#541 The Caretaker- Anthony Doerr

#541 The Caretaker- Anthony Doerr

Doerr’s short stories are not like any of the others I’ve read. They don’t tell stories about everyday occurrences, they don’t try to tap into common themes or try to make connections that the reader can relate to. These are singular tales, each an emotional undertaking that takes us into an experience we would otherwise never think possible.

Joseph is a thirty-five year old Liberian man, doing anything he can do to survive, including theft and looting. His mother is a loving woman, teaches his son English from a dictionary and tends to her garden. When civil war breaks out, she disappears and he is lost. He searches for her but only finds death, and he is forced to kill a man.

He finds his way aboard a freighter and is given an American refugee visa. He gets a job as a winter caretaker at a beach resort in Oregon. When he witnesses a pod of beached whales on the shore, he goes into a depression he cannot find relief from. He buries the hearts of the whales. He is fired from the job because during his depression the house was left in extreme disrepair and he settles into the adjacent forest tending to a garden he has planted over the whale hearts.

One day he saves the life of Belle, the daughter of his former employer. She was about to commit suicide. They begin a secret friendship. She is deaf and teaches him sign language like his mother used to teach him English. They grow the garden together, the only thing Joseph has left of his mother. He is discovered, arrested and when he won’t eat, he is hospitalized. He is on the brink of death, and he seems resolved with his plight.

“There is no fight is Joseph, no anger, no outrage at injustice. He is not guilty of their crimes but he is guilty of so many others. There has never been a man guilty of so much, he thinks, a man more deserving of penalty."

When Belle brings his the fruits of their garden, he eats with absolute joy. It might be a last meal, or it might be redemption. But it is pure light.

Rating: 10-10-9-9 Total= 38

#445 Eating Fish Alone- Lydia Davis

#445 Eating Fish Alone- Lydia Davis

A woman eats fish, but not that often and only when she eats alone. She has a list of fish that is acceptable to consume socially, healthily, and environmentally. She puts a lot of thought into the fish she eats, and is very delicate in the manner in which she goes about her meals.

Usually, when she eats out the wait staff and the kitchen staff is too busy to give full answers to her questions about the fish. She does her best to manage anyway. One particular night, a restaurant was serving marlin. She didn’t remember how marlin tasted, and although it wasn’t on her list, she decided to try to anyway. The waitress asked on behalf of the chef if she enjoyed her meal. Even though she thought it a bit chewy she gave a pleasant if vague reply.

“I thought of the waste, and the care with which the chef prepared, over and over again, the vegetables that no one ate. At least I had eaten his vegetables, and he would know that I had liked them. But I was sorry I had not eaten all of his marlin. I could have done that.”

Rating: 7-6-7-6 Total= 26

#205 Year of the Spaghetti- Haruki Murakami

#205 Year of the Spaghetti- Haruki Murakami

You could name this one 'Zen and the Art of Cooking Spaghetti'. “Thinking about spaghetti that boils eternally but is never done is a sad, sad thing.”

Or you could name it 'Apocalypse Pasta' or something like that. “Spring, summer, and, fall, I cooked away, as if cooking spaghetti were an act of revenge. Like a lonely, jilted girl throwing old love letters into the fireplace, I tossed one handful of spaghetti after another into the pot.”

This man has two things going on in his world: he’s going crazy, and he loves spaghetti, although I don’t think one thing necessarily led to the other. He sits in his room on the floor where the sun warms the floor, and thinks people are outside his door, people like William Holden and himself from a few years ago.

“Not one of these people, though, actually ventured into my apartment. They hovered just outside the door, without knocking, like figments of memory, and then slipped away.”

He can no longer handle the everyday responsibilities of life, so he cooks spaghetti, alone, in a pot big enough to hold a German shepherd.

Rating: 7-7-6-7 Total= 27