A Century of Solstices

                            A Century of Solstices
 
            Wednesday was my mother’s 96th Winter Solstice.  She’s not aware of it and, quite honestly, my brother and I thought her 95th would be her last.  She went into hospice care over a year ago and, even though she still recognizes us (most days) she immediately forgets we were there once we’re out the door.  It’s sad and not a situation she would ever ask for or care to be in.  Miraculously, her vital organs keep working for another day and then another day.  Back on December 2nd she seemed “unresponsive” and the woman who runs the Assisted Living facility (a high school classmate of my brother’s daughter, I believe) sat at her bedside, where staff came in to, essentially, say “good-bye.”  (She’s been there for over a decade and is beloved by the staff.) According to my brother’s text, “the staff were coming in to check on her, people filling up, and then she woke up and said, ‘Why are you all standing around – are you going to get me something to eat or what?’”  Anyone who knows Mom, knows that’s a perfect take if there ever was one.  In the last five years she’s broken both her hips, a shoulder, fractured her pelvis and had a brain bleed --- yet here she is, living through her 96th Winter Solstice.  In keeping with that indomitable spirit, I thought it might be interesting to consider what Mom saw as all those Winter Solstices passed by.

            Grace DiGangi (born Maria Grazia DiGangi) arrived on August 15, 1927, before the Stock Market crashed.  By her fifth Solstice that event had occurred and Franklin D. Roosevelt --- a President always spoken of in reverential tones --- was elected.  Her father, a carpenter and construction worker, somehow always found work (even moving to Chicopee, Massachusetts – by himself - at one point) to provide for the family which, by Mom’s tenth Solstice (the year the Hindenburg exploded) was comprised of her parents, an older brother and two younger boys.  By her twelfth Solstice Germany had invaded Poland and World War II had begun.  As Mom entered high school and her 14th Solstice approached, Pearl Harbor was bombed (December 7, 1941) and the U.S. entered the Second World War.  Prior to her 16th Solstice her neighbor and friend (my dad) had enlisted in the Navy (August 1943) and a year later her older brother followed suit --- and another brother (Frank, April 1943) had joined the DiGangi clan.  By Mom’s 18th Solstice she was a high school graduate, the war was over, and the boys were home.

            By her 20th Solstice Mom and Dad had married (June 1, 1947) and were living around the corner from her parents in Canarsie, Brooklyn.  FDR had died, two atomic bombs had been unleashed, and the post-War Baby Boom had begun.  Mom and Dad joined that parade and, by her 22nd Solstice, I  joined the family.  We moved into the now-finished basement apartment in my Grandparents home on East 93rd Street as my first Solstice approached.  By Mom’s 25th Solstice we had moved out to Babylon, Long Island (a “development” called “Twin Oaks”) and my brother had joined the family.  Dad worked for the Babylon Village Police Force, and we were the embodiment of the new American Dream lifestyle --- the nuclear family living in the suburbs where low-slung new schools were being built as Levittown-inspired developments began sprinkling the landscape.  Just before her 27th Solstice I had started Kindergarten at the South Bay School and my parents were talking about finding a bigger house.  By Mom’s 30th we had hopscotched over West Islip and moved to Bay Shore --- and my brother and I were walking to our new neighborhood school.  We were living our version of the post-War American Dream and Mom saw us as Bay Shore’s “Nelson Family,” playing Ozzie, Harriet, David, and Ricky.

            By Mom’s 40th Solstice she had seen quite bit of the world shifting.  Kennedy had been elected and assassinated, the Cuban Missile Crisis had scared everyone, the U.S. and Russia were engaged in a Cold War and Space Race, the Civil Rights movement  gained momentum and the war in Vietnam was becoming more and more controversial.  The next decade of Solstices saw an acceleration of events.  As her 50th Solstice rolled around, men had walked on the moon, Nixon had been elected and driven from office, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy had been assassinated, and the U.S. had withdrawn from Vietnam.  On a personal note, Mom and Dad retired, sold the family homestead, and moved to an apartment in Bay Shore (which didn’t allow them to keep their dogs, so I inherited Radar and Coffee!).

            In the next decade, by her 60th Solstice, Mom and Dad had moved to Tampa/St. Pete --- but returned to the northeast (Stroudsburg, PA) when their first grandchild was born in 1980.  They settled into a mobile home in Marshalls’ Creek, PA and Dad started working part-time at a Sears (or Penney’s?) Automotive Center in Stroudsburg.  In the wider world, Ronald Reagan had been elected (much to Mom’s dismay), the AIDS epidemic had begun, the Challenger exploded, the Stock Market crashed --- and a second grandchild arrived. 

            By 1997, Mom’s 70th Solstice, the Berlin Wall had fallen, the Los Angeles Riots occurred, and bombings at the World Trade Center and in Oklahoma City highlighted the foreign and domestic threats we were now facing.  We also had our first Baby Boomer President (and Vice-President) and the beginnings of extreme right-wing reactionary politics with Newt Gingrich’s “Contract with America.”  And we saw the O.J. Simpson “Trial of the Century” in Los Angeles.  On the sports front, the Johnson nuclear family was thrilled by the New York (football) Giants winning two Super Bowls and the New York Yankees successful return to the World Series! 

            Another decade of Solstices passed and, by 2007, Mom was still adjusting to living with Dad’s passing (in 2000) and the topsy-turvy world we found ourselves in.  By her 80th Solstice we all had lived through the Clinton impeachment, the Columbine shooting, the Y2K scare, the disputed election of 2000, the 9/11 terrorist attack, the start of the War in Iraq, the creation of Facebook, the Hurricane Katrina disaster, the beginning of another recession, and the creation of the first iPhone.  Technology was accelerating the pace of change in our society, and we were all adjusting to living in the 21st Century!

            I think it may be hard to imagine seeing 90 Winter Solstices, but Gracie did, and that next decade brought new historic events.  The election of Barack Obama, of course, is first on the list --- and something Mom loved.  This decade was marked by several horrific events: the Sandy Hook school massacre & a number of other mass shootings as well as the Boston Marathon bombing.  Superstorm Sandy also devastated a large swath of the country.  On a more positive side, we ended our involvement in Iraq and Osama Bin Laden was killed, the Supreme Court ruled same-sex marriage was constitutionally protected, and Obamacare miraculously passed into law.  But storm clouds were looming.

            By the time this 96th Solstice came to pass, Donald Trump had been elected President and a far more chaotic world ensued.  As Trump attempted to dismantle the Climate Accords and Trans-Pacific Partnership, he also promoted tax cuts for the rich, railed against the Black Lives Matter movement, and instituted draconian measures regarding immigration.  Impeached twice (but not convicted) his response to the Covid-19 crisis was dramatically ineffective and, of course, his reaction to losing the 2020 election was to attack the Capitol.  On the personal side, Mom managed to get Covid and survive it, but the isolation of that year had a severely deleterious effect on her psychological state and cognitive abilities.
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            In all, it was an incredible (almost) Century of Solstices.  What I’ll remember, from my perspective (of 74 Solstices), is that Mom and Dad did their best for their kids.  There’s no playbook for being a parent but now, I’ll look back and remember that, as a boy, there was always a radio on and Mom was often singing along with Hank Williams and Perry Como and whoever was crooning.  I’ll recall that she usually wouldn’t smoke her first cigarette of the day until after dinner --- but kept smoking until a hospital stay a few years ago finally put her on the patch and relieved her of the habit.  I know that our liberal politics were introduced early on --- Mom loved the Kennedys (successors, in her mind, to FDR), was against the war in Vietnam, supported “labor,” hated Nixon, Reagan, the Bushes, and, most of all, Trump --- and wouldn’t hesitate to let you know it.  Things were far from perfect (the words “intrusive” & “controlling” come to mind) but now I’d rather focus on how amazing it is to reflect on the almost Century of Solstices of my mother experienced and what a full life she has lived.