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Sydney Nash didn’t dream of becoming a despicable man. What hunger he felt during the depression, what horrors he saw in the war? No excuse for the fact that he withheld cancer treatment from his wife, saying god would cure her if it was his will. No excuse for telling my mother that her pain was a symptom of her sin. So when he died, and few noticed or grieved, he had still done the damage other despicable men do.
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There’s a plastic Marshall’s bag caught on one of the upper branches of the mulberry tree outside my window. It has been there–suspended–for some time, at least since the tree dropped its leaves, and it was one of the last to do so this year. Up there, out of reach, it always seems full, fat, and bloated with dancing.
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You’re safe and sound in the predictable environment of your bourgeois terrarium. Now, you can reminisce about how hard your life was when you knew me, when we had something in common. I accommodated your entitlements and listened to your stories of luxury vacations and home renovations. But we shared an experience once, and you thought we were the same. Would you know what it’s like to buy your clothes at Walmart? Go to the food bank? Have no safety net? Would you understand the indignity of having tried to climb a ladder only to find yourself at the bottom of a chute?
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Susan was a pathbreaker, respected and fearsome. And for a short time she paid some attention to me. She praised my writing and thinking while others sat as sentries to the gates of the Ivory Tower. She told me to ignore the pettiness of white feminists. She said she was scared the day Donald Trump was (first) elected. She shared her movie watch list during the pandemic. Now Susan is gone and her encouragement echoes in another place.
Featured image: “Chalice of Saint John the Evangelist [reverse]” by Hans Memling, c. 1470/1475 via Samuel H. Kress Collection.
Sara Gabler 