SoMa Literary Review - From the Mouths of Babes

From the Mouths of Babes

By Camincha

You have a writer's workshop, a class? Yes.

With hesitation the voice lowered a bit to add, my daughter, she is thirteen, she likes to write. Could she join your class?

Sure. But it isn't a class, it's a writer's group. We learn from each other. We give each other positive feedback to help us, to go on...

The voice picked up, got lively. Sounds good. Can you give me some information? I mean, what time, day?

From seven to nine every other Thursday night. And what is your name and phone number?

Nora hung up delighted. Another new member. Only a few weeks since she plastered her flyer all over town including the library and community center. Also her ad was in the local freebie, Pacifica Tribune and monthly Poetry Flash. And the writer's group was filling up quickly and with a cross-section of ages! Being only a few minutes ride from San Francisco helped a lot also.

THAT EVENING THEIR kitchen was submerged in delicious aromas from the baked swordfish and the al pesto pasta. As soon as they sat down Nora excitedly told her boyfriend her news. Jim's blue eyes smiled at her across the table. He was being supportive without understanding her earnestness, this flurry of activity, the phone calls, rearranging the living room furniture to accommodate the group on Thursday nights.

I'll work late those nights. I'll lose myself in the fog for a couple of hours. I'll get out of your way, he offered.

Nora laughed and continued, then as she talked, common sense, reality, prevailed. And she exclaimed, I can't have a thirteen-year-old in the group with Lilly's erotic novel coming into more and more passages of voluptuous bodies, sweaty nights. Larry’s poems of The City at night loaded with monstrous humans that claw, howl, crawl their way through the streets, aIl of it sprinkled with scenes of explicit sex.

Well, well! so that's what's going on, Jim laughed, with that gesture of his that Nora knew so well, pushing himself away from the table, his palms on his thighs. He gave her a long, amused look, You know? On second thought I think I'll stay home....

Nora shook her head, playfully dismissing his comment and went on. This is serious, Jim. I can see me screaming and kicking when they drag me to court for pervading their precious daughter's virginal mind.

SHE CALLED THE lady. Hi! Mrs. Zacks? You called me. About your daughter, about my writer's group?

Yes.

Well. I'm thinking that perhaps it's not the best idea. You see. What we write, read, there might be explicit sex, profane language.

Oh!oh!oh! I had no idea anything like this was going on! I thought this was about literature. She answered.

Can you imagine? Nora told Jim. Her answer took me by surprise. My common sense left me, you know! And this righteous indignation that I didn't even know I had stored away just for just, for that moment gained impetus, and enveloped me like a dust cloud: Lady, I said, we are serious writers. In literature. In life, there is sex, profane language. Literature reflects life. Go to the library. Read Faulkner, Dostoevsky, Vargas Llosa, Garcia Marquez, Zola, Ginsberg. Had to pause for breath. Had to see if any other names jumped at me from the bookcases. None did. I continued, at thirteen she hasn't experienced life yet, even read enough. I stopped. I waited.

Well, let me see. I'll talk to my daughter. Mrs. Zacks, answered with a hint of appreciation in her voice. Thank you, she added.

A COUPLE OF days later, it was an evening of paperwork and phone calls. When the phone rang she picked it up business-like: This is Nora, can I help you?

I am Mrs. Zacks, Elsie' smother.

Oh! Yes. Good evening.

Good evening. I’m calling you, because my teenager was asking about. She wants to attend your writer's group. When I explained it to her and she wanted me to ask you if you would perhaps, have some time at another moment to, maybe just listen to her? At another moment? Since you explained to me that because of her being a teenager, and the group is all adults ...

Oh! Yes. When? Humm Yes. An hour on a Saturday afternoon. Why not? Yes, we can do it that way. How about this Saturday? Let me see. Just a second. My calendar. Oh! here it is.

JIM MOCKED HER, I won't stay home for that. Don't think that'll be very juicy, do you? He smiled as he walked out the door. I'm going to the gym. Be back 'a couple o’ hours.

They were on time. Filling up the doorway was the mother. Perhaps fortyish. Short, pleasant.

The daughter, a projection of the mother, same brownish hair, blue eyes, white skin. Both plump, round face, round eyes, round body. There was in Elsie none of the: I'm full of hormones ready to explode, evident in most teenagers. Full of middle c1ass, the mother: I'm a homemaker. No, I don’t work outside the house. My work is at home. It's plenty.

The moment was polite. Coffee? A soda?

No, thank you. I like your plants! Your orchids. They are difficult to grow. No?

Yes. My boyfriend is the one who keeps them alive. Nora shared, appreciative of Mrs. Zachs interest.

With no space to spare, mother and daughter fitted into the love seat. Nora smiled, and faced them ready to listen to a fairy tale, or maybe, well? What would this clean-cut, All-American girl read about? If not a fairy taIe, for sure a romance story.

Mrs. Zacks matter-of-factly took a book from her purse and immersed herself in it.

Nora asked. You are not going to listen to your daughter?

Without giving her mother a chance, EIsie answered: No. I don't let her know what I write about At home....No. I don't.

Mrs. Zachs smiled, and bowed her head just so, till her eyes found her place on the page again. Then continued as if she had never been interrupted.

Elsie, what have you brought to read? Nora softly.

I have been working on this short story.

Do you want to publish it, sometime?

Yeah. Sometime. I have shared it with my cousins, but that's all, she smiled. They liked it. Her soft blue eyes kept darting to the page in her hand, anxious to start. The teen-ager read:

Serena was glad she had packed lightly. Everything

fitted into her backpack, her package of hashish,

her birth control pills. After sneaking out of her

parents house last night, sleeping on the floor at

Martha's hadn't been comfortable for her body but

her mind felt so free, her heart so full of freedom.

And later that day she was enjoying her conversa-

tion with [she lowered her voice and it seemed

to Nora she hesitated before going on]

Purple Blood at The Horse's Hind's Saloon. He is tall,

lanky, leather and chains. And all that purple hair!

Hanging onto the bar stools they talked. He asked

her: "what would you like to drink? "Scotch on the

rocks, ” Serena answered.

Mrs. Zachs turned pages regularly, reading as if she were all alone in the room. Nora looked at her from time to time to find her expression totally lacking any emotion, any feeling. Might as well be another potted plant in the room, Nora thought. Then, for a second, she was alarmed. Is this mother going to suddenly get angry and stop her? No. There was no sign of that. Next, she was curious, how is Mrs. Zachs going to handle this at home?

The teenager’s story continued for a few more lines. Her characters said: Thank you. And: please. As in Purple Blood:

Will you please go to bed with me tonight?

Serena: No, thank you. I'm not that kind of girl.

Nora's ears closed up. She never heard the ending of the teen-ager's story. In her head she kept hearing, Oh!oh!oh! I had no idea anything like this was going on.

That evening, her tone serious, her eyes playful, You should have stayed, She told Jim.

Also by Camincha on SoMa Literary Review:

At Night, Warmbodies: Yolanda, Man in the Shadows, Paradise Is Where You Find It, Daydreams, I Don't Write Anymore, What You Don’t Know Can Hurt You, Blue Eyes, I Love This Dress, Blank Pages, Warmbodies, Suburbia, Hope and Justice, The Sorcerer & Pussy cat, pussy cat

Camincha is originally from Miraflores, Lima, Perú. Today she lives in Pacifica and is the author of the novella As Time Goes By.