Just talking...
On our daily ravine walks, apart from observing everything around us, we discuss things of interest to us, bring one another's attention to news reports the other might not have seen, and then proceed to discuss the whys and wherefores. Last week on one particular walk we were speaking of why it is that people vote as they do, how committed they may be, how easily swayed they might be, that type of thing. It brought to mind something that happened to my husband many years ago and he described it for me.We had been planning our yearly vacation trip and were set to leave our home for a week away in New Hampshire to do our usual week of climbing around the Presidential Range. My husband had left work and was heading to where he generally parked his car, and he had a pocket full of wadded cash (he never uses a wallet). On his way a man younger than he was at the time accosted him and asked if he could spare some change. My husband snuck his hand into his trouser pocket and extracted a $20 bill, proferring it to the man. Who was utterly delighted, and he actually hugged my husband, thanking him profusely, and telling him he had just been released from prison and this restored his belief in a future for himself. (!?) Then he asked my husband what he could do, in exchange, for my husband. Somehow, he struck upon a solution (so he thought) and asked my husband for whom he would like this man to vote. My husband's advice was that he should vote for whomever he believed in, and finally went on his way home. I don't recall his telling me this before, although he might have, for in fifty years of marriage much is recalled and much forgotten.
I thought that quite an interesting story, and said so. (All the more so, since he always remonstrates with me when I respond to requests for money from street people.) We began talking about travel, and our conversation turned to the many places in the world his work had taken him to, how, at first it was a delightful diversion to travel so broadly, a privilege he looked forward to. It soon palled, however, and he began to dread the continual need to travel, and wanted instead to stay home. He spoke in particular of a very difficult winter we'd had at home, and how, after his long flight to Tokyo, he'd gone for a walk in Aoyama Cemetery (just off Aoyama dori, close by the Aoyama Twin Towers, and not far from the Presidential Hotel, where he was staying. He sat on a bench, he said, feeling himself unwind and relax from the long trip, the bitter cold he'd left behind at home, and letting the sun warm his face, eyes closed. He was soon approached, he said, by an elderly patrician-looking Japanese man who spoke, he said, excellent English, and who commiserated with him on observing how drained he looked. He man offered him a slender cigar, and they spoke for some time, both smoking, enjoying the peace of their surroundings, the warmth of the sun.
Our exchanges with people can be an utter delight on occasion. We all need contact, however superficial-seeming at times. Just these two brief points of contact made such an impression on my husband that he has never forgotten, and was able to dredge the occasions up from the far reaches of his memory to recount them to me.
An entertainment tip, tangential though it seems: Last night we cuddled up and viewed a film titled "Himalaya". A film by Eric Valli, a French documentarian, it is a look at village life in the Dolpo region of Nepal. Wonderfully filmed, poignant and beautifully acted. Well worth watching. Subtitled, an Academy Award Nominee, winner of best cinematography, and best original music (oh, the music!).
posted by Pieface @ Sunday, April 17, 2005
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