by Edward Riche
Alessandra Cappello did not belong in the company of these buffoons, but Matt was grateful for her presence. Matt felt Councillor Cappello did not fully understand, or, in her difficult European leftie way, chose not to understand how the market economy worked, how development was an engine that kept the city moving, how money was a fuel and a lubricant. But on most other civic matters she and he agreed. She raised the level of debate in the chamber. Matt liked to hear her voice. Perhaps the faintest trace of an Italian accent remained (she spoke better English than anyone on council), the music of her mother tongue coloured her speech and she occasionally let a word or phrase drop in, but mostly it was the tone. He wished, when she spoke, she might never stop. But she did and Wally started up again.
“Maybe dat’s what’s happening to me, all dat Angel Dust in da water.”
“That must be it, Wally, all the horse trank that’s after getting into your system,” said Councillor Jardine. “Or, what’s the new one, bath salts?”
Bluff and ruddy Cyril Jardine, the councillor seated nearest Matt’s left, was always good for a laugh, thought Matt, for poking fun, but good for nothing more. (The deputy mayor, Councillor Wendy Kennedy, sat nearest his right hand and was, befitting their comparative placement, the antithesis of Jardine in temperament; dour, humourless, all business.)
“Bat’ salts? Dat da one made da fella in Florida eat da face off buddy?” Wally affirmed before returning to the agenda. “All I knows is dat if you ask the crowd dat live up to what used to be called da Gullies, or any of dem dat got a place down on da lower road if dey would rather have a job making paint or . . .”
Did Wally cultivate that “t’ick” accent? Matt thought it might be heavier in these evening public meetings than it was in the private meetings they held in the afternoon. He said “nickelll” and “milllk” and “fillum” like someone from St. John’s, but otherwise spoke like a proper bayman. You dropped your h’s in ’olyrood and picked them up in Havondale but there was no locus to Wally’s lilt. And wasn’t Wally from the Southern Shore, or those parts of the Southern Shore now subsumed by the expansion of the city? Some fishing village recently exurbed? Maybe that explained the townie taint on his tongue. Maybe it was his mother’s Conche. The only person on council who had any trouble with it was Ms. Cappello, and Matt wondered if Wally sometimes didn’t lean on it to antagonize her.
Matt checked his emails. From his brother, Len: probably a GIF of some tool messing themselves up, the looped falling off a ladder, or crashing a mountain bike, something head-splitting or nut-crushing that was supposed to be funny that Matt didn’t get. His Camry was due for servicing. Six invites to events that he would forward to his secretary, Audrey Manning, without opening. He only bothered to read the email from his daughter, Katie, who was majoring in Montreal at McGill.
“I’m assuming you put that $2000 in my bank account. Thanks. Wasn’t hinting but thanks. Mom is now bombing me with Christian stuff a couple times a day. Weird to me. Anyway thanks Luv U Dad.”
His wife, Patty, the daughter of lapsed Catholics, announced six months ago that she had joined the Christian and Missionary Alliance, an evangelical Protestant church. Their kids, Katie and Jack, who were now in regular receipt of religious literature from their mother, kept asking their father how and why this happened. Matt didn’t have an answer. Were they still talking about waste water?
“. . . everyone needs a drop of paint and we know how useless the environmentally friendly stuff was on the roads last winter . . .”
Jesus, they were.
Two
It was everything Alessandra Cappello could do to stop herself from doodling like a teenage girl in the back of class. In a forty-year-old woman it was an unfortunate tic. Withdrawing, luscious English word. Her fellow St. John’s city councillor Wally O’Neill was driving her into herself. It wasn’t merely Wally’s ignorance; it was that he wore it as a badge of honour. He laughed at his own errors in the accurate calculation that it helped voters identify with him. Wally could even join in with those sniggering at what he’d said, echo the fits and giggles when he was unintentionally funny, could laugh with them as they laughed at him. This was his fourth term in office. He may as well have re-election posters saying “We All Make Mistakes — Vote Wally O’Neill.”
This was Alessandra’s first term in office. She would not run again. She would use her husband Jules’s failing health as an excuse, knowing everyone would accept it and in doing so feel entitled to observe, behind her back, that it was the price she paid for marrying a man so many years her senior.
“. . . T’anks, your Worship. . .”
Had Mayor Olford taken mercy and cut Wally off? The mayor could do that sort of thing without offending. It was a skill. Alessandra thought Matt Olford was wilfully naive about the dangers of the unchecked expansion of the city. He bought into some neo-liberal myths about what was proving to be the trickle-up economics of late capitalism. But on every other account she thought him an almost perfect fit for the job.
“. . . one udder matter . . .”
Stronzo. More from that donkey.
Alessandra had assumed she could not win the seat in the municipal election. Her run was an opportunity to draw attention to issues concerning the preservation of some older neighbourhood features being lost in a recent flurry of urban development. It was a break from her job at the university’s map library.
The campaign was during a clear-aired August and September. She enjoyed walking around canvassing, talking up her concerns, offering solutions, meeting people. Nobody was as surprised as she with her narrow victory. It was her secret that St. John’s liked her more than she did it.
On went Wally.
“. . . is an ideal location for the Newfoundland and Labrador Sports Hall of Fame. . .”
Where was an ideal location? For what? She thought they were discussing the cleanup of the former paint factory site. Alessandra should have been listening more closely.
“This is kind of out of the blue, Councillor O’Neill,” said the mayor.
“They are bursting out of their current digs, Your Worship,” said Wally.
“Is no one interested in running it as a theatre?” asked Councillor Dunn.
“You’re proposing turning the LSPU Hall, the theatre, into the Sports Hall of Fame?” asked Alessandra. No one answered. Alessandra signalled to the mayor that she wished to speak.
“We are definitely not getting into show business,” said the mayor, indicating with a glance that he’d seen Alessandra, “but . . .”
“That theatre wasn’t much of a business, ‘show’ or otherwise,” said Wally.
“Who has the floor? I believe Councillor Cappello,” said the mayor. “Can we please . . .”
“You must be in the Sports Hall of Fame, Your Worship,” offered Councillor Neary.
“Hall of Shame maybe, Councillor Neary,” answered the mayor.
“Matt Olford will be in the Hall of Fame, there is no doubt about that,” said Wally.
“Someone will have to shoot me before I can be stuffed and mounted, Councillor. Can we please have order. Councillor Cappello has the floor.”
“Thank you, Mayor Olford.” Alessandra stood. “There was never a formal arrangement with the LSPU Hall Theatre because we assumed responsibility on such short notice, in an emergency, really. They hadn’t anticipated losing their funding. The bank would have taken the building if we hadn’t stepped in. No one ever said at the time that the city was going to operate it. There was an assumption, mistaken, it seems, that some group from the arts community would come forward with a plan. There have been a few requests to rent it but there are liability issues that would have to be worked out if we were to oblige. That said, I think the understanding has always been that it would continue, in some fashion, to be a theatre.”
“Councillor O’Neill.” Mayor Olford acknowledged Wal
ly. Alessandra sat.
“I think the Sports Hall of Fame would do a great job of preserving the old building,” Wally said. Alessandra stood again.
“That it’s a heritage structure isn’t the only issue; it’s having a downtown theatre.” Alessandra sat. Wally stood.
“I knows, I knows. We have to wait. Knows it. But . . . just saying but . . . if . . . the theatre thing doesn’t pan out, even with the limited parking it would be a grand spot for the Sports Hall of Fame. I has a sense dat people aren’t going to the theatre so much anymore what wit Netflix and games on dere phones, but dat’s a guess. If people wants to go to shows down dere den I can see it. But if not we can’t keep it open just to say it is.”
“It was,” observed Councillor Mercer, “the Longshoreman’s Protective Union — LSPU — Hall before it was ever a theatre. Longshoremen went the way of the dodo when shipping containers came along. Maybe theatre is a thing of the past. Maybe smartphones are theatre’s shipping containers . . . I dunno . . . but things change.”
“Dare I send this to committee?” asked the mayor. There was a desultory murmur of agreement that such should be done. “Any new business?”
Neary stood.
“We may have some people living in Bowring Park,” he said.
“Living?” said the mayor.
“Camping? I dunno, like a tramp or tramps. Homeless. Are you allowed to call people gypsies, anymore?”
“Can’t call someone retarded anymore,” said Wally.
“Roma,” said Councillor Cappello. No one gave a sign of having heard her.
“It’s ‘gyped’ you can’t say,” said Councillor Mercer.
“And you wants to be queer before you calls anyt’ing gay,” said Wally. “D’know dat?”
“There are reports,” Councillor Neary continued, “of people living in the wooded area out there.”
“That’s probably the same crowd who vandalized the war memorial,” said Wally, putting his fist to the table. “Sleveens who were at Peter Pan’s no-no place.”
“That was on Peter’s privates?” asked Jardine.
“Yes b’y,” said Wally, “right up under his dress. Sick wha’?”
“Tunic,” said Deputy Mayor Kennedy. “It’s a tunic.”
“What about security? Why haven’t . . .?” the mayor queried.
“Sentry has been having a devil of a time keeping staff. Price of the boom, Your Worship. Good workers are made a better offer and move on. People from the company were genuinely sorry and are on it.”
“You know that ‘on it’ means ‘we haven’t yet done it,’” said the mayor, earning a few chuckles. “It’s a corollary of ‘it is what it is,’ which means, ‘it’s something I won’t do anything about.’” He pointed to Alessandra. “And please don’t say ‘I told you so,’ Councillor Cappello.”
Alessandra had been alone on council in opposing the contracting out of security at city parks.
“The Parks and Public Spaces committee meets Wednesday,” said Alessandra. “If we can have an update then?” She looked to the table at which a trio of city staff sat and got three nods.
Three
What’s the word?
The thing the thing the knife the blade thing for . . . for the face, for shaving, that simple thing?
Name of the thing, the thing with the . . . the . . . maw, the clamp for the . . . name of the thing?
He stirred the contents of a drawer full of unctions and ointments with his hand. Italian face cream. “Nailclippers” he knew.
Where was he last? He flew out of Milan. Fish every day in Genoa. Potatoes.
No, no these were a woman’s things in the drawer and he was looking for . . .
If he had one in his hand he would know what it was called. If there was a package he’d read it.
The bloody thing, yes bloody . . . you’d cut yourself your whiskers.
The thing was . . . he knew its its its haecceity, its quality of being the thing it was, its thisness. Or was that because he was thinking of it from without? Was it its thatness, its quiddity?
Thisness thatness
This is
The is
This is the thesis
This is
Went to a lecture by Sir Bernard Williams once. That was Oxford.
Where were we?
Had he pissed? Washed his hands? He could smell the soap, lavender like Aix. Jays screaming outside. Summer. Leaves on the trees. Then why was he going to class? No. He was home. It was summer. This was St. John’s. He was in Newfoundland. He was looking for the thing. Name of:
He knew what it was, its qualities, only the name escaped him. Got away from him.
He was going to talk to a doctor about this. Consult a physician. Confusion, the confusion was the issue more than the memory. He could remember everything even the kettle and he knew that Corte-Real’s caravel was the
It went out of his mind.
What was he doing up here? Why had he come? He decided to go back downstairs.
And fear. Afraid in his heart, a bird cupped in your hands. Jules was going to make an appointment with his doctor and demand something for the dread. He was a man and he could not be afraid of things. There were ways of coping with every other symptom, you could write yourself notes, you could. There was something else too, he was going to talk to, who was it? About what?
Someone was coming into the house. He couldn’t remember there being a door over there. Was it a window one time and they’d renovated? They were coming right in. It was a woman, coming right in like that. Should he hide? No, she’d seen him. Was she the cleaner? No, he knew her, she was a grad. Student. Wasn’t she?
Four
Alessandra more and more often found Jules like this, adrift. He was standing in a spot in the kitchen where one didn’t stand, in reach of nothing, on no heading. There was a mien of terror on his face when first she entered. It was replaced by an attempt at a smile.
“Were you getting something to eat, Jules?”
“No. No. I’m not hungry.”
“You haven’t shaved? Did you shower? You have a doctor’s appointment early tomorrow morning, remember? First appointment so we won’t have to wait.”
“The doctor I did remember. I will go back up now and get a shower.” Jules lit up. “Shave with a razor. Non fate tardi.” He headed upstairs.
“Late for what? The doctor is tomorrow,” asked Alessandra, but Jules was gone.
How little medical science could do for Jules. Surely, Alessandra thought, with legions of baby boomers about to be so afflicted, Big Pharma would concoct something that alleviated the symptoms. Surely there was money in that? Not necessarily anything for the aphasia that had Jules slipping into Italian, or the forgetfulness, but certainly a balm against the anxiety, the panic that seemed to more frequently seize him.
Jules’s Italian was sound but sterile when Alessandra met him. His was the fluency of an exceptional student, learned in classes and libraries, not in taverns, not at Dalla Marisa. He wanted to study Venetian dialect but it wasn’t often formally taught, so that part of the archival work, the local diplomacy and barter with the librarians and archivists, fell to Alessandra. The Cappellos were a “new” family of Venice, only in Veneta since the fourteenth century. They’d been doges and procurates of St. Mark’s and traders. Venetian she knew.
Her father, Piero, clung to the status of being a Cappello in La Dominante even as the palazzo, its piles rotting, sank in the mud. He tried not liking Jules and opposing the marriage. But Jules was dashing then and engaging and the two men got on. Jules suffered Piero’s tiresome Indipendenza Veneta arguments and his cockamamie economic theories without complaint or correction.
Jules’s subject, the mariner and mountebank Zuan Cabotto, one of the many reputed discoverers of Newfoundland, fled Venice owing money to
a Cappello, and Piero joked that he would hold Jules to the debt. Though Jules was a lowly scholar there was some family money, and his attentions let Piero forget the Cappellos were in hock, that the lagoon was reclaiming the city, and that Italy was a shambles. Alessandra’s mother, Marina, confessed she loved Jules more than her daughter loved him but refused to bless the union. Jules, Marina told Alessandra, was too old for her and the marriage would come to grief; a judgement proven fair when, not many years later, her new friends in St. John’s started having babies and Alessandra did the math.
She and Jules moved to a mythical Canada; a liberal social democracy, the fancy, she later realized, of a generation of bright postgraduates, drunk from travel to (but never quotidian life in) Scandinavia and France, a fiction forced on a bunch of frontier hicks who had more recently organized, taken back their country, and then sold it cheap to resource multinationals. There was a deep, core anti-intellectualism about the place, a trait of which Jules always knew but neglected to ever mention, a lie of omission that Alessandra was beginning to feel was a betrayal. The country wasn’t Norway; it was northernmost North Dakota. The political left (to which Alessandra inclined) in Canada was a loose assembly of self-righteous touts for self-evident causes, sharing only their terror of the central economic tenets of socialism. They were more like retired teachers in a church group than agents of political change.
But in the colonial outpost of Newfoundland, where Ontario-born Jules accepted a full professorship, there was no ideology whatsoever. It was tribal here.
There was no one with whom she could share these thoughts. She was a foreigner, so not entitled to grouse.
Alessandra looked out the kitchen window and on to the yard. It was early June and an uncommonly balmy one so far. The leaves still wore a newborn sheen and pallor. The tulips were only now in full bloom. Until recently she had not missed Venice. Not missed the tidal funk and the unending staying of the sinking, not missed the garish tourism, not missed the contradiction of constant complaint and resignation that had become the national norm.