(1) Trauma For One
It all got kicked started with a mocking remark of Jordan’s. They were sitting, rather than relaxing, on the still cold Muskoka chairs, facing the lapping lake and lightening grey of sky on the first mild day of spring. It must have been all of five degrees celcius, but the wind had dropped and stillness had taken over, and what with a whitish sun palely loitering beyond the thinning cloud, it was almost bearable.
Andrew had just rather breezily noted his complete failure to droop into depression in the days since Lara’s
cremation. Was he feeling guilty about it? He wasn’t sure. But dammit, he felt her presence all around the place. It was as if she never left. Jordan opined that he was tempted to agree, and that her spirit, although freed, preferred it here. Perhaps she was working on Imrat.
Continuing on regardless, rather in the monologue manner he so mocked in Jordan, he warbled on about how much he’d turned a corner in his struggle against the whole death fear vibe thing, the way people turned incorrigibly gloomy when god dished out a development they didn’t particularly like, inventing or investing in cheerless and mendacious philosophies.
Like what, Jordan had demanded.
Like existentialism, he’d replied
And what’s a nice young chap like you doing using words like mendacious?
Andrew chuckled and turned to look at his interlocutor, I don’t know what came over me.
Jordan returned the stare, giving nothing away, and asked, have you ever played frisbee with existentialist angst?
Andrew admitted that no, he had not. Despite his roving education in the ways of the world. So thus it was, with Jordan’s surprise production of the gold Frisbee, always, he claimed, secreted in his luggage, that the two friends, separated by a quarter century in age, and defined, more than once by Lara, as father and son, played Frisbee on the lawn as the sun meekly moved into the spectrum of yellow.
As the golden saucer sailed through the air between them, looking free and easy but actually chained to their aim and thrust, Andrew noticed the distinct lack of rivalry in the exchange. It took a while but eventually he had to mention it. Jordan laughed loudly and insisted that was the basic point of it. It only worked if you co-operated. It was anti-competition. Andrew felt stupid; of course, he knew that. You didn’t actually have to have been at Woodstock to get the point, although people Jordan’s age often thought you did. Back inside Jordan related his own Woodstock story. There’d been so many festivals around that time, and Woodstock was just another. Really it was the film which raised it to iconic status. Another Hollywood con job really.
Preparing the requested herbal tea Andrew gave silent thanks for Jordan’s seeming reluctance to rattle on about Woodstock. He had feared he was in for the worst, but the worst had not occurred. They discussed Lara’s ghostly presence. Andrew was convinced she was around, and had even dreamed of her two nights ago. Jordan assured him that he needed no convincing. The point was, Andrew blurted, what to do about it. Why do anything, was Jordan’s rejoinder, if she’s comfortable?
Shouldn’t spirits be encouraged to move on?
Well yes, ultimately, but sometimes mild attachments to place can be worked through without much fuss and bother. We’re not talking malicious poltergeists and punitive measures here.
