Shortly before the New Year, George Goverman called to tell me that, "the last member of the 8:30 Club has died." That last member of the club was his mother, Mae Dolby. Mae knew me since I was born; she knew my brother, who is ten years older, from his birth, too.
The 8:30 Club was an informal group of about a dozen couples; my parents and George's parents, Mae and her first husband, Obie Goverman, were members. (A few years after Obie died, Mae married a very nice man named Harold Dolby; I wonder if he new he was getting more than a new family; he was getting the club, too.)
The club got its name from its meetings: 8:30 on Tuesday nights, rotating among the homes of members. For many years, the women played canasta and the men pinochle. (Does anyone play either of those games any more?) As times changed and their numbers began to thin, they shifted to mixed games of bridge. There were also New Years' Eve parties, not to mention the bar and bat mitzvahs and weddings of member's children.
The most significant things about "the club," were the closeness of the friendships, and their longevity: the members were friends for sixty years, apart from some who did not live long enough to meet that milestone.
There were, of course, relationships within the club: my mother didn't speak to all of the other wives every day, only to two or three of them; to another three or four she probably spoke two, three or four times a week. We didn't have business or professional relationships with all of the men either, but Obie Goverman was Dad's lawyer and my pediatrician was George Kahn, whom my father had met when both were in college; George's wife, Ida Mae, and my mother grew up near each other, in New Jersey.
Those of us who were children of club members knew that if there there was a bar or bat mitzvah, or a wedding, the club would be there. In weddings, there were tables for the bride's side, tables for the groom's side, and a table or two for the club. It was a given.
Growing up, it seemed natural for my parents to have a group of friends--people to whom they were closer than to many members of their families--for decade after decade. I assumed that I, too, would have a club of my own. It did not happen, of course. While my parents and their friends stayed married forever, I did not. Nor did I live on one place for year after year; I've lived in a dozen houses and apartments since going out on my own. While I do have friends who go back about fifty years, there's only one with whom I'm in regular contact, and he lives in San Francisco. This is a sign of changing times and technological advances, but but we have lost much in the process.
When my Mother died, three and a half years ago, I pictured a couple of card tables set up in the great beyond, with eternal games of pinochle and canasta going, and I heard my mother's friend Betty Canner, in her smoker's voice, saying, "Rosie! Over here! We've saved a place for you." Now, with Mae's passing, the tables are full, but the 8:30 Club will live on in memory for a while yet.
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1 comment:
I like this essay for several reasons.
Like you, I interrupted the process of establishing long
lasting tradition, through divorce.
Breaking up is hard to do for those who break up as well as for relatives, neighbors and friends, the extended relationships you write about.
People's reactions range from, "I'm not surprised" to "They seemed like the perfect family".
Bottom line for the community, they are conflicted about what to do. Chose one or the other to support, try to be friends with both, or just avoid the problem, bow out. It's understandable.
And, like you, I understand and worry about the negative effect of such dissolution on our society, our culture.
Divorce rates are high. That can have consequences in several ways. People come to realize that they are miserable in their relationships and see a chance, through divorce, to try again or return to an unmarried state.
There's a significant cost to all options.
It's taken me 20 years to regain a semblance of genuine friendship with my four sons. In truth, I suspect that their having children and want those kids to have a grandfather has been a significant motivation, and/or at least the excuse they can use to come back to being closer to me. I'll take what I can get.
Your essay is mostly about the wider set of relationships; friends as well as relatives.
It wasn't lost on me that those events and relationships which you recall seem to be with people of your particular persuasion, which often is what binds a group together.
If I were to write a similar essay it would likely be about people of my own immediate and particular persuasion, if I had one. For me it would about those I spent the most time with, and they, of course, would be people I lived around and did stuff with; like going to church and living in a neighborhood.
In other words my stories would be much like yours. The differences would most likely be in the particulars of the binding elements, and those being mostly ritualistic in nature.
My stories would be about Christmas Eve services, baptisms, and Confirmations. They might differ in terminology and ritual, but they might be similar if not alike to those you mention.
What troubles me, as clearly it concerns you, is how fragile our relationships have become by and from the loss of the power of community. The value that ethnic and religious communities played in the lives of people dealing with all the challenges of life, seems to be gone, and with it the glue that we all need to feel a part of something real.
When I was a boy(how's that for a turnoff to younger readers) we lived on a street with neighbors, and not just the next door neighbors. We all new each others' names, and we liked some and didn't like some, but we had a choice to like or not like. We didn't understand how important that was then.
Following my formal education I have not lived in such a community.
Even now I live on a street where more than half the houses are either summer homes or rentals.
Thanks for your contribution. It is valuable and needed.
Ironically, the Internet, through which you and I have come to be acquainted, is what we go to now to satisfy our need for community. It's now called a virtual community.
But it's missing something so crucial; the ability to be accurate in sizing up someone as trustworthy, honest and decent by living near them and observing how they live. The community.
It's now more difficult to make that evaluation. For all I know, you are a really bad guy, and for all you know I'm a really bad guy.
But in both the virtual and actual worlds, one should not rush to judgment. One should be patient with observation and experience, and understand that,in the virtual world, as in the actual world, apparent facts should be subjected to the evaluation of intuition.
That's why I pull up your blog every morning.
Happy New Year my friend, and to the lovely Diane.
The Voice
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