The World in My Kitchen (24 page)

A few weeks later, when I called his office to invite him once again for dinner, I was told that he had pneumonia and was in the hospital. I went to see him, but when I got there, I was led to a special hospice-like part of the hospital. Alan was segregated with other patients who, like him, had pneumonia. Alan was lying in his bed, pale, his eyes closed, looking so sick. I wanted to cry.

I heard him say in a very low voice, “Water, I’m thirsty.” I saw no glass, only long, very large Q-tips. I went out and ask the nurse what to do.

“With AIDS patients, you take the Q-tips, soak them in water, and wet his lips. Don’t touch anything; don’t touch him and wash your hands.”

I was aware of the disease that had been spreading, but AIDS hadn’t been made real for me until that day. This is how I learned that Alan had AIDS. It explained his flu symptoms and his tiredness. I was horrified and sad.

I tiptoed back to his room, did what the nurse had told me to do, and as I was wetting his lips he opened his eyes, looked at me and murmured, “Go, go, leave me.” After a few minutes, I did.

I realized, thinking of the past, that Alan had never wanted me to know he was gay. Despite our lasting friendship, he did not think I would approve. He was so wrong. I had known for years and was completely comfortable with him. We flirted, but I knew it was all a game. I trusted him; he was my best friend. I felt sad and also betrayed that he had not trusted me in return.

I called the hospital every day to see how he was, but he never wanted to speak to me. Once he was back home and feeling better, he came by to see me. Once again we cooked together, talked together, but never did he mention my visit to the hospital, and I did not know what I was supposed to say or do.

A few months later, Alan was back at the hospice. This time both Jimmy and I came right away. When Jimmy left the room, I sat down near him and told him I knew he was gay, that it made no difference to me, that I was his friend, and that he had to trust me. “I am sorry, Colette; you must forgive me. This is very hard. I hate what this disease is doing to me. I don’t want to die…”

I was broken hearted to see him like this. We had been so close to him. We knew his mother and his sister. Years ago, when I wanted to write about Savannah, he had helped me. We stayed with his family. I felt he was like my brother. I was loosing my best friend to this horrible disease that would take so many lives in the years that followed.

A few days later, Alan died. There was a memorial for him. Half of Soho came, also celebrities for whom he had designed apartments or lofts. Both Marianne and Juliette wrote and read poems. Of all our children, Marianne was the most affected. They had been close, and when she had a problem with a relationship, instead of talking with us, she went to him for advice. He then would help me to understand what was happening to Marianne. Alan’s death was a great loss for the whole family.

Once again we redoubled our efforts to protect our children from the outside world. We became more involved in their lives, trying to help them avoid being too hurt when joining the adult world. We didn’t always succeed.

Looking back, I realized that I was then too involved in their lives and often interfered by trying to solve their problems when I should have let go of my children. Despite that, like many other couples in these troubled times, we sometimes failed but still managed to remain a close knit family.

Juliette, always the most adventurous, had gone to Istanbul, Turkey to teach. While teaching in Istanbul, Juliette, very entrepreneurial, managed to get Jimmy an exciting new architectural job: the design of a new gymnasium for her school. While the gymnasium was being built, we went several times to Turkey to visit.

On her day off, Juliette and I explored the bazaar, ate in a small restaurant, and visited markets. My Egyptian grandmother was born in Istanbul, and I felt very at home there. However, Juliette soon grew bored with teaching English to wealthy Turkish girls, and later college students, and decided to become a journalist. It was during the time of the first Gulf War. Because she was fluent in Turkish, she was hired by
Business Week.
Her first big break came when she covered the Gulf War on the Turkish-Iraqi border. She wrote from Cizre about the plight of the Kurds who were crossing the border from Iraq into Turkey. When the war was over, she reported on the Kurdish refugee camps where hundreds were dying. She also had a by-line for
The New York Post.
I learned about her exploits by reading the paper. When the war was over, Juliette continued to write for
Business Week.
She covered the war in Azerbaijan, one of the former Soviet Republics in the Caucasus. She sent dispatches about a fierce battle between Armenians and Azerbaijanis as witnessed from a helicopter also under fire. We learned all of this through her articles, living in fear that something terrible might happen to her.

Later, she wrote about the effect of the war on the Turkish economy, and at the same time, she was also falling in and out of love. First she fell deeply in love with a Turkish teacher, but this did not work. Later she fell in love with a French journalist who whisked her away to Moscow. This did not turn out either, but Juliette, still the great adventurer, learned Russian and was a witness of the Russian uprising in Moscow and the burning of the Russian “White House.” From Russia, she took many trips to Central Asia, to Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan. To our great relief, she came back to New York in one piece and started to work for
Forbes.
She had fallen in love with a bright American who was working in Saudi Arabia. David spoke Arabic and loved the Middle East. Marriage was in the air, and we felt very happy for her.

But it was Cecile who we worried about the most. She had taken years deciding what she wanted to do and finally decided to follow in Jimmy’s footsteps and study architecture. After graduating from Princeton as an architect, Cecile had a problem finding work. New York was in a recession and work for young architects was sparse. She worked for Jimmy’s office for a few months then for Arakawa, our artist friend. When Arata Isozaki, a Japanese architect and our friend, came to New York, he told Arakawa he needed young architects for his office in Tokyo. Arakawa suggested he hire Cecile. Arata said he would be eager to take on Cecile, and so for a while, Cecile worked at Arata’s New York office and then left for Tokyo to join the main office.

Much later, Jimmy was offered a spring show of his drawings in a prestigious gallery in Tokyo. We flew to Tokyo for the opening, and after a week in Tokyo, we spent time with Cecile. I was sad to leave Cecile alone again in Japan, but very soon letters and e-mail arrived full of good news. Cecile loved Japan, was learning the language very quickly, and was having a very creative time. By the fall, she had met a young Japanese architect and was deeply in love. At the next Christmas, they both arrived in New York. Ghen was a handsome and gracious man who loved music and art. He seemed to be a very talented architect, and most of all, he loved Cecile. We were delighted having them with us. When they were about to leave, being an interfering mother, I asked Ghen if he was going to marry Cecile: His answer was “I ask her every day, but she says she is happy as we are.”

A month later Cecile called, “We are getting married. But the wedding has to be in Japan because Ghen’s grandfather is too old to come to New York, and Ghen wants him to be present. You don’t have to do anything. We are designing the wedding.”

Cecile had been our most restless child, and we were ecstatic that she had finally found someone who shared her ideas about life. Although disappointed that the wedding would not take place in New York and that once married they would continue to live in Japan, I already was planning trips back and forth in my mind.

A few weeks before the wedding, we were awakened at two in the morning by a telephone call from Cecile. Ghen had died suddenly in her arms. The cause was a brain aneurysm. We learned to our horror that she had tried to get help from neighbors, but doors were slammed in her face, and when the ambulance had finally arrived, it was too late.

The next morning I flew to Japan to be with her. What do you say to your child when her world collapses? When you look at her and see how deep the hurt is? You say nothing; you are simply there. You hold her hands, you let her cry, and you stay by her side. The funeral was long and arduous. I stayed a week longer than I intended. I hated leaving her alone in the tiny apartment she had shared with Ghen. I wanted her back with us, but she adamantly refused. She was staying in Japan.

Months went by. Every time I called I could hear the tears in her voice. I had to help her get out of Japan. Jimmy and I decided that we had to talk to Arata Isozaki. I knew in my heart that I should not interfere, but I could not stand her pain and thought, right or wrong, that once out of Japan where everything reminded her of Ghen, she might feel better. Arata was an internationally renowned architect who had projects around the world. We begged him to send Cecile somewhere, anywhere out of Japan.

A few months later, Cecile announced that Arata Isozaki was sending her to Berlin to help with the building of a large project. Cecile had been in Berlin two years when she announced near Christmas that she was visiting us with a new wonderful friend. Christian, her future husband, came into our lives, and we hoped that Cecile had recovered from Ghen’s death and would be able to rebuild her life.

Meanwhile, Matthew, our first grandchild, was born.

Two years later, Marianne announced she was pregnant again; Thomas and Rebecca were married; and Juliette was seriously in love with David. They got married in Jordan, but they were moving back to New York.

A year later Julien, Marianne’s second little boy, was born. The family was growing.

As time went by, the family changed and grew even more. Two years after Julien was born, Marianne divorced and was living in Brooklyn with her two little boys. She had become very involved in education. She was now taking a degree in education at the New School University as she had decided to follow her dream of creating new, radical, smaller schools. She had met a young man, Edi, who shared her dreams. Together, once she graduated, they would move to Santa Barbara, California, to try and establish their dream school.

Thomas was designing very exciting projects at a leading New York firm while being totally absorbed by his lovely baby son, Luca.

Cecile had married Christian. She now lived in Berlin. She was still working as an architect but had also begun to write and was finishing a book of short stories. Her daughter, Celine, was saying her first words of English. Cecile was also expecting her second child.

Meanwhile, our house on Sullivan Street felt different. Our children had flown the coop, and the house seemed deserted, too vast for both of us. Jimmy decided to remodel the house.

“Let’s build an apartment downstairs. It will bring us much needed income.” I protested. I loved my house, my garden. I would lose my kitchen and dining room. But Jimmy promised to build me a new kitchen, better than the one I had downstairs, and a dining room with a copper dome.

“A
tempieto,”
he called it. “A small temple of food, just for you.”

Jimmy was very excited about this project. This was the first time that he was designing and building something new for us. I was often upset as for a month we camped in a house that was under construction, going back to our beginnings, often cooking in the fireplace while the new kitchen was being built. My lovely garden was trampled by the construction workers. I was getting very impatient, but then one day the project was finished and the downstairs apartment was rented. The
tempieto
was lovely, full of light with a great view of my lovely garden. Once again, I started to cook, inspired by my
tempieto.
We threw an enormous house-warming party, and all of New York seemed to be there. Friends, children, and grandchildren’s laughter filled the house, a flowering hibiscus grew in the kitchen balcony, and my roses bloomed once again.

It is Christmas Eve, and all our children are gathered in our Soho town house. Two days ago, Thomas and I went to buy a Christmas tree. Tonight we will decorate it with Christmas ornaments that we have accumulated over the years. My favorite ones are the ones we bought when our children were very young on our trip to Guatemala. Our friend, Philip Herrera, had suggested the trip and had given us the use of his house on Lake Atitlán. All around the lake were small villages where we bought these ornaments from a local artist. They are made of straw but look like gold in the glow of the tiny Christmas lights. There are other charming ornaments that our friends have brought us. For the past twenty years, we have given a party, inviting our friends to be with our children and grandchildren. Every guest had to bring something for the tree. I usually asked that they make it, but they seldom did. Around midnight we serve dinner, I call it a Reveillon, like the French. I serve a four-meat pâté,
boudin blanc
, a veal sausage served with good mustard, lentils with lots of garlic, salad, cheese, tangerines, and a
bûche de Noël
that Jerome, the patissier from Once Upon A Tart down the street makes every year.

After midnight, when all the guests have gone, we bring the presents down from hiding places upstairs. Jimmy and Marianne usually have made the best packages. One year, the year that the astronauts went to the moon, Jimmy transformed all the gifts into an enormous space ship. Another year he and Thomas built the city of Bethlehem, with palm trees decorated with little lights behind the village.