An Age of Madness

Part 3. Bedlam

Three B E D L A M “This page intentionally left blank”. “They called me mad, and I called them mad, and damn them, they outvoted me.” —Nathaniel Lee (1649 – 1692), Restoration playwright and inmate of Bethlehem Hospital, 1684 – 1689 “This page intentionally left blank”. 187 % 1. I have not been entirely honest. And honesty’s important. Isn’t it? I always say so. It’s what I tell Anna anyway, and my patients. So then. I’ll try to do better from now on. For example. Toby died. Walter, apparently, died first. There are several possible conclusions one might draw from that. I became a mess for a while, and so, perhaps, did Anna. But we pulled through, one way or another, the way people do. Time heals all wounds as the saying goes, along with, I don’t know, love and distraction and a little wine and a little medication. Some years later I meet Russell Blanco, we get to know each other a little. We become tentative friends, we have a fight, we make up and make love and I get mightily confused and shut things off for a while. Anna’s there too, in and out of the picture, not helping things much. Not that I blame her but there it is. I don’t know if it’s all worth it, this tension and argument, this endless dancing between her and me and me and him. It feels easier to just let it all go. But I don’t know if I want that, and I don’t know what to do. And that’s where I am, if I’m being entirely honest. And also: there is an envelope. In my dresser, upstairs, in the bedroom. Top drawer. I’ve mentioned this already, I know. 188 An Age of Madness 2. Sea gulls hover like squawking kites on the updrafts. Noisiest birds on the planet, but I like them. Hard to imagine a seagull with a secret. They shine whiter than the piles of cumulus that rear up into a sky as blue as lapis. Surf murmuring below it, gunmetal gray. No beach no palm trees no surfers. Nothing pretty, just harsh rocky Maine shoreline, waves knocking patiently, knowing time is on their side. Thirty thousand years from now, there will be sand. Till then, stunted pines crowd thick along the edge. Inshore they grow taller. The birds harangue one another, the sun silvers the edges of the clouds as they meander south on the jet stream. I’m sitting on Trish’s porch. It’s a little past eight in the morning . Around the cabin, white birch and hemlocks shoulder against each other, oaks loom overhead, a tangle of branches hosting convocations of jays and titmice, goldfinches and chickadees. Nuthatches hop upside-down, peeping. I learned about these birds from my husband, and then again from my son. Trish tells me a colony of puffins roosts on the rocky islands a mile offshore, but I haven’t seen any yet. Toby never saw them either, maybe it’s something we could’ve done, or should have. Somehow there never seemed to be time. Years ago, Trish retreated from Boston and settled about as far north as she could get without a passport. Sitting now on her ragged rattan loveseat, with the salt breeze weathering my face, I feel like I’ve gone to the end of the world and I’m looking over the edge. It’s just where I want to be. The ass end of the world is how Walter described it, loudly, more than once. The screen door creaks open and Trish appears, carrying a tray. Two steaming mugs and a terra cotta decanter, chunky and greenglazed , her own work. She settles beside me on the love seat and sets the tray between our feet. She hands me a mug. I say, “Up the rebels,” and she says, “Fuckin ’ right.” We tap mugs and sip. The coffee is milky, sweet and heavenly . David Maine 189 She presses into me. Trish is my age but bigger, softer. Her backside is generous, always has been, and she’s top-heavy as well. Still she exudes a kind of radiant health, with long auburn hair only starting to streak, her eyes burning with a raccoon’s steady brown intensity, and her cheeks—must be all that fresh Maine air—positively rosy...