Excerpt
from Defying Gravity
I. On Top of the World
I was holding Maligne Lake and a Jasper gondola when it happened.
Pushed behind the postcard rack by one sharp-elbowed tourist, I had
managed to pull out only two of the scenics I wanted before they revolved out
of my reach. In seconds, my eyes
alternating between the serene turquoise lake and the crowded tramway car
suspended high above the earth, the realization hit me.
I watched it hit. The very moment it did, my thumbs bent back the skies.
Even after I had carefully smoothed them flat again, lightning-forked
wrinkle marks remained on the upper corners of each postcard.
Turner had been gone for quite awhile.
We were standing outside on the lookout deck when he suddenly went into
the Jasper Tram building perched there in the rocks, the destination point for
the cable climbing gondolas ascending the mountain.
When I followed, I figured he must have headed into the bathroom since
he was nowhere to be seen in the gift shop area or even in the little coffee
shop. I waited, then stepped back
outside and peered around, but all I could see were the gleaming white-capped
mountains along the horizon encircling me, the bare boulders before me, the
little town of Jasper sprawled down in the valley in a silver J-shape and the
sky above, stretching into infinite blue.
And, beside me, the tourists furtively feeding the marmots right behind
the sign that said, “Do Not Feed.”
I wandered back inside and went to the postcard racks to wait a little
longer. Every time the men’s
room door opened, I glanced up expectantly, with no luck and no Turner.
Worrying the clerk might think me a shoplifting candidate, I began to
browse with a strongly affected casual air, although a glance at myself in the
mirror above the sunglasses rack showed only a stranger looking both anxious
little girl and Patty Hearst in the bank after the brainwashing. Unpredictable, the
look warned. Dark eyes stared
just a little too intensely from between strands of short, limply curled brown
hair. Thin lips were alternately
bitten and pursed. A worried
squint lent tension to my whole face. When
I reached up to rub the furrow between my eyebrows, the static electricity
from my windbreaker made my hair stand on end.
The effect was all cornered animal and woman at the end of her rope.
No wonder the clerk cleared her throat right about then.
And running through my mind throughout this failed attempt to appear a
casual, carefree tourist was a familiar question.
What was going wrong now? This
time?
Only when I remembered one of the last things Turner said to me did my
anxiety begin to deepen into realization.
“Listen, I don’t need this. It’s
just not for me.”
At the time, I thought he was talking about a souvenir shaker toy, the
water-filled plastic bubble type, complete with mountain panorama, action
gondola lift, and fake snow. But
gazing at my chosen postcards and the dusty shaker toys on the shelf, I
instead realized Turner was not in the bathroom and, in fact, was no longer on
the mountaintop. A gondola
descended every twenty minutes or so and, by this time, I figured Turner was
well on his way down to the parking lot.
That is how our engagement ended.
Not that I had a ring – it hadn’t quite been an engagement of the
bridal magazine variety – but I had certainly told people and so as I paid
for the postcards with extra sincerity directed at the clerk, I did wonder how
I was going to explain the breakup.
We were just heading in different directions.
Different directions all right. Right
down the bloody mountain. Right
down a different highway.
And that was another thing to consider.
Was the car going to be gone, or would common courtesy replace
cowardice once he reached the foot of the mountain?
It was my car.
I pushed the door open and walked back outside for another view from
the top of the world. The wind
gusting into my ears immediately brought an ache to my head.
I hoped Turner was not going to leave me a note.
The last thing I wanted to find was some sort of “I didn’t know how
to tell you” under my bug plastered windshield wiper.
The whole thing actually started to seem funny to me at that point.
I wanted to tell someone. Go
back to the clerk and say, with a casual chuckle, “You know, you would just
not believe it. I’ve had
breakups before but isn’t this the most....”
The most what? As if
getting the clerk onside with a bit of a laugh would somehow reduce the shock
and humiliation I felt, the utter, stony coldness that was making it hard for
me to breathe right then.
The wind cut through my jacket and prompted me to seek shelter on a
bench behind an outcropping of some of the larger boulders.
Shivering at a slightly lower frequency, I nevertheless felt an aching
cold seep through my limbs and deep into my bones as I sat there.
I never have understood the popularity of metal benches.
One stocky little marmot eyed me from behind the guardrails.
Another came right to my feet and sat expectantly.
More rotund than their squirrel cousins, their inquisitive eyes and
shrill whistles make marmots an instant hit with the tourists, particularly
those under the age of four. One
curly-haired, blond baby stood extending a peanut in a clumsy, balled up fist.
The marmot approached: a careful step or two forward, then a watchful
pause on its haunches, then another step forward. The marmot’s pattern of movement toward the coveted peanut
was irregular in timing but single-minded in determination.
Its final dart to the prize was sudden enough to startle the toddler,
however, sending her tumbling over in surprise, the peanut falling between two
rocks, and one mother rushing to gather up a wailing child.
I did not have anything to offer this little pack of marmots, hungry
after their long hibernation, so I could abide by the posted rules easily
enough and simply watch them. As
calmly as they surveyed me, I returned their gaze.
Without exception they were brown, bushy tailed, and remarkably
unafraid – especially the one at my feet, still staring up at me.
As he tilted his head and peered into my eyes, I wondered if animals
did have the ability to pick up our feelings telepathically.
Two weeks ago, the segment of our newshour called “lifeSTYLES!” featured a
psychic who claimed he could “read” the emotional intelligence of animals.
According to him, animals were naturally tuned into people at the level
of raw emotion and instinct. One
of his examples was that dogs and horses tend to act up when a person feels
afraid of them. Because of this theory of his, he had actually started a
pilot project for rabbits to be brought into the children’s wards of local
hospitals. I, however, had
squeezed my remote control in disgust and flipped over to check out CBC’s
five-part series on the legislature the moment he started complaining about
lack of government funding for his new psychology clinic in which patients
were to voice their troubles to the furry little pet of their choice. The incident had also prompted me to charge into our news
director’s office the next morning and complain loudly about mindless
entertainment taking the place of intelligent news – more specifically, the
mini-documentary on family violence I had produced that had been cut short to
make way for the dubious Dr. Doolittle character.
But now this one marmot kept staring at me.
Staring.
He cocked his head to the left.
Could this little guy know what had just happened?
Did he pick up on some universal animal distress wave I was probably
beaming out? To experiment, I
thought a little “thank you” at him for his concern and, lo and behold, he
darted off the split second I directed the thought to him.
Maybe there is an uneasiness when a little critter knows you know.
The belief I could silently communicate with the animal world was
probably a sign of shock, but if I were in shock I should not have been.
Turner had run out on me before, although never quite so dramatically
or effectively.
The usual scenario was Turner simply not showing up after calling to
say he was on his way over to my place. The
first time it happened, I frantically phoned everyone I could think of and
then sat up into the night by the police radio scanner I keep in my kitchen,
listening intently for reports of traffic fatalities.
He always had a reason. Something
came up. Someone needed his
advice. Sometimes a song that had
never worked until just that moment started to come and he simply lost himself
in the recording studio. And of course I understood how he could get so carried away he would
forget to phone. This was simply
the drawback of dating an aspiring musician and – if I hung in there long
enough, possibly a great one.
Other times his disappearances caused my humiliation and hurt to be
seen in a more public light. The
time, for example, he stranded me at the bar where his band usually played,
leaving me with no idea what I had said or done wrong.
After finishing the last set, Turner mingled past me, pointedly
avoiding my gaze, smiled at some of the reporters I brought to the gig and
disappeared. After waiting long
enough to learn that no, he was not in the back room talking to the sound guy
about a level problem, I pretended to the others at the table that we had
argued earlier and that I had told him, rather rudely, to leave me alone.
Familiar with my rough-edged personality around the newsroom, no one
there had any trouble believing me when I said I had better catch up with him
and make my apologies.
But we had not argued. In
fact, I had been looking forward to seeing him.
Wrapped up in my purse was a chocolate guitar to celebrate our two
month anniversary of having found each other.
Instead of celebrating together, I ended up in a phone booth a few
blocks away from the club realizing as I replaced the receiver that there was
no point in ringing phones around the city.
Wherever he was, he was not picking up and had no wish to be found this
night. Turner had gone incommunicado once again.
What I would learn later was how depressed he had been, how sure he was
the band had never been worse, and how that feeling had transformed itself
into anger directed at me. After
all, I was the insensitive lout who brought an entire news team to hear him
play the sorry gig.
This fragile, creative being simply had to have time and understanding.
Providing him with as much of both as I could was a responsibility I
shouldered philosophically, thankful for the opportunity to break my usual
routine of dating fellow television reporters who resented me when I broke a
few too many lead stories, or who avoided me completely when I became a
producer. Turner, on the other
hand, when not stricken with bouts of creative angst, seemed to enjoy my successes as much as he relished my steady
paycheque. At least, that is what
was starting to become clear to me, as hurt and cynicism seeped into me like
the numbing cold from the bench into my back and thighs.
Admittedly, there were signs our careful accommodation of separate
interests had started to show further strain.
Over the last few months I was less inclined to sit up and listen for
traffic fatalities, more inclined to try to remember the name of the female
singer most recently in his company. They
were generally talentless young things, well intentioned but sweetly malleable
enough to believe in the grand future Turner laid out for them – if only
they followed his lead in every way.
The situation was not at all what I thought,
said Turner.
Said Turner repeatedly.
I chose to believe him. I
had my reasons. Desire for him,
desire for some romanticized idea of a relationship.
On good days, ours truly was that rare TV movie style romance, the kind
that overlooks any wrong since it is based on the true
love that conquers any petty hurt, every disappointment. After all, the final scene of the movie always makes all
previous betrayal worth the while. I
knew it would get better.
Love is not blind; the desire for love is.
My new rule is that if a couple is in counselling together after dating
for only three months, then the courtship is probably fatally flawed.
Hindsight, right?
My fingers were losing their feeling.
Down at the foot of the mountain, the season was definitely a very
bearable early June; up here was a bit more of a mild February. The sky was clear, but the air felt grey cold and snow still
filled some of the crevices between the boulders. I started to shiver, walked back inside, and lined up with my
orange plastic tray for some coffee and a shrink-wrapped muffin of
indeterminate age. I can only
marvel at the focus of our brightest minds; preservatives seem to get more
powerful all the time.
The coffee was as flavourful as it was hot, but the lukewarm liquid did
not, at least, pose any danger of burning my tongue and at that particular
moment I was ready for the pleasantly benign.
Probably good that it was so bad; I had given up caffeine three months
earlier, and aside from this moment when I felt I deserved a coffee again if I
felt like it, I had no desire to pick up my habit again.
For a second the wild idea occurred to me to pop all the pills in my
purse, but what effect swallowing all five remaining birth control pills and
two lint-covered aspirin might have had is still unclear to me.
There was nothing drastic in what I was going to do.
Even atop Whistlers’ Summit with all of Jasper to see me plummet, I
felt no concern I was going to try to end it all.
I did want to sleep though, to tuck my feet up under me in the chair,
lean my head against the panorama view window and just sleep with all the
clatter and chatter of the tourist-jammed cafe muffling my thoughts.
I took another sip of coffee and stared at my postcards.
I considered writing my sister and explaining what had happened,
although for that I would certainly have needed an extra large scenic.
Instead, I thought about Turner and my life and the pointless direction
it seemed to be heading. This was the third day of my holiday with Turner and, being
Monday, my first away from work. Awaiting
me back in Edmonton was a TV newsroom filled with bright, prying minds that
would no doubt ask if Turner and I had set a date yet.
Not for the moment, no.
My timing has always been impeccable.
An entire newsroom of genetically created gossips had been none the
wiser about our engagement. Had
been. Until Friday just after six
when I leaked my good news to one of the friendlier editors and a makeup
artist. This
just in. By now, the word
would have travelled not only through news – radio and TV – but right
through the building and out past the sales department.
It would, very possibly, be working its way across the country via our
network’s affiliates. And what
had loosened my lips? No
hard-nosed interviewing style. No
pressure. No wheedling. Just hapless editor Ken Ridgway, a sweet balding man with a
sincerely hopeful comb-over, and Peg, a woman with more mascara than common
sense but with an honest gift for making people laugh.
She also has a friendly smile that reminds me of my Mom some days and
she, along with Ken, had the misfortune to wish me a good holiday.
They seemed to mean it.
I melted.
Such a sucker I am for anything resembling warmth after a day spent
chasing the family of a guy charged with four counts of murder.
Why I hadn’t simply nodded and responded with even a touch of my
usual sarcasm before safely leaving the newsroom, I don’t know.
I only know that any random bursts of intimacy in my life have left me
regretting them. This would be no
exception.
This would also inject some added anxiety into my first day back at
work. A place I have had a hard
enough time facing lately.
In a way, Turner leaving me on the mountain did nothing but return me
to exactly the same precipice I was poised upon when we first met. During the few short months in his company I was able to
forget how staring into a TV had become like staring into the void, me feeling
like an alien as I watched world affairs coloured by my distorted reflection
bent across the screen.
Suddenly on my own again, staring out that mountaintop window smeared
with children’s fingerprints and my small, shadowy reflection, the feeling
was back with greater intensity. There
I was in the glass, short wisps of hair standing up at odds with each other,
the curl mostly blown out of it, my eyes blurred smudges in a distorted,
heart-shaped face, my narrow shoulders slumped.
They’d been so sure and square once upon a time, when I was a kid.
It made me sad to think of it.
Winded, I think.
I’m winded.
It wasn’t the first time I’d thought that, either, staring at
myself. For too long I had been
wondering just what it was that made me feel so removed from the world, even
while I spent all my time exploring that whole bloody world and reflecting it
back into flickering TV screens. Supper
hour news and the difference it could make.
The difference I made every time I sent a reporter off on another story
or approved another script. Not
to sound maudlin or maybe just typical newsroom burnout case, but everything I
did in the course of a day, or a ratings period for that matter, left me lost,
although more incredulous than depressed.
How I could be that busy, talk to as many people as I did in a day, or
laugh as much as I tended to do around the newsroom and still feel so
pointless inside was an accomplishment I was quite proud of in many respects.
This holiday was supposed to give me some perspective and possibly a
new start. The logic of this was
straightforward. Maybe all I
needed to do was to impress some big shots at one of the Vancouver stations
and the malaise would miraculously disappear as I packed my bags and headed
toward a new job. Turner and I
had talked fairly often about a making a move.
He was interested in the coast himself since session work for a good
musician was supposed to be more plentiful there.
Secretly I wondered if he also thought cocaine supplies would be more
plentiful there, although as far as I could see he never had much of a problem
obtaining supplies of it in Edmonton.
Turner’s predilection for drugs was another little problem between
us.
He had been pretty open at first about having been wired to coke
“once upon a time.” Past
tense. But lately the past had
been creeping up on him. That
alone was a good enough reason for us to have ended things.
To have ended things.
For us to have ended things.
I could already hear myself. How
quickly it had become a mutual decision in my mind, how his daring escape from
the relationship had transformed itself into a for
the best discussion with hard feelings happily resolved.
I love the resiliency of the human animal.
The flexibility of memory.
The whole afternoon is still a bit of a blur to me, as if the first few
hours “post Turner” did not register properly.
I do remember going up for several refills of coffee. I remember a while later the girl from the till came and took
my tray away with an odd look of annoyance.
Her hair was light brown with strands falling out of her ponytail and,
after she walked away from me, she whispered something through the order
window to somebody in the kitchen. I
got up at that point, thinking maybe I should order something else to placate
the restaurant staff, and that was when I noticed the sunlight hitting the
walls at a steeper angle, with a warmer tone to the sharp streaks – like
someone had set orange gels on the lights.
I had asked my cameraman for that exact effect on my last documentary
shoot.
Peeling the plastic wrap from my sandwich seemed to lull me back into
my previous numbness, because the next thing I remember was a tap on my
shoulder.
“Excuse me.”
My eyes realized they were staring out at snow on a distant peak and
then turned to refocus upon a tall fellow in a soiled apron leaning over me.
The girl from the till stood a few steps behind him wearing a sweater
and holding a purse in front of her. She
looked watchful. He smoothed his
hand back over his black hair.
“It’s the last gondola down. We’re
closing up.”
This fact, undeniable now that I could see I was the lone tourist in
the coffee shop and that a sliding partition barred my view to the souvenir
counter, shocked me. I stood up
clumsily, feeling as disoriented as I normally do on mornings when the radio
alarm clock blasts the Bosnian situation into my head while I am still
dreaming. Picking up my purse, an
old favourite I held onto despite its broken clasp, I caught the strap on the
side of the chair sending it flying and spraying the contents of my purse all
over the floor. Approximately
four lipsticks rolled in as many directions, a dusty roll of throat candies
smashed, my change purse flew open, pennies did rain from heaven, and the
birth control pill case broke. “You
are in Bear Country” and other National Parks brochures fluttered around me.
“I’m sorry, I can’t believe I did this.”
I started frantically trying to pick up my things from the floor.
The tall, aproned fellow handed me the birth control case, along with
one of the pills that had fallen from it.
“Thanks,” I said as I looked up and slammed my head into the
underside of the table.
The whack of my head caused an instant flood to my eyes. I quickly looked down and tried to blink fast enough to guide
my hands to a lipstick and hairbrush behind one of the chair legs.
The whole cleanup did not take long.
Apron Boy kept handing me
various items diligently and even Till
Girl set down her purse and picked up some of the change.
I nodded a thank you in her direction, but avoided his glance.
He had a sympathetic expression that I could already feel too keenly
and I was still having to blink an inordinate amount.
We climbed into the gondola along with a few other staff members who
appeared from the kitchen. I
turned to face the window and watched trees disappear above me as we descended
along the face of the mountain. After
we bumped past the first tower, I could not blink fast enough anymore and
tasted salt the whole, long ride down. Far
off, I could see the gondola’s small moving shadow darkening the treetops,
the only proof I could find that any of this day was real.
*
*
*