Ode to the kooky ones

We all have one, don’t we? That kooky relative that’s just a little… off. When I was a teenager, my favorite uncle (who is a tad kooky himself) married a woman named Marilyn. To my white bread suburban eyes, she was as exotic as they come. Her brown hair was a wild array of curls, spreading willy-nilly up and around her head like fluffy clouds. Her eyes sparkled just a little too much. She laughed loudly and often, and she had the broadest smile I’d ever seen. She was rarely without it as far as I could tell. Just a little too happy, to my narrow way of thinking. And she was very bohemian, with her loose, flowing clothes and odd grooming habits. This was the first woman I’d ever known that didn’t shave her legs, on purpose! Being a very vain teen, I wouldn’t take out the garbage without full on hair and make-up. For me, Marilyn just did not compute. I was both fascinated and repelled by her. Even a little embarrassed for her. She was just so… wild. A free spirit in our conformist Washington, DC suburb.

Once, at a holiday family dinner, I had an attack of severe stomach pains (a frequent occurrence at the time). She actually got down on her hands and knees to teach me the universal ‘let-out-the-gas’ technique. “You just put your head down, and your butt up… like this!” right in front of everyone! I was completely mortified, but – ahem – relieved. Clearly, she meant well. But couldn’t she be a little more ‘normal’? Again, that push me/pull me dynamic was hard at work.

She wrote a long book of poetry: The Asboo Bampin Forest and Other Places I Have Been. I got the chance to read it, bound in manuscript form. It was a wild ride, indeed. Beautiful and surreal. My favorite poem was Daffodils Laughing, and I have never gotten it – or her – out of my head. Her smile and happy daffodils are forever linked. In fact, when I hear the song “Yellow”, I think of her.

These days, I rarely wear make-up and seldom shave my legs unless I have to. I’m not making a statement or bucking the establishment either, as she was. I am simply lazy! And I disdained her. God, the shallowness of the young! She cared not a whit about convention, or people’s opinions of her. She lived as she liked, and I now admire her for that. Sadly, the marriage was not long-lived. I never had the chance to know Marilyn as an adult, a relationship I think I’d have quite enjoyed. Still, my memories of her have informed my views on life in some indelible way. I’m awfully glad I knew her.

Wherever you are Marilyn, I hope the daffodils are laughing.