Something For Over The Couch PART 10 “The First Argument” That Saturday morning when I headed for my art teacher’s house I had an anxious feeling of uncertainty, and when I tell you of the disaster that befell me that day you will be sure to think that a lot of what I have said about my teacher, myself and her family was probably not true. My entire connection to their household was based on the excuse that I was the boy who cut the lawn, and now, for several weeks, I had been mowing grass on Saturday morning that did not need mowing. I was cutting grass so that after it was done I could sit in the kitchen in the afternoon and talk to my teacher, who had become, simply a close friend, and a mentor. But now what, was I going to be mowing the snow in December? But my connection to that family was more precarious than I realized as I walked up to their house with my bath mat naked lady art project under my arm. When I finished with the lawn I put the machine back in the garage and noticed three unfamiliar cars in the driveway, and then found some woman similar to Hanna in her kitchen involved in a conversation. For a second I felt deep resentment to find these women in what I considered my kitchen in my accustomed spot, but the absurdity of my indignation was so ridiculous that I just settled into a sudden despondency. Hanna introduced me as the lawn boy, who is, “A marvelous artist who is doing wonderful paintings for such a young boy.” This remark made me so angry I thought I would cry out in frustration, and then one of the women walked right up to me, and said to the others, “So, this is him.” Their plan I soon discovered was that they were going to play bridge on Saturday afternoons, and so, in conclusion, my charmed upper class life suddenly came to an end as if it had never happened. I excused myself and started to leave, but Hanna, seeing something rolled up under my arm, asked to see it. When I hesitated, the other visitors, seeing my confusion, excused themselves and went into the living room, where a card table had already been set up. I rolled the naked lady bath mat out on the kitchen table. There was a long, terrible silence. “Richard, what disgusting obscenity is this, why would you do such a thing?” “It’s a commission,” I said. “Are you going to put this over somebody’s couch?” She said, with no humor in her voice. Then she continued. “Who is it that is paying you to do this commission?” 48 • MAY 2022 THE ARTFUL MIND
“The barber that cuts my hair wants me to cut out this woman’s shape from the mat,” I answered, but seeing her revulsion, I too began to see that there was something not right about the idea. Now, however, having a clear picture of what I was doing and why, Hanna went into her dictatorial mode, a mode of behavior I now dimly remembered from her second day as our art teacher, when the class refused to do her homework assignment, because she was a substitute. “Take this monstrosity back to your barber and tell him that what he is doing borders on a crime, paying a minor to create an obscene image, is...what’s his name, where is his shop?” She went on in anger and said other things I can’t remember but suddenly and unexpectedly I began to defend myself. The fact that I spoke without even knowing what I was going to say may sound unlikely, even impossible, but the words were already in my head, the exact words Max her former husband had said to her, “It’s art, just art, a fiction, you…” but I could not bring myself to utter the word ‘moron.’ The Greek Chorus of the bridge players in the living room were, I imagine, listening to every word of that conversation, and though there was a tragic epiphany going on in the kitchen, they made no comment. I rolled up my obscene crime of a bath mat slowly and deliberately, and silently left the house by the kitchen door, and in parting closed the door carefully so as not to make the latch click. I closed the door silently, as an expression of the injury I had received. Perhaps you have received such an injury in your life; the kind that makes you think that all that went on before in your life was not only wrong, but also stupid. It’s a long downhill from the Wasserman house to the bus stop on Oneida Street, and from the house to the stop my mind was mute as I walked along. It was the sight of the bus in the distance that triggered the monologue in my mind that now began with the statement, “I’ve never seen any of those phonies on the bus, and I never will.” But my teacher and her family were not phonies and I knew it, it was just that the word ‘phony’ was often in my head at that time because I had recently finished reading Ruth’s copy of “The Catcher in the Rye.” This remark, in my mind, was followed, out loud by the reverse, “It is you yourself, that is the phony, thinking you are going to be some famous artist, sitting and talking with people where you have to pretend to understand what they are saying, pretending you know the names they mention. You should be ashamed of yourself, thinking because you mow some rich woman’s lawn you are part of her family. And now you treat your own Mother with contempt, because she happened to not know who Rothko is. And what would Dad have said about it? He would have said nothing at all. He would have rapped his knuckles on the top of his head and called me a hardhead, a knucklehead.” What happened next I am ashamed to tell you, but I cried for a long period of time, quieted down, and then cried again even louder till someone blew their horn, because I was standing in the street. I had decided to walk home and avoid the bus because it is embarrassing to get on a bus when you are in hysterics. Then came that moment of quiet resolve after a long and terrible cry, that calm mo-
ment, between suppressed sobs when you swear to yourself to never do something ever again, a promise ready to be broken at the first possible opportunity. I started walking home, and only got two blocks when out of the corner of my eye I saw the familiar shape of the red fender of the Thunderbird belonging to my teacher’s twin sons. Which son was driving I couldn’t tell, because they always looked like the same person to me. He gestured for me to get in, and I did, throwing the bath mat into the back seat. “My mother sent me to fetch you, I was on the way to your house.” I said nothing but did not particularly like the word ‘fetch.’ Hanna’s son seemed anxious to explain something to me, but had difficulty saying anything more than a few words, and then he would fall silent. As for me, I said nothing. I felt like an escaped convict. I was afraid I had triggered some nervous reaction in my teacher that might lead to a confrontation with Savi, my barber. How could anyone ever criticize Savi? He was just a simpleton of a barber, and an institution in my family. I cared nothing for Savi, but the truth was, I would have had to give up art and my art teacher if it came down to having some argument with Savi. We pulled into the driveway, and there was an apparition, Hanna’s husband, the Good Doctor himself was standing at the end of the driveway, next to the kitchen door. As soon as he saw the car he went into the house. He was sitting at the kitchen table when his son and I entered the house. The doctor also wanted to explain something to me, but thought better of it. Then he got up to leave, only saying, “She’ll be down in a minute.” Strangely there were no other cars in the drive, and the bridge players had departed. After a few minutes Hanna entered the kitchen and I could see that she had been crying about something, but what it was I had no idea, and had no interest in finding out. “Where’s the bath mat?” she inquired. “It’s in the back seat of the convertible.” I answered. “Go get it and bring it in here, we will need to figure out how to do the drawing head on, and not profile, profile is never going to work. Think about this, if you were going to be standing on a woman’s body, which would you prefer, to stand on her front, or on her side? On the front, obviously. Have you ever seen a naked woman’s body Richard?” she asked “No.” “Pictures?” “Not really.” “Well, wait a minute, and I will get the Janson Art history book and we will use a Greek marble torso, they are perfect, and are always minus the head, arms, and legs, just like we will need.” I thought to myself, “I wonder what Ruth will have to say about this, perhaps she can make sense out of it for me?” —Richard Britell Parts 1 through 9 at Spazifineart.com (short stories)
