A Way With Words - Chapter 61
23-29 July 1989I first began to write down my dreams the morning after the first time Jack Tornado called me in London. The moment I awoke, spent and sticky, I reached for my notebook. I wanted to remember everything I'd just dreamt so that someday I might understand it. My scrawled fragments show that I was barely awake. But seeing my handwriting
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Indeed. Ennis will eventually use the return ticket to go back to Boston. First something will happen that would send anyone else (well, you or me) rushing to Heathrow but he’s going to dither, unsure. He’ll act with resolve only when he realizes there is a specific action he can take that might ease Jack's pain, one that involves more than just talk or sex.
It’s funny that you refer to mirrors here when it’s probably the only chapter so far that does not feature a mirror or a reflection. I didn’t plan for this one to be so surreal, it just seemed to evolve that way. The next chapter will feature much more physicality and many more face-to-face confrontations and conversations. In chapter 40b where Ennis found the envelope of cards and other things in the bread box in Elliot’s kitchen, among the items are some poems and one of them is by Derek Walcott, probably his best known one, called Love After Love. I included it in the envelope not really knowing what I was going to do with it later or why it was there. It just seemed a natural fit.
I couldn’t believe my luck when I came across a reference to that pub. I wanted to send Ennis to a pub after the gallery visit, one that was nearby and had a name or decor that was apt for the story. So I did a search on unusual pub names and eventually found a site that showed them on a map. One next to Charing Cross station? Great. Nautical theme? Perfect. Red front? Even better. A twin of it right opposite? OMG! I’ll be in London in July and will definitely go check it out.
By the way, 1989 seemed to be punctuated by extremely tragic events in the UK. I wasn’t even living there yet but by the end of that summer I remember thinking, what’s next? Just before the new year it was the Lockerbie bombing, then in the spring was the Hillsborough disaster (football fans crushed) and in the summer was the Marchioness disaster (look it up). When I realized that Ennis would probably still be in London when it happened, I knew I would have to use it in some way.
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