6-29-2009, the era of rounded digits
Dear Mildred Rodgers,
We were in bed one late, drunk night. I don’t know if you remember, but I asked if you would miss me, to which you relied, “In all honesty, no. It will be a great weight off my shoulders.” And I lay stunned, cowed, etc. Then you said, “What are you thihnking? Of course I will. You ask the strangest questions. Will you miss my cold house?”
And I said, quite frankly, “Yes,” but let me amend my response.
Last night I was in a drafty old farm house worked with polished wood and smoke. I sat in the kitchen drinking stewed wine and instant coffee with people dying. The wood stove made the room cozy and rosy and intimate, heavy almost with feelings of self-aware tragedy. It was late, three in the morning, perhaps, when I stood up from the table and announced that I’d be off to bed.
In the cold hallway, fumbling through passages and forgoing light, I could see my breath. It stuck to the windows. It stuck to the sheen of wood along the door frames, and I wiped it off with my hands.
I thought of your question and that frigid, drunken huddling. I thought yes, I’d still say yes, only now I’d realize that yours was a cold I could always leave if I only opened the door. But who wants to open the door?
Love Always,
Philip Carey
