The Box
At some point last week, the boy and I were having a chat about 2014: how it went for each of us, what we thought of it, what we had hoped for it as opposed to how it turned out, that sort of thing. As you do. I said — and surprised myself in the saying — that 2014 was a bitch of a year in most external respects. Around the world, the year’s been awful. But for me personally? Despite ongoing challenges, my year was good. I credit my own drive to “take control” of various aspects of my life for this feeling. I credit a certain amount of personal stability — sorely lacking in the 3, 4, 5 years immediately before — and a whole lot of self-work for this. I could have improved on 2014, to be sure, but I’m pleased with what actually transpired for me. I’m still uncertain, still physically hobbled. But I’ve learned my limits, and within those limits I did well. I feel good.
We talked briefly about 2015. I can tell, in general terms, how it’s going to go. It’s nice to have a path again, even if it’s arbitrary and entirely self-imposed. What I lack, I said, is a theme. He suggested — ha! — that I check my horoscope. We looked into Rob Brezny’s opinion on the matter, who had this to say:
The entomologist Charles P. Alexander (1889–1981) devoted much of his professional life to analyzing the insect known as the crane fly. He identified over 11,000 different species, drew 15,000 illustrations of the creatures, and referred to his lab as “Crane Fly Haven.” That’s the kind of single-minded intention I’d love to see you adopt during the first six months of 2015, Cancerian. What I’m imagining is that you will choose a specific, well-defined area within which you will gleefully explore and experiment and improvise. Is there a subject or task or project you would have fun pursuing with that kind of intensity?
You’re looking at the beginning of my answer to that challenge.
For the most part, this is Dinu’s box as I received it in 2002. I’ve taken care that none of its contents has come to harm, but the project of cataloguing or just plain doing something with it has stalled every single time I’ve tried. Part of the problem is that his notebooks are so dense that they defy study. Another is just the utter lack of organization aside from basic categorization — photographs mostly in one smaller box of their own, then everything else. My relationship with it so far has been to open it, reach in for one or two objects, smile, then put said objects back.
Tonight’s candidate was a tiny, half-palm sized journal from 1954. For the latter half of the year, Dinu was traveling. Every other day contains a slightly different location, from Spain to Germany. Zaragosa. Carcasonne. Stuttgart. Sometimes these place names are accompanied by a short comment.
Then, because it seemed appropriate, I checked to see where he spent New Year’s Eve these sixty years ago.
He was in Heidelberg. Cy was not coming to join him, having declared that “he was not for her.” The next day, he shaved off his moustache and noted, “Liberation.”
I don’t know who Cy was, but I think I might have seen a photograph.
There are myriad bits of his life in these notebooks, not all of them this self-contained, but all of which, together, make up some kind of context. I hope. I want the story. I want to know why he did some of the things he’s supposed to have done. I want to understand why he left home when he did, why he roamed the planet most of his life, why his sister (my grandmother) never spoke his name, why he saved so many pictures of his nephew (my father), why he wrote to me. Why he never flew. Why he never married.
I realize I may not find out any of it, but also that trying to figure it out is going to require a system. Some actual study. Forensics. Maybe a “crazy wall” or two, you know the kind, with the pictures and the maps and the pins and the colored threads?
Well. First, to sort. I got some supplies today.
We’ll see whether I can make any of it make sense, yes?
