Bruce Wagner - Memorial

“You’re feeling your oats.”

That’s what Ray liked to tell her, though BG hadn’t a clue what he meant.

He wasn’t feeling so bad himself.

They sat in a window booth of Ambala Dhaba grazing curried goat and Mysore bonda, spring dosa, and payasam. Then they went to market for spices and she bought zebra rice, tiger biscuits, Ovaltine, and a case of Manila mangoes. At a curio shop, he got her a small statue of Durga on a wooden base, nicely detailed. The goddess strode a lion and possessed 8 arms; one held a trident, one a sword, another a lotus, another a conch shell, another an arrow…. Ghulpa said that when Durga went to war she lopped off heads while trumpeting a conch — a one-woman band, for sure. He bought an emerald green sari to commemorate the pregnancy. Man, she was pretty. He told her she made him “prouder than all get-out.”

They were late to the film. There were subtitles but some of the phrases were in English. At 1st, Ray thought it was silly. The story was about a wealthy man (he recognized the bearded, aristocratic actor from a poster she kept in the living room) who learned he was dying. He had a handsome son, a wastrel who’d recently married and moved with his wife into his parents’ palatial home. The living room looked like the atrium of a Hyatt. The daughter-inlaw was soon pregnant and the father wanted his son to get a job but the kid was too lazy; he had some damn-fool acting competition on his mind instead, a fantasy longshot that would make him solvent. Now that he’d been secretly diagnosed as having a terminal illness, the dad belatedly realizes he’s ruined his son through a lifetime of coddling. He decides his legacy will be to force the boy to grow up — fast. So he kicks the newlyweds out of the main house and makes them stay elsewhere on the property (some punishment!), a kind of luxury Quonset with no electricity. Dad proceeds to generally torment his heir — already in his late 20s — until he has no choice but to earn rupees of his own (soon there will be another mouth to feed). The kid realizes how tough it is out there in the world. He tries his hand at being a movie stuntman and gets chased by a wild pack of dogs, then inadvertently set on fire. That sort of thing; slapstick but effective. The producer is impressed by the kid’s bravery because he knows he’s an amateur. When he asks what he is called, the young man won’t say. “I am trying to make my name,” he says. “When I do, you will hear it.” The plot was dopey and Ray was surprised because it actually engrossed the hell out of him. (Every now and then there was a vigorous dance number and the actors stood and gyrated. The show would have been fine without it.)

Then came intermission — these Bollywood deals were long. A slideshow of advertisements: Indian lawyers who could get you out of jail, Indian tax lawyers, Indian immigration lawyers, Indian realtors who sold mansions right there in Artesia, Indian wedding planners, Indian haberdashers. After the slides there were a bunch of trailers for upcoming extravaganzas, with most of the actors looking suspiciously like the ones in the feature Ray and Big Gulp were sitting through.

The film resumed and the whole thing got very amazing. Ray thought it “damn fine.” Damn good. It turns out that the dying rich guy (who was incredibly charismatic and looked like he was 55) is a famous toymaker and all he wants is to live long enough to see his grandchild born — and continue to strengthen his weak-minded son by being a major hardass. The tough love routine was heartbreaking to keep up and heartbreaking for his boy to endure, but it was what the “doctor” ordered. Finally, the kid has enough of Dad’s bullying and tells him he was at fault for raising him too leniently! That all he ever wanted was “a finger to hold on to but you gave me an arm, all I wanted was to stand with my own 2 feet on the ground but you always hoisted me on your shoulders to get the royal view.” He was eloquent and Ray had to admit the spoiled sonofabitch had a point. The kid said that when he became a father, he would never treat his son that way — nor would he ever banish him from his house or deprive his daughter-in-law food for the fetus — if his son stumbled, he’d be patient and give him time. (The dad said, in an aside, “I would give time if I had time”—but his progeny couldn’t hear.) He was laying the guilt on pretty thick and Ray was worried the old guy would drop dead on the spot. He told his father he would never let him see the grandkid. He was damned pissed and there didn’t seem to be any way out of it. Things got more and more complicated, this and that happened, the boy managed to make the finals of the cockamamie talent show, suddenly he was odds-on national favorite — and if he won, the stakes were enough for him to become completely independent.

On the night of the televised competition, they rush the sallow patriarch to the auditorium in some kind of beautifully appointed private ambulance. The arena’s packed; even the producer that hired the son as a stuntman shows up. By mistake, he learns that his father is actually dying and finally understands the ruse. He stands onstage distraught and basically relinquishes his spot, telling the millions of people watching that the famed and beloved toymaker is on the ropes, and he doesn’t give 2 shits about winning the damn contest, all he wants is that everyone should take a minute out of their lives — right then — and pray that his dad lives long enough to see his grandson, that his fate is in the audience’s hands. He tells everyone that the toys his father made were responsible for millions of babies’ 1st smiles — the word he used was design, his father “designed babies’ 1st smiles”—that the old guy manufactured the big, cushy, friendly, forgiving toys that helped children learn they could fall down and get up again. Before the transfixed mob, a shaky father and son meet onstage. He wipes his dad’s tears away. “At last,” says Pop, “you are a man! You, who caused so many to cry, now wipe away others’ tears.”

Just when Ray thought it couldn’t get any more rollercoaster-emotional (Ghulpa was stifling sobs), the old guy clutches at his chest, the daughter-in-law goes into labor, and they’re both rushed to hospital! The grandson’s born and the father is discharged but has only a short time to live. Now he must give the baby a name: with a last breath, he christens him with his own. Ray finally got the whole Indian thing about rebirth — the child is father to the man.

The cycle would begin again, and that was how it should be.

It was damn fine. Damn fine.

On the way out, Ray looked at the poster for the film while BG used the restroom. It said, COME TO LAUGH, COME TO CRY, COME TO TERMS…

When they got to the car, Ghulpa, eyes still wet, told Ray he must christen their child. Without hesitation, he said Chester — she knew about his kids but had never been told their names — and she smiled her bucktoothed smile, repeating Chester under her breath, and it pained and startled him that he’d blurted out such a thing, that it would be seriously considered; it honored and frightened and overwhelmed him that the whole event was even happening. But life was like a dream and now he understood why, in the midst of melodrama, there was suddenly singing.

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