Jesse Ball - How to Set a Fire and Why

Eventually, they grew old, and the disaster came, and she ended up in the camp with her tent, and the beggar shows up again, and he doesn’t even have a broom, but still he sweeps the ground in front of the tent, this time with no broom. He doesn’t even have a name anymore, she says, he has utterly become the costume he was wearing.

So, that was the story, but it was much better in reality, because it is all matter-of-fact. The woman doesn’t see anything strange about any of it. Also, there is this thing about what the service actually is—what it is that the beggar is providing, and what it is he is taking. It is pretty hard to say who is winning.

On this visit, I will go from my aunt’s hospital to visit the Home, so the route will be different. There is actually a rail line that I can take, which is pretty exciting, since I have never taken it before. So, I will sneak on if I can without paying, or alternately, I will pay. I can’t make a prediction about that until I know more. When I get to the Winston stop on the rail line, I will walk to the Home, this time from the other direction, and go up the drive, get my pass from the counter, go to my mom’s room. She won’t be there. But, she won’t be at the fish pond either, because I think it will rain. She will probably then be under one of the gazebos. The place has at least ten gazebos. It seems like doctors think that gazebos are good for curing mental illness, because every asylum I have ever seen in reality (one) or in a film (five or six?) has gazebos everywhere. I guess some of the ones in films just look like prisons, so those don’t have any gazebos, but I think it is mostly true.

Why that would be so—is hard to fathom. In my opinion, a gazebo should exacerbate mental illness, as it is a pretty unreasonable structure. It is poorly made, it doesn’t provide any real shelter, and it is impossible to do any meaningful tasks inside of it. If a person is struggling to figure out the most basic rationales about life—is that the kind of place you want to stick them? It is pretty hard to understand.

Anyway, I will sit in the gazebo and witness my mother’s gazebo behavior. I think that behavior will be a lot like the fish pond behavior. At some point the orderly will show up and we will pretend like nothing happened, but maybe he will give some overture to see what else he can get.

Then, I will head out and take the bus to the bus to the bowling alley and I will cry my face off telling Helen about my aunt, and she will give me a drink and I will wake up either at my aunt’s house, or at Helen’s. It doesn’t really matter which.

I saw my aunt, and she said she could go home definitely the next day, or at least within the week. That was a real comfort to me. The doctor was there and he gave me a list of things that she shouldn’t do. I said she doesn’t do anything anyway. He said she should eat these things, and go to this physical therapy, et cetera. I pointed out that it would be expensive to do that. Probably what would happen is she would do what she has always done, which is sit in her chair, tend her garden (which is not really tending anything), and eat oatmeal and eggs and shitty bread, and every now and then something fancy like a bologna sandwich or something equally vile for dinner. He looked at me over his glasses for a while and said it is impossible to say how long she will hold out, and gave me a bunch of numbers about the decrepitude of her organs, which apparently had all already failed. I asked him if he had bothered to have children. He said yes, he had children. I said why if this is the result. He said I beg your pardon. I said if it leads to this, where you’re a skin bag full of putrescent failing organs, and time passes quickly, it passes so quickly, and he knew that, then why have kids. He didn’t like that, and his tone changed. He told me some more bad things about my aunt’s condition, signed something with a real flourish, and went off.

Well, then I went to the train, but my information I guess was bad, because it only runs during rush hour. It was raining and I would have gotten soaked, but I had my raincoat on, so it was okay, but my bag was getting wet and my shoes were soaked and I was pretty discouraged.

Then a taxi stopped and offered to take me for free since the driver was going home and lived in that direction. He was a young guy who had come there from Mozambique. He said he drove two shifts per day and slept in between. He showed me a picture of his wife, who is studying to be a dentist. She had monster buckteeth, which I guess if they are in good condition could be an advantage for a dentist, like an advertisement of some sort. He confessed that she was much smarter than he was, and so he would support her for now, but in the end, it was he who would be supported. I said that didn’t sound dumb. It sounded like a good deal for him. It is hard to stay awake, he said.

When we pulled into the drive and he let me out, he asked why was I going to visit a mental hospital, and then immediately he apologized and took back the question. No, no, it’s okay, I said, I sell medical equipment. I’m a rep for a company. Sure you are, he agreed, and I got out.

There was a new guy at the desk, and so I had to run through the whole rigmarole from the beginning. Eventually, I got the pass, and headed down to my mom’s room. I was wrong about the gazebo. She was in her room.

I was dreading that, because it had happened once before that I tried to visit her in her room and she freaked out because she doesn’t want anyone in there.

I think that’s the reason why she is usually at the fish pond. If she is in her room she won’t tolerate anyone she doesn’t recognize, so the hospital personnel mostly just stick her there to sleep. The rest of the time, I guess, it is fish pond, gazebo, cafeteria, bathroom, whatever. I don’t know all the rooms at the Home or I would list them for you.

I went to go into her bedroom area and she lost it. She was shouting for help, and I started crying. Then the nurse came, and it is lucky that my mom always behaves this way, because the nurse didn’t blame me. Give me a minute she said, we’ll take her to the bingo palace. I sort of curled up in the hall and waited, which was made even worse by the fact that my legs and feet and bag were wet. I was a real mess.

For some reason, my mom let this nurse woman calm her down and get her in the wheelchair, and then the three of us trundled along down to the bingo palace, which is a bizarre place. There are beans all over the tables, which I guess get used on the bingo cards. There are stacks and stacks of bingo cards. There is a stage with a podium. It is a pretty big production. The nurse had to turn on all the lights or none, so the whole huge room was lit, and she asked where we wanted to sit. I said, we might as well sit up there, so we sat on the stage where the bingo-caller sits.

Do you mind staying, I asked.

No, I don’t mind.

I think my mom has been getting fatter since being in the loony bin. She has always been as thin as a stick, but now she is pretty heavy. When I look at her, it makes me wonder if there is anything left there that comprehends me. These are not the hands that touched me, this is not the mouth that kissed me, and so on.

I cried a little more, and the nurse squeezed my hand.

People here, she said, think it is wonderful the way you are with her. Don’t think it doesn’t matter what you do.

I hate being pitied. I just hate it. That’s why I vowed to never mention anything about my parents to anyone, even if my aunt thinks it’s the wrong way to handle it. She isn’t always right.