Nate Briggs's Blog - Posts Tagged "memoir"
Sunday Literary Life: June 4
Knowing what I know now, it should have been beyond alarming when my father decided to sell a house almost paid for, in a town that was neither better nor worse than any other town, to move out to a small village: with no one but my father believing that our relocation was anything other than an epic error in judgment.
I spent over a year in that place – waiting for my very young life to be jump started by...something – experiencing the village in all kinds of weather. But the permanent picture I hold in my head is that of a low, Flanders sky in a late autumn day drained of all color – navigating the muddy unpaved streets - walking to the post office to get the mail. The pivot of my day for most of that time.
Naturally, that time – composed mostly of confused misery – was with me when I began this novel – "Relentless Angels" – putting the narrator of that book, Rebecca Weatherhead, in a very similar place. A village called Utopia. As she introduces it:
“After about 20 minutes, the telltale trees appeared, Uncle Danny slowed down to make the turn, and we knew by the crunch of the gravel under the tires that we were in town. A village home to 214 Caucasians, mostly of Scandinavian descent. With about the same number of dogs and cats. And vermin past counting.
“Even after so much time has passed between then and now, I think I’m safe in assuming that nothing there has changed. Utopia was, and always will be, a grid of four blocks to north-south and three blocks east-west. A tiny collection of unpaved streets lying right next to the highway. Twelve miles from Elsinore, the nearest town of any larger size. A short length of asphalt marks the “central business district”. Otherwise, only dirt. No sidewalks anywhere. No landscaping. No statues. No fountains. And no monuments to anyone.
“In the Central Business District the town halfheartedly supported a café and a general store: with that store being the nearest source of gasoline, diesel, and packaged beer. Those enterprises just limped along: trying to make ends meet. The truly prosperous part of Main Street was a tavern: the Six Shooter. Known to almost everyone locally as the “Shooter”.
“The other storefront — at the west end of the village — had closed down, due to lack of business, even though it had the best location: at the very edge of State Highway 98. The last visible stop for gasoline before Elsinore. At the time of my arrival, that building was unoccupied: weeds growing up through cracks in the pavement, the windows filled with plywood.
“I don’t mention this building lightly. It does become important later on.
“At the time they took me in, my Aunt and Uncle had been Utopian for seven years. In the fashion of a medieval farmer Uncle Danny lived right at the edge of the village, within sight of most of his land. And he rode out each day to meet the gods of agriculture while Aunt Billie ruled the household.
“Their residential arrangement soon struck me as absurd: since it gave them the disadvantages of both town and country life. There was something of the isolation of the farm about where they were. A house at the very end of the street, at the very edge of town, in a town remote from everything. But they also lived their lives under the constant, unblinking gaze of neighbors. Across the street. And right next door.
"Small town people — with nothing better to do than keep an eye on each other.”
To her credit, Rebecca responds to her unpromising situation with some energy and some humor. Less to her credit: Utopia is also where she begins her occasional practice as a stone-cold killer.
But more on this later, as "Relentless Angels" – the Great American Novel revisited - is our featured book for this month.
I spent over a year in that place – waiting for my very young life to be jump started by...something – experiencing the village in all kinds of weather. But the permanent picture I hold in my head is that of a low, Flanders sky in a late autumn day drained of all color – navigating the muddy unpaved streets - walking to the post office to get the mail. The pivot of my day for most of that time.
Naturally, that time – composed mostly of confused misery – was with me when I began this novel – "Relentless Angels" – putting the narrator of that book, Rebecca Weatherhead, in a very similar place. A village called Utopia. As she introduces it:
“After about 20 minutes, the telltale trees appeared, Uncle Danny slowed down to make the turn, and we knew by the crunch of the gravel under the tires that we were in town. A village home to 214 Caucasians, mostly of Scandinavian descent. With about the same number of dogs and cats. And vermin past counting.
“Even after so much time has passed between then and now, I think I’m safe in assuming that nothing there has changed. Utopia was, and always will be, a grid of four blocks to north-south and three blocks east-west. A tiny collection of unpaved streets lying right next to the highway. Twelve miles from Elsinore, the nearest town of any larger size. A short length of asphalt marks the “central business district”. Otherwise, only dirt. No sidewalks anywhere. No landscaping. No statues. No fountains. And no monuments to anyone.
“In the Central Business District the town halfheartedly supported a café and a general store: with that store being the nearest source of gasoline, diesel, and packaged beer. Those enterprises just limped along: trying to make ends meet. The truly prosperous part of Main Street was a tavern: the Six Shooter. Known to almost everyone locally as the “Shooter”.
“The other storefront — at the west end of the village — had closed down, due to lack of business, even though it had the best location: at the very edge of State Highway 98. The last visible stop for gasoline before Elsinore. At the time of my arrival, that building was unoccupied: weeds growing up through cracks in the pavement, the windows filled with plywood.
“I don’t mention this building lightly. It does become important later on.
“At the time they took me in, my Aunt and Uncle had been Utopian for seven years. In the fashion of a medieval farmer Uncle Danny lived right at the edge of the village, within sight of most of his land. And he rode out each day to meet the gods of agriculture while Aunt Billie ruled the household.
“Their residential arrangement soon struck me as absurd: since it gave them the disadvantages of both town and country life. There was something of the isolation of the farm about where they were. A house at the very end of the street, at the very edge of town, in a town remote from everything. But they also lived their lives under the constant, unblinking gaze of neighbors. Across the street. And right next door.
"Small town people — with nothing better to do than keep an eye on each other.”
To her credit, Rebecca responds to her unpromising situation with some energy and some humor. Less to her credit: Utopia is also where she begins her occasional practice as a stone-cold killer.
But more on this later, as "Relentless Angels" – the Great American Novel revisited - is our featured book for this month.
