There was disagreement in the air when Ann attended her first meeting of CUSS, Citizens United for the Study of Secession, but it had little to do with politics. Instead, the heated discussion around the sunken Sherman Oaks living room, with its gigantic sectional sofa, oversized ficus tree, and big-screen TV, centered on food. Linda, the chapter chairperson and hostess, had brought in a tray from Jerry’s Delicatessen in Studio City. However, a vocal minority felt strongly that Art’s Delicatessen, a mile or so farther east, would have been a smarter, tastier choice.
“There’s no getting around it,” said one woman. “Jerry’s is a chain.” She uttered that last word disdainfully, as if “chain” food was prechewed and filled with rat hair.
“There’s only one Art’s,” pointed out another woman. “It’s a family operation. It shows.”
“Where every sandwich is a work of Art,” added another woman, feeling the necessity to throw in Art’s shopworn motto for lack of anything original to say.
Ann was firmly with the Art’s rebels, but she remained quiet, conserving her energy for the rigorous political debate she knew would follow. She found it odd that the group was so small, and that it was all women—all upper-middle-class white women driving SUVs and wearing gold earrings. Not that women can’t move mountains, mind you, but she expected that something so highly charged and political would be, well, more coed. Maybe even a tad more diverse. But that wasn’t important. Ann had questions, about schools, taxes, police, the fire department—splitting the Valley off from the rest of Los Angeles seemed fraught with peril. What form of government would the new city have? Is it like a divorce? Will the powers that run Los Angeles try to pawn off the old, ineffective streetcleaning machines on the new city, keeping the good stuff for itself? Will secession happen overnight? Will the Valley go to bed on a Tuesday night and wake up Wednesday morning with a new mayor, new city council, new fire and police chief, and new superintendent of schools? Or do cities secede gradually, one department at a time? What about the Dodgers and LACMA? Can you have a custody fight over a baseball team and an art museum? Why is all the good stuff on that side of the hill, anyway? Maybe USC or UCLA could move to the Valley. Certainly USC would be interested—it’s in such a terrible part of town.
Those were the questions haunting Ann. The questions haunting the rest of the group had more to do with latkes. The superiority of Art’s latkes versus the pathetic attempts at Jerry’s.
“What do you expect from Jerry’s?” asked one woman. “It’s inside a bowling alley.” The group nodded, sadly acknowledging the bitter truth of that statement. Jerry’s did indeed share a building with a bowling alley.
Ann felt that perhaps she should speak up. “How soon before the meeting actually begins?” she asked, carefully using a therapeutic tone of voice so that her question would sound nonthreatening.
The group grew silent as they pondered how to tell the new person that this was the meeting.
Finally, one of the women spoke. “One of things we try to do here is build a sense of community. We’ve been the bastard stepchild of Los Angeles for so long, we forget that we have an identity.”
“And power,” added another.
“Our agenda is not a downtown businessman’s agenda. We’re not obsessed with power. We want to build something, not tear down.”
To Ann, this was beginning to sound like those feminist meetings she had gone to at Everywoman’s Village when the boys were young. That’s not such a bad thing, she thought. She had appreciated the sense of community she had gotten there, and if CUSS gave her the same thing, she’d be ahead of the game. She still loved Everywoman’s Village, after all. The pottery class she took there was better than therapy. Besides, everyone loved the series of decorative bowls she made in that class and her teacher wondered why she didn’t try to sell them.
One woman began to tear up. “Perhaps you’re new to the Valley,” she said to Ann. “Perhaps you haven’t had to live with the low self-esteem and self-loathing the way the rest of us have.”
Before Ann could protest, the woman held up her hand.
“I’m going to make a confession now. I’m going to tell this room something I never, ever talk about.” The group again became quiet as it prepared to share. “Years ago, after my second baby was born, my husband and I prepared a will. We wanted to make sure that if, God forbid, something bad happened to us, our children would be well cared for.” The audience murmured its approval.
“But we had a decision to make. Who would take care of the kids if we died? Would it be my parents—two wonderful people who loved and cared for our children deeply, who lived right here in Sherman Oaks and saw the children often? Or would it be his parents—cold, wealthy, self-absorbed Gentiles who lived in Holmby Hills?”
Even Ann found herself leaning forward to hear more.
“When we filed that will, I did something I will be forever ashamed of. I agreed with my husband that his parents should get guardianship of our children—not because they were better people, not because they were rich—but because …”
She pointed a finger in Ann’s direction.
“But because I didn’t want my children to grow up in the Valley if they didn’t have to!”
Several small gasps filled the room, followed by sotto voce expressions of support and understanding.
“To me, that’s why we’re here. So that no mother will ever be forced to make the choice I had to make.”
Even Ann realized that all the air had been sucked out of the room and that any sensible discussion was now impossible, so she got up and made herself a sandwich from the Jerry’s deli platter. ?
There is no getting around it, she thought. Art’s is definitely the better deli.