Wednesday, October 27, 2004
TMI
I was an obedient little manchild; I didn’t like to go where I didn’t belong. This reticence made me appreciate my opportunities to go sailing all the more. The open sea, the way the wake disappeared behind our scudding sloop, the confidentiality of anything that happened on board… even within the confines of the Sea Explorer code and rulebook (which goverened my outings since the Explorers owned the boats), I experienced a kind of freedom at sea that I didn’t get from the rest of my life.
This sense of freedom would begin when my friend Eric’s dad picked me up to drive us both to the marina. Once I closed the door to their dusty Peugeot I was in a new world of old salt and secret knots. Eric and his dad (an accomplished sailor who’d taught me most of what I knew of sailing) and I would chat laconically, as if equals, discussing matters a 14-year-old usually didn’t discuss with a grownup, much less a friend’s dad. But Eric’s dad was a little different anyway - we’d gone camping and fishing together, panned for gold, spent actual quality time with each other. Plus, he was an actor, and therefore, by definition, cool - tall and Lincoln-thin, he was the casting office choice for the minuteman or hardbitten lanky rancher, a man who looked like, if he was on your side, things would work out okay.
One particular day we were on our way to the marina when the subject of Eric’s mom came up. I knew her well, too, and she knew me; I’d been a frequent guest at Eric’s house since first grade and she was as good as a surrogate mom to me. She came along on our camping trips but always stayed back at the campsite, never sailing or fishing or hiking with the rest of us. She did a lot of cooking, some cleaning. She kept a nice house, as far as I was concerned. She did, however, strike me as a PDP (potentially difficult person), who often walked with a limp and equally often scowled. But I got along with her just fine; I was a mannerly child, as I mentioned before, and moms respond well to good manners. Regardless, I could always see that she held something back from the world, something injured and bitter, and I didn’t tempt her favor by asking her anything strenuous or personal.
I had no such compunction with her husband, though, so as we zipped along through west LA and the subject came up, I felt free to satisfy one of my lingering curiosities. She always protected that leg; her limp came and went but she was careful all the time. Why not find out why? So I went and asked, “What’s wrong with Mrs. S’s leg, anyway?”
Eric’s dad took a deep breath. “Oh, Dan, that’s a tough one,” he began with uncharacteristic solemnity. “It’s like nothing’s ever good enough. She wants everything to be different than it is, but she doesn’t want to do anything to make it happen. She gets so angry sometimes it’s hard to talk to her. She can turn on a dime too, so something that was fine is suddenly not fine. She hates to plan; she hates surprises. She’s just an argument waiting to happen sometimes, I guess.”
I was taken aback. At the very least, he hadn’t answered my question; I felt at the least that I should make sure he’d understood it - make sure he hadn’t thought I’d asked him to divulge all that he’d apparently felt compelled to divulge. “So… what does that have to do with what’s wrong with her leg?”
“Her leg? Oh, I thought you asked what was wrong with her life.”
“Oh no, Mr. S. I would never ask a question like that.”
“Well, I guess you found out anyway.”
He told me then about her leg, but I forgot what he said. I’d already heard plenty. Once we got to the docks, it took a lot of sailing to put that conversation out of my mind. I guess it never completely left, did it?
MORAL: Enunciate!
