Happiness, as Such

by Natalia Ginzburg

  I hereby announce that I have moved in with the pelican. I got here two nights ago after that friend of mine told me to pack up my stuff and move out of Via dei Prefetti. I had told her about the pelican and she said so I didn’t need the place on Via dei Prefetti anymore and so I should leave. She has this idea about turning the apartment into a club or art gallery or something. She’s not planning to make it a boutique anymore. Either way, she told me, she needed a lot of money and that I should leave and not give her any trouble about it. Of course I could have argued the point and stayed longer but I got angry and in twenty minutes I was packed up, had the baby, loaded everything into the stroller, and headed over to Fabio’s place. Fabio, the pelican. He has a loft in Piazza Campitelli. It’s a wonderful apartment and I don’t have the long commute from Via dei Prefetti anymore. He was quite surprised to see me there in the middle of the night but immediately sent the maid to buy milk for the baby and some chicken for me at Piccione, that cafe on Largo Argentina. The baby is drinking regular milk now. I can’t remember if I told you. No more formula.

  I’d been to Fabio’s before and I like his loft a lot. The only thing I don’t like is his cleaning woman. She’s fiftyish and big and tall and has a hard, unkind face. She looks at me so harshly and doesn’t respond when I address her. She acts like the baby is a dirty rag that’s in her way. I suggested to Fabio that he fire her, and he thought about it but said she was irreplaceable.

  I don’t go to the office anymore. I stay home and enjoy the loft. I go out onto the terrace and tan. I take the baby out with me and keep him under the umbrella. I can’t tell you how great it is for both of us. I don’t have to leave the baby with that woman anymore. She ignored him and didn’t change his diapers and I’m sure she just let him cry. When he gets back from work, Fabio comes out onto the terrace too and we hold hands and Belinda brings us tomato juice. Belinda is the fifty-year-old in the pink apron. When I ask him if he’s happy now, he wrinkles his big nose and says he is. The relationship with Ada is over. He doesn’t see her anymore. I phoned Osvaldo to find out how Ada took the news. He said she took it badly but predicted that my relationship with the pelican won’t last long. But I think I’ll marry the pelican. I will have more children because I like having children more than anything else in the world. Of course, you need money to have children, otherwise it’s horrible, but I figured out that the pelican is a millionaire. I’m not going to marry him for money. I’m marrying him because I love him, but I am happy about all the money. I’m envious about how rich he is, and how smart, and sometimes I even feel as if I envy his enormous nose.

  I send you huge congratulations on your wedding and you should send me some for mine because you’ll see I might even get married before you do.

  I’m giving you a painting by Mario Mafai for your wedding. I’m not sending it to you because it’s not a simple matter to send a Mario Mafai painting. It’s hanging in the bedroom here in the pelican’s house and I asked him if I could give it to you and he said yes.

  Mara

  23

  March 18, 1971 — Leeds

  Dear Angelica,

  I received the papers, thank you. I got married on Wednesday.

  I’m sorry to hear Mamma is sick. I hope it’s nothing too serious.

  Eileen and I found a small two-story house on “Nelson Road,” which is an endless street and all the houses are identical. We have two square meters of garden in which I will plant roses.

  I want to thank Mamma for the money, shirts, and the dark suit, which I didn’t wear on my wedding day. I’ll never wear it. I put it away in the closet with some mothballs.

  Eileen goes to the university early in the morning and brings the children to school. I go out a little later. I clean the house, wash the dishes, and vacuum. At least this has been the schedule for the last two days. All is well.

  On my wedding day, we had dinner in a restaurant with Eileen’s parents. Eileen’s parents are in love with me.

  I heard that Viola and Elio wanted to come to my wedding. I heard it from Signora Peroni’s cousin, who came to stay in the same boardinghouse where I was living until the day before yesterday. Luckily they didn’t come, luckily none of you did. It’s not that I don’t want to see you. I’d be so happy to see everyone, but we did the wedding ceremony quickly, and we didn’t worry about the sorts of things that you, Viola, Elio, or any of you would have, and you would have been disappointed if you’d been there.

  Tell Oreste that my wife is a member of the Communist party, she’s one of very few Communists around here. I’m still not a Communist. I’m still not anything and I lost contact with those friends I had in Rome and haven’t heard anything more about them. To think, I actually left for political reasons. Well, not just for political reasons. It’s not that easy to explain why I left. Anyway, I don’t think about politics now. I think about my wife, and that’s enough for me.

  I need a book, Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. See if you can find it in my studio, if my studio is still there, and if I can still call it mine.

  Michele

  Ti abbraccio

  24

  March 23, 1971

  Dear Michele,

  I’m back on my feet, it’s been two days and I’m feeling better, I’m still run down but that will pass.

  A letter from you would have meant a great deal to me, but you’re so stingy about writing to your mother. I heard the news anyway, through Angelica. I’m glad you have a nice house, at least I imagine it’s nice, with a little garden and a carpet you vacuum. I can’t imagine you vacuuming. I can’t even imagine you planting roses. The idea of planting roses right now seems so foreign to me, I wonder if I’d even know how, and yet that’s one of the reasons I moved to the country. It might be because it’s still winter, and still cold, and it rains all the time, but I have the impression that I won’t be planting a garden even once spring has arrived, I’ll probably call a gardener and won’t touch a leaf myself. I don’t have a green thumb, though apparently Ada does. Roses in particular remind me of the Via dei Villini house, where we had that beautiful rose trellis right under my window. It wasn’t even our garden, it belonged to the neighbors. In the end, roses remind me of Filippo. Not that I want to forget him, there are hundreds of memories, the paths in my mind that lead to him are too many, but I must have been looking at those roses when he told me it was over and so now whenever I see a rose trellis, I feel like I’ve suddenly fallen into darkness, and so while I hope there will be flowers in my new garden, there won’t be roses.

  Since you and I are similar in so many ways, I don’t believe you’re capable of tending to flowers. But then it’s possible that you’ve changed in these last months and are a different person from the one I knew and different from me. It’s possible that Eileen has changed you more. I have confidence in Eileen. I think I’ll like her. Would you send me a picture of her? The one you sent is so small, all I can make out is a long raincoat. You’ve also said that she’s very intelligent. I’m like you, I love intelligence. I always try to surround myself with intelligent people. Your father was peculiar and brilliant. We were able to live together because we both had such strong personalities and both of us needed a lot of space. Filippo is peculiar and very smart. Sadly, he left me. He is completely gone from my life. We never see each other anymore. We could have remained friends if that was what I’d wanted, but I didn’t. Anyway, we would have had to see each other in the presence of that harried-­looking woman he married. She must be utterly stupid. Maybe our relationship wore him out. I don’t think I’m very intelligent but I might have been too intelligent for him. Not everyone loves intelligence. I have such wonderful memories of my years with Filippo, even though it all ends in this darkness. The memories are marvelous. He never wanted to live together, he always had so many excuses . . . his studies, it would have upset the twins, his health, the health of his mother. They were all excuses, tho
ugh. To be frank, he didn’t want to live with me. Maybe he didn’t love me enough. But I do have good memories of the hours spent with Filippo in the Via dei Villini house. He played chess with Viola and Angelica and helped them with their homework, made curried rice, used the typewriter in my room to work on the draft of Religion and Pain. I thought a lot about Filippo during my illness, I even wrote him a letter and then tore it up. He had a baby girl just a few days ago. They sent me an announcement with a picture of a flying pink swan on it. What stupidity. They named the baby Vanessa. Stupidity. You tell me, what kind of name is that for a baby girl.

  I’m writing you from my room, there’s a fire in the fireplace. I can see our bare garden through the window, it’s flat, there are no flowers, just the wrought iron lamp posts, the fake carriage, I chose it all without really believing in it. Those two dwarf spruces that Matilde picked out and that I hate. I can see the village in the distance, and the moon over the hills. I’m wearing a black dress that I think suits me and when I go down to dinner I’ll put on that Spanish scarf that your father gave me maybe twenty years ago, it was in a chest with mothballs and I pulled it out. Osvaldo and Colarosa, the editor, are coming to dinner. Matilde invited Colarosa. He’s earned a dinner invitation, Matilde has broken his spirit in every possible way. You should know that Polenta and Poison finally came out. We have copies all over the house. Matilde sent you an inscribed copy. You’ll see the hills, the sun, and the fields. Matilde drew the cover. Colarosa suggested using a Van Gogh painting on the cover, but there was no reasoning with her. When Matilde gets an idea in her head about something, nothing will change her mind. Everyone told her the cover looked like socialist propaganda. But she could not be convinced.

  Matilde went to Rome yesterday to buy champagne for tonight. She planned the whole menu herself and has spent the day in the kitchen getting on Cloti’s nerves. Cloti is already in such a fury and nervous enough as it is. We are having a rice timbale, vol-au-vent with chicken and béchamel sauce, and sponge cake. I pointed out to Matilde that all the food is round. I also pointed out that all those dishes are quite heavy. A dinner like that could kill a bull.

  Matilde wants the twins to put on lace-collared velvet dresses and wear their hair out. She’s going to wear a Cossack blouse and her black skirt. I haven’t met Colarosa yet. Matilde tells me he’s short, his head sits right on his shoulders, and that he has a remarkable nose. I’d wanted to invite Ada too but Osvaldo explained that Ada and Colarosa, the editor, were lovers and now they’re broken up. He’s with your friend Mara Castorelli now. She descended on him late one night, the baby in her arms. To think that Ada got her that job and Mara stole him away as fast as lightning. I don’t know if Mara will be coming tonight too, I said she could, of course, but it seems as if she doesn’t know what to do with the baby. I’ll have Ada over another time. I haven’t met her yet and she’s been unspeakably kind to me. She’s the reason they’re going to install a telephone here. I can hardly believe that I’m going to have a telephone here. I’m going to call you first thing. Even though the idea of calling you makes me nervous. I don’t think I’ll have the nerve, my heart isn’t strong enough. I was such a bull once. But now so much has happened. I’m fragile.

  I hear a car. They have arrived. I must leave you now.

  Your mother

  I just saw a small figure in a mink coat climb out of the car. It must be Mara.

  25

  March 26, 1971

  Dear Michele,

  I had dinner at your mother’s house a few nights ago. It was not fun. Osvaldo and Angelica were there, and the pelican, your aunt, your mother, and your little sisters. I don’t know why I wanted to meet your mother and wanted her to like me. Maybe because I was hoping that she’d help me get you to marry me. To be clear, I’ve never wanted to marry you. Or at least I never thought that’s what I wanted. But maybe out of desperation I wanted that without knowing that I did.

  I wore a long black and silver dress that the pelican had bought for me that same afternoon. And a mink coat that the pelican also bought for me five days ago. I kept the coat on all night because your mother’s house is so damn cold. The thermostat is defective. Wearing that dress and coat made me feel legitimate, I can’t explain why. It made me feel sweet, and ever so small. I wanted everyone to look at me and think how sweet and small I am. I wanted this so badly that when my voice came out of my mouth it was sweet and gentle. And then, at a certain point, the thought occurred to me, “These people probably all think that I’m just a high-class call girl.” The phrase, high-class call girl, is something I’d read in a mystery novel that morning. As soon as I thought up those words I could feel them falling down on me like stones. It made me think that everyone was being standoffish with me. Even Osvaldo. Even Angelica. Even the pelican. The pelican spent the whole evening curled into a corner of the couch with a glass in his hand. He stroked his hair. He stroked his nose. He didn’t wrinkle his nose, he smoothed it down, slowly. Your mother is beautiful, but I’m not sure she’s very nice. She was wearing a black dress and a fringed scarf that she kept fiddling with, and she fiddled with her hair which is exactly like yours, curly and auburn. I thought to myself that if you’d been in the room, it would have been easier for me, because you are perfectly aware that I’m not a slut, high or low class, you know I’m just a girl. There was a fire in the fireplace and I was still cold.

  Your mother asked me where I was from and I told her Novi Ligure. I started making up all sorts of things about Novi Ligure. I said that I have a big gorgeous house there and lots of adoring relatives waiting for me, a dear old nanny, and a wonderful little brother. In fact, the dear old nanny is an old lady who cooks for my cousins. I do love my brother but I never write him. My cousins’ house is nothing special as houses go. It’s on top of a store. A crockery store. My cousins sell crockery. I didn’t tell them that. I told them that they were all lawyers.

  Your mother and Angelica were busy in the kitchen because your mother’s housekeeper suddenly got sick and had to go to bed. The truth is, she was offended by something your aunt had said about her vol-au-vent. That’s what Angelica told me. Your little sisters refused to help because they said they were too tired, and played ping-pong instead. They were still wearing their gym clothes and refused to change and that made your aunt angry too. That, on top of the vol-au-vent being all mushy and liquid inside.

  I started getting depressed at a certain point. I thought, What am I doing here? Where am I? Why am I wearing a fur coat? Who are these people who don’t ask me practically anything and can’t seem to hear me when I speak? I told your mother that I wanted to bring my baby over to meet her. She said I could but didn’t seem enthusiastic about it. I was dying to start screaming about how the baby was yours. If I was a hundred percent sure I would have. There were pictures of you from when you were little, they were everywhere, and when I looked at them I realized that my baby does look like you, around the mouth and chin. But it’s hard to be sure. Similarities aren’t proof of anything.

  They didn’t talk a lot but I couldn’t understand much of what they said. They are intellectuals. I was dying to start shouting at them that as far as I was concerned they were all big assholes. I didn’t even like Angelica. I didn’t understand anyone. The pelican was very serious there. He didn’t even look at me. Every so often, I’d try to hold his hand and he’d pull it away. I got the impression that I was annoying him every time I spoke. He had never been with me with other people and maybe he was ashamed. At the end of dinner they poured champagne. I said, “I would like to congratulate you ever so much on Polenta and Chestnuts.” I got the title wrong. The pelican corrected me. I said I had gotten confused because of the song that goes: Non andare sulle montagne . . . Mangerai polenta e castagne . . . ti verrà acidità (“don’t go into the mountains . . . they’ll feed you corn and grits . . . then you’ll have indigestion”). I decided to sing the whole song. It’s a cute song and I
am tone-deaf. Your mother smiled a little. Osvaldo smiled a little. The pelican didn’t smile at all. The twins didn’t smile. You could feel the ice in the room while I was singing. Your aunt went out to knock on the housekeeper’s door with a plate of vol-au-vent and other leftovers but came back mortified because the woman refused it all.

  We drove home in Osvaldo’s Fiat. Me, Angelica, and the pelican. I sat in the back with the pelican. I told him, “I don’t know what your problem with me is. I don’t know what I did to you. You didn’t say a word to me all night. You didn’t even look at me.” He said, “I have a terrible headache.” “My God, you always have a headache,” I said, because he always has a headache. He was flattening himself into that back seat. As if he didn’t want to touch me. So I started crying, quietly, not hard, and the tears were getting on my fur. Angelica rubbed my knee. Osvaldo was driving and didn’t turn around. The pelican just shrank into his corner, wrapping his coat around him, his nose perfectly still. It was terrible to be crying in the middle of all that iciness. It was worse than singing. Much worse.

  I’d left the baby at home with the maid, Belinda. I should have brought him along. Belinda has no patience with babies. The baby was crying when I walked in and Belinda was standing there waiting to leave. She told me that she had a right to a good night’s sleep. I told her that I have a right to relax sometimes. She told me that I didn’t have a right to anything. I didn’t answer her at first. I slammed the door in her face. Then I yelled and told her that she was fired. I’ve already fired her a number of times. But she says she won’t go. She says she needs to hear it from the professor himself. The professor is the pelican.

  The baby cried all night long. It was awful. Poor child, he’s teething. I walked him back and forth in the living room, tears streaming down my face. It was almost morning before he fell asleep. I put him in the stroller. I felt sorry for him because he was so tired of crying, he was sweaty, puffy, his hair was wet and clinging to his head, he slept like a rag. I felt sorry for myself because I was dead tired and still wearing the silver and black dress. I hadn’t had time to change. I went into the bedroom. The pelican was awake, lying there with his arms crossed behind his head. I was annoyed at all of it. His pajamas, his head on the pillow, his nose, were all annoying. I said to him, “I don’t think I can go on like this. We need to hire a nanny.” “A nanny?” he said, as if he’d fallen from the moon. “When I lived alone,” I said, “at Via dei Prefetti, when the baby was really bad I could let him cry a little but I can’t do that here because of your headaches.” “I don’t think I could have a nanny here too,” he said. “I don’t think that I want that at all, not at all.” “So I should just go back to living alone,” I said. He didn’t answer. We stayed like that, lying down, not moving, on ice like two dead people.