rambling rosemarie

Before there were "GATE" programs in public schools and long before there were kids diagnosed with ADHD and strung out on Ritalin ,  there were teachers who gave kids extra assignments to keep them busy.  I had the benefit of learning from one such teacher.  She didn't know it but she gave me one of my best childhood memories when she gave me the assignment to research the building of the Golden Gate Bridge. Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area and moving to Kentucky as an adult left me with ha special affinity for the bridge.  When I get home sick, I think of her.  I think of all the times I crossed her and even in my angst over city traffic or how the tolls have increased,  I was always mindful of her beauty. I used to love to take people from out of state to see her and hear them say, "It's orange, it's not gold."  On this, her 75th anniversary, I am fondly remembering the assignment given by my second grade teacher, researching the ...

Lost in thought today I found myself humming a song I learned in 7th grade. Ms Renfro taught chorus and she was an amazing woman- a renaissance hippie of sorts- way ahead of her time. She had long hair that she would grab quickly into a pony tail, twist and put up with one of those leather hair holders that had a stick run through it. The end of her pony would flop into a fan above her head. It was some twenty-five years later that I noticed women wearing their hair that way on purpose. Ms. Renfro simply wanted hers out of her way. When she put it up like that she reminded me of the NBC peacock. She was young and wore eyeliner. Until her class I had teachers who were gray haired and named Hazel Pickard and Miss Irwin. They wore my grandmother's glasses. Ms Refro wore big sun glasses pushed up on her head when she was inside. She was beautiful in an earthy sort of a way. She taught us Dona Nobis Pacem. We sang it a cappella and when we did all the parts the acoustics in the ch...

Yesterday was my mother's birthday. She's been gone for over 25 years and I still have difficulty with her birthdays. Normally I try to do something nice for myself on her birthday. I bought my first new car on birthday. I have purchased myself some spectacular jewelry and even bought my first home on her birthday. In keeping with tradition I tried to think of something nice to do for myself yesterday. I don't have the money I used to have so buying myself something extravagant wasn't really a possibility. Even if I'd had some money that wasn't working, I would have had difficulty purchasing something that would have helped me feel better about missing her. I don't need anything, that's for certain. Even more than that, I have come to see that I can't fill the hole that not having a mom has left in my soul. I will never have anyone who loved me like my mom loved me and in my 50s I am wrestling with the pain that truth has brought me. I am c...

The smell of figs is like catnip to me. It makes me happy. One sniff and I am immediately transported to my grandmother's home in El Sobrante. She lived on the top of a small hill that had a view of the San Pablo Bay. I lived with my grandmother for several years after my parents split up. I can't tell you that it was a happy time which is odd since the smell of figs makes me happy. It's just part of the time that was mine and in the middle of my childhood chaos I found sanctuary in a fig tree. I was young and fairly self-sufficient from the very beginning and since Grandma was not the affectionate involved type, I had many hours of solitude. I liked to spend that time perched in one of her fig trees. There I could observe the world go through its motions and nobody noticed I was watching. They were completely oblivious to the running commentary in my inner monologue. I made mental notes on everything. For instance, I bet you didn't know you could sing all the s...