When Dad stopped driving, Mom became the family driver. This is nuts. Dad, at his worst, is ten times better than Mom ever was at her best. But, in a sense, it’s the story of their relationship. Mother, in her determination to dominate, took over. She’s become the leader. Dad, in his timidity, awareness, sensitivity, his superdeveloped sense of responsibility, gradually handed over the reins. Probably this isn’t too uncommon with life in general. If you’re good at something, you don’t fight so hard; you don’t have to.
Still, even now, Dad’s the one who keeps their car in running condition. He makes sure there’s water in it, has the oil changed regularly. He keeps the tire pressure right and has a full tune-up every six months.
We drive off toward the hospital. I want to see if Dad can show me the way. He had a gall-bladder operation there ten years ago and did a lot of driving back and forth.
But he can’t direct me at all; he’s like a child. He’s stopped thinking of streets and directions; he’s only watching things go by the car window. I ask what’s the best route, and he shrugs.
“I don’t know, Mother usually drives us.”
This is such a role reversal. It’s always been a joke in our family how Mom never knows where she’s been. She actually got lost once four blocks from home because she’d taken a wrong turn. She went into a police station to ask her way. I have something of this myself; I get lost easily.
But I’m beginning to feel Dad is operating at less than a quarter of his capacity. I sense how this happens, how easily it could happen to me. It’s frightening how a combination of resignation and lack of confidence can debilitate far beyond any physiological loss.
I determine to press Dad into naming the streets. I want to force his mind out from the back court of his hand-built house on a dead-end street nestled quietly between the arms of giant freeways. I’m pointing out streets as we go along, encouraging him to respond.
Then, in the middle of my spiel, I realize he has something else on his mind. He gives off vibrations like dead air before a storm.
“You know, John, this is a good hospital; the union recommends it.”
I nod my head and turn left on De Soto.
“But there’s an awful lot of niggers there; not just niggers, Japs.”
He pauses, looks over at me.
“Even so, Johnny, it’s a good hospital.”
I try not to respond. I don’t want to get into it, especially right now.
When we go in the hospital, the receptionist is a good-looking black woman and remembers me from the day before.
“Hello, Mr. Tremont, your mother seems fine today.”
I’m impressed she remembers not only me but the situation. To be perfectly honest, I hadn’t noticed she was black when I came by myself. I’d registered her prettiness, kindness, efficiency, but not her color. It’s only because of the car conversation it hits me; that’s the way it goes.
Dad’s standing there smiling, but it’s peculiar, as if he’s looking at someone in a cage at the zoo. She is in a kind of cage, a glass cage; maybe that’s part of it, or maybe it’s all in my mind.
We start toward the elevator wading through Muzak.
“Do you know her, Johnny?”
“I talked with her when I came to see Mom last time.”
“She certainly was nice.”
“Yup, she seems like a fine person.”
He shakes his head and speaks to the floor.
“The world’s changed, Johnny; you wouldn’t believe how the world’s changed.”
We enter the elevator. Dad’s becoming more nervous; his face is blanched, his hands are shaking. I put my arm over his shoulder.
“Come on, Dad, it’s OK. They’re taking the best possible care of Mother. She’s getting exactly what she needs, a good rest.”
We walk down the carpeted blue corridors; wild fantasy decorative paintings are on the walls. We arrive at the intensive care unit. It’s another black woman. I ask if we can see Mother. She checks her clipboard. It’ll be all right but we’re not to stay long. We walk around the nurse’s station over to Mom’s cubicle. She’s awake and sees us come in.
Dad kisses her, and she cries. Dad starts crying, too. I’m feeling embarrassed. Mom and Dad have never been much for public demonstration of affection or emotion. I can’t think of any time I’ve seen them really kiss except for a peck goodbye or hello. Joan and I talked once about this. We were also trying to remember when Mother ever held or kissed us as children. Neither of us could remember this happening.
Mother had a terrible experience as a young girl. She was one of ten children living in a three-bedroom row house in South Philadelphia. She had two sisters whose names were Rose and Anne; they slept three in a bed, Mom, the youngest, in the middle. Anne and Rose, in the course of one year, died of tuberculosis, called, in those days, galloping consumption.
Mother, all her life, has been convinced she has tuberculosis. The horror of the whole experience was that Rose, the second to die, died in Mom’s arms. Mother was trying to hold her out the window on a hot summer day so she could breathe. Rose hemorrhaged suddenly and died within minutes. Mother was fourteen at the time and had what was called a “nervous breakdown.” She never went back to school.
All her life, Mom’s had a bizarre fear of germs. She’d never kiss us on the mouth, neither my sister nor me. If she ever did kiss anybody, she’d wipe the kiss off right away as if she were wiping off lipstick; she was wiping off germs.
Mom puts her arms out and wants me to come kiss her. She kisses me on the lips and doesn’t wipe. Maybe now she’s dying, germs don’t count. Dad stands looking at her, tears coming down his face. Mother gives him a fast once-over.
“He looks marvelous, Jacky; you’re such a wonderful son. What would we do without you?”
She pulls herself up in the bed.
“Are you all right, Jack; are you taking your blood-pressure pills?”
“Oh, yeah, Bette, I’m fine. You know, Johnny can cook and clean house, all those things; he’s like a regular wife.”
Mother gives me a quick look, a short almost-snort.
“You two just try keeping things going. I’ll be out of here soon. Eat at McDonald’s and there’s food in the freezer compartment.”
Now she begins a detailed description of different menus Dad likes and can digest. This involves no onions, no garlic, no seasoning except salt. It gets down to various kinds of hamburger with either noodles or those fake mashed potatoes made from powder.
I nod along. I figure I’ll use up what she has in the freezer but I have no intention of eating that way. Mom might be the world’s worst cook. I don’t want to perpetuate the tradition. I like cooking and prefer variety in my food; if I have to, I’ll cook twice, once for Dad, once for myself. But I’m sure Dad’ll enjoy what I cook. The poor bastard’s been living on poverty-hospital-type food for over fifty years.
Dad’s staring at Mother as if he’s surprised to see her in bed, staying there, not getting up and taking over. It must be worse for him than it is for me. When we’re about to leave, he kisses her again; he can’t keep himself from saying it.
“When are you coming home, Bette? How long do you think it will be?”
Mom turns and gives me one of her looks. Now, these looks are special. In one way, it’s as if she’s trying to hide an expression, usually negative, from another person, but she does it so obviously everybody must notice; a Sarah Bernhardt dramatic gesture aimed for the last row in the balcony. This time she looks at me, raises her eyebrows and turns her eyes to the ceiling. She’s saying, “See, he’s helpless, he has no idea.”
In a sense, this is true, but he’s standing right there; he sees it. It’s either incredible cruelty or insensitivity. She does this kind of thing about my sister, about our children and about me; it’s something I’ve never been able to take.
“You know, Mom, Dad really would like to have you home. It’s perfectly natural; we all would. We’d like to get y
ou out of here soon as possible.”
I’m trying to ride over those crazy signals.
“But you just have to take your time and relax. Do what the doctor says. You’ll be fine but you’ve got to change your way of living, Mom. You’ve had a heart attack and can’t go back to your old wild and woolly ways.”
Her eyes fill up.
“I don’t know if I want to live like that, Jacky. If I can’t do what I want, what’s the sense?”
I hold back; it won’t help getting her upset.
“OK, Mom. But do what the doctor says. He knows best and he’ll let you out when he thinks you’re ready.”
Then she comes on with the kicker.
“You know, I’m not sure I had a heart attack, anyway. How do these doctors know for sure? It felt like gas pains to me.”
This had to come but I keep my big mouth shut. What else?
I kiss her goodbye and we leave.
As soon as we get in the car, Dad begins.
“Johnny, when do you really think she’ll come home?”
“She should stay in the hospital just’s long as possible. The longer she stays, the better off she is.”
“I guess you’re right there, Johnny; I guess you’re right.”
But he isn’t believing it.
That evening, we don’t do much. We watch some TV, then I roll my old Honda 175 motorcycle out of the garden shack and into the patio. It needs some heavy cleaning and tuning; it’s been sitting there almost two years. Dad comes out and works in his greenhouse. He can putter around in there by the hour, his private world.
The sun leans quietly up over Ira’s barn.
Each day a mite sooner, a bit to the right.
The start for the day, an end to the night.
5
I must’ve slipped off because my head jerks and the country’s changed, higher, not so dry.
I only hope to hell we can keep off the subject of what I’m going to do; at least for a while. He’ll never understand why I cut out of Santa Cruz. He did all the paperwork for the scholarship, establishing residence, getting high-school records in, all that crap. And now, after a year, I don’t want it. Sometimes I don’t even understand, myself.
But, Jesus, if he could only have seen that place. It was a giant baby-sitting operation. I mean, Santa Cruz is an old people’s home for kids.
I about vomited when I arrived on my motorcycle, after ten days on the road. I’m caked with dirt from head to toe; everything I own’s in my saddlebags. I couldn’t believe it. There were trucks and cars pulling in with stereo sets, wall-to-wall sound systems, rugs, teddy bears, ten-speed bicycles, tennis rackets, golf clubs, fencing costumes, huge suitcases full of clothes. God, you wouldn’t believe all the junk these people were dragging along. It looked like a junior-high-school garage sale.
Then, there was my crazy roommate, Flash. My mother, my own mother, picked him for me. She filled out a form with what she thought I’d like for a roommate. Would you believe it, Santa Cruz even has a form for that. Mom said how I’d like somebody with a good stereo set who’s interested in electricity, motorcycles and running. I actually hunted up this form in the Registrar’s Office to find out how it happened to me.
I get a guy with a terrific stereo set all right; in fact, he’s an electrical genius. He’s also crazy. For one thing he has a bicycle hanging on pulleys from the ceiling of our room with a monster lock on it. He designed and built the lock himself. There’s a sign on this bike. It says:
IF YOU STEAL THIS BICYCLE, YOU WILL BE STEALING
THE BEST BICYCLE IN THE WORLD PROTECTED BY
THE BEST LOCK IN THE WORLD AND YOU ARE GOING
TO HAVE THE BEST DETECTIVE IN THE WORLD CHASING
YOU TO THE ENDS OF THE WORLD.
Now, you know this is an out-and-out challenge. We wind up constantly locking our door. Nobody in Santa Cruz is locking doors except us, nobody even closes doors!
Flash wears black clothes; he wears black T-shirts, black jeans, black socks, black jockey shorts, black shoes, black pajamas. He has long black hair combed straight down on all sides, even across his face, and a brush cut on top so you can see the white skin on his skull; it’s the only white you can see. He looks like something out of Mad magazine.
Except for examinations, I don’t remember Flash ever going to class. He only left the room to ride that bike or get something to eat. That’s the way it is at Santa Cruz; nobody’s watching you. It’s a place where nobody gives a damn what you do. At the same time, you wind up with a guilty feeling all the time that you’re not doing enough. They use a pass-no-record system, meaning either you pass or else it didn’t happen; you can’t fail. Still, in some twisted way it’s a superman nursery school; the place is like a hothouse for sequoia trees. To be honest, I actually felt more on my own at that crummy American high school in Paris; at least you could fail.
The dorms at Santa Cruz were weird. Living in a Paris apartment is like living alone in a cave on the side of a mountain compared to living in a dorm at Santa Cruz. Everybody’s into everybody else’s room, and after the third week it was musical-bed time. The lights were lit all the time; there wasn’t one dim corner, let alone dark. I used to close my eyes sometimes, trying to remember what the dark was like. I’ve gone out at three in the morning and looked back. The whole building vibrated with noise and light, electricity being burned by the kiloton. And, the next day in class, these same people would talk about ecology and conservation.
Just to get away, I practically live in the library. I even work a job there; helps me hold on to a corner of my mind. Those people have no moments alone. They write their term papers surrounded with junk, noise and smells. And God, the smells would knock anybody over. The floors in all the rooms are covered with paper, food, dirty socks, clothes, books. Everybody tramps over these piles. People walk around half dressed; it’s a zoo, nothing private.
Dad hasn’t really gotten into why I don’t want to go back. He’s strange that way; he doesn’t talk about things. He can talk to people; I mean, conversation; he’s a great storyteller, and shit, painting’s communication; but he doesn’t talk where something’s important. He tends to ignore anything he doesn’t want to hear. Mom’s the same.
But we’ve got to talk this out sooner or later, only I’m not going to bring it up.
What I want to do is write. Writing’s something I enjoy doing. That’s the way he got into painting. I know I bullshit better than most people; that should help. First, I’ll try a novel or maybe a screenplay; it doesn’t matter. I only want my cabin and some quiet. I’ll bear down and get something done for a change. Christ, my days get by and I’ve nothing to show.
Maybe Debby will come. She’d groove on my cabin. She’s shit tired of Berkeley and it’d be fine having a good woman around.
The trouble is I don’t know how I can make money. I can’t get a carte de travail. With the common market, there’s no way for an American to work in France, legally. Maybe I’ll hire myself out picking sugar beets. I hear you can work up a thousand bucks a month that way. I could live easy on a couple thousand a year. Debby’s old man will chip in something, too.
“Hey, Dad, let’s stop someplace for breakfast. I’m starved.”
He nods his head. He’s off spinning somewhere. We’ll be crossing from Utah into Colorado soon. The Rockies are somewhere in front but out of sight.
When I pushed across on my Yamasaki, I was so much closer to things. I knew every hill, every bump. I sucked in each goddamned mile and spit it out, a mouthful at a time. I was holding down those handlebars, rattling teeth, jiggling kidneys. At nights, I was a wreck. Twice I peed blood. Also, sleeping out with gnats and mosquitoes was hell. I’d packed a tent but no mosquito net. I swear I’m allergic to mosquitoes; every morning I’d be swollen up like a balloon. Just grabbing the handle and shifting gears with thick sausage fingers was hell.
“Dad, how about if we roll down a window; OK? This canned cold air gets to me.”
>
“Good idea. We’re through the desert now.”
He pushes buttons and both windows start rolling down; the bionic man. Wind blows through and around us.
“Ah, this is more like it, Bill. I get inside a box like this and lose track where I am.”
Half an hour later we stop for doughnuts and coffee. Jesus, it’s impossible! Just the two of us, nothing else, the bill pushes two-fifty.
The world’s sure a shitload. You work your ass off just staying alive. Most any job you get only pays enough to rent a roof, feed your face and buy clothes, even secondhand junk. And there’s no way to live without working; we’re all locked in. Look at Gary and Marty; they’ve thrown the key away.
It’s a bummer all right.
6
Next day, after we come back from the hospital, I begin working on my Honda. First, I spread some newspapers to catch any grease or crud. I blow out the carb jets, then pull the plugs, scrape and set them. It’s been sitting so long there’s mold on both plugs. I push the bike back and forth in gear to see if the motor’s frozen but it’s OK, the pistons are moving.
I clean the points and adjust the timing as best I can without proper tools. Even though I’m a crappy mechanic, I like fooling around with a small simple machine like this; it’s a thing my mind can handle and I’m needing something in that category just now.
Dad comes out and watches me. He’s always been such a tremendous mechanic he makes me nervous. It’s the joke of our family how I’m rotten with machines. For years I was called “Hatch” because I hatcheted things requiring skill. I was away from home five years before I realized my mechanical talents were only low in comparison to Joan’s and Dad’s.
Dad stands over me. I point out what a fine piece of machinery a motorcycle is; nothing extra, just a motor mounted on wheels; the ideal solution for overland travel, the next best thing to wings. I know Dad thinks it’s dangerous and undignified for a grown, middle-aged man to be balancing on two wheels.
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