Miriam Toews - All My Puny Sorrows

My mother didn’t bother to fight with me. I put together my sister/aunt costume, a flowered sheet, and trudged off to rehearsals with Elf who was a bit embarrassed by me but she’d gotten used to that a long time ago and only sighed wearily once. The pageant director phoned my mom a few times to complain. She told my mother she couldn’t convince me to budge from Elfie’s side, that I had just wedged myself in there between her and Joseph and wasn’t moving, and the boy playing Joseph was getting really annoyed by it. Jesus doesn’t have a pushy aunt in this thing, he said. It’s not in the Bible. My mother told the pageant director she had no advice for her. I got to play my sister’s sister and everybody tried hard to ignore me but I knew I’d been there and more importantly so did Elf who was a fantastically demure Mary, just sitting there placidly and holy, while I bustled around a bit making sure the kid was breathing, the cradle was secure, the straw was fluffed, Joseph wasn’t swearing out loud, all the things a good aunt would do when her sister has a baby.

We had to get a Christmas tree. Nora and I went to the No Frills parking lot across the street from the Runnymede Library on Bloor Street West and bought the biggest, most beautiful tree in the lot. The tree had plastic straps around it, keeping it skinny and portable, but the guy who sold it to us said it would puff out when we took them off. He tied it to the roof of our car. He called it the Everest of trees. We drove home with the tree and lugged it into the house through my mother’s back door. It took up the whole living room. As we took off the straps it kept getting bigger and bigger. Needles were everywhere. It was much too big but we loved it. My mom sat knitting me a black boat-necked sweater in her easy chair while Nora and I tried to put up the tree. Nora played the new Kanye West record on her laptop. My mother asked her what it was. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy , said Nora. She sang some of the lyrics along with Kanye. Honey, said my mom, you’re not a monster. I know, Grandma, said Nora. Thanks. My mother sat in her easy chair knitting and nodding in time to Kanye.

We were trying to get the tree to stand in the stand without falling over. Nora was balanced on the arm of the couch wearing leather mittens and holding the top of the tree. She had strands of Christmas lights around her neck all ready to go. I was lying on the floor trying to get those metal screws to go into the stump of the tree. My mother was sitting in her chair saying to the left, to the right, now the left, no the right. Kanye West was rapping about what he needed badly. We couldn’t get it straight. Then we thought we had it.

Nora, let go, I said. I let go too. The tree started to fall over to the left and Nora grabbed it before it crashed onto the piano. My mother laughed. There was flour on her forehead and chin. She had been baking tarts earlier on. I got back down on the floor and swore and Nora held the top with her mittened hand and my mother said hey, the tree wanted to lean, we should let it.

What, I said, just let it lean against the piano and have it like that?

No, said Nora, do you see people just leaning their trees against stuff? No, you don’t.

We kept trying. Then we thought maybe we should get a rope and tie the tree to the curtain rod. We could disguise the rope to make it look more Christmassy.

Ah, the Christmas Rope, said Nora. A beautiful new Von Riesen family tradition.

It’s really a big tree, isn’t it, said my mother.

One more time, I said. We worked and worked to make it stand straight and on its own without a rope. Back away now, I told Nora. We both moved slowly away from the tree and it was standing alone, there it was. O happy day. We had succeeded in doing something normal. The ceiling was very high but the top of the tree was touching it. We breathed. We eyed it for a while. Okay, I think it’s good, I said. Let’s have some wine, said my mother.

I opened a bottle and we went to the dining room table and sat there and toasted to our success. We lifted our glasses high, even Nora had a bit of wine, and said things about Christmas, about ourselves, like here’s to us. Our shoulders dropped. We were proud. We were covered in pine needles and the room smelled so good. My mother gazed towards the tree. Nora and I had turned our backs on it. We were sipping our wine. Then my mother shouted and Nora and I turned around in slo-mo, Kanye got loud again, and we watched the tree fall. It fell slowly at first, discreetly, like it was having a heart attack in public and it didn’t want this to be happening but it was happening. Then it picked up speed and as it crashed to the floor it took things with it, a painting of two boys playing in puddles, the television, the books on top of the piano, a sculpture of a girl in a dress being shy, an almost empty coffee cup and a large plant. It finished falling and lay still on the floor.

Hoo boy, said my mother. Head count, said Nora. We toasted to ourselves again and laughed hard. My mother just couldn’t stop. Then Nora and I went back to help our fallen comrade and finally, finally made him stand alone for good in the living room without a rope.

Claudio stopped by for a visit. He stood on the front porch, snow on his shoulders and cap, cradling gifts, perfectly wrapped. I thought I would see Elf behind him, shaking off her boots, big green eyes sparkling. He pulled a bottle of Italian wine out of his coat. We sat in my mother’s living room next to the piano. My mother plays hymns on it. A lot of Elf’s old piano books from her early years are piled on top.

Claudio put the gifts under the tree and handed my mother a bag. These are letters of condolence from a few of Elf’s colleagues, he said. And from fans. Wow, that’s quite a tree.

You might want to keep your distance, Nora said. She was setting the table. We tasted Claudio’s Italian wine and we toasted to Christmas, to the birth of a tiny Saviour (we’re waiting), to family, to Elfrieda.

Okay, let’s sit down, said my mom. Claudio asked us how we were doing and we told him we were okay. How was he doing? He was still in shock, he said. He had honestly thought music would save her life. Well, said my mother, it probably did, for as long as she was alive.

He told us that a guy named Jaap Zeldenthuis had filled in for Elf on the tour.

He’s not Elfrieda Von Riesen but I think he did pretty well given the short notice, said Claudio. Critics noticed a few rhythmic vagaries in his playing, a certain waywardness. But it’s all right, Jaap was performing with jet lag. I was pleased with Elfrieda’s obituary in the Guardian . I liked it because it’s about what is special about her playing, its colour and warmth, and not just the usual stuff about her rigour and discipline. Bild was good too, very beautiful, and Le Monde . It bothers me that the other papers made a big problem of her health issues, an obituary must not read like another sensational headline story. Did you see them?

My mother made a dismissive noise. Pffft. No, I didn’t, she said. I used to read those things but not anymore.

I read them, I said, and you’re right.

There was a heavy silence in the room. We stared at the tree for a while and then Claudio said I must tell you that in the gifts there is a video recording of Elfrieda’s last rehearsal. He told us that Elfrieda had given the best performance of her life that day, that she had played beyond herself, as if there was no physical barrier between herself and the piano and she could express her emotions at will, and when she was finished the orchestra stood and applauded her for five minutes. Elfrieda buried her face in her hands and wept, and then half of the musicians also wept, and now Claudio was crying too as he told us this. We thanked him for telling us the story, and for the video, and we promised we’d watch it. We all hugged him at the front door and he held on to the banister. He wouldn’t leave.