When humans participate in ceremony, they enter a sacred space. Everything outside of that space shrivels in importance. Time takes on a different dimension. Emotions flow more freely. The bodies of participants become filled with the energy of life, and this energy reaches out and blesses the creation around them. All is made new everything becomes sacred.
~Sun Bear
Betty’s husband worked on the Manhattan Project while they were living in Los Alamos, New Mexico. It was top secret. It was not until years later that her husband confessed to her what he worked on as a nuclear physicist. This changed Betty’s perspective on life, and I feel, always, troubled her psyche. They divorced and life was never the same for her.
The Orange Warriors / Painting By Hudley/ Holly D Cornell
1990 Betty MaCusic and I met at a little coffee shop in Rochester New York. She was drawn to my stick figure tattoos on my left arm which looked like Native American Kachinas.
“Are those Kachinas on your arm?”
“No, but they do look like them. They are actually a design I created.”
I was having a cup of coffee and some apple pie. I asked Betty to join me. We talked for a few hours about life. I was new to the east coast, and she had lived there for years. I just turned thirty and she just turned seventy. It seemed like a friendship that was predestined to happen. We had many common interests. Two of them them being an interest in Native American spirituality and art.
Betty talked about politics, spirituality, and architecture. As her life unfolded before me, I was amazed to find out how beautiful and emancipated she was, and how tragic her life had become. She was a teacher, mother and grandmother but was now unemployed, divorced, and distant from her grandchildren. She had lived on the street when she did not take her lithium.
Yet, during the short time I lived in New York our friendship grew and continued years later even after I moved back to California. Writing letters was still an art form then and we wrote to each other for many years. She would send me index cards with special quotes on them to inspire me.
While living in Rochester my white ford sedan took us on rides along the Erie Canal and into local wine country. My car was purchased on the east coast, so I had snow-tracker radial tires and windshield wipers that sprayed a special solution to stop freeze build up.
One trip that I especially enjoyed with Betty was to the New York wine country of Naples. It was very cold during November and the farmland and vineyards were bare. The hills seemed to roll on forever. Some of the farmland and hills went through forests and over rivers.
I remember one hill being very steep with an amazing view that looked over a frozen lake covered with snow, but even with my snow-tracker tires we almost went over this hill. I was new to driving in the snow. As I was making a turn, I put on the brakes too fast, and the car did a 360 and then slid to the end of the hill …very slowly. We almost went over a 30-foot cliff.
After surviving this trauma, we drove silently for some time on our way back to the city of Rochester. We stopped off at an apple farm on State Victor Route 444. In the middle of this large apple farm was a friendly barn converted into a store where products of all kinds were available for purchase. Anything and everything pertaining to apples that is, even bee-apple honey. A big barrel was set up on a country table that served the most devious apple cider I ever tasted; perfect to take off the cold chill of the autumn day and near-death experience.
So glad you and Betty were ok! I’m from CA, currently living in NJ. The first winter, during a bad storm, my SUV slid over the double yellow line. A car was coming but luckily by some miracle, the tires caught and I crossed back just in time. Such a helpless feeling! I’m definitely going home to CA at some point!
Yes… Black ice can take hold of the brakes and steering wheel… one time a prayer was said as I let go as my car crossed traffic into another car…no damage like you a miracle… it seems maybe we are meant to really feel that feeling of being totally powerless to do a thing… but here we are…
Sounds like a neat friendship – I’m glad she had somebody to connect with when thing weren’t so rough for her, and to write to after you moved away.
Betty sounds really interesting. I liked your line about apple cider taking the chill off a cold day and near death experience.
When a chance meeting brings you someone you can relate so well to you have to think it was meant to be. This was a great read.
Near death experience, handwritten letters, and warm apple cider sound like clinchers for a lifelong friendship.
All this came forth from my memory due to an Apple prompt… I like this Yeah Write place…it is a challenge for me in learning to conform… but I love all the comments and reading other stories and memories…I know Betty would have loved the WWW
This does sound like a neat friendship, and I wish the art of the handwritten letter would come back in style. Great post, and I’m glad you were okay.
I lost contact with Betty years ago… I have one Christmas card from her.. I tried to contact her family… I think she passed away…. But I still have many of her index cards in books and around.
I agree and thank you! I love receiving mail from friends.. writing and receiving mail by the POBox develops the quality of waiting..
I’m typing this as I’m listening to the song. I loved this story because I’ve had wonderful relationships with people much older and much younger than me. I love when age doesn’t matter and what matters is the commonality and just the chemistry. And handwritten letters? From anyone…anyone at all? Swoon! I love them and I’m disappointed I don’t receive them much anymore. However, I still send them. Beautiful post with an interesting ending re: Betty’s husband.
I agree….age does not matter to me either…thank you for a letter-type of response…
What a fascinating friendship! I really feel for her after she found out what her husband did — learning something like that would lay heavy on my soul, too.
It did take Betty some time to tell me the story..she did a lot of charity work… a way to somehow make up for the shadow that followed her…
What a neat friendship! I miss those days of letter writing–oh man. I used to refer to electronic communication as the whore of communication because it was too cheap and easy. I don’t remember the last letter I wrote.
Glad you guys didn’t go over the cliff and all that apple sounded delicious!!
I love when fate brings people together who clearly were just meant to be!
Mind-boggling