{"id":3278,"date":"2019-12-02T09:37:30","date_gmt":"2019-12-02T16:37:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/?p=3278"},"modified":"2019-12-02T09:37:30","modified_gmt":"2019-12-02T16:37:30","slug":"honing-the-fourth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/archives\/3278","title":{"rendered":"honing: the fourth"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"beach<\/a><\/p>\n

On Christmas day in Carmeline Creek, a small town on the far north coast of California, Elisha Montoya, fifty-one, and her husband Paul Windsor, fifty-eight, make their annual walk around the town giving gifts to their friends: sturdy hot pads Elisha crocheted, jars of home-made apple sauce, and copies of Paul\u2019s new holiday short story Naughty and Nice<\/i>.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s walk is especially poignant for them because this is the first Christmas since they married seven years ago that Elisha\u2019s children Conor and Alexandra are not with them, both living in Ireland now\u2014Conor twenty-two, Alexandra nineteen.<\/p>\n

Elisha, who is half-Irish and half-Spanish, misses her children more than she ever imagined she would, and Paul misses them, too, though his missing them is conflated with his concern for how deeply sad Elisha is about her kids living on the other side of the world; and he blames himself a little for their leaving because he knows they were emboldened to go by their mother having a loving husband.<\/p>\n

\u2206<\/p>\n

The last stop on their Christmas ramble is the home of Ephraim Spinoza and Tivona Descartes, very recent transplants from Switzerland.<\/p>\n

\u201cCome in, come in,\u201d says Tivona, greeting Elisha and Paul on the front porch of the stately old brick and wood building she and Ephraim took possession of just three weeks ago. \u201cGet warm by the fire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tivona is sixty-seven, Moroccan, raised in France, her black hair cut short, her figure girlish, her eyes brilliantly blue. She leads Elisha and Paul through the empty downstairs space\u2014a single large room with a very high ceiling\u2014and up a long flight of stairs to a two-bedroom apartment where a fire is blazing in the living room hearth and Ephraim is in the kitchen cooking\u2014Bill Evans playing on the stereo.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere you are,\u201d says Ephraim, seventy-one, Spanish, with an impressive mop of gray curly hair. \u201cI\u2019ll open the wine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLooks like you\u2019ve lived here forever,\u201d says Paul, gazing around the cheerful room.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe found everything at the secondhand store,\u201d says Tivona, taking their coats. \u201cNow the only question is what to do with the big empty space downstairs.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy do anything with it?\u201d asks Elisha, joining Paul by the fire. \u201cIt\u2019s lovely empty.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDid Paul tell you about our dream?\u201d asks Tivona, hanging up their coats in the hall closet.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour quest for a magnificent seven?\u201d says Elisha, arching an eyebrow. \u201cHe did.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have not yet appended magnificent<\/i> to the seven,\u201d says Ephraim, laughing. \u201cOr any adjective for that matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think you are the fourth,\u201d says Tivona, gazing at Elisha. \u201cI love the way you think and speak.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought she was the fourth the first time we met her at Mona\u2019s<\/i>,\u201d says Ephraim, nodding in agreement. \u201cI was only waiting for you to think so, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhich only leaves three more to find,\u201d says Tivona, going to the kitchen to open a bottle of wine.<\/p>\n

\u201cI smell garam masala and garlic and tomatos and onions,\u201d says Elisha, standing beside Ephraim at the stove.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lentil stew,\u201d says Ephraim, stirring the m\u00e9lange in a large iron pot. \u201cInspired by the stew you served at Mona\u2019s<\/i> a few days ago. Was that your recipe?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mother\u2019s,\u201d says Elisha, lifting the lid from a pot of jasmine rice. \u201cForgive me. My caf\u00e9 habit. I\u2019m terrible.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou are a great cook,\u201d says Ephraim, speaking Spanish to her. \u201cYou may lift our lids whenever you desire.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGracias,\u201d says Elisha, Ephraim\u2019s Spanish bringing tears to her eyes. \u201cI don\u2019t often hear Spanish as my mother spoke it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe mother tongue,\u201d says Ephraim, offering Elisha a taste of the stew. \u201cThey say there is nothing more profound to our senses than our mother\u2019s voice.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2206<\/p>\n

During supper, in answer to Elisha\u2019s question about where and when Tivona and Ephraim met, Tivona says, \u201cParis. I was thirty-seven, so\u2026 thirty years ago. I was a lecturer in Archaeology at the Sorbonne, Ephraim was a professor there in Spanish Literature. We met at a party given by a mutual friend. And we fell in love at first sight, only he had a wife and I had a husband, so\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo,\u201d says Ephraim, taking up the tale, \u201cwe were in love but would not pursue each other because neither of us was inclined to adultery. We did occasionally have lunch together in a caf\u00e9 near the university, but spoke only of academic things and never revealed our feelings for each other, at least not in words.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then seven months after we first met,\u201d says Tivona, her eyes sparkling in the candlelight, \u201cI came home one evening and my husband Jerome told me he had fallen in love with someone else and wanted a divorce. I was quite surprised because I had no inkling he was having an affair. Fortunately we had no children and I was ready for a change, so I agreed, and then I asked him who he had fallen in love with and he said Margot Espinosa, Ephraim\u2019s wife.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes,\u201d says Ephraim, swirling his wine. \u201cMargot was confessing to me at the very moment Jerome was telling Tivona.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo then how long was it before you got together?\u201d asks Paul, who was married twice before he married Elisha, both marriages ending when he learned his wives were having affairs.<\/p>\n

\u201cA year,\u201d says Ephraim, gazing fondly at Tivona. \u201cOur lunch dates became more personal and less academic, but we both wanted to be completely free from our previous mates before we embarked on a relationship. We didn\u2019t discuss this, but we knew this was what we both wanted.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThen finally we did get together,\u201d says Tivona, her eyes full of tears, \u201cand eleven months later our daughter Simone was born. Our only child. She lives in San Francisco now, which made our decision to move here much easier.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat does Simone do?\u201d asks Paul, loving the romance of their story.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe is a film editor,\u201d says Ephraim, smiling as he thinks of their daughter.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd a fine musician,\u201d says Tivona, proudly. \u201cShe plays the guitar and sings.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 \u2206<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you are one and two, Paul is three, and I am the fourth of the seven people your dream told you to find,\u201d says Elisha, sitting with Paul on a small sofa facing the fire and enjoying after-supper tea. \u201cWhat happens when you find the seventh?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know,\u201d says Ephraim, sitting in a grand old armchair. \u201cMaybe the mystery of what to do with the room downstairs will be solved when we find the seventh or the seventh find us, but maybe not. Meanwhile, we are trusting the dream and living the days as they come.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat if I said I don\u2019t want to be one of your seven?\u201d asks Elisha, speaking to Tivona who is sitting on a big pillow near the fire.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think it matters,\u201d says Tivona, shaking her head. \u201cIn the dream Ephraim says, \u2018Our first visitor will be one of the seven,\u2019 and I say, \u2018And you and I are two of the seven.\u2019 And he says, \u2018Leaving four to find.\u2019 But nothing is said about any of the seven belonging to us or belonging to a collective or that any of the seven is required to do anything or even acknowledge they are one of the seven. I think it must be more about recognizing them and their recognizing us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor that matter, we don\u2019t even know if the seven are all people.\u201d Ephraim shrugs. \u201cThey might be the four of us and a dog and a cat and a beautiful parrot, like the parrot in our dream. So perhaps the purpose of finding the seven is a way to focus our awareness as we settle into our new lives here.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel the seven are people,\u201d says Paul, sounding quite certain. \u201cThough I realize the dream is yours and not mine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe it is<\/i> your dream,\u201d says Tivona, dancing into the kitchen.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe you<\/i> will find the other three,\u201d says Ephraim, following Tivona. \u201cAnd now we are going to have a special sherry we brought all the way from Zurich.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA Christmas tradition,\u201d says Tivona, clapping her hands four times. \u201cA most delicious elixir.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow will we recognize the fifth, sixth, and seventh?\u201d asks Elisha, lifting Paul\u2019s hand to her lips.<\/p>\n

\u201cA certain je ne sais quoi,\u201d says Paul, shivering as Elisha kisses the back of his hand.<\/p>\n

\u201cA delightful aliveness,\u201d says Ephraim, pulling the cork from a tall green bottle.<\/p>\n

\u201cA pleasing complexity,\u201d says Tivona, setting four small crystal goblets on the counter. \u201cAn ineffable sparkle.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel those things about so many people,\u201d says Elisha, laughing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen it shouldn\u2019t take you long to find them,\u201d says Ephraim, pouring the dark red sherry.<\/p>\n

Fin<\/i><\/p>\n

Breaking News! My brand new album of songs Lounge Act In Heaven<\/i><\/a> has just come out. You can buy copies of the CD with all the marvelous artwork for just five dollars from my web site<\/a> (think Solstice\/Xmas\/Hanukkah gifts), or you can download and stream the album from Apple Music<\/a>, CD Baby<\/a>, Amazon<\/a>, qobuz<\/a>, YouTube<\/a>, or any of your favorite music sites. I\u2019m very excited to be sharing this collection of twelve new songs. If you give them a listen and like what you hear, please tell your music-loving friends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Christmas day in Carmeline Creek, a small town on the far north coast of California, Elisha Montoya, fifty-one, and her husband Paul Windsor, fifty-eight, make their annual walk around the town giving gifts to their friends: sturdy hot pads Elisha crocheted, jars of home-made apple sauce, and copies of Paul\u2019s new holiday short story […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[5694,5467,5687,5695,713,5305,5484,5688,5683,5696,5661,5691,5463,5538,5697,5693,51,5682,5692,5690,5689,9,33,5686],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3278"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3278"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3278\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3282,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3278\/revisions\/3282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}