Snow White and the Moon: She was my neighbor and that night she smoked a cigarette while sitting on her doorstep. I spied her from my bedroom window after the glare of a midnight full moon woke me up. The moon beamed its light on her solitude as if it was its most important task that night. We weren't friends, but I'd heard her 5'4" husband gave her black eyes, and I wondered how he was violent with his 6' tall wife. Still, she was deeply in love, which I gathered from her gaze of him. She had porcelain white skin and jet black hair, and that night she burned into my memory the impression of a cool, woman enjoying her smoke alone.
Maria: By all standards, Maria was overweight, but her presence and personality were as light as feathers. Mostly, I was dazzled by her smile and effortless chic appearance, as if she lived, slept, and played in sheath dresses, sharp black suits, red nails, glossy lips, and muted eye shadows. When I had a break from teaching, I stopped by her desk and asked how she was doing because she was going through a divorce, a difficult time with a teenage son who had been sentenced to a juvenile detention center, and a pending surgery for breast cancer. Yet she always shared her worries in a matter-of-fact tone before returning to work with a dazzling smile and a sense of effortless effort.
The Grey-Haired Vampiress of the Upper West Side: Occasionally, I saw her running down the streets of Manhattan in old tee-shirts, jogging shorts, and sneakers. She was tall, sinewy, distant, and she sprinted by pedestrians, stores, and kiosks never noticing the stares of admiring men or women. Most impressive was her waist-long, grey hair that flew right alongside her when she ran.
Ms. Attitude: I saw her only in profile and knew immediately she didn't belong in dowdy Portland, Maine. She was an older woman with a mid-length bob of brilliant, shiny, white hair that bounced along to the rhythm of her gait. From her decisive, elegant stride, I knew she owned the streets of Portland, Maine or anywhere in the world she took a stroll. I tried to catch up to get a better look, but she disappeared into one of the side streets as if she was in a Rue in Paris and not an artery of a small town city. She could have been a diplomat, queen, spy, secretary, housewife, not that it mattered because she was fabulous nonetheless, and I thought of Winston Churchill who said attitude is everything.
Mademoiselle Seine: It was nine in the morning, and she sat on a bench along the River Seine in a strapless silk, red dress and black, motorcycle boots (I couldn't t imagine the kind of night which left her glowing and still spectacular in her finery). She was blonde, blue-eyed, and in her early 20s, but none of the conventions of beauty influenced her way of being present in the moment and taking in the Seine as if it was hers. It was spring in Paris and tourists walked along the river's edge with their cameras, but she took no notice of others. With her legs crossed and arms folded gently over her lap, she gazed only at the river.
Me: It was spring but still winter cold. I walked briskly on Broadway to Carnegie Hall, where my daughter had a chorale concert that evening. Because I miscalculated the temperature, I wore brown knee-length leather boots, a salmon colored sheath dress, a 1960s black Kimono, a lavender cashmere shawl, and large Jackie O sunglasses. And even though I felt a chill that day, in that world of black coats, hats, and shoes, I sauntered down the fiercest streets in NYC as if I was the most beautiful woman in the world - and everyone believed me.
Read my exciting memoir, "The Continent of Ruby," available at:http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00TT5DDWO
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