Week 2: “a traveler departing forever”

A friend suggested I read Wendell Berry’s novel Jayber Crow, or, as the title page states, The Life Story of Jayber Crow, Barber, of the Port William Membership, as Written by Himself. This “title” (whether intended as a subtitle or not, I’m unsure) sums up the story fairly well: a young boy, known as Jayber, loses his parents, gets sent away to school, learns how to become a barber, returns to his home town, and sets up a barbershop. There, in Port William (a fictional town in Kentucky), Jayber observes the lives of his fellow townspeople; his previous stint as a student in a ministry program supplies him with the necessary proverbs and goodwill to wax philosophical as he muses on the quotidian events around him.

Disclaimer: I haven’t finished the book yet, so my observations may be imperfect. But thus far (two-thirds of the way through), Jayber’s steady, rambling first-person narrative puts me in mind (as he himself might say) of other “Great American Novel” -type narratives: descriptive-yet-abstract depictions of small-town or farm-country America, where common-sense folks, hardworking folks, Bible-thumping (or at least Bible-quoting) folks are determined to live honestly and die hopefully. Faulkner, Cather, Ingalls Wilder, Hemingway, Norris come to mind: the petty quarrels and small-town dramas rival the overwhelming struggle with the land and the weather, and although politics and government seem far away, they too are encroaching.

In the middle of the novel, Jayber pauses to ponder how each generation grows old and passes on. As he says,

“But you could not be where I was without experiencing many such transformations. One of your customers, one of your neighbors (let us say), is a man known to be more or less a fool, a big talker, and one day he comes into your shop and you have heard and you see that he is dying even as he is standing there looking at you, and you can see in his eyes that (whether or not he admits it) he knows it, and all of a sudden everything is changed. You seem no longer to be standing together in the center of time. Now you are on time’s edge, looking off into eternity. And this man, your foolish neighbor, your friend and brother, has shed somehow the laughter that has followed him through the world, and has assumed the dignity and strangeness of a traveler departing forever” (Crow 129).

Here, Jayber steps away from the concerns of his barbershop, or his insistence on financial integrity, or the incident of the pigs, or even his own heartaches, and he evokes a sense of homelessness and wandering among the stolid roots and stones of America’s agrarian heartland. I cannot claim that this passage is unique among Berry’s fellow novelists, nor even in the book itself, but it offers a pause for contemplation and an appreciation of the transcendental significance of an individual, even a stranger, among the simultaneously monotonous and calamitous events that comprise the Americana life.

Week 1: “with ah! bright wings”

In a previous life, I was an assistant teacher in a 9th grade English class at an all-girls boarding school run by Catholic nuns. Yeah, long story.

Among other assignments, the girls were required to memorize a series of poems, one of which was “God’s Grandeur” by Gerard Manley Hopkins. As the teacher’s assistant, I was expected to, well, assist. So I sat behind the desk, trying to look taller than I felt, and I followed along while each girl stumbled through her recitation of the poem. Some knew it, of course; you can picture the one who stood primly before the desk, heels together, skirt smoothed down, blouse tucked in, short blonde ponytail swishing enthusiastically as she galloped through “Why do men then now” and rounded the corner at “over the bent / World broods.” Others — you can well imagine them — others took a more relaxed approach to the assignment. Energetic or otherwise, though, the girls all learned the poem, and I did too.

Since then (it’s been a while), I’ve had the poem bouncing around in the old bean, and a line or two will spring to mind now and then. In the past few years, as I’ve spent more time taking long walks outside, I’ve often thought how interesting and important it is that “nature is never spent.” On a purely natural or material level, we can see how the tiniest of green shoots will push through the cracks in cement sidewalks, or how vines and trees have retaken certain places and buildings in Detroit. No matter how much of a mess of things we make, nature keeps calm and carries on.

And then, yesterday, for the feast day that begins our new calendar year, we sang Veni Creator Spiritus at mass. It always makes me cry (which made for an awkward moment in the choir loft). But it also brought to mind Hopkins’ line about the Holy Ghost brooding over the “bent world.” It is this brooding that gives nature her energy and her continuation; it is this brooding that brings us morning “at the brown brink eastward.” And so, at the beginning of another year, as we anticipate (or dread) whatever is to come, Hopkins’ image is here to console us. Our uncertainty is His Omniscience.

Escape

The girl lay in bed, listening to her roommates’ heavy breathing; listening to Sister Jean Raphael slowly pacing the hall to the beat of the Hail Mary; listening to the outside world, the world beyond her bedroom window, the world so frightening and so delightful when drizzled in moonlight – unlike tonight. Tonight, all was still. The birds hid their heads under their wings. The wind left the leaves alone.

Perhaps tonight was not the right night. Perhaps she needed to wait for the moon – the blessed, beckoning moon that called to her outside. Not tonight. Tonight, the moon slept … maybe she would sleep too …

There was one faint whistle in the darkness, a whistle almost too far to hear – but she heard the call. It was the 440 train, from Aix-en-Provence to Lyons, traveling north. The girl heard the call. And she came.

The girl slid out from under her covers and noiselessly pulled on a contraband pair of jeans and an olive-green sweater she had stuffed under her bed. She pulled out her backpack and scooped her toothbrush and pajamas into it – everything else of necessity was already smuggled in there. Everything, that is, except –

She could hear Sr Jean Raphael roll off the balls of her feet as she came to the end of the hall. There was a clink of beads and a rustle of a veil as (the girl knew without seeing) Sister threw it over her shoulder impatiently and turned on her heel and continued down the hall in the opposite direction. When the nun had passed the landing at the top of the grand staircase (the girl could hear the three distinct creaks as Sister passed) the girl drew in a deep breath, opened the bedroom door, and crossed the hall in a sudden move.

Across the hall was Sister’s room. Cell might have been a better term; it was hardly big enough to fit a narrow bed and even narrower priedieu, but it was plenty big enough to hold a very important cupboard, which the girl now sidled up to. She took a bobby pin from her hair (stuck there for the purpose), bent it, and deliberately inserted it into the cupboard lock. Quietly, carefully, oh-so-patiently, the girl twisted the pin until it clicked, and the little wooden door swung open. There, inside, the cupboard held all the treasures of the class of seconde: confiscated jewelry and makeup (held until the parents returned), secret stashes of candy, a pack of cigarettes, a cheap romance novel or two (those would be the key talking points for some parents next holiday weekend). The girl reached in with two fingers and pulled out two items: a slim leather wallet and a well worn American passport. She slipped both into her pocket, closed the cupboard door, and retreated across the hall.

Once back in her room with her still sleeping roommates she took a deep breath. Now for the difficult part. She slung the backpack over her shoulders, opened the window, pushed back the shutters (gently, since they squeaked), and looked outside into the vast darkness.

Flying

She swung through the doors, and it wasn’t until she looked up that she realized it was dusk. She stood on the steps and stared at the greying sky, where the birds flew between the cracks in the clouds. It had been grey that morning when she entered the office, and it was grey now as she left. She slung her bag across her shoulders and began making her way down the empty sidewalk.

One drop, but she didn’t notice. Another, and still her head hung low. Three, four, five, and a gust of wind made her twitch her nose; then, suddenly, the great cloud overhead broke open and dropped its contents on her head. She stood, drenched before she could think to move; a clap of thunder woke her, and she shook herself, and as if by divine inspiration, she smiled. She threw off the bag, and started to walk; she untied her hair, and started to run; her shoes fell off as she ran, and with each step she shed another concern; first one worry dropped, then another; the wind caught up her doubts and they whirled in a windstorm into the sky. She was stripped of all but a hope; she took a leap of faith and found herself flying.

Professor

The looming clouds didn’t seem to bother him. He stood by the lamppost, his puffy navy blue coat hanging from his shoulders, his eyes blinking slowly behind the round glasses. A gasp of wind blew up the avenue, catching up scraps of paper and sending them wisping through the air. His hair stood on end. The cars shook and shivered in the cold; their headlines stared out into the quickly-falling dusk. He still stood.

He stood still as a class of freshmen let out from the building behind him, swarming the sidewalk, jostling and joking in oblivion. He stood still as a homeless man lurched past him; the man shook his gnarled locks and glanced only once at the stubborn academic. It was over now; what was there to be stubborn about anymore? He stood still as the bus slowed and swayed close to the curb. The doors wheezed open, and the man stepped stiffly onto the bus. The doors clanged behind him; the bus jerked forward, and, without a glance backward, he rode away for the last time.

Flannery O’Connor quote

“At its best our age is an age of searchers and discoverers, and at its worst, an age that has domesticated despair and learned to live with it happily.”

Mrs. Smith

Even though they stood at opposite ends of the room, they were conscious only of each other’s presence. The whole room was conscious of their presence — their united existence, the invisible, connecting thread strung between them, affecting each other’s smallest movements, slightest thoughts, with an intangible twitch. He, with his coolly unimpressed air, stood by the window, tossing off well-worn puns to the gaggle of women who made their way, consciously or unconsciously, through the crowd to congregate in that very spot. She, on the other hand,  was judiciously helping the hostess hand out drinks to those members of the party gathered by the bar. She turned her back, and he straightened his; he coughed, and she twitched her nose; when either’s laugh rung out across the crowd, the other grew silent and still, as if a song had been put on mute. They did not make eye contact; they merely breathed in sync. They could hear snatches of each other’s separate conversations, and the call-and-response became apparent to even the least observant.

One of the gaggle, a particularly peckish type named Linda, broke away from the flock momentarily to forage from the snack table. She bumped into another woman scraping the sides of the potato salad bowl. Linda apologized with a giggle. “What a party! I love people watching. And this *charming* man — he’s enchanted every woman in the room.”

“Yes,” said the woman, without looking up. “That’s my husband.”

Snow

Whether it was the pale transparency of her face, or the icy touch of her hand, or her sharply pointed nose, anyone who met her was struck with an unexpected chill. She was not unkind; she was not aggressive or disdainful in her demeanor; but the questioning glint in her eye and the gentle lift of her shoulders when she breathed were the only indications that she was not a perfectly molded wax figure. She glided across the room like an iceberg; when she spoke, each word that fell from the sedentary line of her lips floated gently to the ground, spinning with its fellows in a cascade of crystals. “Excuse me,” she said, and the room shivered. The man in the back corner, with the furrowed brow and over-sized trench-coat, sneezed.

K

There she sat, facing him across the bright green lawn. There she sat, her golden curls as so many daffodils waving in the breeze, her face reflecting a golden marigold; she sat, as an evening primrose, basking in the pink and purple hues of the coming night. The royal blue canopy above cast uncertain shadows across her face, shrouding her in an aura of sanctity. He took another step; he had reached her throne. He glanced down at the hem of her gown, trailing across the cold white marble. He knelt before her and held her hands, and looked up to meet her eyes, but they were not there to greet his. The red leaves left the trees above their heads and landed despondently at his feet. There was no wind; there was no sun. He felt the stifling air envelop him, close in and pressure him from every side. While her ruby mouth spat words of welcome, her eyes, previously his alone, now searched above his head for another. His face fell. Surely … he saw her eyes light up and he turned around to follow their gaze. There stood an image of himself, a shadow of a reflection of him. Dressed in the best of finery, leading a pearly white horse, the newcomer advanced and came to stand before the lady – his lady – and grinned at the brown-clad figure kneeling at her feet. “Welcome home, brother.”

M

He cut, as they say, a striking rather than handsome figure: tall, without the required chiseled proportions; icy blue eyes, which shifted rather than stared; lips too full, face too pale, nose too round for a female’s fancy; with a great shock of salt-and-pepper hair, more fitting to a well-seasoned philosophy professor than an idealistic thirty-something trying to be taken seriously. His physical appearance was made irrelevant, however, when he opened his mouth and began to speak. The stereotypically Irish gift of gab had passed in abundance from his ancestors, to settle, nay, ignite in his own personality. The warm, round brogue of — County resonated as strongly and fervently as his words. He spoke of people, politics, morals and men, in terms of absolutes, ambitions, ideals, and principles. His absolutes were divine absolutes of God and reality; his ideals those of a patriot-martyr; his ambitions, the ambitions of a romantic or transcendentalist; his principles, the principles of a man with no practical application or experience whatsoever. Unlike the kindly Protestant or the diplomatic atheist, who base their lives on the virtues of skeptical reason and irrational skepticism respectively, this man based his life on the unshakable belief in his Faith — with the emphasis on ‘his.’