Part 15 (2/2)

OF course there was no phone hooked up in the kitchenette anymore, so I drove into town to use the pay phone at the gas station. I could have gone to my dad's to make a call, but this was one I had to make from the privacy of the street. I had a fistful of change, and my hand was shaking as I dumped in the coins. I didn't call collect.

”It's me, Vangie,” I said when my mom picked up. Besides my dad, she was the one other person I was bound to. No one else was left.

”It's your long-lost daughter,” I said.

”Your long-lost mother is more like it. I haven't been very good about keeping in touch. How are you, honey?”

”I'm doing all right,” I said. ”I can't talk long. I just wanted to call and say I'm single again. Del and I broke up.”

”Oh Evangeline,” my mom said then. But I give her credit. She didn't try to sound wise or make me feel better.

”I'm sorry, honey. Do you want to talk about it?”

”Not particularly. I just wanted to let you know where I was. I'll be at the apartment for a while.”

”Well, I appreciate the phone call. I like to hear from you.”

”It goes both ways,” I said. ”How are you?”

”I'm fine. I'm always fine,” my mom said. Then she went, ”Be careful, Vangie. You don't want to have a life like mine.”

I said, ”I don't know whose life I want to have.”

”Are you sure you don't want to tell me more about what happened, honey?”

”It wasn't just one thing, Ma. I can't talk about it.”

”I understand.”

That was all. There were other things I could have told her-about Del, about Kevin Keel. Even some things about June. But it wasn't really my mom I wanted to tell those things to.

It took three weeks for that set of bruises to disappear. Like any scar, they told a story. They embarra.s.sed me, but I was sorry to see them fade.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

Thank you to:.

Nicole and Sarah, for taking a chance; David, for the photograph; Mary, for always picking up; Loyda, for the cabin; Jim, for taking time at Iowa and years after; Tom, for all the sword-fish dinners on the terrace; Lynn, for chai and proofing; Richard, for being an early, enthusiastic reader; Melodee, for introducing me to Blue (and the dump); Jeff, for enduring.

Swimming Sweet Arrow.

by Maureen Gibbon.

A READING GROUP GUIDE.

”Here is what they never tell you about being a girl.”

A Conversation with Maureen Gibbon.

An obvious component of Swimming Sweet Arrow is the explicit s.e.xuality. What did you hope to achieve through this explicitness?

I think many women have the s.e.xual feelings and experiences that my protagonist Vangie has, but those things aren't always discussed openly. That's part of what the sentence ”Here is what they never tell you about being a girl” is about. I didn't want things to stay polite in this story, so I pushed myself to let Vangie say things that were hard to say. I wanted her to be able to speak bluntly and specifically about the things that compel her. The result is sometimes raw. s.e.x isn't the only thing Vangie is explicit about, though. She's also explicit in the ways she describes her jobs-carrying chickens, waiting tables, and picking pears. All of her jobs are very physical, and I hope those descriptions are no less vivid or detailed.

Your book invites the reader into the bedroom (or backseat) of the main character, and it almost demands a kind of intimacy on the part of the reader. What kinds of reactions have you gotten?

That the book is daring. That the s.e.x is enthusiastic, and that there is a joyousness in the frankness of it all. A couple people have read it all at one sitting. All kinds of things.

Did you feel that you had crossed over some kind of line in writing so explicitly?

Sure, I often felt I crossed the line. A few places in the book are still hard for me to look at. But once I started being that direct and specific, it was hard to be anything but that. Vangie's voice became the standard.

You commented earlier on Vangie's jobs, all of which you write about very knowledgeably. Have you worked as a waitress, pear picker, or chicken carrier?

I did all those jobs as I was growing up. They all made a very strong impression on me, and I've never been able to forget them. It makes sense to me, because when you learn a job, you take in a lot of information that you need to know, and if the job involves any manual work, you take in information with your body, too. My body remembers picking pears, carrying chickens, waitressing. It also remembers the very visceral details of those workplaces. I like to write about work because I like to describe the actions and processes of it, and how the person moves through the work. There's a lot of beauty in it to me, even if it's a bad or taxing job. I've also worked as a church secretary and as a change girl in a casino, but I haven't written about those jobs yet.

Of Vangie's jobs, which was your personal favorite?

Picking pears was the hardest but the most beautiful because of the green fruit and trees. Carrying chickens was not as bad as you'd a.s.sume it to be, in spite of the chicken s.h.i.+t. Waitressing produced the greatest number of nightmares and feelings of dread, but I remember that job best of all and feel some strange sort of love for its details. I still have one of my old green ”Guest Check” pads.

Do you believe it enriches a writer's work to have those kinds of jobs?

Many American writers have thought that for a long time, and I respect and embrace the tradition. Yet I say that from a position of luxury, because I don't have to do those jobs now to earn a living. I don't know what would have happened to me if I hadn't gone on to college and moved into the wider world. I don't know if I would be calling those jobs enriching then.

There are tremendously deep friends.h.i.+ps in Swimming Sweet Arrow-and tremendous betrayals. Can you talk about those themes of friends.h.i.+p and fidelity?

I didn't think about themes as I was writing, but you're right, there are certainly deep betrayals between different characters. The question makes me think of a poem by Marina Tsvetaeva where she writes about how sometimes, when we are being utterly faithless to others, we are being true to ourselves. I believe that. At the same time, you don't want just to go around damaging people, or acting wholly out of self-interest. That's no life either. I'd say that Vangie has awareness of that distinction. And she knows herself, or is trying to know herself and the behavior of which she's capable.

Any plans for a second book?

Absolutely. I'm in the gathering stage right now, letting voices and images come and go. I can't say more than that. It's good to be at this place. I don't want to jinx it.

Reading Group Questions and Topics for Discussion What are the forces that, in the absence of parental or other adult guidance, help Vangie determine the kind of person she wants to be? What fuels her frustration when, at the end of the novel, she tells her mother, ”I don't know whose life I want to have”?

None of Vangie's jobs is very enviable, but she derives a strong sense of self and purpose from them. Why? What do Vangie's jobs teach her about the world? About herself? Why is the most physically demanding job-picking pears-described in almost poetic terms?

Maureen Gibbon's writing has been likened to that of Kate Chopin, Anais Nin, and Colette because of its frank exploration of female s.e.xuality. What do Vangie and June have in common with the characters created by Chopin, Colette, and Nin? Why do you think s.e.xually forthright women characters in fiction continue to cause such a stir?

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