Evening with the Wife

By W. F. Twyman, Jr.

Start spreading the news I’m leaving today I want to be a part of it New York, New York These vagabond shoes Are longing to stray Right through the very heart of it New York, New York If I can make it there I’ll make it anyway It’s up to you New York, New York — As sung by Frank Sinatra, Bluebloods, Season 1, Episode 1

To understand my wife, I mean to really understand my wife, you have to understand my wife’s sense of self. The Ivy League education and degree are superficial. All of the accoutrements I bristle against like Alpha Kappa Alpha and even Jack and Jill take one only so far. The trappings of Our Kind of People are largely inherited like the armoire from the summer place in the 1920s. Belonged to the great grandparents. A love of children comes closer to the mark but, when we relax as husband and wife on a Friday evening, the house is quiet. The kids are gone — living their adult lives in Palo Alto, North Park and New Haven.

(The other day, my car mechanic asked about the kids. He has known our kids since they were in diapers. His face lit up as I recounted their higher education. He was proud of me as a Dad, and of my wife, for raising children of high aim. The compliment felt nice as it was unexpected.)

But back to understanding my wife when she is most centered and at peace.

Everyone has an identity. I think of myself as a small-town kid from Chester, Virginia. Maybe I will place that epigraph on my tombstone. My wife is the daughter of a New York City police officer. Law enforcement centers my wife.

Tonight, we settled into place in the living room with a salad. Hope springs eternal. I turned on her favorite television show, Bluebloods, and watched my wife transport herself to the streets of her father’s passion, the streets of New York.

Bluebloods is the story of NYC Police Commissioner Frank Reagan and his Irish Catholic family. The Reagans have been invested in the police force for generations. The patriarch of the family, Commissioner Reagan, runs a tight family as a son, father and grandfather. The sense of tradition and legacy appeals to my wife. She follows the characters as they combat bad guys and she see echoes of her father’s life. She grew up with a strong sense of police as good guys, as family.

I enjoy watching my wife lose herself in the story of a NYPD family. As she watches the episodes, she sees familiar buildings of her youth. She recognizes street life, although she was sheltered within the oasis of Our Kind of People and the summer place. The accents are the accents of her Dad, Mom and Grandparents, close and distant cousins, classmates at the local private school and neighbors.

Conclusion: Black Lives Matter (BLM) may be supported in public for show. On a lazy Friday night, however, memories of a New York City childhood and Dad in uniform trump ideology, dogma and slogan words. I believe in writing about examined lives.