The Restoration of Celia Fairchild - Marie Bostwick Page 0,69
up at the moment they’re most needed?”
I sipped my water, thinking about Trey, Lorne, Pris, and even Caroline and Heath. “It is,” I agreed. “But Polly, I really admire the way you pulled yourself together. That can’t have been easy.”
“No,” she said. “But I didn’t do it alone. Rehab dried me out but joining AA finally helped me stay that way; changed my whole life, the way I looked at everything—myself, other people, even God.”
“I wondered how you ended up at St. Philip’s. So AA is the reason you joined the church?” I was really just teasing, but Polly bobbed her head in response.
“Step two: Put your faith in a higher power. And the other steps are mostly about where faith leads you. But I haven’t joined St. Philip’s, at least not yet. I’m still shopping around, trying to see where I fit. Hopefully, I won’t have to visit all four hundred Charleston churches before I decide, but it might take a while.” She grinned and dragged the last bite of waffle through the pool of syrup, making sure it was sopping before putting it in her mouth.
“Well, if my father were here, he’d definitely urge you to join St. Philip’s”—I laughed—“so you could start hanging out with all the best people.”
Polly used her napkin to wipe the syrup from her lips.
“Maybe I already am.”
That might have been the nicest thing anybody ever said to me. I’d missed her so much but I hadn’t realized how much until that moment. I thought about what Heath had told me when I started cleaning out Calpurnia’s hoard, when my first inclination had been to toss out everything and start from scratch. Heath had advised me to curate my collection carefully, to preserve and protect the truly special artifacts that could illuminate and celebrate the family history that was also my history. Sorting the worthless from what was worth keeping was a lot more work than throwing it all out would have been. Now I was so glad I’d heeded Heath’s advice.
I treasured Calpurnia’s typewriter, pearls, and hand-stenciled dresser, Beebee’s yarn, piano, and sweetgrass baskets. I cherished my mother’s Chantilly sterling silver service, wedding veil, and the worn, much underlined Bible that made me wish we’d talked more and known each other better, as well as my father’s gold watch and books, including a perfectly preserved copy of his play and the hardbound, beautifully illustrated edition of Winnie the Pooh that my grandfather had read to Sterling and Sterling had read to me, something that I’d forgotten until I’d found the book.
When I’d spotted that red cover in the bottom of a crushed and battered box, my mind was flooded by vivid memory. I saw myself sitting on Sterling’s ample lap, and slats of sunlight pouring through the shutters of his office window, casting sharp, angled shadows onto my father’s big, capable hands when he turned the pages, relived the contentment and sense of safety that enveloped me as I laid my head on his chest to hear and feel rumbling and vibrations within as he dropped into a lower register and gave voice to the complaints of Eeyore or observations of Owl.
That book was an artifact worth finding, a memory worth keeping, a piece of my history. So were the other pieces I’d preserved, the relics that told our story. Not every memory that I’d excavated was happy, but all were true and real and helped me grab hold of who I was and where I’d come from. I hadn’t found everything I’d hoped to. Some memories, pieces of the puzzle that had mattered most to me, were missing, possibly even intentionally discarded, and that hurt. But so much of what I had found had given me a clearer picture of the past and a vision of how to shape the future.
The same principles apply to people, don’t they? Old friends remind us of who we were and what we’ve become. New friends hint at who we could be and inspire us to move forward. We need both, the new and old, the grounding of the past and hope for the future, because life is terrible and wonderful all at once, and too hard to face alone.
I put down my fork and tossed my napkin onto the table. “Polly? I know it’s short notice, but I was just wondering, are you busy Monday night?”
Chapter Twenty-Three
On Saturday afternoon, after my meeting with Polly, my effort to finish cleaning the dining room took on