Babysitting George by Celia Walden

George Best: 22 May 1946 died 25 November 2005

At first, George Best, the surname seemed predestined.  At age 17, he scored a soccer triumph which made history for the team Manchester United.  Throughout the 1960s, he was sought-after on every level.  In addition to his heroic sports status, Best was adored by countless female fans.  He also succeeded in becoming a member of the globally known Mensa Society, meant to include only the top 2 per cent of those with mental acuity.  

Still, throughout his life, his consumption of alcohol was intense. As a young man in peak condition, the results of these bouts, however wild, could be thrown off by his highly self-disciplined exercise regimen. Furthermore, his determination to continue receiving public acclaim undoubtedly aided in his relative ability to maintain a greater degree of sobriety than he might have otherwise. 

Sadly, when the exhilaration of fame began waning, Best sustained his sense of self-esteem and well-being mainly from the boost liquor gave him.  This accelerated the process of ageing, rendering him of less interest somewhat sooner than, in all probability, than would have come about if he had retained some vestige of appeal during his later years.  

In 2002, Best required a liver transplant to prevent him from dying before he reached age 60.  In addition, tablets were surgically implanted into the lining of his stomach which would induce nausea if he drank alcohol.  Ideally, Best would have used this opportunity to enjoy a fruitful old age as a soccer coach or instructor.  Instead, its result had the opposite impact.  His subsequent conduct indicates Best savored this chance to return to his youthful shenanigans.  By then, his tolerance for alcohol was such as to overcome even the internal implants.

It was at this juncture that young journalist Celia Walden was hired to protect Best from vulnerability to predatory tabloid reporters who sought to exploit him.  Ms. Walden was not told to try to prevent Best from drinking.  Such a task was understood, by that time, to be futile, and likely to annoy and alienate Best. 

As their friendship evolved, Ms. Walden spent some time at Best’s home, purely in a platonic manner.  She recounts, when Best asked her if she found him attractive, she replied her liking for him was not of that kind; he seems to have respected her honesty. On the other hand, she refused to enable his alcoholism in even the slightest way.  Hence, when he asked her to get him some ice for his drink, she told him to get it himself.

Walden’s initial hope that, at some point, Best would realize the hazards of drinking and stop were eliminated during his time in substance abuse rehabilitation.  Ms. Walden, visiting him, was delighted by what appeared to be a rejuvenated vigor and verve. Then, someone better informed as to the tricks of alcoholics told her it was alcohol which allowed Best to feign this sense of renewal.  In fact, he was functioning under its influence, its odor disguised under breath mints known to seasoned drunkards. 

In time, Ms. Walden’s journalistic assignment ended.  George Best was no longer a figure deemed worthy of even the attention of tabloids. After that, she phoned him from time to time, to wish him well rather than due to what she knew to be unrealistic expectations.  Thus, his needlessly early death did not come as a shock to her, or apparently anyone close to him. 

In conclusion, what can one say about journalist Celia Walden, meant to shield Best from tabloid abuse, having written her own memoir after his death?  Some reviewers have seen her book as being as invasive as those interviews she was paid to thwart.  While this position is valid, as a veteran reader of memoirs, I disagree with this interpretation. 

True, there were definite financial and publication credits to be gained by recording her recollections.  At the same time, a compassion and concern radiates throughout these pages.  To a large extent, this book explored the last years of the life of this once esteemed athlete in a deeper and finer way than an objective, purely factual account could have provided.  

Cut Me Loose by Leah Vincent

Leah Vincent: Courtesy of leahvincent.wordpress.com 

Full title.  Cut Me Loose: Sin and Salvation After My Ultra-Orthodox Girlhood by Leah Vincent

Tragically, numerous parents communicate to their children either directly or subtly, “I will always love you if, when, unless, and other parameters.  This could not have been truer than in Leah Vincent’s original home, where Jewish strictures were rod-like in their rigidity.
  
Leah’s first disgrace came about when, in her mid-teens, she was found to be corresponding with the brother of a close friend.  Still, although this was viewed as besmirching herself, and potentially the family as a whole, they were willing to allow her to redeem herself-if she did not stray again from those rules which were meant to be part of her marrow.  

Marriage and motherhood were meant to be the absolute goals of anyone in Leah’s position.  Initially, she viewed this as her ultimate destiny.  Then, having lived for a while with her married older sister and observing the humility of her life, its appeal quickly dwindled. 

Eventually, Leah was sent to New York to a comparatively liberal school, as no Orthodox school would enroll a girl who had written letters to a young man.

Increasingly ignored by her family, Leah turned to romances which proved bogus and false.  In time, she turned to self-harming and overdosing on pills in order to distract herself from the despair borne of emptiness.  The candor with which she chronicles this part of her life is both astounding and moving. 

Leah’s anguish continued, until one older lover made a suggestion that would entirely change the path of her life.  Though ultimately his affection proved hollow, his advice impelled her to take risks which resulted in avenues of success she could not have dared to envision without his encouragement.
  
Having come to accept her family’s bigotry regarding any choices which did not conform to their beliefs, she was able to overcome this wound and begin her separate life, with its own joys and pitfalls. 

The raw honesty of Leah Vincent’s account leaves those of us with families who place no conditions on love feeling deepened compassion for those who do not, combined with renewed gratitude for our own.   

An Iranian Odyssey by Gohar Kordi

Gohar Kordi: Courtesy of Serpent's Tail Press

An Iranian Odyssey by Gohar Kordi

A more difficult escape from an emotionally suffocating life situation is almost inconceivable.  Born into a culture where being born female was already a detriment, at four years of age, Gohar contracted an illness which, ignored by her family, resulted in her complete loss of sight.

While this neglect may have been accidental, it has long been understood that in some societies a female child is deliberately or negligently disfigured, maimed or disabled in order to enhance household income via begging.

As soon as she was viewed as old enough, each morning Gohar was placed in an area believed suited for her to sit and implore passers-by for whatever meager coins they might spare.  Later in the day, these “earnings” would be appropriated by a family member.

With time, as her intelligence grew, Gohar found this plight humiliating to the point where it became unbearable. Still, her familial role had been assigned, and her pleas for its end were treated with that same indifference which had caused her to lose her sight.
  
A time came when she felt she would die inside if this subsistence continued. Desperate and determined, she found a means of contacting a radio station and thereby makes her miseries publicly known. 

Eventually, she was rescued and relocated to a school for the blind. Once there, despite brilliant grades, her attempts to enter a university were met with a similar bigotry as she had suffered in the past.  Still, in 1970, she succeeded in graduating from Tehran University.  

Fortunately, during weekends spent at the home of a friend, this friend’s brother saw both her physical beauty and observed her deep understanding of literature as well as other interests the two of them shared. 

At this point, I will leave the rest of the story for readers to explore and enjoy.  Despite its disheartening start, this memoir ends on a drumbeat of triumph, a sense that the cruelest obstacles can be overcome by a combination of strength and ingenuity.   

Not Without My Daughter by Betty Mahmoody

Betty Mahmoody

A more romantic meeting between two people would be hard to imagine.  Having suffered a back injury, a course of physiotherapy was prescribed for Betty, an attractive young woman. The doctor designated to give this therapy was the courteous, gentle Iranian Sayed Bozorg Mahmoody.  

Born in Iran, Mahmoody had been educated in the USA and seemed to concur with the American belief in spousal equality.  A subtle attraction must have evolved during these sessions.  After her final session, Dr. Mahmoody turned Betty on her back and kissed her lips, expressing the love he had developed for her.  As Betty reciprocated his feelings, the two soon began seeing each other.  Having married shortly thereafter, they produced a daughter, Mahtob.

Though initially seeming contented in Alpena Michigan where they had met, in 1984, Mahmoody began urging Betty to bring their daughter Mahtob for a two-week visit to his family in Tehran. When Betty questioned his plan to return to America, she states he pledged on the Holy Koran to return when their visit was finished. A nephew, as a house guest, reinforced this vow by assuring her the family and overall cultural structure would never allow Mahmoody to dishonor his word, given such a deeply religious foundation.

Once in Iran, they were both aghast by the sounds of domestic beatings by husbands, evoking cries of pain from their wives. Then, when the Mahmoody’s themselves had a minor dispute, Dr. Mahmoody struck Betty, with force.   Both spouses were shocked by this act; he pleaded with her from his soul to forgive him.

Startled but striving to accept this aberration as a cultural reflex, Betty was able to overlook it until his later violence showed it to be an ingrained part of his sense of the matrimonial state.  Her initial tolerance allowed her to enjoy the rest of their visit, convinced it would only be for the agreed-upon two weeks.  

Then, in the midst of her packing for their trip home, Mahmoody told Betty they would stay in Iran for the rest of their lives, their daughter inculcated with middle-eastern values of wifely subservience.  Nothing on Betty’s part to alter the granite of his betrayal, calculated before they had left America, could urge him to change this decision. 

Through the subsequent weeks and months, her defiance continued, freeing Mahmoody, in his own mind, to brutalize her in those ways which had at first seemed appalling to both of them.  Whenever Betty and their daughter left the house, Mahmoody had them followed, then quizzed the toddler as to their doings and whereabouts.  He showed an even deeper malevolence by separating mother and child for a week or more.  
  
Eventually, he stated Betty was free to leave Iran if she chose, but their daughter, Mahtob, would stay in Iran under his sole custody. This crystallized Betty’s decision.  Yes, she would flee from Iran, but she would not leave Mahtob to endure the miseries of Iranian womanhood.

After various attempts at negotiation, Betty was able to lull Mahmoody’s suspicions to the point where, despite their estrangement, he believed she would stay in Iran with Mahtob until a conference took place with a lawyer.  The rest of Betty Mahmoody’s book, later made into a controversial film, chronicles the strategies needed to gain hard-won liberty from middle-eastern cultural suffocation of wives and daughters.