If you haven’t already and are feeling so inclined, check out my conversation with the lovely Kim Warner of
as we talk about writer’s block, the sting of youth, and finding our voice later in life.And stay tuned for our inaugural Qstack post tomorrow, featuring an excerpt from
’s novel Falling Through the Night.Start at the beginning:
We Regret to Inform You | Lamb ♣ 01
The Watch on the Wall
♣ ♣ ♣ 11 ♣ ♣ ♣
I’ll never forget the time Lamb dragged me to visit his grandma at some old folks home in Redondo Beach. He came down to SoCal for spring break, I think it was, and on our way to a party in Long Beach, he says, “Let’s just stop for a minute—I promise I’ll be quick. I haven’t seen her in ages and she’s really old.” So we pull into this nondescript, low-rise complex right near the beach, and he’s screaming into the intercom, “Gramma! It’s me, Willam!” and she buzzes us in.
Lamb’s mom’s family was from L.A., and even though her only daughter was off in Houston with her latest husband (some state senator or other—Republican, of course,) Grandma refused to move to a home “in that horrible place” (Texas, that is, or so the legend goes.) Plus, two of her sisters also lived in the same complex (“Aunt Dolly and Aunt Lolly,” Lamb says—“You’re shitting me,” I says.)
Anyway, it was just as institutional and antiseptic as you would expect walking through the lobby with the TV lounge set up like a drive-in theater, only wheelchairs; that fake wood paneling in the surprisingly large elevator (“For the coroner’s gurneys?” we speculated) and this long-ass, putty-colored corridor to reach Grandma Lamb’s front door. The residents were required to flip an indicator switch on their door every morning so the attendants could walk down the halls and scan to see who didn’t wake up.
It was like stepping from a grade-school cafeteria into a witch’s cave, Grandma’s apartment—stuffed to the gills, like she didn’t want to part with a mansion full of stuff, and just slotted it all into her new digs like a Chinese box. She was a cute old thing—she took a shine to me right off, giving me little winks on the sly—but it was clear things were getting a little fuzzy for her—I distinctly remember she kept calling Lamb “William” with an “I” for one thing, like she didn’t remember or never knew it was the Dutch version, despite what he wrote about it. Also, she kept petting his hair like he was a cat or something—I mean, it was pink at the time, but still. Anyway, I settled in with the clicker to watch TV while he had his little visit; luckily, she smoked, too.
The crazy thing about that day actually came about six or so months later: Lamb’s mom, Miranda, called me out of the blue. No “Hello how are you?”—she got right to the point, said she got my number from Lamb and had to ask me an important question.
“Did my mother give Lamb my father’s gold watch?”
Apparently, Grandma forgot she had given the watch to him, couldn’t remember later what happened to it at all, and so Miranda had accused Lamb of stealing it and didn’t believe she’d given it to him—in fact, she insisted.
Miranda sounded pretty miffed even after I corroborated his story, which is probably why I still have the watch—it was in one of Lamb’s boxes that I kept all these years, and I never felt the need to return it to her when I found it, wouldn’t even know how to get in touch with her if I wanted to.
I found this little story about that day tucked away in one of his journals. About a year later, he mentioned to me that Grandma died, so I think it was the last time he ever saw her, actually.
“Do you like it?” she asks, but she knows that I do, the watch on the wall, the gold watch engraved with a snail, a dragonfly, a beetle. It had stood on a table in her old house, hanging from a hook inside a bell jar, but since she’s moved to the Hotel Chrysanthemum, a shelf on the wall near her chair is its new home. She can just turn her head, she says, to tell the time.
We turn our heads now, look at it together. “It’s a lot of fun—I’ve always thought so, since I was little.”
This is the truth. The Art Nouveau watch has fascinated me, heavy with gold, iridescent green and amber enamel. I only touched it once, three or four years old, when my grandmother had lifted the glass and retrieved it to show my mother—a keepsake of a husband long dead, a grandfather before him—recently cleaned and repaired. I was allowed to hold it for barely a moment, my mother’s hands hovering around my small, just long enough to feel its heft, then snatched back. I was always fascinated by it whenever we came to visit.
“It was your grandfather’s, Willam,” she says again, she always says. (She means great-grandfather.) “It’s yours now—I’ve never considered it mine, father to son—but I never had a son, until you.” (She means grandson.) The moment passes. My friend sits in the wing chair nearest the television, glances at us furtively with the remote poised in his hand; the channel changes from flags and soldiers to tennis match. He sighs, sinks back, hiding.
“Pass me my cigarettes, my darling.” (“Thank God!” cries the wing chair.)
I take a cigarette from my own pocket, too, but lean forward to light my grandmother’s first. Her eyes flash her approval. She inhales gratefully. I light my own. (My friend revives, lights one too—there are ashtrays on every table.)
Eighty years distilled into two rooms and a kitchenette: furniture on furniture, shelf upon shelf; pictures and paintings, cheek by jowl; boxes and baubles; books and birdcages (empty, flown the coop.) And nestled within the center, powdered and rouged for her audience, she, a babe again, wise and wizened. Ash dusts the table, dusts the chair arm, her sleeve; I imagine her slowly buried in ash, turned to ash herself, reach over to hold her hand.
“It’s nice to see you,” I say. “What are you reading?” I point at the yellowed paperback slipped between the seat cushion and the arm of her chair.
“Huxley!” she says with a wink. “It’s your father’s.” (She means grandfather.) She glances at the watch. “Where can he be?” (He died in World War 2.) “He doesn’t like me to read his books, but I like to keep current.” (Brave New World, 1932.)
Another, bigger sigh emerges from the wing chair. The channel on the television changes again, cowboys under siege, arrows landing like lilies clasped to breasts.
“I wanted to tell you something,” I say, “Mama doesn’t want me to tell you, but…”
“That mouse—!” she laughs, shakes her head fondly. “To think I raised such a beige wit.” She laughs even harder as I blink at her audacity. She nods toward the wing chair—Grande Dame Sees All. “He’s very handsome—is it love?” (A quizzical eye peeps round the edge of the chair.)
“Oh… We’re just friends.”
“You could do worse,” she says. (“Much worse!” agrees the echo.) “Tea?” (“Yes, please,” says the echo.) She wants to rise but I stop her. I set the kettle on the doll stove, rummage through the cupboard for cups. “Your father will have coffee.” (She means grandfather, would have had.)
“Looks like we’re out…”
“Of course… Curse this war; God damn this war!”
Three cups of tea, three more cigarettes. I rinse everything in the sink, set them to dry on the yellow towel. When I step back in the room, she’s got the bell jar set aside, watch in hand.
“This is for you.”
I shake my head. “No! No, I can’t.” She is insistent, almost angry at my refusal.
“But it’s yours! He’s always meant for you to have it—it was never mine, and it’s certainly not your sister’s.” (She means mother.) “You must take it! He’ll be upset if you don’t. Please, honey.” She puts it in my reluctant hand, closes my fingers around it. Her eyes are moist, soft again. She kisses us both on the cheek as we leave.
We’re halfway down the hall when she calls after us, “Be careful out there, dears—don’t let the butt flu get ya!” (She means AIDS.)
♣ ♣ ♣
Esteemed Readers:
If you have a queer bestie, coworker, frenemy, nemesissy, softball team, gym buddy, book group, favorite guncle, Aunt Butch, or adored florist-caterer-handyperson-bartender—please help extend my reach to the wider community by sharing this post directly with someone who will appreciate a queer story.
Thank you!
THREAD: “What we talk about when we talk about ‘Song of Myself’”
SoM, v. 14 | “What is commonest, cheapest, nearest, easiest, is Me...” | AUDIO
I love that the narrator kept the watch. He’s a sly little devil and I like it.
And Lambs Grandma is amazingly written Troy.
I really liked this description, it just got me:
“Eighty years distilled into two rooms and a kitchenette: furniture on furniture, shelf upon shelf; pictures and paintings, cheek by jowl; boxes and baubles; books and birdcages (empty, flown the coop.)”
Oh my goodness, Lamb’s grandma!! Love, love, love her so very much. Grateful she was part of his life and what formed him. 😍