Family
“We need more stuff to eat,” Smith says as he cleans the kitchen table. There’s an onion, a clove of garlic, a half bag of peanuts. He picks up garlic skin, sweeps crumbs into his hand.
“I know,” I say. “But I’m tired of going to the market. I’m tired of cooking, too. I need someone to feed me food pellets. What I really need is for my mom to come down here and cook for me.”
“Yeah, but then I’d have to talk to her, before and after.”
“Not my mom. She’d be happy just reading a book.”
“No. They all expect human interaction, social intercourse. Maybe we can keep her in a cage.”
“Fine, as long as she has a book.”
“We’ll put a pile of really really good books outside her cage, just out of reach. Turn the spines so she can see how good the books are. Maybe tie a string to them so we have them close enough so she can touch them, then slowly pull them away from her. We can leave one really good book close enough for her to get, but we’d make sure it’d have blank pages.”
* * *
I’m spending most of my writing energy revising Smith’s biography, CRIMINAL. This is the 11th round of editing with many more to come.
I’m spending less time on MySpace and blogging because I need to focus on this writing project.
Here’s a passage I particularly like:
We were poor folk, but we ate well. We had our own garden. We had beef, pork, rabbit, chicken, goose, infrequent duck and frequent venison. We ate chicken eggs, goose eggs, duck eggs. We churned our own butter, had our own whole milk that was at least one quarter cream on top.
I roamed several hundred acres. Forty were ours. I knew where every apple tree was. I raided the garden, ate the raspberries, ate raw peas in their pods. I sliced a dug-up potato and cooked each slice over a fire I made. We had a fruit cellar. Mom canned peaches and pears. She dyed the pears green and red and pink and yellow. I’d steal a jar, and I’d have to eat the whole thing. You can’t leave a half jar. Evidence.
Up in the attic of the fruit cellar, I found boxes of old magazines from the thirties and forties. Colliers, Liberty, Saturday Evening Post. I tore out advertisements and played with them. I still do, only now I call it collage. I’d still rather have an old advertisement than a new thing.
Photo by Lady
You endure and you endure and then you die. And then after you die, you either have an answer, or you don’t.
All my life I’ve tried to work things out, study the clues. Learn shit. Pay attention. Think. Analyze. Still ain’t got no answers. And I ain’t gonna get any answers. So what the pluck’s it all about?
If we’re supposed to be learning something, nobody seems to be giving us much information.
If we’re supposed to be DOING something, nobody’s giving us many clues.
Can’t just BE, because they took that away from us with advertising. We don’t even know what be IS anymore. So you gotta select one of those roles they offer you.
“Central casting?”
More or less. Good Mom. Good Provider, Good Rat, Good God. Although in this case, Good God would be Good Got, because it’s all about getting and got. That’s our gods, Getting and Got. I worship the Big ‘G.’
It’s kinda funny, the few folk on this planet know how to live are tribal islanders or northern eskimo tribes, aborigine dream timers. The only folk who have a sense of how to live, we’re killing off. We’re drowning the islanders, destroying the fertility rates of the eskimos, and just beating the aborigines to death.
So all we got left to guide us along the path of life are CEOs, politicians, television evangelists, and PR guys. Those are our gurus. I just lucked out. None of them roles they offered me ever came close to fitting.
“What roles did they offer you?”
Sacrificial son, lawyer, believer, follower, shit head.
“Shit head?”
That’s what most roles they offer you are: shit head. Be a shit head. Get ahead.
Poppy says Jesus is the Son of God, and when I pray (which I don’t), I have to pray to the Son of God because that’s how prayers get to God. Poppy is my real dad. Dad is my adopted father.
I go to church when I visit Poppy, and I don’t understand the sermons. Poppy’s minister talks about Jesus the Son of God and his disciples in a serious way, and he talks about parables and says that it teaches us something. But the words don’t relate to anything I think about. Shouldn’t they? I think about God a lot. People say something had to create the universe, so there’s God. I wonder why nobody thinks to ask who created God, then. Doesn’t make sense. I ask Dad about it, and he says he believes in the Great Turtle but he’s teasing me. Mom says God is Nature — not a person — which makes a lot of sense.
Poppy is solemn quiet on Sundays, even when he makes biscuits and eggs for me and Margaret. I sit in the hard pew with them. He wears a suit. She wears a pretty dress. They go up to the front to drink communion wine. In Virginia, it is always sunny in the church, but I feel solemn, like I’ve done something wrong. Poppy sits in his suit in the hot vinyl seat in the van. He always has to clear a space for me in the van when I visit. I wonder if I’ve done something wrong when he clears the seat because he moves quickly. Maybe he’s mad at me because I don’t have his last name and Dad adopted me. I don’t know how to act around Poppy. He’s a carpenter, just like Jesus was. After church we pick up fried chicken and coleslaw.
How can there be a God, and is this the difference between me and Poppy? There’s something different inside him, who believes, and me and Mom, who can’t believe. It’s like a knife and I can’t see his thoughts and he won’t tell them to me. But if I have Poppy’s blood, shouldn’t I just know? Maybe Mom’s blood is different from Poppy’s blood, and that’s why she divorced him. I’m lonely with him. Maybe that’s why she divorced him, because she was lonely too. Maybe I can’t talk to Poppy because he’s too sad about Mom divorcing him. Maybe I can’t believe in God because I’m bad, and I think God is like Poppy, and I’m sad around Poppy. Poppy tells me things but he doesn’t talk with me, not like Mom and Dad do. Before I visit him I’m excited like it’s Christmas, but when he picks me up it’s like the day after Christmas and I feel deflated. I wonder what it was I expected.
“Becky, I want to talk to you,” Poppy says.
“What?”
“Hey, don’t be such a smart alec with me.”
“But I just said what? What’s the matter with that?”
“You’re still doing it. You just said ‘just.’ That’s talking back to me.You need to be respectful to me. Your whole attitude is bad.”
“OK, I’ll try.” I try to speak with respect and friendliness, but my stomach hurts and my eyes burn. The words don’t seem right. I don’t know what words are correct to say.
“Well, when I come home, I want you to run to me and hug me. I want some sort of acknowledgment.” It sounds like he’s going to cry, too.
That’s strange, I think. He doesn’t usually spend time with me. Aren’t dads supposed to be the ones who take care of the kids? I wait and wait for something special to happen that makes me happy and warm inside, like when I’m with my grandparents or Mom or Dad. Nothing happens. Maybe he doesn’t know how to act around kids because he’s not used to me.
“And you need to talk nice to Margaret. She said you’ve been talking back to her too.”
This is hugely bewildering. I had no idea Poppy and Margaret didn’t like the way I talked. Maybe that’s why he’s short with me all the time. I hurt his feelings and I didn’t even know it. I wasn’t a good daughter.
How could she think I was bad? Margaret was so nice. I even called her Mom. I even told everyone how happy I was to have four parents, and I was sincere about it. What have I done wrong? They don’t really know me, I think. I’ll show them how smart and good I am. I’ll clean every day before they get home and I’ll study Margaret’s medical books the rest of the time. I won’t be a little piggy, eating all the chips and candy from the cupboard. I’ll show them how adult I am.
I go down to the basement to my bedroom. I tear a poster I made off the wall and shred it. The drawing was stupid, a character from a book. I sniffle and cry to myself as I fall asleep. I can’t wait until I go home.
The next morning I wake up to the noise of Poppy and Margaret going off to work. I feel empty.
They like me, don’t they? They made this bedroom for me. But why was the bedroom in the basement? They could have cleared the office upstairs for me. Maybe they really don’t like me, but they felt it was proper for me to visit. I can’t think straight, but I just know it’s unfair, and I can’t say anything to make it better even though I have the best intentions.
I can’t cry anymore. I feel resigned to my new sober realizations. I wait for the sound of both cars to leave the driveway before I get up.
My stomach has no interest in breakfast, nor can I read anything. My books seem childish, and anyways, I can’t concentrate. I go out to the back lawn. It’s scorching hot. A plane of vision clarifies and I see hundreds of brown things jumping in the dead grass. I catch one. It’s a grasshopper or cricket.
I tear one of the legs off the cricket, and put it on the patio. The cricket struggles about in a circle. I don’t feel sorry for it, just curious. I find another cricket, and pull the opposite back leg. It struggles too.
I go back inside and find a medical book, Grey’s Anatomy. With the goal of memorization, I take some of Poppy’s computer paper and practice drawing the muscles and bones. I have all the main bones memorized before Poppy gets home.
Poppy pulls in the drive in the afternoon. I have butterflies in my stomach. I go up to the door as he comes in and I say, “Hi, Dad,” and hug him. Poppy acts like everything is normal and I always greet him at the door. It’s a little weird, but I’m relieved.
“Guess what I know, Dad?”
“Hm?”
“I know the bones of the body. This is my femur in my thigh, and down here are the tibia and fibula, and the cookie on my knee is the patella.”
“Your thigh bone connected from your knee bone, your knee bone connected from your leg bone,” Poppy sings. He walks into the kitchen with his groceries and puts them away, still singing the funny song.
I come to the door to hang out and watch him. He sings at me, he sings to the chicken he’s making, and he makes his voice alternately low and then fake high like a woman’s. “Them bones, them bones gonna walk around, them bones, them bones gonna walk around, them bones them bones gonna walk around, I hear the word of the Lord.”
He grabs a bag of chips off the fridge makes a quick pre-dinner sandwich, chips and white bread and bananas and peanut butter. He chews it with relish and bugs his eyes at me, and I laugh, and he offers me a bite.
Poppy makes cracker chicken and chicken gravy and rice, with (ugh) peas and carrots for dinner. I don’t like frozen vegetables but I find that if I mix the peas and carrots in with the rice and cover it with gravy, it tastes pretty good.
Traveling Light (by Smith)
More from my project:
THE REPUBLICANS
“Why did you fight with Grandpa?” I asked Dad.
“Because he’s a Republican.”
“What does that mean?”
“Well, there are Republicans, and they try to get all the money from people like us and give it to rich people. And then there are the good guys on our side, the Democrats.”
My opinion of Grandpa immediately plummeted. How could this good man like Republicans? Didn’t he know what they do?
“Nixon was the worst Republican. He was a real bad man. He broke the law. He spied on Americans.”
“I don’t understand. Why do people like the Republicans?”
“Because they don’t know any better. President Reagan is a Republican. He’s one of the worst. But the absolute worst was Nixon.”
“President Reagan likes jellybeans.” That’s pretty much all I knew about him ‘cept that he was old like Grandpa and had a big smile. We learned about the jellybeans in our weekly reader in school. We also learned about Sam Walton, who made Walmart. But I’ve never seen a Walmart.
“Did you know Reagan thinks ketchup is a vegetable? He’s trying to stop them from putting vegetables in your school lunches. He doesn’t care about kids.”
The rich kids at school got tator tots and pizza. Some of the really poor kids got that too. They had free lunches. But I’d never seen a vegetable in a school lunch. And we couldn’t afford to buy lunches, so I packed mine.
“But I’m really mad because Reagan is crazy. He sends money to bad people in other countries as long as they’re against the communists. He talks real tough to the Russians and they’re afraid he’s going to start a nuclear war.”
“Oh my God! What can we do to stop this? Why are people so stupid?”
“We can’t do anything about it, Kath. But we’re probably OK here. If there’s a nuclear war, the Russians will bomb the big cities, the military bases.”
“Will they bomb Cleveland?”
“Hard to say.”
“I’m scared, Dad!”
“Well, I’m thinking about storing up some food, putting it in barrels in the basement. We can store food, water, some basic things we might need until it’s safe to look around. If they bomb Cleveland, we have to wait in the basement until the main fallout is done.”
“Reagan sounds like Ray-Gun.”
“You’re my little hippie girl.”
“Good night, Dad. I love you.”
“Good night, Kath.”
He leant down and gave me a bristly kiss. Turned out the lights. I saw his profile blocked out in yellow light from the hall.
“Wait!”
“What? Good night, you.”
“No, tell me your favorite thing. What was your favorite thing today?”
“Oh, talking to you.”
“Do you want to know what my favorite thing is?”
“OK, what?”
“Talking to you!”
“OK. Sleep tight.”
He closed the door and left me in the subdued lighting from the fish tank. I couldn’t see the fish from the bed, but I saw the green cast by plants, the beige and black rocks at the bottom. The hum of the aerator was comforting. I had my own little controllable world in a fish bowl.
My thoughts flowed with the hum of water. What could be done about Reagan? How could I be safe, and how would my family be safe?
The basement wouldn’t be good. I just knew it. Mold grew down there. I decided I would try to dig a shelter in the backyard. We could live in the shelter for years if we could store enough food. I’d make it really big, so Mary could come, too.
I didn’t think our cats and dog would be good down there. I’d have to ask Dad.
I’d get Dad to give me some money, and we could tile the walls and floor. We could make it really nice. And I’d bring a lot of books. Dad could figure out how to make it work as long as I dug the hole. He could make electricity and plumbing.
I fell asleep into heavy dream. In the dream, we lived near a volcano. The volcano was going to erupt and I was trying to shake everyone. I shook my Mom, my Dad, but they seemed to be sleeping. The volcano erupted, and I ran down our street towards our house. I flapped my arms, and I clumsily floated a few feet off the ground. The harder I flapped, the more difficult it was to float. Then the lava came, engulfed the street, and I was way up, in the clouds, dizzy. Some type of weird miscalibration. I aimed myself down at the street, towards the rooftop of our house. My family was on the roof. I grabbed my Mom, but she was too heavy, I started sinking towards the ground. I grabbed my brother and I was able to fly away, over the spurting volcano and into a dizzy height where I again lacked control.
“I lost a pound. I hadn’t shit for three days. Then I just made a fast big firm one and lost a pound.”
“I’ve decided we’re piss and shit machines for Mother Earth. I think it’s Mother Earth’s plan. She wants us to dig up this mineral in country A. Put it into fertilizer in country B. Put it on crops in country C. Ship the food to country D, where we eat it an shit it out. It’s Mother Earth’s way to get the mineral from A to D.”
“Well, Global Shipping of food is not part of Mother Earth’s plan.”
“Global Shitting is.”
I make coffee, give a cup to Smith.
“Thank you. Oh yeah, you’re a lady, K. Well, I met a little lady and she a shady gray. But when I lick her lapidarry it the only way.” He’s saying stuff from a poem.
“You wanna lick my lappy, happy pappy?”
“I wanna read again.” We need to be among poets badly. I’m looking forward to London, where we plan to have a reading at the Poetry Cafe.
* * *
Dream last night. My arms were contaminated with bad soil. Visible tape worms squiggled about on the the undersides of my arms, burrowing under my skin. I tried to get all them off, but there were too many of them.
Looked at my arms, and eight of the worms succeeded in getting completely. I watched them make fluid movements under the skin.
Fortunately then I woke up. Good to be in this reality rather than that one.
When I first started my travels, I’d wake up in the dead of night and worry about my family. I’ve been gone so long that I’ve stopped doing that.
I feel guilty for not calling my grandmother. Mom says she might be slipping a little more into Alzheimer’s grasp.
I do write letters to Grandma, but it’s cumbersome to set up Skype and I do not want the reality of Home invading my current, more independent reality.
Sometimes I dream about Grandma, and she’s a little girl or a kitten I must protect. Heartburn.