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- - - - - - - - - - T A B L E++T A L K What books do you read to your kids on Christmas? Hanukkah? Kwanzaa? Swap favorites in Table Talk
- - - - - - - - - - R E C E N T L Y Hot flash
Time for one thing
Confessions of a Lesbian Sperm Donor
Wild Things
Spice of Life
- - - - - - - - - - Mamafesto
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- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Broken things have been on my mind as the year lurches to an end, because so much broke and broke down this year in my life, and in the lives of the people I love. Lives broke, hearts broke, health broke, minds broke. On the first Sunday of Advent our preacher, Veronica, said that this is life's nature, that lives and hearts get broken, those of people we love, those of people we'll never meet. She said the world sometimes feels like the waiting room of the emergency ward, and that we, who are more or less OK for now, need to take the tenderest possible care of the more wounded people in the waiting room, until the healer comes. You sit with people, she said, you bring them juice and graham crackers. And then she went on vacation. "Traveling mercies," the old black people at our church said to her when she left. This is what they say when one of us goes off for a while. Traveling mercies: Be safe, notice beauty, enjoy the journey, God is with you. Besides the big brokennesses in people's lives this year, I've noticed all sorts of really dumb things breaking lately. Since Advent began at the end of November, I've had a dozen calls reporting broken cars, water heaters, a window, even a finger. So I was on the lookout for something wonderful to happen, because of this great story I heard recently about dumb things going wrong: Carolyn Myss, who writes about healing, went to Russia a few years ago to give a series of lectures. Every single aspect of getting to Russia that could go poorly, did. Then in Moscow it turned out that her reserved room at the hotel had been given to someone else. She ended up sleeping on a stranger's floor. Two mornings later, on a train to her conference on healing, she began to whine at the man sitting beside her about how infuriating her journey had been thus far. It turned out that he worked for the Dalai Lama. And he said gently that he believed that when a lot of seemingly meaningless things started going wrong all at once, it was to protect something big and lovely that was trying to get itself born -- that, in other words, perhaps it needed for you to be distracted so it could be born perfect. I totally believe this to be true; and I especially believe it when other people's things are breaking down. When it's my stuff, I believe the cause is that I'm a bad person. For instance, when the new car I was leasing had a complete nervous breakdown a month ago, a friend helped me get the lease rescinded, but while trying to figure out what to drive next, I rented what was billed as a quality used car. Two days later, when it broke down by the side of the road, I did not find it very inspiring: I did not look around to see what lovely thing was getting itself born. I was just deeply disturbed. I decided I was jinxed, that I had bad car karma. This was right after Advent began, when all around the world people awaited the celebration of the birth of the King to a raggedy homeless family. It was also in the days just before the great rainy weather of El Niño began. Now I'm not sure why, looking back at all those broken cars, with the rains about to come, it seemed like a good idea to buy a used Volkswagen convertible. Maybe it was the realization that the luxury tank I'd leased in an effort to feel safe had -- quelle suprise -- failed me. That there was no safety out there -- that it was going to have to be an inside job. Or maybe it was because so many things had broken or been so troubling this year that I just wanted to feel lighter. Or maybe I wanted to have a little fun. I'd always loved Volkswagens. I learned to drive on a 1962 VW bus. I've had a number of VW's over the years. They're cheap and they run forever. Remember in "Sleeper," when 200 years from now Woody Allen and Diane Keaton come upon an old '60s VW bug rusting away in a cave, with the key still in the ignition, and the car starts right up? This is what I wanted: something cheap and reliable that didn't waste gas, something funky and smart, a little rusty, a little banged up, like me. However, I didn't set out to get a convertible; I mean, what with El Niño and all. I started thinking about old Volkswagen Jettas, because they're sporty but in a touching, hippie way, like Pete Seeger wearing new Reeboks. They're supposed to be a great car. Then, on the day the rains began, I heard about a '92 Cabriolet, which is basically the convertible form of the Jetta. This one only had 39,000 miles on it, five speeds and white fake-leather seats. Teal green, a white naugahyde top, a nice sound system and it was inexpensive. I called the owner, who was Iranian. She was selling it for her uncle, who lived in Southern California. It seemed like a great deal. The Iranian woman and I took the car for a ride and it drove like a dream. I could afford it without needing a bank loan and it would run forever. I took it in to a deeply anal, obsessive Volkswagen diagnostician, and even he said it was a terrific car. So I bought it. By then it was the second week of Advent, of waiting with the rest of the world for the birth of the child whom, the Old Testament tells us, would be called Emmanuel: "God with us." And the rains came pouring down. Sam loved the car, and it didn't leak at all. We tooled all over town in it, listening to oldies on the radio, fantasizing about trips to the beach. I decided to spring for brand new tires, in deference to the bad weather, and the front wheels needed re-aligning anyway. So I took it to a tire shop in Marin where there are always a million new tires stacked in front. I bought four tires, arranged for the realignment and bonded like mad with the woman behind the counter. Her name was Matty. She was the sister of the man who ran the whole operation, the daughter of the man who owned it. She lent me an old Cutlass Supreme to drive. She was my new best friend. I picked up my car that night and said goodbye to my new best friend. "Come back in 40,000 miles, and we'll cut you another great deal," said my new best friend's dad. He looked like an old golf pro in a 49ers jacket. Two days and 40 miles later, on a Saturday afternoon, Sam and I were cruising around town when all of a sudden, at the stop sign of a busy intersection, there was a sound from the front of the convertible. It was a bad sound, a slippery crashing, as if it had prolapse, and all of its internal organs were trying to fall out of its vagina. And the car wouldn't go forward. Sam and I gaped at each other. I tried to ease the car into first, but it made the bad sound again and would not move forward an inch. Cars behind me started to honk. "Move your fucking car," someone shouted. Everyone started honking. It was my own private New York City.
N E X T__P A G E: The woman you bought this car from is on a plane back to Iran |
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