Boxed In

Anybody reading this blog will have figured out quite quickly that this is not a linear story .. I don't know why ... but it feels better telling it that way ... 

The next three memories all occurred very close to each other but I am not sure of the order .. so I have given order to them ... they may have occurred on the same day .. or a week apart .. or one of them maybe just a solitary memory that seems to fit .. that will be the 'kitchen one' ...

There was a phone call .. someone at the cold storage where the old man worked looking for him ... I said I thought he was at work ... no ... he was dropped off earlier at his sister's place ... (I say sister .. he might have used cousin) ... just up the road and they just assumed he would be home by now ... he actually gave me the address and the name ... the old man didn't have a sister .. and I knew where he was ... this woman had come up in conversation before in the house .. don't know why ... but I was able to connect the dots ... in a moment of uncharacteristic candor on my part I told my mother ... usually whatever 'news' I had went in and stayed in ... she phoned the woman up the street and the only phrase I can remember is  .. 'you can have him' ... I have no idea what happened after that ... or even that evening ... but it might have been this memory ... 

The old man and my mother are having one of their arguments .. but this one is different .. my mother's voice is raised but pleading ... and the old man clearly has her at an advantage he has never had before ... there is a box in front of the closet .. in fact it is the cardboard box a replacement water heater came in ... he is tossing clothes into it and telling my mother that he had enough .. he is leaving .. my mother is going on and on about .. what will the children and I do .. you can't leave me her on my own ...  and the old man is enjoying every minute of this .. I went into their bedroom .. something I had never done when they were wound up .. I remember at one point I was on my hands and knees pounding the old man's feet with my fists .. he was just pushing me away with them ... I can't even remember how old I was but it must have in the 14 - 15 area ... I remember thinking ... this is going to stop all the arguing and griping ... in the end the old man didn't leave .. he got what he wanted .. he'd finally gotten the better of my mother .. he finally knew how to even the scales of discontent ... I don't remember how all this was reconciled ... or even if it ever was ... 

This last memory seems to connect to this ... I am in the kitchen .. there is a glass bottle of milk on the table ... the old man sweeps it off onto the floor and walks away .. I stand there locked in place watching my mother in tears clean up the broken glass and the spilt milk ... I didn't say a thing ... it was like watching a movie ... this memory is real .. not a dream ... I never forgot it .. the old man now had the advantage .. he could do anything he wanted .. if my mother complained ... he would threaten to leave .. so ... like mutually assured destruction .. detente ... well maybe not ... 

After the old man passed, I returned to my summer job at the cold storage plant and cleaned out his locker .. amongst various personal items I found a small jewellers ring case containing a diamond ring ... he'd actually taken the bold step to do that .. probably showed it to his 'sister' to prove it wasn't a third rate romance ... I never forgave him for not leaving ... my mother and father continued to verbally spar until his death ... but I have no memory if it became less because of this confrontation ... but I would like to think so ...

They didn't have the strength of their convictions ... to quote the bard ... 'it was all sound and fury .. signifying nothing' ... unfortunately my sister and I were but ... 'walking shadows ... that struts and frets .. and is heard no more' ... unwilling cast in this long running play ... what a tragedy ... 


Phil (30 December 2020 - San Patricio de Melaque - 8:45 PM)


Krome Koan - 'It's only fun when you don't get caught'




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Swearing Off

Image
Before I venture any further ... let me say that this blog is not dedicated to slagging my mother and father .. it is my story .. not there's .. but naturally they play a large part ... I was screwed up enough on my own ... the only thing I can blame them for is my genetic make-up ... which I think plays a major part in this story ... let me give you an example ... The old man every once in a while would take it upon himself to try and repair something .. in this case it was a lawn mower ... now my head does not handle sequences or patterns ... or three dimensional space ... North .. South .. East .. West ... are simply concepts to me ... in first year university, we had to take drafting ... given objects to measure and then plot out in three views .. top .. side ..end .. I did it but with great difficulty. So my job in the lawn mower repair was to remember the order of the dismantling and therefore be able to pick the right part at the right time for re-assmebly ... and this was a...
Read more

Coda

Image
If you examine the timeline of this blog ... I basically was boarding away from home in the fall of 1969 .. with no prep for anything outside the home .. dealing with a number of issues that only in the last decade have I come to even barely understand ... and then it gradually accelerates to marriage 7 years later ... it is hard to comprehend and hard for me to believe looking back on it ...  Knowing what I know now .. I would have sought counseling in June/July 1974 .. instead I was starting a new job and a new life ... so take all my issues ... add to it a serious break-up .. a new job .. away from school and home .. not knowing anybody ... it was a recipe for fucking disaster .. but I was saved by Bill Jaques ...  Bill loved to laugh .. and act a fool .. but he was a brilliant mechanical engineer ... and meeting him and having him accept me as a friend .. saved my life .. I am not the suicidal type ... but death by misadventure was well within reach based on my behaviour a...
Read more

A Golden Oldie

Image
My father was a stationary engineer at the Cold Storage Plant in Saint John, NB .. it was part of the  CPR ... in West Saint John ... the West Side .. you usually worked for the railroad or were a long shoreman on the docks. I knew he worked for the CPR directly before moving to the cold stoarge operation ... but how I knew that ... I don't know ... he obviously got his engineer's ticket somewhere alomg the way and transferred but he never said and I never asked. I worked there for 2 summers and part of a third. I worked with a general handy man who did odd jobs around the plant keeping things in shape ... the plant mangers son worked there as well .. the old man tolerated the plant manager but couldn't stand the crew foreman .. who was always turning the screw into him .. I am sure it reminded him of home. The Plant Manager's son also worked there but doing his own thing .. he was a go getter and he and his older brother .. who worked in the office .. had rented a blue...
Read more