The Prince of Tides

by Pat Conroy

  “No, Savannah is one of those anorexic New York women who exist on salads, tofu, and diet drinks,” I said. “She’ll eat nothing that contains a nest of unsightly calories or a streak of animal fat. Eating with Savannah is an ascetic experience rather than a voluptuary one.”

  “She and I once compared diets,” Lowenstein said. “She could skip two meals a day with no problem. I’ve bought every diet book published in America for the last ten years, but…”

  “Why, Lowenstein?” I asked as I chewed a buttery claw of a soft-shelled crab.

  “My husband thinks I’m too fat,” she said, and there was real pain in that admission.

  I smiled and continued eating my crab as the waiter returned and poured us both another glass of wine.

  “Why are you smiling, Tom?”

  I looked across at her and said, “Your husband’s wrong again. It’s not virginal and it’s not fat, Lowenstein, and it’s a crying shame that neither you nor your husband is deriving much pleasure from the fact.”

  She changed the subject and began talking about her childhood, but she had received the compliment and it pleased her. She talked about her mother’s coldness, a reserve so innate and measureless that Susan Lowenstein could never remember a single time in her life when she had won her mother’s unsparing approval. Instead she had lived for the praise of her father, which was precious but extortionate. He was the kind of father who could never condone his daughter’s unsanctioned sexuality. She was his favorite child until she reached puberty; then he abandoned her for a younger brother. Though both her parents were proud that she had gone to medical school, they were both appalled when she decided to study psychiatry. But she had thought that her own failed and needy childhood would help her understand those patients who would come to her with their own desolate childhoods shining in their eyes. She thought she brought a gift of compassion for those exhausted souls who had not received a just portion from the people who raised them. If compassion and therapy did not work, she could always send her patients to the local pharmacy for drugs. As a psychiatrist, she felt like an all-powerful father, but one who would always forgive his daughter for the crime of becoming a woman. It was the power of psychiatry that both frightened and engaged her, the irresistible seriousness of her connection with her patients, the delicacy of each alliance, and the responsibility to enter each of these tenuous affiliations with humility and good faith.

  As we talked and ate our dinner, I began to see once more a loosening in the features of Susan Lowenstein, a slow abandonment of that resolute professionalism she wore in her office. When she spoke of her patients, her voice grew supple and loving, and I imagined it would be a wonderful thing indeed to be driven to your knees in New York and to find yourself ministered to by her warm, forgiving gaze. The arch professionalism was a frontispiece erected to ward off the discomposed superiority of men like me and her father. When she spoke of that father who had worshiped then abandoned her, Susan sounded as though he were unique to her own experience. Yet something in her voice, something that sang with all the undertones of a hard-earned wisdom, knew that her father’s story was the oldest and most dispiriting story in the world. It made me think of all the women in my life—my mother, sister, wife, and daughters—and how I could make a strong case that I had betrayed each of them by a strategic collapse of my own love when they needed it the most. I could not hear about Susan’s father without cringing at the thought of the harm I had caused the women of my own family. In happy times, love poured out of me like bright honey from a stolen hive. But in times of hurt and loss I withdrew into a self-made enclosure of impenetrable solitude, and the women who tried to touch me there—all of them—drew back in utter horror as I wounded them again and again for daring to love me when I knew my love was all corruption. I was one of those men who killed their women slowly. My love was a form of gangrene withering the soft tissues of the soul. I had a sister who had tried to kill herself and who did not wish to see me, a wife who had found a man who loved her, daughters who did not know a thing about me, and a mother who knew far too much. “Change it all,” I said to myself as I sat listening to Susan Lowenstein while she relaxed under the influence of the wine and the sedate ambiance of the Coach House. “Change everything about yourself and change it absolutely.”

  My main course arrived and it was superb. The sweetbreads were rich and tender and the morels tasted like pieces of truffled earth turned into dark, smoky flesh. I heard Susan moan with admiration as she tasted the bass, whose white glistening flesh fell off its bones in tender segments. My mouth was a happy place and I thanked God for the scrupulosities of gifted cooks and the inexhaustible beauty of women as I watched Susan eating her dinner and drinking a wine that had been aged for us and us alone in the generous and ancient fields of France. I ordered another bottle of wine in honor of those glorious fields.

  Susan told me that she had a dream the night before last in which we had met by accident in a snowstorm. To escape the storm we had gone to Rockefeller Center and took an elevator ride to the top. Then we watched the city turn white while having a drink in the Rainbow Room and then danced a slow dance when the storm turned wild and we could no longer see the city through the snow.

  “What a great dream, Lowenstein,” I said. “I can never remember a single detail about my dreams. They can wake me up and I know they must be horrible, but I can’t recall a single image.”

  “Then you’re missing a wonderful and important part of your life, Tom,” she said. “I’ve always thought that dreams were both the love letters and the hate mail of the subconscious. It’s just a form of discipline to remember your dreams.”

  “I can do without the hate mail,” I said. “I have stacks of that stuff that I write to myself.”

  “But isn’t it rather amazing that you were in one of my dreams,” she said, “when I’ve only known you for such a short time?”

  “I’m delighted that you didn’t present it as a nightmare,” I said.

  “I can assure you it wasn’t a nightmare,” she said, laughing. “By the way, Tom, do you like concerts?”

  “Sure,” I answered. “Except when they play modern music. Modern music always sounds like trout farting in salt water to me. Of course, Savannah loves modern music.”

  “Why do you think she’s so open to modern culture and you seem so closed to it? I must admit, Tom, that it irritates me every time you don your mantle of cultural yahoo intimidated by the big city. You’re too smart a man to play that role very effectively.”

  “I’m sorry, Lowenstein,” I said. “No one finds my role of New York debunker and cultural redneck more tiring than I do myself. I just wish it wasn’t a cliché to hate New York, that it was a startling new doctrine originated by Tom Wingo.”

  “Anytime I hear someone like you say they hate New York, I automatically think they’re anti-Semitic,” she said.

  “Please explain the connection between anti-Semitism and not liking New York, Lowenstein. I’m from Colleton, South Carolina, and at times these distinctions confuse me.”

  “There are more Jews in New York than there are in Israel,” she said.

  “There are probably more Albanians here than in Albania and more Haitians here than in Haiti and more Irishmen here than in Ireland, Lowenstein. There might even be more southerners here than there are in Georgia; I have no idea. I don’t like New York because I find it huge and impersonal. Are you always so paranoid?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I’ve always found paranoia to be a perfectly defensible position.”

  “Now you understand how I feel about being southern when I come to New York,” I said. “What did you think about the South, Lowenstein, before you met me and Savannah?”

  “The same thing I think about it now, Tom,” she said. “I think it’s the most backward, reactionary, and dangerous part of the country.”

  “But do you like it, Lowenstein?” I asked.

  She laughed and it was a fine laugh, but I conti
nued, “Why is it that there are times in history when it’s all right to hate Jews or Americans or blacks or gypsies. There’s always a group deserving of contempt in every generation. You’re even suspect if you don’t hate them. I was taught to hate Communists when I was growing up. I never sighted one, but I hated the sons of bitches. I hated blacks when I was growing up because it was a religious belief in my part of the world to consider them inferior to whites. It’s been interesting to come to New York, Lowenstein, and to be hated because I am a white southerner. It’s rather bracing and refreshing, but odd. It makes me understand your theory of paranoia.”

  “The reason I asked you if you like concerts, Tom, is because my husband is giving one next month,” she said. “I got you a ticket and I hope you’ll come as my guest.”

  “I’d love to come,” I said, “if you promise he won’t play anything modern.”

  “I think the program is mostly baroque.”

  “What’s his name?” I asked.

  “Herbert Woodruff,” she said.

  “The Herbert Woodruff?” I said, surprised.

  “The one and only,” she said.

  “You’re married to Herbert Woodruff! Goddamn, Lowenstein. You sack out with someone world famous every night.”

  “Not every night, I’m afraid. Herbert’s on tour over half the year. He’s in great demand. Especially in Europe.”

  “We’ve got his records,” I said. “At least a couple of them. Sallie and I get drunk and listen to them. That’s wonderful. I’ll have to call Sallie and brag. Is he Jewish, Doc?”

  “No,” she answered. “Why do you ask?”

  “I thought Jews were like Catholics,” I said. “When I didn’t marry a Catholic, my father acted like I got caught peeing in the altar cruets.”

  “My father is the most assimilated Jew I’ve ever known,” Dr. Lowenstein said seriously. “We never went to temple, never celebrated Passover, and put up a Christmas tree every December. I never knew how seriously he took his religion until I married a Christian. I thought he was going to sit shiva for me on my wedding day.”

  “What’s shiva?”

  “Prayers for the dead,” she answered.

  “But he must be proud that his son-in-law is world famous.”

  “I wouldn’t know, Tom,” she said. “He’s never forgiven me. He’s never even met his grandson.”

  “That explains a lot to me, Lowenstein,” I said. “I thought you were a Presbyterian who had converted to Judaism. Why didn’t you take your husband’s last name when you married?”

  “I chose not to,” she said, effectively shutting down that line of conversation.

  “How old is your son?” I asked, changing the subject.

  “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, Tom. That’s why I’m glad we could have dinner tonight.”

  “About your son?” I asked, puzzled.

  “I have a son who is very interested in athletics,” she said.

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Why do you say it like that?” she asked, unable to mask the irritation in her voice.

  “It just surprised me,” I said. “I doubt if he got much encouragement from home.”

  “It shocked his father. Bernard attends Phillips Exeter. He was a freshman there this year. We received a copy of the yearbook recently and his father found a picture of Bernard on the freshman football team. We have never allowed him to play contact sports because of what it might do to his hands. You see, we want Bernard to concentrate on his violin lessons. That’s why we worry about his hands.”

  “Ha,” I could not help hooting. “A surprise jock in the family.”

  She smiled. “It’s not funny. The most distressing part about this whole affair is that Bernard lied to us. Or at least he simply did not tell us. He was also on the junior varsity basketball team. He evidently is quite competent.”

  “Why don’t you just let him play ball and take music lessons too?”

  “My husband wants Bernard to be a total musician.”

  “Is he any good at it?”

  “Yes, he’s good at it. It’s just that he’s not a genius at it, Tom. You can imagine the difficulty in following in Herbert Woodruff’s footsteps. I always thought we should have him play a different instrument from his father. Then the comparisons wouldn’t have been so threatening to Bernard. Herbert won an international competition when he was only nineteen.”

  “You see a lot of that as a coach. I can’t tell you the number of boys who come out for a team because their father is trying to relive his youth through his kid. It’s sad when it doesn’t work out.”

  “For the fathers or the sons?” she asked with aggrieved earnestness.

  “The sons,” I said. “Fuck the fathers. They should know better.”

  “I don’t think it’s that way with Herbert at all,” she replied. “I just think that no other instrument exists in his imagination. He loves the violin so much he just can’t imagine someone not sharing that love. Especially someone related to him. Especially his only son.”

  “How do they get along with each other?” I asked. Her face darkened and something passed across her eyes. She chose her words carefully and I could feel their weight and gravity as she spoke them.

  “Bernard respects his father a great deal. He’s very proud of him and what his father has accomplished.”

  “Do they pal around? Go to ball games? Play catch in the park? Wrestle in the living room? That kind of thing.”

  She laughed but it was a taut and nervous laughter. In discussing her child, I was touching something essential in her.

  “I can’t imagine Herbert wrestling on the living room floor. He’s a very fastidious and serious man. Besides, he could do damage to his hands, and his hands are his life.”

  “But is he fun, Doc?” I asked. “That’s what I think I’m asking.”

  She thought for a long moment, then said simply, “No, I wouldn’t describe Herbert as fun. Not for a teenage boy anyhow. I think Bernard will appreciate Herbert far more after he becomes an adult.”

  “What’s Bernard like?”

  Once more I saw a shutting down near the eyes, some internal hatch-battening in the face of this interrogation about her family. It occurred to me that this psychiatrist would rather listen to the griefs of others in her office than speak of her own pressing and worrying concerns. Her face was pale as she leaned her head back and rested it against the brick wall behind her. She looked like one of those long-necked elegant women you see in profile against a background of dark agate in cameos.

  “Bernard is difficult to describe,” she said with a long sigh. “He’s an attractive boy who thinks he’s ugly. He’s very tall, much taller than his father. He has enormous feet and black curly hair. He doesn’t speak much, especially to adults. He’s a mediocre student. We had to pull every string imaginable to get him into Exeter. We’ve had him tested, and he’s done brilliantly, but he’s lazy and I think he enjoys hurting his parents by making poor grades. What else can I say, Tom? The adolescent years are tough on everyone.”

  “Is he fucked up?” I asked.

  “No,” she said sharply. “He is not fucked up. He’s a perfectly normal teenage boy whose parents are both professional people. Herbert and I probably made a mistake by not being around him more during his formative years. I admit that and take full responsibility.”

  “Why are you telling me this, Lowenstein?” I asked.

  “I thought, Tom,” she said, leaning forward across the table, “that since you seem to have so much free time on your hands, you could coach Bernard a couple of times a week.”

  “My first job offer in many a moon.”

  “Would you do it?” she asked.

  “Have you talked to Bernard about it?”

  “Why should I do that?” she asked.

  “He may not want a coach, and besides, it’s polite to ask. Why don’t you get Herbert to go out to Central Park and throw batting practice to Bernard, maybe
even hustle up a pickup game.”

  “Herbert loathes athletics, Tom,” she said, giggling at the thought. “In fact, it would infuriate him to know I wanted a coach for his son. But Bernard told me he was going to play sports next year no matter what we thought about it. Also, I think you’d be good for Bernard, Tom, and I think he’d like you, because you’re the kind of father he’s always dreamed of having. An athlete, funny, irreverent. And I’ll bet money you can’t play the violin.”

  “You’ve never heard my recording. Wingo playing the shit out of the old masters. You stereotyped me again, Doctor.”

  “And I saw you stereotyping me,” she said edgily.

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Yes, you did, Tom. Admit it. You were thinking to yourself, old Dr. Lowenstein, psychiatrist and healer of the mentally ill, cannot raise a happy son.”

  “Yeah,” I admitted, “I did think that. There must be a reason why shrinks can’t raise kids. It’s a cliché, I know, but it is a problem, isn’t it?”

  “Not in this case,” she declared firmly. “Bernard is just shy. He’ll grow out of all these problems. I think why psychiatrists do have trouble with their children—and not all of them do, let me assure you—is that they know far too much about the damaging consequences of a bad childhood. Too much knowledge paralyzes them and makes them afraid to take even the smallest false step. What begins as too much caring sometimes ends in neglect. Now, what about your remuneration?”

  “Money?” I said. “Don’t worry about the money.”

  “No, I insist we keep this on an entirely professional basis. What is your schedule of fees?”

  “My schedule of fees. You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “Look, I insist we do this on a strictly professional basis. What do you charge an hour?”

  She had taken a notebook from her purse and was making a notation with a thin Dupont fountain pen.

  “How much do you make an hour?” I asked.

  “I hardly see the connection,” she said, looking up from the notebook.

  “The connection is this, Doctor. Since you want to do this in a strictly professional manner, I want to oblige you. I don’t know what people make in New York City. I need some figures to work with.”