Dear Papa,
I just finished reading your story, finally. You’re not getting a handwritten letter because I type much faster, plus now I will have an electronic copy of our correspondence, dude.
As I told you on the phone, I got into your story. I’ve read some of it a while ago (13, 14 years?) and gotten different things out of it now. I have certain books I read over and over again and depending on the stage of life the stories mean different things to me. Women Who Run With the Wolves has stories with hags and wise women and girls getting lost in the forest, and your last story had some of the themes I’m used to. I feel incredibly lucky that you write (and Mom) because it is the chance to know you on a different level.
The words in your stories are beautiful – beautiful phrases and sentences too. Some of my favorites:
“Listening to you talk to a woman is like drinking clabbered milk – it goes down in fits and makes you gag.”
…
“I want a family, Willie, I want kids, I want somebody to hold me.”
…
”Oh my god, she’s coming up. I don’t know if I like her. I don’t know if she’s that good looking. Maybe living by myself isn’t so bad.”
“I’m not interested in talking you into enjoying this. You are a real piece of work.”
.
These mindless robots of proper usage These husbanders of inconsequentia
The hospital scene made me LOL (Laugh Out Loud). “Now do you see why you can never take anything for granted in a hospital?” Hee hee.
…
He worried about the wholeness of the building because it had been built by men and even well-intentioned men sometimes make mistakes. Brian knew just how powerful the world outside the door was. He wrapped himself and went out into the night. While the women and girls, carefree and cozy, slept on, he scraped the snow from their rooflines with a long pole. Khaa! That’s the difference between men and women, children.
Excuse me??!!! Maybe it’s because I’ve spent many night hours awake with my children while my husband slept – carefree and cozy – that I take a major exception to this. Men may worry about the structure and the building and in our case, mowing the lawn, but women’s work is worrying about the emotional and physical health of the entire family, and rack up many, many sleepless nights. I’m convinced women don’t fully sleep for the first 5 years of their children’s lives, because they need to hear the coughs and cries.
But I forgive you, because then you make up for it when Brian tells the story of Claire killing the hag. I’ll let it slide.
…
So. I’ve included two of my short stories. The Toe will be published in The Sandstar Review, an online poetry and prose publication. Carrying On is the prelude to The Toe. Whenever I want to write fiction I use these two characters, Fran and Oliver, and it frees me up to be a little more creative. I’m thinking I should invent another character who is a working mom, but I fear there will be too many clichés coming out of that one.
I’ve also included vital information from the internet, in case you ever have to make the decision whether or not to drink sea water.
I am incredibly grateful to have your stories, and I look forward to reading them again when I’m forty. Sigh. The only good thing about turning forty in six years is that I will cease to be ignorant and I will become wise.
I love you,
Your eldest daughter,
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Carrying On
Fran opened the door into her home and heard voices. She walked through the dining room to say hello to Oliver, to ask what he was doing home so early. Then the woman's laugh drifted through the closed kitchen door, and Fran stopped.
Cabinets opened and closed, dishes and silverware were set on the table, the water ran in the sink and was quiet. The smell of cold roast and pickles and the sound of Oliver's low, pleased grumble made it to Fran, all the way to the dining room.
Fran would have rather caught them in bed.
She nudged the door open and walked into the kitchen, pretending to be surprised, as if she were the one who had something to hide. The woman was a young beatnik, dressed impossibly in long blue striped pants and a flowered blue shirt, and bare feet. She was standing behind Oliver as if to be ready in case he needed more food, or salt, or a refill on his coffee. They were not touching.
"I thought you volunteered at the school on Tuesdays," Oliver said to her, an accusation.
"I had a headache," Fran said.
Fran had always imagined hippies smelled bad and didn't comb their hair, but this young woman smelled like lavender and had long, silky brown hair tied neatly with a scarf. Fran could see a soft freckled shoulder and no bra strap. The woman gathered Oliver's empty plate and placed it in the sink, and without a trace of shame, set to doing the dishes. The plate, the fork, the cup and the dish towel found their homes while Oliver and Fran looked on, as if they were watching the theater.
It was Fran, not Oliver, she addressed. "Tears will build up in your ears if you don't cry them out, and then you won't hear anything." She touched Fran's face and left, and they both watched her climb into her little white Ford Falcon parked across the street and drive away, still barefoot.
It was the only day in their entire marriage that Fran did not make dinner. She lay in the lavender-scented bed and listened as the children came home from school, while Oliver boomed that their mother wasn't feeling well and he would take everyone out for hamburgers and shakes.
In the twilight of their lives, in one of her deliriums, Fran would take electric pruning shears to her husband, but they never spoke of it.
To read more about Fran and Oliver, and the electric pruning shears episode, click "Fran and Oliver" on the right, or search for "The Toe," one of my fiction stories.
Cabinets opened and closed, dishes and silverware were set on the table, the water ran in the sink and was quiet. The smell of cold roast and pickles and the sound of Oliver's low, pleased grumble made it to Fran, all the way to the dining room.
Fran would have rather caught them in bed.
She nudged the door open and walked into the kitchen, pretending to be surprised, as if she were the one who had something to hide. The woman was a young beatnik, dressed impossibly in long blue striped pants and a flowered blue shirt, and bare feet. She was standing behind Oliver as if to be ready in case he needed more food, or salt, or a refill on his coffee. They were not touching.
"I thought you volunteered at the school on Tuesdays," Oliver said to her, an accusation.
"I had a headache," Fran said.
Fran had always imagined hippies smelled bad and didn't comb their hair, but this young woman smelled like lavender and had long, silky brown hair tied neatly with a scarf. Fran could see a soft freckled shoulder and no bra strap. The woman gathered Oliver's empty plate and placed it in the sink, and without a trace of shame, set to doing the dishes. The plate, the fork, the cup and the dish towel found their homes while Oliver and Fran looked on, as if they were watching the theater.
It was Fran, not Oliver, she addressed. "Tears will build up in your ears if you don't cry them out, and then you won't hear anything." She touched Fran's face and left, and they both watched her climb into her little white Ford Falcon parked across the street and drive away, still barefoot.
It was the only day in their entire marriage that Fran did not make dinner. She lay in the lavender-scented bed and listened as the children came home from school, while Oliver boomed that their mother wasn't feeling well and he would take everyone out for hamburgers and shakes.
In the twilight of their lives, in one of her deliriums, Fran would take electric pruning shears to her husband, but they never spoke of it.
To read more about Fran and Oliver, and the electric pruning shears episode, click "Fran and Oliver" on the right, or search for "The Toe," one of my fiction stories.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)