Minerva's Owl Read online

  Chapter 3.

  "The eyes and faces all turned themselves towards me, and guiding myself by them, as by a magical thread, I stepped into the room." The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath

  When Toby was a baby, Marta had taken him to playgroup, but he would generally spend his whole time running like Sonic the Hedgehog or standing vacantly looking at some leaves shifting in the breeze. Other mothers and the occasional father would offer the harassed and puzzled Marta what they thought were pearls of wisdom, but their advice didn’t ring true to her; she knew that these implicitly judgemental recommendations didn’t have any meaning for her and her son. The atom bomb of autism had not been formerly exploded, but there was a looming, growing fear gathering in the far recesses of her mind. As yet, she just did know the name of her adversary; she only knew that something was at variance with the commonplace mould.

  After the autism bomb had officially exploded, obliterating her child’s imagined future; Marta was directed to attend a playgroup catering for children on the autism spectrum. She still didn’t fit in. Most of the other children at least spoke some words and many had outstanding talents. Toby was as silent as the grave. At the group, it seemed as if most of the mothers came from the upmarket part of town and had husbands who were engineers or commercial artists or scientists. Marta didn’t have a husband and she didn’t have a new car or marble kitchen; things which would have helped her to fit in. During these “play dates”, the mothers would congregate as the children dispersed, then conversation would be set in motion. Many of these exchanges would cover the latest behaviours of the children, be they strange or genius, but there also seemed to be a lot talk centring on assorted New Age mumbo jumbo - like healing the “life, energy force.” But, at least, Marta had learned not to ask any difficult questions these days. And, when one mother spoke of her incessant prayer, beseeching God that her son’s autism to be cured, Marta did not even contemplate asking what a statistical analysis of the effectiveness of prayer would show. Motivated reasoning, cognitive bias and cognitive dissonance, can provide a kind of armour against cruel reality and sometimes, that is all you have.

  I suppose, it is becoming more clear now, how Marta is able to make others around her feel uncomfortable; she stands outside the tradition of ordinary people, who delight in intuition; who rely on personal anecdote as evidence and who are perfectly comfortable with basing their life on unfalsifiable claims. Marta’s mind functioned with a slightly different operating system; a different way of seeing.

  After a few weeks of cleaning and washing at the woman’s refuge, Marta without ceremony or preamble became part of the place and its enterprise. It helped that the workers there were a passionate and eccentric lot, who either didn’t see or didn’t care about Marta’s little oddities and foibles. But, undoubtedly, it was the social worker Kamaria, who was the pivot and the cement which held this place and these people together. It is funny is it not, how one person, can radiate such light and understanding?

  Kamaria was a large woman, with a copious collection of braided hair and a generous mouth generally shaped into a smile. Her smile wasn’t one of those smiles which are inspired by delusion or naivety; no, it had a cheeky slant to it, which spoke of a wry humour but a generous heart. She was a gregarious person and a passionate advocate for the women in which she came into daily contact; women who hailed from all walks of life.

  Kamaria, was also the catalyst behind many impromptu parties and get togethers, where clients and their children and the assorted staff, would share interesting food and music. After some months, Marta began to bring Toby along to these gatherings, where, more and more eighties music began to be played. And, not long after this, Toby launched into a kind of convulsing dance move during a Michael Jackson number, one sunny afternoon, as he watched Kamaria’s husband, Delroy, get down and bogie. And sometime after that, he started to give a fleeting sort of eye contact, to people other than his mother.

  Marta’s happiness advanced even further, when she scored herself a part time job at the centre, doing the same cleaning and laundering that she had been doing for free. It wasn’t much, but it was definitely something.

  It is Friday evening and the town is lit up, dazzling and dressed up in its best finery. On the west side of town, a train pulls into the station: bridling its power. A jumble of people hop off the now stationary maroon lozenge and scurry forward. They are here for the annual Spring fair, which begins on Friday evening and continues on to Saturday of the following day. On the other side of town, Marta, wearing her polka dot dress and Toby, are at the top of the second hill, where they have just watched the same train dash past. They are on their way to meet two people who have just alighted from that train; a mother and daughter, who are looking expectantly about them.

  As Marta and Angela see each other for the first time, after all these years, they both begin to cry, not because of the years that have both changed and marked them, not for all the years of lost friendship and not for all the suffering and joys which have not been shared. They are crying for all of these reasons and so much more; for things that have no words.

  Angela meets Toby and Marta is introduced to Angela’s five year old daughter Minerva; a pert little girl who chatters nonstop, asking questions and pointing at some new wonder. Marta has come a long way; such a child no longer hauls the heart from her chest.

  This newly made group, begin their walk back to Marta and Toby’s house, through streets swarming with people, along past groaning stalls of food being mobbed by famished and expectant pleasure seekers. Then, there are the craft stalls, attracting mumsy types, who jostle elbow to elbow in the hopes of picking up a patchwork toilet roll holder. And stalls, with tie-dyed tee-shirts and “organic” teas, where people wearing Birkenstocks and hemp clothing huddle seriously. The Goths hang about in the shadows, observing everything.

  Over a dinner of eggs, potato, peas and corn, Angela relates her story, how she now lives in the city, in a cramped studio apartment, where she shares a room with her daughter. Her “kind and wonderful” husband had died two years and now Angela and Minerva are alone in the world. Angela does the best that she can. She works in a department store by day, while her daughter is lodged at daycare. In the evening they return to their small refuge, where Angela tries to relax her face muscles. And, sometimes, she wonders, if she will remember how to have conversations if the need should ever arise again.

  Marta tells Angela about Jack and how she never even met his Jewish parents. Marta didn’t even know that Jack was Jewish; she didn’t know it was an issue. It seems that it was. Jack said that the mother of his child had to be Jewish. It was very important. Marta told him that, he, Jack, was actually going to have a child soon and the mother wasn’t Jewish.

  “Jack was suddenly offered a job overseas. How about that for a coincidence” said Marta sourly.

  “Men”, sniffs Angela, although she is not talking about her husband.

  Later, Marta and Angela are enjoying a cup of tea and talking of times past, Toby, is watching 101 Dalmatians on his computer and Minerva is sitting perched on a chair by the open window, where she sits, head cocked to the side. She is fascinated by the night sounds and by the fact that the ground is so close by to her window. In the city, where she lives on the 13th floor, the ground which is a very long way away brings vapours of petrol and the noise of waring traffic. Here, she smells the earth and hears the sounds of night birds, with the muffled music of the town fair playing in the background.

  “Look! Exclaims Minerva excitedly, pointing outside at the old Cypress tree, which glows softly in a column of moonlight. Marta and Angela, rising to her summons, see a common barn owl, raise its wing and take flight into the velvet night of secrets.

  Of course, Angela and Minerva will leave the city and come to live with Marta and Toby, but that is another story.