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.