The Zinger Man

One of the pilgrimages I'd planned while in Ann Arbor was to Zingerman's Deli, a nationally – or perhaps universally – famous rival of Katz's in Greenwich Village (where Sally demonstrated to Harry how women fake it). When Diane was in town on Wednesday, we spent about a half-hour of her well mapped and directed efforts to get us to the location of this Rosh Hashanah Mecca (you should excuse the metaphor); but the diabolical gerrymandering of AA's "old town" area is such that we might have been the expedition searching for Dr. Livingstone in the jungle, with less satisfactory results. We gave up, that day.

However, I could not give up the odyssey, because Stu Chalin mentioned its worthiness; so on Friday – yes, Shabbat Eve, and this year the eve of Rosh HaShanah – I found my way there, with the help of careful MapQuesting and The Great Jehovah. (It also helped that I went at 3 PM – just about the only "off hours" time at Zing's.) I was even able to park right across the street! No lines out the door! But there was a line indoors, and I joined it gratefully.

A great burly Dionysian redheaded fellow in a Zingerman's tee-shirt sidled up to me and said (observing my confused glances) "First timer?" I agreed that I was that; and said I was here to find out if the tales are true that Zingerman's is as good as Katz's and/or Russ & Daughters, on Houston Street in Greenwich Village. He gave me a snarky look, raised one eyebrow and snarled, "As GOOD as?? Are you kiddin'? Let me tell you a little true story. A couple of years ago there was held a US competition across America to find the best corned beef from coast to coast. Who won? Do I have to tell ya? Of course Zingerman's corned beef. And here's another true tale: last year the Manhattan-only deli's held a city contest for the same crown; our beloved boss had a friend in the business in NYC and they smuggled in some of Zing's corned beef. Who won? Who else? We killed 'em all, again!"

I told him I would put them to the test this very day, but not with corned beef. "Do you serve your brisket undressed?" I asked. Absolutely of course, just ask for No Sauce.... then he pointed to the guy in line in front of me and said, "by the way, be nice to that guy, he's from Chicago." I said "I'm always nice to guys from Chicago; they're dangerous!" Dionysius clapped me on the back and said, "I like you; here's an employment application, fill it out!"

So I could be working in Ann Arbor, if I should choose; ain't life grand!

PS: I won't tell The Man, but no way does Zing's brisket come within a country mile of Katz's! It's good -- maybe only super, if you get it with their BBQ sauce, but that's not Manhattan, bud. I'm having my other half of the sandwich for dinner tonight, but only because it's there. (Sorry, Stu: I'll take you to Katz's if I am ever in Manhattan at the same time you are; we'll have a brisket on rye, but I don't give demonstrations.)

Diane & Fran's Excellent Reunion: Day 3

This little entry answers the question: Can old high-school friends who have not seen each other in 55 years still have anything to say to one another?

As Diane's photo seems to reply: "Are you kidding?!"

The two friends spent a really glorious day together on Wednesday; Diane arrived at my "guesthouse" around 10 AM, and after hugs and exclamations, we had coffee and gabbed about everything that had occured in our lives in more recent times. When it was lunchtime, we set out on our Grand Tour, with me driving and D. navigating, which turned out to be the ideal arrangement; Diane beats me all to hell when it comes to reading maps and sensing which way is up. We toured the campus area, as the carillon bells were chiming merrily, and finding nary a parking spot to be had, we gave up on our dream to have lunch once again in the Michigan League as in days of yore; and we had the same luck (or lack thereof) finding parking anywhere downtown. So we drove out of town a short distance to a roadhouse and had a fine salad lunch and more chatter – followed by a tour of old neighborhoods we'd both known, and ending up at the beloved Washtenaw Dairy, where we had the ice cream of our ancient dreams – absolutely the best I've ever had in my life, to this very day.

We both needed to catch our breath, so we separated for an hour's nap in our respective hostels; and then we had the Yearbook Session, laughing at our pictures and those of remembered classmates and teachers, for a couple of hours. Then it was off again for more food: we had a super German supper at an old traditional Oktoberfest haunt, where a friendly waitress took photos of us together, on Diane's camera; when they arrive from her to me I'll share them.

After a good sleep overnight, we had breakfast together and a final summing up of where our hearts and minds are at the age of 73 years. We shared "best and worst moments," the most beautiful places we'd ever been, greatest joys and greatest regrets; both of us were ready with answers on the tip of our tongues. It was astounding that our many conversations occured as easily as if we'd just spent two hours gabbing on the phone last night (with our parents yelling, "hang it up and do your homework, NOW!") – and were just taking up where we'd left off, the next day. 55 years melted away from the moment she got out of her car on Wednesday morning and we ran into each other's arms.

That, my friends, is friendship. And for it, I thank God.

We both thought, gazing at the yearbook together, that we were geeky ugly ducklings back in the day; but in this day, my opinion of Diane is that she is truly beautiful; I am mature enough to see the brave, smart, loving woman she has become over the years; and I am in awe of her courage and strength in dealing with the adversities that life brings, and of her steady, calm and hopeful spirit.

Many things change and die, in life; but a great friendship is forever.

Wednesday Morning Meditation

A little while before daybreak this morning I woke, thinking about Teri's question I'd read last evening: "Why did you (adamantly?) vow you would never return to Ann Arbor? Was it so bad? Or was there an event that triggered this dramatic sentiment?"

I'd said something in my blog about Leaving Ann Arbor FOREVER! and though to me at age 20 it seemed obvious, I realize it may not be so.... Answer: I rejoiced that I was not going to be buried alive in this hick town!

My kids, who if they had grown up in their Santa Barbara milieu for their first 20 years of life might understand what I meant, were instead joined to the IBM System ("I've Been Moved") that was so prevalent when John and I got married, and so they were cast out of the town of their birth, weeping and gnashing their teeth, and became citizens of The Real World.

Teri and the others may never fully comprehend how smothering and stultifying it felt for me to graduate from 18 years in one small-town cocoon – to find myself enclosed in a boring little prison, walled in forever: "My God, Montresor: have pity!"

Looking at my old hometown now, from the perspective of 50-plus years of world citizenship, I can't help but wonder if today's Ann Arbor High School graduates could understand my ancient angst. Due to the great communications revolution that is still expanding into the 21st century, I have to wonder if these future citizens can posssibly feel that walled-in.

Yet, if given my birth family's Zeitgeist ("Money is tight, the future uncertain; you ain't goin' nowhere" was my graduation anthem) a lower middle class scholar of 2009 might still feel glued to this plot of ground in Michigan.

Luckily for me, the gates opened wide in 1955, when my father was forced by his several physical problems to retire permanently from his dead-end job here – and my parents, fueled by their old itchy-foot syndrome, began to feel their California mojo working again. As so many years earlier, when I was just a baby, Dad's poor health issues sent them westward to California in a fruitless search for the pot of gold, they were ready at last to fare forth to Lotusland; and I and my two siblings escaped with them into the wide world.

I remember walking often to the old bridge that spans the New York Central rail tracks by the Ann Arbor depot yet today, gazing down at the trains as they pulled out and whispering a line from one of my mother's favorite poems: "There isn't a train I wouldn't take, no matter where it's going!" That's what I felt then; anywhere would be better than here.

I still believe that may be true; but I've come to think that those old prison walls were in my own head, and that eventually I would have left Ann Arbor – if only in my dreams.

GF's Excellent Adventure: Day 2

Behold: the entranceway to my home away from home, "Claire's Guesthouse," just outside the actual U of M campus environs (and it appears, close enough that I may hear the marching band practicing for Saturday's big first home game of the season).

After a very sketchy sleep at the Marriott last night (not the hotel's fault – it was so nice that I reserved a room there for the night before my very early morning departure for home). I think my problem was that I was too excited about today's adventures.

I got up early, therefore, grabbed a quick cuppa, and was off in the shuttle to catch an Enterprise bus to the car rental office. Those E-People are the way to rent wheels, friends; they were super-helpful and friendly, gave me a choice of three different autos (in Detroit loyalty mode, I chose a Chrysler Sebring, nice and solid, as I'm going to be doing a lot of auto-exploring, even unto darkest Canada perhaps). The drive over to Ann Arbor was quick and easy (dear brother Frank, I found Michigan driving just as simple as in California).

Negotiating the mean streets of my old hometown, however, is a different matter. First of all, how this little hick town has grown! Secondly, road construction seems to be a way of life here, far worse than anything I can remember in CA (Land of CalTrans); and finally, if my husband thinks he's seen "one-way-street madness" in Santa Cruz, he would be driven insane by the New Ann Arbor. What streets there may be that are not ringing with nine-pound hammers, have been turned into arbitrary one-way lanes. And no, this is not Italy: I'm afraid to try to claim, "But officer, I AM only going one way at the moment."

However, after a Starbuck's pick-me-up refueling, I was able to find my way to my first destination on this journey: St. Thomas the Apostle Church and School, where my earliest formative years were spent in study and prayer.

It was quite wonderful to be able to park the car in front of the school entrance that was exactly where I remembered it to be (though the building has been enlarged beyond any memory). As I walked back toward the church on the corner, I was retracing steps I'd followed for too many years to recall; in May Processions, going to practice playing the organ in the choirloft, or to choir practice with Professor Rochon (whose darling son Paul was the dream-fantasy of every girl in my grade-school class)..... I went in the same side door I'd always entered from the school property; and spent almost an hour there, gazing at the white marble altar and remembering the towering figure of our pastor, Monsignor Peek, as he thundered from the big pulpit about the abject failure of his congregants to donate enough in the collection plate. The Monsignor and the big pulpit are gone now, as are the two white marble archangels who guarded the Epistle and Gospel sides of the altar. But the statue of dear Saint Joseph, at whose altar I knelt so often to say my "Act of Contrition," after childish confessions, still smiles down on little congregants; I lit a candle there and prayed my thanks that God must have forgiven all my nasty little faults, since I've been allowed to come back and see Joseph's smiling face once more. (I added prayers for my own son Joseph and his family -- a group I could not possibly have imagined in my wildest dreams back in the day.)

I finally found public parking down near Liberty Street and Fifth, near where my Dad's office used to be located; and I had a quick lunch on a corner where it may well be that I'd imbibed so many chocolate-peppermint ice cream sodas at a fountain in the drugstore across from his place of labor (now a cafe called "Afternoon Delights.") They don't know from afternoon delights there, though, as they have never had a chocolate peppermint ice cream soda for 50 cents on a hot after-school afternoon.

By that time, my get up and go had got up and left; so I found my way to Claire's Guesthouse out here in the New Suburbia south of campus; and as crickets call in the garden outside my window, I am off to sleep-land. Another big day cometh tomorrow: high-school best buddy Diane arrives from Kalamazoo (Kazoo to us Michiganders) at 10 AM, and I want to be ready to recreate those memories with her for a day and an evening.

GF's Excellent Adventure: Day 1

It is after midnight in Dee-troit, The Big City of childhood memory.

My first ever First Class plane trip was a success; at least it was a giant step for womankind beyond Cattle Class – I guess I'll call it Happy Cow Class. With more comfortable seats, no passenger elbows to poke you awake, and unlimited free food and drink (golly, even hot towels before the meals), it made my two-step trip from San Jose to the Texas hub to the Detroit terminal very bearable.

Granted, this 21st century mode of flitting about is not "fun," in the way that I recall from my early days of flying. (That was well after Amelia Earhardt disappeared into the clouds, I'll have you know.) Those were the days when we dressed up in chic two-piece suits and silk blouses and heels and pearl necklaces; when soft music was playing as you boarded, and beautiful young stewardii greeted you at the door with exuberant smiles rather than tired sighs. (I heard a couple of those travel-gals talking on the shuttle bus; they are assigned 12-hour days, with one day off/one day on. If the pilots are on the same sort of schedule, Lord help us.) In those bad old days or yore, drinks were served a-plenty, as soon as a safe altitude was reached, with a choice of munchy snacks and a printed menu distributed to you, so you could decide on your hot three-course lunch or dinner choice. (Good cognac was offered after dessert, too, if you wished.)

But back to reality: I am safely ensconced in a nice Marriott airport hotel; took a wonderful, needle-spray shower when I got here tired and sweaty, and am ready for a good night's sleep. I did some thinking during the flight about what I hope to learn about myself during this adventure. More on that tomorrow, after I get my wheels in the morning and drive to Ann Arbor to look at the old home town.

Test For Ann Arbor Journal

Who: Frances Anne Colborn Soule; that's me! What: This is a test page for my "Madeleines" journey to visit my youth.
Why? Remembrance of Things Past
Where: Ann Arbor, MI, the little, tree-shaded college town where I grew up.
When: Departing San Jose, CA on Monday, September 14th; returning on Thursday, September 24th.


I plan to include photos in this daily journal, and travelogue descriptions as well as ruminations on this (for me) fascinating experiment in recapturing memory and getting acquainted with the girl who became the woman I am today. My guess is that I will know her better now than she knew herself in those formative years. I intend to take copious notes and write brief essays in my private notebooks; my goal is to build up a record and a much better understanding of the influences and guidance that formed me there, from the age of seven years to the day of my departure ("Forever!!") when I was 19. Forever is a very long time; it's been 54 years since I uttered that oath, but I am very ready to take it back now. I am in the process of writing my first memoir of that time when I was being launched upon the great sea of life. My promise to myself is that I will be as fully truthful in accessing my memories and in my assessments of them, as I have heretofore found myself incapable of being: because the only memoir worth my writing would be one that is clear-eyed and honest to the woman I have become at the age of 73. However, dear readers, you will not be subjected to the brunt of my unbridled honesty in this blog! This is for your enjoyment (if you should enjoy the tale), and as a souvenir of a journey that has been waiting for me for over 50 years. My first actual travelogue entry will be posted next Monday, if all goes well – labeled with some cutesy title that will indicate its content, I'm sure. Wish me "Bon voyage," my dears.

A DO-NOTHING LABOR DAY

There is a lovely quote from Scripture that I always think about on this annual holiday weekend: one hears it occasionally in a funeral liturgy. "Yes, says the Spirit, let them rest from their labors, for their works follow them."

So I hope you have all worked hard enough over the past year that you feel you can rest – just "be" – for a couple of days. That's what I'm doing, folks.

A new blog is coming, covering my sentimental journey home to Ann Arbor, MI. I'm going there in the hope of meeting again (for the first time) the little girl growing to a young lady there – who has turned out to be me.

I'm seeking a name for that blog. If any of my readers have a suggestion, I'm listening. I will incorporate on-the-spot photos in it, as I can, and some of my daily journal notes exploring what I find in my past as I contemplate the setting in my present. I've been doing some good mental exercises over the summer, using Natalie Goldberg's fine course on writing memoir, "Old Friend From Far Away." Even viewed from across the miles, a lot of scenes from my Michigan upbringing have come up to me, with Natalie's prodding; I plan to incorporate some or most of that writing into the final draft of my own meditations on the first years of my life.

I'll send the blog access connection to the people I think might be interested in accompanying me on this spiritual journey. If you have any suggestions about who should be on that list, let me know about that too.

I leave for Ann Arbor, and begin my journal, on Monday, September 14th – about a week from today.