The Small World Problem -- or-- 6 Degrees of Separation

It's a common catch phrase with us. You'll mostly hear it when Dad is around and you're discussing a landmark, one of the United States or Canadian provinces, a country, museum, mountain range, or body of water.  Dad has traveled to a lot of places in this world, either through his career with Norton Company or his adventurous travels over his many years.  There are few places on the map that you can point to that he won't say, "Been There!"  When we all sit to watch a movie, frequently while mostly amusing himself he'd blurt out, " BIN 'DERE!" when he recognized a familiar scene.  He's also met an awful lot of people.
 
It happens when we're among our friends and acquaintances, usually during animated conversation, that the name Wallace West will invariably come up.  So often, in fact, it became a sort of running joke among us  later becoming a challenge to see who would bring his name up in a topic first.

Our friends Jos and Darcy first became acquainted with Dad in his book shop at Cleveland Place.  Darcy was visiting Alma and getting re-acquainted with her ancestral home after many years of absence.  While talking in the bookshop, Dad learned that Darcy was a professor at a small college in central Tennessee where my sister's son was a student, not far from where my sister was living.  While Darcy and her family were getting more familiar with Alma, they often relied on Dad for his knowledge of the area and its long-time residents, seeking homeowner advice for their 100 year old home, enjoying each other's company with a shared devotion to Fundy.  Eventually, Darcy left Tennessee and accepted a teaching position at a university in Abu Dhabi, and traveled back to Alma to live with her family during the summer months.

After Dad moved to The Farm, we became friends with Darcy's family during their short time spent in Alma each year.  During the months she was teaching in Abu Dhabi we stayed connected through e-mail and she would recount their experiences and adventures in the United Arab Emirates, sharing exotic tales of visiting neighbouring countries while they immersed themselves in the culture, food, and surroundings of the residents there.  Darcy wrote that she'd been introduced to a fellow at the university and in the course of their conversation they each described their lives and where they lived when they weren't living and teaching in the UAE.  Darcy told about the Fundy area and Alma Village and her new acquaintance exclaimed, "Well, you must know Wallace West!"  Over 6,000 kilometers away, but just one degree of separation.

Several years ago, Dad and his friend Gerry built The Gazebo; an octagonal cottage at the edge of the Bay of Fundy --one of the few areas in North America where the eastern shore is still pristine and undeveloped.  We've hosted guests at The Gazebo from all over the world.  One was a fellow who found his way from the west coast of Canada to the east traveling by bicycle to celebrate turning 55.  As he passed through Albert County, he eventually landed at The Gazebo since he was rain soaked, tired, and the rural area offered few overnight accommodations.  It took one call to reach Dad who opened the door and offered a snack of peanuts and a respite for the weary biker.  Later, when Henk wrote a book about his travels, he told about his encounter with Dad and The Gazebo. 

With our New Jersey friends, Jim and Jen, bringing up Wally nearly became an eye-rolling annoyance that I was becoming self-conscious about.  Once, within just a few hours spent together over dinner at their house, we counted three times that Wallace West had been introduced into the conversation:

• His acquaintance with author E. Annie Proulx and her visits to Dad's book shop at Cleveland Place.  Having read all of her books, we shared his excitement and brush with fame (I later met her myself on two of her subsequent visits).

• His travels with my mother in a soft-top Jeep Wrangler to The Yukon and The Northwest Territories.

• His scuba diving adventures in Michigan and Canada and a spoiled diving expedition when Canadian customs officers released all the air from their scuba tanks after a traveling companion got arrogant with an agent. 

We all decided enough was enough. Though Wally's exploits and life stories were entertaining, we had to start drawing on our own experiences to fuel conversation and so we made a friendly agreement: we would not bring Wally into conversation again.

Weeks later, we met Jim and Jen for a fine meal.  We'd been anticipating  the grand opening of an authentic Greek Restaurant in central New Jersey.  We knew the owners as we'd become frequent customers at their other business; a small specialty market that featured Greek imports and fine wines.  One hard-to-find item that they carried was slivovitz, or plum brandy.  On one of our visits to the shop, Dad bought several bottles to bring to Canada with his new wife, Anna, who'd left Bratislava many years earlier and happily recalled the memory of her father making slivovitz when she was a young girl.  Tassos, the owner, chatted with Dad enjoying the novelty of meeting a Canadian foreigner.

When Tassos bought the adjacent building and announced the opening day for the new restaurant, we eagerly made our reservations, anticipating Jen and Jim's impression with the new taverna and its Athenian decor with enticing aromas from simmering pots of rich Greek cuisine, and our ability to get a table on a busy grand-opening night.  When we arrived we were immediately seated by fresh-faced expectant servers to our reserved table in a very lively and crowded restaurant --every seat filled.

Not long after we'd settled at our table, and perused the menu options, I leaned over to Jen and reminded her that since we hadn't seen each other for several weeks, we had a host of topics to cover, adding that none of them involved Wally.  Remembering our previously agreed upon pact, she laughed, said, "We'll see" and continued to read the menu.  Moments later, when our wine was opened and poured, we toasted the evening just when Tassos caught Stephen's eye and approached our table with arms outstretched, beaming a welcoming smile, and loudly said, "Hello!" while eagerly shaking Stephen's hand thanking us for coming out.

His next words were, "How is your father, Wallace West?"

I experienced my very first spit-take.

Guess What?

On several occasions over the years when I was growing up my Dad would quietly grin as he'd ask the question.  As I recall it was usually timed just as we were lifting our forks to take the first bite of a meal as we five sat at the dinner table.

"Guess What?"

It immediately made my sister cry.  My mother would set her fork back to her plate with a look of realization, steel herself, and simply state:

We're moving.

I'd be elated.  But for everyone else in the family, it meant something different.  For Dad it was a promotion, a new territory to cover for Norton Company, a better opportunity.  For my mother, it meant selling a home, searching and buying a new one hundreds of miles away, and cleaning.  Not just dusting and setting aside knick-knacks and gee-gaws to attract a potential buyer, but a thorough scouring and renewing of our house that was already in near pristine condition  -often, one we'd lived in for just a few years.

Mayflower was the contracted mover for Norton Company, and the familiar green and yellow transport truck would pull up in front of our house with three men, blank newsprint and cardboard boxes.  It was a good contract for them at our house, no doubt.  We had books, and lots of them.  Books are easy to pack and weigh a lot--benefits for the both business office and the packers at Mayflower.  Also, our house was clean.

When they pulled a chest of drawers away from the wall, there was nothing there; no dust, no stray socks or missing toy parts, no intricate cobweb structures that had housed several generations--all that was there was the footprint of the furniture in the thoroughly vacuumed carpets.  When the washing machine was disconnected, there was no lint, no detergent spills, no telltale sign of leaks that had repeatedly dripped and dried, just gleaming linoleum that was cleaner than most family's kitchen floor, all the while, my mother exclaiming and apologizing to the burly workers for the unsightly conditions, contritely suggesting that they must see some real 'doozies' of filth in their line of work.  They'd nod politely and continue with their work while she'd kneel and wipe. 

As a little kid, of course, I was oblivious to the concerns of my folks who had to oversee these operations, transitions, school transfers, mortgage approvals, title searches, interest rates, closing dates, car and pet licensing, and my siblings' emotional turmoil for the upheaval of yet another move.  My brother and sister were several years older than me and they had to leave schools, friends, scouts, bands, and familiar neighbourhoods; mostly the ties that I never had or realized being much younger. 

When a new home in a new state was ours, my mother acted as forward artillery and attacked all its imperfections, wear and tear, and the previous owner's dirt with fresh paint, and elbow grease.  Our boxes would arrive ready to start again.  We kids would start a new school -often in mid year, and then we'd do it all again, soon.  A familiar routine, each with a unique story or memory.

A vivid memory is the move from Illinois to Michigan in dead winter in the late 60's.  My sister and brother were in high school by then, and had several moves under their belts.  I was seven.  We stayed at The Mayflower hotel in downtown Plymouth, arriving tired on a blistering cold mid-winter's night.  After a full day's drive in our Volkswagen bus, we were keen to get out of the car and get some warm elbow-room in the hotel.  We walked up the wide stairs in the stately 30's era hotel, continued down a long hallway to our large 3rd floor room, and settled in.  Beds were turned down, the heat turned up.  Once pajama'd, we were ready to call it a night, but nature called and Buffy, our dog, needed one more run.  To make a quick trip of it, shirtless, but wearing his pajama pants and socks, my brother Allyn took the dog to the fire escape at the end of the hall.  Once outside, the door shut behind him and he quickly realized there was merely a two-foot square platform and he would be unable to get down to the street level carrying the dog on the iron-rung drop ladder.   Too late, he also realized that the door was now locked from the inside. They were trapped.

As the rest of us slowly let the day drift away, it didn't occur to us that the knocking and muffled yelling outside was my brother --just a faint background noise in strange surroundings.  He banged, hollered, and pounded on the thick fire door for a long time while holding a very unhappy dog who did not like being suspended several stories above ground on an open grid ironwork platform and wriggled earnestly to be freed. The pounding persisted, the yelling continued, until it worked its way to Dad's nearly asleep semi-consciousness when it occurred to him that Allyn and Buffy had been for gone quite a while.  He poked his head out of the room to look and heard -much more clearly- the imploring racket.  Back in the room, as Allyn warmed up and described his predicament, our laughter was even louder.  My brother was not nearly as amused.

That was our last move together as a family.  When I was in high school, my folks and I moved again to rural central Massachusetts.  I watched, unseen as one mover whisked away my dress-making mannequin, and with a gruff voice, said, "C'mon baby, let's dance!" while he waltzed her all the way out to the truck. It's funny, the little details you remember that made big impressions.  As adults Stephen and I moved many times with our growing family.  Those moves, too, had some stresses and unique adventures we can recall --you may have read a few of them in earlier blogs.

After Stephen and I moved from Nebraska to New Jersey in the mid 90's, our family of six stayed at an extended stay hotel called Embassy Suites.  We had a two room suite and they allowed pets.  The company that had hired Stephen was paying for the stay while he worked as a consultant.  The four kids and I went house hunting with real estate agents during the day.  At the end of the day, we'd all meet up at the heated indoor pool, enjoy the Manager's Complimentary Cocktail Hour, and the kids swam while Stephen and I would catch up.  Our spacious rooms, which had complete housekeeping services and two televisions  included a full cooked-to-order breakfast every morning in the dining-room/courtyard.  I quickly got used to the surroundings, routine --and luxury-- while we stayed there for several weeks.  

Eventually, we found a home, the kids enrolled in school, and we started again.  Justin started middle school and since the school year was well underway, he was quickly thrust into the curriculum and his science class required a few 'from home' supplies.  Justin was asked to bring a raw potato the very next day.  Not yet moved into the house, Justin matter-of-factly explained we didn't cook and didn't have any potatoes.  The teacher, understandably, took this as a lame excuse to avoid the assignment and quickly chastised him and dismissed his excuse.  Justin insisted he was being honest, and compromised that he could probably ask one of the kitchen staff for a potato.  Now his teacher --with an entirely new assumption-- wanted more information about her new student and his 'kitchen staff' and asked where he lived.  Justin simply replied,  "The Embassy."  She stopped asking questions and I think with our foreign sounding last name, it temporarily left quite an impression on her; it may have been Justin's first not-lie.
 
Recently, I hope, we've finally made our last move.  Stephen and I have settled in at Cleveland Place.  Here my folks, Pat and Wally, had done the spectacular and complicated forward artillery work with their battery of skills, taste and work ethic.  We have the luxury of turning the key and comfortably settling in to continue the high standards that they set. The stories and memories and friendships they shared here are abundant, and we hope to carry on those standards and traditions. Except for one.

Guess What?  Chicken Butt.

Pardon me, do you have any Grey Poupon?

My mother was a very classy lady. She appreciated the finer things in life but would never pay full price for them. She knew quality, had excellent taste, had a great sense of humor which included being able to laugh at herself, and was extremely.......frugal.

In the 70's, my family lived in Plymouth, a suburb of Detroit Michigan, for several years while my Dad was an abrasives engineer for Norton Company. My mother was primarily an at-home mother who sometimes took self-fulfilling job opportunities outside the home. She was a school librarian for awhile, and later passed her real-estate license exam to sell homes. I never knew if she made much money, but I know that she never spent any without tremendous consideration.

There were two high-end department stores in Michigan at that time. J.L. Hudson's and Jacobson's. Jacobson's fulfilled the luxury niche. My mother knew those stores, but found the sale racks. She never followed fashion trends, always keeping a classic, timeless, style of well made and long-lasting garments. Whenever there was a social event for Norton Company, she was the Queen of the Ball, but at a mere fraction of the price of any other women in the room. The Norton wives shopped at Jacobson's and Hudson's, too, but they all went to the stores in Southfield, Jackson, or Ann Arbor.

Not my mother. She went to the stores in downtown, metro, Detroit. In the early 70's, one could still see the effects and lingering decline of the city after the 1967 race riots. Crime was high, housing conditions were sub-par, and the economy of the inner city continued to suffer. But for Pat, THAT'S where the best prices could be found. I remember a particular trip to Jacobson's in Detroit and her angst at the purchase of an evening gown for a Norton event. It was a one-of-a-kind, from a big name designer. It was a lot of money (to this day, I don't know how much), but for that particular dress, it was a relative pittance. She walked around the store, nearly pacing, but she ultimately relented and received the personal customer service and attention that every patron at such a posh store should receive.

On the evening of the big Norton event. My mother was gorgeous. Not flashy, just elegant, pure class. I remember tagging along as she made-up, coiffed, and bedizened. Since cocktails were in several hours, and dinner even later, she decided she'd have a wee snack to tide her over just before they left: two pieces of white bread with a slice of American Cheese and Heinz yellow mustard.

On her first bite, the mustard oozed out of the back end of the sandwich and plopped a quarter-sized dollop right onto her lap. She pointed to her forehead, tapped her fingertip a few times and said, "Stupid, stupid, stupid."

She fixed the stain, wore the dress. I'm sure they had a wonderful time. We still have the dress.