Grandpa, what a crazy bastard he was. I took a lot of crap for it at school. After it was all over I think Mom just wanted to shut it out of her mind. I know I did.”
I picked up the photo of my grandfather and stared at it a moment.
“I should get home, get some sleep,” said Val. “We’ve got a lot to pull together tomorrow before we bring Dad home.” She headed for the door, then turned to me. “Don’t go stirring thisup for Mom and Dad, all right? God knows they’ve already got enough to worry about right now.”
I watched from the window as Val got in her truck and started the engine. The truck’s lights shone two paths down the road through the smoky night.
Across the way, fire flared up in Jude’s kiln shed as he removed glowing pots and vases from the kiln with tongs, and placed them into the metal garbage cans filled with newspaper; the pots themselves set the newspaper on fire before he jammed the lid on to starve the fire of oxygen. It was a process called reduction, and the result of this, and the raku firing itself, would be the glorious red, purple, blue, metallic, black, and crackled finishes of raku ware. But just one of those scraps of burning newspaper drifting from the garbage cans could set the dry grass of the surrounding field alight. I stood by the window and watched him for a time as he moved back and forth from the kiln to the cans in a practised dance, fire and smoke billowing around him. Then I spread John Weeks’s Essondale files across the kitchen table and, with Harrison sleeping on my feet and the face of my dead grandfather staring up at me, I read them.
9.
TO: Mrs. Maud Weeks
Turtle Valley, B.C.
May 4, 1945
FROM: John Weeks
Mental Hospital
Essondale, B.C.
My dear Girl
This is Sunday & I am so lonely & continually thinking of home & you dearie. I ate the box offudge you sent already. it reached me, the staff here didnt eat it as I thought they would & each piece made me think of you, how you test the fudge rolling it between your fingers in a bowl of water & how you feed it to me in the kitchen if Beth isnt there. how you let me lick that sweetness from your fingers. there! let the staff here read that & be scandalized!
How is Beth keeping and yourself, donot work too hard, & if you wish it why not put on music for yourself it will cheer you anyway, but not for the neighbours, for you donot know just how rotten they are, say nothing to them ignore anything they may say & be careful of the new man. keep him out of the house.
You shouldnot have let Valentine build that greenhouse I said I would get to it & I would have if these headaches hadnot set me low. you donot think I am capable of finishing things but I am if you give me the chance. now Valentine’s gone and built that greenhouse and I cannot do it for you he had no right. don’t invite him in for tea any more you might be innocent to his intentions, but I am not.
Listen to me, my dearest: stay out of the bush & at very least carry the .22 with you when you bring in the cows, you don’t know the terrible things that will catch you out there unawares.
Things are not too bad, its quiet here and I am left alone & I am able to write to you, last year Icould not do that much for the Bromide the doctors filled me with took away what sight I have & made me like a drunken fool.
Well, sweetheart I must draw this to a close, so bye bye my dear Girl, ever your lover
“J. Weeks”
Ward Notes
REG. NO . xx, xxx
NAME
DATE OF ADMISSION
J. Weeks
March 17th, 1945
1945
March 17th
This patient was admitted from Promise, B.C., March 17. He was given a bath and allowed up and about the ward. He seems apprehensive and nervous, continually shaking and trembling and starts violently at the least unusual sound. Complains of severe headache. Keeps his eyes closed and strokes head continually. He
I picked up the photo of my grandfather and stared at it a moment.
“I should get home, get some sleep,” said Val. “We’ve got a lot to pull together tomorrow before we bring Dad home.” She headed for the door, then turned to me. “Don’t go stirring thisup for Mom and Dad, all right? God knows they’ve already got enough to worry about right now.”
I watched from the window as Val got in her truck and started the engine. The truck’s lights shone two paths down the road through the smoky night.
Across the way, fire flared up in Jude’s kiln shed as he removed glowing pots and vases from the kiln with tongs, and placed them into the metal garbage cans filled with newspaper; the pots themselves set the newspaper on fire before he jammed the lid on to starve the fire of oxygen. It was a process called reduction, and the result of this, and the raku firing itself, would be the glorious red, purple, blue, metallic, black, and crackled finishes of raku ware. But just one of those scraps of burning newspaper drifting from the garbage cans could set the dry grass of the surrounding field alight. I stood by the window and watched him for a time as he moved back and forth from the kiln to the cans in a practised dance, fire and smoke billowing around him. Then I spread John Weeks’s Essondale files across the kitchen table and, with Harrison sleeping on my feet and the face of my dead grandfather staring up at me, I read them.
9.
TO: Mrs. Maud Weeks
Turtle Valley, B.C.
May 4, 1945
FROM: John Weeks
Mental Hospital
Essondale, B.C.
My dear Girl
This is Sunday & I am so lonely & continually thinking of home & you dearie. I ate the box offudge you sent already. it reached me, the staff here didnt eat it as I thought they would & each piece made me think of you, how you test the fudge rolling it between your fingers in a bowl of water & how you feed it to me in the kitchen if Beth isnt there. how you let me lick that sweetness from your fingers. there! let the staff here read that & be scandalized!
How is Beth keeping and yourself, donot work too hard, & if you wish it why not put on music for yourself it will cheer you anyway, but not for the neighbours, for you donot know just how rotten they are, say nothing to them ignore anything they may say & be careful of the new man. keep him out of the house.
You shouldnot have let Valentine build that greenhouse I said I would get to it & I would have if these headaches hadnot set me low. you donot think I am capable of finishing things but I am if you give me the chance. now Valentine’s gone and built that greenhouse and I cannot do it for you he had no right. don’t invite him in for tea any more you might be innocent to his intentions, but I am not.
Listen to me, my dearest: stay out of the bush & at very least carry the .22 with you when you bring in the cows, you don’t know the terrible things that will catch you out there unawares.
Things are not too bad, its quiet here and I am left alone & I am able to write to you, last year Icould not do that much for the Bromide the doctors filled me with took away what sight I have & made me like a drunken fool.
Well, sweetheart I must draw this to a close, so bye bye my dear Girl, ever your lover
“J. Weeks”
Ward Notes
REG. NO . xx, xxx
NAME
DATE OF ADMISSION
J. Weeks
March 17th, 1945
1945
March 17th
This patient was admitted from Promise, B.C., March 17. He was given a bath and allowed up and about the ward. He seems apprehensive and nervous, continually shaking and trembling and starts violently at the least unusual sound. Complains of severe headache. Keeps his eyes closed and strokes head continually. He
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