A Pivotal Person Can Save Your Life

Last night I dreamt about a pivotal person in my life, a person I haven’t thought about in years. Joyce. She was one of my college roommates. But that’s not the pivotal part.

In May of 1979 I traveled from Ohio to New York to attend a preview of my brother’s movie for television called Friendly Fire.

It was a low point in my life: my second divorce pending, I was forty-five years old, sleepless, skinny and despairing. I needed to leave the small Ohio town where I had spent twenty-three years-- married to two people--and where I had raised my three children. I knew I had to go, but I had no idea where.

In the New York hotel, I discovered a run in the only pair of stockings I had brought with me so off I went to Bloomingdales. I was staring at the various stocking options when I heard a voice. “Cecily! I can’t believe it’s you!”

It was Joyce, my six-foot tall, blonde, smart and funny roommate with whom, for four years, I had sung in the Vassar Nightowls. I had been a bridesmaid in her Washington wedding.

I hadn’t seen her for twelve years.

We hugged and exclaimed as women do when they are excited about seeing each other. Neither of us said OMG! because we didn’t say that in 1979, but it definitely was an OMG! moment.

We had lunch together and, at Joyce’s generous invitation, I spewed my falling apart life across our salads.

 When I had finished, Joyce said quietly, “come visit me in Bridgehampton in July.”

“Bridgehampton?” I asked. “Where is that?”

“At the far end of long Island. You must plan to stay two weeks.” Her voice was firm and definite.

“Two weeks? Joyce! No one should stay with anyone for two weeks, least of all someone who is a wreck! I’m no fun. I cry a lot.”

She grinned. “Two weeks.”

 With my kids well off into their summer plans, in July I flew east to spend two weeks in Bridgehampton, NY.

Joyce was right: right about it all. The vast Atlantic Ocean, the wide, bright beaches, and the interesting people-- the tiny farming town was full of writers and artists.

Joyce’s husband, Shascha, was a fine musician, a former Yale singer and the three of us sang as we did the dishes at night. We took picnics to nearby Sagaponack beach. I reconnected with writer, Jack Knowles, (A Separate Peace) whom I had known when I was nineteen, and began to meet other local writers who were friends of Jack’s and Joyce’s. We hung out at Bobby Van’s Bar, with Sascha or Bobby--a graduate of Julliard--at the piano. We sang, drank wine and laughed.

I loved the small town, the pretty Main Street with its two churches, the independent shops: De Petris’ market, The Bridgehampton pharmacy where Chip dispensed meds with a smile, and The Candy Kitchen where George, the proprietor, greeted everyone by name.

Bridgehampton worked its healing magic on me with the consistency and steadfastness of the tides and with the flare of a crashing wave, the droplets sparkling in the sun.

I began looking for a place to rent for the month of August—the busiest month of the summer. I was going to be on my own for the first time in twenty-three years and it had to feel safe and right. The agent and I found nothing I liked.

Near the end of July I called my brother to say “hello.”

“Where are you?” he asked. “I’ve called you at home and got nothing.”

“I’m in Bridgehampton,” I replied, and explained that I was with Joyce, had been there for almost two weeks, loved it and wanted to stay, but so far, I couldn’t find a house.

“I don’t believe this!” My brother exclaimed. “A friend of mine from advertising days in New York called me this morning to ask if I knew of anyone who might want to rent her farm house on Mecox Bay.

 Ces, I have been there.You would love it!”

He gave me her number.

I moved into Tina Raver’s house on the first of August in 1979 and I lived in that house for eighteen months. When I was divorced, I bought my own small house on Sagg Pond in Bridgehampton where I remained until 1993.

Call it serendipity? An accident of fate? That Joyce, unseen for so many years, was buying stockings in Bloomingdales on that Saturday? I call it God, Universal Intelligence, the Great Choreographer In The Sky, offering me a chance at a new life. And, Joyce, bless her forever, was the instrument.

All that was required of me was that I answer “yes.”

And then my brother in California finds me a house.

I knew that whatever happened after that—and there was to be so much!--I was in the right place and that a force beyond my knowing, a force I could trust, had led me there.

***

And you, kind readers, who were the pivotal people in your lives? I hope you are thinking of them now.