Read Trials of the Monkey Online
Authors: Matthew Chapman
Tags: #Biography & Autobiography, #Nonfiction, #Retail
Trials of the Monkey (39 page)
We walked in and I could recognize no one. It turned out that almost everyone from my father’s factory had come, and most whom I had known when I worked there were either dead or had moved away. We sat at the front, myself, Denise and Anna Bella, and Francis and his wife Gilly, daughter of the imported vicar. My father was nearby, completely in control and dignified. I thought I’d be able to handle myself with equal aplomb and I did for about three minutes, until the first hymn, ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful.’
I read the words but could not sing. Tears stung my sinuses as I was thrown by memory, a sudden surge of nostalgia for my lost past, for Christmases at Mrs. Marshall’s school at Kingston Village, the Harvest Festival in autumn, my young mother, elegant and alive in her bright summer frocks. Next to me, Gilly sang with wonderful pure certainty, provoking further recollections of lost and squandered innocence.
My uncle’s boyfriend of over forty years, as much an uncle to me as any other, gave his speech. My daughter began to wriggle and complain, death no damper to the incessant itch of childish energy, begging for cheese brought by Gilly, kicking her feet against the pew. I kept whispering in her ear, ‘I’m begging you, please, please, please be good. My mother has died and I’m very sad. Please, please be good.’ Who cared? Not her and rightly so: It was life that mattered—action, kicking, cheese.
The trio played Bach’s poignant Double Violin Concerto in D Minor. More tears, more nose blowing into a handkerchief stolen from my father.
The local vicar performed (at least no eggs this time) and our vicar followed, the latter so sure of the idea of renewal (life is like a dry seed, heaven is the flower) that it was almost comforting. The petty vicar smiled enviously and five will get you ten he used the seed/flower metaphor before he flowered himself—and finally, we were all singing ‘Jerusalem’ and only a blessing
remained before we filed out to the subtle strains of ‘The Red Flag.’
remained before we filed out to the subtle strains of ‘The Red Flag.’
Outside, there were many people to speak to. An old employee of my father’s who built the garden wall and got so drunk one Christmas party that he could not ride his bike home. An architect who used to come for drinks on Sunday morning until such parties became impossible.
Now, as we started home along the village green, I looked forward and saw my father walking beside Peter, his ex-business partner, my mother’s great love, father to my brother. Two distinguished, handsome men, my father, head held high, alert, polite, the other still with the upright, sprightly bearing of a runner.
By the time we got home there were already fifty to sixty people in the house, half of whom I didn’t know, some I knew quite well, and a good ten or so I hadn’t seen for twenty years, including Mrs. Marshall, my primary school teacher, the only good teacher I ever had, aged almost eighty now, but as bright as ever. I wanted to sit beside her and recall my childhood, but somehow when I tried to talk to her, my attention skidded away and all that remained was a sense of unease.
Whatever this occasion was, it didn’t have the vigour of a wake or the flamboyance of even more primitive ceremonies where there is wailing and tears. No songs, no drama, no ceremony. I was emotionally exhausted, unsatisfied. My mourning lay out in the future, waiting for me, waiting until we could all be alone together: me, my memories, and the infinite sadness of my mother’s final absence. My brothers drank heavily. Ludovic put on a hat and dark glasses so he looked like a gangster and shouted across the room. Once, as I crossed in front of him, he grabbed my chest and pinched me. ‘Don’t be so boring! Have a drink!’
I had a drink. I remained boring. I had another. Nothing happened. No matter how much I drank, I remained sober. Or rather, as I drank, and drank a lot, I sidestepped the glow of intoxication and simply became fearfully hung over.
Slowly the thing wound down. Anna Bella met a boy named Max and they sat on a wall, talking, then went over into the barn
to play. Suddenly, there was a scream and Max came rushing across the yard:
to play. Suddenly, there was a scream and Max came rushing across the yard:
‘Anna Bella! She’s dying! She’s dying!’
From behind the barn I could hear her screaming. I imagined some accident involving the sewage disposal system or a fall from the thatched roof which I often used to climb up as a child. Soon, however, it became apparent she had simply fallen into some stinging nettles. We took her, howling, into the sitting room and covered her with calamine lotion. We spent most of the rest of the day in here, I feeding the fire, my wife caring for the kids, both of us avoiding the hilarity in the back of the house.
When I was my daughter’s age or younger I discovered a place further down the river where girls went to swim in the summer. Climbing a tree, I hid myself on one of the branches and waited. When they finally came, I watched them change. Little pink bodies against the green grass and the slow brown river. Unfortunately, as one floated on her back, she saw me and they all came out of the water. I jumped out of the tree and started to run, but they brought me down like a pack of beagles. It was a hot day and I was wearing only shorts. Two of them held me while a third used a towel to pick some nettles. They then beat me with them.
The itch—and I was used to itches—was comprehensive and extreme. I was
encased
in itch. I ran back to the house, shrieking with pain, and my mother plunged me into a calamine bath. She was at her best at times like this, crises rousing her from despair and giving her a sense of purpose. She despised illness, but dealt with it efficiently and, at least in my case, kindly. Hours passed before my body recovered and the blisters subsided. She sat by the bath and talked to me. The house was very quiet.
encased
in itch. I ran back to the house, shrieking with pain, and my mother plunged me into a calamine bath. She was at her best at times like this, crises rousing her from despair and giving her a sense of purpose. She despised illness, but dealt with it efficiently and, at least in my case, kindly. Hours passed before my body recovered and the blisters subsided. She sat by the bath and talked to me. The house was very quiet.
Of all the ceremonies, the burying of the ashes was the one I cared about most. No vicars, no religion—her ashes, our land. I had thought of it (and, to be fair, not told anyone) as being just me, my father, and my brothers and sister. I wanted one thing where those of us who had had to tolerate her for thirty to fifty years (and love her) were alone with her, simply. We five knew
her so much better than anyone else, gave so much more to her, took so much more from her, were hurt by her, formed and deformed by her … and yet, in the end, it was not to be. In drunken bonhomie, ex-wives, children, old friends, all were invited as if to the launching of a boat.
her so much better than anyone else, gave so much more to her, took so much more from her, were hurt by her, formed and deformed by her … and yet, in the end, it was not to be. In drunken bonhomie, ex-wives, children, old friends, all were invited as if to the launching of a boat.
I remonstrated with Ludovic, the most extroverted and inclusive of us all, and he became angry. He would invite who he wanted. I accused him of being insensitive, not just now but all day. (‘You’re so boring.’) He countered that I was being hypocritical. My jokes about my mother’s ashes were okay while his about my being boring weren’t. He was not entirely wrong. I tried to argue for a moment but he was so angry there was no point, I walked away.
I went upstairs to the large bathroom where my mother had sat next to me as I recovered from my nettle-beating. I lay on the floor and put my fingers in my ears and tried to remember that quiet summer afternoon. Soon, however, it was time to bury her, and down I trudged to find everyone gathered outside the front door, ready to go. By now ex-wives were sloppily embracing new wives. Boredom and indifference had been subsumed by love. Promises were being made of eternal friendship. The meek had become bold and the bold maudlin.
The alcoholic mother who died of lung cancer was to be buried by her drunk children between cigarettes. Evolution, bullshit. We all stumbled up to the abandoned graveyard, one with the carton, another with a trowel.
In spite of everything leading up to this moment, there was something so sad about the little pile of ashes—my mother!—being poured out of the plastic inner container into the ground—that’s all that’s left of her!?—that when Francis started to cry, so did I. In went the ashes, into the little hole, and then a small plant—more plastic here around the roots—was put on top and the earth was tamped down. My uncle’s boyfriend, the most gentle and considerate of men, gave me a melancholy look and hugged me. I hugged my wife and Francis—and it was over. I cannot remember if Ludovic, who, as the youngest, had suffered
most from her alcoholism, cried or not. My father did not cry, I remember that. He cannot cry, he says. It’s something to do with school or the war or being English at a certain time.
most from her alcoholism, cried or not. My father did not cry, I remember that. He cannot cry, he says. It’s something to do with school or the war or being English at a certain time.
All funeral-related wounds healed and my sister and brothers and I speak to each other frequently and with affection. For all my faults, they are my allies in all matters and I am theirs. We live different lives in different parts of the world but share an identically sardonic sense of humour. In part this is inherited from our mother, who despised hypocrisy and affectation and found the desire for respectability hilarious. And if there is something sad in our assumption that people don’t lead the lives they pretend to, it is also true that we tend to be more tolerant and forgiving than those who have suffered less.
After a while, the plant above my mother’s ashes, a lilac tree, withered and died. Some people say it died the day my father remarried, but I am not a superstitious man and don’t believe it. A new plant was put in and she’s still down there, her ashes filtered ever deeper by rain—not her, you understand, the shell not the egg—no, she’s gone, not here, departed. And seven years after her death, I still miss her. Extraordinarily so. I thought I’d get over this, but no. I miss her letters, written at such cost in her deceptively clear and optimistic hand. I miss watching her demolish pomposity and affectation with a single lazy flick of her sardonic tongue. I miss her anecdotes, and most of all, I miss the comedy which can only be fully appreciated by someone who has known you since birth.
‘This boy is allergic to life.’
We all failed her completely. She was a woman with a disease and none of us could force her to a doctor. Intolerably stubborn and self-destructive as she was, at least once a week, I think, ‘I wish she was here so I could tell her about …’ Then, in spite of my beliefs or lack of them, I say, ‘Still thinking of you, Mama, and all is forgiven.’ Because all
is
forgiven. After all, if I can’t forgive her, how can my child forgive me for whatever my sins are?
is
forgiven. After all, if I can’t forgive her, how can my child forgive me for whatever my sins are?
Saint Matthew’s Epilogue
When I got back to New York, I called Carter Johnson, the pastor, to ask him some further questions about Calvinism.
‘No, let me ask
you
a question,’ he interrupted in a suspicious tone. ‘Who are you? Meaning: there is no Matthew Chapman in New York.’
you
a question,’ he interrupted in a suspicious tone. ‘Who are you? Meaning: there is no Matthew Chapman in New York.’
I said, ‘I beg your pardon?’
He said, ‘Matthew, I’ve looked you up on the internet, can’t get an e-mail address, can’t get a Matthew Chapman in the phone book. Are you actually Matthew Chapman?’
‘Yes. Why do you ask?’
‘Well, the reason I ask is that I tried to look you up—you can look up almost anybody via the internet—and I couldn’t find a Matthew Chapman in New York at all. I had the address, did a search. Nothing.
Nothing
.’
Nothing
.’
Here was an odd twist: a man who believed in God, but not in Matthew Chapman.
When I first went down to Dayton, I was stretched to the limit. When I missed the re-enactment a month later, something snapped. Contrary to what Pastor Johnson believed, I still existed, but my journey, begun almost as a lark, had changed me. The Matthew Chapman who went south in June was not the same Matthew Chapman who returned in July.
I came to understand, not just intellectually but emotionally, that faith is often all that holds a person together. When I think about my mother, I must conclude that had she been a believer, had she been in the habit of faith rather than cynicism, she might easily have stopped drinking and lived a happier life. Considering
faith’s poignant causes rather than the often irritating details of its consequences, I began to see just how cruel my attack on Denise’s faith had been.
faith’s poignant causes rather than the often irritating details of its consequences, I began to see just how cruel my attack on Denise’s faith had been.
There was a period in our marriage when we almost broke up because of our philosophical differences. Tennessee made me look at her faith with kinder eyes and at my lack of it with more suspicion. Was it an accident, I began to ask myself, that I, a sceptic and an atheist, married Denise, a woman of a thousand faiths? Could it be that I unconsciously hope that even though I have no faith, I can benefit from hers? A friend of mine says, as a comment on our different characters, that if you flush the toilet at one end of our house it flushes clockwise, while if you flush it at the other, it flushes counter-clockwise. I’m not so sure. Sometimes I think Denise has so much more certainty than I do that while her toilet flushes clockwise, mine just splashes around and doesn’t flush at all.
After thirteen years, our religious views remain in conflict, but our experience of life begins to merge. As individuals we are the same; as a couple we have become something else, an unlikely amalgam, the best product of which is Anna Bella, our daughter, half Brazilian, half English, and totally American—half Denise, half me, and wholly herself. Denise and I have survived poverty, wealth, success, failure, a near plane crash in Brazil, the murder of her sister, riots, earthquakes, the last years and death of my mother, and perhaps most remarkably, our violent arguments. As I seem to need her in my life to apply the plunger of her conviction to the turbulence of my uncertainty, I am learning how to keep my mouth shut.
Looking at my life objectively, I can see there is some nobility in it. I work hard to provide my daughter with everything she might need to fight her way into an interesting and relevant life; against the odds, I have written some beautiful scripts, two or three of which might yet get made; and I do my best to be kind and fair to everyone I meet. If you put who I am and what I do on a scale, the good would far outweigh the bad.
But still something is missing.
‘That life is worth living,’ wrote the philosopher George Santayana, ‘is the most necessary of assumptions, and, were it not assumed, the most impossible of conclusions.’ For twenty-five years I have worked for myself. During this time no one has told me when to wake up or when to go to bed, nor how many hours to work in between. I have invented a set of rituals by which I trick myself into a state of calm productivity. But I have not learned how to trick myself into a state of philosophical calm. In a letter Laurie writes me after I have returned to Manhattan, she describes how faith gives her ‘peace of mind not dependent on external circumstances,’ and ‘a quiet, deep certainty.’
I came back from Dayton with even less certainty than I had when I went. As much as I was touched and inspired by Laurie, the preachers, whose faith seemed fanatical in its conviction, cruel in its form, and useless in its effect, ultimately disgusted me. If I went down an atheist, I came back an agnostic, refusing to share with these men the arrogance of any conviction in a matter so clearly unproveable either way.
In his autobiography, Darwin, who also called himself an agnostic, wrote that the magnificence of the universe almost forces one to conclude that God exists. However, he continued, ‘can the mind of man, which has, as I fully believe, been developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animal, be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions?’ He goes on to say that the problem is further compounded by ‘the probability that the constant inculcation in a belief in God on the minds of children has produced so strong and perhaps inherited effect on their brains, that it may now be as difficult for them to throw off their belief in God, as for a monkey to throw off its instinctive fear and hatred of a snake.’
For this monkey at least, he’s right. There is a saying in Brazil, ‘I do not believe in witches—but that they exist is beyond question.’ With this in mind, I often find myself talking to my dead mother, sometimes out loud, and imagining her in a place where she has at last found happiness. The comforting, childlike belief in the existence of an afterlife obviously suggests a similar belief
in the existence of God. Intellectually, however, as an adult, I have no faith in either.
in the existence of God. Intellectually, however, as an adult, I have no faith in either.
I am made happy, even ecstatic at times, by my wife and daughter, by love in all its forms, by the beauty of nature, by a witty remark, or by art, but I have no unifying theory to relieve a persistent, though not chronic, philosophical pessimism. That anything exists for any eternal purpose seems to me unlikely. I do not walk around all day brooding about this, but when I am facing a crisis, I see that believers have access to a cosmic tranquilliser which I do not.
I am aware that it would be more pleasant to have faith, but what can I do? Should I force myself—for therapeutic reasons—to believe in something which at best seems charming but unlikely, and at worst seems dangerous and absurd?
To quote Santayana again, ‘Scepticism is the chastity of the intellect, and it’s shameful to surrender it too soon.’ I am too proud to abandon my agnosticism for organised religion or—almost worse—disorganised religion, that laughable stew of whimsical superstitions that constitutes the so-called New Age. I have a craving for a larger meaning, but refuse to satisfy this spiritual hunger with theological junk.
But I’ve been wondering of late if my intellectual chastity must
ipso facto
deny me the peace that everyone else obtains through surrendering their reason? Must the sceptical virgin starve out in the cold while the whores gorge themselves at the fires of belief? Is it possible for rationality to somehow provide the comforts of faith? All that is missing (all!) is something neither ridiculous nor vicious, which, like an awe-inspiring bridge, starts before birth and ends after death. What is missing, I suppose, is the
sensation
of God.
ipso facto
deny me the peace that everyone else obtains through surrendering their reason? Must the sceptical virgin starve out in the cold while the whores gorge themselves at the fires of belief? Is it possible for rationality to somehow provide the comforts of faith? All that is missing (all!) is something neither ridiculous nor vicious, which, like an awe-inspiring bridge, starts before birth and ends after death. What is missing, I suppose, is the
sensation
of God.
When I was an aspiring saint I worshipped a God who, though infinitely vast and powerful, was capable of the most intimate compassion. I was part of a family—God, the father, Mary, the virgin mother, and brother Jesus with his cousin-like disciples—and the fantastic rituals celebrating these relatives inspired a feeling of profound inclusion in divinity.
What an art Christianity is! The music, the paintings, the poetry. On Christmas Eve, my mother would turn on the radio as a carol service was broadcast live from King’s College Chapel, Cambridge. I was usually too busy running around in a hysteria of materialistic anticipation to savour anything as elevated as this, but on one occasion during my religious phase, I lay down next to her on the sofa as she listened, glass in hand, to ‘Silent Night’ sung by a solitary boy whose voice had not yet broken. I closed my eyes and saw feathered angels gathered around a God resembling Da Vinci, who smiled down at us from the dark sky above.
I have never felt so magnificently safe since then, nor so happy, and I probably never will; but I do not intend to give up trying. Sometime soon I’m going to see what happens if I satisfy the demands of my third circle of responsibility: a trip to Africa when I can find the time.
On the morning when the doctor informed my mother and me that I was ‘allergic to life,’ we emerged from his office in shock. She held my scabby little hand in hers but said nothing as we walked away down a long corridor in the hospital where she would later die. After a while, I turned and looked up at her. She moved her head irritably.
‘Ridiculous,’ she said. ‘Allergic to life. Abso-luuutely ridiculous.’
She started walking faster so I was forced to trot at her side. When I next raised my head to study her, she was smiling.
‘Allergic to life!’ she exclaimed dismissively. ‘You’re no more allergic to life than I am,’ and we pushed through the big doors and walked out into a cold bright day, laughing.
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