| Waiting For Garon To Speak His Mind by Christopher Woods |
|
On my nephew Garon’s third birthday, my wife and I gave him a puppet, a large furry monkey with room for a hand inside. Depending on the puppeteer, the monkey could do all things, or only a few. In the most talented hand, the monkey could be magic. Garon immediately accepted the monkey as a close friend and a confidant. He carried it slung on his arm through the house while the rest of the family ate cake and ice cream. Garon is three, but much wiser than those few years. We all agree on this. But we are also aware that he is holding back something from the rest of us, the family that watches him from many different angles. Uncles and aunts, and I count myself among the former, do not see much of Garon. His own mother and father divorced when he was very young. Now, they live some distance apart, and Garon lives with his mother. Our only chance to see Garon is when he comes to spend a weekend with his grandmother. At first, Garon did not get the hang of the monkey. He did not know how to move his small hand inside the furry head of the beast, to make the cloth lips open and close, to bring about speech. Instead, Garon brought the monkey to each of us. We, in turn, made it talk, placing our arms inside the monkey’s elongated body, and of course adjusting our voices. The monkey then made all kinds of speeches, both sensible and silly, all of which pleased Garon. Listening to those speeches, I looked forward to the day when Garon would make the monkey speak. I wanted to believe that the monkey would then speak for us all. The monkey would express what we were thinking, but for so many reasons, not wishing to hurt or to anger, never verbalized. Perhaps, when the monkey began to speak, he would announce his displeasure at the confusion in the family. He would ask why things were as they were; why Garon’s parents, if they spoke at all, always spoke harshly to each other. I hope that someday, the monkey will say all this and more. If he is angry, he might chastise us for putting our own feelings before those of Garon. He will ask why we insist on nursing old wounds and half-remembered resentments. To be honest, I would like for this to happen. I would like to see the monkey take a kind of Swiss stand, to be a neutral observer in the family war zone. When we asked Garon what he would name the new puppet, he said, “Mr. Monkey.” He chose to name it after no one he knew. “Mr. Monkey” is, I admit, a vaguely generic name. It could not possibly offend anyone. Perhaps, with this name, the monkey could better avoid making enemies. Lately, when Garon visits his grandmother, I've noticed a subtle change. Ordinarily his grandmother packs his things for the trip home. This is no longer the case. Now Garon insists on doing his own packing. He decides which toys to take home to his mother’s, and which he will leave behind. He says that some of his toys have a way of falling into wastebaskets at home. Or, that they simply disappear. It is not unlike the magic of hands inside the monkey’s brain. This being so, Garon always leaves “Mr. Monkey” behind, to sleep on the floor in a closet in his grandmother’s house. “Mr. Monkey” waits there, silently, for Garon’s return. Because of Garon’s wise decision, we know that “Mr. Monkey” will be safe. For now, he will survive. Maybe he will last and last. At some point in time, “Mr. Monkey” will learn to talk. This is what we hope for, and what we must now wait for. We hope for something else as well, that the words that come from his mouth will be a kind of truth. |
Copyright 2003
by Christopher Woods
AAABackgrounds
Yahoo Geocities Clipart