How often does anyone say "It's the end of an era." when someone leaves the world? They have to be someone extraordinary. I have been lucky and have known three, women all- my grandmother, who died in 1991, her best friend who died just last year, lingering to hold a three day long cocktail party in her home for people to give their respects (it was packed. She wore lipstick, and held the lightest of drinks on her delicate, manicured hand. She was our last link to our favorite generation), and now a lady who left us just last night.
Eirini was the mother of my dearest friend, grandmother of my daughter's dearest friend. Loving and affectionate as she was in those roles, you somehow never thought of her in relation to anyone or anything else. Her existence was so grand, large, it could be contingent on nothing but her vibrance and verve. She had enough personality to be completely New York and completely Cretan at the same time- not expat, not immigrant, just utterly cosmopolitan.
For those of you who haven't been, I'll introduce Koum Kapi, the easternmost of the three bays of Chania. It's a working class neighborhood, simple houses and shacks, narrow streets, a couple of 1970's apartment buildings, all around a fabulous beach- a ring of rocks we swim out to and kids dive from on the right, and the golden stones of the Venetian fortress on the left. The sun sets in between, a little more toward the fortress than the rocks. It is, like this lady, effortlessly beautiful, with integrity and innate, authentic style.
Every summer, a ritual drink on her balcony (so close to the sea it feels like you are on a boat, and nearly next door to our own apartment) marked the beginning of summer for me. Her living room, enormous and spare, had two day beds for lounging, some over-the-top mirrors, and an enormous chair she would have recovered from time to time to suit the mood. This was always changing - a different color of drape, an object or two, and she would effortlessly create a completely different environment; it was curated, there was an element of fantasy, more like a set for living. She had been a fashion illustrator in New York, making dreamy, evocative sketches we loved to look at. Copies of Vogue were stacked high in one corner- we would leaf through them while drinking Cretan wine poured from a plastic water bottle into short French tumblers- she knew quality, not pretension, and once you have tried the tawny rich wine of Crete that smells like an amontillado and is so strong you need an ice cube to dilute it, well, there is nothing like it. That living room functioned as a modern day salon- family and friends converging at their dynamic center, the heart of their world. It was also a haven, a place I was grateful to always find welcome. Style's not much without grace- she had lots and lots of both.
Her sense of high style was so timeless that it rendered her vaguely immortal, or, at the very least, ageless. We were out late one night and ran into her having drinks with some friends. We joined them. Pavlos later remarked "when you're out with her, you're just out with a woman." She was a year or two before 80 then, smoking, having a glass of wine, and talking with joy about culture, design. She was wearing one of her flowing caftans in a solid color- this one in vivid lilac, with excellent shoes and an even more excellent bag- bold and large. She had a collection of them. Of caftans too- the best was the chartreuse, not so much because of the color itself but because of the chutzpah of the color- you really have to be somebody to wear chartreuse, and she was somebody. She wore it like other women wear navy, or gray. I saw her one morning waiting to cross Venizelou, a sack of oranges her net shopping bag, in that chartreuse caftan and large sunglasses, all poise in the sunlight. She smiled and waved. She made the whole neighborhood feel more glamorous.
Is being beautiful a pre-requisite for living a grand life? Well, it can't hurt. Just last night I was at the cinema and Claudia Cardinale was playing. She must be close to 80, and I thought how beautiful women stay beautiful forever. That was just as my friend was leaving the world, her magnificent features only amplified in age by her animation and the very richness of life well-lived. As to beauty, maybe it does lend a quality of the epic to a life story. Certainly it did to hers, and we loved hearing about it.
Why all this talk of fashion, of elegance? It's hardly considered a virtue. But that's a mistake. When it's coming from someplace real, elegance expresses the highest virtue- making an occasion of life- an expression of reverence, and joy.
She did, and will always, embody for me a particular excellence, the virtue of a life so well and gracefully and boldly lived. Eirini was someone who inspires you to make an era of your own.
