To Start Over

Dana

By : Dana
Views : 748

My Thai wife had been driving. In the back seat was our daughter Nim, aged six. They had been to 'dance' class. All girls go through a stage where they want to dance. Every town has some mother who plays music in the livingroom and little girls dance. If, as the father, you go to pick up your daughter you are stunned by how cute and innocent it all is. You may forget a lot of things in your life as a man, but you will never forget your little girl's earnest face as she dances.

Another stage that all girls go through is the 'horse' stage. Little girls are mesmorized and hypnotized and just taken over by the idea of horses. Lately. Nim had been talking about ponies.

"Can we get a pony?"
"We could get a pony."
"I'd like a pony."
"Other people have ponies."
"If we had a pony everyone could ride it."
"I'll bet there is a pony that wants to live here."
"Can we get a pony Daddy?"
"I want a pony."
"Mom could knit the pony a hat with holes for his ears."
"He could live in the garage."
"I would name him Happy."
"I want a pony."

One morning I was being silly and imaginative with my daughter. She wanted to know if we were going to do something the next day and I said no--I would be sailing to Tahiti.

Nim: Why are you going to sail to Tahiti Daddy?
Me: I'm going to see the ponies.
Nim: What ponies?
Me: Tahiti is covered with ponies. They are everywhere. From the beaches to the valleys to the mountains there are thousands and thousands of running and jumping happy ponies. In fact, Tahiti is a French word that means Land of the Ponies.

My daughter paused, looked me straight in the face, and with big Daddy trusting eyes said:

"I'd like to go to the Land of the Ponies."

There was no family except my wife Lek and myself and my daughter. I took care of everything after the automobile accident including designing the gravestones for my wife and my child. My daughter's gravestone read:

NIM

Born: June 4, 1983
Died: July 18, 1989

Here lies Nim. Daughter of Dana and daughter of Lek. Loved by her father and loved by her mother.

"I'd like to go to the Land of the Ponies."

One year after installing the gravestones of my wife and of my daughter I flew to Thailand. To start over.

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sawadee2000
March 18, 2009, 13:20

What can I say? You pulled me right in, and I have to stop to wipe my eyes. This past weekend we took out little boy Sam up to the Chiang Mai Zoo, where his eyes were as wide as saucers. I couldn't help remember though a other trip many years ago to another zoo I made with my little Colin not long before he passed away. Oh How I wish there really was a land where the ponies lived!

reader
March 19, 2009, 04:45

I beg to differ Sawadee. This fictional piece coming on the coat tails of Steve Rosse's moving and honest story of his relationship with his son smacks of metoo-ism. It's contrived and trying to trump someone else's writing and stealing his thunder. One wonders why Dana has to be so competitive on this site? He's got enough talent not to be like that. Take it easy Dana,where I was sitting there were only dry eyes in the auditorium.

steve rosse
March 19, 2009, 10:36

I think this story brings up at least two interesting considerations. The first is that on this site the readers are so familiar with the regular contributors that there is a cognitive dissonance generated by reading this story under the byline of an author who has, a couple of times at least, proclaimed his belief that having children gives a man no special sensitivity or insight. Maybe regular contributors to TS.com are sabotaging ourselves by commenting so frequently.

On the other hand, if this story was posted on a more mainstream site, most readers would, I think, come away from it saying, “What the hell?”

The story lives and dies on the strength of that last line, and without knowing why the narrator chose Thailand as his refuge that line loses all its punch.

Even knowing Thailand fairly well I could only come up with two reasons. The first is the bar scene, but if that’s the narrator’s motive then this is a poignant bit of pathos at best, and an anticlimax at worst, because the cheap sex and lukewarm beer won’t even ease the pain of an angry divorce, let alone the kind of pain described above.

The second reason for seeking solace in Thailand would be Buddhism, I guess. But the narrator of this story has not studied much Buddhism, or has not taken what he’s studied to heart. The Buddhist solution to this kind of pain is detachment, and this voice is still very attached to the world, and the things and the people in the world.

The bulk of the story, brief as it is, while written with some admirable skill, has its emotional payoff defused by the last sentence.

John Daysh
March 19, 2009, 11:10

"This fictional piece coming on the coat tails of Steve Rosse's moving and honest story of his relationship with his son smacks of metoo-ism."

What a load of rubbish. With this reasoning most of the stories on this site would be guilty of 'me too-ism.' From now on we can only have one story about loss, one story about love, one story about a man falling for a bar girl? Perhaps only someone who doesn't know of loss and grief could be so myopic. For me the best stories move me in an emotional way. Both stories did move me. I liked them both but they are no where near the same. I don't think any one writing on this site is engaged in oneupmanship except perhaps in the comments which is as it should be in literary and social debating.

Marc Holt
March 19, 2009, 11:24

Reader misses the point, as he usually does. Dana has just proved once again what a versatile and imaginative writer he is.

BKKSW
March 19, 2009, 20:57

"smacks of metoo-ism. It's contrived and trying to trump someone else's writing and stealing his thunder. One wonders why Dana has to be so competitive on this site? He's got enough talent not to be like that."

One wonders why someone would approach a critique this way, especially if 'one' wants to be taken seriously. Nasty, mean, assumptive, and reaching..

Why not just use your real moniker and then we wouldn't have to read your narrative to know what you have to say?

Dana
March 19, 2009, 23:15

"I beg to differ Sawadee. This fictional piece coming on the coat tails of Steve Rosse's moving and honest story of his relationship with his son smacks of metoo-ism. It's contrived and trying to trump someone else's writing and stealing his thunder."

This story has been pinned up on my storyboard in my bedroom for a long long time. This comment by a 'reader' is offensive on many levels. He owes me an apology. I do not expect to get one. Perhaps Mr. Rosse would like to say something here.

reader
March 20, 2009, 12:55

"Perhaps Mr. Rosse would like to say something here."
Dunno about him but I'll say this:
1. Mr.BKKSW obviously suffers from a case of mistaken identity.
2. By saying that the story was pinned to your storyboard for a long time you just confirmed my guess that it was me too-ism.
Long forgotten then prompted by Steve's non fiction to dust the cobwebs off and post it . There's a reason for everything.
3.I don't disagree with Mr. Daysh, I was questioning the timing of the posting. Or is it the "Sob Story" week we're having now?

sawadee2000
March 20, 2009, 13:34

There is hardly "anything new under the sun" here. The whole history of mankind is "the same old story with a new set of words. I don't read secret agendas into anything, as I don't play mind games. I stand by what I felt after reading this piece. By the way, just so not to be accused of "me-too-ism", in the queue is a piece I wrote well over a year ago about Fatherhood. I thoroughly enjoyed Steve's recent, but didn't just decide to jump on his band wagon.

steve rosse
March 20, 2009, 18:13

I don't mind at all seeing themes run through various authors' works. It helps sometimes to see one mind's perception of a particular aspect of the human condition side by side with another.

But when an author kills a child, even in fiction, he needs to be very careful. That's playing with dynamite. You better do it exactly right or the reader will resent your attempted manipulation of his emotions. John Irving kills at least one child in every book he writes. It worked beautifully in in his early career but since "A Boy of the Circus" it's just become self-parody. Bad Hollywood movies always tug at the audience's heartstrings by at least placing a child in jeopardy, if not killing the waif outright. If you pull it off, like in "Slumdog Millionaire," you win the Oscar. If you don't, like in "Pay it Forward," you almost get blacklisted.

And the pony thing is kind of trite, but then so is a teenager texting on his phone.

Dana
March 20, 2009, 20:18

Mr. Rosse. One could infer if one were a careful reader that the reason the story teller went back to Thailand is that is where he met his first wife: a woman he loved and the mother of his child. To miss that is an error, and to read anything else into the word Thailand is not cued by the story.

I suggest that there is name calling here in these 'comments' rather than careful reading of a carefully constructed story.

Trite? You must be insane. Have you spent any time with children?

Richard Mather
March 22, 2009, 07:18

DANA, - don't change your style . . .
Every now and again you throw up something different from your usual. This, your latest submission, is very different from your norm. Personally I enjoyed this short read; it entertained me and provoked reflection on my own past experiences. However, if I may offer just one small criticism? But then again perhaps not, as you seem to have attracted enough already. Never mind -

On the Death of a Daughter:
Robert Burns 1759 - 96 penned the following just one year before he died, with regard to the very sad loss of his own Daughter, -

"Here lies a rose, a budding rose,
Blasted before its bloom;
Whose innocence did sweets disclose
Beyond that flower's perfume.
To those who for her loss are grieved,
This consolation's given -
She's from a world of woe relieved,
And blooms, a rose in Heaven".

steve rosse
March 23, 2009, 05:25

"reading anything else into the word Thailand is not cued by the story." Well, it's not a story, it's a little snippet. Not much is "cued" at all. But again, an author cannot blame a reader for not "getting it." It's the author's responsibility to make sure his readers understand. I don't see anything in the story to imply they met in Thailand, or that the narrator had ever been to Thailand. He says "my Thai wife" but America is a melting pot, she could be third-generation Thai, or a recent immigrant. The story didn't work for this reader, it may work for others, but you can't get all defensive and blame the reader if it doesn't.

"Have you spent any time with children?" Huh? On this site I've talked ad nauseum about my own children, I've mentioned that I'm a board member of the PTA, a committee chair for the Boy Scouts, and I taught English in Thailand to students aged 8 to 20. I once read the entire first Harry Potter book out loud, with separate voice and dialect for each character, to the before school program. I played Santa Claus in a pediatrics ward in 1977.

But that's not important. Again, the author's responsibility is to get his point across through his writing. A reader should not need a particular curriculum vitae to understand a story. The pony thing is trite. It's so common that my daughter's book shelves have a dozen books with girls and horses on the cover. "National Velvet," "Black Beauty," "Caddie Woodlawn," "Little House on the Prairie," "My Friend Flicka." Put "ponies" into Children's Lit on Amazon.com and you get 9,918 titles.

That's not to say the ground can't be covered again, and covered well. It's just something an author has to be aware of.

Dana
March 23, 2009, 21:15

"but you can't get all defensive and blame the reader if it doesn't."

Yes you can. Not all literature is appropriate to all audiences and not all readers are appropriate to all writing. If the reader does not 'get it' he may be trying to read something he is not qualified to read. The notion that the reader that does not 'get it' can blame the writer in all cases is absurd. I can't make stupid people smart, I can't make uneducated people educated, I can't make mean people kind, I can't make poor readers alert readers and none of those things are my job as a writer.

korski
March 24, 2009, 09:42

"The notion that the reader that does not 'get it' can blame the writer in all cases is absurd. I can't make stupid people smart, I can't make uneducated people educated, I can't make mean people kind, I can't make poor readers alert readers and none of those things are my job as a writer."

Dude, ya hit it on the head of the nail, square like. :)

steve rosse
March 24, 2009, 11:15

Look, Dana. When I wrote “biweekly” and Korski didn’t understand it, I didn’t call him names. I changed the line to “every other week.” Korski is smart, well educated and widely read. If he did not understand the line, it needed to be changed. You seem to think your readers owe you something, and they do, but not what you think they owe you.

The artist does not spoon feed experience to a passive audience. The audience seeks a certain kind of experience, selects an artist, subsidizes the artist, and by its reaction the audience changes what kind of Art the artist produces. An artist cannot stand on stage in front of an empty theatre; an audience cannot stare at an empty stage. Neither can exist without the other. Their relationship should not be antagonistic.

This is why famous movie stars still act on the stage, so that they can hear the audience breathing behind the footlights. It’s why famous writers who sell millions of books will still read to a crowd of 20 in a book store. Artists crave feedback. Not just praise, and not mindless abuse, but an honest, thoughtful, response. A reader is a writer’s friend. A careful reader who takes the time to send constructive criticism is a writer’s best friend.

Dana
March 24, 2009, 21:07

"A reader is a writer’s friend."

Those people do not start a missive with "Look, Dana."

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