Chapter Three—False Memories and the True Nature of Orchids
It is Sunday, two days after
Charlotte’s manicure, and my distaste of Lydia has had time to ferment . She
emailed me late Friday evening, delighted by how many tasks she had
accomplished that day. I didn’t respond. She emailed me again on Saturday with more of
the same self-congratulatory comments. She telephoned me late Saturday night,
but I didn’t pick up. Her message mentioned her kite-running high produced by
the heap of events she had executed over the past 32 hours. I have decided to block Lydia from my life. Now
all I have to do is to send her bouncing face-to-face.
I visit my parents almost every Sunday; sometimes my son joins
us. He is their eye-apple. Both of them
were born on the same day of the same year and they are happier together in
advanced age than they have ever been. At least, my witnessing skills tell me
this. They cook together, figure out the vagaries of Internet options, garden
on their condo roof-top, watch CNN with fervor, stay true blue to Barack Obama
through his difficult mandates, and shop for gifts on Amazon. My father,
Joshua, is still handsome, even at the age of 83. He has maintained his boyish
walk and trim physique and his lips curve naturally into a hearty smile. My
mother, Diana, is slender with refined, almost sharp features.
They met when they were barely twenty at her
father’s Inn in the Eastern Townships.
She was waitressing and working at the front desk along with her four
lovely sisters. When my father studied each one of the comely Shaw girls, he
couldn’t decide who the prettiest one
was. He knew only to whom he was the
most attracted: Diana, with the slight overbite and cherry red lipstick.
Unless, unless he did not exclude the eldest: long-stemmed Rose with her
bouncing auburn curls and distractingly deep bosom. Perturbingly, there was something off about
Rose. She laughed too loudly, spoke and walked in abrupt chops and halts, wore
too much feverish rouge . Also, it was rumoured that she could hold down
neither a job nor a boyfriend, but her lips and hips were luscious.
The year was 1948; the aura in and
around Montreal optimistic, almost charmed. Anything seemed possible for the
young and healthy. My father spent the
entire summer at Hollyhock Inn. He was there with a young auto mechanic, Karl,
who was later to become a millionaire, but remain a lifelong friend. He courted
Diana fastidiously, but a sliver of his imagination stalked Rose. My father never understood his
obsession with James Shaw’s eldest daughter, and he confessed it to me only
after she died. Rose had never married. She had lived her life tentatively,
never certain of who she was or who she hoped to be.
In fact, my father was soon
enamoured of Diana’s entire family: her hard-working and gentle mother and reckless red-haired father,
both of whom had emigrated from Ireland.
How different they were from my father’s prudent parents, and the main
difference was religion. In those days, it was scandalous for a Jewish boy to
marry a Gentile girl, especially if she hadn’t converted. I suppose that the
inverse was also true, but James Shaw was a free-thinker, and conformed to
nothing but his own notion of what made sense.
My mother presumed my father was
just interested in a good time, and she held on tightly to her virtue. But oh!
The warmth, charm and energy of her family. At meal-times, there was so much
hot debating and easy banter, so unlike the rather dour dinners held in my
paternal grandmother’s stiff and formal dining room. And so, my smitten father
threw caution to the wind and proposed marriage to his Irish sweetheart. His
parents refused to talk to him for years, but they relented when I was born. Unfortunately, they remained ill at ease with
my mother and never met any members of her family—not even once. In contrast, my mother’s parents welcomed
Joshua from the outset: a pharmaceutical student with impeccable manners and a
car to boot! They praised him to the
skies, telling all of their daughters repeatedly that he was their favourite
son-in-law by far.
My parents chose to elope even though James Shaw offered them the gracious dining room in
his well-known Inn. (He would lose it
due to unpaid back taxes only a few years later, and go on to other brazen investments, which all ended in
financial disaster).
On this particular visit, I feel
clingy and needy. My dad shows me his new collection of orchids. They are grouped gracefully on a round
mahogany table around a stained-glass lamp he designed and built himself. The lamp is a work of art to my
fantasy-addicted eyes: lagoon-green mermaids
perched on slate grey rocks, their tresses silver and gold. My father enjoys
his freckled orchids. “The flowers last for months, and look at the homely
speckles. Don’t they remind you of frog bellies? They look prehistoric, almost
ugly and yet the creamy texture and rose and lavender tints look like
brush-strokes. What an intriguing mixture of ugliness and beauty.”
“But, Dad, surely they’re more
beautiful than they are ugly,” I both assert and question at once.
“That’s not certain at all,
Gloria. I can tell you this, though. If
they had cost more than $24, I wouldn’t have bought them. Do you remember when Provigo was selling
Venus Fly Traps?”
“Yes, yes, come to think of it, I
do. And for very little money, as I recall.
I was very tempted, but being an aspiring vegetarian, it seemed peculiar
to buy a carnivorous plant.” I change the subject abruptly. “Dad, I want to
thank you for helping me out, supporting my decision to opt for early
retirement.”
“Gloria, honey. You’ve worked hard.
If you need to walk away from it all, and figure your life out, your mother and
I are all for it. We have your back.”
On cue, my mother enters the study,
so lovely in a white sweater, turquoise shawl and black trousers. Her hair is
pale-silver and her eyes have always looked green to me even though she claims
they are merely hazel. The three of us walk single-file to the breakfast nook
where my mother has set an elegant table of smoked salmon, rye crackers, vegan-wasabi
caviar in little mounds on Melba Toast rounds and creamy slices of drag-queen
flamboyant Dragon Fruit with its quirky black-headed edible seeds.
I love my mother dearly, but I
adore my brilliant father. We sit down, and in the background Leonard Cohen is
snarling and crooning. I will always be safe with my parents alive. When they
depart, I will be shipwrecked, and I
don’t even begin to understand what that means.
We eat quietly. My mother offers
wine. We decline. My early retirement will start in only two weeks, at the end
of the autumn session. My parents share the concern that I will be defeated by
the lack of structure, that the minutes and hours will drag me down into dark and
doubting waters. My father also retired young, but in his case, it had been a
seven-year-plan and his acumen at reading the stock market had made him what is
humbly referred to as comfortable. They were prepared to support my drastic
decision, but they had one major concern: my eBay spending. They both agreed
that it was on the edge of being out of hand, and perhaps they were right. I
only knew that it gave me great pleasure and I tried to be very reasonable with
my highest bids.
Dad suggests we take in a movie,
but I don’t want to be in public; the movement and dissonant energies of
throngs of people are very draining.
My mother mention my brother’s upcoming wedding in Vermont.
“I hope it isn’t going to be too cold.
A tent-wedding in November is risky business.”
“There should be plenty of
space-heaters, but just in case, I’ll
have toasty throws in the trunk,” my father explains.
“Gloria, tell me about Susan’s
dress.” My mother is a fashionista. She loves dressing up for parties even
though she doesn’t feel beautiful anymore.
Susan and I had chosen her dress
shortly after Ralph moved out. I think she believed the quest would be a
distraction for me, and strangely, it was. We entered upscale, minimalist
boutiques on Laurier and I was immediately attracted to a one-of-a-kind raw
silk turquoise dress. The lines were simple; the fabric shimmered. The colour
of the dress was a perfect replica of Susan’s jewel-toned eyes. When she
stepped out of the fitting room, I could only hope that she would choose this
one. No other would do. No matter how many dresses she might try on, none of
them could possibly possess the same magic. I was ecstatic when she said this
was the dress she had to have. We hadn’t yet acknowledged the price tag—$1200.
I watch these
bride-stalking-perfect-dress programs on TV. The attendants provide long, white
garments that are often beaded, feathered and flounced and classified as
mermaid, princess or ballroom. And the costs are more often than not over
$5000. I shake my head over this. A fat girl is a fat bride. An ungainly girl
is an ungainly bride. A beautiful girl is a beautiful bride. I don’t appreciate
the wedding gown being a costume, disguising the personality of the bride. Luckily, this custom need not apply to older,
second-time brides.
Even though the dress was perfect,
it was not perfect for a near-winter wedding. Susan and Saul had hoped to have
a summer wedding, but US immigration had other thoughts, and Susan did not
receive her clearance until November. Her brother was to be the caterer.
Catering parties was one of his many sidelines. My gift was to supply the
wedding cake. The wedding would take place on their tract of land which was
framed by Lake Champlain and a marsh. I
had spent a weekend there over the summer. There was a carpet of collectibles
all over the main room, and tables were piled with tureens, cups,
figurines—items that Susan hunted down painstakingly and sold on eBay, Etsy and
Ruby Lane.
After brunch, I help my mother wash
the dishes; she usually eschews the dishwasher. I then decide to walk home. It
will take about an hour, but the crisp air might do me good. I am in turmoil. At my age, how could I have
and be so little? And will I have and be even less once I stop teaching?
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