OF MUTTS AND MEN

or

The J.J. Chronicles

Cate Garrison

BUY THE BOOK AT http://www.lulu.com/content/2059586

 Chapter One

No Pets Please: I’m British

“Y ou’re English,” said my recently acquired American husband. “You need a

dog.” And he left for work. Alone, I took stock.
That I was English was undeniable; the labyrinth of entry requirements through which I
had recently dragged myself and my two younger sons had left no doubt about my
foreignness. Less than two months had elapsed since, tired and jet-lagged, we had been
bundled with a motley crew of other hopeful immigrants into a windowless room at
SeaTac airport, where we were duly fingerprinted, photographed, and rubber stamped by
an unsmiling immigration officer. We clutched our newly minted green-cards proudly,
until we finally slid along the moving walkways of Portland International and into the
arms of my native-born, sponsoring spouse.
That I needed a dog was more debatable. With my first husband, the out-of-work
actor, father of my eldest son, Ben (a young man who had chosen, temporarily I hoped, to
stay back in England and finish his high school education), I had owned a cat. We were
living at the time in a country hovel in Suffolk, the only accommodation we could afford
within reach of the capital and its promise of West End success. This choice of residence
proved disappointing for a couple of reasons. First, the proximity to London proved
immaterial to a would-be thespian too unsure of himself to attempt either to acquire an
agent or attend an audition. And second, we were not the only inhabitants. The
exponentially exploding mouse population that shared our cottage had forced us to select
a likely-looking killer kitten from a neighbor’s river-bound litter.
This creature, whom we mistakenly named Cato before we learned her gender,
grew rapidly into a large, white, grumpy old lady with only two tricks. Though she never
did more than toy with the resident mice (who admittedly died occasionally of heart-
failure), she brought rats and rabbits home at regular intervals and laid them on the stairs,
dead or half-alive, as if to offer them up for the cooking pot. When I staggered down
each morning to make the extra-strong, black coffee that would keep me sane while, as a
part-time lecturer at a college some thirty miles away, I earned just enough to keep my
would-be Sir Laurence Olivier, his dreams, our infant child and myself alive, I would
frequently step on a still-warm rodent and begin the day with a scream. The cat’s only
other accomplishment was to swipe at my toddler’s chubby calves whenever he tried to
stroke her. When she tried to do battle with a passing Morris Minor and failed, the tears I
shed had more than a whiff of crocodile.
My second husband, the impoverished artist and father of my two youngest lads,
already possessed a doddery old Yellow Labrador when he and I first met. She was a
sweet-natured, friendly dog, who enjoyed wet, sloppy kissing, barking at anything louder
than a falling leaf, and engaging visitors in playful crotch sniffing. Member of a breed
best known for copious shedding, she had, in addition, a skin complaint that made her
hair come out literally in handfuls. I spent hours vacuuming the carpet, a task I hated
with the same force I applied to all other housewifely chores but which, for some reason,
still fell to me regularly while my spouse, like his predecessor, consulted his Muse.
Despite our relatively high-powered machine, I felt as though I were driving a tiny,
battery-powered blower through endlessly accumulating drifts of Alpine snow. And like
snow, the newly fallen hair quickly covered all traces of its previous removal. The Lab
lived with us until she was a lumpy, bumpy, grizzled, bewildered nineteen-year-old and
our marriage a similarly endowed and also itchy seven. At her demise, we rediscovered
our rugs and chairs actually had color, though the blush of our romance had long since
faded.
Apart from six iterations of a recently departed (and departed, and departed…)
family goldfish (the first won at a local fair, the last buried eight weeks later with due
solemnity and a headstone, his demise having coincided with a holiday weekend when all
the stores were closed), the only other pet I had known well was my first son Ben’s
gerbil, given to him one birthday by my mother, acting as usual against my will. We
were living at the time in a tiny village of about twenty houses and a pub, in the northeast
of England. I had moved there in pursuit of a better paid, full-time job, a senior
lectureship with actual tenure in the French department of a moderately-sized college,
which I thought would leave me plenty of time to raise Ben in accordance with what I
thought of as the “true values” (including a hard day’s work for an honest day’s pay). My
divorce from his father had been perfectly friendly; we didn’t even quarrel about such
things as child support. My ex contributed when and what he could, and when he
couldn’t, I didn’t bug him. My apparent generosity stemmed mainly from knowledge
that a mostly “resting” actor’s life meant there was often no support to be had, but also
from that innately female sense of guilt that the breakup was my fault. The end of my
tether had been rendered tangible to me by the fact that those lines from John Keats
buzzed permanently round my head like one of those songs you can’t get rid of:

Love in a hut with water and a crust

Is,…Love forgive us!...cinders, ashes, dust.

And dust, as I say, was a by-product of life with which I was disinclined to cope.

Of course Ben saw his father regularly, not only because we scraped enough funds
together to fly him as an unaccompanied minor down to London (where my ex now
lived) for a long weekend each month, but also because my formerly bashful spouse had
somehow overcome his fear of rejection and found paying jobs in TV commercials (a
medium for which he had expressed artistic distaste during the whole of our relationship).
I have to admit that, although I suffered the odd, unattractive twinge of resentment, I also
felt a certain pride when I saw his blue-eyed, blond, white-toothed physiognomy (a face
inherited almost without alteration, except for the single-dimpled cheek and one-sided
smile I’d given him, by our potential lady-killer son) exhorting me to buy toothpaste or
gin. I even bragged a little at work whenever someone mentioned a new ad. (“You mean
that cute guy who’s holding the bottle of Tanqueray? I used to be married to him.”)
The proximity to my mother, and indeed my original birthplace, was entirely co-
incidental. It was also irrelevant, as we rarely saw each other except for those rare
occasions when she would swoop down like Lady Bountiful to dispense largesse to what
she called “my poor grandson.”
“The child is lonely without his father,” she’d tell me often, although Ben’s good
looks and outgoing personality made him a favorite with both his friends and mine. “You
should let him have a pet.”
“I don’t have time to take care of an animal. And neither does he. He has
homework. And friends.”
“There are animals that don’t need much care, Catherine. They are simply there.”
My mother always used my full name, which I loathed, when she really wanted to make
her point. I supposed she based her animal-husbandry information on her knowledge of
daughters (or in her case, daughter).
And thus it was that the gerbil came into our lives, along with an ancient birdcage
she had found in the attic.
“They were offering the creatures free at the local school,” she said. “And I had
the cage anyway. Your grandmother gave you that budgerigar, remember? Silly bird.
And I’d only opened the cage to clean him. Lucky I kept the thing really. I knew you
would say you had nowhere to house this poor animal. Any excuse!”
The fact that the gift had cost her nothing didn’t endear her, or the gerbil, to me.
But I have to admit, however begrudgingly, that Ben for some reason really did love them
both. He thanked his grandmother with an enthusiasm I’d rarely seen, certainly towards
any gifts I’d given him. The gerbil he immediately named Tarzan after his favorite comic
book hero. For the next three weeks he spent all his free hours talking to the animal
through the bars of the cage and stroking him with his index finger. The creature seemed
to respond to his ministrations--at least it didn’t scratch or bite him.
“Tarzan really loves me, I think,” he told me one morning shortly before his next
regularly scheduled visit to the Big City and his increasingly prominent actor dad. “I
don’t think Cato ever did.”
His understanding of failed relationships left me speechless. He smiled that one-
sided, single-dimpled smile I knew from my own mirror.
“I really wish I didn’t have to leave him next weekend. Do you think Dad would
mind if I canceled?”
I felt a little hurt that he didn’t seem to trust me with his pet. Besides, I had
planned on spending a little child-free time with someone I had just met, an aquiline-
nosed, bespectacled, studious- looking but personable guy who had turned up in one of
my adult French conversation classes, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and ready to learn.
“It’s the language of Manet and Monet,” my attractive new student told me when
it was his turn to introduce himself at the first session, fixing me with the cool, green-
eyed, penetrating stare that was his trademark. “I want a closer understanding of them
and their culture. I’m an artist too.”
 My choice of men had always tended towards those with a creative streak. But
this one, unlike my ex, seemed willing to put effort into his chosen craft. And where the
actor had been broody and saturnine, for all his fair and bubbly looks, this man was witty
and talkative. I was interested. He’d invited me over on this particular Friday evening
after I’d delivered my son to the airport, to see his paintings and cook dinner for me.
There was no rule against dating students one’s own age, at least none that anyone could
care about. Besides, the idea of having some man actually prepare a meal for me was
utterly irresistible. The actor and I been equally poor performers in the kitchen.
“I can’t believe I’m actually falling for an invitation to see someone’s etchings,”
I’d said as I accepted, though the truth of the implied ulterior motive in the old cliché
escaped neither of us. So it was not entirely selflessly that I explained to Ben that his dad
would be sad if he didn’t show up.
“Your dad expects you every month,” I told my earnest-looking little boy as he
scratched his pet’s nose through the bars of the ancient cage. “He’d be disappointed if
you didn’t come. We promised him. You know it isn’t polite to break a promise. And I
promise you I’ll take good care of Tarzan.”
I was true to my word. Before I left on my date, I made sure the food and water
bowls were full. I even said goodbye. And the first thing I did when I returned in the
wee small hours of Saturday was check on the animal’s well-being and cheer him with a
friendly greeting.
“Well, I for one have had a good time, Tarzan, my old love. Pretty good meal.
Fabulous wine. And if you promise not to tell Ben, I’ll confess there was a fairly
promising smooching session for dessert. I hope you’ve spent your evening even half as
productively.”
I stared at him blearily through the bars and blew him one of my few remaining
kisses. Then I stopped in my tracks. There was something unusual about the creature.
Though my own eyes weren’t focusing as well as usual, I could tell his right one was red
and swollen. In addition, it seemed to have lost a good part of its surrounding fur.
I rushed for the phone book and called the vet. In my slightly tipsy panic, I’d
forgotten the hour. A very sleepy male voice answered on the fourth ring.
“It’s my son’s gerbil,” I spluttered. “His eye is red.”
For a long moment there was silence at the other end of the line. Then, mostly in
words of one syllable, many of them just four letters long, the on-call veterinarian
explained to me, though I cannot say patiently, that, unless my animal were a cow in
labor, I would be foolish to expect a house call.
“But Ben--he’s my little boy--will be home on Sunday evening,” I said, by now
weeping. “I can’t let him see Tarzan in this state.”
I suppose I wasn’t listening very well. I’m sure no self-respecting veterinarian
could possibly have suggested what I thought I heard. I’m not even sure a gerbil could be
flushed down a toilet. And a hamster replacement wouldn’t go unrecognized.
Eventually, however, I realized that the sleep-deprived vet was also telling me there was a
Saturday morning emergency clinic.
“Don’t worry,” I sobbed through the bars of the cage after I hung up, trying to
concentrate on the poor beast’s good left eye. “You’ll be right as rain by tomorrow.”
I didn’t mean it. In fact I automatically crossed my fingers behind my back as I
said it, the way we’d always done as children, to ward off the evil consequences of telling
a big, fat lie. I was sure the young man I met the following morning at the vet’s office,
where I turned up carrying my birdcage like an old music hall star, would tell me the only
solution was the Final One. But I was wrong. Kinder than his colleague, he held the
creature carefully in his hands and looked him over.
“Probably just an infection,” he said. “You always keep him in this old
contraption? Did you scrub it out carefully? No? Ah, well, don’t worry. These eye
drops are miraculous. Four times today and four tomorrow and you’ll see an
improvement. The hair will probably soon grow back too. Oh, and you might want to
buy him a new place to live. This cage belongs on the scrap heap.” He showed me how
to hold the animal in one hand and squirt a drop in with the other. He actually gave me
his card, for use in case of emergency. I felt I could cope.
I stopped at a pet store on the way home and bought the animal a plastic but
palatial pleasure dome, replete with towers and turrets, fit for some rodent Kubla Khan (if
less stately). Despite the expense, I felt that, not only would I score points with my son,
but I had somehow also trumped my mother. I was brimming with confidence when, a
couple of hours later, I administered the first set of drops (Tarzan’s second for the day);
the whole thing went perfectly. The next attempt, three hours after that, was a little
squirmier, but I managed. I ate my lonely TV dinner in triumph, though not without
nostalgia for the previous evening’s blanquette de veau. I even had a couple of glasses of
celebratory wine. Just before bedtime, I picked the animal up for his fourth dose. Much
of the swelling around his eye had already abated, the redness reduced to a pink blush.
The lack of hair was much less noticeable too, with everything else back down to normal
size.
“Come on, old fellow,” I said. “Let’s get this over with and go to sleep.” I
laughed a little at the innuendo. “As the actress said to the Bishop.”
Perhaps Tarzan simply didn’t like off-color humor. Or perhaps my laughter
loosened my grip. Before I knew it, he tried to leap out of my hand back into his cage.
Naturally, I grabbed at him, mid-jump. The cracking sound was as stomach-turning as
nails scraping on a blackboard, the resultant limp undeniable. I had broken his leg.
It was slightly earlier than on the previous evening…midnight rather than three in
the morning. I found the young veterinarian’s card and called him. Though he too
sounded sleepy, he was once again much kinder than his colleague. I blurted out the
whole story.
“I was divorced, you see. And I thought everything was fine. But my mother told
me my son needed a pet. And I told her she was wrong. But she wasn’t. And Ben loves
him. Tarzan, I mean. The gerbil. And I’ve ruined everything. I mean, what’s the point
of a fancy new cage if the cage is empty?”
I knew in my heart of hearts this was more information than the young vet
needed. But the break in my voice must have touched his heart-strings; at least he didn’t
shower me in expletives like his older partner.
“Come down in the morning,” he said. “I’ll open the office for you.”
Overwhelmed by the kindness of this relative stranger, and helped by another
glass of wine, I actually managed to sleep. My heart was nevertheless heavy when I
rolled up at the vet’s with my rodent gimp. This time I was sure Tarzan would face the
final curtain. But once again the young man showed veterinary optimism.
 “I can’t put the leg in a cast, of course.” Given the size and nature of the patient,
the remark seemed somewhat redundant. I had a wild, brief vision of Tarzan standing
upright, supported on crutches, his injured limb encased in bright, white plaster, inviting
friends to sign their names. But the vet was still speaking.
“I do think it’s worth persisting with treatment, rather than putting the poor thing
to sleep. His overall health seems good.”
“What can I tell my son?”
“The truth, perhaps?”
“I can’t do that.” I was almost wailing. “I mean, he’s with his dad. He’s
probably having a good time. And that’s what I want, of course. But I want him, you
know, to be happy to come home.” I couldn’t quite bring myself to say I wanted Ben to
love me best. But perhaps the vet had been divorced himself. He seemed to understand
my predicament.
“Well, animals do get arthritis.” I’m sure he even winked as he spoke. And so it
was that my blond, beautiful, innocent child heard his mother’s first lie; even his delight
at the gerbil’s bright new digs couldn’t quell my sense of guilt.
From then on, Ben’s sympathy for Tarzan knew no bounds. Alas, Tarzan knew no
bounds either, nor even tiny leaps. The sorry creature hobbled pitiably from that day
forward, only to die in humiliating circumstances one Christmas morning, face down,
drowned in his water bowl. I could only empathize; he had presumably gone for an early
morning drink, pitched forward, unbalanced, and been too decrepit to right himself. The
day was ruined before I’d even had a chance to burn the dinner for the three of us,
including my new, artist husband (who, incidentally, had stopped cooking for me the day
we wed, despite the fact that I was seven months pregnant), or for my only son to break
his new and (compared to the gerbil) unenthusiastically received toys, or for the Labrador
to bury us in a heavy flurry of seasonal white.
My new, third husband, Byron, the American, was a man I had known at
university, before I met either of the other two. He had studied Politics, Philosophy and
Economics on a Rhodes scholarship at Oxford (just like Bill Clinton, except that my man
inhaled) after doing an undergraduate degree in English at Yale and topping it all off with
an M.B.A. at Harvard. After several profitable years in Boston and Philadelphia, he had
ended up a prominent businessman back on the West Coast in his native city of Portland,
Oregon. Though not without appreciation for all things cultural, even he would have
been proud to say he had not a single artistic bone in his body. I wasn’t entirely sure
what his job entailed, though I knew it involved the manipulation of large sums of money
and a certain amount of traveling. My decision to marry him as opposed to some
penniless poet ran counter to type, which of course was part of his charm. I’d left job,
country, friends, extended family and even (briefly, I hoped) my eldest son, to marry him
in a country I’d visited only once before tying the knot. I was eager, keen, excited; for
the first time in my life, I felt I was making a totally fresh start. And, given my
unfortunate history, I felt that this bright new beginning should include the absence of
animals.
I looked around me now, at what had once been Byron’s bachelor pad. Unlike my
previous home in England once the ancient Lab had made her entry, the house had a
clean, fresh smell. There were no dirty pawprints on the kitchen tiles. No lurking bowls
of kibble tripped me as I crossed the floor to the bathroom, where the toilet stood full of
sparkling, undisturbed water. Back in the living room, on a whim, I lay down and rolled
on the thick white carpet. My new, black mohair sweater did not change color; my gray
Armani pants remained, like Jacob, smooth and hairless. Life felt good.
The doorbell rang. That old, English dog would have set up a vociferous
greeting; here nobody barked. It was my friend Jeanie, a woman I had met at the boys’
new school the day I dropped them off, all three of us white of face and knuckle, for their
first day of phonics, the colonial version of history, and American spelling.
“It looks to me like you need a bit of help here,” she’d said, taking pity on me as I
attempted, half reluctantly, to wrest my wrists from their two cast-iron grips. She turned
to the child standing next to her.
“This is John. He’s been to England, haven’t you, John?” The little boy she was
delivering up to the education gods smiled and nodded. His voice sounded confident and
welcoming.
“I went to London last year. It was cool. I saw the Changing of the Guard.”
“My big brother’s dad lives in London. He’s an actor.” William, the elder of my
two young fellow-immigrants, uttered the word “actor” in hallowed tones.
“Yeah, an actor.” James, his little sibling, disciple and echo, nodded vigorously to
emphasize the worthiness of the profession. “Wow, an actor!” said John. “That is totally
rad. Is he in the movies?” Next thing I knew my lads were talking animatedly, holding
hands with the smiling teacher who’d been patiently waiting, and who I knew in my heart
would take good care of them. My rescuer hung around while I waved goodbye to their
departing backs.
“They’ll be fine,” she said, when I finally managed to turn my head away. “I
don’t know about you, though. You look a bit pasty. What do you say we have a
coffee?” And she swept me off to the new, up and coming Pearl District, hardly more
than a concept in those days, and introduced me to the notion that coffee comes in far
more varieties than the simple black or white I’d known back home.
“How did you know we were English?” I was sipping my first ever skinny
cappuccino, a drink I’d expected, from its name, to come in a tall, narrow glass, but that
turned out merely to be made with skimmed milk. My new friend laughed.
“Well, you guys did talk out loud.”
“Is John your only boy?”
“Oh, he’s not mine. I don’t have kids.” She shuddered slightly. “Two ex-
husbands were children enough. No, I was doing a favor for a friend. She’s been
working at the downtown Women’s Crisis Center but she’s leaving at the end of the
week. She’d promised to go in early today and help train her replacement. They’re short
of helpers right now, even volunteers. Anyway, I usually take Wednesday afternoons off,
but this week my boss is out of town. I felt like having a lazy Monday morning anyway,
so it didn’t hurt to help her out. I guess I’ve got to get the old rear in gear now, though.”
She drained her drink, glancing up at me over the rim of her cup as she did so. I
must have looked more than a wee bit disappointed that our chat was over.
“How about letting me show you around a little?” She wiped her mouth and
stood up, glancing again at her watch. “I get the feeling you don’t know many people.
You into art? There’s lots of stuff to see down here in the Pearl. And like I said, I’m free
most Wednesday afternoons.”
 Over the next few weeks Jeanie introduced me to the Jamison-Thomas gallery, the
Blackfish, Waterstone, Elizabeth Leach and others. She also gave me my first taste of
Mexican food, bought me a copy of the Highway Code so I could get an American
driver’s license (admittedly on the second attempt) and showed me the best place to park
downtown, in the Galleria on Ninth, just a few blocks from the library, so I could “shop,
shop, shop,” as she put it, without getting a ticket. She also introduced me, courtesy of
young John’s mother, to the woman who ran the Crisis Center she’d mentioned, where I
soon began to salve my conscience and assuage the guilt of my newly inactive Protestant
work ethic by volunteering a couple of times a week.
I wasn’t a lot of help in those early days as I rummaged like a mad thing through
index cards and phone lists to find the addresses of welfare services and shelters while
some poor soul sobbed her life away on the other end of the line. But the long silences,
filled on my part with furious searches for practical information, must have made me
seem like a good listener, which made up for my lack of knowledge. And in a curious
way, the job helped me find my own way around the ins and outs of the American
experience. I felt I was being useful, while learning something myself, and I enjoyed
meeting many of the crazy but friendly bagladies who often turned up for a chat. Still, I
was glad they never needed me on Wednesdays, the day Jeanie took an afternoon off
from her manager post in one of the West Side’s busiest medical offices.
Jeanie stood on the doorstep now. As I let her in, I had a fleeting vision of the old
Labrador’s greeting techniques; Jeanie’s groin was exactly the right height for olfactory
interrogation by an intrusive snout.
“Byron thinks I should have a dog,” I said, before she’d even crossed the
threshold.
“You’ve got to be kidding. That man needs therapy. They all do.” She set her
purse on the hall-stand, where it remained, unmolested, as she eyed me up and down.
“You look great today, kiddo. Seems like you found that new hairdresser I told you
about. I guess you’re acculturating fast.”
“I slept well. I’m sure that’s half the battle. In fact, I’ve slept like a log ever since
I arrived here. Once I got over the initial jetlag, anyway. It’s so peaceful in this
neighborhood. Nothing wakes me.”
I made lunch. Or rather I set out the scrumptious looking sandwiches I’d bought
at Elephant’s Deli in the Alphabet District and which, along with every other kind of
wonderfully prepared food the lazy cook can dream of, made life in the United States so
glorious. We ate peacefully. My tuna salad on rye was delicious. I remembered with no
regret the thinly cut ham between two slices of white bread that passed for a sandwich in
England. I stretched back in my chair unencumbered.
“My ex’s old Lab would have been begging and scratching by now,” I said. “She
used to ladder my nylons all the time, not to mention drool all over the floor.”
“No need to tell me,” said Jeanie. “You’re preaching to the choir.” She pushed
back her chair. “But enough with the dogs, already. How about we offload a few of these
calories and go to that impressionist exhibit at the Art Museum? It won’t be in town
much longer. As a matter of fact, I took the liberty of ordering tickets for us in advance.
I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist, what with you being a recovering artist’s moll, and
all.”
 “Great idea. Let’s go right now. I’ll scrape all this stuff into the Insinkerator later.
Gosh, Jeanie, I tell you, I love these American gadgets. I don’t know how I ever
managed without them. And I love even more that there’s no hungry animal lurking in
ambush, ready to knock the plates to the floor while I’m gone. Let freedom ring, say I.
You Yanks were right.”
The paintings were breathtaking. As well as the Manets and Monets beloved of
my second husband, there were canvases by Mary Cassatt, Childe Hassan and other
Americans I was ashamed to say I’d barely even heard of. We thought we’d stay an hour;
instead, we spent three.
“How about a walk along the waterfront?” said Jeanie, when we finally managed
to drag ourselves away from contemplating all that glorious, shimmering color. “There
are some cute new stores down by the marina. Then maybe we could do a little real
shopping later on. You know that’s my favorite form of exercise. Well, almost.”
“That would be brilliant, actually. The boys are both going home with friends. I
can stay out as long as I like.”
Despite my professed enthusiasm, I admit I felt a twinge of regret. Since that first
difficult school day, my sons had thrived in their new environment. The outgoing
personality they’d both inherited from their dad had proved popular with their
schoolmates, as had the funny English accents they were now rapidly losing; they had
made friends galore. Like their father, too, they were both naturally curious, especially
about this new culture in which they found themselves. Whereas his interests had tended
towards art, theirs veered more typically for six- and eight-year-olds towards sports,
video games and other arcane pursuits that were baffling to their resolutely non-athletic
mother. Their new chums had given them trading cards of every sport imaginable.
William, my older boy, in particular, had studied these in the evenings, after his
homework, with a dedication that impressed and amazed me.
“Can you test me on these, Mum?” He’d fix me from the top bunk with that
irresistible green-eyed, somehow serious smile he’d inherited from his dad, as I put him
and his little brother to bed, the slightly daunting aspect of his longish nose offset by an
endearing sprinkling of freckles.
“Have you done the rest of your homework?”
“Of course, Mum.” He’d roll his eyes a little at the preposterous implication.
“You know I finished that paper yesterday.” He’d mention an essay he’d been writing on
Lewis and Clark, or some other American heroes unknown in the English school
curriculum. Though he’d learned a completely different version of history, he was
catching up fast. Usually I let the matter drop; I didn’t want to admit to too much
ignorance.
“So why do you need to learn all this other stuff? You’re such a good boy, and
you’ve been working so hard. Surely your teacher doesn’t expect you to know sports
trivia.”
“I just do, that’s all.” And he would set his chin in the determined manner I knew
so well while I shuffled through the cards to try to find something I thought would stump
him.
“Who does the number seven hundred and fourteen make you think of?” I was
sure that what seemed to me like a random figure would be bound to catch him out. His
answering smile would be as triumphant as it was scathing.
 “That’s easy, Mum. Seven-fourteen. It’s Babe Ruth’s home run record.
Everybody knows that.” As if to prove the point, his younger brother’s voice would echo
from the bunk below, a spot his fear of heights had won him.
“Babe Ruth, of course, Mum. Everybody knows.”
“Why does he have a girl’s name? And why do they call a man a babe?” Even I
could recognize my attempts at banter were pathetic.
“Oh Mum, you’ll never understand.” William would sigh and shake his head at
my ignorance. “You need to know these things too. All my friends’ mums do.” But the
facts never seemed to sink in.
Nowadays, my two little ones spent much of their after-school time at classmates’
houses, sometimes for sleepovers, sometimes to be collected later.
“You could bring your friends to our house.” I’d try not to make my invitations
sound too much like pathetic pleas.
“Cameron’s mum orders pizza,” William would say. “The kind we all like.” Or,
“John’s Dad can get to the third level in Super Mario. And he coaches my Little League
team.” And James would nod his head gravely in agreement, his baby blue eyes and
chubby cheeks belying his attempts to imitate his brother’s seriousness.
“Third level, Mum. John’s Dad’s rad.”
I was glad they were settling in so well and acclimating better than I could ever
have hoped. They had even begun affectionately to mock the way I said “mall,” and
“basil” and “car” and “tomato.” But somehow I missed them, just as I missed Ben, my
oldest son, whom we had left, temporarily, behind.
“It’s ironic, really,” I told Jeanie. “One of the things I thought would be so great
about being here and not having to work so hard was that I could spend more time with
my children.”
“That’s kids for you,” she said. “They’re ungrateful tykes. Once they’re off the
breast they never really want to be with their mothers any more. Of course boys are
always on the lookout for bigger, better breasts.” She grinned salaciously. Though I
sometimes wondered where she got her information, at least about children, I couldn’t
prove her wrong.
“I suppose you’re right. And so long as they are happy…”
We made our way back to the multi-storey car park in the Galleria, picked up
Jeanie’s Subaru, and drove to Waterfront Park. We walked and walked along the
Riverfront Esplanade, stopping here and there to visit the little arty crafty boutiques that
had sprung up along the way. Then we wandered the few blocks back into downtown and
hit the stores, including Nordstrom. We tried on clothes. I fell in love with a red coat.
“Go, girl,” said Jeanie. “That color suits you. It brings out the blue of your eyes.
Buy it.”
“I don’t know. I still feel guilty spending money I didn’t earn myself.”
“He has plenty, Cate, honey. Quit worrying. You’ve worked all your life. Didn’t
he tell you to enjoy it?” My compunction foundered at the easy onslaught. It was true
that Byron had insisted I treat myself. I could hear him now. I just want to adorn you. I
don’t know how often he’d whispered those words in my ear during our first heady
weeks of romance. Who was I to disobey? Within minutes, the coat was mine.
As Jeanie and I walked back down to the river again in the bright, sunny weather,
we passed men and women with dogs on leashes. The animals ignored us. Nobody
barked, growled or snarled. Before we went home, we had a glass of wine at one of the
outside tables of the Riverplace Hotel, for no other reason than that we felt like it. I
looked out over the bobbing masts in the marina, where a couple of Chinese dragon boats
lay tethered ready for the upcoming races. The Willamette sparkled in the sunlight, its
waters churned by a timber-bearing barge. The twin glass towers of the newish
conference center framed the dome of the Rose Garden arena over on the up-and-coming
East Side. The luscious Oregon Pinot noir lingered on my tongue with an aftertaste of
pepper and blackcurrants. I sighed with pleasure; a girl could get used to this.
“I don’t even like dogs.” I was recounting that morning’s conversation to Jeanie
again as we soaked up the sunshine. “I mean, I don’t dislike them exactly. But they seem
unnecessary, somehow. And I hate the way dog owners get so self-congratulatory. All
that stopping and admiring and ‘oh-how-cute, what’s-his name?’ gets my back up. Give
me human adult interaction any day. Particularly if it looks like him.” I was watching a
particularly handsome young man go by.
“Amen to that,” said Jeanie, following my gaze, then turning to me with a grin.
“You really are beginning to enjoy life here, aren’t you? If I were you, I’d tell that man
of yours just exactly how you’re feeling. It’s about time you started to spoil yourself.
Relax, lie back, and feel the sun on your face, if you get my drift.”
What with the warmth, the wine, the view and the companionship, my instincts
told me perhaps she was right. Maybe this was my place in the sun. I certainly felt I’d
earned it. So what if I didn’t know who Babe Ruth was, or why everything was named
for these persons Lewis and Clark? So what if my children wanted to play at their
friends’ houses? This feeling of freedom, novel as it was, was nice. I set down my empty
glass with a sense of resolution strengthened. No matter what my dear, sweet, misguided
husband suggested, my fresh beginnings in these United States held a promise of life,
liberty, and, yes indeed, the pursuit of happiness. And that, in my opinion, meant my
future would be dedicatedly dog-free. What’s more, I’d tell my new spouse so, that very
night, at dinner.