A Different Harvard Square

(Photo credit: Nextstop.com)

For those of us who hate wrapping up each workday in darkness, the prospect of winter solstice, less than three weeks away, carries the promise that the worst will soon be over. In the meantime I can visualize a simpler time in life when I coped with 4:28 pm sunsets by strapping Daphne into her car seat, tossing her stroller in the trunk, and heading off to Harvard Square in my Ford Maverick.

I could count on the Square to be brightly lit with neon and enough hustle and bustle to placate a 26 year old new, at home mom needing an escape from suburban Chestnut Hill. Parking was relatively easy, and our routine was simple.

The Harvard Square I knew between becoming a mom in 1976 and sending Daphne off to pre-school in 1979 no longer exists. Few young mothers I know these days have the luxury of postponing the decision about whether or not they should be out in the workforce.

It’s only in retrospect that life acquires meaning and structure. Despite my inner struggles about not yet knowing what my career might be or how I’d ultimately emerge as a professional woman, I now cherish that time with Daphne and the flexible schedule that allowed us to spend a portion of most days strolling through Harvard Square.

With a nod to Black Monday, I can’t complain about the convenience of being able to shop for books and clothing online, but the Internet hadn’t come into our lives just yet. Besides, the Internet would have done nothing to get us out of the house on dark, cold afternoons when I knew it would be hours before Daphne’s dad, a psychiatrist seeing patients at his office in Brookline, would be home for dinner.

Perhaps needing to conjure up sensations of summer, I usually made Emack & Bolio’s our first stop. Conscious of not wanting to remove chocolate stains from Daphne’s spiffy, one piece snowsuit, I would opt for a vanilla frappe the two of us could share without interrupting our stroll. At the risk of belaboring the obvious, there are some things that can’t be purchased online.

Eventually we would make our way into the bookstores. The surprise is that some of them still exist, including the Harvard Book Store and the Grolier, specializing in slim volumes of poetry. Tennessee Williams’ Memoirs, the purchase of a woman who never regrets having majored in English, survived the purge preceding our move to a condo in urban Brookline nearly three years ago.

By 1977 I was free-lancing for The Brookline Chronicle Citizen. Daphne’s dad had suggested that I sign up for a series of writers’ workshops at Radcliffe Seminars, and I began selling my homework assignments to our local newspaper. Workshops often concluded with a stop at the Blacksmith House for coffee and sacher torte with the women from my class, all of whom were seeking an identity beyond wife and mom.

Once Daphne started pre-school and I began doing interviews for my stories, our trips to Harvard Square became less frequent. The big moment of pride came when the instructor for my writing workshops, Marty Robbins, asked me to guest lecture about how I’d developed free-lance opportunities.

My then three year old accompanied me in her little navy wool blazer, white cotton shirt, and plaid skirt. Just as Daphne was beginning to tire of drawing on a large, rolling chalkboard, I got a question from a fifty something woman peering at me over her half-glasses. “Do you have a five year plan?” she asked.

I told her I take each day as it comes. Some things don’t need to change, including the ability to embrace the spontaneity provided by life’s uncertainties.