by Jim Harrison
Mother’s cousin, Warren, was in his early forties and a game biologist for the Department of the Interior, and his wife, Maureen, a plump vigorous woman, taught drama at the local college. Warren was slender, quiet, contemplative, obsessed with birds and mammals, while Maureen was loud, hearty, profane, the first woman I ever met who swore a lot. In fact, the first thing she said at the door was “Jesus H. Christ, what a beauty!” For some reason I laughed, and she embraced me. But I cried for an hour or so when Mother left the next morning, so Maureen insisted I go to a play rehearsal with her. I was abashed sitting in a small auditorium watching the students speak their parts in Garcia Lorca’s Blood Wedding. It had never occurred to me that people could speak that passionately out loud. Grandfather had read Shakespeare to me but this was raw and direct. Several of the men sat down next to me during a break but I was too shy to say much. One of the men, a graduate student from Chicago, was unbelievably handsome and this made me nervous. He was dressed in the fashion of the bohemians I had seen in a photo essay in Life magazine. Maureen waved the men away, whispering to me, “No wonder you’re pregnant.”
The time passed quickly because I was given so much schoolwork to do and on a level beyond my capacity. Warren tossed my schoolbooks aside and put me on a science program of his own devising. Maureen did the same in the humanities, screeching “Puppy shit” as she threw my textbook on English and American literature into the fireplace. She taught me what she called “living literature” rather than the writers she loathed in the text—Pope, Dryden, Tennyson, William Cullen Bryant, Howells Markham. Her favorites were Keats and Yeats, Dickens, Twain, Melville, Whitman, and William Faulkner, who was difficult at first, though I identified closely with Light in August. Maureen also started me on a rigorous study of Spanish which I hated at the time but have been grateful for ever since. They both strongly disapproved of the country-Western music station I listened to all day but decided I must need the music in order to endure it. The music made me homesick but had the familiarity of old and favorite clothes. Duane’s favorite singer was Hank Williams, who Maureen admitted had a certain quality she called duende, a Spanish gypsy term for “ghost” or “soul.”
Once Maureen came home from work early. I was in the shower and didn’t hear her and she found me standing nude in front of my bedroom mirror looking for signs of rumored baby. I was a little embarrassed after I dressed and sat down to review my schoolwork. She had a large tumbler of imported sherry and poured me a small glass. The Jerez sherry was an indulgence she had learned during the two years she had lived in Barcelona and Ibiza. She pushed the schoolwork aside and started to talk, more a slangish monologue than a lecture: “I certainly don’t believe that story about you screwing a pheasant-hunter but that’s your business, and right now it should matter to no one except you. You’re going to have a hard time, because you are lovely and your body is as fine as I’ve seen.” I objected to this as ugly and irrelevant but she went on: “You have to study extremely hard and find some subject or profession you’re obsessed with because in our culture it has been very hard on the attractive women I know. They are leered at, teased, abused, set on a pedestal, and no one takes them seriously, so you have to use all your energies to develop the kind of character that can withstand this bullshit. You don’t want to waste your life reacting to it. Don’t waste your time on men who talk and stare but don’t listen to you. They just want to fuck you. Women I’ve known in your position get easily depressed because they are valued for something, their looks, which they had nothing to do with, you get it? It’s all genetic. And there’s a lot of envy from other women. I wouldn’t mind looking like you for a few weeks just to bowl the assholes over for a change.”
“Aren’t you happy with Warren?” I asked.
“Of course. He’s the best man I ever had and I tried quite a few, though most of them weren’t top-drawer. I met him when I was twenty-eight and it took two years to get him to marry me. I hiked every goddamn hill and swamp in the Upper Peninsula with him during that time. I quit that on our honeymoon which was a week of more camping on Isle Royale. Warren thought it was very funny when I quit because he knew I never liked it in the first place and I was just acting. Then he sent me off to New York City for a week of theatre as a present. I also know you’re thinking of ways to keep your baby but you can forget it because no one’s going to let you.”
Unfortunately, the week before Naomi, Ruth, and Grandfather were to arrive for Christmas vacation I became ill with a particularly virulent form of flu. At the tail end of the flu came a serious case of pneumonia which put me in the local hospital. I did not become better and the holidays were an uncomfortable dream of visits from Naomi and Ruth. For a stretch of time my fever made me somewhat delirious and the regular doctors were joined by a specialist Grandfather had flown up from Omaha. The pregnancy complicated matters and there was fear for both of our lives. One late night after the fever had begun to subside Grandfather came in against the wishes of the nurses. He said he had made a mistake that he wanted to correct. He had hoped so badly that I would forget Duane that he hadn’t given me the necklace that Duane had left behind for me. I grasped the necklace, seeing immediately it was the one Duane wore with a plain small stone in a copperish setting. There was also an envelope that had come more recently in the mail. It was a Christmas card with a Rapid City postmark. The card was a crèche scene and Duane had printed “This here card is a joke. You sing one of your songs for me and I’ll sing one of mine for you, your friend Duane.” There was no return address. I kissed Grandfather’s hand and rolled over to face the wall, holding the necklace to my lips. When he left, a nurse who had become a friend came in and asked me what was in my hand.
“My boyfriend sent me his good-luck necklace.” She helped me put it on and brought a hand mirror so I could see myself. It was one of the happiest moments of my life. That night I dreamed of riding with Duane on horses that ran through the air, under the ground through the soil, under the surface of lakes and rivers. I awoke the next morning feeling much better. I hid the necklace from Naomi and Ruth because they would recognize it.
The doctor from Omaha had insisted before he left that I be moved away from the cold damp climate of the Upper Peninsula. It was the kind of suggestion that put Grandfather into his “umbrage” mood, as Naomi called it. He had been staying at the only good hotel in town and Maureen had seen him at a restaurant with an attractive woman. He was also wearing elegant but old-fashioned suits that had the vaguely foreign touch of New York or London.
It was confusing when I got out of the hospital and learned that I was only to be at Maureen and Warren’s for another day, or until the weather let up. Warren and Grandfather got me from the hospital in an old Dodge power wagon borrowed from Warren’s job. The streets were partly drifted over and no one was around though it was noon. The wind blew so hard the whole world became blinding white, and Warren would stop the truck until it cleared a bit. I could sense their nervousness but thought it was all quite wonderful because I was out of the hospital.
Back at Warren’s I ate my promised hamburger in the kitchen with Ruth sitting beside me, the sort of silly relief you want from hospital food, and listened to the quarrel in the living room. Naomi wanted to take me home and Grandfather insisted that it was the doctor’s second choice to a drier climate. I could hear the anger in his voice as he repeated charges of how Naomi was suffocating us in our Nebraska “nest” and, in this case, my health was at stake. Naomi’s voice was a little quavery in protest though on our way to Michigan, in the hotel in Duluth, she admitted we all ought to get “out and around” more often. She had said she tended to think of the world as something that had killed her husband and the farm as their beloved and safe place. Grandfather made a speech to the effect that everything was arranged. A friend of his from Chicago was going to pick them up in his plane and fly me to Tucson. My uncle Paul whom I had only seen at my dad’s funeral would take me to his ranch house near Patagonia, whe
re there would be a registered nurse who was also a teacher. All the calls had been made and the plan was final.
And that’s what happened. The weather cleared in the night, the plane from Chicago arrived, and off we went, arriving in Tucson in the evening. It was someone’s corporate plane so there were nice chairs to sit on, also a small bed where I could rest. I played gin rummy with Ruth who must have been twelve or so. Ruth whispered to me that she had thanked God I was pregnant because she at last had gotten to go places and ride on an airplane. She was sorry to say it but it was true. We met Uncle Paul at the airport along with a dark-skinned woman who called herself Emilia. Ruth and I sat and watched television—Naomi disapproved of it so we had none at homeo—while Grandfather, Naomi, Paul, and Emilia had a meeting in an office. Ruth was angry because she had learned we weren’t going to keep the baby. She was unsure about my abilities but she knew she could handle the job. They came out of the office and we said goodbye.
Paul put his arm around me when we watched out the window as the plane took off for Grand Island. “You look like your dad and my mother. I was always sort of homely myself. Emilia here knows everything worth knowing. You’ll like her.”
At the Desert Inn there were two bedrooms for us and a parlor where we ate dinner. I was so quiet that Paul asked me what I was thinking about. I admitted that I always had heard that he was a wild-eyed and crazy treasure-hunter who lived with different women without being married. I also told him that when I went to see the movie The Treasure of the Sierra Madre with Naomi she said Humphrey Bogart was just like my uncle Paul. He thought this was very funny and told me he had been surprised and happy when my father had the sense to marry a farm girl.
Like many men who wander the world and live far from their native culture, Paul had evolved elaborate and private theories about many things. The same thing seems to happen with all solitary people, hermits, country bachelors, trappers. The moment we reached his ranch house the next morning we went on as long a walk as my health could bear. His notion was that hard-working Mexican women of the peasant class had an easier time in childbirth because of their enforced exercise. Therefore, at least a two-hour walk was in order every day before I began my studies. In his frequent absences, Emilia was to take me, or make sure one of the two hired hands took me. I went for these walks right through the winter until I reached my seventh month of pregnancy, when I still waddled slowly around the outbuildings. Paul approved of the books I brought from Warren and Maureen, adding his own prejudices in favor of Spanish and Italian culture. He said if I ever visited Spain, or Florence in Italy, I would understand to what depths of greed and stupidity the United States had sunk.
There were two Tennessee walking horses Paul used for hunting but I still could not look at a horse without thinking of Duane. Hunting was Paul’s main passion along with geology, and women, to whom he was courtly. I saw the bills on his desk from sending flowers to a half-dozen or so women around the United States. He had a kennel where he kept English setters and pointers for hunting quail, and a Labrador for ducks that was allowed to wander around except at night. His one concession to Grandfather was a large male Airedale kept to look after things. The idea of a guard dog wasn’t a popular notion then, though many rural people owned a dog who performed the function. I asked Emilia why one of the hired hands carried a large pistol and she said he was a retired bandito. His name was Tino and his son—Tito, of all things—wasn’t allowed to carry a gun unless he was walking with me. He used the occasions to exercise the bird dogs, and when they pointed a covey of quail Tito would shoot in the air to keep the dogs interested.
When Paul was home from Mexico we would drive with several of the dogs to new areas within a hundred miles or so. He would point out geological formations, flora, and fauna, but not much of it registered on me. This didn’t disturb him. He told me when he first came to southern Arizona it all looked like moonscape to him, and probably more so to me what with being pregnant.
“Should I want to shoot the young man?” he asked one morning. We were sitting near a beautiful spring far up Sycamore Canyon off the Arivaca road, oddly enough the same area where Ruth seduced her priest so many years later. I shook my head no and he hugged me. He smelled like my father had up on the Missouri when I was a child.
“Your father would have. He was a violent man at times. Dad bought us sixteen-ounce boxing gloves so we wouldn’t hurt each other. Your father was a great fighter whenever it was called for but he gave it up when he got married. He liked machines. I liked books and rocks. I take after my mother except for the drinking. I don’t like to drink very much.”
I asked him why the hired man had a gun. He said the border country was always a little bit risky. The drug heroin was smuggled across the boundary; also, people sneaked into the U. S. and he had a few business enemies in Mexico.
Once when Emilia and I were plucking quail for dinner I asked her if she was Paul’s lover. “Sometimes,” she said. I continued the line of questioning until she became embarrassed and changed the subject by saying the doctor was coming in the morning. I disliked the doctor who was puffy white and wore too much cologne. “Who was the lucky boy?” he asked during the first examination when I lay with my legs up. I told him I didn’t know because I had been drunk and there were several. A wave of disgust passed across his face and further examinations were without conversation.
I had my son April 27 in a Tucson hospital. Mother was there with me, and Uncle Paul acted the nervous father. I hugged the baby for just a moment and kissed it goodbye. I wanted to give it Duane’s necklace but I knew this would be lost or the gesture misunderstood. Somehow, when I was supposed to be sleeping, I overheard talk in the hall that the baby was going to be adopted by a couple in Minneapolis. I think they were out in the hall waiting to see the baby.
When Mother took me home to Nebraska, Ruth embraced me mightily, then became angry and rushed to her room because I didn’t have a photo of the baby. “What’s his name, goddamn you?” she screamed. I was too tired to cry. Grandfather embraced me and stared out the window. For some reason I wanted to work in the garden. I walked with Naomi and Grandfather out into the garden, and then slowly around the house as if we had a purpose.
The summer passed a little like a mixture of dreaming and sleepwalking until the afternoon of our polka party. It was Uncle Paul’s theory of walking that helped a great deal. I found my father’s World War II canteen in the attic and sometimes I would pack a sandwich, or double back to Grandfather’s to have lunch and to take some dogs along. I wasn’t particularly more observant than I had been in Arizona though later my memory was sharper than I would have expected. Nowadays there are all sorts of technical explanations for such times—I know them because I studied them at the university and in graduate school. For a girl of my age at the time, experiencing what I had, the emotional “burnout,” as it is rather glibly called, was actually a vital emptiness, a time when life was so poignant, and full of what is understood as suffering but is really only life herself making us unavoidably unique. I still reread a letter Uncle Paul sent me soon after I arrived home.
My Beloved Dalva!
It was a delight to have you here. It made me love my brother more in retrospect because he had a part in your being alive. You are at an age when you are not to yourself what you are to others. You were spreading good feeling from your prison, joking about your tummy, singing while you brushed the dogs, making us Nebraska desserts, telling stories about my father so I actually wanted to see him again. When I got home from the airport Tino and Tito imitated your fine lisping Castilian and we laughed, then fell silent because you were gone. Emilia wouldn’t come out of her room, and the Labrador wandered around the property looking for you. In a childish way I was angry that you were gone. I don’t wish you any trouble because I love you, but you must know that I am always here if you need a refuge, or want to get away. I haven’t been to church since I was fourteen but I pray that things will get better for you.
I have never met a girl who made everyone she met feel more strongly that they liked to live, a fuzzy notion but true.
What follows are some notes I made for you about our walks and trips. I felt that later on you might want to know just what it was you saw. I began walking at your age just because the natural world seemed to absorb the poison in me. Then I gradually wanted to understand why this was so and I suspect you will too. Strange, but we started on the same place, the same farm, and I knew some of the same anguish at your age, which is not to say that I fully comprehend what you are going through.
What you saw from Patagonia is much like the entire SE corner of Arizona—a 5,000-foot-high rolling plateau with grassy benches falling off into broad valleys with cienegas of sycamore, cottonwood, and live oak, a cooler, breezier, and slightly wetter place to live than up in Tucson (which is out of the question anyway because of all the realtors!). Sonoita Creek, along with Aravaipa and Madera, is one of the few remaining Sonoran Desert creeks with native fishes. In that bosque along Sonoita Creek west of Patagonia where you had morning sickness, there are a vast number of pugnacious, iridescent-throated hummingbirds, impossible to identify except the males hovering close to us. The fabled coppery-tailed trogon sometimes nests here but I’ve only seen him once in the area, and several times up in Madera Canyon where we picked those wild hot peppers, the chilatepines. I take these on airplane and train trips to make the food palatable.