Carbon Dating : Part 6

Ditched by Dr. Right: And Other Distress Signals from the Edge of Polite Society
by Elizabeth Warner

(Page 6 of 6)

Of course she was right about the getting-busy part. Wisest to get back on the plan. So I would become subsumed by my job, forget all about Dr. Right, and feel that sense of serene calm that comes from good old head-in-the-sand hard work. I would be, after all, functioning. And I would find the answer. And it would be direct mail.

I then crawled into one of the mirthless barracks-style twin beds in "my room." It was, in fact, still my room, even though it too had undergone that whitewashing process that people perform to create a generic guest room when the kids have gone. I know this causes problems for many people. People who feel forgotten and alienated once the space they grew up in (and slept in, wept in, journaled in, played 45s in, and viewed dirty pictures in) has been utterly transformed. Transformed until their beloved sacred spot is no more personal than a "demo sleeping chamber" at Calico Corner. Still, I can take comfort in the fact that mine are actually parents who would have kept trophies displayed even now, if I had ever won any. Looking around, I had to smile, because even though the plaster Christmas hand imprints were gone, I could distinctly make out a small stack of Ranger Ricks on the bookshelf - although My Friend Flicka and Black Beauty had long since been delivered unto grandchildren, replaced now by volumes from Winston Churchill, William Buckley, and Amy Tan.

I noticed a shiny new catalogue on the bedside table. (Editorially speaking, a well-crafted catalogue really can reside comfortably and alone on the summit of direct mail's Mount Olympus.) I hadn't authored this particular one, but it was clearly a handsome example of this important genre. What's not to like about catalogues like these: four-color shiny invitations to a Better Way that will require some fiscal outlay on your part? I am all too happy to invent the bright, customer-friendly worlds of bold colors, attractive copy blocks, and undeniably appealing lives and styles.

On the catalogue cover, in an upbeat, devil-may-care font: this summer. So summer's upon you. So there's that. You're reminded, ever so gently, that you're quite likely to be stuck in lederhosen and a hair shirt this sum- mer unless you buy some clothes. And damnit, you'll need that one cotton sweater, color: surf, that's good for exactly one afternoon when, by golly, you better be sitting Native American-style on a dock talking animatedly about this week's issue of The New Yorker because - jiminy! - you actually got through it and it only took you seven hours.

Then you open the catalogue up. And behold. Extraordinarily attractive people, seemingly devoid of concern. The kind of young, scrubbed people who, if you asked them about domestic abuse or Kabul or stem-cell research, would probably produce one of those red plastic rings on a stick from a reinforced on-seam khaki pocket and blow a soapy bubble right through it at you. Those khakis that are, of course, available in shale, slate, silt, or schist. And next spring in pesto and alloy and root and hemoglobin and lentil and inlet.

Suddenly you wonder why you don't have a boyfriend who wears eight layers of plaid shirts all at once. And why doesn't he bring you the fresh milk that he's just happily procured from the goat . . . the goat grazing delightfully by your handcrafted knotty-pine and wrought-iron trellis? Why doesn't he bring that milk to you as you're reclining languorously atop that downy, sunlight-flecked bed that is covered by a bold, colorful quilt? The quilt you stitched last summer while you laughed happily at your Adirondack fishing hideaway with your good, straight, white, appealingly liberal friends before joining forces to make a healthy but robust meal together filled with laughter, humility, and pointed intellectual debate. And even when you had a flat tire it was fun, because those guys you're with - the ones with all the plaid shirts - see, along with the fact that they all have doctoral degrees in Semiotics and a profound understanding of Mahler and can explain the difference between wicker and rattan, why, they're also uniquely qualified to change a tire in less than ten minutes, plus they can operate a forklift, and they'd also ably run with bulls in Pamplona.

Which is when I closed the catalogue, took three Benadryl sinus tablets, and enjoyed a hot mug of Sambuca. Before I drifted uneasily but antihistaminically into raglan-sleeved, garment-dyed sleep, a cursory check of my answering machine in New York revealed that Dr. Right had indeed phoned, but simply to let me know that he was returning to retrieve his nine iron and his "Paul Stuart Elements of Style" CD-ROM. And he'd phoned, he said, so as not to startle me. But now, of course, nothing startled me, and as I considered the gyrations and machinations of the human spirit, I came to realize that it was all, really, just nature's way. Just nature's way. Besides, I was eating. And frequently in top-flight restaurants. And it dawned on me that perhaps one can coexist peacefully with - or at least graze alongside - one's black heart and empty life.

The following morning I returned to New York with renewed vigor. Sometimes you just need a little trip home to see that once we overcome the Gaza Strip of childhood, anything's surmountable. Even Susan Sontag.

Copyright © 2005 by Elizabeth Warner.

About the Author

Elizabeth Warner is a writer and actress whose one-woman show, The Wandering Eye, premiered at HBO's Aspen Comedy Festival. She has read her work on NPR and written for several network game shows, and particularly keen viewers can spot her in a few films. Elizabeth lives in Los Angeles but, no fool, maintains a home in New York as well.