Don't Make Apple Sauce out of Us

‘I don’t know how to explain it without it sounding silly,’ she said.

         ‘Do you think it’s silly?’ I asked.

         ‘No!’ she said. ‘I think it’s wonderful.’

         ‘So, why should it sound silly?’ I asked.

         ‘I just don’t feel like things are any different than they were before,’ she said.

         ‘Do you think things should be different?’ I asked.

         ‘People expect things to be different so I feel silly to mention it since they aren’t any different,’ she said.

         ‘Do you not want to tell people?’ I asked.

         ‘I do want to because I’m very happy,’ she said. ‘But I don’t want to tell them if they are going think it’s silly.’

         ‘I don’t think anyone can take anything away from it,’ I said.

         ‘I know and I want to tell people,’ she said, ‘but I don’t want to tell them if they’re not going to get it because it’ll make me sad.’

         ‘How will they not get it?’ I asked.

         ‘Maybe they will think you don’t really care because you didn’t make a big thing out of it,’ she said, ‘or they will think I don’t really care because I don’t feel like things are any different now.’

         After this there was a pause and I waited for her to say more but then I realized that the call had dropped. I redialed but I got a busy tone because she was dialing me. I tried twice more and then I stopped and a moment later my phone rang.

         ‘We’re getting 20 percent now,’ she said.

         We had registered for a calling plan that gave certain discounts based on the day and time and location of the call. We were spending enormous amounts of money on airtime since she had moved to Zwedru and it had become our habit to start each call by announcing the discount even though it never influenced the duration.

         ‘Do you wish I had made a big thing out of it?’ I asked.

         ‘No. I like how you did it,’ she said, ‘and it’s not a big thing to me except everyone expects it to be.’

         ‘So you like the way it is and you want to tell people about it but you don’t want to tell them because you think they will think it’s silly even though it’s exactly how you want it to be?’ I asked.

         ‘Yes!’ she said. ‘That’s it exactly.’

         ‘You’re exhausting!’ I said.

She moaned and I continued.

         ‘Really I think you’re comparing apples to oranges,’ I said.

         ‘What do you mean?’ she said.

         ‘We all need excitement, right?’ I said.

‘Sure.’

‘I think it’s very hard to do exciting things because it takes lots of time and effort and certainly courage – like that friend of yours that’s mountain biking through Rwanda. I think it’s a lot easier to create excitement out of celebrating what we already have. Does that make sense?’

‘I guess it does,’ she said.

         ‘For me, I want us to celebrate what we have done – together,’ I said. ‘And I want us to make a life that will have plenty of things to celebrate.’

‘That’s what I want,’ she said. ‘I want us to have many, many doing things to celebrate. That’s what I’ve always wanted.’

‘Good,’ I said. ‘So maybe that’s why you don’t feel like it’s a big deal and nothing has changed.’

         ‘Ok, love,’ she said. ‘I’m with you on it.’

The line was silent. I thought she was thinking more about it was actually that the mobile phone network had cut into her end of the line.

‘It’s telling me I only have one minute left! Call me back! Call me back!’ she said and she immediately hung up.

I dialed her number and she answered before I heard the first ring.

‘You know you have a whole minute left when the message cuts in. You don’t have to be in such a rush,’ I said.

‘I know. I like to save it in case I need it before I have a chance to load new airtime,’ she said and without a breath she continued. ‘So I’m with you that it’s not a big deal and on the celebrating the doing. But what do I tell people when they ask why we’re not making a big deal of it?’

         ‘Tell them we’re oranges,’ I said.

         She thought about this and then she said, ‘Yeah, we’re oranges!’

         She thought about it for another moment and then she said, ‘But that’s not enough to tell them.’

‘I think you’re struggling with this because you’re trying to make our orange thing conform to an apple’s expectations,’ I said.

         ‘That’s exactly what I’m doing,’ she said. ‘I’m a closeted orange!’

         ‘Maybe you are,’ I said. ‘If you try to make it conform or you make excuses for it, it sounds like you don’t believe in it.’

         ‘But I do believe in it,’ she said. ‘It’s exactly what I want it to be.’

         ‘I believe you,’ I said.

         ‘So what should I do?’ she said suddenly sounding very tired.

         ‘Tell people or don’t tell people,’ I said. ‘Just don’t make apple sauce out of us!’

Usually When They Leave They're Gone

‘How often will she come back?’

‘She’ll be back for a week or so at the end of February and then about every five weeks after that,’ I said.

‘That’s not so long, I guess,’ he said.

‘Sometimes it seems very long time,’ I said.

He looked at me and I think he understood both my meanings.

‘Anyway, it already feels very long,’ I said.

Then my phone made a sound like a telegraph.

‘We’re going to spend a ton of money on text messaging,’ I said.

I retrieved my phone and read the message: ‘I’m getting a kitten here!’ I thought for a moment and then I typed out a reply with my thumbs. When I was done, I waited until I heard the sound like a rocket ship taking off and then I put the phone back in my pocket.

Lachlan sat on an upright wooden chair and he drank a cold beer and his boots were off. He wore shorts and a straw hat and dark sunglasses. It was just past midday and it was very hot but there was a nice breeze off the ocean, which we could see beyond the sand.

‘Is this where they go surfing?’ I asked.

‘It’s down that way past the trees,’ he said. ‘You go past the trees to Nana’s Guesthouse where there is camping and then past that there is a cove and that’s where they go surfing.’

‘And the surfing is really that good here?’ I asked.

‘Hell if I know,’ he said. ‘But these guys are from California so maybe they know something about it.’

He motioned to the other side of the long balcony where the owner and his few friends sat on a bamboo sofa with cloth covered foam cushions on it. The owner was dark with thick, wavy hair and a dark, thick growth from not shaving for several days. I thought he looked like he had slept on many sofas and in many youth hostels and even though he was a little older now he did not look any different. His friend was taller and much lighter with a heavy but very well manicured beard. He had a boy’s face and a hairless chest and then you saw the manicured beard and you thought that he wanted to appear rough but also not be. There was a woman who sat between them and she was lighter than the one but darker than the other so that she looked like she was put there intentionally to tie the room together. She sat there with her legs crossed and her big eyes and her many freckles all seemed to be focused intently on the blond one. He had been reading a book about the war in Vietnam and now he was talking about what he had read.

‘We could have gone straight for Hanoi in the first place and the war would have been won,’ he said, ‘but the military industrial complex had other ideas.’

‘He’s from California?’ I said.

‘Yeah,’ Lachlan said and I could tell that he was restraining himself as he listed to their conversation.

‘Actually, you know I’m from California and I really don’t understand surfing,’ I said.

‘Is it that complicated?’ he said.

‘I suppose the mechanics of it are straight forward enough,’ I said. ‘It’s the enjoyment that I don’t understand.’

‘Says the one who rides motorbikes in Liberia,’ he said.

‘OK. It takes all kinds,’ I said. ‘Anyway, I took surfing lessons a few years ago and I was quite disappointed.’

‘You grew up in California and you only just learned to surf a few years ago?’ he said.

‘Not all Californians are like this joker,’ I said.

‘So you learned to surf?’ he said.

‘Or took a few lessons, anyway, I said. ‘Here’s what I took from it. You paddle like hell to get out past the breakers, taking one face full of water after another. When you finally get out there, you’re too exhausted to do anything so you just float around for while. Then, when you’ve got your wind back and probably you’re starting to get bored, you paddle in and maybe you catch one. If you don’t, you’re in no man’s land and you’re going to get pounded by the next one so you’ve got to turn around and paddle your ass back out pretty fast. If you catch it and you can stand up, then maybe you get a ride and I suppose it’s fun enough and then it’s over. Then you either go in or you paddle like hell back out there and do the whole thing over again.’

We drank from our beers, which ran with condensation down the sides of the bottles and dripped on the floor. I untied my boots and pulled them loose at the ankles. Beneath, I saw that my socks had red stains where the sweat and the road dust had combined. We had arrived an hour or so before and I still wore my jeans, which were covered in the same red highway dust as my boots, my shirt, and my arms.

We had left early in the morning to avoid the traffic in the capitol and to have as much of the day here as possible because we would only stay the night. Lachlan and Nik drove the four-wheel drive with the NGO plates because it would have an easier time passing through the checkpoints. I drove behind on the motorbike because they had a full back seat and because I preferred to ride. From my apartment we went through downtown and across the bridge. After the bridge we drove through Bushrod Island where we passed through Vai Town and Clara Town and past the brewery, following Mamba Point Road with only a detour to avoid Duala Market. After the Brewery the road crossed another bridge and opened onto a highway. It was good tarmac and it was straight most of the way until we reached the immigration checkpoint at Klay.

Nearing the checkpoint, Nik slowed and, she slowing, I pulled alongside as though to overtake. This is how the motorcycle taxis drive here and I had mimicked them so that maybe the four-wheel drive would obscure me from the immigration officers. There was nothing to hide because my papers were in order as well as they can be in a developing country, but a white man on a motorbike is a target and the ride had been very pleasant thus far.

After the checkpoint we turned left and followed this new segment of good highway over another river until where it split off southwest. Then we passed another checkpoint and at the junction we pulled off so that Lachlan could take the driver’s seat.

‘The tarmac ends up ahead,’ he said as I pulled alongside. ‘Do you want to lead so you don’t catch our dust?’

I nodded and I accelerated ahead, over a rise, and down the other side, slowing just before the tarmac ended and the road became graded dirt and pebbles. It can be very tricky to drive a motorbike at speed on a dirt road and it was my first time on this one. Motorcycles that are made for this are usually quite light, have a high center of gravity, and almost always they have a long suspension and deeply treaded tires called knobbies. My motorcycle was light enough but it had very little suspension and street tires with only enough tread to channel the rain away.

I ran it at near 70 kmh and I saw in my mirrors that Lachlan maintained plenty of distance. As long as I stayed straight and perfectly vertical the bike skimmed fast over the pebbly surface. At bends in the road, I kept the front wheel straight and I steered with slight shifts of my body to influence the rear wheel. After some kilometers, we took a short break at a clearing beside Lake Piso. Then, afterwards the road became more gravelly so that the pebbles acted like ball bearings under my tires. I cut my speed to 40kmh and this helped but not completely. The gravel covered the whole road and it was hard to find good lines particularly where the bends were flanked by dense vegetation. After an hour we arrived at Robertsport where the tarmac resumed. At the intersection by the petrol station we turned away from the downtown, which was only a narrow street of small restaurants and storefronts. At the next street we turned seaward and we continued straight until we reached the guesthouse.

‘How was it?’ Lachlan said when we both had parked.

‘Good fun,’ I said. ‘There were a few hairy moments that you might have noticed.’

After lunch we walked into town and took beers at a small entertainment center beside where the lake joins with the ocean. We sat around a large plastic table and we ordered Club Beers that were served cold and in extra large bottles. It was a typical place with African hip-hop playing too loud over a too weak sound system and further distorted by the thundering of a nearby generator. The noise made it so that speaking was a chore. One person might raise his voice to make a passing observation but most of the others around him would not hear it. So, he might repeat himself with more effort or another might relay the message. Then, the others would smile and nod and decide that responding was not worth the exertion.

         On the way back to the guesthouse, we stopped at another entertainment center where the music was quieter and the generator was better removed from the sitting area. The others, which were Nik’s visiting workmate, a friend, and the friend’s houseboy, decided to continue back to the guesthouse and then to enjoy the beach during the hot afternoon. We order beers and we sat a little easier because it was quieter and there were fewer people to try to include.

         ‘I haven’t made a decision about her yet,’ I said, ‘but she has one of those tone deaf voices that is always loud and never changes its pitch.’

         ‘I guess it’s really been OK but it feels like it’s going to be a long five weeks of having her in the house,’ Lachlan said.

         ‘Mostly she’s been doing her own thing but for things like this it’s hard to tell her we’re taking a trip and not invite her along,’ Nik said.

         ‘Is she helping out at the school at all?’ I said.

         ‘She pokes around in the classrooms and tries to give suggestions,’ Nik said. ‘The other day she spent some hours barefoot at the river and she came back wanting to put on a musical or puppet show or something.’

         ‘Well, send me an invitation,’ I said.

         ‘Maybe you’ll want to sponsor it,’ Lachlan said.

         ‘Now there’s a thought,’ I said.

         After the beers we walked back to the guesthouse. The sun was still strong but it was lower and the breeze was nice. We changed into our bathing suits and laid our towels at the top before where the sand slopes into the water. I listened to an audiobook and then I fell asleep for a while.

         ‘I slept,’ I said when I woke up.

         ‘Yes you did,’ Nik said.

         ‘I didn’t snore, did I?’

         ‘You did a little,’ she said.

         ‘I don’t snore and don’t tell Jess that,’ I said.

         The sun was very low now and it was becoming dusk. Nik and Lachlan went back to the guesthouse and I stayed a while longer and put my feet in the water. At the guesthouse the lights were on now and the guests had returned from the beach and others had come just for dinner. The guesthouse felt a lot like a youth hostel and the conversation seemed to fit only most were probably too old to stay in youth hostels.

‘It’s a lot to pay for not having flushing toilets or running water and to use a solar camp shower,’ I sent in one of my text messages to Jess when she asked how it was going.

‘Look at who has become so particular,’ she replied.

‘It’s just a lot to pay for that,’ I sent back to her.

The dinner was rice and sauce and fried plantains and grilled barracuda. It was quite good and I added local chili sauce to it so that the rice became very spicy and the sweat began to drip from my forehead. ‘Are you happy now?’ is what Jess would have said, I thought, and I missed the ribbing that she would have given me. We drank Tiger beer and after dinner we moved to the balcony and we each took another bottle. Soon the guesthouse quieted and the generator went off and we sat on the balcony in the white light of a solar lantern.

         ‘The house belonged to an NGO before they took over the lease,’ the houseboy said. ‘I was a beneficiary of the NGO when they were here. They helped to put me through secondary school when I came back from Sierra Leone after the war. Last year they closed the office and went back to Texas. They brought some of the beneficiaries with them to attend university. When they took over this place to make the guesthouse they gave me a job. It is good but I am waiting that soon the NGO will bring me to Texas for university with the others.’

         ‘I wonder if they’ll send him to university,’ Nik said when he had gone to fetch something.

         ‘I hope so,’ I said but my thoughts were less optimistic: usually when they leave, they’re gone.

The next morning, Nik and Lachlan took a stroll on the beach before breakfast. From the balcony I saw him put his arm around her and then they held hands. I thought it looked nice and it made me think about Jessica and I sent her a text message.

‘It’s really nice of them to invite me along but somehow I feel like it’s too soon,’ the message said.

Better that than sitting around the house getting drunk in your underwear, I thought after I hit send.

When they came back the others in their group were ready to go.

‘I guess that’s the signal,’ I said to Lachlan when they returned.

‘Actually it’s just as well,’ he said. ‘I got a call from my boss early this morning. He needs me to put together a presentation for some investors. It’s the usual pitch but it needs some attention.’

When they left I walked along the beach to the cove where the surfers go. There were a few of them clustered at the far end of the cove near the rocks. The break did not look so good and when they caught a wave they had to peel off before long to avoid the rocks. I stood and I watched this and I stopped listening to the book that was being read over my earphones.  It was a nice beach and beautiful day and I felt very alone. Then, in a moment, I felt my pocket vibrate and I heard the sound of a telegraph.

‘Good morning, love,’ the message read. ‘I will be coming back at the end of February when the supervisor goes on vacation.’

I started to type a response and then I cancelled it.

‘I was just thinking of you!’ I said after I dialed her number and the call connected.

‘I’m always thinking of you,’ she said.

‘Well, I’m always thinking of you more.’

Lying in a Ditch Somewhere

Jess:  Have you spoken to Eric lately?

Me:    No.

Jess:  What if something happened to them?

Me:    Like what?

Jess:  I don’t know. Like something bad?

Me:    I don’t think so.

Jess:  Well, did they go on their trip?

Me:    Sure.

Jess:  Well how do you know?

Me:    I suppose I don’t.

Jess:  Are you sure nothing happened to him?

Me:    Yeah, I’m sure.

Jess:  But you haven’t heard from him?

Me:    No.

Jess:  I thought you were good friends.

Me:    Very good.

Jess:  But if you don’t talk for so long?

Me:    We don’t need to.

Jess:  What does that mean?

Me:    It means that we talk when we want to.

Jess:  It doesn’t bother you that it has been a while?

Me:    There’s no quota.

Jess:  OK, but still how do you know nothing happened to him?

Me:    I don’t think so.

Jess:  But couldn’t he be lying in a ditch somewhere?

Me:    Could be.

Jess:  But you don’t think so?

Me:    No.

Jess:  How can you know?

Me:    I suppose I can’t.

Jess:  Then how are you so easy about it?

Me:    Bad news travels fast.

Jess:  So when will you hear from him?

Me:    When he wants to write.

Jess:  Couldn’t you call him?

Me:    Sure. If I feel like it.

Jess:  So that’s how it goes then?

Me:    For years.

Jess:  Ugh! Boys!

You're All Used Up

‘I mean I haven’t seen my brother in years, you know,’ Jess’s friend says. ‘Not since he finally got off drugs and went with his girlfriend to live in Newfoundland. I wanted them to stay with my parents so that I could have my space and I could visit them but then I could also come home to escape.’

Jess in downtown Toronto

She takes a strong pull from her lager and she continues her story. I am sitting across from her and Jess is beside me and another of her old friends is across from her. I am drinking a Smithwicks, which is a dark, strong English beer. It is very cold and very full tasting and I am enjoying it very much because it is what I used to drink at the Crown and Anchor in New Orleans and also it is a lot better than anything I have had lately.

‘But, fine, I said I’d have him and his girlfriend stay with me and so I went to meet them at the airport. But, you know, as soon as I see them come out of the baggage claim, I am totally regretting this. Before they even reach me, I can tell from his expressions that he is the same lunatic as before!’

She is vivid and very alive as she speaks and she has a bright face that compliments her mannerisms. We hang on her words and we listen without realizing that we smile because she is a great storyteller. I look at Jess and I see that she is smiling and I think that she is pleased to be here for a time with these two old friends. I take another pull from my Smithwicks and I feel it go down coldly and fully to my stomach.

‘We’re not even at the subway yet and he is complaining so loudly about each one of the people around him. He speaks so fast, and he’s impossible to follow because his brain is so scattershot. And he’s rude – especially to his girlfriend. He is so rude to her! I mean, it’s overwhelming to be around. And it’s infuriating too. I want to shake him and say, “Calm the fuck down!”’

I am smiling because I am very amused and I reach for my Smithwicks to take another good pull. Before I do, a feeling stops my hand halfway to my mouth and I put the pint glass back on the table. Then I feel that my stomach goes hollow and then it begins to turn over. A bending happens in my gut and my senses all change as though my whole body is focused only on what is happening there. It might just pass, I think, but I know this signal well enough even if I am not yet ready to accept it. I look around the table and I see them very engaged in the story and they are laughing at something that I have not heard. I smile to play along and I try to focus on the words but I feel the table growing wider between us.

‘Love, are you feeling OK?’ Jess says.

She has looked to me during the story and she has noticed my complexion change. She is concerned and her face looks very lovely that way.

‘No,’ I say. ‘I am bad.’

‘Will you be OK?’

‘Let’s wait and see what happens,’ I say.

When the waitress comes I do not order but I ask her to refill my water.

‘Will you want to have some bread or something from my dinner?’ Jess asks.

‘Not if I continue to feel like this,’ I say.

In a few minutes, beads of sweat have sprouted on my nose and my hairline is damp. My stomach turns over on itself and now I know for certain what will happen. I have only to wait for it. When it comes, I excuse myself to the restroom. In the stall, I do not wait long and, when it comes, it is quite easy at first. When it passes I feel better but I am not relieved the way I hope to be, so I know I am not finished with it. At the sink, I wash the foul taste from my mouth and I scrub my face clean with the hand soap. When I return to the table the conversation is stopped and they look at me very sympathetically.

‘Are you OK, love?’ Jess says.

‘I am sick,’ I say.

‘Oh no,’ she says. ‘Did you?’

‘Yes I did.’

‘Do you think it was the sushi from lunch?’

‘Yes,’ I say.

‘Then it was probably the tuna,’ she says, ‘because that’s the only one that we didn’t share.’

CN Tower at night

‘Probably,’ I say.

‘But you were fine all evening at the CN Tower.’

‘Yes. It was not until I had a few sips of beer,’ I say.

‘It must have set something off,’ she says.

‘Must have.’

‘Should we go?’ she says.

‘No,’ I say, ‘this is your last chance to visit and, besides, it's not over yet.’

‘OK,’ she says, ‘but you’ll tell me when?’

‘Yes,' I say. 'I’ll tell you when.'

Jess’s friends look sympathetically at me and I smile as best I can. I remember how I was frequently sick for months after Hurricane Katrina. I had thought it was a virus until the pattern emerged that it was from the stress of the hours and the work pressure. I remember that I had hating always being sick but even more I had hated being seen as the one who is always sick. Jess’s friends dote on me and their sympathy reminds me of that, and then the one who sits across from me resumes her story.

Damn bad luck! I think as I sip water and try to follow the conversation over the revulsions of my stomach. It is a few months since I have taken to eating sushi. We have gone several times to the restaurant at the Mamba Point Hotel and each time I have enjoyed the new experience and my stomach has been fine. Now we have come home to where food is delivered fresh and there are actual quality standards and this is when I get sick. Probably I will appreciate the irony later, I think.

In a few minutes the meals arrive. The girls begin to eat and Jess asks if it would help to have some bread.

‘No,’ I say. ‘Water is even too much.’

‘I feel so bad to be eating,’ the other of Jess’s friends who is not the storyteller says.

‘Don’t feel bad,’ I say.

The girls eat and the one of Jess’s friends who is the storyteller continues to speak. It has become an epic but it is still engaging, though I have lost the thread and can only sip water. I was fine all evening after the sushi until I had this drink of beer. Bad luck, I think. I mean, all evening I was fine at the CN Tower.

View from the CN Tower

We had gone after the sushi and I was fine waiting in line to take the elevator to the lookout at top. Then at the top, we stood beside the thick windows and we saw the scattered lights across the city and the dark emptiness where you are seeing Lake Ontario. Jess took a few pictures with the view behind me and then we took the elevator to the Sky Pod and she took a few more. Then we did not know what else to do so we joined another line in order to take the elevator back down. At the bottom there was only the gift shop so put on our hats and our gloves and went out into the cold.

‘It was a lot of waiting in lines,’ I had said when we were outside again.

‘Yes, love,’ Jess had agreed. ‘That’s all I remember.’

After a few minutes the signal has returned and I excuse myself again. This time there are two people in the restroom and one occupies the stall. I delay at the sink until the one at the urinal leaves and then I pace. In another minute, the one in the stall finishes and then he leaves. I enter the stall and I can feel my stomach turning heavily over. Then I hear the door swing open and footsteps approach the urinal. I feel the sickness rising and I spit into the bowl because maybe it will buy me some time. In another moment the one at the stall finishes and then I am alone.

It comes quickly now and it takes half of everything I have. When it has taken the half and there is a break, I hear the door open again and another one goes to the stall. I flush because it seems like the right thing to do. I have half left to give and the stopping and the holding on is making me feel even worse. Then the one at the stall finishes. There is a flush and then the water from the tap and finally I am alone again.

         The sickness comes again and it takes the half that is left. When it is done I am sweating and tearing and my bones feel hollow. As I clean myself, another one comes in and goes to the stall but I do not notice him. When I am washed and I have mostly dried off, I return to the table.

         ‘Oh, love, you look awful!’ Jess says.

         ‘I have experienced a lot,’ I say.

‘Yes, love, you look very "experienced",’ she says.

‘This last was a bad one and I was interrupted because people came in.’

         ‘Let’s go then,’ she says.

         ‘No, I will hold out a little longer.’

         The story has ended now and they are talking about something else but I can pay no attention. In a little while, some friends of Jess’s friend who is not the storyteller come, and then another of Jess’s friend comes a while after that. The friend who comes last is the one who I have been told hopes to open a tattoo parlor. Also, I am told that she has made a very good canvas of her body, but I have forgotten all about that.

         I look around and I see that the group is very large and I watch the waitress replace the empty glasses with full ones.

‘I’m all used up,’ I say to Jess after I think she has had enough time to spend with the friend whose body is a canvas.

‘OK, we’re going,’ she says. ‘You have been very strong!’

‘Yes, I have,’ I agree, ‘but I’m all used up now.’

‘Come on, we’ll take a cab home.’

‘No,’ I say, ‘a cab will be expensive. I’ll be ok on the subway.’

‘Of course not!’ she says. ‘You’re sick and you’re being silly.’

‘I can hold out,’ I say.

‘No, love, you’re all used up, remember?’

My Ultimate Minimalism

Jess in front of her parents' home in day-after-Christmas snow

‘Is it time to open presents?’ Jess’s nephew Payton asks again – it has been his refrain for tonight.

         ‘Yes. It is time,’ Jess’s sister Lillian says finally.

         We have all finished the fondue that is a Swiss and Ferndriger tradition. Lillian has kept Payton at bay as long as she can. She watches over the new baby, Xavier, while Payton races past towards the tree. Jess sits next to me and talks to her mother. She is very tired but she has this little bit left. I am in a conversation with her father and Lillian’s husband, Matt. Her father is talking about their travels to Spain and Canada when they were younger and Matt is talking about American football and many other things. I am exhausted from the jetlag and from the new kind of eating and now from trying to make a good impression while following the thread of two conversations.

When we arrived everyone was already there. Lillian had given birth only two days before and she and Matt and Payton had come with the new baby nearly straight from the hospital. It is very curious how so much excitement can surround something that is almost always asleep. Xavier slept eyes tight and soundly beside the sofa and Lillian sat close by. Matt greeted us at the door and helped to bring our luggage in. Jess’s mother was preparing the fondue and at the top of the steps her father came to meet me and shake my hand.

‘He caught me in a bad handshake,’ I say when we are in Jess’s room getting sorted before sitting down to dinner.

‘Who did?’ Jess asks. She is changing into her flannel pajama bottoms because she is practically allergic to wearing outside clothes when she is home in the evening.

‘Your dad did,’ I say.

‘What do you mean?’

‘He sort of, you know, gripped the ends of my fingers instead of my palm.’

‘How did that happen?’ she says.

‘He caught me when I wasn’t ready or at a bad angle or something,’ I say.

‘Well which was it?’

‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘It all happened so fast.’

‘Aww. It’s OK, love,’ she says. ‘I’m sure he didn’t notice.’

‘I’m sure he did notice,’ I say. ‘It’s exactly the kind of thing that a father would notice about the guy who’s dating his daughter.’

 At the dinner table Jess eats and talks to her mother and is mostly quiet. She checks in with me occasionally but she is not following the plan.

‘What about the plan?’ I will ask her later. ‘You were supposed to run interference, remember?’

‘I know, I know. I’m awful!’ she says, ‘but I was so tired and I was overwhelmed too, you know.’

For dinner we each have strips of raw beef and pork and chicken on our plates. We have a small skewer each with a different color at the end of the handle.

‘You remember your color or else you might take someone else’s meat,’ Jess’s father explains.

‘It’s my favorite meal,’ Matt says and I see that he has an entire steak in large slices on his plate.

I skewer a strip of beef and I place it in the pot on a stand in the center of the table. The pot is filled with an oily sauce, which is kept at a boil by the fire from the burner beneath it. We leave the skewered meat in the fire for a few minutes while we take appetizers of olives and bread and cheese and other garnishes. After the meat has boiled in the oil for some minutes we check it and if it is not fully cooked we let it sit longer before we eat it. It is a new kind of eating for me and I like it very much. I eat slowly and so I am the one to scrape the sides of the pot at the very end.

During dinner I take a beer and afterwards Jess’s father offers me a glass of Jack Daniel’s. I am very grateful because it is exactly what I like. It tastes good because I am very tired and because my last bottle has finished two weeks before and I am too long without it. I ask if Jess’s father will take one with me but he says that he chooses not to anymore. We converse at the table for a while longer until I hear Lillian give in to Payton: ‘Yes. It is time.’ Then I feel Jess grab me by the arm and pull me away from my chair and down to the ground where we sit on the rug between the sofa and the Christmas tree. It is a moment before I realize that this is the moment that I have been waiting for more eagerly, I am sure, than Payton has.

We each receive and open gifts in a loosely coordinated merry-go-round fashion. My first is the ‘stocking’ and it is a bag of chocolate truffles, and a Toblerone, and a box of Belgian chocolate seashells. My next is tall and heavy and contains a large bottle of Jack Daniel’s. These are from Jess’s parents and I try through tired eyes to show my surprise and gratitude. Next is the box from Amazon that holds the two books on Adventure Motorcycling and a DVD on Dual Sport Riding Techniques. This one is from Jess and me to ourselves but I am sure I will be the one to enjoy it more. Last is the most important one, though of course it comes in the smallest box.

         Most everything I own fits into two suitcases and three cardboard boxes, which are in storage back home. Everyday clothing is in one suitcase and winter and formal wear is in another. The cardboard boxes contain camping and sporting goods, books and albums, and yearbooks and other mementos. I have always been tidy and somehow existentially concerned by my material footprint. Your things are an extension of you – I surmised at one point in my early twenties – and, if they are many or untidy, then the same will be true for your mind. But, after Hurricane Katrina, when I shared a cruise ship berth and lived out of a rucksack for six months, my penchant for minimalism became a survivalist instinct.

This doctrine was a shrewd philosophy for a time, but slowly I came to suspect that, the fewer the things I had and the more selectively I acquired them, the more those things become a necessity in themselves. This suspicion became enshrined as law when, six weeks before, my beloved iPhone suddenly died.

It happened when I foolishly plugged it directly into an outlet that was supplied by a Chinese generator. It shut off and, when I turned it back on, it was unable to boot up. This was at Lachlan and Nik’s house and the loss of my iPhone made an already difficult day even more so. When we got home and for several days after, I checked all the forums and scoured the online support and I twice called the Apple hotline. After following all the recommended courses, it was determined that my Mistress 3 (two iPods bore the name previously) could not be resuscitated. After lamenting the loss and further lamenting the cost of DHL, I shipped the corpse home for replacement under the one-year warrantee.

The six weeks since then had been as difficult as any before or since. I borrowed an old Sony Ericsson from Jess to make phone calls. In most ways it was OK except that the microphone was very bad. I would place a call and, after receiving an answer, I would be halfway through my first sentence before I would hear, ‘Hello? Hello? Anybody there?’ For music and audiobooks and podcasts, at first I tried to go without. I decided that it might be Zen-like to reduce the noise, except that, without the noise, you remember how boring most things are. So next I borrowed Jess’s old Chinese-made mp3 player.

‘Boy, we have truly fallen,’ I said when I conceded to try it out.

But it had a very finicky connector so that the slightest disturbance during a transfer and you lost everything. Also, it has a terrible interface and it could not remember your position in a track, which made a 10-plus hour audiobook very difficult to get through. Finally, I borrowed Jess’s newer Sony mp3 player and this worked well enough but it just was not the same.

Our memories of Christmas eve in Toronto

Somehow the days and weeks passed and now we are in Toronto visiting Jess’s family. We have just arrived and it is Christmas and my new Mistress is here in a box that Jess’s mother has wrapped in holiday paper. I peel off the paper and tear open the box. Inside is my ultimate minimalism. It is new in its case and it turns right on when I press it. I see the glow from the screen and I take a breath and I am comforted.

Then I put it down. I look around the room. Matt is telling a story and there is Payton with his new video game, and there is a new excitement around the baby who has woken up for the first time this evening. I look back at my iPhone and I realize that I have not any excitement left in me. Maybe tomorrow, I think, but right now I am just paid out. 

So, I sit back next to Jess against the leg of the sofa. She smiles dully at me, which is the best acknowledgement she can muster, and we stay like that until everyone has left or is gone to bed.