Misty ideals

Small droplets of hope landed on the pavement, barely thicker than a mist. Ian stepped out of his flat and into the early evening alleyway. His faux leather Oxford gave a light squeak as he latched the bolt. He appreciated the heritage found in the skeleton key as he rotated his wrist counterclockwise, twice-over, until he heard a satisfying thud. His father would have scoffed at this security protocol back home in Mount Washington, and not without reason. When the woman who would later become his mother first sat down with his future father at the Pittsburgh family law office where she was one of five partners, he was still in a mild state of shock over the carjacking he found himself victim to the week prior. The driver couldn’t have been more than 20, which turned out to be a blessing in disguise. He threw open the door and dashed away two clicks after popping the curb and coming to a stop when a navy blue Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority hydrant had nestled into the hood just to the passenger side of the engine block. Ian’s father would be forever grateful the chap’s phone chimed when it had yet this didn’t stop him from installing a second deadbolt at all three points of egress in the two story aerie he and his new bride would purchase despite the 7.4% interest rate barely 15 months after that afternoon at Dewey, Cheatem, Howe, Mullins, & Mazeroski.

Ian glanced left and then right at a crossing—a habit from his home country. He mentally gave himself grace as he blinked a drop of mist from his eyes. He appreciated the physical and emotional security his dad had cultivated during his upbringing even if he had sensed a double-take in his father’s eyes when he broke the news he would be spending the fall semester in Edinburgh to continue his research on value-added taxes in western democracies. Though it was delayed by a second, his father, Martin, said he was proud of him. “Don’t let anyone tell you tax-and-spend liberals don’t know how to run a country over there in Scotland,” his dad told him from the Departures level dropoff lane at Pittsburgh International Airport. His dad loved that joke and there were no technicalities to be annoyed at given Scotland was somehow both its own country and part of a larger United country.

Ian heard the hum of tires slowly accelerating on the wet road, coming from a block east as he crossed the street near his alley. His mobile suggested a 26 minute walk, but the GPS didn't account for the 10% reduction in his pace when he allowed his head to drift into the rain clouds on nights like these. He had registered for tonight’s book club seeking the vague comforts of friendship and contentment. But now, as he strolled through the misty evening, already feeling content, the destination seemed less important.

The trope was not lost on him: disillusioned American creative moves to walkable northern Europe where one can skate on rain-glistened sidewalks to the nearest Jane Austen book club. Yet he was on his second novel with this bunch and he had yet to host a birthday party for a geriatric bookworm. Nor had he taken an overnight train with friends to wake up in the City of Love. At least the books were entertaining. Ulysses had always intimidated him, and The Corrections was a pleasant surprise. Ian’s sister briefly dated a guy in college at Mellon who claimed he had gotten into birdwatching after reading Freedom, the other Jonathan Franzen bestseller. Their parents found his manners so genteel they began a brief moratorium on the jokes about whether the latest party she was hungover from was worth the fat tuition bill that landed in the mailbox on their wraparound front porch each September and February. Claire had once muttered to Ian she’d rather have a GED than the leverage their parents now found, and even periodically flexed, over her. When she broke up with the boy, Ian inherited the Franzen paperback with a bird on the cover—and found himself unexpectedly entranced.

A small blackbird flitted across Ian’s peripheral vision, landing on a tree at the park’s edge. He hoped the perch would keep it mostly dry. Actually, is that a raven? Nevermind. As he continued under the oaken canopy, the mist lessened, and Ian walked straight through the next intersection instead of turning right—the way he would again in the morning. Wednesdays were ‘Show & Tax’ day among his research group, the one day a week he interacted with his colleagues. Ian had nothing to “tax” about tomorrow, but he genuinely appreciated the face-to-face-ness of these gatherings even if it meant humoring their advisor’s penchant for puns. Patric, one of the elders of the group at 36, had made him chuckle once at the last one with a self-deprecating comment and even mentioned the Steelers comeback win over the Ravens to him on the way back to their basement cubicles. Maybe they could grab pizza or haggis this weekend, a “thank you for acknowledging me as a human in my new land” meal, Ian mused.

Ian’s phone chirped as he made his way past a gray-stoned Church of Scotland sanctuary, its wall abutting a public house with a warm yellow glow emanating from its front window. He had forgotten to put his phone on vibrate when he left his flat, an action he now took, as Ian saw his sister’s name on the screen before it was dotted over by falling vapors. Probably more Thanksgiving logistics. Still nine weeks away from his first trip home via EDI, EWR, and finally PIT, each of the Mullins had a torch they had taken up and coincidentally needed his services to complete. Claire was on the organizing committee for her 10 year college reunion which would take place the Wednesday evening before the floats made their way down early-morning Central Park West. The globally-televised avenue may as well have been where their father thought they lived given the abundance of Ring cameras currently in their Amazon cart for which he expected Ian to be the prime installer. That Mount Pleasant was not Manhattan and neither had a crime rate worth discussing was irrelevant on this email thread. Their mother, Dana, wanted to spend that Wednesday morning driving to a print shop a few miles up the Allegheny where her supposedly “final legal brief of her career” was being bound. She chose this spot due to their leather selection and its proximity to a local creamery. Ian reminded himself to jot down a few notes to share about their family’s suspicion she would blow past her retirement date over two scoops of blueberry custard. He had resigned to Scottish desserts being disappointing and his November trip to the states being in service of his atomic family rather than his own interests.

The Corrections spoke to Ian in a way that made him feel understood, as if someone else grasped the depth and breadth of his inner life. The only people he’d discussed the novel with were currently waiting for him 17 minutes in his future. His attempts to bond over his love for Freedom had been met with several variations of supportive dismissal._ I empathize with the female character, not the main one but the other one—what was her name again?_ Claire had responded when he mentioned how richly he could visualize the scenes in Tribeca and Minnesota and Chicago. Ian had walked enough miles in his Oxfords by this point to know that not everyone needs to enjoy a creative work in the same way, but that didn’t necessarily assuage his feeling that they had only nominally read the same book. The opening paragraph to The Corrections contained a sentence which was etched in his brain: “Red oaks and pin oaks and swamp white oaks rained acorns on houses with no mortgage.” Was this the work of a poet or an economist? The voice stood out so sharply from other novels he’d read that he chose it as his contribution to the previous club gathering. Several people smiled and nodded and the discussion moved onto the relationship between two characters. Are we even reading the same book? Ian tried to apply his best meditative approach by acknowledging and dismissing this thought. He had come to Scotland not-so-secretly expecting a socialist utopia where his neighbors offered him duck confit on a quiet Friday evening and instead found more adherents to the social philosophy of “If thou wanteth to make friends and thou liketh books thou shalt attend a book club.” There was no next step, no plan B. Ian found this advice equally underwhelming in a British accent, and noticed he was starting to finish sentences in a higher tone, too.

The mist had lightened and the sky had evolved from its gray pallor into a soft yellow which gave a sepia hue to his entire field of vision. Up the hill, a left, another stretch of residential blocks, and he would be approaching the literary community towards which he was suddenly feeling lukewarm. Ian released the tension in his shoulders with a quick breath out and continued forward.

To be continued (if I feel like it).