9 - Wedding in Zafferano

        I returned to Taormina last year for the first time in well over 30 years.

       We didn't stay at the Timeo this time, Airbnb having changed all that.  Instead, we found a wonderful rooftop apartment with a panoramic view of all the region --the Timeo's gardens below, the Ionian sea down to the right and Etna perfectly framed in the distance.

       My first trip to Sicily was in the Spring of 1978, and Etna was then in eruption.   At the time, I didn't realize how rare that was.   After dark, it looked like the peak of the mountain was ringed in multi-colored neon lights.

     I must have been to Taormina a half dozen times in the intervening years, but left to my own devices I can be a pretty lazy tourist, and I never bothered to get any closer to Mount Etna than the hotel terrace.   Brenda is a much more dynamic traveler, and we arranged with our airport driver for a day trip up Etna (which of course was not erupting this trip), plus a few hours drive around the surrounding countryside.  

     Other than Palermo and Taormina, and undoubtedly a few other exceptions, Sicily is filled with towns which give all appearance of being extremely poor and under-animated.   Traveling from Taormina to Mount Etna, you go through several of these sleepy communities which time seems to have forgotten.

      Zafferano-Etna, at the bottom of the volcano landmark, is more colorful and animated than most.  It has a stunning view of the valley below, and undoubtedly attracts a few tourist stopovers, like ourselves, on the way up Etna.  But make no mistake about it, Zafferano is not exactly booming.  Less than prosperous it may be,  but the town church is vast and grand, sumptuous even.  Somehow incongruous with the simple wedding party upon which we stumbled.

      Brenda and I had just arrived in the main square one morning last Spring when we saw them preparing to climb the church stairway.   

      Neither bride nor groom was in the first bloom of youth.  The bride's hair was Marilyn Monroe-blonde, except at the roots, and it contrasted with her dark Sicilian eyes and eyebrows.  

     We initially steered clear of the group, because before seeing the bride-to-be, we had somehow assumed it to be a funeral. 

     The local photographer was posing everyone in pre-ceremony group portraits when we arrived upon the scene.  The bride's father was missing one of his front teeth, and he looked ill at ease in his dress suit.  When he could bear it no longer, he unbuttoned his shirt collar before going into the church.  The groom seemed in a kind of daze, staring at the ground and looking the most uncomfortable of all.

      The bride's dress was mainly white, but with peachy overtones and mauve sleeves; the bridesmaids wore nearly identical miniature versions.  Bride and bridesmaids wore elaborate make-believe paste necklaces.   The mother was in dark burgundy, but the other women were dressed in black.  Apparently black is the tradition at Sicilian weddings, which explains why we originally took them for a funeral party.

     The bride entered first with her father, and the groom followed immediately after with HIS mother by his side.  All to the organ accompaniment of Wagner's Bridal Chorus.    We stood in the vestibule, and watched them proceed down the long aisle.  As the ceremony began, I suddenly realized that we were about the only "guests."   There were not more than a dozen people, not even filling the first two rows.

     With the exception of the little bridesmaids, no one seemed at all happy.  In fact, most of the principals appeared seriously morose.  There was undoubtedly a story there somewhere, but I was never to know what really led up to that moment in the Santa Maria della Provvidenza Church. 

      I look back at the photos sometimes, and I wonder how their lives are going.  Not great, I suspect, but then I could be wrong.

 

 Your input is welcomed:  frank.pleasants@libertysurf.fr

CROSS REFERENCING … a look at other postings

 Taormina was first featured in  "Room Without Bath" from Hotel Musings No. 5, again in "Clementina, Still Lady of the Manor" from Hotel Musings No. 7; lastly in Hotel Musings 12, "The Beginning and the End of Duncan" (to access, click on highlighted title).

8 - Hazeline and Josephine

Hazeline and Josephine, Midway 2003

     Hazeline and Josephine were twin sisters who sometimes looked after me when I was a small child.  They were little more than a dozen years my senior, so they would have still been in their teens then, and their job was presumably confined to baby sitting.  They were the children of Leanna who worked for many years for Renata Fairchild (see musings no. 4, "Renata").  Hazel and Jo sometimes worked for Renata also, helping out in the kitchen.

     Growing up in the Sandhills as black females was certainly no bed of roses in the 1940's.  As soon as they were old enough, they headed North where life was supposed to be easier.  In many ways it was, but they were disappointed to discover that the same racism they had grown up with was just as prevalent in Philadelphia or New York as back in Aberdeen.   Prejudice manifested itself differently, often more discreetly, but it was never far away.          

     They eventually found relative financial security, working in a variety of factory jobs, sometimes taking domestic work. They had several husbands between them, and plenty of children and grandchildren.  When I next saw them in the 1990's, Hazel was already a proud great grandmother.

     For as soon as they were able to retire, they had what seemed to me to be an odd dream --to move back to Aberdeen!   And even odder in my view, the first person they thought to reacquaint themselves with was one of their old employers, my mother.

     Mother was never anything of a liberal, but neither was she particularly retrograde.  During the South's difficult period of desegregation, after the federal laws had long been passed, she tended to say that she wasn't against change, just thought it needed more time.  Most of the blacks felt that a hundred years or more was plenty long enough!

     Things may have been tough when the twins were growing up, but by the time they returned as mature women, life in the South had profoundly changed.  More than the North, they told me more than once.  For people like themselves, of modest means, living in the Sandhills now seemed infinitely preferable to the alternative in a big city ghetto.   I think Mother was as happy to see them as they were to see her, and she enthusiastically  piled them into the car, and off they went to visit all the old ladies --Juanita, Gala, Ulma and the others-- who had once been employers to them or to their mother. Everyone was truly delighted to see them and to welcome them back to the area.

     As children, they couldn't do most of the things that I would have taken for granted.   You tend to  read more about separate water fountains or riding in the back of the bus, but these were ultimately minor inconveniences when you think that they couldn't even go into the drugstore to spend their money.  And of course they weren't allowed anywhere near the town lake!  So it must have been a special satisfaction to return to their hometown with all the rights they were once deprived of.

       We went with my friend Judy (another one of their cares) to a deli in Pinehurst some years ago.   Pinehurst is a particularly chic golf resort a few miles west of Aberdeen, and I hadn't realized what an exceptional treat it would be for them.   Josephine told me that, growing up, she would have never dreamed of  one day going to Pinehurst for lunch.

     Their younger brother, Lacy, had also returned to Aberdeen after a successful career as a brick mason.   He had built a fine home for himself, and when his sisters arrived, he had the means and talent to convert Leanna's old run down  cabin into a  comfortable and attractive home, too.

 

    Hazel's pride and joy was Brandon, her five year old great grandchild.  His mother was dealing with her own problems, and Hazel's big dream was to have him start school in Aberdeen where she felt he could have a real head start.

     Though already  over 70, she and Jo brought Brandon  South to begin first grade in the new Aberdeen Primary  school.   The experiment only lasted a year, but he got a taste of  community life and personalized small town schooling before returning the next year to Philadelphia.   He was an especially bright and personable little boy, and the year in Aberdeen seemed to be a success.
 
     Unfortunately, the twins were too old by this time to be raising a small child, and they had no choice but to return Brandon to the care of one of his  grandmothers at the end of the year.  It broke Hazel's heart, but she had the satisfaction of having tried.
    
     When Brenda arrived on the scene, they seemed crazy about her, and we always visited with them when in North Carolina.  I never actually remembered their caring for me as a small child, but I developed a special affection for them in later years.

     Josephine had never learned to drive, and she always depended on Hazel for getting around.  By the time the twins reached their 80s, she was feeling more and more isolated living on the outskirts of Aberdeen.   In 2014, a few months before Hazel's death at 87, she moved back to Philadelphia.   The last I heard, she was missing Aberdeen.  I wish I had a more upbeat ending, but then that's life.



Your input is welcomed:  frank.pleasants@libertysurf.fr

CROSS REFERENCING … a look at other postings

Renata is also featured in  "Renata" from  Musings and Meanderings No. 4; Mother in "A Christmas Gift ... or the Little Red Lamp", Hotel Musings No. 51  (to access, click on highlighted titles).

   

7 - Introducing Monsieur Gérard

Monsieur Gérard

   
     I am not a good target for beggars.  Big cities, like Paris or New York or London, have more than their share; and this marginal, often homeless, population increased noticeably during the 1980's.  I tended to look the other way.   I did a 180 degree turn at one point, just once, and the experience was rewarding, enlightening, and ultimately heartbreaking.

     I was touched some years ago by a television program devoted to the homeless in France.  It conducted an experiment whereby a successful business owner, a self-made man, served as guinea pig.   He was taken to a city he didn't know,  left with just a few francs, no credit cards, no telephone, and challenged to survive.    The premise was for him to ideally demonstrate his ability to find work and turn a difficult situation around.

      He expected to prove that anyone who was sufficiently motivated could secure employment, if only the most menial, but he soon found doors slamming in his face.  As a newly minted down-and-outer, himself, he was shocked by the systematic rejection he encountered in looking for work.  In an emotional interview at the end of the filmed experiment, he was reduced to tears when he recounted that the only people willing to lend a helping hand were the other homeless people who befriended him along the way.   His whole perception of the world of the jobless had been radically altered.

     I was deeply moved, and about the same time, I began to notice a beggar in the métro whom I would see every morning on my way to work.   He was different from most, there was a certain dignity in his demeanor hard to describe.

     One day I did something completely out of character:   I gave him a few francs, then hurried away.   After that I began leaving a coin or two every day.   I would sort of nod in his direction, but we had no other immediate communication.

     After about a week, he spoke to me.   He told me his name, and said he had some papers he wanted me to see.   I  reluctantly took the package of documents away with me.  I discovered some yellowed newspaper illustrations from the comic page, and a little children's magazine about a magic rodent.    At first I couldn't see the connection; then I understood that this "Gérard" who signed the cartoons was my homeless man in the métro.

     When I next saw Monsieur Gérard, he explained that he had just wanted me to know something about himself.  I began to talk with him every day on my way to work, and on the rare days I didn't see him, I would worry.

     I learned that in addition to illustrating comic books, he had been a house painter, out of work for several years.   He slept in various charity shelters, sometimes at the Salvation Army, but early each morning he had to move out and look for a new place the next evening.

   We established a real  bond, and I proposed that he do some work in my apartment.   I came up with a couple of doors that needed a new coat of paint, and he acquitted himself beautifully.   Afterwards I felt terrible when he refused to be paid.  He said that the confidence I had given him meant more than money.  I was ultimately able to make him see reason.

     Later I spoke to my friend Julie about Monsieur Gérard, and she was equally touched and eager to meet him.   He told us he just needed to find some way to hang in there for another two years until he would be eligible for retirement.  Between us we found several painting jobs for him.

        Julie's mother owned the family building, and it so happened there was a small studio on the ground floor which had stood vacant for several years.   We approached Arielle and appealed to her to allow Monsieur Gérard a chance to find a new life by allowing him to live --at least temporarily-- in her vacant lodging.

     Our plea was first refused (and understandably so), but after some extra prodding from her determined daughter, Arielle ultimately agreed to take on our homeless man.   We arranged a meeting with Monsieur Gérard where she set out the conditions:  he could stay rent free if he would agree to clear out and clean up the studio and paint the walls.   As well as be responsible for sweeping the building's stairway once a week.

     Even these modest conditions overwhelmed poor Monsieur Gérard.  He was distressed by the responsibility, and asked us for a few days reflection.

    Arielle was skeptical, M. Gérard was unsure, and friends warned that once people find themselves severed from the system it is rare for them to be able to find their way back.   But Julie and I were determined to make it work, and we were unrelenting in encouraging him to accept the proposal.

     He finally moved in, and I am sorry to report that it was downhill from there on.   To sum up, it soon became clear that getting himself back into the "system" was just too much for him.  He seemed unable to make much of an effort.  We quit looking for odd jobs for him, because other than when he had direct contact with me or Julie (and then he always made the extra effort), his work became, to say the least, unreliable and unsatisfactory.  His drinking veered more out of control.  It was not so much that society gave up, it was Monsieur Gérard who finally gave up on himself.

     After several incidents in the building, Arielle reluctantly decided the "job" was not working out.  She told him he would have to leave in the Spring, but gave him leeway in choosing the exact date.    Her fears of difficulty in evicting him proved unfounded, as he left on the appointed  day without incident.  

     The outcome profoundly saddened me, as I had become convinced of a happy ending.  I saw him a few times back in his old post in the métro, but it was difficult to know how to react.  When he moved elsewhere, I must say it was a relief.

     I only saw Monsieur Gérard one  time after that.  It was several months later, maybe even more.  I was returning from a weekend in Normandy, walking home from the Gare St Lazare.   Just outside the train station is a little square, where homeless people sometimes congregate.  There he was, sitting alone on one of those green park benches.    He was staring into space, as though completely disconnected.  He looked worse than I had ever seen him.

     I went up to him, and I tried to make contact:  "How are you, Monsieur Gérard?"  I said.  But he just stared into space.  I am sure he didn't know I was there.

 Your input is welcomed:  frank.pleasants@libertysurf.fr

CROSS REFERENCING … a look at other postings

Arielle is also featured in  "Mademoiselle Laslier and Arielle ... Parallel Lives" from Musings and Meanderings No. 3 (to access, click on highlighted title).

6 - Leslie Caron ... Looking for Gigi

On the set of Gigi 1958 with son Christopher and Maurice Chevalier

    I saw Leslie Caron again last summer.   Brenda and I had gone to Cadogan Hall in London for a concert of Rachmaninoff and Mahler.   I spotted her sitting about three rows in front of us shortly before the lights dimmed.

     It wasn't the first time I have run into Leslie Caron since we spent  part of Christmas Eve together at the Closerie des Lilas bar in Paris forty years ago.   That evening at the Closerie was for an interview.   I saw her by chance a few years later at a ballet performance at the Opera Comique.  Then another time in the 1980's at a revival of Gigi at the McMahon art house cinema where she was the guest of honor.

     I had already been at UNESCO a couple of years when I interviewed her back in 1975.   My newspaper days were well behind me, but every once in a while I still managed to set up a celebrity interview which I sold either to a local English language weekly or to After Dark, a short-lived New York show business glossy.

     She made a now-forgotten movie here when she moved back to France, and I requested an interview via the film company's press rep.   I think I said I was with The Village Voice, which of course I wasn't, but no one ever seemed the wiser.

     She was warm and personable during that interview, and I have a vivid memory of her contagious laugh and dazzling  smile.    Over the years I have followed her career, as with all those I interviewed, and just by virtue of the fact that we once spent x-number of hours together,  I have continued to feel some vaguely personal connection.    In fact, I have a repetitive dream where I am engaging in a long distance telephone conversation with her.   It usually ends badly and stressfully with the line disconnected.

     That December evening in 1975 she talked a lot about her time in Hollywood at the end of its Golden Age, about Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire and Cary Grant.   Also about her years with Warren Beatty.  I didn't know then that she had left her two children and husband in England for the then much sought-after Beatty.

     I read an interview not long ago in which she described herself and Beatty as the Angelina-Brad of the day.   I have since seen photos of her little son and daughter, dressing up as Bonnie and Clyde, playing with Warren Beatty during their summer vacation in California.

     In recent years she wrote a well received autobiography (she has also published an interesting volume of short stories) which I found first rate, very honest and entertaining.

     Back to Cadogan Hall.   I was in an aisle seat, and watched  at the intermission for her to pass by.  She was with her son, the same one who once played with Warren Beatty.    She looked great, as 84-year old ladies go, and I decided to speak to her as she approached.  I told her how good she looked, and said how much I had enjoyed her book.

     I had lived with the memory of a vivacious woman these last 40 years, and I was expecting a smile or a word of pleasure at my compliment.  Alas, there was neither.  She looked at me fleetingly,  and an unmistakably chilly "thank you" barely made it out of her mouth.  Then she was gone.

     Her son, now in late middle age, was holding her hand.  He stood slightly behind her, and he looked back at me and said, "Thank you very much."  It sounded sincere, and I interpreted it as akin to an apology.

     I was crushed, rather foolishly disappointed, I suppose, that Leslie Caron had been so totally indifferent to me or to my compliments.  Then I realized that had been the reason I gave up doing those celebrity interviews in the first place.   I always wanted the subjects of my profiles to really like me.  And somehow they never did.

Your input is welcomed:  frank.pleasants@libertysurf.fr

5 - Deep South Drama At Aberdeen Lake

Summertime at the lake 1953 (Moore County Historical Association)

  
 

     Looking back, there was something vaguely idyllic about growing up in a sleepy southern town in the post-war years,  but life was easy for only some of us.  There was a distinctly darker side for others living in Aberdeen.

      This is a  story about our one-time police chief,  his teenage daughter,  a young black man, and the Aberdeen Lake.   The names have been changed, but the story is only too real.

      As for Chief Pringle, picture Rod Steiger in the movie "In The Heat Of The Night."  Then just take my word for it, the Aberdeen character was a whole lot worse.   He was fat, loud, rough and roundly feared and hated in the black community.   He had any number of children, but Peggy Ann was his favorite, at least until she started growing up and showing signs of independence.

      The Aberdeen Lake was municipal property, and like much of the town, it was then  reserved for "whites only."   It sat on a well kept lot with bathhouse and refreshment center, a jukebox and dance floor popular in the evenings with several generations of jiving and bopping teenagers.  It then stretched north by  the all-black community of Broadway, but by that point there was no longer a beach nor easy access to the water.

      Peggy Ann was not an especially attractive girl, just kind of average.   She lived in a house in the middle of town just about where the Aberdeen creek turns into the lake.  The young black man (whose name I never knew, but let's call him Cary) lived a half mile away in Broadway.

      All of what really happened, no one really knows today.  What is fairly certain is that in some measure Peggy Ann and Cary knew each other, perhaps only by sight.   Whenever the black man went into town, he would have inevitably passed by the police chief's house.  It had a big porch with swing, and he probably saw Peggy Ann there.  They just might have exchanged words at some point.

      One day, Cary slipped a written message to Peggy Ann.  It proposed a rendezvous the following evening somewhere around the Aberdeen Lake.

      Did Chief Pringle discover the note by accident?  Did Peggy Ann voluntarily show it to him?   This was always a little hazy.  The official story was that Peggy Ann --appalled at the proposal-- turned it immediately over to her father.

      The rest was not pretty.  Cary was at the designated place, but instead of Peggy Ann, he was met by a contingent of local law enforcers.  He  was arrested and put in jail.  Even in those days when interracial courtship would have been more or less illegal, it was never clear precisely what law had been broken.  He appeared in the Aberdeen court where he was found guilty of whatever crime and incarcerated.  

      He was sent to prison, or more likely to some sort of work farm, for a sentence of a year or less, then released with the obligation to leave the area.   I never knew what kind of life he might have found elsewhere, though it takes little imagination to understand that his future would have been mightily compromised.

      I remember that a number of the kids, my age and a little older, were aware of and disturbed  by what we saw as such a blatant injustice; but no one to my knowledge went so far as to voice any kind of official protest.  

     Whatever one may have thought of Peggy Ann, she was almost certainly one of the victims here.   I cringe to imagine her relationship with her father, either before or after the incident.  The week Cary had been "banished" from Aberdeen, she came into Bryan's Drug Store where many of the young people congregated after school.  It was always noisy there, but a hush fell over the soda bar when she entered that afternoon.

     I remember her speaking, either to me or to someone right next to me:  "I know they are all saying that I led him on," she said.   That is all I remember.   

     Chief Pringle did find his comeuppance, of sorts.  I think he must have crossed the line once too often, because he was suddenly and somewhat mysteriously removed from office about a year later.  He left virtually overnight with his family.  They moved to South Carolina or Georgia, and as far as I know, none of them were ever heard from again.   

   

Your input is welcomed:  frank.pleasants@libertysurf.fr

4 - RENATA

I have no photos of Renata, but who knows,

 this one just might come close ... back in the day

       As a young woman in her first teaching job, my aunt Ruth lived in a teacherage* with Renata.   They were the very closest of friends, and even after Ruth married her first husband, she and Renata --who stayed single into her thirties-- remained inseparable.

      Whether it was with her niece (my mother) or her daughter or just her friends, Ruth felt a kind of lifelong mission to help steer them all toward a better and more financially secure life.   She was a staunch proponent of  a good education opening doors, but not unlike Dolly Levi from Thornton Wilder's "The Matchmaker" (and later "Hello Dolly"), she also saw this path best realized via what was often referred to as a good catch.  In other words, a rich husband.

      With my mother, Ruth's efforts had come to no avail.   She was considerably more successful, however, with her friend Renata.

      Leon Fairchild was a middle-aged bachelor who had grown up with his older brother in Aberdeen.   Neither sibling had much of a personality, but they had a distinct talent for making money.   For a start, they had the foresight to obtain an early franchise to bottle and distribute Coca-Cola.   Once having sewn up the local soft drink monopoly, which was then a considerable and never-ending pot of gold, both brothers launched out into some serious real estate investments, the most notable being the development of an entire village of at least 100 low-cost dwellings destined to house employees of an important textile factory which located in Aberdeen after the Second World War.

      Ruth had acquainted herself with Leon at a social gathering in Aberdeen in 1932, and newly married, herself, she saw possibilities for Renata.   My aunt was very much a take-charge lady, and she wasted no time arranging the first meeting with Leon and Renata; and almost before you knew it, the deal had been sealed.   

     Never considered a real beauty, Renata was nevertheless a handsome woman with a vivacious personality, and despite a considerable age difference and little in common, she became Mrs. Leon Fairchild after only a few months' courtship.   In no time at all she resigned her teaching post, built a fine home in Southern Pines not far from Ruth, and little by little metamorphosed herself into the archetypical Grand-Lady-of-the-town!

      As a child I thought she resembled the Duchess of Windsor.  They looked a little alike, both were from humble albeit respectable back grounds, and both went more than a little over the top with their new-found social status.   She swiftly acquired what many, including my aunt Ruth, would have called "airs", and she proceeded to discard most things which reminded her too much of her previous life.

     Among those discarded was my Aunt Ruth.   At least that was the way Ruth remembered it.  Ruth could be demanding, however, and no one ever knew exactly what happened.  The fact was that for the next 40 years their friendship was definitively broken, and by the time I was growing up I never dreamed that they had ever even known each other.

      After only a few years marriage, Renata found herself an extremely wealthy widow, and she remained thus for the rest of a long life. She outlived Ruth by more than a decade.

     I ran into her once when I was visiting the family around 1980.   Mother re-introduced us, and explained that I lived in France.  By this time Renata had become so grand that she seemed absurdly unreal.  "Yes, France, such a lovely country," she said.  "The grandchildren all go there to finishing school, of course, there or in Switzerland ..."   No literary license here, I specifically recall the "of course" and just how foolish  she sounded.

Ruth 1930's

    When Ruth died a few years later, my mother was alone waiting to greet visitors at the funeral home when she saw the black Chrysler arrive.  Renata emerged, holding herself straight as an arrow despite her 80-plus years.

     When she saw Mother, she started to offer a rather stilted and formal condolence.  Then suddenly she paused, and it was as though she had reverted to a different person ... the Renata of the depression years who would pop by the house every day to see her best friend, the days when my mother was a teenager living with her aunt.  How Ruth would have savored the scene!

     They put their arms around each other,  then, unexpectedly, Renata burst into tears.  Her voice changed and all the affectation seemed to disappear.   She was just an elderly woman, overcome with grief ... and perhaps guilt.

      "Oh, my darling Jeanne," she sobbed.  "I have never forgotten what she did.  She made it all possible, you know.   It was Ruth who found my Leon for me!"

________

*Teacherage : that was a word that everyone used to know back in Aberdeen.  It seems to have just about disappeared today, as I suppose there are no longer any boarding houses for teachers in existence. 

Your input is welcomed:  frank.pleasants@libertysurf.fr

CROSS REFERENCING … a look at other postings

Aunt Ruth is also featured in  "Thanksgiving, Ruth and Dickie" from Hotel Musings No. 49; Mother is featured in "A Christmas Gift ... or the Little Red Lamp", Hotel Musings No. 51.  Renata is also mentioned in "Hazeline and Josephine" from Musings and Meanderings No. 8  (to access, click on highlighted titles).