The Good Luck of Right Now(40)
“What is the point?”
“You’ll understand it one day, Bartholomew. Without my needing to explain it to you. You will understand. I promise.”
Richard Gere, I’m not sure I understand any better now than I did back then.
Even still, I’ve been wondering what good might have happened when Mom died to balance out the heavy bad of the hungry brain cancer squid ending her life. I’ve been trying to pretend that The Good Luck of Right Now produced something extremely beautiful when she passed, because Mom was full of love—enough to wipe out much, much bad. But I’m finding it hard to believe in her philosophy these days.
Father McNamee said nothing when I asked him about it on the beach the night after the funeral. And lately, given how manic he’s been acting, I’ve been too afraid to ask him again, or even say “The Good Luck of Right Now” to Father McNamee, because I get the sense that he’s having a hard time pretending himself, especially since he never brings up Mom’s philosophy anymore.
And yet, your being born during the same year that China became a threat to Tibet gives me hope, because maybe you were really conceived to equal out the bad the Chinese government would do to Tibet. It seems like proof. Too significant to be coincidental. Jung would agree here.
And if you were a response to China’s planning to invade Tibet, it helps me believe in Mom’s philosophy, which gives me hope for my own postmother future and life in general.
I found this Dalai Lama quote on the library Internet: “Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.” And it seems to agree with Mom’s mantra.
I also found this other Dalai Lama quote: “There is a saying in Tibetan, ‘Tragedy should be utilized as a source of strength.’ No matter what sort of difficulties, how painful experience is, if we lose our hope, that’s our real disaster.”
What do you think?
Can we find some common ground here, Richard Gere?
Maybe our letter correspondence will be the good that comes of Mom’s death?
Maybe you will help me move on to the “next phase of my life,” like Wendy wanted me to do, when she was still around, before we figured out her secret?
Stranger things have happened, I suppose.
And this is the only hopeful outcome I have available to me at the present moment. So it’s important for us to continue the pretending, even if we can’t believe 100 percent.
Your admiring fan,
Bartholomew Neil
11
I DIDN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT TYPE OF MATH MAX WAS USING HERE, BUT HE SEEMED SO EXCITED THAT I DIDN’T INTERRUPT HIM
Dear Mr. Richard Gere,
After Wendy left, Father McNamee ceased praying and began drinking even more heavily than previously described.
Jameson straight from the bottle—about a bottle a day.
He called it his “Irish purification ritual.”
Sometimes I’d hear him throwing up in the bathroom late at night, although he never left a mess. The toilet flushing over and over. And the retching reminded me of my mother at the end of her life, after the treatments—but, unfortunately, Mom hasn’t visited my dreams at all lately, so I haven’t been able to consult her.
I’d try to speak with Father McNamee through the locked bedroom door, asking if he needed assistance, but he only said, “I’m okay. Riding out the downswing. Just need to be alone.”
Like when Wendy was on the couch, I attempted to take care of Father McNamee the best I could, leaving grilled cheese sandwiches or ramen noodles by his door, which he sometimes ate in the middle of the night and sometimes left cold and untouched for me to take away in the morning.
I’d knock on his door before every meal and ask if he wanted to join me in the kitchen, but he would hold my eye for only the briefest of seconds before he looked away in silence. Sometimes he was in bed; other times he was standing, staring blankly out the window.
He wouldn’t talk at night either or take a walk with me or even listen to the birds’ symphony over morning coffee.
After a day or two of this, I began to worry.
I went to Saint Gabriel’s to seek help from Father Hachette.
I found him in the church office, playing solitaire on the computer, looking rather bored. As soon as Father saw me, he said, “Why weren’t you at Mass, Bartholomew? Your mother would be gravely disappointed in you.”
(Do you think that his using the word gravely to describe my dead mother’s theoretical disappointment was in poor taste?)
It’s true that Mom would not want me to miss Mass, and since I didn’t have a good answer for him, I tried to change the subject. “Father McNamee is not well.”
“Edna told me about your attempt to save her daughter,” Father Hachette said. “Quite dramatic. Quite dramatic indeed.”
“Why are you smiling?” I asked.
“I’m not smiling,” he said, even though he was clearly grinning, as if he knew a secret and enjoyed keeping it from me.
His yellow teeth looked like petrified pieces of corn, and the way he was looking at me made the wrinkles in his face appear deeper than usual—so cavernous, I wondered if he had to clean them with a Q-tip.
The little angry man in my stomach woke up and got to work.
“Are you not worried about Wendy?” I asked.