Suzy Says

At first, it all seemed so normal…

When I got home yesterday, things seemed pretty much the way they always do after our cleaning lady’s ministrations. Only one lock locked on the front door. All cat hair temporarily removed from the hall rugs (though our cats are multi-colored, the cat hair deposited on the carpets is always a depressing, yet fluffy, grey). Everything smelled like Fabuloso. But something was wrong.

I soon realized that Cleo was not home. Since she rarely leaves the apartment by herself, preferring to send us minions out to do her bidding and run her errands, I immediately suspected that she must have slipped past the cleaning lady and into the hall, so I went upstairs and there she was, sitting by the door which leads to the roof deck. As soon as she saw me, she proceeded to tell me off for taking so long to find her, despite the fact that I was still at work when she started this game of hide and seek.

I think she overheard John saying a few days ago that she’s getting old, since she sleeps more deeply now (she’s 9 this year), and wanted to prove that she still has the adventurous spirit that led her spend the night outside 4 years ago. The other cats just walk away when she starts talking about that. Jack and Hannah are unimpressed because they were born on and lived on the street for weeks before we adopted them, and Sophie just goes to sleep. On that occasion, my brother was putting in a new kitchen counter for us (quarter-sawn white oak) and Cleo snuck out the back door and onto the roof. We couldn’t find her until the next day, when my sister Megan spied Cleo’s golden eyes peering out from under the deck.

It all comes of having people over. Here’s your love/hate for this week!

Love/Hate for Friday, May 17, 2002
Company

I love having company. I was brought up with a tradition of entertaining both friends and strangers. When I was a child, we lived in the country outside Ithaca, New York (my father taught at Cornell in those days). Our driveway was a quarter of a mile long, and there were deep ditches beside the road. In the winter, when snow drifts could be seven feet high, people’s cars often slipped into the ditch and they ended up trekking up our driveway to use the phone. We’d always give them something to eat and drink while they waited for the tow truck, such being the innocence of those days.

One of Dad’s students, Gilbert, came to live with us for three years when his (wealthy) family in Tanzania could not get money out of the country due to the laws at the time. He didn’t intend to live with us for that long, but it just happened that way. I bet most professors don’t invite their students to live with them indefinitely. Gilbert remains a good friend.

My father was also involved in an exchange program with Soviet scientists in the 1970’s. He went to Russia, and they came to the US. I remember particularly two women who came for dinner one night with their interpreter. All three were convinced that our house was given to us by the government to show off in, and that we couldn’t possibly live there. I don’t think we ever convinced them otherwise. A blizzard sprang up during dinner, and the roads quickly became impassable. The look of unholy terror on the scientists’ faces when we told them they could not go back to their hotel, where they were supposed to be, was unforgettable. Finally, my father called the sheriff’s office and had the sheriff tell the interpreter that he, the Law, was ordering them to stay where they were. Then they relaxed, knowing that they wouldn’t be in trouble.

Dinner in our house, guests or not, was always a time for conversation, and in retrospect, for learning. I grew up knowing which fork to use, how to hold up my end of the conversation, good manners, both at the table and away from it (we called everyone, even Gilbert, Mr. or Mrs., until invited to call him or her by their first name, and wrote thank you letters within 5 days of receiving presents) and other Victorian arts passed on from my parents, whose parents really had been Victorian and had taught them in turn. My expectations of politeness and what I consider to be good manners isolate me more than my advanced age these days. But I like feeling the connection to the past.

So now, in my own home, I really enjoy having company. I love having an audience to cook for, or to show off for, to be more accurate, since cooking is one of my few talents. I love using the good china and the beautiful engraved French wineglasses my father gave me, and his parents’ silver, with its politically incorrect ivory handles, and the placemats and napkins I bought in Provence. It’s wonderful to sit at the dining room table by candle light with good friends and family and talk and laugh into the evening.