Memory and Straw

by Memory

  Marina, for instance. I went out with her for a while, but it was like dating my phone. She was as slim and beautiful as my iPhone 6, though less obedient.

  She was obsessed with the frontiers of intelligence. I was attracted by her beauty and repelled by her politics, as she was attracted by my humour and repelled by my indecisiveness.

  ‘Machines will be no different from humans in that respect,’ she said. ‘It will be the survival of the fittest. They too will build a liberty tower. They will set goals, and achieve them. Simple.’

  Granma’s cancer brought me back to the UK. I phoned one evening and Grampa – and this was so unusual – answered the phone.

  ‘We saw the doctor at the beginning of last week and tests have now confirmed it’s terminal,’ he said to me straight away.

  I walked that night. All night. Across the Brooklyn Bridge to Manhattan. It was a beautiful night, and I knew that if I walked long enough, for days and nights, I would finally see all the stars twinkling once all the city lights had faded. To walk along the coastline past New Haven and Providence and on to Boston and up to Maine on to St John and maybe towards Nova Scotia. Surely I would see the stars then? I remembered them. All the symbols of greatness were still glittering here – the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty, the Chrysler Building, the Four World Financial Centre. A vertical city, reaching high into the heavens. New York was the Milky Way.

  I thought mostly of Granma that night. And, through her, of Grampa and how he’d be hurting, and whether he’d cope. This dependency on one another, and our need to love and be loved. For none of us live alone, or die alone. The endless city anonymous in front of me. Eight million souls and counting. Where a couple of thousand Lenape native Americans had farmed until the Europeans arrived, one after the other. The Florentines and the Spaniards and the English and the Dutch and the French and the Portuguese. Then the African slaves and the refugees and the dreamers and the poor and visionaries from Russia and the ends of the earth. Until there were so many people that no-one could see the Lenape anymore.

  Once upon a time people must have lived in small family groups. So small that they could hear each other. Depending on each other. In caves and under canvas. Hunting and fishing. Foraging. Huddling together for warmth and company. Looking at the moon, where the man with the hoe lived. Listening to the coyotes baying in the dark. Telling stories. Did I tell you what happened to me last night after I came back with the deer-skin? Singing little songs. Bà bà mo leanabh. On prairies and mountains and in woods and in meadows and villages and cities. Here. Now. Adam and Eve and their plump babies. And afterwards, how she warned ‘Don’t go out there in the dark. It’s dangerous.’

  New York is a single apartment tonight, partners lying quiet in each other’s arms, a child sleeping in a cot. For after the party, when the crowd disperses, an old caretaker is always left, folding chairs and putting things away. Every morning and evening I travel by subway. We sit side by side, shoulders or thighs or feet touching, or stand crushed together breathing on one another. We live together, even if we die alone.

  Granma used to read stories to me as I fell asleep. Once upon a time there was a little girl who lived in a village near the forest. The rest was a dream. Once upon a time a king and a queen reigned in a country a great way off. Once upon a time a mouse, a bird and a sausage entered into partnership and set up house together. In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth. And here, right beneath my feet, native tribesmen and women and children set up camp by the river that flows two ways, the Muhheakantuck, before it became the Rio de Montaigne, the Rio de San Antonio and the North River before Hudson’s great name reigned victorious over them all. As if it was a better story. It was Dante’s moment of eternal fate and judgement, which is to end up forever as you are.

  Granma Rachel was small. That’s what prompted me to think of those things. The fragility of life. Of how tiny things grow. Things had simply gotten too big in my life, constantly living on the edge of gravity. On endless adrenaline, the perpetual search for profit, the next hit, the latest commodity. Living in a land which had no horizon. I found myself in a desert story, hallucinating about palm trees and freshwater wells where there was only burning sand.

  I was being commanded to speak. In the middle of the journey of my life, I came to myself, in a dark wood, where the dark way was lost. I couldn’t get Grampa’s voice out of my head. The voice that had perfect grace and precision, rightly summed up as sing-song. He had taken me to archery lessons once upon a time, and his voice was like an arrow made from feathers, rising softly into the air and then descending in a perfect arc towards its destiny. There was a different story which could begin now and still finish on a long glassy road.

  I had never taken a decision. Not a real proper one anyway – just drifted with the tide, accepting things as they were. School, university, the bank, Artificial Intelligence. Like a character in a story to whom things happen. I was neither Don Quixote nor Monsieur Hulot. I had never really loved, only consented. That night on Brooklyn Bridge I confessed that freedom was a choice made, not a circumstance accepted.

  Back in the apartment, I looked at the old photographs. In one of them Grampa was cycling with Granma Rachel sitting on the handlebars and leaning back into his chest. She was barefoot and smoking a cigarette.

  I resigned from Merrill Lynch in the morning, paid off my rental and booked a flight for London.

  ‘Hi Grampa. It’s me. I’ve booked the flight and I’ll be in London tomorrow at six pm. I’ll get to yours by eight.’

  He looked older. Diminished. As was poor Granma, who had begun to yellow and wither. Though her mind was as bright as ever, and not once from then on till the end did I ever hear her complain about anything. She forever spoke words of encouragement.

  ‘Gavin’ she always called me, never the abbreviated ‘Gav’. I like to think it was because she couldn’t bear for anything in the world to be diminished. Though I was conscious that my middle name was never included, reserved for the sanctity of the written word.

  ‘For Gavin John’ old folk would write when giving me a book as a present.

  ‘Gavin,’ she said, ‘how well you look.’ Although I knew full well that drugs had taken their toll. ‘Gavin, you’re such a good lad,’ she’d say, though I also knew my soul was frayed and my heart pumping with anxiety.

  She loved the Psalms of David, so in these last days of hers I came to know them almost off by heart because she asked me to read them to her morning and night. I waited patiently for the Lord; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord. Texts begin to inhabit us.

  She’d lie back on her multitude of pillows with her eyes closed and a smile on her lips, holding my hand, squeezing it with love any time the word Israel was mentioned. Israel as in God’s chosen people, not as in the modern political construct which has caused so much anguish. Israel as a universal people set apart to worship the one true God. Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. Truly God is good to Israel. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting, and to everlasting. Amen, and amen.

  And how offensive my liberal-hearted friends found these hundreds of verses I could quote about Israel’s favour!

  ‘What about the Holocaust?’ one of them questioned me once upon a time on Twitter. ‘Was that also God’s favour?’

  As if we can diminish love to preference, or pride to prejudice.

  But I’m ahead of myself. These were Granma’s portions and comforts in the valley of the shadow of death. Latterly, in between the nurse’s regular visits, Grampa would sit on one side of the bed holding her hand, while I sat on the other doing likewise.

  Most of the time we sat in silence, letting our presence speak. And, day after day, ou
r trinity became more and more instinctive as if we all understood everything without saying anything. Granma had lost the power of speech and it was unfair to speak things to which she could not reply in words. Silence became the ideal language because it was composed of the the vocabulary of our memories.

  During these days I thought of many things. I read Descartes and marvelled at the notion that nothing outside truly existed except that I thought it so. And to think it so was for it to exist. Whether myself or my Granma Rachel or my Grampa Magnus or the chair on which I sat or the tree out in the orchard or the Brooklyn Bridge over which I’d walked in the moonlight weeks before.

  ‘For pray, whence can the effect derive its reality, if not from its cause?’

  And so on, backwards and backwards to the infinite, which he called God. For something cannot proceed from nothing.

  ‘Were I myself the author of my being, I should doubt nothing and desire nothing, and finally no perfection would be lacking to me; for I should have bestowed on myself every perfection of which I possessed any idea and should thus be God.’

  And I suppose it was the circumstances, with Granma Rachel lying there between us, but I suddenly understood what it is to love. That it is a matter of creation. That taking care of Granma at this moment was not merely a matter of looking after her and attending to her needs, but of creating her existence moment by moment, affirming it, sometimes by word, sometimes by touch, sometimes by silence, as we sat there with her. We give each other life by assent, and extinguish it by withdrawal. We sustain each other simply by being there.

  And who was I to reject what sustained them? Perhaps that’s what prayer is. But who prays to himself and who creates from nothing? How could anyone argue that God or a tree did not exist, when Granma and Grampa thought so? As well to argue that none of their thoughts existed, that none of their ideas had any value whatsoever.

  ‘For though I assume that perhaps I have always existed just as I am at present, neither can I escape the force of this reasoning and imagine that the conclusion to be drawn from this is, that I need not seek an author for my existence. For all the course of my life may be divided into an infinite number of parts, none of which is in any way dependent on the other; and thus from the fact that I was in existence a short time ago it does not follow that I must be in existence now, unless some cause at this instant, so to speak, produces me anew, that is to say, conserves me. For it is a matter of fact perfectly clear and evident to all those who consider with attention the nature of time, that, in order to be conserved in each moment in which it endures, a substance has need of the same power and action as would be necessary to produce and create it anew, supposing it did not yet exist, so that the light of nature shows us clearly that the distinction between creation and conservation is solely a distinction of the reason.’

  We had to conserve each other, for if we didn’t we would cease to exist. So I listened to Granma’s breathing, extending her life by centuries by simply listening to it. And she magnified my life by smiling when I read the psalms to her, the pleasure in her eyes like fields rolling and extending towards the horizon, without walls or enclosures. And Grampa would bring in a mug of tea and a scone or sandwich and by that very act of kindness, we would live forever. For once we cease to love we die.

  On the last morning Grampa brought in John Donne as the three us walked through the valley of the shadow. Who had known so well that everything was hanging by a thread and instantly soluble. As I read him out loud Grampa held Granma’s frail hand.

  Let me pour forth my tears before thy face, whilst I stay here, for thy face coins them, and thy stamp they bear, and by this mintage they are something worth, for thus they be pregnant of thee. On a round ball a workman hath copies by, can lay an Europe, Afric, and an Asia, and quickly make that, which was nothing, all. O Saviour, as thou hang’st upon the tree, I turne my backe to thee, but to receive corrections, till thy mercies bid thee leave. O thinke mee worth thine anger, punish mee, burne off my rusts, and my deformity, restore thine Image, so much, by thy grace, that thou may’st know mee, and I’ll turn my face.

  To read John Donne is to become John Donne.

  We faced each other as Granma died. I offered to leave but Grampa bid me stay, so we sat there, each of us caressing a hand. Grampa spoke to her for hours, in his beautiful soft voice. He kept saying her name. Rachel. Raonaid. He talked of all those things I learnt then, and earlier, and later. He smiled.

  ‘Ambleside, my darling. Do you remember?’

  ‘And that time we borrowed the tandem and the brakes failed as we were coming down the hill.’ ‘Where was it again? That hill outside Cambridge, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it, Rachel?’

  And she smiled.

  She passed away in the early evening. We’d dozed for a while and when I opened my eyes I could see she had gone. I let Grampa sleep on until he too woke naturally. I left so that he would have that quiet moment of valediction.

  13

  ‘YOU WILL STAY on, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course, Grampa. Of course I will. Would love to.’

  And so I stayed on after the funeral. To take care of Grampa, I was going to say, but it was really to take care of each other. I chummed him to church every Sunday morning. We knelt side by side to say our prayers.

  We pottered about for a while. I offered to clear some things away but he said he’d prefer to do it himself, so while I bought and prepared and cooked food and looked after the garden and all the other household things, Grampa slowly worked through Granma’s belongings, retaining and discarding. A time to keep and a time to cast away.

  Grampa Magnus was a very neat and tidy man in every way. Fastidious. When I’d catch sight of him folding and putting things away I was seeing an older civilisation, like the ancient Greeks and Romans I’d studied once upon a time at school.

  He kept himself fit merely by living. He had worked hard all his life and still, into his eighty-fifth year, moved well with the ease and balance and lightness of a young man. We went on long daily walks. I found it hard to keep up with him as he climbed stiles, jumped fences and ascended inclines which left me out of breath.

  He arranged and packed Granma’s things with natural care. An endless number of boxes marked ‘Dresses’, ‘Jackets’, ‘Skirts’, ‘Gloves’, ‘Hats’, ‘Jewellery’ and so forth. I didn’t ask him what he planned to do with the boxes, but one morning he called me in from the garden and asked if I could take the clothes boxes to the East End Jewish Clothing Fund offices and the jewellery to the Feinstein Charitable Trust. He gave me a slip of paper with the addresses written out.

  ‘I’ve already phoned them,’ Grampa said. ‘And they’re very happy to take the items and sell them on for funds.’

  I asked him if he wanted to go to London with me, but he declined.

  ‘No. Best if you do that yourself. For me. And for Rachel.’

  It was a privilege to do that for them, and so I drove to London and gave the various boxes to the folk at the Clothing Fund offices and at the Charitable Trust.

  It was only years afterwards that I discovered the letter in Grampa’s desk.

  Dear Mr MacDonell,

  We just wanted to formally thank you for your generous gift to our Trust. When you phoned us initially you of course made us aware of the fact that some pieces of your late wife’s jewellery were very valuable, and you will remember that you insisted we should sell these items no matter the value, and let you know at some point how much we had raised. I am pleased to report that the diamond necklace and bracelets realised, by themselves, over half a million pounds, and that the Berkshire Brooch, as you marked it, realised a further half a million pounds. Altogether, you have generously donated over two million pounds to our Cancer Trust, and our thanks for that gift is immeasurable. We have no doubt that hundreds of sufferers will be greatly helped by your goodness and kindness.

  With our very best wishes.

  Shalom,

  Esther Bergmann.
/>   Grampa had mentioned the Berkshire Brooch to me in passing: a wedding gift to his wife from Lady Berkshire.

  Grampa seemed sadder when I returned from London. I suppose it was the first opportunity he really had to grieve properly, to live with the absence. Dealing with Granma’s stuff had kept him occupied. Everything he touched was filled with memories. And there was a fragrance, for any time we’d enter Granma’s room her perfume lingered. Lilies and roses.

  I suggested a journey. The old myth that you need to move away from loss. I don’t know.

  ‘France?’ I suggested. ‘We could get the train down to London then the Eurostar over to Paris…’

  But it was obvious it was never going to happen. And of course I knew it. And perhaps I wouldn’t have suggested it either had I not sensed the unspoken. The other absence. The north. I would leave it to him, and it almost took forever. It was almost too late. Though almost is such a stupid, superfluous, word. For almost never happened.

  He began to drift. Forgot things. Would begin to put some toast on when he’d just had some toast. Would ask the same question a couple of times within the hour. Then one morning after breakfast he said, ‘Gav, why don’t the two of us go on a wee journey together? Up north.’

  I acted nonchalant, as if it didn’t matter. Though his use of the word ‘wee’ meant it was important. The ancient diminutive which masked affection, for anything more would almost be an indecency.

  ‘Sure, Grampa. Sure. Anything you like.’

  So we packed that day and the next and left on the Friday. Good Friday, it happened to be. Which was just about the worst day of the year to travel, holiday traffic already choking the M1. But I didn’t want to endanger things by delaying and Grampa was by now impatient.

  ‘Are you ready then, son?’ he asked every few minutes until the car was finally packed and oiled and filled with diesel and ready.