he was thinking of coming to the Faroes at the beginning of July and the beginning of August; Jonathan figured it was his way of assuring emotional support.) Gerda had enclosed a hurried note on the order of We miss you, weather’s been lovely, off to Maine in twenty minutes, do write . What was puzzling was that she had gone to the trouble of carefully opening the bank statement, tucking in her note, and sealing up the whole in such a way as to be nearly unnoticeable: was it meant to be a surprise? Or was she somehow apologizing for opening his mail?
Jonathan hitched his pants up and looked out the window at his view. It was magnificent. Never, in all the world, had there been such a well-situated toilet. The house was on the higher of the two village roads and in addition stood on a little rise of its own, so from this second-floor window Jonathan saw miles across the broad fjord to Streymoy, the main island, and up to the Troll’s Head where the birds’ kingdom lay. His daily twenty minutes in the bathroom were dependably enjoyable—he had even considered making the bathroom into his office. It was big enough; clearly, before indoor plumbing, it had been a bedroom. Even now, since it lacked a bathtub, there was room for a desk. But: Don’t shit where you work. Or something along those lines. He leaned over to flush.
The toilet, a new Danish model, had a roaring cataract of a flush that could sweep his shit to Tórshavn. But now it did not flush. The handle that usually sprang at his touch, unleashing a tremendous whoosh , refused to move. Jonathan scowled and tried again. Nothing. He jiggled the handle this way and that, ran some water in the sink to make surethere was water (there was), opened the back of the toilet looking for obvious problems, tried again. This time a thin trickle made him hopeful. Several tries later, though, he had succeeded only in filling the bowl to the danger point, contents still afloat.
He shut the door on the situation and went downstairs to make muffins. Like many unmechanically minded people, Jonathan believed that if you gave the machine time to recover it would perform properly. He would let the toilet rest. He could piss in the sink, and probably by morning the toilet would somehow have healed itself.
In the morning, his production of yesterday greeted him when he stumbled into the bathroom. Tentatively, he tried the toilet handle; it was as rigid as it had been the day before. Pissing into the sink, Jonathan considered his options: wait for the miraculous self-healing process to begin; ask for advice; ask for somebody to fix it. The first seemed foolish; the second pointless (Jonathan knew his limits, and he doubted his ability to fix a toilet in English, never mind Faroese); and the third involved getting rid of the current contents of the toilet. Breakfast first, he decided.
Breakfast, with its accompanying internal rumbles, only brought home to Jonathan the fact that much of what humans eat is returned to the world as shit and confirmed his initial sense that option three was the way to go. But where was he to put this all-too-obvious evidence of his humanity? In a plastic bag, and then in the trash barrel outside the house. But the bread came naked from the bakery on the other side of the island; the cheese, cut from a big slab, was wrapped in brown paper; the fish was fresh out of the sea. All the traditional American locations for plastic were here so reduced to their origins that there was no need for Baggies. Then he remembered that salt cod, of which the Faroes produced most of the world supply, came in a thick plastic bag stapled shut at the top. He would goto the “other” grocery store and purchase some, throw out the contents, and use the bag. Then he would find himself a toilet fixer.
Within an hour Jonathan was ready to find help. He had made a new friend in the proprietor of the second grocery store, a red-faced woman who was delighted that Americans ate salt
Jonathan hitched his pants up and looked out the window at his view. It was magnificent. Never, in all the world, had there been such a well-situated toilet. The house was on the higher of the two village roads and in addition stood on a little rise of its own, so from this second-floor window Jonathan saw miles across the broad fjord to Streymoy, the main island, and up to the Troll’s Head where the birds’ kingdom lay. His daily twenty minutes in the bathroom were dependably enjoyable—he had even considered making the bathroom into his office. It was big enough; clearly, before indoor plumbing, it had been a bedroom. Even now, since it lacked a bathtub, there was room for a desk. But: Don’t shit where you work. Or something along those lines. He leaned over to flush.
The toilet, a new Danish model, had a roaring cataract of a flush that could sweep his shit to Tórshavn. But now it did not flush. The handle that usually sprang at his touch, unleashing a tremendous whoosh , refused to move. Jonathan scowled and tried again. Nothing. He jiggled the handle this way and that, ran some water in the sink to make surethere was water (there was), opened the back of the toilet looking for obvious problems, tried again. This time a thin trickle made him hopeful. Several tries later, though, he had succeeded only in filling the bowl to the danger point, contents still afloat.
He shut the door on the situation and went downstairs to make muffins. Like many unmechanically minded people, Jonathan believed that if you gave the machine time to recover it would perform properly. He would let the toilet rest. He could piss in the sink, and probably by morning the toilet would somehow have healed itself.
In the morning, his production of yesterday greeted him when he stumbled into the bathroom. Tentatively, he tried the toilet handle; it was as rigid as it had been the day before. Pissing into the sink, Jonathan considered his options: wait for the miraculous self-healing process to begin; ask for advice; ask for somebody to fix it. The first seemed foolish; the second pointless (Jonathan knew his limits, and he doubted his ability to fix a toilet in English, never mind Faroese); and the third involved getting rid of the current contents of the toilet. Breakfast first, he decided.
Breakfast, with its accompanying internal rumbles, only brought home to Jonathan the fact that much of what humans eat is returned to the world as shit and confirmed his initial sense that option three was the way to go. But where was he to put this all-too-obvious evidence of his humanity? In a plastic bag, and then in the trash barrel outside the house. But the bread came naked from the bakery on the other side of the island; the cheese, cut from a big slab, was wrapped in brown paper; the fish was fresh out of the sea. All the traditional American locations for plastic were here so reduced to their origins that there was no need for Baggies. Then he remembered that salt cod, of which the Faroes produced most of the world supply, came in a thick plastic bag stapled shut at the top. He would goto the “other” grocery store and purchase some, throw out the contents, and use the bag. Then he would find himself a toilet fixer.
Within an hour Jonathan was ready to find help. He had made a new friend in the proprietor of the second grocery store, a red-faced woman who was delighted that Americans ate salt
Similar Books
