The Order of Affection
My father loved his fish. It was then, not unusual most evenings to observe him illuminated by the translucent coffin, massive and out of scale in the corner of our small living room.
My father’s history of service to the animal kingdom was impressive. He kept a canary named Pete for years.
Still, his devotion seemed inconsistent when considering the occasional shock of oily blues and bagged feathers splayed out on the refrigerator shelf. I used to fabricate stories about the feathers and the two shotguns shoved under the sofa like a detective reconstructing a murder. And though I was frightened by the idea of hunting and horrified by the rigid game, I was fairly comfortable with the guns. My father never spoke to me about either but found my startled reaction amusing.
I explained away his affection towards fish and birds (when he wasn't preying upon them) cats and later small dogs for the most part, as a significant alternative to humans. These were the relationships that could bring the occasional smile to his face.
In the hours after work, when he wasn't tending the reservoir, my father would descend into the basement to oversee smaller tanks, the surplus he needed to stock his titanic universe upstairs. Beneath a canopy of asbestos, the basement was where he communed with bubbling guppies and mollies. The tool closet however, was where he ate the walnuts.
Because of my life-threatening allergy to tree nuts, my father indulged his craving by customarily retreating into the shallow closet over by the entrance to our kitchen, at the top of the basement stairs. If I kept silent, I could hear him working the silver nutcracker from inside the closed door. The fact that even the tiniest trace of shell or oil was enough to suck the life out of me, only partially reinforced our distance. That my father and I hardly spoke took care of the rest. But still, seeing my father willingly sequestered by my allergy was to witness one of the rare occasions when he would agree to be inconvenienced with regard to something so well within his right.
He was being careful with my life. No one could argue this intentional act of goodwill. Besides, I knew the guns weren't loaded.
When he’d cracked the last nut into a bag, my father re-emerged to turn the key, carry the spent shells out to the trash and walk back into the kitchen to flush out what was hiding under his fingernails. Afterwards, he’d wipe down the doorknobs with a towel that would later have to be laundered.
John
Over time, I came to discover that the planet of my father’s birth was a Grecian island of 75 square miles with a population of approximately 5000 minus one. My father grew up; salted and lulled by the eighty-degree swells of the harbor he so loved. There, where the Meltemi winds of the Cyclades were monitored by the state of the upturned chairs in the harbor café, my father had language, friendship, religion and hope.
Gus
It was my brother Gus who taught me to paint, to drain every crusted drop from the cache of elderly cans he was made to haul from our dank basement. Whenever a tenant moved out, Gus and I would be dispatched to the empty apartment to cover plaster and trim using what we could find. We were experts at cutting the hardening hues with enough water to coat as much wall as we could using brushes as stiff as old beards. And when the light would fade, we’d soak our tools in turpentine, searing our collective memory with the fumes that drifted into our eyes and brains.
Yiayia
The choice of what Yiayia cooked and baked was determined and scheduled by two factors; which ingredients happened to be in season and the calendar of the church, although the two did not exist irrespective of one and other and were in fact principles often synchronized to perfection. For example dishes prepared to follow the April/March Lenten period might contain spring lamb and garden mint. The laborious baking of tsoureki or from the Turkish, Yal Ekmek, was customary during the cooler spring season to break the impassioned fast on Easter morning. I smiled recalling memorable breakfasts squeezed inside the dining room of the family restaurant in thrilling middle of the night Easter morning feasts.