How to Love an American Man (23 page)

It seems to me that back then, romance was found in the everyday. I imagine couples swaying slowly in the dark to the phonograph after the kids had been tucked into bed; the rattle of ice in a man's scotch glass as his wife took down her hair after a tiring day. I like to think that the men proved their maleness with their character instead of, say, their unmatchable lifestyles or their salaries, and the women didn't compromise themselves to get men's attention the way I've caught myself doing in the past. Although I haven't done it lately . . . and certainly never with Chris.

As a matter of fact, his attention is fixed, not begged for or earned. It's the old-fashioned kind: the slow-building familiarity between us that's transformed patiently into fondness; his nature, which is both kind and strong . . . like my grandpa's. There's an intrigue that sparks just from his looks, definitely, but the more you come to know him, the more magnetic he is. I've found myself so scared of him because he's been a challenging read: he's not the rousingly sauntering bad boy whose mouth tastes faintly like smoke and lime when he kisses me in the bar; he's not the guy who would put up with a woman who gets wrecked on the first date. He stays out of moral trouble and has high standards of behavior and character for the people with whom he surrounds himself, and he finds beauty in a late-night swim in the lake as well as in an old woman's eyes. He's complex, but understanding him is so basic: Chris is the most American man I know.

Maybe if I started looking for what's important in romance—not on the high degree of reckless abandon that a man triggers in me or how much fairy-tale effort is spent to facilitate our physiochemical interaction, but on the integrity and authenticity that a man brings to the table . . . then maybe I'd land lasting love the way my grandmother did.

I'm finally ready to be a
woman
in a relationship. Up to now, for a long time, there were graces that I was sadly convinced I lacked. I remember the night I told Grandma the story about getting so drunk on my date with the twenty-nine-year-old CEO that my own friend had to lecture me about my behavior in front of men. Grandma said to me, “You ruined his image of you,” and I agreed yes, I had. She told me that when she and my grandpa dated, she might have drunk
a
glass of wine with him—but back then women who got drunk in front of men were considered “loose.” I, meanwhile, can't even count the number of times I've been drunk in front of men; in fact, I can't think of the last time I've shared a sober first kiss with a guy. Junior high, maybe? What does that say about me? I've been scared to share myself with someone without a chemical encouraging me:
Go ahead, it's safe to open up to him. I'll make it so meaningless that you'll probably forget about it in the morning.
What if I'd only ever kissed guys based on their respect for me, not based on the compulsion of our attraction to each other? I guarantee I wouldn't have entered into some of the heartbreaking messes I've gotten into in my twenties. In some cases it's probably best that I can't remember half of what happened.

Getting to know my grandmother better has shown me that the female graces I didn't think existed anymore are actually in my capacity—and in my blood. It's a true skill for a woman to allow another person to care for her . . . and the good news is, it still happens.
I deserve love.
That's all I've had to learn. It's like the Descartes supposition, “I think, therefore I am.” I'm a woman, therefore I am wonderful. All we have to do is exist, and for that simple state, we hold the title as World's Most Radiant Creatures.

But that sets the bar for my behavior sky-high. I've learned from Grandma that if I want to be regarded as someone who's intelligent, respectable, and top-shelf, then that's exactly the person I need to
be
. I teach the world how to treat me by the way I treat myself, and the way I present myself.

A
FTER THAT DAY
when I learned that my Grandma dresses in a camisole under her everyday clothes, I started wearing slips again. It was something I hadn't bothered with since probably my First Holy Communion, but it feels right. There's a layer between the world and me now. Grandma has taught me that whether I'm involved with a man or not, there are parts of my female experience that are only for me. She confided in me one night that no way would she have considered having sex with my grandpa before they got married. “You have to live with yourself afterward,” she told me.

Meanwhile a neon sign with the number twelve was blaring in my head, as I'd defensively told my gynecologist at a recent visit, “That's only an average of one a year since I lost my virginity.” What have I been
doing
? If I've given a man—multiple men—my most beautiful, sacred form with nothing required from them, then no wonder that's left me feeling worthless at times. Why weren't they calling, why weren't they trying to see me again? It's because my feelings didn't matter to them, because for a minute, probably after too much wine or a few Jagerbombs with my friends, my feelings didn't matter to me. I had wanted to be desired without expecting that these men should want to know my heart first—and they should!—but now I see the value of reserving my most precious self. Besides, as Grandma told me during our sex talk: “Do you think
you'd
like leftovers?” Unless it's Thanksgiving or Mom's spaghetti, not so much. Grandma said that if a woman treats herself as something special, then men are more likely to view her that same way rather than if she carried on like one of Tiger Woods's mistresses. “You'll get more from him, and from the relationship,” she explained. These days shots and crop tops are rare in my world.

There were so many presumptions that I'd allowed to be built in my own mind about what a wife should be. I thought she should be a show-stopping cook and a brilliant entertainer, a nonstop quick wit, a wild thing in bed, an effortless nurturer, the bearer of an upbringing that appeared perfectly bred and super achievement-oriented . . . but, if I can be honest, my grandmother was none of those things and she still enjoyed one of the most legendary lives and marriages that I've ever seen. I thought I had to be good at
everything
in order for somebody to love me. I've been trying so hard to get where I'm going before I'll let anybody in, but when my grandpa first noticed my grandma, she was
walking down the street
. She wasn't doing anything superlatively sexy or admirable; she wasn't in a huddle at a party responding cleverly to questions about living abroad; she wasn't wearing the dress that her designer friend in New York made that's been hanging in her closet for four years waiting for the right opportunity to be worn. She was going to meet her mom after work . . . she was just
being
. Grandma has taught me that a man doesn't love a woman because she strives;
he loves her simply because she exists
.

However, I maintain that it's good for a woman to feel inspired by a man. Knowing Grandma, she'd agree. In my college psychology days, I studied a theory stating that every human is born with a drive to self-actualize; to grow and develop to be the best person he or she can be. From what I've witnessed between Grandma and Grandpa (and the relationships that haven't worked out for me yet), a partner should make us want to improve ourselves constantly, and urge us to maximize what we contribute to the world.

When we left the hospital that day, Grandma's doctor sent her home with no worries and simply told her to drop one of her meds that's known for causing dizziness. “No stroke?” she said.

“We'll schedule a CAT scan, but no, I'm quite certain this wasn't a stroke.” He paused for a second, and placed his hand over the edge of his clipboard. “And Mrs. Gasbarre, I want to promise you something: your memory is not something that concerns me right now.”

She looked up at him.

“You're taking your medication and we're keeping a close eye on you, but the tests always come back normal, and your symptoms aren't severe enough for me to pursue anything more. I'll ask your granddaughter.” He looked at me. “Has she always been a little bit of a scatterbrain?”

Grandma snapped her head to look at me. I shrugged and scrunched my nose. “Well, maybe . . .” I looked at her to confess. “Grandma, you have. Especially without Grandpa around to direct you.”

She surrendered. “Fair enough.”

“Doctor, I do have a question, though: when will she get her pap results?” He said a nurse would call in the next couple days but that with her history, there were no concerns. I ushered Grandma into the hallway to check out. “Let's go,” I said. “I think this calls for ice cream.”

“But it's still winter!”

I stopped and turned to her. “You would skip a root beer float in the middle of the afternoon because there's a little snow on the ground?” I shook my head in mock judgment. “What would your husband say . . .”

Of course at that she agreed, asking if I would drive her car since the roads were a little slick. “Now wait a second,” she said, stopping again in her tracks. “The better question is, do you need a ride home? Didn't Jeff drop you off at the hospital to meet me?”

“He said he'd come back and pick me up wherever I need him to.” I drove Grandma's car, and after we took our ice cream from the walk-up window, I took a bite of my Oreo sundae and opened her car door. “You know, Grandma?” I said. “There's only one thing that could make this afternoon even better.”

“Better!” she laughed. “You think a doctor's visit was exciting?”

“It turned out okay, didn't it?” I climb into the driver's seat and move it back a few inches.

“Well, then, what would make this afternoon better?”

“A visit with Grandpa.”

She sat quietly.

“Would you like to go see him?”

“I don't know.” She rested her small root beer float in her lap and tapped her toes together. “I was in a hurry to see the doctor so I grabbed these slip-ons instead of boots.”

“Okay, well, listen. My feet are a little bigger than yours, but if you don't mind my getting your shoes a little damp, then you can take my boots.”

She stared at me, dumbfounded. “You're going to . . . wear my shoes.”

“Yep.”

We decided to switch shoes at the cemetery to give my feet less time to stretch hers. “These are nice,” she said, lacing up my hikers, which I've been wearing all winter thanks to their water resistance and warmth. My heels hung off the back of Grand-ma's spring loafers, but I was careful not to crush them down as I walked around to help her out of the car.

She braced my arm. This is a habit that strikes me constantly these days, when I think about how intimidated I was to take her hand the day I arrived home from Italy to tell Grandpa goodbye. How we've grown individually, and together.

Her every step across the snow was conscious and precise as she looked up occasionally to measure how far we were from Grandpa's headstone. “Grandma, don't worry,” I said. “Just tromp through it, get them wet.” I kept her pace, allowing her to hang tight to me, while balancing her kept my mind off the cold seeping through the heels of my socks and spreading around my feet entirely. In my rush I'd grabbed my long black ankle-length coat from the closet, the dressy one from New York that I'd worn in this very spot for Grandpa's burial just over a year ago. The wind at St. Catherine's Cemetery seemed to love the coat, billowing its bottom without a break. With my bare hand I slid the snow off the ledge of Grandpa's stone. Grandma stood silently.

I welcomed wandering thoughts, as they helped keep my mind off the chill.
What's she thinking?
I wonder if it's more than a myth that older married couples enjoy very active sex lives. And I know this may be odd, but I wonder if Grandma misses being intimate with Grandpa. When she cries, is it ever for his hold around her body, his warmth, his breath against her mouth? I remember reading something by an author—I wish I could remember who—who said that while she was living in New York, she used to go get manicures just to be touched by another human. When we women live alone, not being hugged or kissed enough is one of the most throbbing realities to live with. I linked my arm tighter through Grandma's.

Around the cemetery the flags had been taken down to protect them from winter, and it was undeniable: for four gray months a year, these grounds truly mark this life's end. Uncle Phil bought the fanciest flag-holder on the market for Grandpa, but it sat empty, bouncing against the wind. Grandpa's here resting the way Grandma wished him on, I thought.
In peace.
I squinted at the snow's brightness, wondering which one of us, Grandma or I, needed the other's support worse.
I'm walking in Grandma's shoes.
I wondered if she felt more secure wearing mine than she did when she left the house. We stood quiet until she said, “I never come here alone, you know.”

“I know. That's why I came with you.”

“Do you?”

“What, come here alone? Yes, all the time. Sometimes I think about bringing a picnic here and eating it, or bringing a lounge chair and tanning here next to him.”

“That's strange!”

“Well, I've never actually done it, but I've thought about it. It's just peaceful to be here with him. I could always tell him anything.” I looked at Grandma. “You too?”

“I could've, I suppose . . . but I didn't. He had enough to worry about without me bending his ear.”

“Oh, Grandma, that's silly. You two were close.” Again, our relationships with Grandpa highlight Grandma's trademark cautiousness versus my typical audacity. “I took him literally when he told me, ‘You can do anything you want to do.' ”

“I know you did!” Her laugh is hushed by the cushion of the snow.