Read Online A Complicated Kindness by Miriam Toews - Free Book Online
Authors: Miriam Toews
Tags: Fiction, General, Coming of Age, Family Life, Abandoned children, Mothers and daughters, Mennonites, Manitoba
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Try again for the love of God Almighty!
A few months ago I was walking home from Travis’s place and The Mouth’s house was on the way. It was around three in the morning and the entire town was dead and dark except for the sparkly streets and car tops which were shiny from melting snow. Just as I was walking past his house a light came on in his kitchen, the little stove light, and for some reason I stopped on the sidewalk to look. I saw The Mouth pass by the window, slowly, in a faded green housecoat he’d only half-heartedly closed with what looked like an old tie. I stared at his profile as he stood with his hands on the stove, a little bent over, head down and motionless. He stood like that for a while. The only sound I heard was water dripping out of somebody’s drainpipe. Then he raised his head and walked, again, very, very slowly, to his fridge and he opened the top freezer section of it and took out a pail of ice cream. Maybe rainbow ice cream. Maybe Heavenly Hash. Then he took the pail and disappeared from view for a few seconds and then returned with a spoon and put the pail down on the stove, under the little light, and opened it up and started to eat. He ate and ate and ate, not like a pig or anything, just steadily and continuously for at least twenty minutes, maybe half an hour.
I stood on the sidewalk and watched him and thought every once in a while that now he’d quit and put the pail back and switch off the light and go to bed, but he didn’t. He kept eating the ice cream.
When he was finally finished he disappeared again for a few seconds and then came back and leaned his head against the top part of the stove, near the fan, the way he had earlier, like a guy completely defeated by life, with holes he could never fill with ice cream no matter how much he ate, and I almost started to cry thinking about poor The Mouth being dumped by thecity girl and just wanting to be able to write a poem that someone in the world would dig. I thought: He’s my uncle. I should love him. And then I walked the rest of the way home.
A while later, maybe a month or so, I noticed my mom leaning her head against the window over the kitchen sink in the very same way The Mouth had leaned his head against the fan part of his stove. She was watching the neighbour’s dog. She said: I envy that dog its freedom and obliviousness.
When I said obliviousness to what, she said: Hey, Nomi, how’d your friends like your new haircut? She was a master in the art of off-kilter conversations. I never knew where any of my questions would go, or if her answers were answers or clues or jokes or what. Some questions resulted in songs. Some in hugs and kisses. I needed a map.
When I was ten years old I had to memorize Bible verses in order to attend Blue Mountain Bible Camp. I’d stand in The Mouth’s office and say: In the beginning was the world and the world was with God and the world was God. And he’d correct me. No, Nomi, not world, word. Word, word. I’d try again. In the beginning was the world and the world—no, Nomi, word, not world. None of it made any sense to me.
I hadn’t even wanted to go to Bible camp. The only thing that appealed to me about the whole experience was the bus trip there and back because the route they took went through part of the city and I wanted to stare at the human beings who lived there. I’ve tried staring at people here but they just stare back, like babies. It’s not an aggressive stare or anything, just a completely unsocialized one. Most people around here are quiet and polite and a little stunned. Somehow all the problems of the world manage to get into our town but not the strategies to deal with them. We pray. And pray and pray and pray. If I couldlive anywhere else in the world, anywhere, I would. Although my preference would be NYC.
My dad has never missed a Sunday. He’s received many awards for perfect attendance. But he never talks about it. At first I was embarrassed
A few months ago I was walking home from Travis’s place and The Mouth’s house was on the way. It was around three in the morning and the entire town was dead and dark except for the sparkly streets and car tops which were shiny from melting snow. Just as I was walking past his house a light came on in his kitchen, the little stove light, and for some reason I stopped on the sidewalk to look. I saw The Mouth pass by the window, slowly, in a faded green housecoat he’d only half-heartedly closed with what looked like an old tie. I stared at his profile as he stood with his hands on the stove, a little bent over, head down and motionless. He stood like that for a while. The only sound I heard was water dripping out of somebody’s drainpipe. Then he raised his head and walked, again, very, very slowly, to his fridge and he opened the top freezer section of it and took out a pail of ice cream. Maybe rainbow ice cream. Maybe Heavenly Hash. Then he took the pail and disappeared from view for a few seconds and then returned with a spoon and put the pail down on the stove, under the little light, and opened it up and started to eat. He ate and ate and ate, not like a pig or anything, just steadily and continuously for at least twenty minutes, maybe half an hour.
I stood on the sidewalk and watched him and thought every once in a while that now he’d quit and put the pail back and switch off the light and go to bed, but he didn’t. He kept eating the ice cream.
When he was finally finished he disappeared again for a few seconds and then came back and leaned his head against the top part of the stove, near the fan, the way he had earlier, like a guy completely defeated by life, with holes he could never fill with ice cream no matter how much he ate, and I almost started to cry thinking about poor The Mouth being dumped by thecity girl and just wanting to be able to write a poem that someone in the world would dig. I thought: He’s my uncle. I should love him. And then I walked the rest of the way home.
A while later, maybe a month or so, I noticed my mom leaning her head against the window over the kitchen sink in the very same way The Mouth had leaned his head against the fan part of his stove. She was watching the neighbour’s dog. She said: I envy that dog its freedom and obliviousness.
When I said obliviousness to what, she said: Hey, Nomi, how’d your friends like your new haircut? She was a master in the art of off-kilter conversations. I never knew where any of my questions would go, or if her answers were answers or clues or jokes or what. Some questions resulted in songs. Some in hugs and kisses. I needed a map.
When I was ten years old I had to memorize Bible verses in order to attend Blue Mountain Bible Camp. I’d stand in The Mouth’s office and say: In the beginning was the world and the world was with God and the world was God. And he’d correct me. No, Nomi, not world, word. Word, word. I’d try again. In the beginning was the world and the world—no, Nomi, word, not world. None of it made any sense to me.
I hadn’t even wanted to go to Bible camp. The only thing that appealed to me about the whole experience was the bus trip there and back because the route they took went through part of the city and I wanted to stare at the human beings who lived there. I’ve tried staring at people here but they just stare back, like babies. It’s not an aggressive stare or anything, just a completely unsocialized one. Most people around here are quiet and polite and a little stunned. Somehow all the problems of the world manage to get into our town but not the strategies to deal with them. We pray. And pray and pray and pray. If I couldlive anywhere else in the world, anywhere, I would. Although my preference would be NYC.
My dad has never missed a Sunday. He’s received many awards for perfect attendance. But he never talks about it. At first I was embarrassed
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