Getting UP

Paul Rudolph
Jul 22, 2017 · 12 min read
The author stands in front of an installation at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA. (photo by his niece)

After some twenty or so months I recently spent some time with my niece in Richmond, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. She is a teenager now and preparing to enter her junior year in high school in another month or so. I’ve had the tremendous fortune of spending significant spans of time with her throughout her life and so I’ve been able to watch her grow into the mature young lady she is today.

During our Saturday in D.C. together, we explored the extraordinary Library of Congress and walked over to the National Portrait Gallery for some cherished museum time. We spoke with one another as friends and equals (I think) and I was grateful to learn more about who she really is beyond her interests and achievements (which, yes, are fantastic in and of themselves — no bias here). She revealed layers of sensitivity and compassion and curiosity and enthusiasm that were most, most invigorating.

I shared with her some personal tales about the past twenty months and reveled in her responses. I told her several stories about taking care of Mema, the great grandmother she probably only saw four or five times in her life, and was overjoyed to see her interest piqued. She learned a bit more about Mema’s childhood in West Virginia and about Mema’s parents. Mema’s father was named George W. Gallop Abraham Lincoln Rebel Killer Cantrell. Who wouldn’t show some curiosity in such a string of words?

I’ve wondered about writing more specifically about Mema and her life as I know it. There are many gaps there, of course. By the time I began helping care for Mema almost two years ago she had begun to forget many things. While talking with Mema, while watching her and the process that is life, I’ve begun to consider memory. And so I’ve set about writing down many more things. Apparently memories escape a lot of us as we go through this process. called “life.”

And somewhere along the way, after spending time with Gretchen a few weeks ago, I began to wonder when she started calling me “U.P.” What of this name, this specific memory? What of that memory in general? Did her mom start calling me that first? Her dad, my brother? I am a fan of person-specific nicknames and this one especially. I love the letter “P.” And I love that with “U’ (for “Uncle” people — get it?) it spells “up.” I’m not always up, most certainly I am not, but it serves as a reminder of love and sincerity and bonds and so forth. So where did I get this moniker?

––

Suzy Pollack and Care Homard were imaginary friends who lived under our basement stairs on Avery Street. Suzy was short and ordinary and friendly and loyal. I’m pretty sure I didn’t know what clogs were at the time but I’m pretty confident stating forty years later that she wore clogs. With jeans and a billowing, neutral turtleneck. Care was a model. She was taller and thinner and more stylish than I would ever become. She wore a navy A-line dress and a bright scarf of saturated yellows and pinks with yellow heels and a pink bracelet.

The three of us were the greatest of friends.

––

After my freshman year at RISD I worked at a golf course on their ground maintenance crew. During what was to have been my last week there, I slept all day, every day. Five days of sleep when I should have been at work. I was racked with guilt. I didn’t return to college in the fall.

I look at my coping mechanisms as a 46 year-old and am certain that 19 year old Paul was depressed and without the communication skills he so longed for. And by-and-large he scoffs at people who refer to themselves by their own name or in the third person.

––

“The closest I could ever come to knowing who Paul Rudolph is would be to look inside myself and write how I really feel about him.

Twice my age, about a foot taller than me, and the most uncommon person I have ever met, theorange1 is quite the diamond in the rough.”

––

After mere minutes of meeting him, he told me he wanted to show me under the hood of his car.

“What?” I thought. Certainly he would have had no idea of my now-distant “career” in golf course maintenance. What else about me would suggest I would be interested in his engine or transmission or the carburetor. But look we did.

“Wow. That’s certainly clean,” I said. To be honest, I just didn’t know what else to say. He prattled on about acceleration and cylinders and I believe I was polite enough. But I also began planning an exit strategy.

Years later, probably nearing two decades, things had changed dramatically. While he was an incredibly dominant presence in my life, he didn’t know my name. He couldn’t have told you why I was with him, couldn’t have shared with you the town or even the state we were in. His gaze was generally vacant now, lacking connection with those around him. His hygiene suffered.

“Come here and look at this.” He opened the car door and tapped on the steering wheel. “Isn’t this something.” He patted the steering wheel again and it seemed he struggled to recall its name.

“Oh wow,” I responded. “Is that what helps us get from one place to the next?”

“It is.” I mean, what else do I say here? He walked to the next car but the door was locked.

“Can you show me the back yard?” I queried, hoping to give him something to do, trying to make some kind of conversation, and wondering how we had each gotten to our respective places. Will that be our last awkward interaction looking at cars?

––

“I’m sorry if that comes across as callous. It’s not. I don’t know what else to do. Reasoning with them in discourse within their echoed hovel doesn’t seem to [lead to -ed.] any good but getting myself dirty. So laughing at their megalomania is the only thing that makes sense.

And I laugh but it does cut.

It makes me angry.

Sad.

Frustrated.

Suicidal.

It makes me feel hopeless and silent and downtrodden and livid and fearful.

But I laugh.”

––

We stood in front of my brother’s house this time. It was cold out and I had loaned you my yellow leather gloves. My fingertips were numb but I wanted you to be comfortable, happy. You flailed more than I had anticipated and I was quiet.

Hadn’t we been here before?

Weren’t you asking about the tape? You wanted to know why I put various stripes of tape on the stems of my glasses.

“I have for years. I just get bored. And you know me…I probably want to stand out, be noticed. Sometimes I use pieces of colorful clippings from magazines or wrapping paper or whatever to make sleeves for the stems. I can cover up the tape that is already there. And they’re just more temporary, not as hard on the frame. The tape leaves sticky residue behind and the stem is never the same again. But then that’s what I’m looking for. I don’t want it to be the same. And with the paper stem sleeves, well, they pretty much cost nothing. And I can make a sleeve for a specific ensemble, to match a specific tie or whatever. You should have seen the one I wore for Christmas the year we went to the Ritz for the holiday work party. Oh my gosh. And my shirt. I got it at Target. ‘FRUITCAKE.’ Amazing. With plaid pants. So much fun. Cat Matt.”

Talk about prattling.

“I love you.”

“I don’t blame you. Would you like to go inside?”

“I’m tired. I want to rest. Can we go have a smoke?”

The fog down Vista was nearly impenetrable to the human eye, and so we couldn’t see the Fremont Bridge on the other side of the Pearl. Frankly, we couldn’t even see the surface of Vista. Car after car after car passed, their headlights becoming these odd apparitions around the turn.

We stood on the stairs that lead to SW Montgomery. The thing was, our feet hovered again above the steps. We heard an elephant and then the roar of a lion.

“Are we that close to the zoo?”

“No, but these people have a few pets..”

Some cyclists whizzed by, those show-offs peddling UP the hill.

Again we were decked out in the purest of white. I had on an amazing top hat. I finally got one! I’m sure I got it at Cambridge at Keezer’s, even though they’ve shuttered their shop for good. It’s a dark grey wool and the crown has the most elegant of outward curves. Grey as white. Even the yellow leather gloves you “borrowed” were white. You wore cherry red Toms this time which I thought was funny. Toms always look like espadrilles to me. And naturally your red Toms were white.

We have shoe thing, I guess. And certainly a shoe name thing. You taught me that wingtips are now called brogues. If I write it here I’ll remember it later, right? I can read it later?

Another roar from the lion.

You lit two cigarettes and passed me one. You still wore those yellow gloves -seemingly white now- while you smoked. And we discussed Andrew Garfield and Colin Farrell and Mark Ruffalo and Hugh Jackman and Aubrey Plaza. Was she the token female? Wait. What? What is this message I am receiving? How do I process this.

I managed to blow a series of smoke rings. Perfect in the fog.

“We should get back to the house.”

––

Mema and I sat on the porch. I asked her to sing the song her mom always sang to her.

We faced the lake and the evening sky was some wonderful mixture of leftover blue, a gauzy rose color, and an amazingly luminescent golden orange. Everything in its path changed color. Emma walked across the yard, stopping for a moment to sit and groom herself. I could hear mom on the phone, maybe in the back yard.

What a friend we have in Jesus
All our sins and griefs to bear
And what a privilege to carry
Everything to God in prayer

Oh, what peace we often forfeit
Oh, what needless pain we bear
All because we do not carry
Everything to God in prayer

Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged
Take it to the Lord in prayer

Can we find a friend so faithful
Who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness
Take it to the Lord in prayer

––

“Are you vaping in that photo? Your niece can see that photo.”

––

I slept for three days after the opening. I was extremely proud of the work. And my name was on the wall. My name. Foot high letters. Dozens of friends had turned out for it. I sold a few prints. A handful of us went to Momo afterward. And I could. not. wait. to. sleep. could. not. wait.

––

I was sure that day I was going to commit suicide. It was gorgeous out and I had a therapy appointment. Ironically the most direct route to therapy involved walking over suicide bridge. Even more ironic, the bridge was quite beautiful and it offered a stunning view of downtown and beyond.

I finally convinced myself to get out of bed and shower. My outfit was utter perfection. A navy gingham shirt, worn pink shorts, my white saddle shoes with a red stripe on each side and blue stripes down their backs. Orange footies peeked out. I think I had my cross-stitched golf-themed belt on. It was bright green somewhere between kelly and lime; “fore” and “birdie” and other words wrapped around my waist.

Therapy was brutal. It was definitely a “recline on the floor and cry and wail and talk” affair. My therapist wanted me to go to a crisis center across the river. It seemed beyond daunting but she listed several reasons that a visit might be beneficial. By “across the river” I mean it was actually some forty blocks across the river and I was some fifteen blocks on this side. She asked if I could take a bus. My wallet was empty and so she fished three dollars from her purse. We looked up the exact corner where I would catch the bus and so in fifteen minutes I found myself there. I was teary. we glided through downtown, passing some amazing architecture, and ended up on Division.

A strikingly tall woman got on in some sort of turquoise jump suit. It was perfect against her skin tone, and became a vibrant cacophony with a bright orange scarf wrapped around her neck. We glanced at each other and slightly smiled. She perched on the seat diagonally behind me across the aisle. I rode in silence and thought to myself that this must be the day. My thoughts and the view became static. After what I presume were a couple of stops, I felt a tap on my shoulder.

“I love your look,” said this colorful stranger. I think I beamed. I’m not convinced I could feel at the time.

“Thank you,” I responded. “And I, yours. Orange is my favorite color too.” We both smiled again, seemingly more from joy than our earlier gestures.

“Have a good day,” I told her before I made my way toward the door at the appropriate stop.

“Did I just tell someone to have a good day when I’m considering suicide?” I wondered.

The interior of the crisis center was enormous and sterile. Fluorescent lights were nobody’s friends — why did they exist? It was probably the largest waiting room I have been in for medical reasons, and it was filled with a fair number of people in many of the chairs. There was a hush about it which, unlike the lighting, I did find comforting.

“Were all of these people here because they were considering suicide today?”

I ended up seeing a social worker first. We made our way through a maze of corridors to a windowless, square room and sat across from one another on either side of a typical (boring) round office table. The wall behind her was a rich red, as I recall, but the three others were a typical (boring) off white.

“Had they been watching Property Brothers and installed “feature walls” throughout this expanse of offices?”

We talked for an hour and a half. More precisely, I talked and talked and talked and talked for an hour and twenty-five minutes and she filled in during my five minutes of silence. I immediately felt comfortable with her and (I think) gave lots of material with which to establish a diagnosis of sorts. She reminded me quite a bit of my cousin Lisa, which was good. During my schpeel she wrote copious notes. I’d be curious today to read those pages of legal paper. Then again, maybe she was just making a list of groceries.

What struck me, though, was that she wrote in orange. Who has pens with orange ink? Twice in one day, in one hour, orange has been put in my path. I told her this.

“Is it a sign?”

And so we talked a bit more and then I was told to wait until a doctor came to see me.

After maybe twenty minutes, a doctor introduced herself and she escorted me to her office. She had windows and so, thankfully, the overhead fluorescents were off. Things were really looking up. She asked a few probing questions and again away I went. She typed furiously, probably a lot like I am right now, and would only pause when I said something particularly, hmm, alarming? Certainly she’s seen it all. We discussed depression, obviously, and whether or not I might be bi-polar, and drug treatments and therapy and so on. I won’t bore you now.

After over four hours in mostly fluorescent lighting, I was released. I wouldn’t say I received a clean bill of health, no, but I was given a prescription and a realistic action plan and I definitely felt better than I had at therapy on “my” side of the river. Oooooh…but I hadn’t any cash on me now. I decided to make the fifty plus block walk. It was gorgeous out, I did make some steps toward better self-care and maybe the fresh air and sunshine were what I needed. The prospect of finding something orange to photograph intrigued me. And well, what other option did I have?

By the time I got near the river and downtown, I recalled that I had a Banana Republic gift card in my wallet.

“You know, Paul, it’s been a horrible day. Retail therapy isn’t going to change a whole lot but one more natty shirt in the closet certainly can’t hurt.”

As it turns out I wasn’t so inspired by their selection but I managed some very playful banter with a charming and handsome salesperson. He was a coquette, to be sure, and I suddenly appreciated feeling attractive. He even commented on the quarter inch of orange he could see peaking out of my shoes. He mentioned orange! Was this happening today? Didn’t this day begin as the worstdayever and how could I possibly explain this conversation, this meeting?

I couldn’t. But that’s how I remember it.

We went on a few dates and I hope to not soon forget sharing a kiss with him in the South Park Blocks. I count him as an important friend today.

Oh, and I did pay my therapist the three dollars she had loaned me.

––

Shaved head. Totally uneven but the rest will fall out soon

Need more hats. Feel like my head is tiny

––

How do you get up?

Written by

artist, friend, brother, son, orange lover, P collector, natty dresser

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