After all these years

When my mother began dying, really dying and we all knew it, I hurried away hoping that God would use the ‘credit’ of my lifetime of prayers to purchase her a miraculous remission. All those rosaries, those masses. All that imploring. “Storm heaven” was a phrase she used. “Falling on Deaf ears” was mine. My aunt died of cancer when I was ten, in spite of the turbulence of all sixteen of us on our knees, so when Mother began to lose weight and wear a wig, I fled. It was a big time for me: I was probably twenty three, had just lost my job as a copy writer at Mattel Toy Company. My boyfriend went on a ski trip to Colorado without me. There was a window there. My sister lived in the Bay Area at the time. I decided to visit. It turned out to have been my escape to a new life.

Thirty something years later, after both my parents had died, after so many of life’s experiences: marriage, divorce, Big Love, remarriage, parenthood, citizenship in a new country and a life as an international writer and performer - after holding my step-grandchild in my arms, after all that and much more, I looked in my spam filter and saw an e-mail from LMU announcing the death of a friend,Tom Higgins, and snapped awake to the life I had left behind. Spam filter. A feeble gesture, the illusion of personal control in a world obsessed with facile technology.

Tom Higgins: the Peanuts spiritual advisor during those impressionable, confused, exhilarating years at university. Hip, outrageous, accessible.


Larger than life, serious and dark, he was also funny, a real human being who made an impression. Most memorable was a trip I made to Vegas after graduation to write a piece on the priest who played blackjack. In the midst of a spam-filter Delete Mission, I tried to grasp it: no more air for him. No fumbling, last gestures for either of us. No final goodbyes. Both my parents had died this way, had slipped out on their own journey, events which came too quickly for my laggard efforts at closure. A familiar panic and regret flooded into awareness when I saw by the date on the notice that his memorial service had already gone by. I had missed him completely.

In less than a week, I ‘found’ my three college roommates after years of separation; had voice-to-voice contact with that boyfriend I’d left in a hurry so long ago, arranged a screening of our film and coordinated the itinerary for three cities of sales meetings for my husband’s artwork.

My nephew’s wedding was ostensibly the reason I came south. But I stayed for the LMU BBQ. I still have dreams of being supple skinned and young, a student with books in her arms walking the green grass of the Sunken Gardens, my imaginary, glamorous life shimmering on the horizon of the near-future.

The world has changed so much in the interim. And I am completely different. Living in Canada while my country wages an unprovoked war on another whose living standards were already in the stone age was one thing to get my mind around. Being a theater artist, another ride. A mother: nothing can transform you as much as that. A filmmaker. And my moment of loss and mourning for Tom Higgins was similar to an insight I had massaging my father’s feet as he lay unable to talk on his deathbed. I realized: now I’m it, the last generation between the living and history. So my question was: how had my friends changed? What had life taught them?

I was startled to notice that most of the familiar names on the organizing committee for the 1972 Class Reunion were men. Didn’t I have any girlfriends other than my roommates? More disturbing: I couldn’t remember. So, I started taking notes.

My ex-roommate, Eileen ('74 BA/French) is a teacher and the captain of a tennis team in San Diego. After graduation she joined the Peace Corps and went to Africa, and in her lifetime, the experience ranks as significant and worthwhile. She still has spindly legs and has grown a bit around the waist. Her blonde hair is now mostly white, her face has filled out, while mine has shrunk to the size of a pencil with a bad haircut I got in my zeal to look good for this reunion. At LMU we were opposites: she stayed in to study; I partied, finished assignments after all-nighters and handed them in with minutes to spare. For her getting good grades was important. For me - it was all about identity and mating and possibility.

From San Diego, we sailed past the parking lot on our right and I couldn't stop myself from thinking: we’re all going to hell in an automobile: everyday, millions of vehicles in California can’t even qualify for the car pool lane. All they need is two (2) people to qualify! That’s one more person than one person!
There are television screens at gas pumps now.


They found a moment when people weren’t looking at advertising.


My sister, Bernadette Hicks Milbury ('76 BS/Biology) who married her college sweetheart in the months before Mother died, has three grown sons and just got her Masters in Nursing from UCLA, met me at the Gryphon luncheon on Saturday in Malone.

Here's Bernie (on the right) w/ Sandy Berketta (‘76 Science & Engineering) at the Student Center.

Sister Peg Dolan (“Mrs. God”), against her very good excuse of ‘chemo brain’ has an excellent memory. It’s frightening how much she can keep in her brain, and how little I have retained in mine. Here she is with Lane Bove, lst Gryphon President (‘68) and Cathy Della- camera (‘91), Prez elect, LMU Alumni Assn



I had forgotten, for instance, exactly how I knew Mitch Rosplock, who turns out to have been editor of The Loyolan during his senior year when I wrote articles and features as a sophomore. But when I saw him, I was grateful to know him still: he has a calm, mellow energy which instinctively I feel safe around: perfect for creativity required for writing. Necessary qualities for an editor. Here's Mitch, looking lean and philosophical at Casino Night.


However, I did retain the name of Michael McColloch’s column: “Every Mother’s Son”. And a photograph someone took of me and him locked in a big, splashy kiss in front of Seaver on his graduation day.
McColloch is the dark eyebrowed Irish guy on the left. I'm sandwiched between him & Irish guy Bob Harper, humming "At the Zoo" (Simon and Garfunkle). The name of the column I wrote for The Loyolan after these guys graduated was “Fine and Fancy Ramble.”

When we went to LMU, the ratio of men to women was 3 to 1. Now there are approx. 8,000 applicants for 1,200 spaces, and the male/female ratio is the other way around. That explains some things.


Althea, Anne & I worked at House of Pies back in the 70s, when it cost $2,500 a year to go to LMU. Of the 3 of us, Althea got the best tips. By the time she got her Masters Degree, she had paid back her tuition, books and living expenses on her waitress salary & tips, with no leftover loans or debts.


Now it’s $45,000. Per year. Good luck paying that back as a waitress, even on Althea's tips. On the plus side: you get the condo overlooking the bluff while you’re still gorgeous and sexy. And your parents are probably paying for it.


HOW PEOPLE TURNED OUT:

Bill Boniface wrote a children’s book and Kevin McGee is a superior court judge in Ventura. (They didn't attend, and I hope they're happy).

Althea Ugone Bassett, one of four of us who roomed together, ('74 MA/Psychology) most recently worked as Foster Family Director & Adoptions Manager for a non-profit agency. That's Althea and Don Bassett on the left. Civil engineer Don has had the same job for 33 years -- but it’s interesting enough that he still likes it. He’s an ex-Alumni director. Their daughter, Nicole, works in Admissions at LMU. Their twin sons go to San Diego State U w double majors: Biz and Music! Althea & Don are still paying back Nicole's LMU tuition.


Anne Linzmeier ('74 BA/French), our #4 roommate and the blonde in the pix, has taught Grade One for the past 12 years. Once, she almost made it to Nairobi. Much more significantly, she raised 3 daughters, (one has recently married). Anne’s husband, Dennis Ianiro, sells airtime for television. My Big Love and I have one son, a graphic designer named Jaz who also performs Improv/Theatre Sports. I play ice hockey and squash, have produced & acted in a film which has screened around the world. (http://www.fatsalmon.ca/themovie/home.html). I am a dual citizen (U.S./Canada) and have just finished a novel called "Catholic Love".

Mitch is a Fleet Manager for La Brea Chrysler Jeep. Mike McColloch is a partner in a law firm named after him. He fell in love with the boss's daughter while a young law student working in her father's LA firm, where she was answering phones. They were married June 1978. "Like you and me she comes from a large family, and we had and have much in common." They have 3 kids, one, a professional volleyball player, another daughter working on a mission in La Paz, Bolivia. They are, like so many of us, "empty nesters" for the first time in years.


As the night wore down, Mark Adams and Mitch invited us to go to The Firesign for a drink, (the name rang a bell, but I couldn't picture where it was). But we stayed, my Big Love and I, to dance with the young alums under the strobes and blue streamers, a quarter of a mile down the other end of that huge University building.

Loyola Marymount University Reunion & BBQ

THE NEXT DAY, under blue California skies.

"I kinda see a failure in our generation," Mitch said, "the Vietnam era generation. We are not in place to be effective in our society."



It was the first I heard. A small but reassuring comment that not everyone is asleep at the wheel here. Dozing, but not yet snoring. I did remember that McColloch was a "conscientious objector" to the war in Vietnam, even as three of my eight brothers enlisted in the Navy. His draft number was called while I was still an undergraduate, and he went to court to object. Good training for a future as a lawyer. In those days you never saw signs pasted on people's front windows, like we saw today in the neighborhood outside Loyola, "Proud mother of an American soldier."

We discussed why we fight.
One of my nephews, Peter, is a marine who served at Camp David for the president: there this almost unbelievable photo of him and his father on either side of a smiling George Bush. At his cousin Joe's wedding, Peter was introduced as a marine and the room erupted in applause, as if he had already done the brave deeds of a hero. And I had to wonder, even as I knew (having been well raised in a military, Catholic family) why are we applauding people whose job it is to kill others? It took a while -- living in another country -- to develop the perspective which would make that question occur to me. Now, it seems: patriotism commits a soldier to kill whomever the politicians of the day choose to call enemies. The only other force of equal power to persuade people to do questionable things is religion. Luis Bunel said, "God and country are an unbeatable team; they break all records for oppression and bloodshed."


Certainly I have no understanding what it's like to kill someone, and I'm pretty sure my nephew doesn't either, but he carries a sense of mission around with him. He's such a great kid, easy to be with, an innocence about him you don't want to puncture. He's a devout Catholic, with all the good intentions evident in his eyes. Not to be overlooked: he's a man, big and strong and in the prime of his manliness. And he's been indoctrinated by the culture to want to fulfill his training. There's tremendous pressure to have a war, have it far away and prolong it as much as possible, if only to use up the weapons already purchased with so much of our trust. And of course, there are those who profit. Disaster Capitalism.

Without them, what would we be so proud of producing?

The other thing Mitch said was, "You can be assertive about helping people. It's one thing I saw this weekend, and it's kinda missing from my life. I've never really seen that before. You can make choices."



"People came out of law school because we wanted to change the world," Mark Adams offered. He has created a small fortune out of improving slum buildings, while upgrading quality of life for the building's tenants. Michael Hughes is waist deep in social work for the delinquent, abused and neglected.



Maria Fitzgerald Dzida (next to the red balloons) is a volunteer manager of a soup kitchen. There is an Alumni for Others program and Julianne Berry has built 35 homes in Tijuana, Mexico under its umbrella. Gryphon Circle, the club I belonged to as an undergraduate where we mostly served teas, now works with women & children in need. Here's Bernie & Priscilla Munoz, Gryphon Prez.
I knew almost nothing about Mark as an undergraduate; at a party he told me he was Greek, as he offered me the drink he had in his hand: ouzo. I liked him from afar. His voice carried, some would say 'loud' perhaps. I thought 'commanding", assigning him some sort of military charisma, which at the time, was a compliment. He and McColloch and Mitch hung out together, discussing life and politics and in spite of their perhaps individual quirks, I thought they were cool. I remember a party: we all drank ouzo and danced to the Rolling Stones, "I can't get no satisfaction." Mark was dancing with Mimi Fitzgerald. Mimi was famous on campus because her father Bill, was chair of the Poly/Sci Department. Mimi was a strong character, a free spirit and full of life.


I thought Mark & Mimi were married in the chapel behind Malone. I used to attend Mass almost everyday there and often, confession. But Mark tells me otherwise: "I did marry Mimi but at a parish church. We had our reception at the Bird's Nest so you were almost right. Yes, I was a poli sci major but didn't start dating my prof's daughter until I'd finished all my classes with him AND got my law school recommendation." When Mark and Mimi got to the end of the chapel, after marching through the recessional hymn, arm in arm as newlyweds (in those days it was after being congratulated as Mr. and Mrs. Adams), we all heard this boisterous scream of triumph. It was Mimi. Although they're no longer married, Mark seems content: He wrote me a postscript: "I felt very serene about the whole weekend experience. Other reunions I've found myself edgy about the progress of my life in comparison to my 1972 plans and fantasies. This time I felt just fine: happy with my domestic life, proud and fulfilled by my professional life, feeling like I had just hit the top of my game, and, God willing, having another 10-15 years . . .."

Finally, my ex-roommates arrived and we walked the campus, taking photographs of each other, we were so happy to be together again. We put Anne and Dennis under the tower to take their picture. As soon as I saw them on the steps, I remembered their wedding! When Anne Linzmeier married Dennis Ianiro in the church at LMU, they were the first couple to do so. Here they are, thirty something years later.


MISCELLANEOUS ANECDOTES:

Monica Freeman had wanted to major in Business, but her parents didn't think it appropriate for a woman, so she took psychology instead. Colleen Marsch ('76 BS) took classes at Loyola as an "experiment" and ended up being a genestist. I recognized Jerry Amalfitano, even called him by name, but I couldn't remember how or why. We were both perplexed; finally he said, "Did you have anything to do with the rowing team? And it clicked: I was a member of Shell & Oar, their 'cheerleaders'. We wore maroon windbreakers and I probably spent a fair amount of time watching Jerry Amalfitano exert himself in that sport. That's where I first learned that running up and down steps gets you in excellent physical shape. Thirty years later, I steered our Town of Gibsons team to victory in The Howe Sound Outrigger Race. At 45 years old, I discovered sports. Took me long enough, but now, I can't get enough.
Here's my sports fanatic husband Gord Halloran with Jamie Sanchez, after playing a tennis match with members of the Loyola tennis team.

MISSING:
Pam Croft and Mike Malak. Pam was a girlfriend! She helped me with Math, and I managed a B minus under her tutelage. Pam was beautiful: sexy and blonde and a bit of an eccentric, very bright & outspoken. I think she divorced and remarried Mike Malak a few times, last time we visited, they were together.

Steve Bernard and Frank Villelli didn't show up either. Gary Rafferty and Nona Monteverdi were also missing, along with Paul Meyerhofer and Nancy Davis. I dated Gary for three months my freshman year and had a crush on him for four miserable years after that. He had a heart attack prior to the first & last reunion I attended in the early eighties, but Nona saved his life with CPR. Paul was an engineering student, tall, soft spoken with gorgeous blonde curly hair. I got mono after making out with him in his VW Bug. Nancy was Bernadette’s friend, a science major. They married and have been together ever since.

Very skinny Paul Stiver comes to mind, and a column he wrote called “Sexless Best Friend.” He was enormously entertaining, a brilliant observer of life. We hung out together. I’d love to see him today, get his take on life. Kevin O'Neil. A boisterous guy with red hair, a beard and an infectious smile; of course we shared Irish ancestry, so I know the hair is gone by now. Once he took me skiing, which was fun, but ultimately disastrous for me.



I reached Don Maloney by email in Japan, where he lives with his wife, Paula. Father Maloney was a handsome, blue-eyed Irish Jesuit who, if he didn't exactly hang out with Higgins, was certainly good friends with him. We all liked Maloney; he and Higgins were accessible, witty, engaging. I once thought he might be the devil. The other day, he put me in touch with Eileen, after all this time.

And Eileen gave me a gift: she had visited Tom Higgins on campus during Spring Break after he had had his first stroke. "He didn't recognize me," Eileen said, "but he very graciously accepted my visit. I told him I was your roommate, and he said, 'oh, yeah, Patti Hicks! She was one of my favorites.'" So we did have some last words, after all.

Steve Bernard is the boyfriend I fled as my mother lay dying. He and I were best friends through my four years at Loyola. I met him when he was Gary Rafferty's roommate. An engineering major, he also played the piano and was somehow easy to talk to. After Gary dumped me, I confided in Steve my lingering, painful crush on Gary -- it became a joke we shared. He was often my chaperone at parties, he looked out for me. "We'll always be friends," he promised, even as we were white haired and rocking on on the porch at some distant, future date. I believed him.



We talked about everything, during the hours we drove the freeways of Southern California in his white Chevy Nova, listening to John Stewart and Cat Stevens. On trips to Mexico, to "The River", to my family home. I knew his friends and he knew my brothers and sisters, like we were all related from way back. At the very end of my senior year, he became my first lover and I became his, in spite of all the Catholicism surrounding us. He paid his respects at my mother's funeral and witnessed the ceremony for my first marriage -- to someone else.

Time and youth - just keep marching away from each other.



I've kept in touch with Frank Villelli, (Steve's alter ego for years) and we've had our discussions. Now we agree not to talk politics. Frank - whose famous "spaghetti" & beer parties attracted all of us -- who was usually "sans" girlfriend - now has a beautiful wife and several kids, and lives on the top of a hill in Fallbrook on the money he made developing land. The other day, Steve heard my voice for the first time in years. It didn't take long, he simply hung up on me. Frank says Steve and his wife share skiing. They don't have any children; his wild, frizzy blonde afro is gone, he still goes to church. We have a Passive Technology Relationship: I email him from time to time, and he ignores me.

On campus I can still squint and remove all the new buildings, and pretend we’re back thirty years ago, when my life was ahead of me and I could reasonably think I’d have a crack at being a movie star, or a famous person, or someone rich. Not that I wanted those things. But then, it was possible.

Since 1974, a lot of money has made this campus state-of-the-art. It’s not what I want to think, but there it is: the architecture, design, materials and landscaping have all been made possible by an enormous amount of money. (The Rec. Center is my favorite “splendulgence”). Most people who donate $ in their will give to four causes: SPCA, their church, their university, medical causes like cancer foundation. Most large donations go to capital funds - buildings. Programming is usually the last to be funded. As a performer, I have been asked many times to donate my professional services on behalf of others who always get paid for their work.

Anne wrote me afterwards: IT WAS A LOVELY WEEKEND AND GREAT ALL OF US GETTING TOGETHER AFTER SO LONG... SOMEHOW IT JUST DOESN'T SEEM AT ALL 30 YEARS AGO... I CANT WAIT FOR THE NEXT TIME, AND ON ANOTHER THOUGHT ITS NOT SO BAD BEING OUR AGE EITHER. LOVE ANNE.

There wasn't time for anyone to confide Secrets or Sorrows, but I know you can't get through this many years without one or the other. What was it that we wanted then? Are we still a community? Unexpectedly, I feel a sense of belonging - after all our lives and years apart. I am still one of us who shared those early years and I want to explore what we continue to hold in common. My roommates have promised a visit in the summer, when we return from Chicago and our big adventure in Millennium Park. I know that I'll just blink and it will be spring, so I will continue to savor each moment from now -- til then.

For more information on my adventures, or to contact me with insights into your life, visit:
www.fatsalmon.ca or www.paintingsbelowzero.com or www.paintingsbelowzero.blogspot.com or www.paintingsbelowzeroinontario.blogspot.com