Book Worm

This picture was taken at Grandma Nolan's house, February 1, 1947, the day before Richard was born. I was 18 months old. Patricia was three when she read regularly to her kitten. In my baby book Mom wrote: "A book worm--she loved all books. At 2 years her favorites were Dumbo, Children's Garden of Verses, Alice in Wonderland. Was always eager for Cinderella, Goldilocks, etc." Under my favorite books, she listed Daddy's and Uncle George's yearbook, Mother Goose, all magazines, ABC book. Later I wrote in Nancy Drew.

Are book worms made or born? Mom and Dad were consummate book worms. People who say they don't have time to read baffle me. How do they stay sane? How do they escape? How do they figure out stuff? My first library card seemed magical. Jacqui Blackstone once paid me the supreme compliment: "Your idea of domesticity is putting your books in alphabetical order." Reading always took precedence over housework in my family. I was enchanted when three -year-old Elizabeth crooned to her doll: "Don't cry baby; mommy will read to you."

Mom introduced me to my favorite author, Jane Austen, when I was 12. Jane Austen introduced me to Andy Graves. I made a Austen literary allusion on an internet support group, and Andy made a witty comeback. I was instantly smitten. Little did I know how much reading about green cards awaited me.

Penguins

This picture brings back many memories, whether fond or not I have to puzzle out. From first grade through high school, I was taught by the Dominican Sisters of Amityville. Richard was in St. Martha's first graduating class, and all my brothers graduated from St. Martha's; I was too old. I went to Holy Redeemer in Freeport for first and second grade and then Queen of the Most Holy Rosary in Roosevelt for third through eighth grade. Richard and I both went to St. Agnes High School in Rockville Centre; Stephen went to St. Mary's in Manhasset. Peter, Michael, and Mark went to Maria Regina in Uniondale.

The tall nun on the right was Sister Miriam Francis; she was the principal at both Holy Redeember and the Queen. She died last year at age 93, having worked well into her 80's. I wasn't surprised; in retrospect she was an amazing educator. A tall, elegant woman, she effortlessly ruled her 800 students with a clicker; she never had to raise her voice. One click, and we were instantly silent and attentive. She knew the name and the history of every student in the school. We all both feared and admired her, were willing to work hard for her praise.

I was a very good girl. In seventh grade Sister Miriam Francis told me I could not have had a more perfect record. So I was never the victim of a nun's wrath, never had an eraser hurled at me, never was hit by a pointer, never had to stay after school to clean the blackboards. My innate shyness was reinforced, however. Good students only answered questions; they never asked them.

The nuns were very young; many had not yet been to college but were expected to teach classes of over sixty students. Everything I know about English grammar I learned from the nuns; we must have diagrammed a thousand sentences. As I get older, my memories get better; I had more good teachers than dismal ones.

Koch Hair

These pictures beg to be shared with everyone. The top one of Mark, Stephen, and Michael was taken June 16, 1974 at Peter's wedding to Merce's mother, Jacquelyn Blackstone. They got married at the New York University Chapel; Jacquie had just graduated from NYU. Mark was almost 15; Michael was 18; Stephen was 25. Richard has rejoiced in his good fortune at not being able to come and be included in this lineup. The family first met Michelle at this wedding.

Thankfully, the groom had cleaned up for the wedding. This picture of Peter and Vanessa had been taken only six months previously.

Politics

This is a picture of Robert Kennedy speaking at my graduation from Fordham University in 1967. Do I have to explain who he is? The younger brother of President John Kennedy, he served as Attorney General, then became Senator from New York. He was running for president in 1998 when he was assassinated June 5, ten days before my wedding to Chris Hawkins. I remember I had a final wedding dress fitting the day after the assassination, and I was in tears most of the time.

In the midst of a heated debate between Uncle Ken and the younger generation, I posted this account of my political evolution. I would love to hear everyone else's stories.

My first specific political memory centered around the duck and cover, hide under our desks, exercises that were a regular feature of my early school life from age 5 on. I knew enough about nuclear war to be terrified. We lived near to an air force base and I used to go out to the backyard, look up at the planes, and try to determine if they were American or Russian. I remember getting a book out of the library on aircraft identification. When I heard Joseph Stalin died, I remember asking if that meant no one would drop bombs on us.

In 1954 I had a severe case of the measles and Grandma Nolan came to help nurse me. She was listening to the Joseph McCarthy army hearings. Hatred of McCarthy's voice
might have shaped my entire political development. The other determining force was my obsession with John F. Kennedy. I first took an interest in political conventions in 1956, when I was 11. Kennedy made a brief try for the vice presidential nomination, and my mom mentioned he was Catholic, that there had never been a Catholic president. From 1956 to 1963, I read everything I could about Kennedy. When I was 15 I did volunteer work for his presidential campaign.

In high school we had political debates to imitate the famous Kennedy/Nixon debates and I represented Kennedy. What he believed in, I believed in. Gradually I moved to the left of his pragmatic liberalism. Certainly Kennedy was responsible for my decision to major in political science in college.

I cannot precisely date my interest in and commitment to civil rights. When I was a freshman, I joined my college's Interracial Understanding Group. I was envious of those college students who have the affluence to spend the summer down south registering voters and didn't have to worry about money to pay their tuition. Kennedy's assassination, occurring in the fall of my freshman year in college, devastated me. I felt like there had been a death in my immediate family. I quickly translated my political allegiance to Bobby Kennedy.

Gradually during college I became a pacifist. Opposition to the Vietnam War right from the beginning was the catalyst. My husband to be, Chris, applied for conscientious objector status and was willing to face jail rather than be inducted. We became very active in the Catholic Peace Fellowship, the Fellowship of Reconciliation, and the War Resister's League, all pacifist organizations. We went on several anti-war demonstrations both in New York and Washington. I briefly attended Stanford University where resistance to the war was at its height. Almost every afternoon, David Harris, Joan Baez's future husband, spoke out eloquently against the war.

My first job after Stanford was as an assistant to Victor Riesel, a labor columnist, who had been blinded by acid thrown in his face by the mob who controlled the waterfront he was exposing. One of my assigments was to read the AP ticker to him every day, clip articles in all the newspapers, labor papers. This was in 1968, when King and Kennedy were assassinated, when anti-war protect was at its height.

Would Size Order Have Helped?

I keep trying to figure out what ordering--height, weight, age, income, or maturity--would have kept Stephen and Peter in check at Vanessa's wedding. Everyone is behaving beautifully in 1961 and 1967. However, if you look closely at the Peter of 1967, you can clearly see he is plotting mischief. After 1967 none of us cut our hair again for almost a decade. Looking at 1961 picture, I wondered if Richard made Stephen kneel down to exaggerate his height advantage, if it even existed.

This is the first Koch wedding since Rose's and Brian's that everyone was able to attend. We have had eight Koch weddings in the last five years: Rose and Brian, 2000; Mary Jo and Andy, 2001; Katherine and Josh, 2002; Patrick and Elizabeth, 2004; Katie and Joe, 2004; Mercedes and Matt, 2005; Elizabeth and Brent, 2005; Vanessa and John, 2005. All the new Koches behave appropriately when their pictures are taken, so the gene pool looks promising:)

Drums and Batons

My mom and dad must have been dedicated to nurturing their children's unique gifts at whatever cost. Otherwise, why allow Santa to bring Joe a drum and me a baton.

We lived in a tiny two bedroom, one-story house. Was Joe allowed to play the drum inside? Joe has always assured me I beat him up regularly when he was too young to fight back. No one has ever verified this accusation, and this picture proves it must be false. If I regularly terrorized my brothers, surely my parents would not have given me such an effective weapon. This picture proves Joe had not a fear in the world that my baton would come in contact with his head or his drum. My frequent confessions that "I hit my brothers" must have been due to an overscrupulous conscience.

On the other hand, I regularly asked forgiveness for hitting my brothers in confession. The priest should have been more skeptical about my resolution of never doing it again. But I used my hairbrush, not my baton.

Memories and Photographs

I have always been intrigued by the relationship between my memories and the photographs I have frequently seen. Immersing myself in the family history for the last four years, I certainly remember much I had forgotten. I hope everyone finds my photo blog equally helpful.

But do I remember the actual event or do I remember the slides of the event? Do I remember clearly what was never photographed? Unquestionably, discussing the picture slides with the whole family did elicit everyone's memories, which then became incorporated into individual memories. I fondly remember countless slide shows with mom and dad, Grandma Nolan, uncles and aunts, brothers and sisters-in-law, and nephews and nieces. There was always screams of laugher and frequent admonitions to the younger Koches to stop standing between the projector and the screen. I recall Mom's telling me Richard and Kathy were watching the family slides. I suspected correctly that she would call back a few hours later to announce their engagement. I encouraged Andy to watch the family slides on his second visit to New York in 1996:) I tend to gauge the seriousness of potential family mates by how immersed they were in the family photos.

Yet the pictures so distort the reality of our everyday life. We got a few toys at Christmas, but we never played with them. We went away on vacation the entire summer. In the summer we lived in the water, either in the pool or at the beach; in the winter there was always abundant snow. We were always outside, never inside. We never played ping pong or knock hockey. We never played board games that ended with some poor sport upsetting the board once his loss became inevitable. (I was always a good sport because I was usually winning.)

But much of our outside play is neglected. We never played badmitten; we never played baseball; we never went ice skating; we never had a sled; we never rode a bicycle. My brothers did play basketball in the driveway unless the next door neighbor was complaining to the cops about evening play. Richard never ran cross country. Several brothers were photographed in football regalia, but there was no proof the Michael actually played on his high school team. Michael's broken leg is honored, but not Peter's broken arm. Richard's missing tooth is noted.

We were very religious; we spent an inordinate amount of time receiving our communion and being confirmed. However, we never went to church at other times. I never wore glasses; that is an outstanding accomplishment given that I got my glasses at 10 and my contact lenses at 19.

We only graduated from school; we never attended it. Except for a picture of Richard's graduating from St. Martha's, there are no pictures of our schools. You would never realize we attended three different high schools and three different grammar schools. According to the pictures, we never studied, never read a book, never went to the library, never participated in any after school activity. Richard was a drummer; I was a baton twirler. Peter started playing the accordion at his second wedding. Our family pets are very neglected. I gave up trying to figure out how many cats we had and what they looked like. Familes who call their cats "cat" don't waste film on them.

Relationships are neglected. Mom and Dad never kissed one another after their wedding or hugged us after babyhood. During our childhood we always wore pajamas for photographs. Dad was rarely there because he was always behind the camera. Mom was never pregnant or nursing, an accomplishment even more amazing than my never wearing glasses. No one was ever filthy, battered, bloody. Anne was only my friend during school graduations. Bob Logan seems to have been Richard's and Stephen's only friend. Jackie only appears once while she and Peter were in high school. The siblings related to each other by lining up in size order.

Christmas Eve at Grandma's House

My daughter the writer wrote this description of a family Christmas Eve as part of a college application essay.

We’re in the midst of our annual Christmas Eve tree-trimming bash at my grandmother’s house. My father and my uncle Gerry are bringing in the tree, and my sisters and I are breathlessly awaiting its unveiling. I’m afraid that the reason is not that we’re waiting for this magical season to weave its spell over us. We get as sentimental as anyone over Christmas, but right now we’re wondering what geometric figure the tree will most closely resemble. My grandmother is very frugal. The result of this is that her trees are always cheap, but they also tend to have rather original shapes.

They bring the tree through the door, set it in the stand, and cut the netting around it. It does not disappoint. It’s, it’s...it’s nearly a perfect cylinder! My sisters and I begin hanging the ornaments. They consist of a few beautiful heirlooms, some traditional Christmas balls, many, many plastic multi-colored plastic disco balls, and a good number of styrofoam-and-yarn-elves which have been mysteriously decapitated over the years.

The traditional meal of tortilla chips and salsa is served. Much to everyone’s chagrin, but to no one’s surprise, Grandma has frozen the salsa. She has a rather touching faith that the best thing to do for any, and I do mean any, food is to stick it in the freezer for six months. Fortunately, the chips escaped unscathed.

My father places the angel on top of the tree, and we step back and admire our handiwork. It’s may not be one of man’s great artistic endeavors, but this tree has character, lots of character.