I went to a dinner party last night with some friends. When my husband and I parked in front of their house, I noticed the barren neighborhood. The sidewalk and asphalt on the street must have been poured within the past few years. It was a new subdivision with no old tree growth, all bald and shiny, almost annoying—or maybe it was just my mood. Current events the past week had both disappointed and saddened me.
Our friends' house though, was filled with the moist, warm smell of baking ham. It was hearty winter food and I needed it. Something to soothe my soul. The party began with talk around the appetizers. Several of us had read a recent best-seller, a book about slavery. Everyone agreed the book seemed especially fitting considering how helpless and out of control we all felt.
A bad back also contributed to my poor frame of mind. I’d thrown my back out the previous month climbing up Idaho’s Pioneer Cabin Trail. As I reached for the cheese and crackers on the appetizer tray, I felt an ache low in my spine.
“Things are going to get worse for minorities in this country, that’s for sure,” Carol commented, pivoting from our book talk to politics.
“It is, what it is,” sighed another friend in our gathering.
Joan, who was in chemo and battling cancer, spoke up, “Well, I’m just glad to be alive and finally feeling better.”
A brief wave of shame coursed through me. I shouldn’t complain so much about my back. Just then our hostess called us to the dinner table. It was a feast for a king. The ham sat glistening and sliced between a dish of baked apples and a pan of potatoes au gratin. Soon our table conversation moved from politics to the housing crisis, another, not-so cheerful topic.
“Rich people are using houses as investments,” David said. “They’re driving the price up. If we get rid of the tax incentive, they’ll stop buying real estate and prices will fall. Young people can buy a home again.”
Someone muttered near me, “Talking doesn’t do any good. Not if you’re powerless.”
The table was quiet for a while as we contemplated the problems of our country over dessert, homemade cherry cobbler with ice cream.
“We lived in Boise in 1962. On State Street,” Carol said. “Houses were cheap back then. You could get a hamburger at McDonald’s for fifteen cents.”
“Kennedy was president in 1962,” I added. “He was so full of optimism and hope.” I thought about President Kennedy’s noble words at his inaugural address: ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. Those words seemed quaint and naïve now.
After the dishes were cleared from the table, we gathered our coats, ready to go home. David and Carol were going to Depot Bay, Oregon for a while. The winter weather was milder there, and they liked the beach and the ocean. Richie and Belinda were working on home projects the next month. Belinda was a quilter. Paul and Fran were looking ahead to the holidays and seeing their grandchildren. Joan was anxiously awaiting her last chemo treatment. Recent tests were good, and she was hoping to have some more time.
Maybe it was because of my nice, full stomach, or that talking with friends in genuine ways always improved my mood, but I felt better. I stepped outside to go to our car and was suddenly glad for the lack of trees in this new subdivision. There was nothing to obscure the thousands of twinkling stars in the dark sky above me. It was a beautiful, if unintended consequence. Those happen sometimes.
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