Life - Part Two
Chapter 2: God's Country
Lying on my arm in bed. Drifting, recalling dreams. No, not yet. Meanwhile, I wait: locked in the pretherapeutic tangle, the molasses of my life. Stewing in the unused potential, and my struggle to get out. There is some permeability, some translucency, in the membrane between the actual and the possible; but my vision is blocked by the mucus of inertia and habit, routine and inadequacy.
But if life is a dream . . .
The thin layer of permeability diminishes to zero. The whole vulva reengages, swallows whole. I'm inside now, fused with the world of desire.
To cross the barrier is to go from womb to womb: from the locked cage of one existence over to the other side, to the locked womb of the other.
Freedom only in the passage between the two worlds. The tunnel of love. In the movement, the becoming. The birth, the death, the marriage. Life comprises death and living, two worlds linked as one, back and forth among which our souls move, shuttling. Across the thresholds.
Similarly, dream and waking. Silence and expression.
"Good morning," Sharon says to me, her eyes twin mirrors of my own.
I go to work, today on my own house. Here's my to-do list:
- Re-chink the walls
- Clean out the septic tank
- Check the rat traps in the basement
- Change the bandages on the goat's leg
- Try to fix the truck's tailgate
- Move more firewood into house-shed
And on and on it goes . . .
I begin with the first item: tempted as I am to avoid doing any of them, by sitting down first and priorizing the list. That could take half the morning. I just go for the bag of moss we collected and dried in the summer, and start just outside the kitchen door, working clockwise. Constance comes to help, lasts ten minutes, and trots back into the kitchen where Sharon is baking. Eddie spins down the driveway on his bike, saying he's going to Bruce's house. Bruce lives half a mile down the highway. "Be careful," I call to him. He waves acknowledgement with one arm, losing control of the front wheel momentarily over a rough spot in the driveway. I shake my head and take up another small handful of moss, its summer color of bright green preserved in the black garbage bag; I stuff it in bit by bit, between the cracks in the ancient gray-brown logs, using the flat of my thumb.
This wasn't the house that I had built - but what the hell. It was a home. It was the inside that counted, the happy relationships. Just then I heard a dish break, Sharon yelling something, Constance crying.
It was time for a break.
"Everybody okay?" I said on entering the kitchen. Sharon was picking up pieces of a glass pie plate from the stones in front of the oven. Constance was watching, still crying. Red-smeared pie pieces lay in clumps everywhere. Was it blood?
"Yes, yes," Sharon said. "We can handle it."
We?
"Sorry I asked. Anything the matter, Sharon?"
Silence.
"Something I've done?"
She glanced at Constance, then at me. "No."
After a strained lunch together, an afternoon of trying to forget about what might be wrong by dealing instead with the crud in the septic tank, and a supper dominated by the kids complaining about the meal, it finally came out in bed together.
"You never seem to have any time for me."
"Oh. Really. We have meals together. We sleep together every night. That's about fifty-percent of all our time isn't it?"
I was surprised to see tears welling in Sharon's eyes. "That's not what I call time together."
"All right. Any suggestions?"
"Why do I have to figure this out? You're acting like it's my problem."
"Okay, I'm trying to help. But you brought it up. I thought everything was fine. Are you sure it's not something else?"
"What do you think? Are you looking for something else? Do you think I've got a secret lover or something?"
I thought of Phil, who lived alone. That was far-fetched; and anyone else would have to live in Carstairs, where Sharon had her massage practice twice a week. But in the nature of her work . . .
"Look, I don't. It's just between you and me. It feels like you're so wrapped up in your work, your lists of things to do, your groups, your journal, your private thoughts - it's as if all you care about is yourself, your own world, and I feel like the kids and I get shut out of it. There's nothing left for us. For me."
I tried to soothe her. I didn't want her to cry herself to sleep. But I wasn't sure what she wanted. Did she want me to make love to her then, to make it better? Somehow it didn't seem right, for me at least.
"How about if we take the kids and go skating, or skiing tomorrow? Is that the kind of thing you're wanting?"
She hesitated - as if that would be too easy. But it was something. "Do you want to do that?" she asked.
"Yeah, sure. I could enjoy that. You're right, we're overdue for a family outing."
She shook her head. "I can't help thinking there's more to it than that, Charlie. But I just don't know what else. The outing sounds great. Let's do it."
"We can talk about it some more if you want."
"Not now. But another time. That would be good." She looked at me with hopeful eyes. I snuggled up to her and soon she fell asleep. I was still wide awake and reached beside the bed for my journal, and began to write:
Conflict: where is it? I can't see it. I see a bedroom: log walls worn gray and smooth with age; the ancient chinking falling out. Sharon's grandmother's feather quilt on our bed, a big four-poster. This was her family's house, the old homestead. Now the highway goes past, trucks roaring in the night.
She sleeps, peaceful beside me. The kids are asleep in the next bedroom, Eddie, her child by another marriage, Constance, ours. I am a father now, a husband. My time, my dreams and ambitions, are no longer solely my own, under my own control or direction. I take refuge in this journal, these pages reserved for me. Why? Does it matter? Somehow, to say it out, to see and say these things, somehow it does matter. Otherwise, water runs under the bridge, gone forever; and feelings stay clogged and mute.
What would I change, at this point? I have the freedom - or do I? This family is what I have chosen already. From here on, the choices are limited. Within this domestic round, I am bound by certain constraints: do my share of all the chores, bring in half the income, spend quality time with Eddie and Constance and Sharon, be on top of the miscellaneous projects of maintenance and upkeep for the house and grounds, the orchard, garden, vehicle. These things, it seems, take up all nearly the time there is.
Tomorrow we'll wake up next day and go skating together, on the lake twenty-minutes' drive away. This is how the whole day will be spent: I can see that from the beginning. Is this what I want, really want?
Sure, why not?
We'll make sure the kids are dressed warmly; pack a lunch. We'll go all out, and take the cross-country-skis as well as the skates. Sharon will be humming as she fits the sandwiches into a backpack. This is her idea of a great time. Me? I'll go along for the ride.
But what would I rather do, to replace this vague feeling of dissatisfaction? I don't know. In the meantime, this is fine, I guess.
We'll drive there, park, unload, lace on skates. For two or three hours we'll make circles on the ice. Pull Constance around holding onto a two-by-four. Play a little hockey with Eddie. I wish, for his sake, there were some kids his age around here. He doesn't seem to mind, though. Says he gets enough of those kids at school during the week. "Here, Charlie - " He slides me a wobbly pass. Do I wish he'd call me "Dad"? Not really.
When I get back to work on the chinking, it's the same old story. Working for other people, the time flies. I enjoy myself. The work needs doing, and I need the money. No problem. But working around the place, for myself, just for us, I always ask myself - for what? Will Eddie want this place when he grows up; or Constance? Sharon ended up with it, by speaking up when none of her siblings wanted it, and the old man was going to put it up for sale. Easy: just by speaking up at the right time. Maybe we could sell it if they didn't want it . . . but not Sharon. It has sentimental value for her now, and she'd never part with it.
I reach into the bag of moss.
When I'm doing the chores, the job list, I want to do less of it; to spend more time with Sharon and the kids. Then, when I'm with them, I'm thinking about falling behind on the jobs. But what difference does it make if I'm behind?
It's this old work ethic, the conditioning from school, parents, bosses. Gotta get ahead. For a boy, a man, gotta compete to keep up, get ahead, get on top, stay on top.
I've left that rat race behind. But has it left me free? No, I carry it on inside myself, into the work of a handyman, a father, a husband. Maybe all this stuff is just reaction to being tied down to a domestic situation that, looked at objectively, is stifling me. Maybe I need variety, a new sexual partner . . .
or deeper communication with Sharon. We rarely talk about these things.
Change, if it is needed, is my own responsibility: change in my attitude. I could be contented with everything as it is. Comfort is relative. The house works fine, basically, with the old chinking, a little fresh air coming through the cracks. It's all a matter of standards. Whose standards do I live by?
And yet, with the passing of time, things do deteriorate. The brake seals on the truck. The bits of original chinking falling out, bit by bit, letting more and more air in. The situation is not static. I'm growing older. If I truly need more variety in my sexual life, then time is running out to make it happen. Need? Who is to say what is need, and what is compulsive desire, or arbitrary whimsy?
These are issues we discussed at the men's group I went to in Carstairs last month. Will I go again? Squash is more fun, and mixed volleyball. Or the drop-in music night at the bar. More fun - but real?
It's with Sharon that I need to get more real. Wanting variety, that's just a symptom of not doing it right this time. To carry each other with each other, to fill that emptiness as we do our chores, our separate activities. We do need variety, maybe, in how we communicate together. To be more open about what we're getting, or not, in our sexual relations with each other. To talk about what goes on with us around other people, members of the opposite sex. To keep in touch with and share our deep desires: that's the way to pre-empt the "fate" of a relationship suddenly breaking apart because of "someone else." It's got nothing to do with "someone else": it's all up to us. And time is running out.
I shut the binder, turned out the light, and wrapped my arms around Sharon. She stirred in her sleep, moaning softly. I loved her, I knew that much. What else mattered?
I found out, from another bad dream:
I come home from a job to find Sharon in a daze, staring out the window. She shows no awareness of my appearance. Then, like an animated wax figure, she turns to me. Her jaw opens. "Connie . . . Connie's - dead." The last word comes in a whisper, her vain attempt to mute the jagged edge of it. It cuts to the heart.
"How?"
It doesn't matter - fool! Dead.
"Her bike, on the highway . . ."
"Oh, no, Sharon - "
My fault . . .
Then, I dreamed about Jan again. Our life together there - if we'd stayed together. We lived in what was now a suburban tract, called Galena Acres. I was the handyman. I kept the pool clean in summer, cleaned chimneys in winter. Raked leaves in the fall, repaired rototillers in spring. Jan kept books for several businesses in Galena. We seemed to be happy. We had committed not to have other lovers. It was our intention to stay together, "forever." We talked about all this, and then made love on our white shag rug. Like dogs. I woke up with a bad taste in my mouth and hugged Sharon as hard as I could. Everything, really, was okay.
We had a good, full day at the lake. We ended up skating all day, and just skiing in and out. I was exhausted at the end of it - but felt after a good meal of soup and bread, I was ready for a break from the family.
"I'm think I'm going to go in and check out the volleyball tonight in Carstairs," I announced after supper.
Sharon looked at me with some surprise. "You're not tired?"
"Yeah, sort of. But the skating was a bit slow. I need to work out some energy."
Her eyes lowered in resignation. "Okay. I'll put the kids to bed tonight."
"Leave the dishes for me," I said. I'll do them tomorrow."
The volleyball itself was fun, or could have been. It was the politics that rankled. A bunch of new people had come, and the self-appointed leader of our usual bunch had told them the court was reserved, and they'd have to wait till we were done. There were only four of them, teenagers, at least part native: what were they going to do, play two on two when we were finished? I was for working them in on rotation, but we couldn't agree. They waited around for awhile watching us play, and then left without another word.
I let off some steam over beers afterward at the pub. "It's all politics," I complained to my listeners. Influence-mongering, pulling rank. Seniority, backroom deals. I've seen it everywhere, now. Whether it's nominating conventions, academic appointments, awarding of construction contracts, or volleyball. It's disgusting."
When they'd heard me out the others nodded and changed the subject. This crowd was fun to play volleyball with, but they were somewhat racist. Scott and Terry were a couple in their thirties, with whom Sharon and I sometimes played elementary bridge. There was also Heado, who nursed one beer while we went through a couple of pitchers, and Chan, a local accountant. Chan was Chinese, and the most vocally anti-native of all of us - though it had been Wilma Redding, the organizer, who had kept the young players off the court. Wilma wasn't part of our post-game drinking crew.
The topic got around to yuppies, and yuppieism. Chan, who was actually a true "professional," held out a liberal definition by which I, who was neither urban nor professional (nor especially young) was a yuppie. He admitted with a grin that he would go along with membership in that club, seeing as he lived in Carstairs, the biggest town around, and was younger than I by "at least" ten years.
I was also guilty, according to Terry, by association. Sharon's massage practice in town was the key evidence; also, she painted a little on the side, and had taken a yoga class once. I played the guitar, and occasionally was seen jogging along the highway: hard evidence. Not to mention the cross-country skis, for the whole family no less. I didn't mind all this; Scott and Terry were next, and in the end only Heado escaped: he was a "neo-hippie."
Driving home, I switched on the radio.
"Macmillan Bloedel announced plans today to begin roadbuilding operations in its vast new tree-farm license near Carston, British Columbia. Responding to concerns by a handful of local residents and the nearby Taktxit Indian band, spokesman Dan Biquette said that every effort would be made to follow the Government's new Logging Practices Act. The environment, said Mr. Biquette, is one of Macmillan Bloedel's key targets. The company's goals, he stated, are fully consistent with the public interest and are outlined in its new white paper entitled "Our Forests: Sustained Growth in the Twenty-first Century," available for just $24.95 from - "
Enough of that. I looked out at the dark forests lining the highway and felt grateful I lived here now, not ten or twenty years from now. But I probably would, and then I'd seen more changes than just a few more hectares of trees gone. I'd be hearing, before long:
"It was announced today that a major new highway spur from the Transcanada to Vancouver and linking north with the Alaska Highway will be constructed near Carness, BC A cloverleaf design will handle what is estimated to be a thirty to forty percent increase in traffic flow in the region. There are related plans by a separate developer to open a shopping mall and recreation complex nearby. It is expected that the new projects will draw some ten thousand temporary or permanent residents to the area, for the new job opportunities that will open. . . ."
Jobs for Constance and Eddie, no doubt. Jobs at the mall.
Shit, what was the world coming to?
With more development, taxes would skyrocket.
"What's this, Sharon? Did you see this notice we got in the mail?"
"Uh . . . oh, that? I thought it was a tax refund."
Her new black reading glasses are perched halfway down her nose. I like the way she looks, like that. Professional. Like an editor: my own private editor, secretary, business consultant. Maybe I should go back to writing . . . but, this notice - "Actually, no, it's not a refund. They're telling us that the taxes are going up thirty percent this year; and fifty percent on 'unearned' - that's all our interest - income. This is criminal! How can they get away with this!"
"Oh, yeah, I did hear something about it on the radio recently. I assumed it was just for higher income brackets. They were talking about paying off the deficit."
"No; it's everybody - across the board. We can't make it with the income we're making. After the land taxes have doubled . . . with three houses for sale around us, everyone moving out - I'm not gonna have enough work as a Mr. Fixit to keep us going. Your painting's great, but it's not pulling in bucks. What are we gonna do?"
There was always something to worry about. I pulled into the driveway, up to the darkened house.
Home: where the heart is, well enough said.
The beer had made me tired, but also full of passion for what I had gained in this life. I went to bed with the reading light on and wrote in the journal, to try to capture that essence, the concept of home:
The heart is a moving centre, responsive to the wider currents of life. . . .
If this is too philosophical for you, time to get out now, boys. The pub'll be closing soon anyhow.
What can you call home when you've lived so many places you can't count them anymore? The place of birth? For me that's red bricks and white marble stoops. Hard crabs steamed and spicy hot; or soft-crab sandwiches with mustard and iced coffee. Orange skies in the city on a summer night when Palmer pitched a no-hitter. Sitting with fifty-thousand in the fog watching Hornung gallop out of a pack of pursuers. Going to the shore for a break when the heat and humidity both reached ninety, or taking refuge in the earth-coolness of the basement.
And now? Home is a new home, a real home of someone's hand-making. Not my own, but what does that matter? I have built a house, in another place now, with wood milled from trees that grew there. I cleared for it, excavated for it, laid its foundation and erected its posts and beams; framed it, adzed its joists and roofed it, plumbed and wired and insulated it. I brought it to life: and then sold in on the open market. Is that my home?
But no, it's this place off the highway where I dream now, where I work, eat and shit, talk with my neighbors and make love with my mate. From these walls my daughter will go to her school, my wife go out to tend her garden. Farther around, from the standing trees, the animals come and go, the bear for its annual raids, the deer to graze, the ravens to watch that I'm mindful of the skies. The mountains on all sides hold me in, a child in their ageless arms. Behind the house, crown land extending to the rivers, the mountain ranges. Up for sale, maybe. Doomed in the fullness of time. Because this home, in the wider sense, is a shared home, with many others. Too many others, perhaps.
To the north, the highway stretches straight as far as the hazy peaks on the horizon, a hundred miles away. To the west, Carston out of view, humming with its own dreams of the future. To the east, our hidden lake for skating in the winter, and for swans and ducks and geese in the summer. I've seen deer and elk come there in the spring and fall, and coyotes on nights when I've stopped to look at the stars. Scattered along this ridge, a dozen other households, homes like mine.
They call this God's country. Where we've learned to make do, to get by. There's much borrowing, and giving - not much stealing, except by bears and coyotes. Many strands in the webs of cooperation, some formal, some just friendly. Toleration of individuality - but not of bureaucratic indifference. We care about many things, things human and real, things natural. We feel close to our mountains, many-ringed around us in our bowl of a valley; with their faces of four seasons - sometimes three, sometimes two, sometimes one. We don't mind the clouds - we rejoice in the sun that comes in its own time. We have learned to live with mosquitoes, and to walk with our fears in the dark of the woods on summer nights, with or without flashlight, candle, moon or stars. We came here to get away from it all - and to find it all made new in the country of the heart. We mean to stay, so as to ask the questions that still remain: what does it mean to make it even better? Does better mean accessible to more? Or does it mean simply extending our stay, a little longer in the rolling scheme of our histories?
That was enough writing for one session. I should have gone to sleep content; and maybe I did, on the surface. But dreams care nothing for surfaces, and my unsettling speculations about the future came to roost that night again:
"Mr. Ash, your wife, Sharon is in the hospital, here in Carston. She's all right, not too serious. But she's in a light state of shock and can't talk right now. We thought you should know."
"Okay, I appreciate it - but what happened?"
"I'm sorry, but I'm not supposed - "
"Look, Miss, I'm her husband, and I've got a forty-five minute drive to get down there, and I have a right to know what the hell happened to my wife. Was she in an accident, or what?"
"She was raped, Mr. Ash."
"What? Murdered? For what?"
"He was in a fight. There was a knife. They say it was about drugs."
"Eddie? He wasn't into drugs!"
"Apparently he was."
"Sharon, you sound so calm. When did you hear about this?"
"Just a minute ago, I got a call. I thought I should let you know right away. I didn't know what to do. I don't even know if I can bear to see him like that . . . Charlie, I've gotta go now, I'm about to cry my stupid fucking head off - "
Just dreams. These were just dreams. But what do you do when the radio comes on in the morning to cheer you with news like the following:
"Scientists at the National Observatory today announced startling evidence that the earth could face a pole-shift within the next three to six months. Changes in the magnetic charge observed both within the earth's crust and in the outer ionosphere show a strong tendency toward 'destabilization,' according to Dr. Robert Winston. The effects of such a shift could be disastrous for all the earth's inhabitants, Dr. Winston said - especially humans. The last shift in the poles is believed to have caused the rapid extinction of the past masters of the earth, the dinosaurs."
What do you do when you watch a science program on TV at night with your kids, and you learn more than you want to -
"Can scientists create human life in their own image? The scenario is getting closer and closer to that of the Biblical Genesis. In today's program we'll be looking at the latest developments in genetic engineering - for humans. The revolution in biotechnology is no longer 'just around the corner'; it's here.
"To begin, we go to a small, unassuming laboratory in Greensboro, North Carolina. Nestled in the green, rolling hills, scented with a profusion of wild flowers and shaded with the branches of venerable old oaks, in this building the first fully-engineered human being is taking shape, cell by cell. . . ."
You take refuge in your past. You look to what got you where you are today. . . .
