Father,
It feels like a different world up here. A week into my stay in Lambton and I am the only one who has stepped foot in this attic. The room they’ve put me in is big enough and I’m getting used to keeping my neck at an angle with the slanted roof. It’s as if when they built the house, they had all just had enough by the time they’d got this high – chucked a roof on and called it a day. There’s something wrong with the wiring, apparently, so even the plug sockets up here don’t work. This attic might as well be a doorway to the 1800s so salutations for my truth not universally acknowledged.
That first morning I delayed going downstairs as long as I could, clattering away on this typewriter in the morning mist. Eventually I heard the thud of a bolt opening and Watson, the old Irish Terrier, storming the garden and warning off the morning’s squirrels. He must have been a puppy when we last came to Lambton together. I remember him nipping at my hand and bawling like he’d ripped it clean off. I’m glad one of us had a bit of composure and perspective back then. He’s no puppy now though – his back leg shakes and you find the odd lump every time you stroke his back and sides. Still, he’s probably shown me the least judgement since I arrived in Lambton. He’s started to rest his head on my leg in the evenings and randomly sigh, as if the stresses of his sleep-dinner-walk schedule are just one too many.
Uncle Eric is a sigher too, as I’m sure you remember. Maybe it’s a family trait. He has taken me in, even after everything, so I’m not going to sit here and type ill about him. I did tell him what you said about him though, that ‘stoic and stupid have identical front doors’. He sighed.
Breakfast was nice that first day – porridge, cinnamon, some fruit. It was nice on the second day too. My worry is that we are seven days in now and all I have seen is the same breakfast from the same dented saucepan with the same crooked smile from Aunt Mary. This isn’t a comment on her teeth, but it’s the same slightly-off smile that I’ve had from all of them, all week. They know why I’m here and I can feel their judgement. Their eyes are kind and they hug more than I’m used to, but something in the smile is off. Their faces nod warmly, but it’s as if I’ve filled the room with a bad smell and they’re all too polite to make fun of it.
When I got on that train last week I knew you wouldn’t be in Lambton for Christmas, and deep down I know that it’s my fault. Still, it was odd to wake up and not hear ‘Jingle Bells’ roared out with your deliberate disregard for being in tune. The day was nice, but completely backwards. They opened presents in the morning like a pack of animals, with claws digging straight into cardboard. There was no lunchtime pub visit, instead I had to sit with them in the front row of the Church, Eric nodding his huge head piously at every mention of Sacrifice and Sin and Son of God. I was itching for the usual bags of salt and vinegar crisps, torn open and laid next to your standard clumsy splashes of bitter. I found some solidarity from the cousins - Soph and Liam rebelled against the Mass with their own combinations of yawns and phones peeking out from the top of pockets. Sitting shoulder to shoulder with them in shared ambivalence is probably the closest we’ve come to bonding this week.
It seems that Aunt Mary has three gears – crooked smile, zoning out at the TV, and manic acceleration. Throughout Christmas dinner she had her foot firmly on the pedal, circling the table with face increasingly red as each casserole dish of piled veg was brought out. The other three around the table seemed unaware of her increasing pace, while I sat there dreading that she’d touch me on the shoulder for an unhinged, festive version of ‘Duck, Duck, Goose’. The tap never came and eventually Mary took her own seat, but not a single finger or eyebrow was lifted by the rest of this odd little family. If my year here is intended as a model of perfect family dynamics, sorry to report but these four seem more in keeping with the modernity of the attic than anything else I know.
I’ve started taking Watson out whenever the house is becoming a little too much. I promised that I’d be different, and that this would be a year without screens. I will continue to be vigilant here, but it’s hard to hold a conversation with the back of four iPhones. As soon as Christmas dinner was done, the hats were discarded and the scrolling began. I picked up his lead and took Watson out (lumps and all) for a slow plod around the field. It is a short slog up the hill and suddenly you have a view over the whole valley. Seven days later and I am still finding my closest companion is the stars and the quarter-hour ring of the bells, just to remind me that they’re still there. It feels like a different world up here.
Always, your ever-loving son.
Wow you’re an expert at taking people on trips when they’re reading your work! I loved it, the atmosphere, dramatic yet nothing has really happened. But we all know the feeling all too well…
This feels quietly devastating in the best way. The attic framing is doing so much work, physical constraint mirroring emotional exile and the observational detail (Watson’s sighs, Aunt Mary’s smile, the repeated breakfast) builds a pressure that never needs to announce itself. I love how tenderness and judgment coexist without ever resolving. Great read, as always, James.