Love, Nora
P.S. Have you finished War and Peace? I was thinking of you the other day when Evelyn and I were in Scribner’s bookstore. I saw all these classic novels lined up on a shelf and there was W and P. Yikes, there must have been a thousand pages! I told E. you were reading it this winter. She said she read it years ago.
Whitfield, Ontario
Sunday, March 3, 1935
Dear Nora,
Thanks for your letter. I’m sorry that this won’t reach you in time for your thirtieth birthday, but I tend not to make much of a fuss over birthdays. I can’t remember feeling especially troubled about reaching the age of thirty. It’s true, of course, that most women by then have settled into marriage with husbands and children. But the ones I see don’t appear particularly overjoyed by this state of affairs. The young mothers in the village, girls we went to school with like Merle Logan and Dottie Cockburn, look, if anything, a little more careworn than either you or I. Maybe that’s just my imagination.
I am sure there are many advantages to life in the married state (a man to keep the furnace going, for one), but then you have to put up with someone else in the house, don’t you? I see a husband and children as always being underfoot. I wouldn’t know where to go to be by myself when I need to be. Perhaps if I found a man like Father! When he was alive we shared the house, of course, but we never seemed to get in one another’s way. I suppose we were similar in temperament and inclination, comforted by each other’s presence in the house, but seldom feeling any great need to spend time together. He went his way and I went mine. There were days when we probably didn’t exchange ten words and that was fine; it wasn’t a matter of ill temper or sullenness, it was just how we felt comfortable with each other. The way I live now, of course, is not for everyone, probably not for most. So maybe I am the wrong person to ask about being thirty.
I should tell you that I have become a topic of conversation on the church porch these days. Or so I am told. This is the fourth consecutive Sunday that I have missed church and apparently the new minister has been asking questions about my spiritual health. Well, I am not going to church these days because I don’t feel like it. I seem to have lost interest in what goes on there and they can make of that what they will. Do you go to church down there, or have you pretty much given up on that too?
Yes, I finally finished War and Peace. It is an excellent book though I grew a little weary of it in places. A fellow called Pierre is for me the most attractive figure in the entire novel, but I particularly liked Tolstoy’s description of the Russian landscape, especially in winter. It reminded me of Ontario in many ways. This long winter will soon be over, and yes, I am fed up with the damn furnace and its daily demands. On the other hand, I am also tired of the voice in my head that is always complaining about things. I am also beginning to believe that somehow I must learn to recapture the pleasure I took in winter when I was a child. I’m sure I tired of it then too, but I must have taken more joy in it as well. It does no good to wish away the days of the fourth season as I seem to have been doing since Christmas. As someone put it, I must teach myself to cherish not only the rainbow but also the winter branch. I am going to work on that next year. Belated Happy Birthday, Nora, and don’t worry so about growing old. Think of the alternative!
Clara
Wednesday, March 6
A visit this evening from Mr. Jackson who wanted to know why I have not been attending church. I had been expecting him for weeks and wondered why he had taken so long to get around to me; he is supposed to be such a zealot and saver of lost souls. He sat in the front room with the table lamp catching the light in his stiff coppery hair; long legs crossed and looking at me all the while as if I were not entirely right in the head, a woman mildly unbalanced perhaps by keeping to herself. And I said too much. I was far too anxious to convince him of my sincerity. I shouldn’t have gone on the way I did; it is a failing of those who live alone that when we do have visitors, we say too much. Henry Jackson merely smiled at the things I said and from time to time shook his head as if conversing with some harmless madwoman. He began by saying how disappointed many of the congregation were by my absence these past few weeks. “Your friends, Miss Callan, are worried about you,” he said. “They think perhaps since your father’s death last year you may have become a little too withdrawn. I understand too that your sister is now down in the States and can’t get up to visit as often as she might like. Would this not be a good time then to attend your church and see your friends? Worship God?”
I should have told him that he made me sound like an invalid. Instead I said, “I no longer believe.”
“No longer believe what?” he asked. He seemed infuriatingly self-assured. Hardly moved in the chair, but lowered his head a little to study me.
“I no longer believe in God,” I said.
He smiled at that. “And what do you believe in then, Miss Callan?”
I told him then that I believed in nothing. But I went on about it far too long. Told him that my belief in God had vanished utterly one Sunday morning in February while I sat at the kitchen table. Belief in God now seemed to me only a childish fantasy. There is nothing there and there never has been. There is no Heaven, no Hell, no resurrection of the dead. Why did I go on like that? All that detail about Sunday morning at the kitchen table? What foolishness!
He seemed only amused by me. Then he said, “You seem very sure of yourself, Miss Callan. Do you have any proof that God does not exist?”
“Of course, I haven’t,” I said. “It’s not really a matter of proof, is it? It’s a matter of faith and I no longer have that faith. I’m not happy about the way I feel, Mr. Jackson, but I can’t help it.”
Then he wanted me to pray with him. Get down on my knees with him there in the front room and ask God for guidance. I told him the idea was preposterous and he got a bit huffy about that. In the hallway, as he was putting on his coat and hat, he said he would pray for me, though I somehow doubt it. I sense I made an enemy of him.
Tatham House
138 East 38th Street
New York
March 17, 1935
Dear Clara,
Yes, I am getting used to the idea of being thirty and let me tell you my thirtieth birthday was some night. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. Some of the people at the advertising agency took me up to a club in Harlem where we listened to jazz until three o’clock in the morning. Then we had “breakfast” in an all-night diner on Seventh Avenue. It was past four o’clock when I got back here and I was locked out. I had completely forgotten that they lock the doors at one o’clock. So I had to spend the night (well, what was left of it) at Evelyn’s. Fortunately she has plenty of room. But what a swell evening it was! Besides Evelyn and another couple of gals, there was a copywriter named Joe (have forgotten his last name) and a fellow named Les Cunningham. He is an announcer and is he handsome!!! Brother, he looks just like Don Ameche. We are talking tall, dark, handsome and very suave. And guess what? I think he’s kind of sweet on me. He sure paid attention to me that night. But here’s something that bothers me a little. I get the feeling that Evelyn likes me too. And I mean in another way. I’ve had this feeling all along that Evy likes women (if you get my meaning). Not that she has tried anything funny. Even the night I stayed over at her place she gave me the other bedroom, but I just get this feeling about her. The way she looks at me sometimes. The thing is, I like her so much as a “friend.” She has been really nice to me and I don’t want to hurt her feelings in any way, shape or form, but I’ve tried to hint as strongly as I can that I am not that way inclined. Oh and by the way, as you may have already guessed, the tall, dark, and handsome announcer has a wife and two kids. In fact, he had to leave early that night. I might have known that the idea of him being available was just too good to be true. Anyway, enough about my lack of a love life.
Why did you stop going to church? I don’t get it. I would think going to church is something you would want
to do up there. I’m not saying you should join those old ladies in the Missionary Society, but wouldn’t getting out on Sunday morning and seeing other people (even familiar ones) be a good idea? I try to go when I can. If I haven’t been out too late on a Saturday, I will go up to Fifth Avenue Presbyterian. It’s a little snooty, but I like the minister. He’s such a good preacher. I still say my prayers too, by the way. Remember how you used to make me kneel beside you with our elbows on the bed while you made up the prayer? You were such a bossy kid, Clara, but never mind, I loved you anyway. I don’t exactly get down on my knees any more, but I do say my prayers before I go to sleep. Well, most nights anyway.
Is it ever mild down here these days! Just like spring. Oh, Clara, I’m so happy I came down here. I just feel it was the right move for me and things are going to work out. I can’t wait for our program to get on the air. They were going to schedule it as a summer replacement show, but the agency likes Evy’s scripts so much that they are now looking to May or early June. It’s really exciting. Do take care of yourself and write soon!
Love, Nora
Monday, March 25
Showers and the smell of earth as I walked to school this morning. The children were restless today, anxious to be outside even in the rain. There is an eagerness for spring in their blood: farewell to woollen underwear, to overshoes and scratchy leggings. I understand and remember feeling the same way at this time of year. For me, it is now goodbye, at least for a few months, to shovelling coal into that damn furnace.
A letter from Nora today, which I began to answer before supper, but then Marion came by to ask me to go down to Toronto with her next Saturday and see a movie or something. Now that I no longer have the furnace to worry about, I can get away and so I said I would.
After supper the sky cleared and it was such a fine evening that I walked out along the township roads and didn’t get home until after dark. I will drop Nora a note in a few days.
Whitfield, Ontario
Sunday, March 31, 1935
Dear Nora,
Well, you are leading quite the busy life down there, aren’t you? And yes, I do get your meaning with reference to Miss Dowling. I may live in an Ontario backwater, Nora, but I do understand lesbianism. As a matter of fact, I had my own experience with it when I was in Normal School. A girl there “took an interest” in me. She was always seeking me out after classes, touching me on the arm or shoulder as we spoke, asking me to come home with her for the weekend. I think her parents lived in Belleville. Many of the other girls had boyfriends who would meet them after classes, and perhaps this girl assumed that because I had no beau I was like her. She was a nice young woman too, but it took a bit of doing to persuade her that I was not interested in that kind of friendship. She didn’t finish her year, but went into nursing. Used to send me Christmas cards for a few years. These situations can be difficult! I liked that girl very much as a person, just as you like your Miss Dowling. You just have to use tact and judgement and hope the other person understands. I was a little too impatient with that girl, I think. Let Miss D. down gently if you can. As for the tall, dark, handsome (and married) announcer, better leave well enough alone, Nora. A good-looking man like that out on the town without his wife? I can well imagine his intentions, and so can you.
I am glad to learn that you are still going to church, but I’m afraid it has become a thing of the past for me. Yes, it’s a morning out of the house once a week, and I am sure that’s how many people see it, but if I go to church, it has to be for a reason. I have to go to worship God, and, to put it as plainly as I can, I have lost my faith. It happened this winter. Perhaps it’s been happening for some time in small ways, but one Sunday in February, it came with a kind of finality. I just stopped believing. My faith was like a clock winding down until that particular Sunday when it just stopped. So now I can no longer go to church and just sit there pretending to believe. I just can’t do that. To tell you the truth, I feel a little sick about it all. I have to learn to live in a world without God, without the thought of ever seeing Mother and Father again — without any of that. And it’s difficult.
I was down to the city yesterday. I can finally get away now that I don’t have to worry about the furnace. So Marion and I went down on the train for the day. Splurged on lunch at Simpson’s and went to an awful moving picture starring Rudy Vallee. Marion is besotted with the man; otherwise she is a reasonable sane thirty-one-year-old woman. She has been asked to sing at Mildred Craig’s wedding next month and asked me if I would play for her. I suppose I will, though I am tormenting her a little (for taking me to that awful movie) by telling her I’ll think about it. Yes, it’s mild up here too and about time. So hurrah for spring! Take care of yourself, Nora.
Clara
Tatham House
138 East 38th Street
New York
April 6, 1935
Dear Clara,
Got your letter yesterday and thought I’d better drop you a note today because I won’t have time tomorrow. I’m going to spend most of the day with Evelyn and Vivian Rhodes, going over the first scripts of our show.
I found your letter upsetting, to say the least. You say you no longer believe in God? How could that happen? You were always so religious, or at least I thought you were. You and Father never missed church on Sunday mornings, and when I was home on weekends and slept in, you and Father would give me such dagger looks when you got home from church. What on earth happened? You read the Bible almost right through one summer! Remember? You must have been only eleven or twelve, but you spent nearly every day that summer reading through those long chapters of the Old Testament. I thought for a while you were going to be a missionary or something. I’m worried about you, Clara. I just don’t understand how you could lose your faith like that. I wish you would talk to someone about all this. I know you don’t think much of this new minister, but maybe if you told him sincerely how you feel, he might be able to help. I mean, isn’t that what he’s trained to do? It just strikes me as odd. You of all people! What would poor Father think?
I’m afraid I have to run because a girl down the hall (she’s a nurse) has asked me to go to the movies with her this afternoon. She’s from some place in Minnesota, a small town like Whitfield, and last night she said she was feeling a little blue and homesick. Well, it’s been awfully wet and gloomy down here and I’m feeling a bit that way myself, so what better place to be when you’re feeling blue than at the movies. Ruth will be at the door any minute, so I’ll say goodbye for now and get this in the mail. Please write and let me know if you have talked to anyone about all this.
Love, Nora
P.S. It occurs to me that all this may have something to do with Father’s passing. It will soon be a year, and you are probably dwelling on that. You have to put things behind you, Clara.
Saturday, April 13
A letter from Nora advising me to talk to Jackson about my apostasy. Well, she can forget about that. Jackson is the last person on earth I would approach. Have gone instead to the poets. Reading Vaughan and Dickinson at two o’clock this morning.
I saw eternity the other night
Like a great ring of pure and endless light,
All calm, as it was bright;
And Emily D.
I shall know why, when time is over
And I have ceased to wonder why;
Christ will explain each separate anguish
In the fair schoolroom of the sky.
He will tell me what Peter promised,
And I, for wonder at his woe,
I shall forget the drop of anguish
That scalds me now, that scalds me now.
But they lived in other centuries when it must have been easier to believe.
Monday, April 15
Father died a year ago today. A windy cool Sunday with dampness in the air. After dinner he looked out the window and told me he thought he might spade the flower beds by the side of the house, but it looked too much li
ke rain. Said he wasn’t feeling well and took some bicarbonate of soda. I told him he always ate too quickly and he said it was a habit picked up from years of eating in boarding houses before he married. He said he would lie down until the indigestion passed, and so he climbed the stairs to his bedroom. His final words came from the head of the stairs. “Why don’t you play something?” I told him I would, but then after I finished the dishes, I sat down to read the rest of the Herald and forgot.
At three o’clock I went upstairs; I can’t remember why. I could see his stocking feet through the open doorway of his bedroom. He had slept, I thought, too long and would have trouble in the night, so I approached him. He was lying on his back, and when I entered the room, I knew at once that he was dead. I just knew, and I was startled a little at my own certainty. It was the greyness of the flesh around his eyes, I think. Or the perfect stillness of his body. I didn’t touch him, but I knew he was dead.
Went over to the Brydens’ and Mrs. Bryden met me at the door. She must have seen something in my face, but I was not in tears. Why? Already his death was a fact. Unalterable. I said this to her. I remember the words. “I think Father must have had a heart attack in his sleep. He’s gone.”
Mrs. Bryden’s puzzled, kind little face. “Gone, Clara? Do you mean he’s passed away? Oh, my dear child!”
Hurrying across the yard with me, the rainy wind in our faces. Mrs. Bryden surprised me by her quickness. She is Father’s age exactly, but nimble and quick, a little sparrow of a woman. In the bedroom she bent over him and pulled the sheet across his face. “Yes, yes, you’re right. He’s gone, poor Ed. We must phone the doctor.”
Clara Callan Page 5
