Maybe A May Day

May Day - May 1st - blows in and out depending on the mood of the moment politically. Seventy years ago, on the first of May it meant for this young girl at Miss Hutchison’s School for Girls, being excited about the May Day program. We were preparing for a Maypole dance and the sun was shining, a sign spring was knee deep and winter over.  The maypole was ready with its satiny ribbons attached at the top of a pole, to be picked up by the Seniors, one for each, to start the over and under twisting of the ribbon until it was wrapped around the wooden pole (painted white.) It is called the Dance of May or Spring or something acknowledging the arrival of good weather and time to hang the heavy jackets and sweaters in the back of the closet.

This dance for maidens birthed to honor Floralia, a Roman goddess of flowers, back in the days of Greek and Roman gods and goddesses. Founded by Emperor Commodus, it meant one could party the night and day away.  But it put licentiousness on the forefront, and that was a negative, so the next Emperor, Constantine, closed it down. Yet, through history May Day was celebrated in Germany to honor Saint Walpurga, and in Gaelic culture, it was an event when cattle were made to jump over fires to protect their milk from being stolen by fairies - then leap back over the fires for luck. Gees. 

May Day got real in the 18th century through the Roman Catholic churches effort to give devotions to the Blessed Virgin Mary. And other Popes have re-arranged its reason and activities.  But in the 1950s it was a spring act at my all-girl’s school for an excellent female student to be honored and crowned as Queen of May. On that Spring Day at Miss Hutchison’s School, I was a monk (because I was very overweight and not popular) whose role was to wander around getting into mischief, lightly disrupting the Maypole dance and maybe to hold the feet of a clown standing on its head, kind of thing. Sort of a Father Brown type.

But it was only a few years later, when I was at a girl’s Episcopal boarding school in Virginia, that May Day became frightening to us 15-year-olds. In the late 1950s, Russia was swinging swords and bombs and tanks in and around Europe and disturbing and threatening the United States, putting on a huge military parade with “kick feet high” and disciplined marchers and soldiers like none other, while all the tanks and most modern weapons of the moment rolled through the super wide streets of Moscow. It put the fear of God in me and all my fellow students at boarding school. We were sure war was just around the corner and would we, in Virginia, be able to get back home? This was the time when there was a thick line in Germany - drawn on a major street to divide the West from the East - no one dare touch the toe on the enemy side because, we were told, war could erupt. And we in the US were warned that we should all have cellars to escape to down underground so the atomic bomb might not kill us. We had just come out of war in 1945, and with a few twists and turns, and maybe not sufficient prayer, the world was about to cross a thick black line in Berlin that could ignite a war with bombs and armor never imagined. Ironically, decades later, things have not changed as we have been experiencing Russia’s attack on Ukraine. Will wars ever end?

in the 1950s, we girls were terrified. Where was our faith in this? Where was the prayer and the altar and the saints who had suffered and scramble and soared and supposedly given us security? The need was a place to hide from bombs, especially the atomic ones. But did our parents anticipate digging a cell in the back yard and pack it with canned foods and water and I guess soap and batteries - who knew how long we might have to live underground if the war exploded on May Day. It was frightening for me and my roommate off in the inclines of a girl’s boarding school, far from home, far from our Sunday school class, our churches, and our pets.
This was a time when skyscrapers didn’t scrape so high, and other than New York City, they were not so impressive and could be wiped out with a swoosh, probably.  In Memphis, there were only two rather tall buildings - one housed my dentist was and I hated that - The Exchange Building and the other Sterrick Building. I don’t know why I remember those from childhood. I hated going to the dentist and cried and cried the whole time.

In the ‘70ties, I lived in the farm manager’s house on our farm with the treasured cellar below the kitchen - and it was spacious, whether it would protect us from the “red” war or not. In those years, when I was fashion editor for the Memphis Press-Scimitar, a retired, famous fashion photographer Jack Robinson used it for his giant machine  which he used to print out giant photographs - but from 1946 until 1951 when we moved from the Broadnax estate in old Memphis (at South Parkway East and Castilia) to the cattle and horse farm,  we lived in that farm keeper’s house (while my parents dream house with built) and at least we had a cellar to hide from tornados and flying bombs, if that were to happen. It was a style of life then and I guess it should be now with all the dramatic weather and storms and fears of war.

Well, the May pole dancing continues, I think, in many all-girl’s schools. And Woe to those in tornado valley who do not have a basement, that escape into a cellar in times of tornados and storms, which seem to get more violent and dramatic every year. And nothing much changes. Here we are again worried about our friends at war with Russia and not many having cellars to protect them from bombs. And how do the many Russian basketball superstars (it’s not just Russia, but Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan in its spell), enjoying life in these United States face their prosperity here in the US, as their homelands offer constant threats to peace and hope as rumbles of war increases its violence week by week. And the Russian Putin moves his military weapons into the corners of his nation, threatening to take on a wandering former part of Russia, the Ukraine. Nothing is safe along a snooping border that needs super-wide space to parade his military collection like a series of child’s cars, soldiers, trucks, tanks and weapons and ugly bombs, if only to stir up the nerves and worries of the people of not only his nation but his enemy nations. Maybe the man is planning to celebrate May first with a boom and a bomb. I pray not. 

Have a peaceful May Day and rejoice that Spring has arrived in the northern hemisphere, and fall has fallen in the southern half of the world as it prepares for winter. Don’t forget, God is in control, and He loves every one of us no matter where we are in this world, no matter if we dance around the Maypole or not to welcome spring.

 ~ Rev

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audrey@audreytaylorgonzalez.com
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