The Ides of Winter

It's pruning time in Virginia, spring is right around the corner. Out with the old, in with the new. Despots are falling around the world thanks to a growing youth movement, and social media sites that make community organizing a cinch. And this past weekend I listened up close to Anderson Cooper speak - rapid fire - about his life as a journalist. And his Mother.

First, he spoke with the conviction of a zealot, in spiritual tones. His major at Yale (political science, mostly Communism) was made moot by the fall of the Berlin Wall. He was drifting. Then his brother committed suicide. He was a young man at loose ends, in pain, who decided to travel to the farthest ends of the earth, on a fake press pass, and report some of the worst atrocities we humans could dream up. He had to "...bear witness," he said. He described seeing what a family of four could dissolve into at the side of the road in Somalia - fluids and a patch of hair. Seeing a woman washing her fifth child for burial, with the last of her water. Gruesome stories about rape in the Congo; "Congo holds the numbing distinction of being home to the deadliest war in the world since World War II - with more than 5.4 million people killed during the past 15 years." And he talked about Egypt. But what he said to this large group of southern businessmen and women, was pay attention. Don't let the media distract you with Lindsay Lohan's dress. And I thought about the Holocaust, and how it happened because the world wasn't watching, because of silence and indifference. And believe me, I wanted to canonize Anderson and his silky grey locks right there on the spot.

I also had to read an essay from my older brother, the psychologist, about his memory of our car accident when I was a baby after our Father died. He was only seven years old and watched his Mother, Grandmother, sister and me dragged off the road and positioned on someone's front lawn, bloody and waiting for whatever served as an ambulance back in 1949. It was hard reading even though I had always said I was "lucky" for being only nine months old and remembering nothing. Imagine that this is one of your first memories? Not picking blackberries or sitting on your Father's foot while he reads the newspaper above your head, or getting stung by a bee under a clothesline of clean sheets bustling in the wind.

I didn't mean to write about such gory stuff, but that was my weekend. In a few days we'll be heading for the French West Indies, to rest and recuperate with the newlyweds but without the rock star and his girlfriend this time. He's in Texas, smack in the middle of dubbing and post-production (whatever that means) on the band's new album. A good friend, who is going through a divorce, will be joining us too. The hardest questions will be, pain au chocolat ou yogurt for breakfast and which beach should we visit today? My daughter the Bride just saved a baby's life, and she's been working nights. The Groom has come down with the flu, after nights of call and traveling for conferences and interviews. They need this vacation desperately.

My days of covering school board and borough council meetings are over, and I'm not about to strap on a bullet proof vest and head to a war zone. But I can still write letters to the editor, op-ed pieces, and post some petitions on my Facebook page. Hey, that little site helped take down a dictator! But for now, I'm packing a bathing suit. Happy Spring everyone and I'll be back here in a few weeks! Oops, almost forgot what Anderson had to say about his Mother, Gloria Vanderbilt. He was embarrassed when he had to proof read her sexy memoir, and she called an ex-lover the "Nijinsky of cunnilingus." He told her he knew nothing about modern dance - and I felt like shouting, "He was a classical Ballet dancer!" But I restrained myself.