1/4 Full

  

My happiest and most rewarding job was covering credit unions internationally especially when it took me to Warsaw, Paris, Dublin and other interesting places.

I often thought of my best friend's father shaking his head and calling me the "Little Girl From Reading who talks to world leaders."

None of them will remember me of course, and compared to major media reporters who must think sitting down with the U.K.'s prime minister is just another ho hum day. 

As part of covering the World Council of Credit Union (WOCCU)'s annual conference, I was able to interview the key note speakers, often current or former national and international leaders.

One, Mary Robinson, former Irish President and former Secretary General of the High Commission of Refugees (HCR), has influenced my thinking sometimes daily.

Robinson and I lived in Geneva at the same time. My office was across the street from HCR. I never talked with her there, but maybe we ate in the HCR cafeteria, the best of the alphabet UN agencies in the area. Maybe we shopped for groceries at the same time in the Co-op nestled among the agencies. 

"You have ten minutes," I was told as I was ushered into a conference room. Robinson, tall and lovely, was already there. She believed in credit unions, which had made a major difference to the lives of Irish citizens.

Ten minutes had passed. I had what I needed for my story, but I hated to end the session. I mentioned we'd live in Geneva at the same time. I knew she'd left HCR and her work helping those who were so desperate and who had no voice, citing it was U.S. pressure.

We continued chatting until we came to Rwanda, which she visited after the genocide and the horror still apparent well after.

"How did you do it?" I asked her, thinking of all the horrors she'd seen during her travels.

She reached across the table and put her hand on mine and said in her musical Irish accent, "My Dear, to me the glass is always a quarter full."

There was a knock in the door. She'd given me more than a half hour, not ten minutes. Later she introduced me to her husband. She, unlike almost every other keynote speaker, had stayed for the entire conference "to learn." 

The 1/4 glass remark gets me thru the day, stopping the gut-wrenching news from my birth country in the middle of self-destruction, Gaza genocide, Ukrainian bombings. I watch the hypocritical politicians and hear lie after lie.

Then I remember my life is 1/4 full living in France and Switzerland. I have enough food, often fresh from local gardens, time to sit in tea rooms and chat with friends. My two flats are warm, comfy and even color co-ordinated. The chimes on the patio sing in a wind. No bombs fall on me. My marriage adds a joy to my life. 

It's a lucky accident of birth and circumstances that I have what I have. All those things, fill my glass a quarter full but I can't stop caring about the other 3/4s. If only I could do more.

 

 

 

Free Write- Prompt a Seven-Up Sign

 An old sign was this week's prompt.

Rick's Free Write

We are fascinated by artifacts of history. Excavation of the ash-covered ruins of Pompeii. The inexplicable construction of Stonehenge. Pieces of pottery and wall frescoes that reflect how ancient civilizations lived.

Of such is the mystery of the Seven-Up sign of Argelès-sur-mer. Weathered, faded, still proudly mounted on the corner of a building at the intersection of Rue de la Republique and Rue Vermeille. An icon of American capitalist colonialism. A distinctly U.S .beverage promoted in the heart of a small French tourism village on the sea near the Spanish border.

No doubt the cost of the sign was discounted in exchange for the promotion of the soda pop. But why not Coca-Cola, the dominant force worldwide? Or at least Pepsi-Cola (yeech), the No. 2 rival?

I suspect a sense of rebelliousness on the part of the proprietors of the neighborhood grocery. An independent spirit reflective of a non-nonsense woman and her genial husband who was not adverse to getting on the store floor to play with his young goddaughter.

No one has occupied the commercial space since they retired several years ago. So the sun-faded sign remains. Defiant. Seven-Up  

Julia's Free Write

He had decided that the trip to his ancestor’s small village in the middle of France was now a necessity, having been thought of many times over the years.

He had a vague memory of visits as a small child, but those had disappeared along with his grandparents when his mother died. In fact, he didn’t really even remember his mother as he had only been seven when cancer came and although she fought hard, in the end was unsuccessful. His father never mentioned neither in-laws nor his deceased wife. Of the old school, he simply didn’t have the temperament.

But here he was, almost of retirement age and his company had sent him to Paris on a business trip so what better opportunity?

He arrived in the street where once they had lived and the first thing to catch his eyes was the sign: there it hung, an old sign. Perhaps not as old as the building to which it clung, but still old enough. In French– before the days of the Coke and Pepsi-Cola battle: Drink Seven-Up!

D-L's Free Write

The Seven-Up sign has been there for at least thirty-five years. The grocery store below only carried Coke and Orangina. 

Babette and Jean-Pierre were Pied Noir, black feet the term used for French citizens forced to flee North Africa for political reasons.

I used the sign to give directions to my place. "Pass La Noisette on your right and a 14th century church on your left. Take a right at the Seven-Up sign. 

The neighborhood, unlike the sign, has changed. 

A mamie, one of the old women of the village gave me a splendid history of the street with its 400-year old houses and families. 

"Pierre, he looked like an old Tony Curtis, when he wasn't at sea.His wife was an artist. Alain, who once lived in Haiti, sailed to America in a boat not much bigger than a row boat. 

Today, as some of the old Catalan families have died out, they are replaced by retirees from Northern France and summer folks from many countries.

The neighborhood became Copenhagen South. First it was a TV journalist followed by a film director, writers, producers, some who won international awards such as Césars, Emmys and Baftas. 

One flamboyant director, tired of the separation between locals and others, decided to throw a street party for all.

From then on people from all the houses mingled.

Seven-Up was never served. 

Rick Adams is an aviation journalist and publisher of www.aviationvoices.com, a weekly newsletter reporting the top stories about the airline industry. He is the author of The Robot in the Simulator. AI in Aviation Training.  

Visit D-L.'s website  https://dlnelsonwriter.com, She is the author of 15 fiction and three non fiction books. Her 300 Unsung Women, bios of women who battled gender limitations, can be purchased  at https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/300-unsung-women-d-l-nelson/1147305797?ean=9798990385504 

Visit Julia's blog. She has written and taken photos and loves syncing up with friends.  Her blog can be found: https://viewsfromeverywhere.blogspot.com/ 

 

 

 

 

Scam Warning

 

The bad guys and girls are finding more ways to scam people out of money.

One of the earliest targeting me was when I received a text from my friend Mary. The text said she was in Wales and her purse had been stolen with all her credit cards, money and passport. 

Could I send money? She'd pay me back when she got home.

I turned my chair around. "So Mary, how are things in Wales?" She looked confused until I explained. The scammer's timing was bad.

Another friend, a professor in economics, was taken in by a Russian girl who "fell in love" with him. He sent money for her to join to him in the U.S. Needless to say, she never arrived. Because of his intelligence, that he fell for it, amazed me. Probably hormones won out. Her photo was stunning.

And different celebrities allegedly want to be my friend including my favorite Divo singer. Also John Irving was so happy I did my master's degree thesis on repeated symbolism in his books. Donna Leon and I exchanged several emails until I asked her some questions that the real Donna Leon would have had no trouble answering. 

I kinda wish Leon and Irving were real, but I was 99.9999999% sure they weren't. I probably shouldn't have played along, but I see nothing wrong in scamming the scammer.

Lately, I've been barraged by people who will publicize my novels. https://dlnelsonwriter.com and do wonderful things to promote my books. Some will even make a movie. 

The Author's Guild, of which I am a member, is really good at notifying members of the latest attempt to fleece them. 

Today was a new one. A person claiming to know me, had a video of things I wouldn't want anyone to see and for only $2,000 they would destroy it. I had 48 hours to send the money. 

Hmmm, I think I won't. Even on the tiny, tiny, tiny chance I did something so bad, I would remember it. My life is too boring. 

I do wonder about the scammers. It is part of a group where they must get X number of victims or they lose their jobs? Is it a solo person, who can earn enough that s/he doesn't need any cohorts?

I get tired of robbers from those on the street to those at the top levels of business and government. 

It's naive to hope people will be honest, help each other out, care. I want to be naive, but being realistic is self-protective 

 

 

White Supremacists You're Outnumbered

The U.S., about to celebrate its 250 birthday, was founded by white male supremacists. They were the leaders of the colonies, either via the British government or local residents, who were also British.

This was the way society was set up across Europe and the colonies at the time. 

Meanwhile blacks were often consider property, captured from their African homes and bought and sold like any any other property. American hero Thomas Jefferson had a breeding/marketing program. 

The second person killed in the run up to the Revolution was free man Crispus Attucks, a multi-racial sailor of negro and Indian ancestry. The first was an 11 year-old boy. Attucks was shot at what became known as the Boston Massacre, five years before the Battle of Lexington, which will be celebrated this spring.

The attitude toward blacks can be seen through writings even until today. 

Lynchings were common for far too long. Segregation was considered normal. It took a Constitutional amendment to allow blacks to vote, and even today, restricting voting rights by redistricting is ramped in some states. 

What most whites don't realize when it comes to humans on earth, whites do not outnumber other races. 

 

When one class of people are subjugated for reasons of race (and gender) everyone loses whatever contributions to society. 

Does everyone contribute to society? Of course not. 

Some hurt society, not just the robber in the slums. Some of the billionaires, who are white and have much too much influence, do great damage to society as a whole no matter what their product is. 

 

Breakfast Tea with Eleanor

 

The bowl of tea Rick brings me early this morning perfumes the bedroom. He crawls back into bed.

We are both reading. He's researching the novel he plans to write. I'm on the final third of Blanche Weissen Cooke's trilogy on Eleanor Roosevelt. We read bits to one another.

I thought I knew the period from what I've read in the past. In high school and university, U.S. history courses never made it beyond the Depression if we got that far.

What amazes me is that many of the issues the world is dealing with now they were dealing with then. The difference is technology, but the humans living in that era fought with the same ideologies.

I would like to clone Eleanor and have her hold a majority in the Congress and on the Supreme Court. Her view of the world softened FDR, but not as much as she wanted. The U.S. would have far less problems had he listened and acted more, but politics can curtail progress at any time. 

If by some miracle, Eleanor was sitting at my dining room table we could share a bowl of tea. I would want to see her reaction to the negro gains, an issue she worked tirelessly on. As pleased as she would be on the progress, she would also know that white supremacy and antisemitism still exist and work to eliminate them need to be continued.

I bet she would admit that she was wrong about the ERA, although her reasons were sound for the time, and she spent a large portion of her time advancing women opportunities. 

I would tell her that I had no idea how the government limited their use of women in WWII despite all the Rosie the Riveter posters.

The treatment of refugees is the same today, I'd say. We could commiserate about all the refugees who died because a U.S. officer delayed their exit visas from France.

As mothers, I could sympathize with her having all her sons fighting in WWII. I could tell her my relief after having a daughter knowing she would never be cannon fodder, but wouldn't tell her that had I had a son during Vietnam, I would drive him to Canada rather than die in that unnecessary war. It was more patriotic to stop the war, I would say. Would she agree? 

Sitting at my table, Eleanor begins to fade. My respect for her will never fade.

 

 

 

 

Sugar and Spice - Epilogue

 

EPILOGUE 

THE FOURTH GRADE class at HJPS was holding its Valentine’s Day party. The desks were in a circle. A heart-decorated box was in the center on a spare desk The teacher reached in and pulled out the envelopes naming the child whose address was on the outside.

Margaux Fournier had dreaded today. She had been so afraid that no one would send her a valentine. She did not know the teacher had made one out to each child and several anonymous ones just in case a child received none.

Margaux need not have worried. It was weird since she had overheard the murder plot. She knew from the news as well as the press outside the school something was being done about it.

Emma, Gloria and Juliana had disappeared, from school for a while in the fall then came back in January. Amanda and Clay never returned.

Three of Margaux’s valentines were from Emma, Gloria and Juliana. They weren’t friends, but they no longer taunted her without their ringleader.

After she had gone to the headmistress, the news channels had a story that matched what she had overheard. Her mother had talked about changing her schools, but was hesitant to create another upheaval in her life.

With Amanda gone, Margaux had begun to make friends. The conversation about the news casts died down. She just knew that school was better now.

***

“It’s lovely Amanda. Thank you.” Rob, her therapist, gently put the valentine back in its envelope. “I heard you worked really hard almost every day on making the valentines.”

She had used the paper doilies, red construction paper, regular paper, watercolors and colored pencils in the art department. From the time she was in kindergarten, she was told that she had real artistic talent far beyond her years.

“Don’t you want to put Happy Valentine’s Day on your cards?” Millie, the art therapist, asked.

Amanda had shaken her head. “It hides the design.” She didn’t say she would have preferred to write, “I Hope Your Valentine’s Day Sucks.” Being negative wouldn’t help get her out of McLean’s.

Only being sweet and being co-operative would do that. When her father had visited, he’d said that. He had been her only visitor. 

For the first few weeks no one had been allowed to visit. When he had come, she sat on his lap, played with the buttons on his suit jacket and looked into his eyes with what she hoped he took as adoration. Usually, it worked to get him to give whatever she wanted. It didn’t this time.

She asked one of the staff to mail her valentines to her mother, father, Gloria, Juliana, Emma and Clay. “Don’t put a return address on it. I want it to be anonymous,” she said.

The staff member took them to Rob. “Don’t mail them,” he said. Had Amanda known, she would have been furious. It wasn’t that she wanted to wish the recipients a Happy Valentine’s Day. She meant it as a warning.

Married Women's Names

In reading Book 3 of Blanche Weissen's Cooke's biography of Eleanor Roosevelt's I stopped to read a paragraph to husband Rick. Often early morning in bed, we share bits from whatever catches our interest.

A journalist 's daughter said her mother was often annoyed when she had a message from Mrs. R, even when it was in her handwriting because it was addressed to Mrs. Herbert Little. She was a journalist under her own name and if not a friend of Mrs. R. at least a respected acquaintance, who was renown under her maiden name. She said Mrs. Herbert Little didn't exist.

What a woman's married name should be was a feminist issue in the 60s and 70s.

I kept my first husband's name after the divorce It wasn't related to feminism, although I was a card carrying member of NOW and would spend many a lunch hour at the Massachusetts State House down the street from my office when there was an issue I cared about.

I kept Nelson for many reasons in order:

• Alliteration: Five n's and two l's sounded better than Donna-Lane Boudreau.
• I wanted my name to match my daughter's because it would be easier when it came to paperwork.
• Laziness: facing paperwork changes especially having to deal with the Massachusetts Department of Motor Vehicles, a nightmare at the best of times.
• My mother's disparaging of my French maiden name, although in retrospect living in francophone countries the last 35 years, it might have been easier.

When I married in my 70s in Switzerland, my husband and I could select our own last name. The choices were:

• Nelson-Adams
• Adams-Nelson 
• Nelson him or me for both
• Adams him or me for both
• Something different entirely 

We decided to keep our own names. I can't imagine him as Mr. Donna-Lane Nelson.

The next question astounded us. "What name will your children have?"

Er, we are wrinklies. Because we were in our seventies, the chances of pregnancy or even adoption were remote.

However, the box had to be checked. It came in handy when we registered our rescue pup who is now Sherlock Adams-Nelson.

I'm Donna-Lane Boudreau on certain French documents. Women can use their husband's name during marriage, but their maiden name stays with them. The Nelson is appended.

I'm Mrs. Adams to our vet. I was Mrs. Richard Adams to my late mother-in-law. I have no idea why and it's not important.

Our last name means diddly-squat to our personal relationship. We love each other. We share the good and bad that normal life provides. We are friends. Dog parents. We edit each other's work. We share entertainment. We share household chores. 

Neither of us would refuse to empty the dishwasher because of our last name. At the same time, we each have our own identity in the world that neither of us wants to lose.

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

Sugar and Spice Chapter Thirty

4

 

Chapter Thirty

November 4 Tuesday

Beacon Hill

Boston, Massachusetts

 

JUDGE JULIA WRIGHT watched every step on the slippery cobbled bricks. There was a light covering snow, a bit like someone had sprinkled confectioner’s sugar over the city. She had left her Louisburg Square home for the Park Street Red Line exit to meet Bill Reardon.

Dr. John Baines would join them as well. He planned to park under the Boston Common. Together they would walk across the Common to the Lander home.

Julia couldn’t help but compare the beauty of the frosted Common to the disagreeable conversation ahead. Legally they were on shaky ground. Much depended on how the Landers would react to their proposition. If wet cobblestones were treacherous that was nothing compared to how an entitled real estate mogul with political connections might be.

She entered the squat Park Street T-stop building out into the spitting snow. It was early for snow, but then Boston weather was always unpredictable. People said it was possible to have all four seasons in one day.

She hoped that Amanda’s mother would be reasonable. Hadn’t she turned in the hard drive along with a list of where to look to show Amanda’s – she didn’t want to say guilt; legally the child would be innocent until proven guilty and all that legal crap. But this was not a cut and dried case. Sure, the families involved were a better class of most of the people coming through her court. She was so tired of dealing with youth going off track. She wished she could make their lives better.

At the same time, she knew plenty of poor kids, kids with horrible parents, kids raised in poverty not just in money but poverty of opportunity who turned out fine.

How she hoped if it were a poor kid of the same age, she’d try and do as much for them as she was for those four girls. Three girls, she was convinced were followers, but Amanda was a leader who wielded social power with the other three.

Julia felt tired to the center of her bones. It has nothing to do with her not being able to sleep last night. She was just weary of her entire career. Bill Reardon had said the same thing last night when they met for a drink to discuss who would say what today.

“There you are,” Bill Reardon came up just behind. “Look, there’s Baines. Let’s go.”

***

Heidi Landers met them at the door. She wore beige tailored slacks and a bulky sweater. Despite having every hair in place and pulled back into a bun, the perfect makeup did not hide the worried expression. Her greeting was formal as she invited them into a library.

Three walls were lined with oak bookshelves. The fourth was a bay window covered with sheer curtains. The blue velvet drapes were pulled back as far as possible adding what little light was possible on a gray, snowy Boston day.

A tea pot under a caddy and cups were set out. Julia noticed that there were four, not five. “And your husband?”

“He’s traveling. He doesn’t know about this meeting. I will be acting for my daughter.”

Wow, thought Julia. This is no quiet trophy wife. So much for unfounded assumptions. She had seen too much in her career to be surprised by much. “Where is Amanda?”

“With Olga, our housekeeper. I told her not to let Amanda to come in here under any circumstances.” She sat opposite Reardon, Dr. Baines and Judge Wright, who filled the divan. The furniture was comfortable and reeked of old Boston Brahim. The Landers were not new money.

“Julia, do you want to start or should I?” Bill asked.

“I think it better you explain the possibility of arrest and a court trial,” Judge Wright said.

Heidi’s body recoiled.

“We have enough evidence to try all four girls for plotting a murder.” He didn’t point out there was a difference between plotting and a real attempt. “Each girl had a part in the planning, such as writing the suicide note, obtaining a knife, gloves and an apron. But we also know that the instigator was your daughter. From the emails and writings on Amanda’s laptop and phone, she was the ringleader. Emma, Julia and Gloria would be tried as accessories. Your daughter would . . .”

“I know my daughter’s part,” Heidi said.

“What became clear to us from the beginning that this was not typical of children. The planning was extremely sophisticated,” Lieutenant Reardon said. “Of course, nowadays with social media, kids have access to information that they never did before.”

Judge Wright put her hand on Reardon’s arm. “Let me take it from here. Lieutenant Reardon and Dr. Patrick Kelly came to me half as a judge and half as friends. They weren’t sure what other damage the court system could do. That was before we saw Amanda’s electronics.”

“That’s when they called me in as psychiatrist,” said Dr. Baines. “I can show you my credentials. Harvard all the way, and years working as head of the Psychiatric Department at Mass General. I’m now semi-retired, but I still do some private work.”

“We wanted Dr. Baines to see all four girls,” Julia said. “During that time, Mrs. Lander, you gave us Amanda’s media access and her writings.”

“I am not going to give you an exact diagnosis. I can’t with the little time I’ve spent with Amanda,” said Baines. “But I do know that she needs in-depth psychiatric treatment. I feel she is a danger to others.”

Heidi opened her mouth to speak and closed it. No one said anything until she spoke. “I could get her the care she needs but how? And my husband might fight me on it. He thinks Amanda is the perfect child.”

“Part of her illness is portraying to be whatever a person wants her to be so she can get her way,” Dr. Baines said. “She tried to play me.”

“As a judge I can order that she be institutionalized,” Julia added. “We would need a hearing. There would be publicity which would not be good for anyone.”

“I’ve talked with the head of McLean Hospital and he’ll accept Amanda as a patient.”

“I’ve heard a lot about McLean over the years,” said Heidi. “More because famous people have gone there, Sylvia Plath, James Taylor, didn’t they?”

“It has been ranked number one in the country for treatment of adolescents.”

“By whom?” Heidi asked Baine.

“U.S. News and World Report. It’s part of Harvard, the hospital,” Dr. Baines said.

“When would she be able to go?”

“Today or tomorrow.” Baines said.

“My husband is away all week. It would be better if I did it before he returned.”

Judge Wright didn’t say anything. She could only imagine the scene when Vernon Lander found out. “I can back you up. I don’t know what his lawyers will do, but . . .”

“I’m already marshalling my arguments. If necessary, it might mean the end of my marriage. I love the child I thought my daughter was.” Again, she paused twisting the bracelet on her right wrist. “These last few days have been hell.”

Julia reached around the tea tray on the table and took Heidi’s hand. “I won’t say I know how you feel, because I’m not in your shoes. I don’t have children and . . .”

“My daughter could have been a murderer. My beautiful, intelligent, well-mannered daughter debated whether a throat should be slit or whether she and her friends could find a way to make it look like he committed suicide. I gave birth to that.” Sobs overtook Heidi.

Julia pulled tissues out of her purse and waited for Heidi to regain control.

“I’ll call McLean and see when they can admit her.” Dr. Baines stepped into the hall to make the call. When he returned, he said, "They said they can accept her whenever we can get there."

“Do you want me with you, when you tell your husband?” Judge Wright asked.

“I will do a call after we get back from the hospital. I’m afraid I’ll change my mind if I talk to him before. I’ll have Olga get Amanda ready.”

When Heidi had left the room, Julia said, “I think it’s over.”

The two men nodded. “I hope so,” they said at the same time.

Amanda and her mother entered the room. Heidi carried a suitcase. “Let’s go.”