mother’s bad taste.
From the other room Jane said, “Do you mean erotic or true love?” This was the girl who, at the age of three, saw Marilyn Monroe in
Some Like it Hot
and said, “I’m her.”
“Romance,” yelled Kenny, and Jane came into the kitchen, furrowing her brow and asking herself, “Which movies had a lot of chemistry in them?”
Kenny said, “Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in
Woman of the Year.”
“You think Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy had chemistry?” Utter disbelief from the big sister.
“Oh yeah. Sparks flew.
Casablanca’s
pretty romantic too.”
“Let me think!” said Jane.
“Ask me the best musical,” said Kenny.
“Go,” said his mom.
“The one with the best songs is
Fiddler on the Roof but
the one with the best dancing is
West Side Story.”
Jane snorted. “You’re crazy. The best musical is
Singin’ in the Rain.”
And she wouldn’t hear otherwise. But then she had always known her own mind: sitting self-contained and erect at a friend’s dinner table, after all the other children had run down to the basement, chewing the steak she didn’t get at home. And this at the age of eight.
“Scariest movie?” asked Harriet.
“Most suspenseful movie,” he corrected her. “That has to be
Charade.”
“Movie with the worst ending?”
“The Lady Vanishes
. I hated that ending. Everything was so good, the way Hitchcock set it up, and then he ruined it at the end.”
“Movie with the best beginning?”
“Breakfast at Tiffany’s,”
he said, giving her a look, since that’s what she herself had said only days before. Then, “Or
Get Shorty
. I love that beginning, when he puts on his gloves and knocks on the door and punches Ray Barboni in the nose.”
Harriet was sweeping up Kenny’s hair and remembering Lew’s lament the last time he saw these beautiful, almost coppery locks spread across the floor. But now Kenny wouldn’t leave. “Ask me another one. Ask me the best baseball movie.”
“Okay.”
“Bull Durham
, of course. Ask me the best line in a movie.”
“What’s the best line?”
“‘Fasten your seatbelts, we’re in for a bumpy night.’”
“Put that on the list,” she said. “We should watch it with Dinah.”
And Kenny added
All About Eve
to the movie list on the fridge.
8
A Green Globe
T he fern brought a feeling of peacefulness and possibility into the house, if only briefly. It sat on the corner of her desk, looking more and more like an ancient artifact as it faded from green to parchment brown.
I think of you in your rambling house in Massachusetts, and of a sentence I read in a book about Chekhov: “The doors of the Russian house are wide open.” I’m tired of pretending tolike things more than I do. Like Ottawa more than I do. Like Lew more than I often do. I’m tired of having to work up an attachment to things. Tired of life being so much less vivid than it could be
.
It was three in the morning. In the sky a half moon shone above the mighty oak in loud Ray’s backyard, a tree that used to shade four yards, including her own, but now half of it was dead and the rest was dying, branch by branch. Lew had his own idea why. Last summer he’d said thoughtfully, “I think it’s tired of listening to all the traffic on Bronson Avenue.” But Lew had a sensitive ear and a fine voice, unlike herself, who took two days to recognize “Auld Lang Syne” when the Ceremonial Guard was practising it day after day on the open fields at Carleton University nearby. Once she even failed to recognize “Happy Birthday” on the radio. She thought it was “God Save the Queen.”
Hanukkah is coming in a few weeks. Then Christmas. Maybe you have what we have, a menorah for eight days followed by turkey …
Fiona Chester’s light came on; it was half-hidden by spreading lilac bushes in the summer but quite visible now. Fiona, she knew, was waiting for the morning man “whose voice just has that effect,” she said one day.
From the other room Jane said, “Do you mean erotic or true love?” This was the girl who, at the age of three, saw Marilyn Monroe in
Some Like it Hot
and said, “I’m her.”
“Romance,” yelled Kenny, and Jane came into the kitchen, furrowing her brow and asking herself, “Which movies had a lot of chemistry in them?”
Kenny said, “Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in
Woman of the Year.”
“You think Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy had chemistry?” Utter disbelief from the big sister.
“Oh yeah. Sparks flew.
Casablanca’s
pretty romantic too.”
“Let me think!” said Jane.
“Ask me the best musical,” said Kenny.
“Go,” said his mom.
“The one with the best songs is
Fiddler on the Roof but
the one with the best dancing is
West Side Story.”
Jane snorted. “You’re crazy. The best musical is
Singin’ in the Rain.”
And she wouldn’t hear otherwise. But then she had always known her own mind: sitting self-contained and erect at a friend’s dinner table, after all the other children had run down to the basement, chewing the steak she didn’t get at home. And this at the age of eight.
“Scariest movie?” asked Harriet.
“Most suspenseful movie,” he corrected her. “That has to be
Charade.”
“Movie with the worst ending?”
“The Lady Vanishes
. I hated that ending. Everything was so good, the way Hitchcock set it up, and then he ruined it at the end.”
“Movie with the best beginning?”
“Breakfast at Tiffany’s,”
he said, giving her a look, since that’s what she herself had said only days before. Then, “Or
Get Shorty
. I love that beginning, when he puts on his gloves and knocks on the door and punches Ray Barboni in the nose.”
Harriet was sweeping up Kenny’s hair and remembering Lew’s lament the last time he saw these beautiful, almost coppery locks spread across the floor. But now Kenny wouldn’t leave. “Ask me another one. Ask me the best baseball movie.”
“Okay.”
“Bull Durham
, of course. Ask me the best line in a movie.”
“What’s the best line?”
“‘Fasten your seatbelts, we’re in for a bumpy night.’”
“Put that on the list,” she said. “We should watch it with Dinah.”
And Kenny added
All About Eve
to the movie list on the fridge.
8
A Green Globe
T he fern brought a feeling of peacefulness and possibility into the house, if only briefly. It sat on the corner of her desk, looking more and more like an ancient artifact as it faded from green to parchment brown.
I think of you in your rambling house in Massachusetts, and of a sentence I read in a book about Chekhov: “The doors of the Russian house are wide open.” I’m tired of pretending tolike things more than I do. Like Ottawa more than I do. Like Lew more than I often do. I’m tired of having to work up an attachment to things. Tired of life being so much less vivid than it could be
.
It was three in the morning. In the sky a half moon shone above the mighty oak in loud Ray’s backyard, a tree that used to shade four yards, including her own, but now half of it was dead and the rest was dying, branch by branch. Lew had his own idea why. Last summer he’d said thoughtfully, “I think it’s tired of listening to all the traffic on Bronson Avenue.” But Lew had a sensitive ear and a fine voice, unlike herself, who took two days to recognize “Auld Lang Syne” when the Ceremonial Guard was practising it day after day on the open fields at Carleton University nearby. Once she even failed to recognize “Happy Birthday” on the radio. She thought it was “God Save the Queen.”
Hanukkah is coming in a few weeks. Then Christmas. Maybe you have what we have, a menorah for eight days followed by turkey …
Fiona Chester’s light came on; it was half-hidden by spreading lilac bushes in the summer but quite visible now. Fiona, she knew, was waiting for the morning man “whose voice just has that effect,” she said one day.
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