Let’s talk about Cheryl.
In many ways, Cheryl is the cornerstone of the GoMurphCenter because shaping a legacy for Gordon means caring for Gordon’s widow.
For those of you who do not know Cheryl, let’s begin with the basics…
When I was invited to prom in high school, I assured my date that he shouldn’t be nervous about impressing my dad. He looked at me like I was a dummy, “You do know it’s your mom I have to worry about, right?”
I had been butting heads with El Gordo my entire life but my mom was a source of safety, succor, and magic. No, I had not yet noticed that Cheryl was also powerful.
Cheryl Murphy is a 79 year old woman who lives in the turn-of-the-last-century farm house whose warmth and hospitality she has spent 50 years crafting. The pug’s name is Hana and the tortie cat’s name is Quilt. She stays up late reading complicated books and eating candy, then sleeps in until noon.
Cheryl was raised as an eldest daughter of terrible people and promised herself she’d live differently. Her first husband’s mother never spanked kids and she wanted that. His father wrote volumes of longhand prose about life as a Filipino man in Chicago. My sister-in-law refers to Fred Tolentino as Mom’s “attractive husband.” When she was 19, they married and moved to Virginia Beach where she adapted and survived as an officer’s wife amongst Southern women with college degrees whose conversation topics could be dictated by the one with the highest-ranking husband. Fred was a Navy pilot and she was widowed after 3.5 years of marriage. My eldest brother was 18 months old and she was pregnant with my second brother.
My goofy dad hit on her when she brought the boys to his YMCA for swim lessons.
I firmly believe El Gordo would have stayed goofy if not for Cheryl. Her friend Betty got him the job at First Chicago Bank. She took the train downtown 2 or 3 evenings a week to hobknob with Chicago’s finest on his arm. When he took over at Opportunity International, she hosted staff from countries all over the world in her periwinkle guest room with Laura Ashley linens. She fully embraced the gourmet food culture of the 80s and prepared lavish meals for Board Members and church people alike. If you dropped by the house in the evening, she’d offer you a real Coke and put her popcorn pot on the stove so everyone could sit by the fireplace or on the porch together with a little festivity and lightness in addition to the conversations my dad encouraged. For a decade, she grilled brats for the 100 or so people that showed up under the yellow and white striped tent for the Fourth of July.
When she first learned that the FBI was investigating El Gordo, she insulted him once privately and then used the word “we” whenever she talked about his prospects and court dates.
Cheryl did not tolerate fools well. At least 3 different people have repeated to me something sharp she said to them upon their first meeting. When she realized the other moms at Lake Ellyn Park had cliques, she uttered a expletive and found the money to build a fancy playset in our backyard. On a women’s retreat with the church, she overhead women 10 years younger resigned to lackluster sex with their husbands. She sat them all down with a lecture that they must say what they want in bed and quit faking it.
El Gordo adored her. I think he inspired a lot of men to remember that they adored their wives, too. She returned his ardor. Their fights were epic. Early on, my dad tried to give her the silent treatment like his dad used to and she just kept poking him awake until he said whatever was bothering him. Prison balanced the power dynamic in their marriage. He was capable of Scary Daddy tyranny before that (and still after) but when she managed to go back to a get a college degree in case he couldn’t get a job as a felon and also parented 4 kids while he was reading books and playing softball at Oxford Federal Camp, he could be coaxed more easily into a humble posture by her new confidence.
I recently found a letter she wrote when he’d been a jerk about $200 and she signed it:
“Love,
Your wife,
Your partner,
Your equal in the eyes of the Lord and the eyes of the law;
And the person you profess to love more than anyone else on this earth.”
He had saved it because her ferocity delighted him and he knew he deserved the dressing-down.
I live a mile from Cheryl, first so she and Dad could love on my babies and now so i can support her as the trauma and malnutrition of her first 25 years catch up to her as she continues the work of grieving.
It is her skill of spiritual hospitality that inspires the philosophy of change around which I’m developing the GoMurphCenter. People heal when they feel safe and fed and welcome. This is what we want to provide to burnt-out folks.
Cheryl will be at our First Friday Gallery Opening Party on November 6 from 4-8 at Yorktown Mall. Please come and say hello. Alternately, you can work with me to find another time to talk about El Gordo with her. She requested deep privacy in the first years after his death, but as long as she’s not surprised by your presence, she’d love to hear your stories now.
Sincerely,
Rebecca