Provided by explosiveskull https://twitter.com/kaboomskull M_I_SForEver
Tuesday, January 1st, 1856.
Fair and very cold.
This morning,
ice in our bedroom for the first time all winter.
The water froze on the potatoes
as soon as they were washed.
With little pride, and less hope,
we begin the new year.
On the porch after sunup,
I could hear the low chirping of sparrows
in the hedgerows that are now buried in the snow.
Dyer has maintained that with good health,
and a level head,
there is always an excellent chance
for a farmer willing to work.
He feels he can never fully rid himself of his burdens.
And I'm certain that because his mind is in such a bad state,
it affects his whole system.
He told me this morning
that contentment was like a friend he never gets to see.
You're late with the milking.
She wasn't suffering.
And you?
Since our acquisition of this farm,
my husband had kept a ledger to help him see the year whole.
This way he knows what each crop
and field pays from year to year.
And Dyer has asked me to keep a diary of matters
that might otherwise go overlooked...
From tools lent out to bills outstanding.
That I have done.
But there would be no record in these dull and simple pages
of the most passionate circumstances
of our seasons past.
No record of our emotions or fears.
Our greatest joys.
Our most piercing sorrows.
With our child,
it was as if I'd found my bearings.
But I too rarely told her that she was our treasure.
Would you like to try?
Like this, papa?
That's it.
She often seemed separate from us,
as if she was working at just fitting in where she could.
They saw his brothers and sisters
and they were the mouse's family...
There is something so affecting
about mute and motionless grief and illness
in a child so young.
She put her arms around me and said nothing else.
But it felt like we were speaking.
I have become my grief.
"Welcome sweet day of rest",
says the hymn.
And Sunday is most welcome for its few hours of quiet ease.
As for me.
I no longer attend.
After the calamity of Nellie's loss,
what calm I enjoy
does not derive from the notion of a better world to come.
I want to purchase an atlas.
- It could be a bother. - No, no. No bother.
Who is that?
His name is Finney.
- His wife Tallie. - Hyah!
I met them at the feed store.
They seem to keep to themselves.
They're renting the Zebrun farm.
Monday, February 4th.
Why is ink like fire?
Because it is a good servant,
and a hard master.
Did you say something?
I want to purchase an atlas.
I suppose there are more frivolous purchases
one could make.
I've saved 90 cents of my own.
I can't imagine a better way to spend it.
Could buy your husband a gift.
What better gift could I give him
than a wife who is no longer a dullard?
My self-education
seems the only way to keep my unhappiness
from overwhelming me.
Good afternoon.
I've been using a broom on my porch.
The snow is so dry.
I'm Tallie.
Abigail.
I hope I'm not intruding.
No.
I just, I needed to get away for the day.
The farm is a slaughterhouse right now.
My husband is killing his hogs.
Would you like to come in?
Yes, I'd love that.
Or we could just stay out on the porch, shivering.
I know it's the dullest of all things
to have an ignorant neighbor come by
and spoil a Sunday afternoon.
Oh, no, you're the most welcome here.
But I know the feeling.
Sometimes, I imagine during the Widow Weldon's visits
that I've been plunged up to my eyes in a vat of the prosaic.
Oh, Widow Weldon!
She got going on the county levy once...
She saw I had noticed her hair,
and admitted she had been vain about it as a girl.
She said that back then, she'd worn it longer
and plaited in a bun at the back of her head.
In the winter sun through the window,
her skin had an underflush of rose and violet
which so disconcerted me that I had to look away.
As always,
when it came to speaking
and attempting to engage another's affections,
circumstances doomed me to striving and anxiety.
From my earliest youth, I was like a pot-bound root,
all curled in upon itself.
I hope I'm not keeping you from something.
No.
I'm glad you've come.
Finney saw your husband at the cooperage.
He mentioned his new method for farrowing his piglets.
With some asperity?
My husband mentions everything with some asperity.
I told him that once,
and...
he observed in response that it seemed to be quite a favor
to get a kind word from me.
And I told him that if he was married to himself,
he'd soon find out what a favor it was.
My mother always said that having children
would resolve that dilemma.
My mother made the same claim.
And yet...
Here we are...
Both childless.
My daughter, Nellie, would have been five today.
Oh.
How did she pass?
Diphtheria.
Last September.
I'm so sorry.
- Hello. - Oh.
Good afternoon.
I'm Dyer.
Tallie.
Oh, it's late, isn't it? I should be getting on.
Don't go on my account.
Oh, no.
That's a nice wrap you have.
Thank you.
I never receive compliments for my clothes.
I'm so glad you've come.
Meeting you has made my day.
It has?
Well...
How pleasant and uncommon it is to make someone's day.
Thursday, February 14th.
Dyer's third night with the fever.
Drink this.
I plan on getting sick more often.
My wife smiles at me.
Promise me you're not gonna die.
That would be the opposite of my intention.
I've restored him somewhat
with an enema of molasses,
warm water and lard.
Also a drop of turpentine next to his nose.
I spent the day reconsidering my conversation with Tallie.
We compared childhood beds...
Mine in which the straw
was always breaking up and thinning out.
And hers, which was as hard, she claimed,
as the Pharaoh's heart.
I should be taking care of you.
I agree.
Her manner is sweet and calm and gracious.
And yet her spirits seem to quicken
at the prospect of further conversation with me.
I find that everything I wish to tell her
loses its eloquence in her presence.
So how did you come to meet Dyer?
He was the oldest son of a neighbor.
He helped out on my father's farm.
And was he instantly smitten by you?
He was, wasn't he?
He was instantly smitten by you.
He admired what he viewed as my practical good sense.
You don't countenance words like "smitten", do you?
I suspect I use all the same words you do.
I suspect you don't.
In speech, yes, because you're shy.
But I bet you're more accomplished in your writing.
Thank you.
Your good sense, that's all your husband was smitten with?
And my efficient habits.
That's all?
My handy ways.
Dyer likes mechanical things.
I have no doubt he would've been happier
had he been allowed to pursue
the natural scientific bent of his mind.
Circumstances forced him into farming.
And despite all of that, his heart compelled him to you?
Well...
You would have to ask him about that.
And what would you say if I asked you?
I suppose that as a suitor, he was...
not generous, but he was just.
And that he was affectionate, if not constant.
I wasn't sure of his suitability.
But my family felt that more improving
might be in the offing.
After all, it is a long lane that has no turning.
You both have much to be thankful for.
We do.
It's still too soon.
Sorry.
Tuesday, February 19th.
My reluctance seems to have become his shame.
His nighttime pleasures, which were never numerous,
have curtailed even more.
And I have so far refused to engage his persistence
on the subject of another child.
Evening.
This is my husband Finney.
And you already know Dyer.
Our paths have crossed.
And this is the Abigail that I've been mentioning.
My wife talks about you as if you're all about the house,
and everything reminds her of you.
Oh, well, it's all I can do but sit cross-legged and morose
whenever she's away.
- Come in. - Thank you.
The rain so heavy that it broke down our mill.
Did you miss me?
Yes.
You look different.
No...
Finney seems agreeable.
Yes, he is, when he chooses to be.
I guess I'm supposed to offer a toast.
But when it comes to the social graces,
I'm about as smooth as coming down a rocky hill in the dark.
What my husband means is he's so happy
to finally get together,
and to see Dyer again.
Cheers.
Part of what I value about my wife
is how she taught me to associate with my fellow beings.
Finney, that's a handsome neck tie you've chosen.
Thank you.
But with my neck,
my head sticks out like a chicken in a poultry wagon.
Your tart was wonderfully savory.
Oh, did you like it? I'm so glad.
I was worried I wouldn't have enough eggs
- because we had an accident. - Oh.
My hired hand pulled down a box of eggs and broke two dozen.
I announced that he was unlucky to eggs
and no longer allowed to approach them.
"Unlucky to eggs." I like that.
I told him that his shirt had so many holes,
he can make a necklace of it.
Well, we often wish we could afford a hired hand.
We've suffered a great deal from the carelessness of hired hands.
Mr. Holt's hired hand is said to have swum his horse
over the canal despite the cold.
Really?
Yes.
Winter's been so hard,
sometimes Mrs. Weldon's son
has had to deliver the mail on skis.
Now our letters can get lost at breakneck speed.
Did you write letters to Tallie when you were courting?
I did.
And did Tallie keep them?
Only Tallie knows for sure.
Monday, February 25th.
Finney and Tallie's bond confounds me.
At times, when their eyes meet,
they seem yoked in opposition to one another,
while at other times, there seems a shared regard.
There is something going on between us
that I cannot unravel.
Hold this here.
Okay.
Thank you.
Hello, Dyer.
Well, hello.
You're off?
Yes, to town.
Have a good day.
She'll be pleased to see you.
Happy birthday!
Brought you some things.
Hand-knitted?
I hoped you'd like them.
I do.
An Atlas!
The United States of America.
Oh and a little pot of apple sauce with an egg on top.
My feet are freezing.
Oh, let me warm them.
How's Finney?
He's Finney.
Ah, it tickles.
My husband records trespassers in his journals.
And this morning, when I asked him
what he intends to do about them,
his response was so unpleasant that I...
resolved to visit you...
so that there would be something in my day
other than his meanness.
Dyer thinks he has many estimable qualities.
He does.
And he also uses a ledger to keep accounting of whom I visit
and how long I stay.
Why?
I have no idea.
As he's gotten more like this,
I've given up trying to figure out
all the peculiarities of his...
odd little world.
I suppose he's especially unhappy with me since...
I'm yet to give him a child.
What does it feel like?
Like nothing at first.
But then when she began to stir...
it's like butterflies flapping their wings.
Later, like a rabbit...
when she kicked her legs at night.
It frightens me.
The thought of having none of that.
And of giving birth.
Most of us feel that way.
But...
when the time comes, I will be there...
to guide you through it.
Dyer must want another child.
I understand.
Birthday gifts.
A box of raisins.
That needle case you've been needing.
And a tin of sardines.
You spoil me.
Oh, you got gifts from your new friend.
She left hours ago.
I just saw her leave.
The great storm began
with a faint groaning in the northeast.
It was like a noise of a locomotive.
Help!
Come closer, girl.
It's warmer over here.
I'm sorry, I'll be going.
You should wait it out.
Come on, mare.
Dyer!
How long would it be before I receive word of Tallie?
How long could I wait?
How long will the feed in the barn last?
Each cow eats 26 pounds of forage every day.
You should know that.
They start to skinny down after three days.
Heard the newspaper predicts the storm'll let up by then.
But that's probably based on
an expert's consultation of a goose bone.
"In a real crisis of nature, we're all at another's mercy."
Yes.
My mother liked to say,
"We tumble from one mortification to another."
When I was seven, an earthquake knocked down our house and barn.
Did I tell you?
Never.
- An earthquake? - Yes.
I remember something woke me before dawn.
I don't know what.
My father was calling out.
But I couldn't tear myself away from the window.
I saw birds fluttering in the air, afraid to set down.
The river was roiling, and I couldn't move.
And then...
Finally, I jumped down to our collapsed stairwell,
as all my brothers had done before me.
And we all huddled together in the dark on the porch.
Later, my mother said
that the dread never fully went away after that.
She said, "What was safe if the solid earth could do that?"
Mother.
Tallie! You're frozen!
Tallie! Stay awake! Stay awake!
Open your eyes! Open your eyes!
Keep your eyes open!
Look at me.
I would die without you.
Then you're safe.
Because I am here.
Monday, March 17th.
Half the chickens are lost.
I dug ice and snow from their dead open mouths
in an attempt to revive them.
Hobnails...
For better traction.
The Widow Weldon's son, on his rounds,
reported that Tallie had gotten home safely,
with, he thought, only a bit of frostbite.
We haven't seen your friend down the lane for a while.
Finney took her to Oneonta.
So everything is tedious and lonesome?
Thursday, April 10th.
Biscuits and dried mackerel for breakfast.
Dyer has augmented the padding in the cattle pens
with his hoardings of maple leaves and old straw.
It always seems that Tallie will never appear.
But I remind myself that time and the needle wear
through the longest morning.
And I have noted that when she does arrive,
my heart is like a leaf borne over a rock
by rapidly moving water.
Hello. Oh!
Oh! Careful.
Stay. Sit, sit.
Saturday, April 12th.
- I spent the last two days... - Very damp, cloudy and cool.
Smoky.
Perhaps the forest is somewhere on fire.
Your nose is being gracious.
Monday, April 14th.
A terribly bad spring so far,
but the clover has come up through it,
and is all right.
And how's Finney?
The soul of patience.
He's mentioning again the idea of migrating west.
You're planning on moving west?
Perhaps.
I had an uncle who moved to Ohio and came to a desperate end.
Which is what one might expect from Ohio.
- Tomorrow? - Hm.
Thursday, April 17th.
Rain in torrents nearly all night.
The lane is flooded and the ditches brim full.
This morning, only a slight shower.
Tallie came later than her usual time today.
She offered no explanation.
I'm sorry that your childhood was anything less than joyous.
Joyous it was not.
But I made my own happinesses.
My husband says, "God puts heavy stones in your path,
it's up to us to step over them."
Stones are what the fortunate receive.
My mother's mother was born in 1780
right here in Schoharie County.
I often wonder at the courage
and the resourcefulness of those women.
Imagine faring forth into a wilderness,
hoping to build the foundations of a home.
Maybe they had a certain high hopefulness that we don't have.
When can you come?
Tuesday.
- Hello, Tallie! - Good day.
Was your afternoon gladsome?
Yes, it was, very.
- Goodbye. - Goodbye.
I felt,
looking at her expression,
as if she were in full sail on a flood tide,
while I bobbed along down backwards.
And yet,
I never say on her countenance the indifference
of fortunate towards the less fortunate.
Good day.
Are you sick, too?
Not at all.
I was hoping to compare colds.
I'll make you tea and honey?
What?
Every morning I wake up
and I think that I never want to be far from you.
And under your influence, since you're so good with words,
I've composed a poem.
It's entitled...
"Oh, Sick and Miserable Heart, Be Still."
When I was a little girl,
I thought I could cultivate my intellect
and do something for the world.
But my life has surprised me by being far more ordinary.
You're talking about that moment
that I have dreamed about, when we're carried in triumph
for having done something wonderful or received at home
with tears and shouts of joy.
Do you know what I wonder?
Is it possible...
that such a moment hasn't yet come for either of us?
I think it has.
Or that it could.
You do.
So what do you think?
What do you think about us?
I don't know how to put it into words.
Well, try.
- I have tried. - Well, try again.
What do you imagine?
I imagine that I love
how our encircling feelings leave nothing out...
for us to want or seek.
I've presumed too much.
It's been my experience that it's not always those
who show the least who actually feel the least.
Just my dog's toenails on the wood.
Why didn't you do what you attempted to do?
I worry you'll catch my cold.
You smell like a biscuit.
I have to go home.
Astonishment and joy.
You haven't accomplished any of your responsibilities.
- Do you need assistance? - No, I don't think so.
So it's a cold plate for supper tonight?
I'll milk the cows.
Friday, May 30th.
The sunshine streaming through the branches
makes a tremendous farrago of light and shade.
We hold our friendship between us and study it,
as if it were the incomplete map of our escape.
When the day is done,
my mind turns to her,
and I think, with a special heat,
"Why are we to be separated?"
Your smile stopped. Is it meant for someone else?
Sorry, my mind was elsewhere.
We need calico and buttons and shoe thread.
Am I troubling you, sitting here with you like this?
Not at all.
I may be late coming to it,
but I've learned consideration of others.
I've learned the need for human sympathy
and the unfulfilled want of it.
I feel I've provided you with sympathy.
I suppose that's so.
The smile returns.
Good day.
Oh.
I believe that intimacy increases goodwill.
And if that's the case,
then every minute we spend together
will make us more cheerful workers.
Won't our farms benefit from that?
Won't our husbands?
All our burdens will be lightened.
When she left, I was like a skiff at sea
with neither hand nor helm to guide it.
They're cleaning out the drain under the street along the fork.
And several people are down with fever.
Holt came by to hang the bacon.
He still hasn't recovered from being beaten by two strangers.
He had to be hauled to his home in his cart.
He said the men who did it were gonna kill him,
and then realized they were mistaken as to who he was.
Lately, it seems like all you talk about
are highwaymen and house breakers.
On the contrary,
I often defer to your sensitivities.
And I haven't even told you about
all the reports in the county of men
who've poisoned and killed their wives
because I haven't found it a fitting subject for supper.
"Killed their wives," he used those words?
Mm-hm. those words.
Have you had any disagreements?
Yes, about my wifely duties.
I told him that I was opposed to it, that I was not willing.
And he accepted that?
Well, he hasn't touched me since, so...
But I made myself feel better...
by composing a poem.
Can I read you the opening stanza?
You can read me the entire poem.
No, I'll start with the opening stanza.
"I love flowering gardens.
I love creeping plants.
I love walking in the air,
but I fear swarming ants."
I don't think I can support the rhyme.
You see why I didn't read the whole thing?
I'm sorry.
I've always been contrary and maladroit.
Earlier, I... I felt that...
whenever I would draw close to you, you would retreat,
and that, if I kept still, you would return
but you'd stay at a distance, like those sparrows
that stay in the farmyard and won't come into the house.
- That's not how I feel. - How do you feel, then?
When I was in school,
the teacher had me read "Cordelia"
to an older boy's "King Lear."
Near the end of the play,
the king and his daughter are imprisoned,
but he views it in a positive way.
"Come, let's away to prison," he says.
"We two alone shall sing like birds in a cage."
Imprisoned...
In a positive way?
Well, maybe that one has to read the entire play.
It may be only in plays where people
are imprisoned in a positive way.
You don't think there's a cage that could work to our benefit?
I just...
I only know that...
I've never liked cages.
I hope you had a good afternoon in Shangri-La or Timbuktu,
wherever it is you've been.
I had a busy afternoon, yes.
I would think.
Five hours you've been gone.
I went to the drapers.
I couldn't find anything I liked.
Then I stopped by the tinker for a sack of coffee,
but he's now asking 60 cents, and I only had 50.
Then I thought I would buy you a treat of some kind,
but Mr. Arnolds reminded me
that I still owed for my last transactions so...
I was forced to close up my purse.
Tell me everything about your day.
Don't hold anything back.
You're not interested in how your wife spends her time.
I don't feel I have a wife.
I feel I have a selfish whore who...
who'd rather wander off to another man's house
than contribute any labor.
Well, Dyer was off in the fields,
and her house is on the way back home, so...
So it's just Abigail and you
tittering and gossiping away the hours?
Enjoying each other's company.
I have certain expectations, and you have certain duties.
We've talked all night and day about your expectations.
I will not stay with a woman
if it continually requires contention.
Well, then you shouldn't stay with me, should you?
Don't ask for more than you can handle.
Sunday, June 8th.
All afternoon, a hawk has been using a single cloud above us
as its own parasol.
To ward off others of its kind.
Our whole house now seems both angry and repentant.
God help us.
When three days went by without a word from her,
I stole over to her house to look on her
from what I imagined to be
a vantage point of perfect safety.
By turning the lens piece, I could draw her face nearer,
and hold it there until she turned away.
Her image provoked a sensation in me
like the violence that sends a floating branch
far out over a waterfall's precipice
before it plummets.
"For the wife does not have the authority over her own body,
but the husband does.
Do not deprive one another,
so that Satan may not tempt you
because of your lack of self-control."
Ephesians 5:33. "Submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord..."
Monday, June 9th.
Merciful father...
Turn the channel of events.
Wednesday, June 11th.
Dyer has been silent all day,
and I was happy to be left in my solitude.
Hello!
Tallie...
We haven't seen you for days.
Have you been ill?
- Nothing serious, I hope. - Ho!
She's been under the weather.
- Good afternoon. - Good afternoon.
We want to invite you to dinner again this Saturday next.
But it's our turn. We should be feasting you.
In the meantime, please be our guests.
We'd love to.
Six?
- Six it is. - Hup!
My mother once told me in a fury
when I was a little girl
that my father asked nothing of her
except that she work in the garden,
harvest the produce, preserve the fruit,
tend the poultry, milk the cows,
manage the household duties,
and help out in the fields when needed.
She said she appeared in his ledger
only when she purchased a dress.
Am I anywhere in there?
I'm recording spring expenses.
And how have things changed?
Daughters are married off so young
that everywhere you look a slender and unwilling girl
is being forced to stem a sea of tribulations
before she is even full-grown in height.
That's its purpose!
Come on. Come on.
Morning.
Morning, Jim.
Morning, ma'am.
I've got a new book for you.
Do you know, I'd actually like to see
that blue dress you have there.
All right, lady.
Over here!
It's two and a half.
I'll take it.
My change?
Thank you.
The Mannings' oldest daughter tipped over an oil lamp
and it set the house ablaze.
- Fire! - Ho! Ho!
- Fire! - Before she was driven
from the house by the flames,
she heard calls from her sister,
who was trapped in the upper loft.
Get her out of there.
Cassie!
Get her out!
Your wife is to be commended on her hospitality and cooking.
I can recall the day...
No, thank you.
...when every family was fed, clothed, shot, sheltered,
and warmed from the products a good wife
gathered within her own fence line.
I heard down by the loggers that Mrs. Mannings' oldest
got fiercely burned in the house fire.
- Cassie. - And died.
Yes, she did.
Well, as my father used to say,
"The supreme disposer of all events
does sometimes disappoint our earthly hopes."
What a marvelous hanging lamp.
Finney purchased it so that everyone could read
with equal ease around the room.
I wasn't brought up to read over much,
but I do believe a father should give his children
every chance to improve.
Children being a sore point in this household.
And yours, I'd expect.
You'll have to forgive my husband.
Even so,
whatever misfortunes arrive at my doorstep,
I seek to improve my lot with my own industry.
I...
I study my options closely,
and just attend to everything with more vehemence.
Well, then you should be commended for that.
I'll give you an example.
When I first began farming,
I was so vexed at my own inability
to stop my dogs barking
that one January, during a storm,
I held the dog around the corner of the barn in a gale
until it froze to death.
I nearly froze to death myself, at least froze my hands,
even with my heavy work gloves.
That is reprehensible.
Did I see outside that you use an old shovel plow?
Well, since you're interested in my machinery,
I have a hinged harrow that's been giving me trouble.
The spikes catch the rocks and roots, and they break off.
Well, our harrow has upright discs.
Work better?
Yeah, it seems to.
Bring the desserts.
I think we're stuffed.
My husband insists on his pastries
and preserved fruits and creams.
Well, good.
What is happening?
Are you in danger?
What happened to your neck?
No, I just took a fall over a fence.
I hadn't heard.
There are many things about which you haven't heard.
Back at the table,
Tallie kept strict custody of her eyes.
Her husband's mood seemed to have darkened.
He served the pastries and creams himself,
leaving only her plate empty.
Saturday, June 21st.
My heart a maelstrom.
My head a bedlam.
A whole week and no visit from Tallie.
No word.
My anxieties often force me to stop my work
and pace the house like an inmate.
I have to see her.
Ho, ho!
Tallie! Tallie!
What has happened?
They're gone.
And no goodbye?
We need to call the sheriff.
And report what exactly? That our neighbors moved?
It's the Zebrun farm. They were renting.
I'll go then.
For what reason?
There's blood!
And you never had an accident?
So we'll just do nothing?
I'll make the rounds of the neighbors.
And if we are not satisfied,
we can take your fears to the sheriff.
Thank you.
Monday, June 23rd.
Dyer said Mrs. Nottoway recalled spotting their caravan
on the country road in the late evening, heading northwest.
Mrs. Nottoway?
She believed she spied Tallie's figure
alongside her husband's but was unsure.
A hired hand, she thought, was driving the second wagon.
Sunday, June 29th
I spotted the sheriff on his way to church.
I conveyed my accusations, to no response.
Dyer said that no one would investigate a crime
without evidence that a crime had been committed.
Calm myself?
I refused to calm myself,
so he tied me to a chair and administered laudanum.
Monday, June 30th.
Bleary and short of breath from the laudanum...
I wake weeping,
retire weeping,
stand before my duties weeping.
Sunday, July 6th.
I am a library without books,
a sea of fear, agitation and want.
Dyer speaks of how much we have for which to be grateful.
I sit violently conscious of the ticking clock
while he weeps at what he imagines
to be his own poor, forgotten self.
Wednesday, July 9th.
Despite some hours without the laudanum,
I was so befogged and wild with grief
that Dyer left me for the afternoon,
unsettled and wary of my state.
Tuesday, July 22nd.
- Weldon? - Good day.
The renters at Zebrun's farm are gone.
Did they leave a forwarding address?
No. You've got a letter.
Hyah.
Is it from her?
It is.
- Oh. - Origin?
Onondaga County. Do you know it?
It's north of Syracuse.
Are you gonna read it?
To myself.
Abigail, Abigail, Abigail.
I'm sorry that all I have to send you is this letter,
and I'm sorry for all that a letter cannot be.
Even the best letter is just a little bit of someone.
I'm sorry I never got to say goodbye,
and I'm sorry that we seem to have traded
one sort of misery for another.
It turns out that houses deep in the backwoods
always seem to be awful and unnatural in their loneliness.
If there were only a ruined abbey
around here with bats in it, the view would be perfect.
Our roof is ramshackle and sheds water nicely in dry weather
but we have to spread milk pans around the floor when it rains.
Still, outside the kitchen,
there are already anemones and heart's-ease,
and even prettier flowers which my stupidity
keeps me from naming for you.
I believe I've enjoyed myself less these last few weeks
than any other female who ever lived.
During what little time I have to myself,
Finney reads aloud instructions for wives
from the Old Testament.
But when it comes to the Bible,
I have to say that there are a lot of passages
he may know word for word,
but which haven't touched his heart.
I can't account for his state of mind except to say
that my company must be intensely disagreeable to him.
And if that's the case,
I'm sorry for it.
Ho...
Good afternoon!
Afternoon.
Whoa.
Hey.
I've got something for you.
There you go.
Thank you.
Good day.
Hyah. Come on.
- Is it for me? - From Schoharie County.
- Your Abigail. - Give that to me.
Give it. Finney, give...
Finney!
"What's to become of the thousands of our sex
scattered out in the wilderness
and obliged to tax our strengths?
I feel as if, at that selfsame hour
when our prospects were brightest,
that in the dim distance a black shadow approached.
And yet still,
imagine the happiest of unions for us of the sort
in which two families previously at daggers drawn
are miraculously brought together on love's account.
It is your face I bear through the night.
It is to you I devote a dreaming space
before I turn myself to sleep, but there is no sleep.
It's as if within me everything clamors for air,
and I think if it's like this now,
what will it be like later?
I send you what love and support I can.
I send you all my heart's hopes. Abigail."
Please know that force alone
couldn't have gotten me here to a place like this.
I was told I had to act in support of interest,
happiness and the reputation of someone I once loved.
As far as I can figure,
we're now still only about 85 miles apart.
But of course,
people like us don't go on long visits.
Dyer refused first to permit my departure,
and then to accompany me,
and only caught up to the cart
at the end of our property and climbed aboard.
We were the very picture of anguish,
rattling along side by side.
The night was fair and warm with the appearance of a coming rain.
A shower.
It's so hard to write about
how much I want to thank you,
but I have to start somewhere.
Abigail...
I want to tell you that being with you, even alone,
has been like being a part of the biggest
and most spacious community I could ever imagine.
I feel closer to you than I would a sister since
everything amazing that I feel,
I chose to feel.
And do you know what memory it is that I most cherish?
It's of you turning to me with that smile you gave me
once you realized that you were loved.
I have no way of knowing what is to come,
but I do know that all of the trust
and care and courage we shared,
that will all shine on us
and protect us.
You are my city of joy.
Whoa.
Might I ask your business?
We've come to see Tallie. Where is she?
I heard you on the road.
You made such a racket. I took you for the tin knocker.
We've ridden for three days.
We are not leaving without seeing her.
I'm not concerned with what you will or will not leave without.
Keep a civil tongue, friend.
Where is she?
I treated her with tea of soot
and pine-tree root to good effect,
but sickness always tests our willingness
to bow before the greatest authority.
My guess is that it was diphtheria.
No!
There is some alienation from marital...
What time is it?
I don't care.
- I have to go. - You're gonna make a mark.
Come on.
Sunday, August 31st.
Weather very hot and sunny.
I cleaned out the shed
which was full of rusty and dusty rubbish,
washed the windows,
and preserved apples for the winter.
Fourteen dollars from the sale of our milk and butter.
I have cut my hand with a paring knife.
I console myself with the conviction
that someday in the future when Dyer
is forced to travel to Syracuse for feed or supplies,
I will join him,
and take his rifle and go to Skaneateles
and kill Finney where he sits.
Dyer has been at work on the barn.
Each day, we enact our separation.
Sometimes after it gets dark,
we walk over the hills across our upper fields
for the wide, wide view.
And Dyer tries to imagine us as we were,
while I try to imagine Tallie
and that cordial and accepting home
that existed solely in our dreams.
I imagine Tallie and Nellie somewhere together,
and Nellie running her brush through Tallie's hair.
I imagine banishing forever those sentiments of my own
that she chastened and refined.
I imagine resolving to do what I can for Dyer.
And I imagine continuing to write in this ledger,
here,
as though this was my life.
As though my life was not elsewhere.
I've always feared that I would bring misfortune
to those I loved.
Are you really saying nothing to that?
I don't know where to start.
I can't imagine what more we could do for one another...
with our constraints.
You can't?
I can't.
You can't?
Well, then...
It's a good thing we remember that our imaginations
can always be cultivated.
Provided by explosiveskull https://twitter.com/kaboomskull