Read Online Bathing the Lion by Jonathan Carroll - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Jonathan Carroll
Ads: Link
despaired. He planned to move them all into a closet and not think about them until he had sorted through what he did know.
When a week had passed, a whole week, he called Ken Alford and asked one question. The two men had had a fine day on the bus hanging around together and talking about their lives. At the end of it they’d exchanged telephone numbers. Now after Alford answered the phone, Edmonds identified himself and got right to the point. “Ken, what if I can’t find my Vedran? What if there’s not a single thing I can hold on to and feel better because I know she’s still in it, like your knife?”
“Oh, it’s there, Bill; somewhere in your house, your life, or your memory, the Vedran is there. You just haven’t found it yet. Sometimes it takes a while.” The old man’s voice sounded confident.
Edmonds lowered his head to his chest and pressed the receiver tightly to his ear. “But just the opposite’s been happening, Ken: the more I look for it, the more I discover I don’t remember. I don’t remember so much … it’s terrible. It feels like whole chunks of my brain have been cut out. In my own home I’m surrounded by things I neither recognize nor remember! But all of them were obviously part of our life together.” Edmonds heard his voice at the end of the sentence and it sounded scared. He was scared.
Alford was silent a while but eventually said, “Maybe the first half of our life is meant for living, and the second half is for remembering—or trying to. When you consider it that way, both of us were wrong to waste time missing our wives so much after they died. Because mourning does no good: it only makes you feel helpless and lost.
“What we should do instead is try to remember and then savor whatever details we’re able to dredge up from our past. This is possible and each time you do it you feel good because it brings something more of them back to you; like you’re rebuilding them from scratch.” Ken suddenly laughed. “It’s a little bit like making your own Frankenstein version of your wife out of what you still remember about her.” He chuckled again. “I’m being facetious, Bill, but you know what I mean. It’s one of the reasons why I always keep the knife in my pocket: touching it reminds me to stop regretting and keep trying to remember.”
While listening to Ken speak, Edmonds held the ocher-colored elephant and turned it over and over in his hand. He wanted it to speak too. He wanted it to recount exactly what happened the day he gave it to his wife. What had she said? What was she wearing? As Ken Alford talked, Edmonds closed his fingers around the elephant and silently mouthed the words, “Tell me.”
* * *
Josephine appeared for the first time after his bus ride with Ken Alford. Edmonds had followed Alford’s advice and tried finding his lost wife and their life together in everything he did. It was like an Easter egg hunt. In the most unlikely places he rediscovered memories or things about Lola he’d forgotten or knew that he knew. One afternoon while retrieving a jar of mango chutney off a shelf in the refrigerator, the sight of the thick brown condiment unloosed memories of the way she’d spread chutney on the bologna and Laughing Cow cheese sandwiches she often made them for lunch. While eating, she would wiggle one leg under the table like a fidgety child. She often did that—it was her unconscious way of showing she liked whatever it was she was eating. The leg wiggling—how could he have forgotten it?
Or once around Christmastime while walking down the street early in the morning, he’d looked up and seen a long white airplane contrail across the dawning sky. He suddenly remembered Lola loved contrails, and seeing this one brought her immediately to mind. Then Edmonds shifted his eyes a little to the left and on the balcony of an apartment was a small squat Christmas tree full of blinking white lights. It was exactly the same
When a week had passed, a whole week, he called Ken Alford and asked one question. The two men had had a fine day on the bus hanging around together and talking about their lives. At the end of it they’d exchanged telephone numbers. Now after Alford answered the phone, Edmonds identified himself and got right to the point. “Ken, what if I can’t find my Vedran? What if there’s not a single thing I can hold on to and feel better because I know she’s still in it, like your knife?”
“Oh, it’s there, Bill; somewhere in your house, your life, or your memory, the Vedran is there. You just haven’t found it yet. Sometimes it takes a while.” The old man’s voice sounded confident.
Edmonds lowered his head to his chest and pressed the receiver tightly to his ear. “But just the opposite’s been happening, Ken: the more I look for it, the more I discover I don’t remember. I don’t remember so much … it’s terrible. It feels like whole chunks of my brain have been cut out. In my own home I’m surrounded by things I neither recognize nor remember! But all of them were obviously part of our life together.” Edmonds heard his voice at the end of the sentence and it sounded scared. He was scared.
Alford was silent a while but eventually said, “Maybe the first half of our life is meant for living, and the second half is for remembering—or trying to. When you consider it that way, both of us were wrong to waste time missing our wives so much after they died. Because mourning does no good: it only makes you feel helpless and lost.
“What we should do instead is try to remember and then savor whatever details we’re able to dredge up from our past. This is possible and each time you do it you feel good because it brings something more of them back to you; like you’re rebuilding them from scratch.” Ken suddenly laughed. “It’s a little bit like making your own Frankenstein version of your wife out of what you still remember about her.” He chuckled again. “I’m being facetious, Bill, but you know what I mean. It’s one of the reasons why I always keep the knife in my pocket: touching it reminds me to stop regretting and keep trying to remember.”
While listening to Ken speak, Edmonds held the ocher-colored elephant and turned it over and over in his hand. He wanted it to speak too. He wanted it to recount exactly what happened the day he gave it to his wife. What had she said? What was she wearing? As Ken Alford talked, Edmonds closed his fingers around the elephant and silently mouthed the words, “Tell me.”
* * *
Josephine appeared for the first time after his bus ride with Ken Alford. Edmonds had followed Alford’s advice and tried finding his lost wife and their life together in everything he did. It was like an Easter egg hunt. In the most unlikely places he rediscovered memories or things about Lola he’d forgotten or knew that he knew. One afternoon while retrieving a jar of mango chutney off a shelf in the refrigerator, the sight of the thick brown condiment unloosed memories of the way she’d spread chutney on the bologna and Laughing Cow cheese sandwiches she often made them for lunch. While eating, she would wiggle one leg under the table like a fidgety child. She often did that—it was her unconscious way of showing she liked whatever it was she was eating. The leg wiggling—how could he have forgotten it?
Or once around Christmastime while walking down the street early in the morning, he’d looked up and seen a long white airplane contrail across the dawning sky. He suddenly remembered Lola loved contrails, and seeing this one brought her immediately to mind. Then Edmonds shifted his eyes a little to the left and on the balcony of an apartment was a small squat Christmas tree full of blinking white lights. It was exactly the same
Similar Books
