Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Shards


Every time I reach into the cabinet for a ramekin, I have to twist my arm around the spiky remains of my Cruzcampo glass. I imagine, vividly, each time, the glass slicing into my wrist and I can almost imagine the warm flushed feeling I'd get when I would start bleeding. I feel dizzy and then think it's time I threw out the shards of the glass. I'm not going to glue it together, it's just garbage. Just throw it out, Katie, I think. But it's still in the cabinet.

It's a remnant from our trip to Spain and France, maybe my favorite thing I brought back with me, and that's saying something considering the pilgrimage I made to E. Dehillerin in Paris. The glass was from a hotel bar, the pool a vanishing edge over the side of the Mediterranean. Partner and I had spent the day on the beach, tucked up next to a rocky edge, swimming in the clear blue sea. No one spoke English. Our friends opted for the pool, and we all met up on the patio before heading toward home. We had a few drinks and as I sat gazing out over the picturesque bay we were on, something at the next table caught my eye: a little beer glass, the word "Cruzcampo" raised on the side and a fat man drinking a beer. Both the words and the man were silhouettes of raised glass. Subtle. And the shape of the glass seemed unduly elegant for just a little lager, and suddenly I wanted this glass. I wanted to drink beer out of this glass at home on hot days, my hair piled on top of my head and my feet bare on warm bricks. This glass needed to be mine. I complained that I didn't get a glass like that one. I tried ordering a Cruzcampo to see if I'd get the glass too. I didn't. Just before we left, Partner reached out and snatched the glass, slipping it into our beach tote. I mollycoddled that glass all the way through Paris and back the United States.

Whenever I was in a slightly bad mood or felt I wanted a simple thing to cheer me up, I'd take out that glass and pour a lager into it. I never ever put the glass in the dishwasher, preferring to wash it by hand. When we moved, I put it in the same box as the ceramic plaque with Cricket's hand and footprints at three months of age. I have no idea why the glass meant so much to me; maybe it symbolized some European aesthetic I long for in my life, or the dream of living there again some day. Who knows, but I didn't drink out of the glass everyday, preferring to save it for times when I felt I needed a treat.

When Partner was gone in Africa, one night after Cricket was in bed, I took out the glass and had a beer. I left the glass at the side of the sink. I worked the next day and when I came home that night, I noticed that super nanny had cleaned up, placing the glass into the dishwasher. I took it out, washed it by hand, and left it on the drainboard to dry. The next day I worked again and the ensuing night was a hectic as usual. I wanted to spend time with Cricket; we bathed, read stories, and I put him to bed. When I came out of his bedroom, I headed to the kitchen, and that's when I noticed the shards of the glass, placed on the counter.

I wanted to call super nanny and ask what happened, but my sensible side said, "What happened? It broke, that's what happened." I didn't want to make SN feel bad about the glass, as I was sure she already did. Why else save the shards? I kept the glass on the counter for a few days, and finally put it up into the cabinet to get it out of the way. And there it sits.

Every few weeks, I do a search on eBay and Google for "Cruzcampo glasses. I sometimes get returns that bring up small goblets, a printed "Cruzcampo" on the side. Although... even if I ever found the same glass again, it wouldn't be the same glass. In some bastardized version of Benjamin's aura, I know that every other glass would be a replica, a poor stand in. As if the glass itself was the work of art, and everything else the mechanical reproduction.
I can name a dozen or so objects that have some almost ritualistic meaning to me. I have found myself looking at certain things in my house over the past few months and wondering about their meaning. Is a meaning unattached to my life or meaning that captures something else? Pictures, invitations, old papers, books. I'm not sure why I felt compelled to write about my Cruzcampo glass. Perhaps writing about it will free me to throw it out. After all, the memory is not attached to the glass. The memory is intact regardless.
Perhaps there's no larger meaning than the meaning of that moment. Maybe there's nothing left to say.

2 Comments:

Blogger Heidi said...

I totally understand the feeling. I will join you in your ebay search. While it won't be "the glass" at least it will fill a small bit of the void, and not try to cut you.

9:33 AM  
Blogger agoodlistener said...

I know what you mean. We have an ashtray from a Playboy club. It has the bunny logo raised in the center. We were in the club with my parents and our three year old daughter 35 years ago. What a funny thing to keep.

8:44 PM  

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