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Clearing Up a Fcw Things /A family łrip to a faraway place can help unlock the dcepest of secrets By GARR1SON KE1LLOR Apr. 5. 2004
I have becn rambling around Berlin and Paris and London with two brotlicrs and a sister for two weeks, and it has actually bccn fun, for the siniple reason that we had our fights long ago and don't nced to have them agaiu, and there was so much to talk about that wc couldn’t have with nonsiblings pręsent, stuCf from childhood when our hearts werc open, and now wc carry it everywhere we go. We wcrc in London, having supper at the pub on the Thames where tlić gallows oncc stood whcrc tlić highwayman Jack Sheppard swung back in the timc of George T, and the rivcr reminded us of the Mississippi, and pretty soon my brotlicr was tclling how he found a .32cal. pistol in a comficld bchind tlić house when he was 15 and carricd it around on his person for a fcw days bccausc, hc said, "I just liked the fecl of it." Hc had no idea whether the gun was loadcd or not.
I havc known my brotlicr for almost 60 years and he ncvcr told mc this before. I guess the gallows w-as wbat reminded him of it. Now if our spouses or children had been there, tlicy would have been bored silly long before tlie conversation got around to the pistol, and tliey'd have started talking about the reform of tlie I Iousc of Lords or something, but the truth is I am terribly interested in what happencd in my childhood, there being fcwcr and fewer people left who remember it, and with siblings, your minds meld and you piece together tlie story of tlić big Kcillor family meeting at our liousc in 1947--no nced for footnotes or apology, you just sit down in Lcs Dcux Magots cafe and hash it out, as Frcnch people of great clcgancc and purposefulness stride past, one of whom rcminds you of your dad, a gray fedora on liis head. smiling at the Revcre movie camera as ycllow strectcars nimbie down Bloomington Avenue in 1953, and wc children perk up and smilc—someone off-camera bas told us to smilc, and likc good children wc do.
Or you walk up Unter den Lindcn to the Brandenburg Gate, and the great arch rcminds you of Motlicr and Dad and how they eloped to Stillwatcr, Okla.. and got married. (What ycar was that?) You walk into Parliamcnt to meet your ffiend Matthcw who grew up in a good lcftist family and was madę a peer by the Labour govcrnment, and you love to address him as Milord bccausc it makes him wince, which rcminds you ofyour history tcacher Mr. Faust and before long you are remembering Mr. Hochstcttcr and Miss Stor}' and Miss Melby, who are clearer to you in London, being English teachers.
A person would likc to get his lifc story together in coherent form, and lifc is not quitc long cnough to accomplish tliat but a lact-ftnding trip with siblings is a big help. Those missing pieces in tlie puzzle that havc bccn troubling you for years--Why did Dad carry a firc cxtinguisher when he went to tlie Boyds1 to pick up Wanda for Sunday school? And your sister says, cool as can bc, "Bccausc Beryl Boyd was hopped up on vaporizers and liable to hallucinatc and think that the house was buraing down, and sortfehoW a blast of liqnid C02 seemea to calm her down." And tliere you have it. A littlc morę of tlie story'.
Over the years, my rclatives havc been cautious about sharing details of family history with mc, knowing tlie business Fm iu, knowing that writers are vacuum clcancrs who suck up otlier pcoplc’s livcs and weave tlicm into stories like a sparrow builds a nest from scraps. People meet writers and are bowlcd over when the writer is fricndly to them and invites them to his house for a glass of winę or to slioot up heroin or whatcvcr they do, and they talk tlicir heads off, and a year later it comes out Ln a book, and tliere follow years of bitter and fruitlcss litigation, and tliat is why you should always kccp a writer at arm’s length. And tliafs all true.
But travcling to Europę relaxed my siblings, and tlicy told me a lot of stuff I nevcr kncwr before, and now I am pretty wcll set to talk about Lakę Wobcgon for at least two or tlircc morę years. And tłicn Pil take them on a slow boat to China and find out morę. What did my brotlicr do with that .32-cal. pistol? What if it had been tlirown into the comfield by a heinous criminal? Or by Mr. Boyd, who had intended to blow Beryfs brains out and hid the wcapon in tlie com, and then went looking for it, and it wasnt tliere, and thus wc werc narrowly spared tlie tragedy? I would like to get tłiis figured out.
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