At the Arch

I’m home again. My trip to the St. Louis area was successful, though the details aren’t of a general interest to this blog.

I flew to St. Louis on a Friday. I spent part of that afternoon and a good chunk each of Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and the following Sunday doing genealogy research. That included three trips out to the town where my grandfather was born and grew up, twice to pore through church records at the town historical society, and once to visit the county records office. The church records show various family births, marriages, and deaths, though nothing about my 3-great grandfather’s first wife. The county records showed that this 3-great grandfather bought and sold property just south of town.

Wednesday through Saturday was spent at a handbell seminar. About 425 people took part. We attended classes on various aspects of improving handbell performance. There were early afternoon and early evening concerts each day by some excellent handbell ensembles – well, most of them were excellent. One was bad enough people wondered why they had been invited, perhaps the idea of karaoke accompanied by handbells couldn’t be refused (though it should have been). Another group combined bells with electronic music, which perhaps worked, though the group did way too many loud and fast pieces.

This hotel was the closest one to the St. Louis Gateway Arch (the hotel even includes the phrase “At the Arch” in its name). So one could see it (well, part of it) simply by glancing out a window. The entire group stood near the base of the Arch while a member of the organizing committee took photos from the top. Many days were so hot (well above 90F with the legendary humidity of St. Louis) we were glad that we didn’t have to leave the hotel.

On Sunday (a couple days ago) I enjoyed about an hour at the museum at the base of the Arch. It had been redone a couple years ago and looks pretty good.

The book I read during the first half of the trip was Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey. I bought it in Australia last year. A blurb on the cover describes it as “an Australian To Kill a Mockingbird.” Well, not quite, though racism is a large part of the story. The story opens with Jasper, about age 15, knocking on the window of Charlie, age 13, asking for help. Jasper leads Charlie to a glen out in the bush, an area Jasper considers his own private space. But a crime has happened here and Jasper, who is mixed race with a drunken father and dead mother, is sure if the authorities find out about it he would be immediately accused and locked up. So Jasper and Charlie try to figure it out on their own. This wasn’t so much about the boys at the center of a mystery as it was a general coming-of-age story.

The story is quite well written, though the beautiful language was of Charlie as an adult looking back on the events. A thirteen-year-old wouldn’t have used words and shared insights like that.

I was amused the author had lots of references to American authors – Harper Lee and Mark Twain in particular – but no references to Australian authors.

Here’s a quote that amused me. Jasper offers Charlie his first cigarette, then offers a swig of whiskey.

I take a small incendiary pull. Of course, it attacks my mouth and burns down the length of my throat. I gag immediately, wiping my lips trying to keep my lungs at bay. I slant my head and pretend to read a label that isn’t there through my clouding eyes. This shit is poison. And I realize I’ve been betrayed by the two vices that fiction promised me I’d adore. Sal Paradise held up bottles of booze like a housewife in a detergent commercial. Holden Caulfield reached for his cigarettes like an act of faith. Even Huckleberry Finn tapped on his pipe with relief and satisfaction. I can’t trust anything. If sex turns out to be this bad, I’m never reading again. At this rate it will probably burn my dick and I’ll end up with lesions.

Charlie tries to understand the crime he witnessed (he didn’t see the crime being committed, but did see its horrible results). He reads newspaper articles about those who commit such crimes. He has been bullied for what some kids believe is showing off in class. Charlie’s friend Jeffrey is Vietnamese and is great at cricket, but none of the other kids let him play. He laments not finding any answers:

What kind of lousy world is this? Has it always been this way, or has the bottom fallen out of it in just the last couple days? Has it always been so unfair? What is it that tips the scales so? I don’t understand it. … What kind of world gives birth to Fish and Cooke [two criminals he reads about], lets them fester and hate, lets them torment the innocent and make good people afraid? What kind of world punches someone for using big words?

Verbosity. Verbosity. Verbosity.

A world that kills parents and makes orphans of children and kicks away cricket balls and lies through it sharp teeth. That makes a decent person feel rubbish all his life because he’s poorer and browner and motherless. That hosts three billion folks, each of them as lonely as each other. A world that’s three quarters water, none of which can quench your thirst.

Bugger it.

Thirteen-year-old Charlie doesn’t understand, though I think I do. The search for supremacy is one of the strongest human drives. Everything that Charlie laments, everything in this book, is driven by the seeking of supremacy.