The pleasures of silence

On Monday, I spoke at length with my uncle about the surprising turn in my family's fortunes. He noticed that my collar was not well-pressed and asked in what ways I had been dishonest in my previous business dealings. As we sat in his office, he sipping a 20-year-old single malt Scotch from a crystal tumbler and me attempting to make my hands seem useful as I watched, he told me that business was not what it once was. He could no longer afford even the smallest of expenditures to assist distant members of his family.

"But, Mr. Rockwell," I insisted, perhaps too adamantly.

"But nothing, son. Remember you still have your skills as a bootblack. As you yourself have proven, hard, honest work and an inquiring mind are the surest paths to success. Besides, as I've told you, I simply do not have the capital worth sparing."

I was silent then. I nodded when spoken to. I listened as he told me, like he had so many times before, that I must keep my attendance at church, run my household sternly but fairly, endeavor to learn all that might be possible, and present myself as a gentleman ought.

He grew increasingly drunk as he spoke to me, refilling his glass multiple times, as if for emphasis.

Near the end of his half hour dissertation on the merits of business, I inquired, hesitatingly, whether one of his colleagues or a gentleman from his church might profit from my services as a bookkeeper.

He slammed down his glass with such force that its amber contents careened into a wave across the contracts and other sundry paperwork that covered his desk. I had, he told me, clearly not been listening. He would not recommend someone who had difficulty keeping their own books for such a position. He would not, he told me, deign to risk his reputation on a man who at such a point in his life could not maintain the crispness of his own collar. He did not, he told me, have time for such nonsense. At which point he refilled his glass.

Security escorted me out of the building. The guard, oddly enough, shook his head as he grabbed my arm.

"A bit too much of the sauce, eh?"

I have thought endlessly of Mr. Rockwell's advice since that unpleasant afternoon. I believe that he may be right. I have reinvented myself before. There is no reason that more hard work and determination will not allow me to do the same once again, no reason other than the diminished role that Mr. Rockwell must play in my successes this time.

I have not, as yet, told Ida. I am fearful of what I might say to her. She did not, after all, know of my meeting with Mr. Rockwell, so what need was there for my collar to be starched perfectly?Though she says nothing and bares our heavy burdens with the approximation of a smile, she must, surely, let her duties suffer, for how could she have imagined on that day when I fell to my knees with the gaudiest of diamonds in my palm that she would be expected to perform such tasks? We had, for so long, had the sort of staff to which she was accustomed.

For her sake, then, I must redouble my efforts to complete my novel, for therein lies the fame and fortune that might transform the slightest upturn of her delicate lips into that radiant smile which once made me blind with happiness.

A slight misapprehension of our backyarad

The weather over this last, burdensome week has been remarkably reminiscent of the mosquito plagued dampness one might encounter scant latitudes from the equator. Those portions of my skin that have been left uncovered itch as if sprinkled with the devil's own compound. The stifling heat, in similar fashion, has exerted itself on my mind, making each movement infinitely heavier. I have been unable to think, and thereby, unable to write.

My novel remains untouched, my prospects dim as bookblack. Even on days such as this, when clouds, white as a gentleman's pressed shirt, sprawl across the sky as though to suggest the promise of rain (which they will not deliver), I cannot delude myself into thinking my prospects blue as the sun or green as the still-thriving ivy.

Ida believes, as I have told her, that I am focusing my efforts on the garden in mute anticipation that the worst of our fears will come to pass. She is inside sewing hems on my trousers. She plans, if our prospects do not rapidly improve, to speak with our pastor about doing small portions of piecework for the congregation. She tells me that the choir has long needed new robes.

Myself, I am well lost and preparing to swallow what pride I may have remaining. I shall speak with Mr. Rockwell on the morrow.

Humidity and a whiff of regret

It is morning and Ida remains asleep. She has been sleeping in much of late, but I have not the heart to wake her until morning is well upon its way.

The morning is filled with silences: the coos of a dove in an ancient oak, the coffee pot percolating, the mind arranging the day's news.

The kitten? Gone. The incessant mewling has ceased. I must imagine vigorously to find it safely nuzzled against the feline belly for which it cried and cried or to picture it curled on a corner of a someone's sofa, someone with more affinity to St. Francis than myself. I imagine, and I do so vigorously.

A brief encounter

The hour grows late, but Ida has not yet prepared the evening meal. She remains tucked away in the study practicing scales and the exposition of a fugue on the harpsichord which her great aunt contributed to our wedding day festivities. Ida began learning that fugue upon our return from our honeymoon at Niagara Falls.

She has yet to master it.

A headache with which I have struggled for most of the day has returned, roaring within my skull like those selfsame falls. Ida's staccato pounding upon the keys of her harpsichord has not helped matters, nor has my erroneous decision to forgo the comfort of afternoon tea.

Alas, that atrocious throbbing prevented me from contemplating with my full attentions the progression of my novel. Instead the day has been sacrificed to idle hands.

In attempt to assuage the taut anxiousness of not completing the day's tasks, I stepped onto the back porch to have a moment's respite with a most inexpensive cigar. Despite the fact that I spent a full seven-eighths less than I would if our fortunes had remained as they once were, I do suspect that Ida would disapprove. She finds my one solace a despicably unclean habit and refuses steadfastly to admit that one small pleasure, even in circumstances so frugal and dire as our own, might offer the constancy of thought and mind that would allow one to pull oneself from the mire of circumstance that hobbles most men. Thus, I waited for her practice to begin.

Then, as I sat on the stoop outside, savoring the sweetness of smoke, I heard the faintest mewling interrupt the perfected, natural fugue of humming cicadas and croaking frogs. I could not place the sound, which sounded very much like a very distant child or a young cat in much closer proximity. The small, distant sound repeated itself intermittently until it was no longer possible to dismiss its apparent distress as a fancy of excessive mental strain. Within a quarter of an hour, it became clear that the small, high-pitched cries were those of a very, very young cat. Still, I could not locate the source. Resolving to ease the poor beast's suffering, I paced our yard, using my ears as a sole and only guide. After much care, I traced the meek whimpering to beneath a large currant shrub at the edge of the neighbor's yard. When I peered through the shrub's canopy, I found the source: a grey-and-white striped kitten no larger than my outstretched hand. Given the lamentable animal's size and its clear need of care--rather from its mother or a human hand--I spent the larger portion of the next rain-soaked hour attempting to coax it from its cover of darkness. The sound, with its primal cajoling, was simply too much for me.

Yet, it was all to no avail. With each approach, of milk, of kindness, of canned tuna, of soft voice, the diminutive feline would dart further into ivy or bush, well beyond my exasperated reach. I can only conclude that my size and lack of fear, as well as any lingering scent from Jack on my person, exacerbated the fears that had left the kitten to cry its aloneness into the darkness.

I must admit that now, upon reflection, I have only just dismissed the possibility, which is admittedly a foolhardy reflection on my own strength of character, that that kitten, mewling and mewling as a beacon for its absent mother, is very much like Ida and myself.

A few peculiarities

Last night, Ida and I spent several hours seated, at a respectable distance, on the sofa in our sitting room watching television. As those miraculous light-filled images of personages far away in time and place flickered across the bulging screen, I could not help but glance occasionally at my dear wife's profile lit by the faint blue glow of our most prized contraption. The television program Leverage, upon which my wife frequently discourses during tea, aired a charming play on honesty and deception last eve. My wife watched with rapt attention, though I, alas, had difficulty following the machinations of those swashbuckling characters.

I was, I believe, much too taken by dear Ida's profile in that faint blue glow and the continuing calculations of my feeble mind regarding the madness that my novel has become. Indeed, after Ida had retired early to the boudoir, I spent several hours writing and managed to pen, in a most figurative manner, an ensuing chapter. It is a chapter, I fear, that reduces propriety and domestic stability to little more than a midsummer's dream. Furthermore, after having worked for what I deemed a suitable amount of time, I remained restless and concerned by the reception the work may be receiving elsewhere.

Such immediacy, I do not doubt, is a peril to the honing of finely wrought words and paragraphs. Yet, already, there is response. The public is speaking, though I oft may struggle to understand what they say or why they might say it. Take for example, this analysis. Apropos of nothing, the author evokes Marx and the working class, who in all frankness, remain largely absent from my tale of fallen petite bourgeoisie. Unlike the brief morality play Ida and I enjoyed within the context of Leverage, the means of production here are not quite so quantifiable as tapes. Moreover, there is a merger of capital and worker that I daresay Marx might never have envisioned. The dilemma then is merely in methods of distribution. The media, like the tapes on that television morality play, becomes central to the conundrum.

But perhaps there is something to what he's said? I must reflect further upon these troubling notions. I must continue my work without neglecting the attentions of dearest Ida.

Summer storm

A flash storm just blew through our neighborhood. Hail, lightning strikes, thunder crashes, window-rattling wind. Our beagle, Jack, shadowed me around the living room and kitchen, half-begging for the Pop-tarts I'd made for Ida and myself before dinner, and half-cowering at each house-shuddering boom of thunder.

The storm, like my fortunes, was over almost as soon as it began. In the evenings, I study Ida's face as she stares, unfazed, at the latest installment of America's Got Talent or a re-run of The Sopranos. I keep expecting to find evidence that our decline in stature has taken its toll on her, but other than the slightest strands of gray in her still lustrous hair, I find none.

I cannot help but wonder what she thinks of me. Was I dishonest with her in how I first presented myself? Have such reduced expectations altered, in any way, what she feels for me?

I do not know. I must, however, succeed. Somehow.

After the storm, we ventured into the city. Police lights pulsed mere blocks from our house, cordoning off lightning strikes and downed power lines from the unwary. Sheared branches, bright with summer green, littered the roadsides. Twenty minutes and the world had changed.

Today, I've made little progress on my novel. Given my current prospects, I must make this a success. Mr. Rockwell, doubtless, has little time remaining for gifts, and those of my colleagues who have been little affected by the economic downturn are, doubtless, leveraging what assets they can for their own betterment, not the betterment of one whose origins, I must now admit to myself, remain suspect.

For now, I must rest. Perhaps tomorrow will bring more whispers from my muse, a smile from my dear Ida.

A lovely Sunday meal

After church this morning, Ida prepared a simple, yet hearty, repast of meat and summer potatoes drizzled with a lemon sauce of her own concoction. Both of us, surely ravaged by the length of the pastor's sermon, ate more than our customary fill. The simplicity of Ida's cooking took me back to my days as a young bootblack. Indeed, despite its simplicity, it was precisely the sort of meal I often imagined those gentlemen who did deign to procure my services must have enjoyed at the end of their days bookkeeping, filling orders, or scribbling stories for the local gazette.

As one would expect, Ida has now excused herself for a late afternoon respite. Whereas, I, ever vigilant of opportunity, have begun the next chapter in my novel. It, frankly, displeases me. It reads as if written in another tongue, as if it were naught but the ravings of a mad mind.

I shall ask Ida her opinion as soon as she wakes. Though she may no longer trust my judgement in matters of the intellect, I still trust hers. Indeed, the nostalgia with which she has wrought this latest of meals can suggest little else other than her continued understanding of my oft-flagging intellect. Ida is an angel. I do not deserve her.