by John Irving
“LET’S DRIVE TO THE GYM AND PRACTICE THE SHOT,” said Owen Meany.
“I don’t feel like it,” I said.
“TOMORROW IS NEW YEAR’S DAY,” Owen reminded me. “THE GYM WILL BE CLOSED TOMORROW.”
From Hester’s bedroom—even though the door was closed—we could hear her breathing; Hester’s breathing, when she’d been drinking, was something between a snore and a moan.
“Why does she drink so much?” I asked Owen.
“HESTER’S AHEAD OF HER TIME,” he said.
“What’s that mean?” I asked him. “Do we have a generation of drunks to look forward to?”
“WE HAVE A GENERATION OF PEOPLE WHO ARE ANGRY TO LOOK FORWARD TO,” Owen said. “AND MAYBE TWO GENERATIONS OF PEOPLE WHO DON’T GIVE A SHIT,” he added.
“How do you know?” I asked him.
“I DON’T KNOW HOW I KNOW,” said Owen Meany. “I JUST KNOW THAT I KNOW,” he said.
Toronto: June 9, 1987—after a weekend of wonderful weather here, sunny and clear-skyed and as cool as it is in the fall, I broke down and bought The New York Times; thank God, no one I know saw me. One of the Brocklebank daughters got married on the weekend in the Bishop Strachan chapel; the BSS girls tend to do that—they come back to the old school to tie the knot, even the ones who were miserable when they were students here. Sometimes, I’m invited to the weddings—Mrs. Brocklebank invited me to this one—but this particular daughter had managed to escape ever being a student of mine, and I felt that Mrs. Brocklebank invited me only because I ran into her while she was fiercely trimming her hedge. No one sent me a formal invitation. I like to stand on a little ceremony; I felt it wasn’t my place to attend. And besides: the Brocklebank daughter was marrying an American. I think it’s because I ran into a carload of Americans on Russell Hill Road that I broke down and bought The New York Times.
The Americans were lost; they couldn’t find The Bishop Strachan School or the chapel—they had a New York license plate and no understanding of how to pronounce Strachan.
“Where’s Bishop Stray-chen?” a woman asked me.
“Bishop Strawn,” I corrected her.
“What?” she said. “I can’t understand him,” she told her husband, the driver. “I think he’s speaking French.”
“I was speaking English,” I informed the idiot woman. “They speak French in Montreal. You’re in Toronto. We speak English here.”
“Do you know where Bishop Stray-chen is?” her husband shouted.
“It’s Bishop Strawn!” I shouted back.
“No, Stray-chen!” shouted the wife.
One of the kids in the back seat spoke up.
“I think he’s telling you how to pronounce it,” the kid told his parents.
“I don’t want to know how to pronounce it,” his father said, “I just want to know where it is.”
“Do you know where it is?” the woman asked me.
“No,” I said. “I’ve never heard of it.”
“He’s never heard of it!” the wife repeated. She took a letter out of her purse, and opened it. “Do you know where Lonsdale Road is?” she asked me.
“Somewhere around here,” I said. “I think I’ve heard of that.”
They drove off—in the direction of St. Clair, and the reservoir; they went the wrong way, of course. Their plans were certainly unclear, but they exhibited an exemplary American firmness.
And so I must have been feeling a little homesick; I get that way from time to time. And what a day it was to buy The New York Times! I don’t suppose there’s ever a good day to buy it. But what a story I read!
Nancy Reagan Says Hearings
Have Not Affected President
Oh, boy. Mrs. Reagan said that the congressional hearings on the Iran-contra deals had not affected the president. Mrs. Reagan was in Sweden to observe a drug-abuse program in a high school in a Stockholm suburb; I guess she’s one of those many American adults of a certain advanced age who believe that the root of all evil lies in the area of young people’s self-abuse. Someone should tell Mrs. Reagan that young people—not even young people on drugs—are not the ones responsible for the major problems besetting the world!
The wives of American presidents have always been active in eradicating their pet peeves; Mrs. Reagan is all upset about drug abuse. I think it was Mrs. Johnson who wanted to rid the nation of junk cars; those cars that no longer could be driven anywhere, but simply sat—rusting into the landscape … they made her absolutely passionate about their removal. And there was another president’s wife, or maybe it was a vice-president’s wife, who thought it was a disgrace how the nation, as a whole, paid so little attention to “art”; I forget what it was that she wanted to do about it.
But it doesn’t surprise me that the president is “not affected” by the congressional hearings; he hasn’t been too “affected” by what the Congress tells him he can and can’t do, either. I doubt that these hearings are going to “affect” him very greatly.
Who cares if he “knew”—exactly, or inexactly—that money raised by secret arms sales to Iran was being diverted to the support of the Nicaraguan rebels? I don’t think most Americans care.
Americans got bored with hearing about Vietnam before they got out of Vietnam; Americans got bored with hearing about Watergate, and what Nixon did or didn’t do—even before the evidence was all in. Americans are already bored with Nicaragua; by the time these congressional hearings on the Iran-contra affair are over, Americans won’t know (or care) what they think—except that they’ll be sick and tired of it. After a while, they’ll be tired of the Persian Gulf, too. They’re already sick to death of Iran.
This syndrome is as familiar to me as Hester throwing up on New Year’s Eve. It was New Year’s Eve, 1963; Hester was vomiting in the rose garden, and Owen and I were watching TV. There were 16,300 U.S. military personnel in Vietnam. On New Year’s Eve in ’64, a total of 23,300 Americans were there; Hester was barfing her brains out again. I think the January thaw was early that year; I think that was the year Hester was puking in the rain, but maybe the early thaw was New Year’s Eve in 1965, when there were 184,300 U.S. military personnel in Vietnam. Hester just threw up; she was nonstop. She was violently opposed to the Vietnam War; she was radically opposed to it. Hester was so ferociously antiwar that Owen Meany used to say that he knew of only one good way to get all those Americans out of Vietnam.
“WE SHOULD SEND HESTER INSTEAD,” he used to say. “HESTER SHOULD DRINK HER WAY THROUGH NORTH VIETNAM,” Owen would say. “WE SHOULD SEND HESTER TO HANOI,” he told me. “HESTER, I’VE GOT A GREAT IDEA,” Owen said to her. “WHY DON’T YOU GO THROW UP ON HANOI INSTEAD?”
On New Year’s Eve, 1966, there were 385,300 U.S. military personnel in Vietnam; 6,644 had been killed in action. Hester and Owen and I weren’t together for New Year’s Eve that year. I watched the television at 80 Front Street by myself. Somewhere, I was sure, Hester was throwing up; but I didn’t know where. In ’67, there were 485,600 Americans in Vietnam; 16,021 had been killed there. I watched television at 80 Front Street, alone again. I’d had a little too much to drink myself; I was trying to remember when Grandmother had purchased a color television set, but I couldn’t. I’d had enough to drink so that I was sick in the rose garden; it was cold enough to make me hope, for Hester’s sake, that she was throwing up in a warmer climate.
Owen was in a warmer climate.
I don’t remember where I was or what I did for New Year’s Eve in 1968. There were 536,100 U.S. military personnel in Vietnam; that was still about 10,000 short of what our peak number would be. Only 30,610 Americans had been killed in action, about 16,000 short of the number of Americans who would die there. Wherever I was for New Year’s Eve, 1968, I’m sure I was drunk and throwing up; wherever Hester was, I’m sure she was drunk and throwing up, too.
As I’ve said, Owen didn’t show me what he wrote in his diary; it was much later—after everything, after almost everything—when I saw what he’d
written there. There is one particular entry I wish I could have read when he wrote it; it is a very early entry, not far from his excited optimism following Kennedy’s inauguration, not all that far from his thanking my grandmother for the gift of the diary and his announced intention to make her proud of him. This entry strikes me as important; it is dated January 1, 1962, and it reads as follows:
I know three things. I know that my voice doesn’t change, and I know when I’m going to die. I wish I knew why my voice never changes, I wish I knew how I was going to die; but God has allowed me to know more than most people know—so I’m not complaining. The third thing I know is that I am God’s instrument; I have faith that God will let me know what I’m supposed to do, and when I’m supposed to do it. Happy New Year!
That was the January of our senior year at Gravesend Academy; if I had understood then that this was his fatalistic acceptance of what he “knew,” I could have better understood why he behaved as he did—when the world appeared to turn against him, and he hardly raised a hand in his own defense.
We were hanging around the editorial offices of The Grave—that year The Voice was also editor-in-chief—when a totally unlikable senior named Larry Lish told Owen and me that President Kennedy was “diddling” Marilyn Monroe.
Larry Lish—Herbert Lawrence Lish, Jr. (his father was the movie producer Herb Lish)—was arguably Gravesend’s most cynical and decadent student. In his junior year, he’d gotten a town girl pregnant, and his mother—only recently divorced from his father—had so skillfully and swiftly arranged for the girl’s abortion that not even Owen and I knew who the girl was; Larry Lish had spoiled a lot of girls’ good times. His mother was said to be ready to fly his girlfriends to Sweden at the drop of a hat; it was rumored that she accompanied the girls, too—just to make sure they went through with it. And after these return trips from Sweden, the girls never wanted to see Larry again. He was a charming sociopath, the kind of creep who makes a good first impression on those poor, sad people who are dazzled by top-drawer accents and custom-made dress shirts.
He was witty—even Owen was impressed by Lish’s editorial cleverness for The Grave—and he was cordially loathed by students and faculty alike; I say “cordially,” in the case of the students, because no one would have refused an invitation to one of his father’s or his mother’s parties. In the case of the faculty, they exercised a “cordial” hatred of Lish because his father was so famous that many faculty members were afraid of him—and Lish’s mother, the divorcée, was a beauty and a whorish flirt. I’m sure that some of the faculty lived for the glimpse they might get of her on Parents’ Day; many of the students felt that way about Larry Lish’s mother, too.
Owen and I had never been invited to one of Mr. or Mrs. Lish’s parties; New Hampshire natives are not regularly within striking distance of New York City—not to mention Beverly Hills. Herb Lish lived in Beverly Hills; those were Hollywood parties, and Larry Lish’s Gravesend acquaintances who were fortunate enough to come from the Los Angeles area claimed to have met actual “starlets” at those lavish affairs.
Mrs. Lish’s Fifth Avenue parties were no less provocative; the seduction and intimidation of young people was an activity both Lishes enjoyed. And the New York girls—although they weren’t always aspiring actresses—were reputed to “do it” with even less resistance than the marginal protestations offered by the California variety.
Mr. and Mrs. Lish, following their divorce, were in competition for young Larry’s doubtful affection; they had chosen a route to his heart that was strewn with excessive partying and expensive sex. Larry divided his vacations between New York City and Beverly Hills. On both coasts, the segment of society that Mr. and Mrs. Lish “knew” was comprised of the kind of people who struck many Gravesend Academy seniors as the most fascinating people alive; Owen and I, however, had never heard of most of these people. But we had certainly heard of President John F. Kennedy; and we had certainly seen every movie that starred Marilyn Monroe.
“You know what my mother told me over the vacation?” Larry Lish asked Owen and me.
“Let me guess,” I said. “She’s going to buy you an airplane.”
“AND WHEN YOUR FATHER HEARD ABOUT IT,” said Owen Meany, “HE SAID HE’D BUY YOU A VILLA IN FRANCE—ON THE RIVIERA!”
“Not this year,” Larry Lish said slyly. “My mother told me that JFK was diddling Marilyn Monroe—and countless others,” he added.
“THAT IS A TRULY TASTELESS LIE!” said Owen Meany.
“It’s the truth,” Larry Lish said, smirking.
“SOMEONE WHO SPREADS THAT KIND OF RUMOR OUGHT TO BE IN JAIL!” Owen said.
“Can you see my mother in jail?” Lish asked. “This is no rumor. The truth is, the prez makes Ladies’ Man Meany look like a virgin—the prez gets any woman he wants.”
“HOW DOES YOUR MOTHER KNOW THIS?” Owen asked Lish.
“She knows all the Kennedys,” Lish said, after a moderately tense silence. “And my dad knows Marilyn Monroe,” he said.
“I SUPPOSE THEY ‘DO IT’ IN THE WHITE HOUSE?” Owen asked.
“I know they’ve done it in New York,” Lish said. “I don’t know where else they’ve done it—all I know is, they’ve been doing it for years. And when the prez isn’t interested in her anymore, I hear that Bobby’s going to get her.”
“YOU’RE DISGUSTING!” said Owen Meany.
“The world’s disgusting!” Larry Lish said cheerfully. “Do you think I’m lying?”
“YES, I DO,” Owen said.
“My mother’s going to pick me up and take me skiing—next weekend,” Lish said. “You can ask her yourself.”
Owen shrugged.
“Do you think she’s lying?” Lish asked; Owen shrugged again. He hated Lish—and Lish’s mother; or, at least, he hated the kind of woman he imagined Larry Lish’s mother was. But Owen Meany wouldn’t have called anyone’s mother a liar.
“Let me tell you, Sarcasm Master,” Larry Lish said. “My mother’s a gossip, and she’s a bitch, but she’s not a liar; she doesn’t have enough imagination to make anything up!”
It was one of the more painful things about our peers at Gravesend Academy; it hurt Owen and me to hear how many of our schoolmates commonly put their parents down. They took their parents’ money, and they abused their parents’ summer houses and weekend retreats—when their parents weren’t even aware that the kids had their own keys! And they frequently spoke of their parents as if they thought their parents were trash—or, at least, ignorant beyond saving.
“DOES JACKIE KNOW ABOUT MARILYN MONROE?” Owen asked Larry Lish.
“You can ask my mother,” Lish said.
The prospect of conversation with Larry Lish’s mother was not relaxing to Owen Meany. He brooded all week. He avoided the editorial offices of The Grave, a hangout in which Owen was regularly king. Owen, after all, had been inspired by JFK; although the subject of the president’s personal (or sexual) morality would not have dampened everyone’s enthusiasm for his political ideals and his political goals, Owen Meany was not “everyone”—nor was he sophisticated enough to separate public and private morality. I doubt that Owen ever would have become “sophisticated” enough to make that separation—not even today, when it seems that the only people who are adamant in their claim that public and private morality are inseparable are those creep-evangelists who profess to “know” that God prefers capitalists to communists, and nuclear power to long hair.
Where would Owen fit in today? He was shocked that JFK—a married man!—could have been “diddling” Marilyn Monroe; not to mention “countless others.” But Owen would never have claimed that he “knew” what God wanted; he always hated the sermon part of the service—of any service. He hated anyone who claimed to “know” God’s opinion of current events.
Today, the fact that President Kennedy enjoyed carnal knowledge of Marilyn Monroe and “countless others”—even during his presidency—seems only moderately improper, and even styli
sh, in comparison to the willful secrecy and deception, and the unlawful policies, so broadly practiced by the entire Reagan administration. The idea of President Reagan getting laid, at all—by anyone!—comes only as welcome and comic relief alongside all his other mischief!
But 1962 was not today; and Owen Meany’s expectations for the Kennedy administration were ripe with the hopefulness and optimism of a nineteen-year-old who desired to serve his country—to be of use. In the previous spring, the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba had upset Owen; but although that was a disturbing error, it was not adultery.
“IF KENNEDY CAN RATIONALIZE ADULTERY, WHAT ELSE CAN HE RATIONALIZE?” Owen asked me. Then he got angry and said: “I’M FORGETTING HE’S A MACKEREL-SNAPPER! IF CATHOLICS CAN CONFESS ANYTHING, THEY CAN FORGIVE THEMSELVES ANYTHING, TOO! CATHOLICS CAN’T EVEN GET DIVORCED; MAYBE THAT’S THE PROBLEM. IT’S SICK NOT TO LET PEOPLE GET DIVORCED!”
“Look at it this way,” I told him. “You’re president of the United States; you’re very good-looking. Countless women want to sleep with you—countless and beautiful women will do anything you ask. They’ll even come to the linen-service entrance of the White House after midnight!”
“THE LINEN-SERVICE ENTRANCE?” said Owen Meany.
“You know what I mean,” I said. “If you could fuck absolutely any woman you wanted to fuck, would you—or wouldn’t you?”
