2018-08-30 Cincinnati
Happy Anniversary Part 9
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Our Romance Part II: Courtship, beginning 19 August 1977
…continued from 2018-08-27
Campement d’Ours, Ontario
Saturday-Sunday, September 3-4, 1977
Saturday was a glorious North Country day – steady west wind, puffy white clouds, air so clear you can forget about it. Sunday was cold, windy, rainy, and dark.
Favorite memories:
John[1] and Alice[2] sailed in the blue, Stocky[3] alone in the red, and Lawson and I in the yellow sunfish, pretend-racing up the channel a couple of miles, then running before the wind all the way back home.
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Dr & Mrs Wulsin hosted a picnic on Fishnet Island, after which I made fun of Lawson for thinking the water too cold for swimming. I jumped in, expecting him to follow, but he just laughed. Mrs Wulsin applauded my gumption, and rewarded me with her French Fisherman’s shirt – a rough cotton pullover with white and blue horizontal stripes (41 years later, I still have it [of course]). She warmed me, literally.
**
Mrs Wulsin had a penchant for gooey desserts. That weekend the cook served us Peach Bliss (fresh peaches, meringue shells, whipped cream) and Plum Delight (cut plums, pound cake, vanilla ice cream).
**
Mrs Wulsin was good-looking, but not notably beautiful and certainly not glamourous. Like most American women, she felt overweight (she wasn’t), and showed it by placing herself halfway behind someone else in the inevitable group photos of families on vacation. At least she didn’t let her modesty prevent her from being in the picture.[4]
**
Dr Wulsin and I spent Sunday morning in the Big Room (don’t you love houses so grand that their rooms are named? Campedor – the abbreviation of “Campement d’Ours,” the island has the “Map Room,” the “Captain’s Quarters,” the “Beaver Suite,” etc.) sharing a giant atlas and talking about my travels in Africa.
**
In Kenya, mothers are shown respect by being called Mama-xxx, with the suffix being the name of her child, usually her firstborn. Having returned from Kenya just a few weeks earlier, I lapsed into the habit and called Mrs Wulsin “Mama-John,” at dinner.
Mrs Wulsin’s eyes widened. (Little did I know then that she would prefer that I continue to call her “Mrs Wulsin” throughout our 35+ year relationship, despite my explicit request early in our marriage to use something more familial and familiar.) Before she could express her surprise (outrage?) at my unintentional challenge to her status, Lawson said, “Hey?”
“What?” I asked him.
“’Mama-John’?” he asked. “Not ‘Mama-Lawson’?” Lawson had been in Africa; he knew that the honorific was typically paired with the child to whom the speaker was closest. Wasn’t I closer to him than to John?
“Only two weeks’ difference,” I defended myself. After all, I had (re)met Lawson just two weeks earlier; now I had met John. Plus, John was the firstborn – significant in Africa, less so here.
“Two weeks?” Lawson was incredulous. “How about six years?”
He was right. Any African worth her salt would have said, “Mama-Lawson.” Chalk it up to nerves.
**
John welcomed me by leaving on my bed a version of Emily Dickinson’s poem “I taste a liquor never brewed,” which he had either memorized or copied.
I taste a liquor never brewed,
From tankards scooped in pearl;
Not all the vats upon the Rhine
Yield such an alcohol!
Inebriate of air am I,
And debauchee of dew,
Reeling, through endless summer days,
From inns of molten blue.
When landlords turn the drunken bee
Out of the foxglove’s door,
When butterflies renounce their drams,
I shall but drink the more!
Till seraphs swing their snowy hats,
And saints to windows run,
To see the little tippler
From Manzanilla come![5]
***
… to be continued …
[1] John Hager Wulsin, Jr, Lawson’s older brother, eventually the Best Man at our wedding.
[2] Alice Barton Wulsin, John’s wife of ~ four months. They had just returned from a three-month honeymoon in western Europe. Later, a bridesmaid at our wedding. Later still, persona non grata for forsaking John in preference for her lover. Even later still, reconciliation, based in large part on John’s depth of compassion.
[3] Stockton Wulsin, Lawson’s youngest brother, born 3 days before my youngest brother Howie. Howie died shortly before his 20th birthday, 42 years ago.
[4] People who refuse to have their picture taken bother me. Their reluctance makes me feel vain for wanting to be in the picture. Yuck.
Similarly, don’t people realize that they put on a name tag for others? People resist putting on name tags – I wonder if it’s because they want to be “in control” of the conversation. And if they know your name (since you ARE wearing a nametag) and you might not remember their name, they feel in charge. Can’t they just be nice?
Speaking of doing things for others, thanks to people who realized that getting an answering machine was a favor to your callers. Yes, you had to lose your Luddite reputation and self-righteous pride that you were “above” technology and get with the modern age (this, in the 1970s and ‘80s): too bad for you. (Excuse my lack of sympathy.) It was so nice to be able to leave a message and not have to keep calling and calling wondering if and when you would ever be available to chat.
Two generations later…hard to imagine telephones without voicemail.
[5] The classic version of Dickinson’s poem ends with “Leaning against the sun!”
VicWulsin 