #1. 

Both sons “work very, very hard, participate in good charitable endeavors, and are nice, good, gentle people.” Son #2 “hosts many fundraisers and donates his time and talent to very worthy causes.” (ed note:  he then repeats that son #2 is a “very nice person,” in case the reader couldn’t remember what they read 50 words before.)

The man ends his family’s resume by telling the reader he “feels fulfilled and challenged.”   

AGE DOESN’T TEMPER SOME PEOPLE. IT ONLY INTENSIFIES THEIR OBNOXIOUSNESS. 

*PS, I’ve omitted  facts that would reveal the identity of this man and his sons. Not that you’d want to know him after reading this!

Do you know a woman (or four) who talks incessantly about herself? You could be on a call with her, put down the phone and walk away for five minutes, and she wouldn’t know you were gone!

One woman I’ve known for years could go on for hours about her boyfriend (he’s still married); her boyfriend’s problematic grown child; her frail relationship with one of her own grown children; her former boss; her friends. Blah! Blah! Blah! I haven’t met most of them, and while I wish them all well, my interest in their lives is someone near zero! 

When it comes to my grown children, this woman doesn’t ask a single question. If I manage to inject a sentence or two about them into the conversation, she’ll respond for maybe 15 seconds and then promptly flip the conversation back to herself.

She doesn’t ask about how FabOverFifty is doing. She doesn’t ask about my seven-year old grandson. She doesn’t ask a thing.

Contrast this with calls I have with another friend. Our chats flow back and forth between us and cover our kids, siblings,  partners, work, politics,  trips, and more. They’re stimulating, never enervating. 

We all need to unwind at times, but the first woman seems to be in a perpetual  state of  self-directed high intensity. I was empathetic to her situation when she finally left her long-time, emotionally abusive husband and was on her own after decades of being a wife and mother.  I’d listen – and listen – and offer my advice. 

But, after years of listening, her stories started to become tiresome. She’s been telling me all this time that her boyfriend is FINALLY selling his house and getting a divorce.  And he keeps shoving his adult child’s problems under the proverbial carpet, while she doesn’t stop trying to help. I finally told her during our last call that perhaps she should stop putting in her two cents.  Her boyfriend clearly isn’t listening to her counsel. 

I was equally tiresome in my forties, constantly bemoaning my unhealthy relationship with a man who took over so much real estate in my brain, it’s a wonder any other thoughts could move in. Maybe this woman needs more time to learn what I eventually learned: Relationships built on delusions are destined to collapse. (Think about Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction.) 

In the meantime, I have stopped listening to her.

As a dentist, my dad became a captain in the US Army during World War II, stationed at a major supply depot in a small town in England. Thankfully, he didn’t see combat.  He treated soldiers’ teeth, also essential! 

The base had been the estate of a wealthy family, which turned it over to the government for military use during the war. That was common because many upper class families couldn’t keep up their property at the time.  The sprawling grounds had  courts  where my dad learned to play tennis.  He played until he became ill in mid-1987.  

I don’t know much more than that about my dad’s experiences during the war, which makes me sad.  I’m a major league question asker, but I guess I was too wrapped up in myself as a young woman to learn more about what it was like during that period in history.  

Not only  didn’t I learn much from my father;  I learned nothing in school because history back in the day was taught as a compilation of a trillion dates, places and people – which we had to memorize so we could pass midterms, finals and Regents exams (state-wide New York standardized tests.)  Most lessons were as dry as the Mojave Desert.  My preoccupation with doing well on tests far exceeded my appetite for understanding the context of historical events.

Now I’m far more interested in the history of WWII, especially  Germany’s plan to conquer all of Europe. The War, a seven-part series directed and produced by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, was one of my favorite documentaries. It tells the story through the personal narratives of a handful of ordinary men and women from four quintessentially  American towns.  

Last night I discovered a PBS British drama series – World On Fire –  that gripped me from the opening scene. Taking place from the 1939 Nazi invasion of Poland to the 1940  fall of Paris – it follows the intertwining fates of ordinary people in Britain, Poland, France, Germany and the US  as their everyday lives are thrown upside down.

While I don’t want to  minimize the horrible reverberations of the 2020 pandemic on our lives, it’s worth reflecting on the experiences of Europeans at the start of the war.  Jews weren’t the only ones tortured or gunned down in cold blood on the streets in Warsaw when the Nazis attacked. Young Catholic women were beaten and raped.  Talking back to an enemy soldier was enough to provoke your death. Homes were razed to the ground. Shops were looted.  

Some of us feel we’re being “stripped of our rights”  because we’re asked to wear protective masks,  can’t go to baseball games or to have a latte at Starbucks. Think of how we’d feel if we were herded like sheep – at gunpoint – into a stadium because of our religious or political affiliation, stripped of everything we owned, then transported to a detention camp.  

The only war on which we should all be concentrating now is one with a virus.  We may not all see eye to eye on how to interact with this “enemy,” but make no mistake.  Anything that kills 90K people without provocation is indeed an enemy.  Giving it further provocation isn’t wise. 

I strongly recommend World on Fire. Anything that puts life into perspective is worthwhile.