make or receive a call. But he hardly ever did need to. He wrote letters, is what he did. He wrote, You’ll forgive my silence. Winter is knocking at the door and I’m far away from completing fall’s chores. Firewood in these parts is not a lux-
R a i n
85
ury. In deepest summer, he wrote: A picnic lunch on the newly erected breezeway of Anne and Peter Sullivan.
Rhubarb crisp took first place here, followed closely by the sweet corn , then by the honey wheat-berry bread, served still warm from the oven. No offense to the tomatoes, which also deserved a high place in the running, but which are too often and easily praised. Often, he wrote about his inability to stay with women: Disheartening to see how soon the straw begins to suck air. I suppose I admire your willingness to hang tough in your marriage, despite your complaints. I never could argue for trying to force a relationship. Once my mind has decided there’s no future, I’d rather read a book.
Still, it’s awfully humiliating to find oneself masturbating his way through his forties and into his fifties. Especially on those nights I beg off to my own self, pleading the proverbial headache. I’m afraid that the state of my love life might best be summed up by the state of my refrigerator: I have plenty of margarine, but I’m low on the high-priced spread.
Once, sadly, he wrote, I came home to find little Sophie dead at the side of the road. She had gotten out of the house somehow and engaged in her bad habit of car chasing. She was a pretty dog, with a pleasantly blocky face and silken ears, and she was full of life and good humor, as Rosa’s puppies always are. Her dance card turned out far shorter than I’d anticipated, and I buried her this morning with a regret that seemed barely able to be contained. I put her next to Mona, who lived a far longer time but less happily, I think.
(You might remember Mona as the Lab mix I got at the shelter who never would lay off licking her forepaw. On a hot afternoon , it could get on your nerves.) Sophie lies not far from the brook she loved to swim in. I expect it will take a while before I can visit her there. But you know one of her 86
t h e d a y i a t e w h a t e v e r i w a n t e d virtues was patience. That and licking the grease off the hamburger wrapper without ripping it up, allowing for a much appreciated ease of disposal.
His stationery moved from blue fountain pen on brown Eaton pages to pulpy lined paper he found at the dump ( Reams! he said. If you like, you can have some, too. It makes you feel young to write on this ) to the back of flyers and of solicitations that came in the mail. Then he began reusing envelopes from those solicitors, ironically highlighting their gaudy call outs in one way or another before he taped the envelopes shut. When he visited, he gently chided me for the paper cup dispenser I had in the children’s bathroom. Dennis suggested at one point that Michael was going round the bend; I hotly defended him.
The fall after we’d moved to yet another, bigger, house (the last one! Dennis and I promised each other), we invited Michael and several others of our friends for Thanksgiving dinner, and Michael didn’t show. Finally, we all sat down to eat without him, and the phone rang. “It’s Michael,” I said.
“Go ahead and start.” I had been fearful that we had fatally offended Michael with this last acquisition—it was a really big house—and that he was calling to say he’d decided he’d rather not be faced with yet another evening of values clashing. I figured he’d say, as he often had before, that it worked best when I came up to see him, and why didn’t I do that, soon. But it was not Michael on the phone. Rather it was his brother, Sam, whom I’d never met. He told me that Michael had asked him to call and explain that he’d not be able to come to dinner. He was in the hospital. He’d been diagnosed with a brain tumor. And what did I do? I laughed. I
R a i n
85
ury. In deepest summer, he wrote: A picnic lunch on the newly erected breezeway of Anne and Peter Sullivan.
Rhubarb crisp took first place here, followed closely by the sweet corn , then by the honey wheat-berry bread, served still warm from the oven. No offense to the tomatoes, which also deserved a high place in the running, but which are too often and easily praised. Often, he wrote about his inability to stay with women: Disheartening to see how soon the straw begins to suck air. I suppose I admire your willingness to hang tough in your marriage, despite your complaints. I never could argue for trying to force a relationship. Once my mind has decided there’s no future, I’d rather read a book.
Still, it’s awfully humiliating to find oneself masturbating his way through his forties and into his fifties. Especially on those nights I beg off to my own self, pleading the proverbial headache. I’m afraid that the state of my love life might best be summed up by the state of my refrigerator: I have plenty of margarine, but I’m low on the high-priced spread.
Once, sadly, he wrote, I came home to find little Sophie dead at the side of the road. She had gotten out of the house somehow and engaged in her bad habit of car chasing. She was a pretty dog, with a pleasantly blocky face and silken ears, and she was full of life and good humor, as Rosa’s puppies always are. Her dance card turned out far shorter than I’d anticipated, and I buried her this morning with a regret that seemed barely able to be contained. I put her next to Mona, who lived a far longer time but less happily, I think.
(You might remember Mona as the Lab mix I got at the shelter who never would lay off licking her forepaw. On a hot afternoon , it could get on your nerves.) Sophie lies not far from the brook she loved to swim in. I expect it will take a while before I can visit her there. But you know one of her 86
t h e d a y i a t e w h a t e v e r i w a n t e d virtues was patience. That and licking the grease off the hamburger wrapper without ripping it up, allowing for a much appreciated ease of disposal.
His stationery moved from blue fountain pen on brown Eaton pages to pulpy lined paper he found at the dump ( Reams! he said. If you like, you can have some, too. It makes you feel young to write on this ) to the back of flyers and of solicitations that came in the mail. Then he began reusing envelopes from those solicitors, ironically highlighting their gaudy call outs in one way or another before he taped the envelopes shut. When he visited, he gently chided me for the paper cup dispenser I had in the children’s bathroom. Dennis suggested at one point that Michael was going round the bend; I hotly defended him.
The fall after we’d moved to yet another, bigger, house (the last one! Dennis and I promised each other), we invited Michael and several others of our friends for Thanksgiving dinner, and Michael didn’t show. Finally, we all sat down to eat without him, and the phone rang. “It’s Michael,” I said.
“Go ahead and start.” I had been fearful that we had fatally offended Michael with this last acquisition—it was a really big house—and that he was calling to say he’d decided he’d rather not be faced with yet another evening of values clashing. I figured he’d say, as he often had before, that it worked best when I came up to see him, and why didn’t I do that, soon. But it was not Michael on the phone. Rather it was his brother, Sam, whom I’d never met. He told me that Michael had asked him to call and explain that he’d not be able to come to dinner. He was in the hospital. He’d been diagnosed with a brain tumor. And what did I do? I laughed. I
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