Summer of '69(8)

“Thank you, Daddy,” she says.

He smiles. “I’m going to miss you, kiddo. But I’ll see you on weekends.”

“I guess since I’m supposed to be responsible and mature now, I have to stop complaining about going away,” Jessie says.

“Yes, please,” David says. “And I’ll tell you what. When I come to the island, we’ll walk to the Sweet Shoppe, get you a double scoop of malachite chip, and you can complain about your grandmother for as long as you want. Deal?”

“Deal,” Jessie says, and for one brief moment at the beginning of her thirteenth year, Jessie Levin is happy.





Born to Be Wild



The conversation isn’t going well, but that’s hardly unusual for a twenty-year-old woman talking to her parents in the summer of 1969.

“I need some space to breathe,” Kirby says. “I need some air under my wings. I’m an adult. I should be able to make my own choices.”

“You can call yourself an adult and make your own choices when you’re paying to support yourself,” David says.

“I told you,” Kirby says. “I found a job. And I won’t be far. One island away.”

“Absolutely not,” Kate says. “You’ve been arrested twice. Arrested, Katharine.”

Kirby cringes. Her mother only breaks out Kirby’s first name when she wants to sound stern. “But not thrown in jail.”

“But fined,” David says.

“For no reason!” Kirby says. “It’s like the Boston police never heard of freedom of assembly.”

“You must have done something to provoke the officer,” David says. “Something you’re not telling us.”

Well, yes, Kirby thinks. Obviously.

“And we’ve had to lie to your grandmother,” Kate says. “If she finds out you’ve been arrested—twice—she’ll…”

“Take away my trust fund?” Kirby says. “I think we all know she can’t do that.” Kirby will be given control of her trust fund when she graduates from college or when she turns twenty-five, whichever comes first. This has been her sole motivation for staying enrolled at Simmons.

David sighs. “What’s the job?”

Kirby gives them a victorious smile. “I’ll be working as a chambermaid at the Shiretown Inn in Edgartown.”

“A chambermaid?” Kate says.

“You can’t even clean your own room,” David says.

“Now you’re exaggerating,” Kirby says. She decides to stick with eagerness and enthusiasm because she knows this will be more persuasive than anger and indignation. “Listen, I realize I’ve never held a job before. But that’s because I’ve spent all my spare time on my causes.”

“We’ve spent all our spare time on your causes,” Kate says with a barely concealed eye roll.

“Dad has,” Kirby says. “Remember when I was in high school? You didn’t even want me to march with Dr. King. You told me I was too young!”

“You were too young!” Kate says.

“What you meant was that I was too white,” Kirby says.

“Don’t put words in my mouth, young lady.”

“No one will ever march with Dr. King again,” Kirby says. “So that memory is officially priceless and you nearly kept me from having it. I was with Miss Carpenter the entire time, nothing bad was going to happen; it was a peaceful protest, that was the point! The antiwar protests this spring were different because the country is different now. Students like me are the enemy of the establishment—but you should both be happy I’m thinking for myself and not just falling in line!” Kirby pauses. She sees David softening a bit, but her mother remains rigid. “I want to get a job this summer, and after I graduate, I’m going to pursue a career. I want to be more than just a wife and mother. I don’t want to end up like…Blair.”

“Watch it,” Kate says. “Being a mother is a blessing.”

“But you have to admit—” Kirby stops herself before she shares an ungenerous opinion about her older sister. Blair and Kirby have long been described as the overachiever and the underachiever, respectively. (Okay, no one has ever said that out loud, but Kirby knows people think it.) Blair scored straight As all through high school and went to Wellesley College, where she made the dean’s list every single term. She won the English department’s award for outstanding student, and her thesis about Edith Wharton received some sort of special distinction from a panel made up of professors from all Seven Sister schools. Blair had gotten a job teaching the top-tier senior girls at the Winsor School, a position that opened up approximately once every fifty years. From there it would have been a short hop to a graduate degree and becoming a professor. But what had Blair done? Married Angus, quit the job, and gotten pregnant.

“Admit what?” Kate asks.

That Blair’s a disappointment, Kirby thinks. But that’s not true. The person who’s a disappointment is Kirby herself.

Kirby is tempted to come clean with her parents, to tell them she has just endured the worst three months of her life, both physically and emotionally. She needs to wipe away the memory of the protests, the arrests, her love affair with Officer Scott Turbo, the trip to Lake Winnipesaukee. She had been dealt a losing hand of fear, anxiety, heartbreak, and shame.