No, let me start again. I made her into a cipher--Aunt Gale—hollowed out by age and grief and cancer. Certainly there was something unearthly about her. Something of the scarecrow, of the ghost, or of the angel.
What I’ve missed—forgive me I’m new at understanding—is her force. I would have sat with her sipping tea until the end of time. As it was, when she had delivered her message she relaxed entirely and her face lit up. “Now I can die!” she said.
She is Consolation. According to my dictionary, consolation is 1. a source of comfort. 2. a game for earlier losers. Either way, I’m not about to turn it down.
Consolation. Worn-out, forgetful, fragile. But real. Alive, dammit. My mother’s sister that I thought I’d never get to see again unless it was in the casket. Aunt Gale, in whose whisper I can still hear my mother’s voice. She came back to me. Came back and we are both alive.
Another word is grace. Small actions by fallible people. Small actions--on the force of them we mount a full-scale defense of the universe.
Aunt Gale came back. She has something to tell me.
No comments:
Post a Comment