Fish
by Ann Bogle
I was always a writer, but I became one, deliberately, as an adult, to express pain. I believed that I could reach the anonymous ears of God that way and give courage to people who loved truth.
I met people who were not afraid. Some of them loved me more than I could tolerate. Some taught me with more pain. Love and pain overlapped. I ran from both toward a future of writing and arrival. I moved slowly but eventually. I lost a child, rode twice to its funeral on my bicycle, paid in cash. I lost a husband, a father, and more friends than I had ever dreamed of knowing. When I lost writing, as I was losing it, I fought with all my ingenuity for as long as I could -- longer. I sat outside the hospital for hours, reading signs in every movement around me, until nothing was left but fear.
Losing writing broke my spirit. I had been consciously arguing for spirit at that time, noticing it missing in many of the writers around me. Their lack of spirit challenged me. It was a serious and beautiful offense, but I didn't imagine then as I do now that some of them also lacked soul.
The price of fighting for spirit and soul has sometimes been sanity. I want sanity, but I believe in spirit and soul. The sanity we live by is worth less without them.
A woman with spirit appeals to men who fish because she is still alive. If they hook her, they despise her. They never fear dying themselves. They watch remotely as she gropes and sinks, nothing stirring them to love or remorse or even pity. They are bored but fortified by her death to want another.
I have lost will and found it in refusing to accept that men are incapable of equality. I have believed that they are able but unwilling. I have risked my life pulling men's doubles from drowning water, while the men themselves sat comfortably on shore. I have died of this illusion many times -- for humanity, for writing, for my own man, globally and locally. I have lost humor, too, the humor women share when they do not dive to save imaginary men from drowning.
(April 26, 1996)
I met people who were not afraid. Some of them loved me more than I could tolerate. Some taught me with more pain. Love and pain overlapped. I ran from both toward a future of writing and arrival. I moved slowly but eventually. I lost a child, rode twice to its funeral on my bicycle, paid in cash. I lost a husband, a father, and more friends than I had ever dreamed of knowing. When I lost writing, as I was losing it, I fought with all my ingenuity for as long as I could -- longer. I sat outside the hospital for hours, reading signs in every movement around me, until nothing was left but fear.
Losing writing broke my spirit. I had been consciously arguing for spirit at that time, noticing it missing in many of the writers around me. Their lack of spirit challenged me. It was a serious and beautiful offense, but I didn't imagine then as I do now that some of them also lacked soul.
The price of fighting for spirit and soul has sometimes been sanity. I want sanity, but I believe in spirit and soul. The sanity we live by is worth less without them.
A woman with spirit appeals to men who fish because she is still alive. If they hook her, they despise her. They never fear dying themselves. They watch remotely as she gropes and sinks, nothing stirring them to love or remorse or even pity. They are bored but fortified by her death to want another.
I have lost will and found it in refusing to accept that men are incapable of equality. I have believed that they are able but unwilling. I have risked my life pulling men's doubles from drowning water, while the men themselves sat comfortably on shore. I have died of this illusion many times -- for humanity, for writing, for my own man, globally and locally. I have lost humor, too, the humor women share when they do not dive to save imaginary men from drowning.
(April 26, 1996)
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Author's Note
At Ana Verse, June 24, 2007:
http://annbogle.blogspot.com/2007/06/fish.html
Written on April 26, 1996, two days after my arrival in Minnetonka following my life in Houston.
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***
An amazing piece, Ann. Moving. A glimpse of the river that becomes your words. Favorite lines:
"A woman with spirit appeals to men who fish because she is still alive. If they hook her, they despise her. They never fear dying themselves. They watch remotely as she gropes and sinks, nothing stirring them to love or remorse or even pity. They are bored but fortified by her death to want another."
*
What Sam said. And the wonderful closing paragraph. Great piece. *
*, Ann. Even back then you were writing "Ann Bogle" stories. As with Sam's above comment, I concur with his selection, but I also have other favorite lines. as well. To wit:
"The price of fighting for spirit and soul has sometimes been sanity. I want sanity, but I believe in spirit and soul. The sanity we live by is worth less without them."
Top shelf writing, Ann. Bravo!*
Thank you, Dan. And David, Ray, Sam, and James. It is interesting that ladies are seen missing here as among the readers. I hope they turn up alive! This piece is vaguely surreal. I might have been keeping in mind a favorite short story called "Wide Net" by Eudora Welty. Or else I found "Wide Net" later and felt reminded. My books were in storage for thirteen years. Occasionally, I received a book as a present from someone, usually in my family, that duplicated books I kept in storage. That way I could read them again without waiting. Thanks to Bobbi Lurie who isn't reading here today for remarking favorably about this piece when I posted it on Ana Verse.
"I have lost humor, too, the humor women share when they do not dive to save imaginary men from drowning."
Incredible piece, but this section feels particularly relatable.*
So much here to commend. #wow x
*
Thanks new commenters. I appreciate your findings and your time.
Beautiful piece fully realized.
Reading this could save me from drowning. This alone: "The price of fighting for spirit and soul has sometimes been sanity. I want sanity, but I believe in spirit and soul. The sanity we live by is worth less without them." *
Thank you for comments and fav's. It's nice and gratifying that people who like this piece like it, and it is interesting, too, since I am sure I thought I was writing around a feminist subject when I wrote it so soon after leaving Houston. Special thanks and welcome to Ray Nessly, who just joined Fictionaut recently.
Truly lovely piece, Ann. Thank you for sharing it*
Beautiful, Ann. *
Thanks, Jen and Charlotte!
I think Darryl said it best, "Beautiful piece fully realized." The editor in me wants to zap the space between "worth" and "less" and then, the admirer in me would like to ask if you could expand into the territory of the Fisher King legend, which it does, really, but I think the connection might be too subtle. Though I suppose the audience you write for has heard enough of him. Thanks for sharing.
Could the imaginary men be the olde knights searching for the grail?