There is a shiny crust of ice on the snow banks lining the highway as the headlights illuminate them. We drive, my boy and me. And there’s something about the way the headlights punctuate the dotted yellow line that makes me want to keep going. To keep driving on a fine winter night when my breath comes in cloudy wisps, on a night when my fingers blanch against the cold metal handle of the gasoline pump. I know this highway—and many other highways, too. The endless Pennsylvania state, the long slide into the Midwest--where, on a quiet summer night long ago, the musician and I were awakened in the parking lot of a truck stop to the sound of a Muslim calling for prayer. I know these roads, this America… The red clay mountains and mesas of a spiritual western land; and further, to the moonscape of an unforgiving Mojave. Beyond that, the land of plastic, of lights, of a blistering ocean threatening to swallow it all in one angry gulp. I have traveled many of these broken roads, my face to the glass, the fatigue of the road heavy in my bones.
Just a few miles up an undulating road, past the yellow lights of living rooms, of kitchens, where put-together families eat, talk and watch TV. Not like the boy and me tonight, broken and put back together... We are almost home.
There are just two of us in her car that day not long ago when she drives to that place under a steel gray sky. In that town where you can lift your voice and hear it silenced by the wind. That’s how I learned that wind could devour sound, ideas, dreams…
Minutes later we are there. Arrived at an unrecognizable place, each apartment with a Craftsmen’s door and a tidy white porch. Crawling along the perimeter road, the car radio silent, my mother and I remember… We cranked the heat, she says. And of course I remember sitting on the hardwood floor, our backs against the empty walls. Our fingers and toes tingling, the heat inching its way up our spines. After months of snow collecting along the insides of the window sills and sleeping together on a fold-out couch; and milk—when we could get it—stored on the floor of the back porch. Then this: the housing project with its crumbling steps, its banged up parking lot. Its thermostats.
But the place we drive around today does not look like what I remember. Or what she remembers.
Keep driving, I tell her. And she does.
And there it is. The old section that the laborers and their tools have not yet pushed into. The familiar brick walls, those ancient front steps, the metal storm doors. She pulls over so I can get out...
I pick my way along an ice crusted sidewalk, looking for home. This French Canadian, this Welfare child. The sidewalk curves up and around, and I lift my arms to steady myself against the ice, the wind. Raise my arms against this frozen town... And I am here, all these years later, in this remembered courtyard, the wind assaulting the numbered clotheslines inside the chain link fence. I hear, and remember, the ping’ing sound of lines slapping against each metal pole. The wind lifts the flaps of my black wool coat as I remember. They didn’t care about us. In our hand-me-downs, our Welfare cards, our empty bellies. Our lack of bootstraps…
It's a few moments before I realize this section is empty. Each apartment window an Alzheimer ghost, gazing hollowly upon this wind razed courtyard. I look from one vacant window to the next, history emptied and forgotten. All those women gone… Their children—like me—homeless. Again.
And tonight—this winter night—the boy and I drive. Up Route 9, to the Division Street exit, and along Oregon Road. Up the hill to a cottage on a small frozen lake. To the warm place we call home.
***
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Friday, October 1, 2010
P'town
She sits on the sill of the open window, a long, knotty walking stick clutched in her hand. A lonely woman who has seen many things... And it is a raucous crowd tonight, as the piano man revives a lost Broadway, all those songs sitting mute in our minds. We lift our faces to the summer night, to the lights of the street outside, our mouths wide open, words we didn’t know we knew, jack-knifing off our tongues. Just beyond the crowd, a man in a plaid shirt and dark glasses sings louder than the rest of us, lifting his glass at each thundering chord, remembering a time… I can feel the swelling of his joy, like a water balloon tossed hand to hand around this buoyant room, this ocean town. The woman with the walking stick moves her lips to those familiar songs, her words like quiet rain evaporating on the sand. She sits stiffly by the open window, close enough to touch one aching finger to those moving keys. Holding on to her stick, she lifts the other hand to rub the back of her neck, to press against a troubled shoulder. And I know she knows pain... Her stick touches the leg of his polished stool, as his lively fingers move. The stick that helps her navigate so many things... The piano man smiles at her, and this is where she and her walking stick belong.
And he does not wait to finish one song before yanking the next one onto those rollicking keys. We recognize each song from those first few vigorous chords—and here we are, stranger and friend alike, in a small room in a lusty ocean town. Singing. In this land of make believe. Of shingled cottages huddled close together to ward off the rest of the world. This land of gardens and sand and wave.
Yesterday a young man hurled himself from an imposing bridge, and I wonder if he did not know about this place. This place of caresses and wind, of midnight fishing boats easing back to moor. This place that smells of the sea, this place that smells of all kinds of love…
This place that is twenty years mine. Just beyond the Ptown sign, where the tide moves out to reveal a footprint on a muddy floor, a dull white shell that got left behind. I walk out alone, until the sand grass along the shore no longer waves in the breeze, is no longer distinguishable. Until those who wait on the beach have lost sight of me…
And to those of you who accuse me of a certain sentimentality, I say that you don't know this place where I will spend my eternity. In the shadow of the lighthouse, with the scent of love on the waves…
***
And he does not wait to finish one song before yanking the next one onto those rollicking keys. We recognize each song from those first few vigorous chords—and here we are, stranger and friend alike, in a small room in a lusty ocean town. Singing. In this land of make believe. Of shingled cottages huddled close together to ward off the rest of the world. This land of gardens and sand and wave.
Yesterday a young man hurled himself from an imposing bridge, and I wonder if he did not know about this place. This place of caresses and wind, of midnight fishing boats easing back to moor. This place that smells of the sea, this place that smells of all kinds of love…
This place that is twenty years mine. Just beyond the Ptown sign, where the tide moves out to reveal a footprint on a muddy floor, a dull white shell that got left behind. I walk out alone, until the sand grass along the shore no longer waves in the breeze, is no longer distinguishable. Until those who wait on the beach have lost sight of me…
And to those of you who accuse me of a certain sentimentality, I say that you don't know this place where I will spend my eternity. In the shadow of the lighthouse, with the scent of love on the waves…
***
Monday, September 13, 2010
A Ray Charles Night
It’s a Ray Charles night, here in an otherwise quiet cottage on a drowsy lake. A few open windows frame this summer night, the lamps casting shadows over my books, my Sunday Times in a wicker basket by the living room chair. I want to write, to make something tonight with my secular hands, these working woman’s fingers. Earlier I worked my hands through my son’s hair, lathered the shampoo as he laughed, unabashed in his nakedness. I hammer a nail, work a silver screw into a reluctant wall. Move the paint brush over a thirsty trim. Open my laptop and move fingertips over worn and dirty keys…
And Ray Charles sings, I got a woman; and I am alone tonight. My son dreams his blithe dreams from a quiet room a few feet away. I can feel his breath as his chest lifts rhythmically up and down from beneath a dark blue blanket. A different rhythm than Ray’s 4/4 time. Ray who wants to drown in his own tears. But not me tonight; I want to swim, to sing…
Last night, the witching hour beckoned. Me, asleep, belly down, when she called. I woke to the dark night and the sound of nothing beyond the open bedroom windows, to the sound of silence on the lake. The bull frogs disappeared, the cicadas silenced. The witching hour tip toed to my bed, and lifted one quiet finger to my muted shoulder. I had been dreaming, and when I rolled over and saw the shadow from the nightlight down the hall, I whispered, I miss you. And I ached with the missing. Of you. Of me. Of us... I remembered the text, sent last summer, in plain white font against a black screen: “I am so lonely.” And me that hot summer night outdoors at Lincoln Center, seduced by the heat, by the lights, by the sense that I could do this alone. And yet I saved those four simple words. Tucked away between the photos, the drop off/pick up messages. Because I am lonely, too. But I cannot tell you that...
And it’s crying time again…
Ray and Bonnie sing, Do I ever cross your mind? And I wonder the same thing, too. About you. About a long ago dark eyed man. And I wonder tonight, as Ray sings, if I am worth remembering... Me in my less-than, me in my empty hands, my muffled stories. There is a measured man in a country house miles from here who sleeps a fitful sleep, and wonders if I am the one. As the ghosts--once dark-haired, passionate men who make music with their hands—remember the whisper of me, the unsullied me; Van's brown-eyed girl, without the crust of time, without the dirt and grime of living, the dirt and grime of having loved...
***
And Ray Charles sings, I got a woman; and I am alone tonight. My son dreams his blithe dreams from a quiet room a few feet away. I can feel his breath as his chest lifts rhythmically up and down from beneath a dark blue blanket. A different rhythm than Ray’s 4/4 time. Ray who wants to drown in his own tears. But not me tonight; I want to swim, to sing…
Last night, the witching hour beckoned. Me, asleep, belly down, when she called. I woke to the dark night and the sound of nothing beyond the open bedroom windows, to the sound of silence on the lake. The bull frogs disappeared, the cicadas silenced. The witching hour tip toed to my bed, and lifted one quiet finger to my muted shoulder. I had been dreaming, and when I rolled over and saw the shadow from the nightlight down the hall, I whispered, I miss you. And I ached with the missing. Of you. Of me. Of us... I remembered the text, sent last summer, in plain white font against a black screen: “I am so lonely.” And me that hot summer night outdoors at Lincoln Center, seduced by the heat, by the lights, by the sense that I could do this alone. And yet I saved those four simple words. Tucked away between the photos, the drop off/pick up messages. Because I am lonely, too. But I cannot tell you that...
And it’s crying time again…
Ray and Bonnie sing, Do I ever cross your mind? And I wonder the same thing, too. About you. About a long ago dark eyed man. And I wonder tonight, as Ray sings, if I am worth remembering... Me in my less-than, me in my empty hands, my muffled stories. There is a measured man in a country house miles from here who sleeps a fitful sleep, and wonders if I am the one. As the ghosts--once dark-haired, passionate men who make music with their hands—remember the whisper of me, the unsullied me; Van's brown-eyed girl, without the crust of time, without the dirt and grime of living, the dirt and grime of having loved...
***
Saturday, June 5, 2010
Windows
When the Window Man arrives—pulling up too fast to the curb—I am at the outdoor grill, turning some seasoned chicken. From the boom box on the table, Van sings of a garden all misty wet with rain, but that is his vision, and this is mine. Beyond the fire pit are trees and a quiet lake. The sun shifts as evening settles.
He makes his way up the sidewalk, carrying two heavy cases. Deposits them gratefully on the patio, extends his hand. Then sizes me up: me in my jeans and flip flops, my hairclip, my unadorned finger, my older woman’ness.
Sit down, I say. And he does.
The cases are unzipped and there are window samples in clad and wood: low-E4 high performance glass and brushed nickel hardware. A familiar story—experienced in a previous life, in that Dutch Colonial on the hill… But tonight I am alone on a concrete patio in a tired cottage by the lake. Sipping at my wine, I ask him what he has for me, and there is the flurry of papers and brochures. I marvel at this, at people who sell things for a living--and this young man has his windows. He is earnest, naïve. Has plans, I can tell.
And then there is Karen, cutting her Top 40 music along with the engine. She parks on the street, makes her way up the walk.
And who is this nice boy? she says, smiling.
Karen is forfeiting a child-free Friday night to my patio by the lake. This woman who will chuck her suburban house into the weeds after the kids are gone, and move back into the city. She is freshly manicured, her patterned blouse catching the light of a disappearing sun.
He smiles back at her, at Karen’s marine-blue eyes. But there are windows to be sold and so he rifles through the brochures, reaches for those heavy cases.
As he talks, I pour Karen a glass of the same cheap Chardonnay that I am drinking—and when he gets around to telling me the price of the windows, I pour him one, too. There will be no sale tonight.
After the second glass of wine, he tells us about the girl, about her 5-year plan. Karen and I recoil, but only a little--because he describes our own lost lives. Lives that landed Karen and me across from each other at a low wooden table that day at Pre-K. We rolled our eyes at the mothers collected around those tables: so serious about things, so empty of humor. Of course we were older—living carefree partnered lives, traveling, working, spending the whole of Sunday on the couch with the Times, before the kids came.
Our glasses flush gold again, and we tell him our own muddy stories. Different means to the same end: two older women alone. And it is clear to me tonight that Karen enjoys this phase much more than I do. She talks of life in the city, of the men she is dating. As she speaks I take in the petunias, the pretty pink impatiens potted around this patio, the macaroni salad made earlier in the day. The new life I’m building in a cottage by the lake. There are gardening books stacked on the coffee table inside.
You both seem so happy, he says, tugging at the yoke of the 5-year plan. It's clear he sees two women with their faces to the sun, arms open to life. When I doubt we are that. When I know that I am not.
Karen tells him to run...
But he stays. With us. And the suggestion is made to head down to the Inn at the bottom of the hill where a hand-written sign promises "Live Music Tonight." We wait while he loads his window cases into the car.
And tonight, as he leans into the pool table and moves unencumbered limbs to the rhythm of the band, he believes that he will run. Knows that he will. He will drive along the open road--alone--following the beat of the music that thumps from his car speakers. Yet he envisions only the journey, cannot see through the lens of youth and cheap Chardonnay that it will be the same once he gets there.
Of course the truth is that he will not go, that he will not run. Instead, he will wake up tomorrow, put on his tie, drag out those window cases again. And he will send sweet texts to the girl as he drives...
***
He makes his way up the sidewalk, carrying two heavy cases. Deposits them gratefully on the patio, extends his hand. Then sizes me up: me in my jeans and flip flops, my hairclip, my unadorned finger, my older woman’ness.
Sit down, I say. And he does.
The cases are unzipped and there are window samples in clad and wood: low-E4 high performance glass and brushed nickel hardware. A familiar story—experienced in a previous life, in that Dutch Colonial on the hill… But tonight I am alone on a concrete patio in a tired cottage by the lake. Sipping at my wine, I ask him what he has for me, and there is the flurry of papers and brochures. I marvel at this, at people who sell things for a living--and this young man has his windows. He is earnest, naïve. Has plans, I can tell.
And then there is Karen, cutting her Top 40 music along with the engine. She parks on the street, makes her way up the walk.
And who is this nice boy? she says, smiling.
Karen is forfeiting a child-free Friday night to my patio by the lake. This woman who will chuck her suburban house into the weeds after the kids are gone, and move back into the city. She is freshly manicured, her patterned blouse catching the light of a disappearing sun.
He smiles back at her, at Karen’s marine-blue eyes. But there are windows to be sold and so he rifles through the brochures, reaches for those heavy cases.
As he talks, I pour Karen a glass of the same cheap Chardonnay that I am drinking—and when he gets around to telling me the price of the windows, I pour him one, too. There will be no sale tonight.
After the second glass of wine, he tells us about the girl, about her 5-year plan. Karen and I recoil, but only a little--because he describes our own lost lives. Lives that landed Karen and me across from each other at a low wooden table that day at Pre-K. We rolled our eyes at the mothers collected around those tables: so serious about things, so empty of humor. Of course we were older—living carefree partnered lives, traveling, working, spending the whole of Sunday on the couch with the Times, before the kids came.
Our glasses flush gold again, and we tell him our own muddy stories. Different means to the same end: two older women alone. And it is clear to me tonight that Karen enjoys this phase much more than I do. She talks of life in the city, of the men she is dating. As she speaks I take in the petunias, the pretty pink impatiens potted around this patio, the macaroni salad made earlier in the day. The new life I’m building in a cottage by the lake. There are gardening books stacked on the coffee table inside.
You both seem so happy, he says, tugging at the yoke of the 5-year plan. It's clear he sees two women with their faces to the sun, arms open to life. When I doubt we are that. When I know that I am not.
Karen tells him to run...
But he stays. With us. And the suggestion is made to head down to the Inn at the bottom of the hill where a hand-written sign promises "Live Music Tonight." We wait while he loads his window cases into the car.
And tonight, as he leans into the pool table and moves unencumbered limbs to the rhythm of the band, he believes that he will run. Knows that he will. He will drive along the open road--alone--following the beat of the music that thumps from his car speakers. Yet he envisions only the journey, cannot see through the lens of youth and cheap Chardonnay that it will be the same once he gets there.
Of course the truth is that he will not go, that he will not run. Instead, he will wake up tomorrow, put on his tie, drag out those window cases again. And he will send sweet texts to the girl as he drives...
***
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Crumbs
She posts photos of them in D.C., attending a friend’s wedding: she and her husband, and their two kids. They mug for the camera, with the Washington Monument standing resolutely behind them. I know there have been storms, there have been set-backs, disappointments… Yet her husband stands with his arm around her, around his family. There is another picture of her in a shiny blue dress, dancing. A dignified family across a muddy, debris-filled river from me.
And here I am with the jumbled pieces of my life tossed into boxes, stashed into bags, pitched into the dumpster just beyond the downstairs door. Whenever I enter this building, the door clicks shuts behind me, followed by a hollow thud that echoes along the hallway. How I have disliked that haunting sound… I’m sorting through the artifacts of an eventful life, deciding what will stay, what will go. In the corner of the room is a pair of flip flops, a needlepoint stool, the tangled cords of a mute cable box. The morsels of a chaotic life that I am trying to pull together, trying to make into a quiet life in a cottage by the lake.
On the dresser is a dusty rag. I have wiped away so many things…
Earlier at dinner he says: You are back. And I wonder if I am. His eyes fill with tears and I pretend not to notice. He sees history and the blush of youth in my waning face--and I do not deserve the way he looks at me… We wait for our chicken and shrimp, the clear broth soup, our salads. The man in the bloated chef hat tosses egg, onion, pepper into the air, like the contrary bits of my own jumbled life; and then he taps out a rhythm on the grill with his chef knife, the salt shaker, a spatula. It’s all noise and motion to distract us—strangers and family alike—gathered around this grill. I sip a chilled Chardonnay and laugh as the grill explodes in flame. Beside me, he recoils at the sudden heat, this man who looks to reclaim a once-gentle life… The chef scoops portions onto our plates, and uses the edge of his spatula to scrape the extra bits of garlic, of rice, into a cut-out drain. Metal against metal. And then the grill is clean again, as if none of the chaos and flame had ever been there at all.
After I carry the last few boxes to the truck and mop these empty floors, there will only be silence and shine. Yet I want to leave some trace that I have lived here, that I have loved here, that my life once rotated through a whole year’s worth of living. But this Band-aid place did not claim even the smallest piece of me...
Tomorrow, he will come to offer me crumbs. He will set each one deliberately upon the table, and when he speaks, he will rotate each morsel for me to examine and admire. As if these crumbs were as sacred as jewels; as if arranged upon my table were rubies and emeralds, sapphires and diamonds—and not the quiet lint of empty pockets, a few dull pennies, a burned out star. He will ignore their hollow cores, their broken settings. His crumbs will sit, scattered, paltry, unadorned. Yet he will be pleased to have his say, to make his chary offering--certain that I will scoop these few things into a greedy pocket.
When he leaves, I will wipe down the table with a clean wet cloth and run the vacuum over the floor. And I will sweep, and sweep, and sweep—until my arms ache with the effort of it. Until everything is speckless, is empty, is disappeared...
***
And here I am with the jumbled pieces of my life tossed into boxes, stashed into bags, pitched into the dumpster just beyond the downstairs door. Whenever I enter this building, the door clicks shuts behind me, followed by a hollow thud that echoes along the hallway. How I have disliked that haunting sound… I’m sorting through the artifacts of an eventful life, deciding what will stay, what will go. In the corner of the room is a pair of flip flops, a needlepoint stool, the tangled cords of a mute cable box. The morsels of a chaotic life that I am trying to pull together, trying to make into a quiet life in a cottage by the lake.
On the dresser is a dusty rag. I have wiped away so many things…
Earlier at dinner he says: You are back. And I wonder if I am. His eyes fill with tears and I pretend not to notice. He sees history and the blush of youth in my waning face--and I do not deserve the way he looks at me… We wait for our chicken and shrimp, the clear broth soup, our salads. The man in the bloated chef hat tosses egg, onion, pepper into the air, like the contrary bits of my own jumbled life; and then he taps out a rhythm on the grill with his chef knife, the salt shaker, a spatula. It’s all noise and motion to distract us—strangers and family alike—gathered around this grill. I sip a chilled Chardonnay and laugh as the grill explodes in flame. Beside me, he recoils at the sudden heat, this man who looks to reclaim a once-gentle life… The chef scoops portions onto our plates, and uses the edge of his spatula to scrape the extra bits of garlic, of rice, into a cut-out drain. Metal against metal. And then the grill is clean again, as if none of the chaos and flame had ever been there at all.
After I carry the last few boxes to the truck and mop these empty floors, there will only be silence and shine. Yet I want to leave some trace that I have lived here, that I have loved here, that my life once rotated through a whole year’s worth of living. But this Band-aid place did not claim even the smallest piece of me...
Tomorrow, he will come to offer me crumbs. He will set each one deliberately upon the table, and when he speaks, he will rotate each morsel for me to examine and admire. As if these crumbs were as sacred as jewels; as if arranged upon my table were rubies and emeralds, sapphires and diamonds—and not the quiet lint of empty pockets, a few dull pennies, a burned out star. He will ignore their hollow cores, their broken settings. His crumbs will sit, scattered, paltry, unadorned. Yet he will be pleased to have his say, to make his chary offering--certain that I will scoop these few things into a greedy pocket.
When he leaves, I will wipe down the table with a clean wet cloth and run the vacuum over the floor. And I will sweep, and sweep, and sweep—until my arms ache with the effort of it. Until everything is speckless, is empty, is disappeared...
***
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Moving On
Along the hallway, boxes stand shoulder to shoulder, cradling my agitated life. Some of the boxes are neatly taped up, their contents revealed only by the scribble of black Sharpie along the top flap. Other boxes hold things that won’t be contained: long limbs and defiant shapes showing signs of wear, of age. The cracked sconce of a torchiere purchased during a snowstorm in Philly; a heavy, chipped bowl brought back from an antique store in Maine; crackled yellow dishes from John and Mary’s tag sale in rural Vermont; a mother-of-pearl turtle pin missing one delicate foot. My ragamuffin life collected in these dusty boxes.
Tonight the walls are empty. I have spackled and packed. And now I sit in a muted, near-empty room, my feet up, a battered Gibson guitar leaning against the couch. And I will take that guitar with me when I go, and will lean it against a new wall and wait for someone to play it, for someone to come and make music again in my life. On the coffee table next to my toes is a brochure with William Kentridge’s black figures in motion across the page, each figure carrying all manner of things...
It was Christmas Eve, a lifetime ago, that he unveiled that polished Takamine. Opening the case, he lifted it gently into my understated lap. A gift for me. And I tried not to show my disappointment. It was such an easy present for that dark-haired musician, who worked in a music store. He ran his fingers over the glossy wood and tenderly anointed the strings… I do not recall what became of that guitar when I left, when I moved on to a man who picked out fine vintage jewelry, delicate scarves, lacy lingerie.
But all of that is lost…
I am on my own, the trunk of my car filled with painters tape, plastic sheeting, safety goggles, carpet knives. Heavy duty trash bags and gallon jugs of CLR. A shiny new mailbox; and next to that, a shovel so I can dig. Today the phone rings and the man tells me that there are mice—lots and lots of mice—in this “start over” house, this cottage by the lake. And when Karen asks what I will do, I tell her that I will learn different ways to use my shovel. And of course we both laugh, but I can taste the fear that will course through my veins when I land that steel over something that moves...
One night as we sip Chardonnay, my cousin Beth shares that she was once at war with a mouse. A mouse which, on that fateful day, had chewed through her oven mitts. She went to lift the pan from the flame, and there were her two raw thumbs exposed. Later when the mouse found the cheese and the cardboard box claimed him, she didn’t know what to do. The mouse quiet under there, she sat at her kitchen table to think. And when she telephoned her father, he never uttered a word: just strode through the front door a few minutes later, lifted the box and knocked the mouse dead with one swift, hard blow from a trowel. Then he scooped the lifeless body into the box, which he flung into the weeds as he left, and went back to his TV show.
But I have no father to call, no man to slay whatever might threaten me there...
It is warm today when I drive to the house in the hills. Everywhere the birds sing, the trees reach long tender arms to a cloudless sky. The lake is quiet. My soon-to-be house is still. And I stand alone on the road and try to imagine how it will be. With my shovel, my knives, my tools, my lonely limbs. And here come Roberto and Martha, the people next door, who tell me that my boy and I will find friends here, that we are new family. They write their number on paper I dig out of an overburdened purse; Roberto says he will take down trees, that he will plow when the snow falls again. Like finding a lucky penny, I have found these dark haired neighbors, these two new friends. You are not alone, Rachel, they say, and they both roll the “r.” And later I stand there and study my house, and decide that I will put one lovely lamp in the large front window, its soft light spilling at night onto the lawn. And then I press the numbers into my phone to call a man who will come to hang a new front light, which will welcome me home each night, which will announce to the world that this is a joyful little home on a tranquil lake next door to Roberto and Martha. And I know that I will be happy here. That there will be music here. That there will be love...
***
Tonight the walls are empty. I have spackled and packed. And now I sit in a muted, near-empty room, my feet up, a battered Gibson guitar leaning against the couch. And I will take that guitar with me when I go, and will lean it against a new wall and wait for someone to play it, for someone to come and make music again in my life. On the coffee table next to my toes is a brochure with William Kentridge’s black figures in motion across the page, each figure carrying all manner of things...
It was Christmas Eve, a lifetime ago, that he unveiled that polished Takamine. Opening the case, he lifted it gently into my understated lap. A gift for me. And I tried not to show my disappointment. It was such an easy present for that dark-haired musician, who worked in a music store. He ran his fingers over the glossy wood and tenderly anointed the strings… I do not recall what became of that guitar when I left, when I moved on to a man who picked out fine vintage jewelry, delicate scarves, lacy lingerie.
But all of that is lost…
I am on my own, the trunk of my car filled with painters tape, plastic sheeting, safety goggles, carpet knives. Heavy duty trash bags and gallon jugs of CLR. A shiny new mailbox; and next to that, a shovel so I can dig. Today the phone rings and the man tells me that there are mice—lots and lots of mice—in this “start over” house, this cottage by the lake. And when Karen asks what I will do, I tell her that I will learn different ways to use my shovel. And of course we both laugh, but I can taste the fear that will course through my veins when I land that steel over something that moves...
One night as we sip Chardonnay, my cousin Beth shares that she was once at war with a mouse. A mouse which, on that fateful day, had chewed through her oven mitts. She went to lift the pan from the flame, and there were her two raw thumbs exposed. Later when the mouse found the cheese and the cardboard box claimed him, she didn’t know what to do. The mouse quiet under there, she sat at her kitchen table to think. And when she telephoned her father, he never uttered a word: just strode through the front door a few minutes later, lifted the box and knocked the mouse dead with one swift, hard blow from a trowel. Then he scooped the lifeless body into the box, which he flung into the weeds as he left, and went back to his TV show.
But I have no father to call, no man to slay whatever might threaten me there...
It is warm today when I drive to the house in the hills. Everywhere the birds sing, the trees reach long tender arms to a cloudless sky. The lake is quiet. My soon-to-be house is still. And I stand alone on the road and try to imagine how it will be. With my shovel, my knives, my tools, my lonely limbs. And here come Roberto and Martha, the people next door, who tell me that my boy and I will find friends here, that we are new family. They write their number on paper I dig out of an overburdened purse; Roberto says he will take down trees, that he will plow when the snow falls again. Like finding a lucky penny, I have found these dark haired neighbors, these two new friends. You are not alone, Rachel, they say, and they both roll the “r.” And later I stand there and study my house, and decide that I will put one lovely lamp in the large front window, its soft light spilling at night onto the lawn. And then I press the numbers into my phone to call a man who will come to hang a new front light, which will welcome me home each night, which will announce to the world that this is a joyful little home on a tranquil lake next door to Roberto and Martha. And I know that I will be happy here. That there will be music here. That there will be love...
***
Monday, March 22, 2010
The Circus
Two dwarfs in green wigs and white suspenders holding up their knee-length shorts work the crowd on a mild March night here in the land of smoky dreams. Karen and I sit at the table sipping our too-sweet drinks; stuffed grape leaves languish on a shared plate between us. We watch as the young crowd passes by, moving in tangled groups, bodies traversing the busy highway of this tourist street. They are loud: voices raised to youth and drink and insecurity. And I can discern right away their very essence--by the way they react to these two short men on the street. Both dwarfs have painted their faces red; one of them smokes. They are as garish as Christmas, as novel as trinkets in a souvenir shop. They slap five, laugh at the cruel jokes, mug with the drunken, flushed faces of undergraduates who bend down and smile into the camera next to the 3-foot clown. And I feel the curl of anger at the back of my throat, pressing against my tongue. Years from now, some of these kids will swallow the bitter pill of memory. Some will remember this night, will remember their inhumanity, and shrink from it, will taste its acidity on a sleepless night. And so the curl of anger is not for them—but for the two painted clowns who toddle around this busy street hiding behind their shortness, their green wigs, their fear. Tell me who you really are, I want to say to them. I know you are not this…
Yet who am I to demand that? As I hide behind my Olay Regenerist eye cream, behind the gloss of Chianti lipstick, an underwire bra… On the street beyond our table are the girls who own this night, in their half-clothes, their haughty skin, their unawakened eyes. Their bodies are the polished engines of a car show, sleek aerodynamic limbs moving on a festive night. The boys watch, circling, licking their lips, aching to drive one of these revved-up machines. Karen and I pick at the dehydrated grape leaves, watch quietly from the corner where women like us belong. And I lift the white napkin to my lips to wipe away the pretense, staining the heavy cloth. I do not want to be a Jean Rhys character, with her half empty Pernod, her blood-red lipstick bleeding into the crevices around her lips. Pretending, like the wigged midgets, that life is not cruel.
Later we lift our sandaled feet into the Treasure Trove, sand from the nearby beach crunching beneath our heels. There is a two-piece band—guitar and drums—and the singer has rings around his eyes the way a tree reveals its age. He wears a baseball cap tugged backwards on his head, long shorts, Roman-style sandals. This tells me not to expect too much, and they do not disappoint. At the bar are men and women who have arrived at the same place as Karen and me. She and I look at each other and smile, no longer misfits on a tourist street. I put my purse on the bar, and the man beside me offers a stool which he shakes a bit and settles on my naked toe, his movements clumsy, his speech graceless, blundering. I hope you’re not driving, Karen says by way of a greeting, and the man laughs and tries to shake his head, and has to hold on to the smooth, curved edge of the bar. He works on ships, he manages to say through a thick tongue.
Upon closer inspection, everyone here tonight is butter-fingered and lumbering—in their baldness, their rounded bellies, their euphoria when the discordant band strikes up a familiar song. The grizzled man on the other side of Karen whoops at every song, pumps two knarled fists in the air, and looks at us with bleary eyes to dance. She cocks one eyebrow at me, and we both laugh.
At the end of the bar are two lithe blonds, their long hair shaken out over pinched shoulders and angled backs. Like Broadway footlights, the sequins on their too-tight jeans illuminate rounded globes as they shimmy to the raucous music. And when they turn around, breasts choked into a cramped theatre, their faces look like mine, like Karen’s. They dance together, two older women on display tonight, and the unsteady men thrum heavily around them. One of the blondes takes a quiet sip from her water bottle, and Karen says, She has had her time with alcohol. And we imagine her earlier life, wonder about our own—two tousled women on bar stools with sand between our toes.
Then it’s time to go, and just as I am shouldering my heavy purse, I notice, tucked into a corner of the bar, two carved wooden images. A Sambo head with ink black skin and a row of teeth like piano keys; beside him, the head of an ape, with two flared nostrils—upon which someone has tossed a fisherman’s hat… I motion to the bartender, nod to the two wooden images. A piercing sun and the bite of Jim Beam have rippled his skin; his long hair pulled back into a pony-tail. What’s that? I say, and he shrugs his shoulders, impatient—and looks behind me to another rickety man, who waves his money, who wants the memory of youth scooped into a glass and chilled over ice. And I am thrust into this circus, into this unknowable place, on a mild night in March, as the guitar player croaks into the mic, the chords from his Fender guitar feeding back through his pawn shop amp—and the sequined blondes quiver around the dance floor…
***
Yet who am I to demand that? As I hide behind my Olay Regenerist eye cream, behind the gloss of Chianti lipstick, an underwire bra… On the street beyond our table are the girls who own this night, in their half-clothes, their haughty skin, their unawakened eyes. Their bodies are the polished engines of a car show, sleek aerodynamic limbs moving on a festive night. The boys watch, circling, licking their lips, aching to drive one of these revved-up machines. Karen and I pick at the dehydrated grape leaves, watch quietly from the corner where women like us belong. And I lift the white napkin to my lips to wipe away the pretense, staining the heavy cloth. I do not want to be a Jean Rhys character, with her half empty Pernod, her blood-red lipstick bleeding into the crevices around her lips. Pretending, like the wigged midgets, that life is not cruel.
Later we lift our sandaled feet into the Treasure Trove, sand from the nearby beach crunching beneath our heels. There is a two-piece band—guitar and drums—and the singer has rings around his eyes the way a tree reveals its age. He wears a baseball cap tugged backwards on his head, long shorts, Roman-style sandals. This tells me not to expect too much, and they do not disappoint. At the bar are men and women who have arrived at the same place as Karen and me. She and I look at each other and smile, no longer misfits on a tourist street. I put my purse on the bar, and the man beside me offers a stool which he shakes a bit and settles on my naked toe, his movements clumsy, his speech graceless, blundering. I hope you’re not driving, Karen says by way of a greeting, and the man laughs and tries to shake his head, and has to hold on to the smooth, curved edge of the bar. He works on ships, he manages to say through a thick tongue.
Upon closer inspection, everyone here tonight is butter-fingered and lumbering—in their baldness, their rounded bellies, their euphoria when the discordant band strikes up a familiar song. The grizzled man on the other side of Karen whoops at every song, pumps two knarled fists in the air, and looks at us with bleary eyes to dance. She cocks one eyebrow at me, and we both laugh.
At the end of the bar are two lithe blonds, their long hair shaken out over pinched shoulders and angled backs. Like Broadway footlights, the sequins on their too-tight jeans illuminate rounded globes as they shimmy to the raucous music. And when they turn around, breasts choked into a cramped theatre, their faces look like mine, like Karen’s. They dance together, two older women on display tonight, and the unsteady men thrum heavily around them. One of the blondes takes a quiet sip from her water bottle, and Karen says, She has had her time with alcohol. And we imagine her earlier life, wonder about our own—two tousled women on bar stools with sand between our toes.
Then it’s time to go, and just as I am shouldering my heavy purse, I notice, tucked into a corner of the bar, two carved wooden images. A Sambo head with ink black skin and a row of teeth like piano keys; beside him, the head of an ape, with two flared nostrils—upon which someone has tossed a fisherman’s hat… I motion to the bartender, nod to the two wooden images. A piercing sun and the bite of Jim Beam have rippled his skin; his long hair pulled back into a pony-tail. What’s that? I say, and he shrugs his shoulders, impatient—and looks behind me to another rickety man, who waves his money, who wants the memory of youth scooped into a glass and chilled over ice. And I am thrust into this circus, into this unknowable place, on a mild night in March, as the guitar player croaks into the mic, the chords from his Fender guitar feeding back through his pawn shop amp—and the sequined blondes quiver around the dance floor…
***
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