Pew(13)

Just having a walk is all, Kitty said. You know how I just love to see the garden at night. We were all out there walking together.



TUESDAY




ROGER SET A STACK of white paper and a box of colored pencils on the table before me, but I only wanted to stare out the window over the sink, watch the way the wind moved the big, flat leaves on that tree out there. Roscoe slept beneath the table. Roger kept telling me he had all day, we had all day, that we could just sit here doing nothing and that would be fine. Sometimes he’d roll a pencil toward me and suggest I could draw what I was thinking, to just relax and think about where I’d come from, to relax and think about who I was and what had happened before I got here.
It doesn’t have to be anything in particular. It can be abstract. Do you know what abstract means? It means it doesn’t look like anything real, just shapes that look like nothing, or maybe that look like a thought … or a feeling. Just shapes and colors, lines, whatever you like.
Roger picked up a sheet of paper, took out a gray pencil, and drew a large square. He looked at the square for a moment, then drew another square inside the first one. He slid the gray pencil carefully back in the box, took out a red pencil, and drew a red line through the center of both of the squares.
This is a picture of how I feel right now. And this is abstract, though I guess you could say it looks like something, sort of. You could say it’s a television screen or map or something, but it’s really not anything in particular. That’s what abstract means. Just feelings. Do you understand?
I nodded. Roger nodded. He looked down at his drawing, seemed to make some sort of decision about it, then put the page aside.
Would you like to have a try? Maybe you could draw something about how you’re feeling this morning or something you’ve felt in the past. Something about where you came from. Something you remember. It doesn’t have to be perfect. And you can start over as many times as you like—rip them up, throw out anything that doesn’t suit you. You can make as many drawings as you want.
I thought of that white heron I’d seen flying over the edge of a darkening row of trees, just after dusk, some night I couldn’t find a church and ended up sleeping in a field. Two herons had been there, waiting for something it seemed—always it seemed as if a heron was waiting on something to happen. I watched them until it was too dark to see anything.
I took a pencil and drew the shape of a heron flying some distance away. The paper was white and the pencil was white, but the faint shape of the heron—its wings, neck, head, body—made a smooth, raised shape on the page. I took a gray pencil and a blue pencil and filled in the rest of the page around the heron, filled it slowly with thin, hatched lines, then slid it across the table to Roger.
Thank you, he said, studying the page.
He said other things, said them all so quietly, carefully, explained something about the way that he works with his clients, what he does with the drawings, what they can tell him—what they can tell us both.
I listened but I did not listen. I avoided his eyes. Beneath the table the dog snored and sighed. Outside the branches on the tree had stopped moving, sat still as a photograph. Roger put more paper and pencils in front of me, asked me to draw what this drawing made me feel like. It can be abstract, he said. I felt some kind of sideways tilt in the middle of me.
Are you comfortable? And how are you feeling—are you feeling all right? Do you need any water, anything?
I shook my head.
All you need to do is try to remember what it was like to make this drawing. Can you do that for me? Just make a drawing about that drawing, a feeling about a memory. We’re just trying to create an understanding—do you understand? That’s what people do. We can’t live each other’s lives, and we can’t see each other’s memories or feelings, so we try to find ways to share them with each other. What is next to this memory for you? What are the other memories or feelings that sit close to it?
I thought of almost nothing. Roger watched me and made notes on a large yellow pad. I listened to the pencil whispering across the page. Roscoe was standing under the table, then jumped into my lap, and when Roger tried to pick the dog up, Roscoe just growled and snapped at him, then looked back up at me with still, watery eyes.
All right, Roscoe, have it your way, Roger said, but the dog did not respond to him in any way. Roscoe settled all his warm weight into my lap.
What has gotten into you? Roger asked the dog. The dog did not say. At least he likes you. Some people—I don’t know why—but he can’t stand most people.
I made no other drawings and had nothing else to say. Roscoe slept heavily in my lap and I watched the thick green leaves still or windblown all morning until Roger gave me a sandwich on a plate. Roger turned on the television in the corner with a remote and handed it to me. I put it down beside me and watched children eating bowls of cereal that made them grow wings and fly.
You can change the channel if you like. I’ll be in the other room doing some work. Hilda will be over in a few minutes to get you.
When I looked at the television again, the children were gone and a man with gray hair and a suit was speaking about life insurance. I ate the sandwich. On the television was a map of the town with an animated curdle of clouds moving across it. A woman appeared on the screen, smiling, and explained what she believed the sky would do for the next five days.
I finished the sandwich. A metallic, meaty aftertaste hung around in my mouth. Roscoe licked my hands, stopping to bark at the sound of the back door opening, but quickly returned to his task. We heard Hilda’s voice, a shutting door. Roger offered her a coffee. She declined.