Thursday, November 10, 2005

III

This is post 1 of Section III. To begin at the beginning, go here. Section II begins here

Gwendolyn Bennett was spending a rare moment in her study, which had once been a spare bedroom. Now it contained a computer, a fax machine, a chair, and stacks of papers, shelves of books, all relevant to various causes. The walls were lined with photographs of Gwendolyn leading crowds of demonstrators or soothing children in need of assistance or shaking hands with public figures (Bishop Tutu, Jesse Jackson, Mario Cuomo, Tipper Gore). There were also plaques and certificates (AIDS Alliance, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Lambda Legal Defense Fund, Nature Conservancy, Literacy Coalition, Special Olympics). They hung dusty and crooked, as if tired of jostling one another.
Gwendolyn was tired, too. The plans for her son’s wedding were finalized and unfolding smoothly, the permits for the PFLAG march had been issued, and the banner was rolled and ready in the corner, but she had failed to budge her antediluvian husband one iota. In fact, the young men’s invitation to their bachelor party had caused a nasty scene. On the front was a picture of copulating deer; inside it was inscribed, “In a rut? Come to a Stag Party.” Jack had crossed out the “s-t” in “Stag” and replaced them with an “F.” Recipients were informed that queer goings on would occur from 8 to ? at the Grotto, a gay bar on the river in Endersburg. When encouraged to put in an appearance, Bennett had emitted a Neanderthal grunt and buried the card under the Times.
It made Gwen question her whole raison d’être. If she couldn’t lift her own husband out of his morass of prejudice, was all her shouting and marching likely to change anyone else?
“It’s just a joke, Ed,” she said. “And if you ask me—“
(“I didn’t,” said Bennett.)
“—you’ve been in a rut ever since your retirement.”
There. The taboo was broken. She had said the “r” word.

Continue

4 Comments:

Blogger Tom & Icy said...

The "R" word? Rut or Retirement? Both were in the sentence. That was something like a double entendre. Don't know if that was intentional or not, but it did have a emphasizing effect on "the rut of retirement" statement.
I liked seeing how you created the effect of Ed speaking at the same time as Gwen was speaking. I have pondered how to show that situation with writing.
You have a great command of writing as well as a witty mind. I love to read your comments on other blogs.

5:35 AM  
Blogger Doug The Una said...

Clever card. I'm glad Gwendolyn is offering her creativity to the SCLC. They need it. They would have had a blue ribbon comission and a summit meeting to design that card and never gotten past Martin Luther King, Jr.s image in the corner.

7:47 AM  
Blogger Doug The Una said...

If I haven't mentioned it, I'm really enjoying this novella.

12:57 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thanks, you guys.

4:09 PM  

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