Home Again

Steve got off the train and set his bag down. After three years away, he somehow expected things to look different. But there was Pete Johnson still working at the station ticket booth, there was Old Man Schmidt lurching out of the bar to stagger home for dinner with his nervous little wife, there was the same smell from the stockyards just west of town.

Then why did it seem different? Why did everything still look serene and sane? Looking to his right, he saw the Presbyterian church, the white paint newly touched up and gleaming in the sun, and suddenly flashed back to the bombed-out cathedral in Germany, the dead lying covered in dust and rubble while dressed in their Sunday best, the ancient roof a gaping hole, but the altar remaining, as if reassuring all that it was still there for them.

Steve had been having these flashbacks ever since leaving Europe. On the long train journey from Halifax he couldn’t look out the window at the green fields without visualizing them covered with crosses, like the military cemeteries he had left many of his friends in over there. Now, he firmly put those thoughts out of his mind yet again and looked around to find someone to drive him to the farm.

He stepped out onto Main Street and the first person he saw was his parents’ neighbor, Jim Gable, slowing down his truck to let someone cross. Jim glanced at him and his eyes widened in recognition. He pulled over and rolled down his window. “Well, if it isn’t Steve Hardy! Your folks said you were coming home soon! They’re gonna be soooo glad to see you!”

Steve was overwhelmed by the effusive greeting, but fought back against the urge to repel it, telling himself that Jim was being sincere. “Hi, Jim. It’s nice to be back. Actually, I was wondering if you could give me a ride out there?”

“That’d be no problem at all!” So off they went, Jim showing him everything that might be new since he’d been gone, Steve trying to show enthusiasm, until Jim finally figured out that Steve didn’t really want to talk. And there was Sylvia McDonald, pushing a baby pram down the sidewalk. They had been seeing each other before he left, and on his last night at home she sobbed into his shoulder that she would wait for him. Less than a year later, his parents had written to tell him that she’d married someone who had “gotten her into trouble.” She looked up and saw him, and her shamefaced expression as she lowered her head reminded him of women he’d seen in Belgium, being marched out of town for collaborating, with shaved heads and a jeering mob surrounding them, sometimes carrying a baby.

When they arrived at the farm gate, Jim gazed at him and said softly, “I don’t know if you remember, I was at Passchendaele. I still dream about the things I saw there. But I just got on with it. It will get better.” Steve nodded, automatically exchanged some pleasantry and got out.

He stood and stared around him, Jim’s truck enveloping him with dust as it departed. Everything was so quiet! A twitch of the kitchen curtain betrayed his mother’s presence – he knew she was probably standing there waiting as soon as she knew the train got in. Buttons, the border collie, came peeling out from the barn, silly grin on his face, panting his excitement, trying to herd him as he walked up the driveway. He was moving a little slower and his muzzle had some gray on it, but then Steve had irreversibly changed too. “Hey boy, I’ve missed you!” He got down on his knees and allowed himself to be slobbered on, embracing the dog as he stood up on his hind legs, tail wagging ecstatically.

As Steve approached the house, his mother came out, wiping her hands on her apron, smiling as nervously as if he were a stranger. Her hands were trembling and she was weeping. Something about the look in her eyes made him think of the Dutch villagers sobbing with relief as their trucks drove through, their faces pale and hollow with hunger. She opened her arms, but something in him must have warned her away because she dropped them, just touching his elbow as they went into the house.

Of course, she had laid out a spread of homemade baked goods and coffee was immediately poured. They had no idea what to say to each other, so she prattled on about family news. “Your father would have been here, but he’s out on the north quarter, didn’t want to waste a good harvesting day you know.” As soon as he sat down, she started making supper, anything to avoid having to actually sit down with him, and then his father came in, and she seemed relieved to not have to carry the conversation herself. His dad grinned and slapped him on the back, and that was the extent of his greeting. Once dinner was over, Steve excused himself, saying he was tired and wanted to rest, and he went up to his old room.

He lay on his bed with his eyes wide open yet unseeing; unpacking could wait. He could hear snatches of his parents’ conversation downstairs. “Do you think he’s all right? He’s acting strange. Maybe we should get Reverend MacNeill to talk to him.” This was the moment he had been waiting for ever since he was told he was being demobbed, so why couldn’t he be happy? At dinner he’d kept remembering the first time he had to shoot a German soldier. It was a fair-haired boy who looked younger than him; as his life ebbed away, he was staring up into the sky, murmuring, “Mutter.” Tonight that boy’s mother had an empty place at her table, while his parents had an empty shell at theirs.

His dreams were as messed up as ever that night, except that this time he saw Sylvia in one of the Dutch villages, not happy to see him but lying on the ground dead, holding a fair-haired baby who was gazing accusingly at him. He awoke as suddenly as if he had been slapped, and went outside, sat on a stump and lit a cigarette. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the lamp go on in his parents’ bedroom, and knew someone was watching him, and he had to stop himself from becoming irritated. Buttons came shambling up to him and just sat, knowing that he needed looking after. Steve did not react, feeling faint irritation at this too, but after a few minutes Buttons lay down beside him and relaxed his body against Steve’s tense leg. Staring up at the unmoving stars, a soft late-summer breeze ruffling his hair back, he reached down and started stroking Buttons’ soft head, more for the dog’s sake than his own.

After all those people died, after I can’t even sleep without nightmares, after I can’t talk to my own parents, why does this dog still want to have anything to do with me? Doesn’t he know I have a scorched scar where my heart should be?

Suddenly the silent darkness was broken by an engine and lights. Panic’s icy grip tightened around Steve’s chest and he dived for cover under the old wagon. He cowered in the fetal position, hands covering his head, wanting to whimper but not daring to make a sound, until he realized it was just a car that had pulled into the yard. Peering out from under his hand, he saw that it was his sister who lived in the city; his parents would have told her he was coming home. All the lights in the house went on again. He couldn’t face yet another reunion, so he stayed under the wagon. Buttons crept up beside him and whined, licking his hand to reassure him.

It was then, still in the fetal position, that he started to cry. What the hell am I doing? He cried for the Dutch, for the Belgians, for the Germans; he cried for his parents; he even cried for Sylvia.

Soon all the lights were off again, except the one outside the door. They knew he would come back in the house when he was ready. He went back to bed and actually slept peacefully.

In the morning he came down to breakfast. His parents and sister turned apprehensive faces towards him, not sure what to expect. He made himself hug each of them and asked his father what he would need help with that day. The relief he saw in all their faces made something break inside him again, but this time in a good way. Maybe he could really be himself again. Perhaps he could finally come home.

Wow, a long time!

It's sure been a long time since I've updated this blog. I recently found my 100 top novels list in some paperwork that had to be hurriedly moved during a flood at work... bad excuse, I know.

A lot has happened in my life since I last updated. At the age of 53 I was forced to find a new career - I went back to school and took a Medical Office Assistant course. I've now completed the course work and practicum, and will be writing my final exam next week. In the meantime, I'm job hunting with a vengeance.

Wish me luck, please?

Metamorphosis 13 - James Joyce's Ulysses

I'll tell you one thing right now, this is not an easy book to read. He shifts from straight narrative to fantasy to dry technical writing to stream of consciousness. And it's a thousand pages long, describing a day in the life of a man in Dublin in 1904. I have to admit, I passed over a lot of it because it was a library book and I only had it for so long, and some of it is just obscure, especially nearly a hundred years after it was written. Joyce enjoys making up words although they make perfect sense.

But there is true genius as well. Some of his turns of phrase are amazing, and hilarious. It was banned for obscenity in the US after it was first published as there are some explicit passages, although today's readers would barely bat an eye.

Read it if you enjoy a long novel, and I hope you enjoy getting to know Leopold and Molly as much as I did.

Metamorphosis 12 - The Tin Drum

Wow, i'm really getting behind! The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass was a pleasant surprise. Who knew that a novel beginning with a Polish peasant girl harvesting potatoes would turn out to be so engrossing...

In this partially autobiographical story, our protagonist Oskar is growing up during the war in a city which is on the border, geographically and politically, between Germany and Poland. He's not always a likable person, but in the end we are hoping for the best for him.

The edition I read was from a new translation... apparently when it was originally translated from German back in the 50s, they took out some of the more naughty bits, although what's been put back in is really pretty tame by today's standards.

Metamorphosis 11

Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson - kind of reminded me of some of the stories written by my cousin Merna Summers - a Canadian author you should definitely check out sometime. Two sisters growing up in a small town with eccentric relatives... it also reminded me of The Quiet American with its theme of loss, parting, giving up your old way of life. Both books left me with the sense that I wanted to see what happened to those people after the book ended... sadly, I don't think either has a sequel. Or maybe it's just better that way. :-)

Metamorphosis 10

The Quiet American by Graham Greene was a bit of an odd book, but I ended up enjoying it quite a bit. It takes place in Vietnam during the 1950s. The protagonist is a British journalist who is there to cover the war, which at that time is being fought by the French and the Communists. The Americans are still bystanders at that point, and the "quiet American" referred to in the title becomes the narrator's rival in many things and is an eerie foreshadowing of what we all know came later.

Wow, I need to catch up!

OK, I've read quite a few books and again got sidetracked from my 100 must-read quest by other fiction. But I've found a new author I quite like. Louise Penny is a Canadian writer who has penned several Inspector Gamache mysteries... think of Agatha Christie transferred to a village in Quebec in modern times. Check it out!

Metamorphosis 9

Haroun and the Sea of Stories is a whimsical little novel by Salman Rushdie. It reads rather like a children's book, but it also contains some clever satire that only older readers will get. There's a lot of commentary about censorship and propaganda, interesting in the light of his being condemned to death by Islam fanatics. I had never read anything else by him, and found it quite witty.

The Land of Painted Caves

This is the long-awaited latest in the Earth's Children series by Jean Auel. She has stated this will be the last one; she has also stated that she feels the story of Ayla isn't finished, and I personally thought the end of the book leaves way too many loose ends. I wouldn't at all be surprised to see more in this saga, maybe focusing on her daughter Jonayla.

But what did I think of the book? Well, I did enjoy it although I found parts of it kind of repetitive. The Mother's Song is a beautiful piece of poetry but I didn't need to read it ten times. And I do find it a bit annoying that Ayla and Jondalar seem to the the only people who can figure out how to tame horses and wolves, use horses to haul things, every other new advancement in human history, etc. The dust jacket promises that Ayla discovers a new piece of knowledge that is life-changing. Which it is, but I find it a bit hard to believe that nobody would have figured it out before.

However, as usual the descriptions of the painted caves (the famous ones in France that can still be seen to this day) are breathtaking. I find Auel's characters a bit one-dimensional but she's very good at bringing a scene to life so that I can almost see it in front of me.

If you've read all the others, you gotta read this one too. Even if you've never read any of the others, this one can stand on its own as she does explain certain things that happened in the past. It helped me too although I did read all the others, but it's been so long!

I hope Auel hasn't hung up the quill yet. I think she still has a lot of stories to tell.