Her bedroom was a square room, up in an attic. Down below it, a living room led to a kitchen and in between that was a curved, stucco archway. Stepping under the archway - and leaning up against the wall for support - you'd climb a thin, L-shaped, pine stairway and step through the peeling, rouge door.
And the fan was the first thing you noticed.
You couldn't help but notice it.
It extended out across the ceiling, reaching all the way to each the wall. Four, dense, wooden blades curved in a sorta S-swirl to their end point. A dark and aged gloss shone off each blade, reflecting the sunlight pouring in through the small window. The tips were gilded in faded brass.
She told me that the fan was actually a propeller. A wooden propeller off a World War One fighter plane. She did not know how it got up there into her little hiding place from the world. She was renting and never bothered to inquire with the landlord.
I was young and still impressed with those who moved with the weight of weary defeat. I thought that was the reward one received for a life of hectic adventure and discovery. This is why I climbed those stairs. I wanted to learn from her how to reach for such weariness. As if it were somehow a choice - a path one could choose - as opposed to something that comes to us all. With age.
When my turn came - for that weariness - I tried to send it back. But that's a different story.
Her bed was framed in cast-iron. I had never slept in one of those before. That was new.
Come to think of it, all of it was new. She was a chef. That was definitely new.
I waiter once warned me, that when they were stripped naked, all chefs smelled like cabbage. That didn't sound like it could possibly be true. But it would be hilarious if it were. Never let the facts get in the way of a good joke, so I believed him.
I can't remember having sex with her. I'm sure we did. I just can't remember it. I remember her jet black, pixie haircut. Her candy cane coloured socks. The incense on the wardrobe and the ratty pot plants above the sink. She brought up water in the morning in glasses with 70's block patterns on them. Orange circles and red squares. Either the glass was clouded by age or the water was brown from aging pipes.
All those details stuck to and with me. But the sex didn't. Maybe she really did smell like cabbage and I reacted so strongly that I had to block all of that out. Maybe I've suppressed the memory of the scent and that took the sex down with it.
I mean, wouldn't you?
You're getting excited and hot with someone. Energy and drive takes over. Passion replaces imagination and touch replaces conversation. And just as your self-consciousness starts to drop away, there it is - that sharp and soggy and slightly sulfuric smell of cabbage.
Yeah... that would definitely be something you'd want to forget.
I really struggle with scents. I once urgently bailed out of an apartment in North Austin because of a particularly cheap and vulgar smell. I had arrived there by Uber at midnight and was shirtless and in the back of Lyft before 12:30. Sickly sweet, scented candles were to blame that time. I couldn't do it. It all started to smell like we were about to get down in the beauty isle of a Target. And not to disparage Target here, but, there is only so much self-loathing one can volunteer for.
Anyways... that's also a story for another time...
Walking through Bayou St John the other day and the image of that wooden ceiling fan popped into my head. I saw it the way how I saw it. In its lifetime, it was once one thing and then it became a whole other thing. It had been a weapon of movement and war. It saw violence and noise. But I only ever saw it as placid and sensual and soothing.
And history is like that. You can choose whatever stories you need to fill whatever space you need filled. It's easier to remember what you need to remember, than it is to forget what you want to forget.
This must be why they call this place 'The Big Easy' - because we're all out here making things easier by remembering our stories the way we want to.
