You know that oft-quoted
Velveteen Rabbit book, and how it talks about being real, when your fur is all worn off and so on? I think I've been thinking about it, because I wrote this. Not knowing where else to put it, I'm putting it here. Enjoy.
My desk has a smudge on it. It’s blood—from one of the times I was chewing on my fingers and made them bleed, then forgot about it. Unfinished wood absorbs stuff really well, blood and oil and dust and grit, everything all at once. That’s why well-used furniture has that special sheen to it, a glow that can’t be imparted by any other process. Using things really does make them real—things and places and people and feelings.
Some days I just feel like I have to cry—you know those days? The days when the lump in your chest is trying to come up to your throat but too much swallowing hard is keeping it from making any progress. I have a picture of a painting of Madame Renoir, just called that,
Madame Renoir. Looking at it sometimes helps that lump get somewhere. You know the famous painter Renoir, with all those paintings of things and places mostly, and a few girls? This is one of his: a painting of a woman, robust and pink-cheeked, with a yellow hat and pink roses on it. She is not slim or necessarily very young, but she looks like a gardener, and she looks like she knows what she’s about. Her eyes look straight out at you, not shy or defiant, just there, like she’s seeing a friend. I found this print in a drawer in Montague, Massachusetts, at a bookstore which advertises “books you don’t need in a place you can’t find.” For all that, they have an awful lot of dedicated patrons.
Montague is an interesting place in itself. Population probably well under two thousand, they are known locally for their traditional Hallowe’en, done just like it used to be when we were kids—they draw hundreds of out-of-towners to see this living history work of love, put on by the people who see no reason to lock and shutter themselves out of existence. They are a mere two hours from Boston by car, and yet if you have never been to New England, you might not know it. New England is a rapidly changeable place—give yourself thirty minutes driving time and you can move from farms to city, or metropolis to quiet countryside. You can hike and ski and dance all within a 90 minute radius if you know where to look…and you can have a proper Hallowe’en and still be home in time for a Samhain circle at midnight. It’s all in there, everything shrunk down and fitted together like so many pieces of a puzzle.
I was in Boston last weekend, right downtown in a hotel I almost never left for four days. That’s sad—it makes two trips to Boston where I haven’t even gone as far as the ocean, which is right there, and I miss the ocean. It’s also sad because I get homesick going back. I know where I belong—somewhere between Boston and Maine, tucked into a small liberal town with a sense of humour and a sense of tradition. I can fit in other places, but knowing where you belong means you are never quite at home anywhere else.
Having a home is part of being real, and being real sometimes hurts. I don’t know what the balance point is, between being real and not taking care of yourself. I think most of us spend most of our lives trying to figure that out. I do know that I have a richer life because I keep my heart open and I let myself love people and places and ways of being. I could change, maybe if I wanted to, but I like myself better when I’m soft and gentle and unguarded. Leading a defended life doesn’t help me or anyone else, and I don’t like myself for doing it. I think living gently makes us stronger in the end, all of us.
You know that painting of Madame Renoir? I looked it up online. The original is in a museum of art in Philadelphia. I sure hope they know what they’ve got. Clear eyes that can see right through you aren’t a dime a dozen in paintings, or in art of any kind. She has a strength I wish I could claim as mine, too. He painted another picture of her over ten years later, this time with Bob, a tiny dog, cradled on her arm. The strength is still there.
