She considers what a person’s book collection says about them. She tries to imagine Zack reading these books, and considers how they’ve informed his life. And what does he mean about swimming in a crystal? Is that even possible? She has never before thought about liquid crystals; she has always associated crystal with mass and light. Light is luce in Italian, she remembers. Light relates to crystal, and to Zack, who seems to reflect light. “Hmm!” She feels happy, like she’s uncovered a deep mystery.
The washer begins its turning cycle, swishing round and round. Sorting through the laundry hamper, she finds at the bottom assorted water gear: bathing trunks, Speedos, swim caps, booties, even a pair of gloves. She carefully pulls the damp, already musty-smelling garments from the dry ones, placing them in the sink basin to wash separately. She will use her skills to cleanse this important gear for the old man, get rid of that mildew smell. She wonders what Elsa thought about doing the laundry, knowing as she does that most people find it a burden.
“Coo-coo,” she hears, and looks toward the grandfather clock. It’s ten minutes before the hour. That’s odd, she thinks. Looking around the room, she realizes the cuckoo sound is coming from the washer, signaling that the cycle is done.
On her way to move the laundry to the dryer, she passes the bookshelf again and is drawn to another title, The Long Now. Curious, she sits down on the couch and begins to flip through its pages.
She’s not sure how much time has passed or how many books she’s flipped through when Zack knocks on the wall from the kitchen.
She startles. She’s been so immersed she didn’t even hear him come in.
“I’m just returning for my gym bag.” He smiles at her but she feels like she’s been caught. He chuckles—at the expression on her face, no doubt. “Are you interested in the clock?” he asks, pointing at the book she’s reading.
She closes the book and looks at its cover: The Millennium Clock. “Yes, I am.”
He stops, seeming to listen for something.
“Time fascinates me. The way it feels so long and at times passes without a moment of awareness,” Lavinia says.
“Yes, there it is, you’ve hit it. Time has no substance. We don’t even know if it exists.”
She nods, never having heard about this—the possible nonexistence of time. She’s heard a man at the museum say time is life or time is beauty, but that’s different. She looks at Zack, waiting.
“Have you read Cradle to Cradle?” he asks.
“Yes, I keep coming back to it. What do you make of it? Are those words of wisdom? A Buddhist koan?”
“You might say they are. In Buddhism time is the main teaching, isn’t it?” he says.
Lavinia doesn’t know. “Can you tell me how they’re related?” she asks, experiencing a wave of excitement about learning something new. His interest in teaching further sparks her interest in the clock.
“Impermanence. Things appear and then seem to disappear. Time.”
“How interesting. I’ve never thought about time in that way,” she says, her mind bubbling over with enthusiasm.
“Everything rises and passes away,” he says.
“Like thoughts?”
“Yes, and time,” he says.
“So all there is . . . is change,” Lavinia says.
“Exactly. You get it!” he says excitedly. “That’s not an easy concept. And we haven’t even mentioned that we are timeless.” His eyes fill with what seem to be tears, but gleeful tears or laughing tears. “And more. Deep ecology to save our dear planet from us,” he adds.
“Are you an ecologist, too?”
“I study deep ecology.”
“What’s that?” she asks.
“The easiest way to explain it is that everything is related to everything. Interdependence. We need each other. The trees need our breath, and we need theirs. My love is time. Time is love. Your work here is time, and your time and commitment is love.” He looks around the room at his many clocks.
“I’d love to hear more about the millennium clock,” she says. Just then the grandfather clock drones out the deepest and heaviest drawl, a basso profondo, announcing the half hour.
“Follow me,” Zack says. “Let me show you something.” He heads toward the guest bedroom and opens the door.
With the curtains pulled open, a massive machine reveals itself, its shiny panels reflecting light.
Lavinia steps back and puts her hand over her mouth. It’s so impressive with the sun pouring in on it, glinting on the metal. “Is it a robot?” she asks, twirling a piece of her hair and stepping closer to Zack. Whatever it is, it takes up the entire room.
“Yes, you might say that. This is a model of another machine—a smaller version of the main millennium clock that will be buried in a limestone mountain.”
“Another what?” He’s going too fast for her and she wants to understand.
“A clock.”
“This is a clock? But I don’t see any dials.” She moves toward the contraption, searching for anything that might reveal that it’s actually a clock. She steps up to its base and sees a three-pronged wheel with metal knobs at the end of each spike. Mid-range she sees a circular dial sitting on a spiral of coils at least a foot in diameter.
“This is the replica, a smaller version of the 10,000-year clock, designed to keep time for that long.”
“But how can it do that?”
He hands her a small framed quote from the man whose brainchild this clock project was, Danny Hillis.
Lavinia sits on the footstool and reads in a soft voice, “‘I want to build the clock that ticks once every year. The century hand advances once every one hundred years. Cuckoo comes out every millennium for the next ten thousand years.’”
“It chimed two times when we went from 1999 to 2000,” Zack says. “Soon, the Millennium Clock will have a new home.” His voice rises as if he’s singing a glorious chant. He’s on his toes now, looking very much to Lavinia like a little boy dancing with excitement. “If I could have one thing in the world before I die, I would visit the site where the real clock will rest.”
He looks at her with a yearning that she knows well, but her longing, a burning feeling, relates to family wishes and not a clock. And just now she wants to have this connection with Zack.
“The final clock?” She faces Zack, whose eyes light up like the early sun.
“Yes, the one built for the Ely, Nevada site will be embedded in white limestone on top of Mount Washington—with a glorious view.”
Ely, Nevada? “Zack, can you tell me more? I want so much to follow you.”
He looks at her, his face soft and in reflection. “This is like an Egyptian pyramid. Something that will continue to be alive even though there will be no ears to hear it. The idea is that the future goes on—and the clock will symbolize that.”
“The future goes on? Even after we’re dead. Is that so important if we are dead?” she asks, surprised by her own question.
“Yes,” he says firmly. “For the children’s sake, we must believe in the future.”
“Yes, that makes sense . . . and did you say Nevada?”
He nods. “Ely, Nevada.”
“Is that near Las Vegas?”
“No. Ely is nearer to the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest in the White Mountains here in California. Have you heard of it? Oldest trees in the known world, some 4,800-year-old trees-s-s.”
Lavinia sighs. “I’ve never been to Nevada.” She feels an ache in the pit of her stomach as she realizes she’s never left San Francisco—that her life here has been rather sheltered. She always begged Sal to take her to Las Vegas to play the slots, but now that no longer appeals to her as much as seeing a 4,800-year-old tree.
“Let me propose something,” Zack stammers as his long hand rests with curved fingers on his cheek.
“Okay.” Lavinia hesitates.
“I wonder if you might drive with me to the bristlecone forest, and then to Ely. Of course, I’d pay you for y
our time. I think it’s worth . . . four thousand? How does that sound?”
The excitement she feels about this offer runs through her like colored ribbons flying into unique patterns, tickling her mood. And what about the generous fee! “Why would you invite me?” she asks.
“Well, I have a car, but my daughter says I shouldn’t drive on my own to Ely. And Margaret’s a bit too busy right now with her practice.”
His head bends, and Lavinia senses his sadness. Her instinct is to comfort him but she stands still, waiting. He’s looking at her; she keeps staring at all the weird coils at the base of the machine, observing the strong feelings within her body. It’s a pinch in her heart that makes her feel sorrow for Zack and her own loss. She aches with him.
Margaret has this home and this father. Why wouldn’t she want to make his dream come true? Lavinia would do it for her own father, if she had one.
When she comes back to the moment, Zack is spouting off some data about the first prototype of the clock, which was built with Monel metal and brass.
“Monel?”
“An alloy of nickel and copper. Brass for the moving components. The four-inch pendulum is made of tungsten, an indestructible metal—strong enough to last ten thousand years.”
Lavinia looks into the old man’s eyes. He seems to be pleading with her.
“The Long Now,” she says. “The long view of time.”
Just then the grand cuckoo breathes out nine long cuckoos. Has a half hour really gone by?
Zack looks toward the doorway. “Well, I best be going for my swim now and leave you to your work. Don’t worry too much about doing the laundry today. I’d rather you look at the books and consider the drive to the bristlecone forest and then to Ely.”
“I’ll think about it,” she says, smiling.
His eyebrows arch up in a half circle; he is smiling. “Do you drive?” he asks.
“Yes, I have my license.”
“Good,” he says, nodding, before leaving the room.
She hears the front door click a few moments later, and she’s alone with the massive clock.
After Zack leaves, Lavinia reflects on her world, feeling more expansive and lighter. Not knowing about the books, not knowing about the machine, not even knowing her mother or her father seem less consuming of her thoughts. The labyrinth she lives in seems to be less tight. That she can neither see where she entered nor its center or path of return doesn’t bother her. She brushes herself as if she’s clearing some disturbance from her body, making room for something new.
Maybe going with Zack will free her; illuminate her path as she moves into her own future; teach her how to swim in crystal waters; free her up from her fears of dying. And then there is the money offer, more than she’s ever handled.
She wants to walk in the dark the way Mario does, without her morbid fears of loss; to be like Mercedes and Kinky, who make a place for their dead at their table while they sing and dance.
The granddaddy chimes, freezing her to the spot with its basso profondo. Counting each chime—one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten—intensifies the old, familiar feelings of being trapped and time passing. No, she thinks, I don’t want to be trapped in time, I want to remember this new feeling, the expansiveness of time, the future of time. Please, she begs the clock as if it were a foreboding god. Then she is flooded with questions. Do I have time? Is time on my side? Am I living in the time of my life or out of time? No time, or timeless? She doesn’t know the answers.
Look at the space in front and the space behind you. She hears the DJ’s words.
Her life moves past her and yet stands still, too, as if she’s taking two steps back and one forward, going backwards nonetheless. What are her accomplishments? Sal thinks she finished school. And what instead? Ironing and washing. Sorting the dark from the light, the wet from the dry. Hanging and drying. Making crisp pleats in an old man’s pants. She pushes at this lost feeling, fighting with herself. Time in front. Time in back. Time to the right, time to the left. Time now feels frantic. Time to visit Kinky! This thought grounds her.
Although Zack has let her off the hook for the day, she finishes her work—cycling out the load from the washer to the dryer, pressing his pants, and ironing two shirts. Thinking of his generous offer makes her feel good. She hangs the swimwear on the pullout clothesline of azure and crystal, picturing Zack swimming in deep, crystalline waters, considering his offer. Envisioning the eight-hour car ride, followed by an adventure in the mountains, lightens her mood. As she rinses Zack’s plaid swim trunks by hand, she decides she will travel with him to see the old forest and the site of the clock.
When the wash is done, she places it in the drier, sets the timer, and lets herself out.
Chapter 14:
FLAMENCO DAZE
Lavinia watches Kinky pour a jigger from her mother’s Don Eduardo Tequila, 100 percent de agave. The bottle of tequila reflects the late-afternoon light and makes her wonder if it’s liquid crystal. The two girls stare at the small shot glasses on the floral colored tablecloth. One empty glass waits for Mercedes, who is doing her afternoon harvesting and pruning at the community garden nearby.
“Armando talked today,” Kinky says.
“What’d he say?”
“He told me how boys don’t cry. When a boy cries, he gets hit. That’s what his dad told him.”
Lavinia raises her eyebrows in question as she sips her tequila, then waits patiently, aware of her friend’s affection for the boy, seeing that she’s upset.
“Not that I’ve seen any visible bruises,” Kinky continues, the crease of worry in the space between her eyebrows deepening. “He’s using the time now to talk about his family and whether it’s right to complain about his fears.” She bites her lip. “He’s worried his mother will have to return to Mexico.”
“Oh, no. That’s horrible.”
“He’s heard about the immigration officers doing raids in the city and feels scared they’ll come and get them. The mother of one of his friends had to return to Mexico.”
“The poor boy,” Lavinia responds quietly. “How to live like that?” Then she pauses, feeling a quiver in her heart. “I can relate to his fear of loss.”
“You miss Sal?” Kinky swirls the tequila in her glass.
“Encourage Armando to complain,” Lavinia says, not wanting to talk about Sal, or about how she knows about having a mother snatched away mysteriously.
“His Sunday school teacher told him he must love everyone, even his enemies. I wanted to tell him, ‘You get to protect yourself, Armando.’ You know, be safe—but six-year-olds depend on others for their safety.”
“That’s advice I need to hear, too, since I’m surrounded by all these weirdos!” Lavinia looks to her friend and thinks about the snake on Russian Hill. “Why do I keep attracting these nuts for clients?” Lavinia looks around the homey room, the table set with a place for her; this, combined with the anticipation of Mercedes’s bounty, makes her smile, and a feeling of ease fills her body. “I’m glad I have you and Mercedes in my life.”
Kinky reaches for her hand. Lavinia lets her hold it, appreciating the warm gesture from her friend.
“I think there are just a lot of weird people around. I don’t think it’s your fault, Lavinia, or that you’re attracting them. Nuts are attracted to San Francisco, that’s all. Sometimes I think you take too much responsibility for shit happening,” Kinky says confidently.
“That’s something to think about. Thank you.” What Kinky says is on the mark, though Lavinia could never have expressed it herself with such clarity. She sighs, feeling her eyes fill up at being so clearly seen. As the heaviness in her heart lifts, she focuses on the green diamond center of a square floor tile, which pulls her in.
“Buenas tardes, mijitas,” Mercedes says, coming into the dining room from outside, carrying her harvest bag with beet tops hanging over the edge.
“Let me help you.” Lavinia rushes over, takes the hea
vy bag of veggies from her hands, and puts them by the sink.
“Gracias,” Mercedes says as she takes her purse off her wrist and moves toward the table. “You’re relaxing for a change,” she says, looking back at them as if they are still sitting at the table, the way she first must have seen them when she walked in. “You both work so hard. I like to see you taking time in the afternoon to sit together and talk about your day.”
“Mama, you’re home in time to help Lavinia. She wants to roar like a lion.”
Lavinia laughs out loud, swiveling around toward her friend. “Where’d you get that idea?” Kinky astounds her. Is it just that she knows her so well, or is it that she’s truly clairvoyant? “I actually want to dance,” she counters.
“Claro,” Mercedes says. “Bebemos,” she adds, lifting the small crystal glass to her lips. Her upper lip reflects beads of sweat. She stares at the drink before she sips. It looks to Lavinia as if she is consulting with the magic fluid. After some moments, she walks toward a wooden cabinet on the far wall of the kitchen where she keeps her musical stuff: bells, castanets, all sitting in two large bowls. She picks up a small, pleated fan with brightly colored flowers and waves it in front of her face, then brings the bowls stuffed with the instruments to the table.
“How can I pass up this offer?” Mercedes says, sitting down at her table. She places her hands securely on her knees. Kinky pours some Don Eduardo into Lavinia’s empty glass and then into her own. Now three gleaming golden tequilas shine on the table.
After they each take another sip, Mercedes says, “Let’s play music.”
She removes the instruments from the bowls, then places the bowls on the table in front of Lavinia. They look like salad bowls to her and she can’t imagine what the older woman has in mind. When Mercedes leaves to get water, Lavinia taps at the hollowed out bowls.
Mercedes returns and pours water from a yellow watering pail into the larger of the bowls. Lavinia watches, mesmerized by the stream of clear water filling the empty vessel. When it’s two-thirds filled, Mercedes gently sinks the smaller bowl, upside down, into the bowl of water. It floats. “This is a Mexican water gourd drum,” she says, placing her two small hands on the top of the small head of the gourd and tapping it with her fingers, then with the palms of her hands. The water drum makes deep sounds.
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