Page 150 - What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours

freddy barrandov checks . . . in?

s I was saying, I’m an inadequate son. I didn’t really notice this until I
A reached the age my father had been when he was imprisoned for repairing
the broken faces of clock towers without authorization. He’d incurred the wrath

of those who require certain things not to work at all. That’s what the broken
clock towers had been designated as: remembrances of a civil war that stopped
time at various locations scattered across my father’s country. Fixing the
mechanisms seemed political, though it was impossible to agree on the exact
meaning of the gesture. When my dad saw his first splintered clockface he just
thought it was a proud and beautiful work that, if restored, would take the mortal
sting out of being told how late you are, or how long you’ve been waiting, or

how much longer you’ll have to wait.
—

MY MOTHER affirms life in her own way: She did some of her most thorough
affirmation on behalf of a government-sponsored literary award that posed as a
prize sponsored by a company that made typewriters. One year the writer chosen

to win the award declined without giving a reason and asked that her name not
be mentioned in connection with the award at all. Unfazed, my mother
congratulated the next best writer on his win, but was almost laughed off the
phone line: “It’s sweet of you to try this, but everybody knows my book isn’t
that good,” he said. He named another writer and suggested the prize go to her,
but the recommended writer didn’t fancy it either. There had to be a winner, so
my mother went through all the shortlisted writers but it was “Thanks but no

thanks” and “Oh but I couldn’t possibly” all round, so she went back to the
originally selected winner and made some threats that caused the woman to
reconsider and humbly accept her prize.
Even though all went on as before, Mum’s developed a sort of prejudice
against writers; there are behaviors she now calls “writerly,” but I think she

actually means uncooperative. Anyway, my mother agreed with my father about