By Anne W. Semmes
Thank you, Ralph Waldo Emerson, for your inspiring quote on gratitude to start me off:
“Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously.” Well, there’s not a newspaper fat enough to include every good thing that came to me in 2022 but here are some highlights.
With all the divisions occurring in our country I continue to feel grateful that my Semmes ancestors chose to leave England to come to Maryland in the 17th century. I had the opportunity in my midlife to marry and make my life in England but did not have a big enough heart to leave my home country. There were too many freedoms, too many opportunities, too many benefits.
Take Social Security for one. Learning at years end I would have an increase in my Social Security was welcomed in this time of our struggling economy. Thank you, FDR, for establishing in 1935 this “social insurance program designed to pay retired workers aged 65 or older a continuing income after retirement.” But I am far from retirement!
Great is my gratitude that my work as journalist continues with the rare opportunity that I am presented by the Greenwich Sentinel to write about this extraordinary community and its extraordinary individuals that live in my hometown of Greenwich.
Speaking of journalists, the news came hard that a favorite broadcast journalist, Judy Woodruff was stepping down as news anchor of the PBS NewsHour. She has been for me a calm, clear, conscientious voice in a fractious time in our nation’s history. But little did I know what she had been facing at home with her oldest son in all those years.
Young Jeffrey born with spina bifida presented a challenge but there was hope as he became “an active student,” a swimmer and skier. Then at age 16 his doctor recommended an operation to replace a shunt inserted soon after birth to drain excess fluid on his brain. Alas, the next day he was in a coma. His life was saved but he was left unable to walk, “with limited movement, vision and speech.” A “devastated” Woodruff, who admitted in a recent news story, that she had cried every day for the next two years, was given some winning counsel by one of her son’s doctors.
She was told that her quitting her broadcast journalism “wouldn’t heal her son.” That what she needed was to “be the best person…the best mom you can be, support your family in a sense that you’re healthy, mentally and physically. Jeffrey doesn’t need a mom who’s broken into pieces and miserable; he needs a mom who’s able to put one foot in front of the other.’” And this is what Judy Woodruff has done for so many years, and I did not know it! Thank you, Judy – I am so grateful for your example, your true grit, and caring.
This past year it’s hard to believe I had a hip replacement. What a success! And I’ve escaped Covid thus far! So wasn’t it free-wheeling fun to head into New York for my end of year birthday with a couple of friends to see the Alvin Ailey Dance group perform my favorite Duke Ellington music, “The River Suite.” I had planned to introduce granddaughter Ruby to this but learned sadly she’d still be in school. I wanted her to experience what the music meant to me.
So, years ago, I lived on the Byram River with adjoining lake and had my own pair of pinioned swans. I’d named them after two famed Royal Ballet dancers Antoinette (Sibley) and Anthony (Dowell). When I first heard The River Suite, my swans were no more, over the years their two offspring flew off and then the two sadly died. But upon hearing that music those swan days returned. Ellington describes the music in his memoir, “Music is my Mistress” as an imaginary journey beginning with “Spring,” then “Meander,”, then “Giggling Rapids,” then “Lake,” then “Falls,” then “Whirlpool,” then the “River.” That musical journey told the happy/sad tale of my swan family.
So, my friends and I, we all wore masks for the performance at the New York City Center. They were bowled over by the music as I was. It’s a classical and jazz blend. And then departing for the train one friend suggested we hail a pedicab, those bicycle-drawn carts with blaring music. And off we went down Fifth Avenue, drawn hazardly through the crush by our bicyclist with his music of Frank Sinatra singing “Silent Night” soaring as we passed the Christmas Tree at Rockefeller Center. It was a night to remember – for which I am forever grateful!
