Emotional Rollercoaster of a Weekend
After meeting more than my fair share of professional “bloggers” recently, I felt it was only fitting I should start one of my own. I have never been very good at keeping up with any thing even resembling a diary. I cannot tell you how many of those journals/diaries/dreamcatcher books I got for birthdays over the years…they all have one initial entry, which begins along the lines of:
“Dear Diary, This is my first time writing to you! [Insert long-winded re-telling of one of my most recent sagas]. Well that felt great; I cannot wait to write every day! Love, Mara”
Never a single entry past that initial burst of optimism and promise. I’m serious, I have stacks of these practically empty journals.
I figured seeing as this weekend has been one for the record-books, if I must say so myself, this was a better time than ever to start a blog. If the length of my emails is any indication, this blog should be quite the “hit”. Yes, pun intended.
To bring you up to date, I must start with my schedule for this weekend.
Friday night:
- 6pm Drinks/Dinner with my gay husband David @ Adrienne’s Pizza near Wall Street — hadn’t seen him in months since his life is as crazy as mine (whose isn’t these days, really…)
- 6-10pm Mini-launch party for a friend from Kansas City’s website/philanthropic venture called Giveforward.org @ a bar in the East Village
- 9-4am Another random charity event (What is with me and charities lately)
Saturday:
- 12pm Brunch with Jessie @ Pastis (which was sadly cancelled because she is so so sick and I didn’t feel I could force her to talk over noisy celebrity-stalkers when she had no voice to speak of)
- 6pm Dinner with two of my oldest friends from KC, Eliot and Malynn @ Crispo. Had not seen Malynn in possibly 3 years
- 8pm Best friend Sarah K’s classical orchestra concert near Lincoln Center
- 10 pm Danielle’s brother Jason’s engagement party @ Flute
Sunday:
- 1:30-4pm Eagen’s Birthday Brunch @ Paradou!!!
So, yes, my schedule was pretty packed? Ok, fast forward to Saturday morning. I received an email from my father - a forward. One of my mother’s best friends, Jocelyn Kress, had passed away that morning in her sleep.
I simply started crying. There I was, already exhausted, and I couldn’t stop crying. This woman….she was one of the most incredible women I have ever met. Truly inspirational to myself and everyone she met. She had been battling breast cancer for the past 5 years, but I had always seen such a strong side of her. I couldn’t imagine she was simply gone.
I feel like my emotions have gone up and down so many times in the past few days, I don’t even know how to act anymore. I was able to be up and happy for the appropriate occasions - which wasn’t an act necessarily; I was truly happy at those moments - but then my heart sank the minute I started thinking about what I had happened Saturday morning.
Her two sons were holding visiting hours Sunday between 11am and 3pm up at their country/weekend home in Tuxedo Park, NY. They had included directions to their house in the email … of course they were driving directions. As a happy Manhattanite, I have no need for a car and would rather put up with rude NY cabbies and absurd subway delays than ever pay for parking in the city. I spent most of the day Saturday on the phone with my parents trying to figure out the best plan of action to get up to Tuxedo. My amazing friend and colleague, Jessie, bless her heart, offered to drive me up herself since she knew how to get there already, but seeing as how she had a 103 fever when she made this kind gesture, I decided it was probably a hallucination and she was not in her right mind. So I declined and was back to square one. Another one of my mother’s best friends, Patricia, of course suggested the train. What a novel idea! My mother and I figured I would get there, take a taxi to the Turners house and all would be well. The best possible train for me left at 9:14 am Sunday morning. I managed to get on that train - a miracle considering I was in bed at 4am (see above schedule) - and arrived in the village of Tuxedo at 10:17 on the dot. What great timing I had made. I could even get some coffee at the deli across the street from the old-fashioned train station before going up to the house. Unfortunately, Tuxedo being an old-fashioned town as well, people quickly informed me, there were absolutely zero taxis in the town. There was no way I could walk up the hill into the Park (Tuxedo Park is actually one of the oldest gated communities in the country) in my stilettos, or call the family to have them pick me up, both of which were the lovely deli owner’s suggestions. We’ll call her Norma, for the sake of this story. I could just see the dialogue now:
Me: Hi, I know your mother just died….but could you come and pick me up? I seem to be a little stranded…
Scratch that idea. I started asking every deli customer if they knew how I could get into Tuxedo Park. Then I got to the point where I was asking these fellow early morning customers if they would be so kind as to give me a ride. I offered to pay, of course. A nice woman and her husband said they would have done it, and not taken my money, if they had not been on their way to mass. Sigh. I thought I was truly stranded.
To be continued…
