How Should a Person Be? (10 page)

Night fell, but then, there are always holes to fall into.

I don't want 00:00:00 anymore. It is banal. Yet in the pitch-­perfect moments of life, I say to myself that I have followed my rules wisely, and that the surge of sublimity that flows within me is the gods' reward.

Now when I wake in the mornings, I look out the window in the hopes that a policeman on a ­horse will pass by. When it ­doesn't happen, I untangle myself from the sheets and get up and go to the mirror to start my day. I produce a 
haughty, superior expression to intimidate myself into thinking I'm cool, cooler than I am. I make my eyes as
world-­weary as possible, like a fashion model's, then I think,
You're a charlatan. You love everything you ­were ever given.

I want more than to appear sufficiently cool in my own
eyes—­though this would be admitting that all my vanity and
primping has been a waste. Every glance into the mirror and the expressions I've contrived to intimidate myself—­f
atuous. It is perhaps better to continue along the path
toward beauty I have started on, and to hope that, if I am
rigorous enough in following this path, it will lead me some
where
great. Then, if I do succeed in turning myself into an idol, it will not have been for nothing.

I am not thinking of the one who said that in order to
gain life, you have to lose it. If I lose it, I will be like the
earth spinning off its axis into infinity, and who knows, without being something I can gaze at and admire, if I will ever find my way back.

But I can only imagine what would happen to all the stuff of the earth if the earth was to spin off its axis. I think
trees would crash into cars, but I don't know enough science
to say.

•
chapter
3
•

ANTHONY AND URI

T
he
next several weeks I worked double shifts at the salon,
to distract myself from the nothing that made up my days.
One afternoon, Sholem came in to have his hair washed. He
said he was still feeling dirty from making his ugly painting, and he wanted to wash away that feeling. It often happened
that people came to the salon for that very reason—­more
than anyone would guess. Seating him at a basin, I put a towel
around his neck and guided his head back into the bowl, then turned on the water and adjusted the temperature on my hand. Uri had recently started me on shampooing. I put the spray near the crown of his head, and as the water flowed down, I asked, “Is it too hot? Too cold?”

“Just right.”

When it came time for the conditioner, I gave him a head
massage, the way I had been taught, but he was tense, his shoulders straining toward his neck, and his neck was very rigid. Then he blurted out, “Oh, why did Margaux make us
do
this?”

SHEILA

Do what? The Ugly Painting Competition?

SHOLEM

Yes
, the Ugly Painting Competition! I've been thinking about it a lot, you know, because I still ­can't understand why she'd want me to have these bad feelings, and the only thing I can come up with is that she must be going through a painting crisis. She wants to make the worst possible paintings out of some mistrust of painting.

SHEILA

A painting crisis! But she never stops painting! She's painting all the time.

SHOLEM

But she hasn't begun her ugly painting yet, has she? And why not? When you ask her, she just shrugs it off. But it's been
months
! I saw her at an opening last night, and she just
kept saying that paintings don't matter. I find it really depressing,
and it makes no sense. It's so frustrating!

SHEILA

But she's always spoken like that.

SHOLEM

But don't you think it's strange? And the strangest thing about her crisis is that it's late.

SHEILA

It's what?
Late?

SHOLEM

Late! Most paint­ers go through their crisis in art school, because that's where you're surrounded by all these people
telling you that, you know, painting is dead. So I ­can't
understand why she's going through this crisis
now
, when everyone loves her work, when the critics do, and when she has a dealer who's a consummate believer in painting. Why
now
? And I think it's because Margaux ­doesn't trust painting. She ­doesn't trust it to be a powerful communicator, so she has to make the worst painting possible. Then, if there's still some beauty or value at the end, it will restore her faith in painting.

I led Sholem to an empty station and swiveled the chair around. He sat, and I turned him to face the mirror. I took
the comb from my apron and dipped it in the Barbicide, so he could see for himself—­whether he was consciously
worried or not—­that it was free of germs, and I flung off the
excess liquid and drew it through his hair, looking down at his head. Ruby came up and put her hand on my arm.

“Use the mirror,” she told me. “The mirror is a tool.”

I nodded. I looked at Sholem's head in the mirror. He seemed glum. I went to get some cream to settle his Jewish curls, then ran my hands through his hair.

SHOLEM

Of course, it's a brilliant plan, because there's no
way
Mar
gaux
can make an ugly painting. She just
­can't
! How is she
going to reverse her color sense? How is she going to reverse her amazing compositional sense, her brushstroke, her line? I have to say that if Margaux brings something to the competition that she's embarrassed about, a painting that she is really, truly ashamed of, or one that is actually bad—­I will be
agog.

I went to get one of the stylists, because I was not experienced enough to blow-­dry. But before I left, I asked Sholem if he felt any cleaner than he had felt before. He shook his head simply. “No. For some reason I only feel worse.”

Then he said, “Listen—­everything I said about Margaux
is just between you, me, and the walls. Don't tell her I said any of this.”

“Okay,” I said, for I wanted him to like and trust me.

That afternoon, walking back and forth through the salon, picking up towels and sweeping the floor, I kept my attention on Anthony—­one of the dozen stylists who worked there. Uri did everything so beautifully, but I ­couldn't say I 
loved him. I admired and respected him, but I had genu
ine love for Anthony. Maybe because I felt he was like me, I saw him with my heart, not my mind. He worked at a station in the corner of the salon and had been working there for nine years. A few weeks
ago, I began overhearing gossip:
Why ­doesn't Uri fire Anthony?
Anthony is so immature and arrogant! He made Leslie cry!
Anthony
was always boasting about how he had cut hair in Los
Angeles, Miami, and New York, and had been asked to teach in various salons. He was better than this city. If he hadn't met his wife, he would be in one of those cities right now. Did we know that he had once colored Lindsay Lohan's hair? He claimed
that nobody in the world cut the way he did, a method he called
fluid motion cutting
, whereby he'd move quickly
around a client's head. To watch him was like watching an athletic per­for­mance. He would dye customers' hair without telling them, if he thought it would make them look better, and though some gazed into the mirror with tears of regret, no one protested, for they felt they ­were dealing with an artist.

And that was how Anthony saw himself—­as an artist—­whereas Uri had the simple goal of the craftsman: excellence. He was so dedicated to the business that he almost died three years ago from blood leaking into his brain. He did everything perfectly, and the same way every time—­but he was not without some cruelty, I was beginning to see, which made his customers reliant on him, because he knew their flaws. He was the first to tell them that they had
gray hair, even before they saw it. Or he'd explain that
their hairline was receding, or thinning at the back. But he was consistent, and it was hard to find fault. With Anthony, you never knew what you ­were getting. He was a new man every day.

I once mentioned Anthony's accomplishments to Uri, and Uri laughed robustly. “Oh yes, the amazing Anthony! Tell me then, if he's so amazing, why ­doesn't he have his own shop?” This was Anthony's greatest regret, though he hid his shame. The more Uri took me under his wing, the more Anthony tried to win my confidence, cornering me in the back room and telling me about his life; how he had
almost opened a salon five years back, but then the seller took
it off the market—­he did not know why—­and a month later the economy collapsed, and then it was impossible. He ran a
consulting business on the side—­this salon was not his ­whole
world!—­but when I asked if I could have one of his business cards, he made a big show of being affronted. He never gave out business cards! That would be tacky.

Just before closing that day, Anthony's children ­were paraded in—­three sweet toddlers—­and Anthony had me wash their silky, childish hair. Seeing me doing this, Uri came up and put his hand on my shoulder and said in a booming voice,
“Some hairdressers think they are gods because you have people all the time telling you how incredible you are. But a good hairdresser does not think he's a god!”

I didn't want to write this on my arm.

When I was finished, I hung up my rubber apron in the back room and changed from my low heels into winter boots and headed straight for Israel's.

Sheila's mother prays that Sheila will help her
.
.
.

1. I am renting a dumpster and throwing out all the
garbage from the basement and the garage. Hopefully
this weekend or at most in two weeks.

2. I do not want to throw out my daughter's things; she has lots of wonderful things ­here, pictures and more.

3. May she come over one day and sort out what is garbage. I do not want to throw it all out, but I am tempted.

4.
I know it is a bad time for my daughter. But it's been a
bad time for her ever since she moved out. She will
never ever have the time for it, and I do understand. It
is a very low priority. But it is not a low priority for me.

5. I have been living ­here for almost thirty years, and I don't want to go on with my reasoning, I am just ready to do it! Please make her come over now, not when she has the time for it, for she will never have the time for it.

6. Once I rent the dumpster, I might as well throw out what belongs to my daughter. Ninety-­nine percent of the stuff is just garbage. That is probably why she ­doesn't do it. Why would she spend her time with garbage?

7. I don't want to be the storage place for garbage anymore. It is a huge clutter on my brain! Perhaps I can figure out something better for my basement. I just want it free of the piles of garbage. Starting with my ex-­husband's pinball machine.

8. Please let her come over and be nice to me and do it. If I do end up throwing out her things, neither of us will ever forgive me.

9. If my daughter comes over, she will make me very happy.

1. Yesterday, at a barbecue, somebody asked me if I had any kids. I almost said,
I used to have kids
. I don't think it's all my fault that I said that.

•
chapter
4
•

SHEILA BEGINS AGAIN

Sheila sits with Misha in a cheap Italian restaurant, late at night, in the back, under the fluorescent lights. There are people at every table.

SHEILA

(
to the waiter
) I want the “whole grilled rainbow.”

Misha nods at the waiter; the waiter leaves.

SHEILA

I don't know if that was the right choice but?

MISHA

It's all right.

SHEILA

(
hyped up
) I'm finding it so confusing with him! And I'm really aware in this situation, like,
Oh, ­we're not going to get married
, you know? It ­doesn't have that big dream attached. Even though I don't think of myself as somebody with that big dream, obviously I am, because I have been—

MISHA

—married, yeah. I guess when I was single and promiscuous,
a lot of what I kind of objected to was the idea that those two things had to go together.

SHEILA

But how can you
not
have an emotional relationship?

MISHA

You
do
have an emotional relationship, but it's just a different kind. Like, it's really
fun
to have sex with people. You spend a lot of time in your life going out and having coffee with people you're not friends with. You don't want them to call you at two in the morning if they're feeling down,
you're not going to help them move ­house, they're not dear
friends. But you do understand that
Oh, it's thrilling to have—

SHEILA

—this exchange?

MISHA

Yeah! And on the ­whole it makes you an intellectually more interesting person. The same might be true of sex. It seems very analogous. Like,
Oh, it's really fun to have sex with different people.
Even if you liked to play squash, and you
wanted to play squash with different people—

SHEILA

But sex is different from
squash
, no?

Misha shrugs.

I spent the next few days at Israel's with my cell phone
battery dead, working on my blow jobs, really trying to
make them something perfect. I started feeling proud, like
I was doing something useful in the world—­and not for
one moment did I think to myself that I should be doing
something more old-­fashionedly important, like finishing a play.

When I arrived home late one night, I found a yellow envelope in my mailbox. I took it to my room and opened it, and the gray dust from inside went all over my hands and face. Inside the envelope was my tape recorder. I hadn't seen it in so long! I didn't even realize it was gone. I turned it on, and a light flashed—­one new file—­noting a day I had not recorded; a day I had been at Israel's.

Margaux's voice comes out softly
.
.
.

1. It's me. I'm not sure where the recording part is. I'm sitting in our studio, but I'm at your desk. I never noticed before that it's completely chalk-­blue.

2. It seems like such a strange desk, now that you're gone.

3. I came into the studio to­night and there's an art opening downstairs, so they gave me a glass of wine. So now I'm just looking at the glass of wine. But it feels very different than when you're ­here.

4. My rule is that I'm not allowed to erase anything that I record
.
.
. I tell myself after something I would have erased.

5. The sky is so beautiful today, right now, out the window.

1. Last night, Misha and I ­were looking at the ­MacArthur Fellowship website. But I think you have to live in the U.S. to get them. And I think you have to be a genius.

2. It was funny. I had no feelings of insecurity looking at the MacArthur Fellowships, or at all the people who won them. I felt so happy looking at it.

3. It felt so much nicer than an art magazine or other types of reward systems. I guess it's a grant for potential. But it was so nice to think that there are these quiet people doing these wonderful things, and that someone tries to notice that. It maybe felt like a more beautiful illustration of ambition. Or a better kind of ambition. Like not to be a genius, and not to be
.
.
.

4. Just to do good work
.
.
. to have potential
.
.
. to be recognized in your field among other people, as though you're progressing somewhere collectively, rather than competing.

1. I think I do better with the recordings when you're ­here. I think what I want to do right now is just record this, then go over to my desk and work. And so to pretend like you're ­here.

2. The quieter I am in your tape recorder, the more it feels like you're ­here.

1. (
sighs
) I always had a fantasy of meeting a girl
.
.
. who was as serious as I was.

I ­wasn't sure if this delivery was Margaux's way of telling me to get to work on my play—­or that she missed me in the studio, or even that there was money for geniuses—­but somehow it all felt possible. It suddenly felt like the simplest thing. Why had I forgotten all the ways that it was natural and easy for me to work?

A feeling of my true freedom came up inside me, and I sat down before my computer and calmly transcribed the message Margaux had left me on the tape recorder. Then I wrote up the narrative of what happened to us in Miami, putting down all the things we said; the private sentiments
that only I knew. I wrote fluidly for three or four hours.
And I felt so happy doing it, so at home. There was a peace and
security in me. It ­wasn't my play, but it felt good—­far bet
ter than fiddling with the dialogue of Ms. Oddi and Mrs. Sing,
as I had been doing for so long. I felt closer to knowing some
thing about reality, closer to some truth.

Printing it out and reading it over, a feeling of pride bloomed in me like spring, like something new was being born.