A prayer for Owen Meany (68 page)

        
 
spend the night in her apartment-if he drove
home to Gravesend-he sometimes didn't get to bed before three. Hester slept all
morning; but Owen had morning classes- or, in the summer, he was at work very
early in the quarries. Sometimes he looked like a tired, old man to me-a tired,
old, married man. I tried to nag him into taking more of an interest in his
studies; but, increasingly, he spoke of school as something to get out of.

"WHEN I GET OUT OF HERE," he said, "I'VE GOT MY
ACTIVE DUTY TO SERVE, AND I DON'T WANT TO SERVE IT AT A DESK-WHO WANTS TO BE IN
THE ARMY FOR THE PAPERWORK!"

"Who wants to be in the Army at all!" I asked him.
"You ought to sit at a desk a little more often than you do-the way you're
going to college, you might as well be in the Army already. I don't understand
you-with your natural ability, you ought to be sailing through this place with
the highest honors."

"IT DID ME A LOT OF GOOD TO SAIL THROUGH GRAVESEND ACADEMY
WITH THE HIGHEST HONORS, DIDN'T IT?" he said.

"Maybe if you weren't a stupid Geology major, you could be
a little more enthusiastic about your courses," I told him.

"GEOLOGY IS EASY FOR ME," Owen said. "AT LEAST, I
ALREADY KNOW~ SOMETHING ABOUT ROCKS."

"You didn't used to do things just because they were
easy,'' I said. He shrugged. Remember when people "dropped out"-
remember that? Owen Meany was the first person I ever saw "drop out."
Hester, of course, was born "dropped out"; maybe Owen got the idea
from Hester, but I think he was more original than that. He was original, and
stubborn. I was stubborn, too; twenty-two-year-olds are stubborn. Owen tried to
keep me working in the monument shop the whole summer of '. I said that one
whole summer in the monument shop was enough-either he would let me work in the
quarries or I would quit.

"IT'S FOR YOUR OWN GOOD," he said. "IT'S THE BEST
WORK IN THE BUSINESS-AND THE EASIEST."

"So maybe I don't want what's 'easiest,' " I said.
"So maybe you should let me decide what's 'best.' "

"GO AHEAD AND QUIT," he said.

"Fine," I said. "I guess I should speak to your
father."

"MY FATHER DIDN'T HIRE YOU," said Owen Meany.
Naturally, I didn't quit; but I matched his stubbornness sufficiently-I hinted
that I was losing my interest in practicing the shot. In the summer of ', Owen
Meany resembled a dropout-in many ways-but his fervor for practicing the shot
had reappeared. We compromised: I apprenticed myself to the diamond wheel until
August; and that August-when the USS Maddox and the USS Turner Joy were
attacked in the Tonkin Gulf-Owen set me to work as a signalman in the quarries.
When it rained, he let me work with the sawyers, and by the end of die summer
he apprenticed me to the channel-bar drillers.

"NEXT SUMMER, I'LL LET YOU TRY THE DERRICK," he said.
"NEXT AUGUST, I'LL GIVE YOU A LITTLE DYNAMITE LESSON-WHEN I GET BACK FROM
BASIC TRAINING."

Just before we began our junior year at the University of New
Hampshire-just before the students returned to Graves-end Academy, and to all
the nation's other schools and universities-Owen Meany slam-dunked the
basketball in the Gravesend Academy gym in under three seconds. I suggested
that the retarded janitor might have started the official scorer's clock a
little late; but Owen insisted that we had sunk the shot in record time-he said
that the clock had been accurate, that our success was official.

"I COULD FEEL THE DIFFERENCE-IN THE AIR," he said
excitedly. "EVERYTHING WAS JUST A LITTLE QUICKER, A LITTLE MORE
SPONTANEOUS."

"Now I suppose you'll tell me that under two seconds is
possible," I said. He was dribbling the ball-crazily, in a frenzy, like a
speeded-up film of one of the Harlem Globetrotters. I didn't think he'd heard
me.

"I suppose you think that under two seconds is
possible!" I shouted. He stopped dribbling. "DON'T BE RIDICULOUS,"
he said. "THREE SECONDS IS FAST ENOUGH."

I was surprised. "I thought the idea was to see how fast we
can get. We can always get faster," I said.

"THE IDEA IS TO BE FAST ENOUGH," he said. "THE
TRICK IS, CAN WE DO IT IN UNDER THREE SECONDS EVERY TIME! THAT'S THE
IDEA."

So we kept practicing. When there were students in the

        
 
Gravesend Academy gym, we went to the
playground at St. Michael's. We had no one to time us-we had nothing resembling
the official scorer's clock in the gym, and Hester was unwilling to participate
in our practices; she was no substitute for the retarded janitor. And the rusty
hoop of the basket was a little crooked, and the net long gone-and the macadam
of the playground was so broken up, we couldn't even dribble the ball; but we
could still practice. Owen said he could FEEL when we were dunking the shot in
under three seconds. And although there was no retarded janitor to cheer us on,
the nuns in the saltbox at the far end of the playground often noticed us;
sometimes, they even waved, and Owen Meany would wave back-although he said
that nuns still gave him the shivers. And always Mary Magdalene watched over
us; we could feel her silent encouragement. When it snowed, Owen would brush
her off. It snowed early that fall-long before Thanksgiving. I remember
practicing the shot with my ski hat and my gloves on; but Owen Meany would
always do it bare-handed. And in the afternoons, when it grew dark early, the
lights in the nuns' house would be lit before we finished practicing. Mary
Magdalene would turn a darker shade of gray; she would almost disappear in the
shadows. Once, when it was almost too dark to see the basket, I caught just a
glimpse of her-standing at the edge of total darkness. I imagined that she
resembled mat Owen thought he had seen at my mother's bed. I said this to him,
and he looked at Mary Magdalene; blowing on his cold, bare hands, he looked at
her very intently.

"NO, THERE'S NOT REALLY ANY RESEMBLANCE," he said.
"THAT ANGEL WAS VERY BUSY-SHE WAS MOVING, ALWAYS MOVING. ESPECIALLY, HER
HANDS -SHE KEPT REACHING OUT WITH HER HANDS."

It was the first I'd heard that had been moving- about what a
busy angel he thought he'd seen.

"You never said it was moving," I said.

"IT WAS MOVING, ALL RIGHT," said Owen Meany. "THAT'S
WHY I NEVER HAD ANY DOUBT. IT COULDN'T HAVE BEEN THE DUMMY BECAUSE IT WAS
MOVING," he said. "AND DSf ALL THESE YEARS THAT I'VE HAD THE DUMMY,
THE DUMMY HAS NEVER MOVED."

Since when, I wondered, did Owen Meany ever have ANY DOUBT? And
how often had he stared at my mother's dressmaker's dummy? He expected it to
move, I thought. When it was so dark at the St. Michael's playground that we
couldn't see the basket, we couldn't see Mary Magdalene, either. What Owen
liked best was to practice the shot until we lost Mary Magdalene in the
darkness. Then he would stand under the basket with me and say, "CAN YOU
SEE HER?"

"Not anymore," I'd say.

"YOU CAN'T SEE HER, BUT YOU KNOW SHE'S STILL
THERE-RIGHT?" he would say.

"Of course she's still there!" I'd say.

"YOU'RE SURE?" he'd ask me.

"Of course I'm sure!" I'd say.

"BUT YOU CANT SEE HER," he'd say-very teasingly.
"HOW DO YOU KNOW SHE'S STILL THERE IF YOU CAN'T ACTUALLY SEE HER?"

"Because I know she's still there-because I know she
couldn't have gone anywhere-because I just knowl" I would say. And one
cold, late-fall day-it was November or even early December, Johnson had
defeated Goldwater for the presidency; Khrushchev had been replaced by Brezhnev
and Kosygin; five Americans had been killed in a Viet Cong attack on the air
base at Bien Hoa-I was especially exasperated by this game he played about not
seeing Mary Magdalene but still knowing she was there.

"YOU HAVE NO DOUBT SHE'S THERE?" he nagged at me.

"Of course I have no doubt!" I said.

"BUT YOU CAN'T SEE HER-YOU COULD BE WRONG," he said.

"No, I'm not wrong-she's there, I know she's there!" I
yelled at him.

"YOU ABSOLUTELY KNOW SHE'S THERE-EVEN THOUGH YOU CAN'T SEE
HER?" he asked me.

"Yes!" I screamed.

"WELL, NOW YOU KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT GOD," said Owen
Meany. "I CAN'T SEE HIM-BUT I ABSOLUTELY KNOW HE IS THERE!"

Georgian Bay: My , -Katherine told me today that I should make
an effort to not read any newspapers. She saw how The Globe and Mail ruined my
day-and it is so

        
 
gorgeous, so peaceful on this island, on all
this water; it's such a shame to not relax here, to not take the opportunity to
think more tranquilly, more reflectively. Katharine wants only the best for me;
I know she's right-I should give up the news, just give it up. You can't
understand anything by reading the news, anyway. If someone ever presumed to
teach Charles Dickens or Thomas Hardy or Robertson Davies to my Bishop Strachan
students with die same, shallow, superficial understanding that I'm sure /
possess of world affairs-or, even, American wrongdoing-I would be outraged. I
am a good enough English teacher to know that my grasp of American
misadventures-even in Vietnam, not to mention Nicaragua-is shallow and
superficial. Whoever acquired any real or substantive intelligence from reading
newspapers! I'm sure I have no in-depth comprehension of American villainy; yet
I can't leave the news alone! You'd think I might profit from my experience
with ice cream. If I have ice cream in my freezer, I'll eat it-I'll eat all of
it, all at once. Therefore, I've learned not to buy ice cream. Newspapers are
even worse for me than ice cream; headlines, and the big issues that generate
the headlines, are pure fat. The island library, to be kind, is full of field
guides-to everything I never knew enough about; I mean, real things, not
"issues." I could study pine needles, or bird identification- there
are even categories for studying the latter: in-flight movement, perching
silhouettes, feeding and mating cries. It's fascinating-I suppose. And with all
this water around, I could certainly take more than one day to go fishing with
Charlie; I know it disappoints him that I'm not more interested in fishing. And
Katherine has pointed out to me that it's been a long time since she and I have
talked about our respective beliefs-the shared and private articles of our
faith. I used to talk about this for hours with her-and with Canon Campbell,
before her. Now I'm ashamed to tell Katherine how many Sunday services I've skipped.
Katherine's right. I'm going to try to give up the news. The Globe and Mail
said today that the Nicaraguan contras have executed prisoners; the contras are
being investigated for " major cases of human-rights abuse"-and these
same filthy contras are the "moral equivalent of our founding
fathers," President Reagan says! Meanwhile, the spiritual leader of Iran,
the ayatollah, urged all Moslems to "crush America's teeth in its
mouth"; this sounds like just the guy the Americans should sell arms
to-right? The United States simply isn't making sense. I agree with Katherine.
Time to fish; time to observe the flatness of that small, aquatic mammal's
tail-is it an otter or is it a muskrat? Time to find out. And out there, where
the water of the bay turns blue-green and then to the color of a bruise, is
that a loon or a coot I see diving there? Time to see; time to forget about the
rest. And it's "high time"-as Canon Mackie is always saying-for me to
try to be a Canadian! When I first came to Canada, I thought it was going to be
easy to be a Canadian; like so many stupid Americans, I pictured Canada as
simply some northern, colder, possibly more provincial region of the United
States-I imagined it would be like moving to Maine, or Minnesota. It was a
surprise to discover that Toronto wasn't as snowy and cold as New Hampshire-and
not nearly as provincial, either. It was more of a surprise to discover how
different Canadians were-they were so polite! Naturally, I started out
apologizing. "I'm not really a draft dodger," I would say; but most
Canadians didn't care what I was. "I'm not here tor evade the draft,"
I would explain. "I would certainly classify myself as antiwar," I
said inthosedays. "I'm comfortable with the term'war resister,' " I
told everyone, "but I don't need to dodge or evade the draft-that's not
why I'm here."

But most Canadians didn't care why I'd come; they didn't ask any
questions. It was , probably the midpoint of Vietnam "resisters"
coming to Canada; most Canadians were sympathetic-they thought the war in
Vietnam was stupid and wrong, too. In , you needed fifty points to become a
landed immigrant; landed immigrants could apply for Canadian citizenship, for
which they'd be eligible in five years. Earning my fifty "points" was
easy for me; I had a B.A. cum laude, and a Master's degree in English-with Owen
Meany's help, I'd written my Master's thesis on Thomas Hardy. I'd also had two
years' teaching experience; while I was in graduate school at the University of
New Hampshire, I taught part-time at Gravesend Academy-Expository Writing for
ninth graders. Dan Needham and Mr. Early had recommended me for the job. In ,
one out of every nine Canadians was an immigrant; and the Vietnam
"resisters" were better-educated and more employable than most
immigrants in Canada. That year the so-called Union of American Exiles was
organized; compared

        
 
to Hester-and her SDS friends, those
so-called Students for a Democratic Society-the few guys I knew in the Union of
American Exiles were a pretty tame lot. I was used to rioters; Hester was big
on riots then. That was the year she was arrested in Chicago. Hester had her
nose broken while rioting at the site of the Democratic Party's national
convention. She said a policeman mashed her face against the sliding side door
of a van; but Hester would have been disappointed to return from Chicago with
all her bones intact. The Americans I ran into in Toronto-even the AMEX
organizers, even the deserters- were a whole lot more reasonable than Hester
and many other Americans I had known "at home."