Theo of Golden

by Allen Levi

Only a year. Not so long. But long enough to create a current of his own and to catch others in it. Without knowing it, a whole cadre — Asher, Tony, Ellen, Basil, dozens of others — was being carried along by the vortex that was Theo.

Minnette let that thought settle in her mind. Was it possible that, so quickly, the innocent exchange of a portrait, an unexpected gift, had opened the hearts of two total strangers to one another, across generations and backgrounds and homelands? That she would bare her soul to an old man whom she had known for only a matter of minutes? That she, the girl who never cried, would do so now?

know I probably romanticize the whole motherhood thing in my mind,

“Good morning, St. Minnette. You are strong. And you are brave. And you are kind. Even when you are sad.”

mélange

antithesis

eclectic,

fastidiously

dissembling;

Whose reverie might he have disrupted once upon a time?

stillness and listening.

That hour, that practice, that stillness had saved him when he was a younger man.

raison d’être

bane of his existence,

Eventually, the dark spell broke.

murmuration.

Looking back on that moment, he realized that, in the time between the quarter hour before sunset and the first star of dusk, somehow under the spell of that April evening in France, his splintered soul had begun to heal. It would happen in fits and starts. It would be a healing that would never, at least in this life, be total or final. But it was the moment when the fever broke for him.

And on many days, sometimes for many consecutive days at a stretch, he would check the local morning paper for the exact time of sunset to ensure that he would be punctual for his date with a ten-year-old girl whose laughter was a murmuration and whose memory was a single star, the brightest in all the sky.

There must be love for the gift itself, love for the subject being depicted or the story being told, and love for the audience. Whether the art is sculpture, farming, teaching, lawmaking, medicine, music, or raising a child, if love is not in it — at the very heart of it — it might be skillful, marketable, or popular but I doubt it is truly good. Nothing is what it’s supposed to be if love is not at the core.”

I simply help people sit still long enough to see what is already there.”

priced them really low so that people could afford them. Some of the people I’ve drawn probably don’t have money to buy their pictures — you know, like students and homeless folks — but I know a lot of the others pretty well, and they spend more on a single meal or a concert ticket than the portraits cost. If I’m honest, the project has been a little bit discouraging. I’ve wondered at times if Shep just doesn’t have the heart to pull the plug on it.”

Seems like unmet expectation is one of the hazards of this line of work. From what I can tell, lots of artists and creatives, especially little-known artists, wrestle with it.”

He once wrote that the best portion of a good person’s life is ‘the little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love.’

Theo was not particularly comfortable with small talk. His own active mind and colorful thoughts were so engaging that shallow babble felt at times like an intrusion, an interruption, a subtraction. That

“Well, it is subtle, and maybe it takes an old man — an expert in sadness — to see it, but it is there in every portrait, in some more than others. It is not gloomy or angry or even terribly obvious. It is like a weariness or an unmet longing or a disappointment; something we inherit from those who lived before us. But to these old eyes, it is in every face, the universal affliction. It is what gives such gravitas to your portraits and makes them so believable. Even when your subjects are smiling, the shadow of sadness is there. And so far, my meetings at the Fedder only confirm my suspicion.”

Living with sadness, accepting it, is easier than trying to pretend it isn’t there. It is another of life’s great mysteries that sadness and joy can coexist so compatibly with one another. In fact, I wonder if, on this side of heaven, either one can be complete without the other.”

There is no virtue in advertising one’s sadness. But there is no wisdom in denying it either. And there is the beautiful possibility that great love can grow out of sadness if it is well-tended. Sadness can make us bitter or wise. We get to choose.”

But here’s a question before I go. What about the child? That one there?” Asher pointed to the beaming face of a young boy. Theo looked. “OK. That one: no sadness. But draw him again in thirty years.”

“Baby, they’s justice and they’s mercy. If you not sure what to do and you gotta choose one or the other, I say always go the mercy way. If you make a mistake, make it for mercy. Bad mercy don’t hurt nearly like bad justice, and always remember, the eye of God can see.”

“Well, Mr. Derrick, I looked. Real good. Real hard. I looked at him. His eyes had tears in ‘em. And I saw hurt and fear, and it changed me. And when he leaves court tomorrow, I hope he’ll know somebody looked at him and didn’t see a thing or an idea or a label but a man with a soul. And a man with a child. Even if y’all put a hard sentence on him, I hope he’ll know somebody saw his face. The eye of God sees it. Sees you and me too.” Kendrick looked down at his hands, worried that he might have

Theo was fascinated, and mildly horrified, at the casualness with which lives were shaped and altered by the pronouncements of an ordinary man wearing a robe.

“Know this: When you drink this port, you taste the hillside of my childhood. You taste the sunlight and the Douro. You taste the strength of the vine, the sweetness of the fruit, the sweat and labor of the harvesters, the oak in the barrels. You taste the music of the accordion, the laughter of the children, and the prayer of the priest. You taste a young man’s joy and an old man’s memory.