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I am here in my room upstairs, at my desk, and she is here with me\u2014Andy, the painter. She\u2019s just outside the window. I\u2019ve been working, trying to carry on amid the sounds of scraping, hammering, long extension ladders being notched, trying to ignore the scratchy shushing sound of primer being applied, and Andy\u2019s flat gray buzz cut which every so often comes into view in the bottom of the window to my right.<\/p>\n
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It\u2019s strange\u2014this person utterly unknown to me maybe six feet away, her labor utterly unlike mine. She is so high up, so intent on what she\u2019s doing, that I feel my work is no work at all, privileged idling at best, and if she were to step one rung higher, she would see me, elbows on desk, forehead cradled in the fingers of both hands, staring at the illuminated patch in front of me.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Whatever I was planning on writing has been redirected, sent back, because the only thing I can think of now is Andy right there, the stranger at my window. She is a stranger in that she is someone I don\u2019t know. But her look and demeanor make her stranger still. She is tall and sinewy, aged anywhere from forty to sixty, old blue tattoos running the length of her arms. She wears glasses and has an intensely quizzical way of looking at me when we talk. Her face is long, drawn, but when she smiles, I see a mouthful of huge teeth. She has earbuds in and listens to who knows what all day long. And here she is now, the flat gray top inching up\u2014forehead, eyes studying her brush, immersed in a private world that I can\u2019t even conceive of.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
There is always the matter of otherness, which starts close to home with the otherness of family, and ultimately encompasses the whole great world. What is my wife thinking right now, my son? With family, long familiarity allows some illusion of knowing, assumptions not countered because they are seldom voiced. But here, now, with this woman at my window, I have nothing to go on. Is she married? No sign. My guess, unfounded and based on visual stereotypes, is that she has a partner, a woman. When she takes her lunch break, I see her sitting hunched over on the porch step, talking into her cell phone with private animation. Partner, lover? When she talks, she appears heated, possibly arguing.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t know where she lives. I haven\u2019t asked. She could live anywhere in the area. She mentioned to Lynn in some context that she used to be a chef in a restaurant. Is that possible? I can\u2019t see it. On another occasion she asks Lynn what she does. Lynn answers that she works as a therapist. Andy nods enthusiastically. She does too, she gives therapy on Zoom.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
With some puzzles, though the pieces are scattered, you trust that with enough patience and skill a picture can be assembled. I don\u2019t have that trust. Each new bit of information is confounding, unconnected. For one thing, she is vigilant. No matter where she is working, she keeps track of the other painters. It\u2019s as if she thinks they are talking about her, but just out of earshot. On the carpenter\u2019s last day, I gave him a bottle of whiskey, and Andy somehow found this out. The first thing she said the next day was, \u201cSo, Kevin got a big bottle of Jack Daniels\u2026\u201d He did, I said. Then, scrambling, I asked, \u201cWhat\u2019s your poison?\u201d She didn\u2019t hesitate an instant. \u201cTito\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
It\u2019s what philosophers call \u2018the problem of other minds.\u2019 Each a kind of black box that can never be retrieved. I would enlarge that, in this case, to include \u2018the problem of other lives.\u2019 I can only make guesses. A small house near one of the towns north of here, a fence-in yard with dogs? I\u2019m full of classist clich\u00e9s. Maybe she has an apartment in Northampton, or Greenfield? Maybe she goes home, changes, and gets to work in the kitchen. Chicken? Poached salmon? Or did she pick up something from Subway? Does she turn up the music in the car when she drives? Would it be metal, or country, or opera? Later at night: nightly news, CSI, or a documentary on fly-fishing, her passion?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been told I ask a lot of questions, sometimes with insinuations that I snoop. I do, both. I realized just now, writing this, what it is I\u2019m doing. I am making pictures, connecting things\u2014what my daughter and I used to call \u2018detectiving.\u2019 As if by imagining aspects of a life, I can get purchase. Sometimes I feel that I do. But watching this woman, her gray flattop right here at window level, I know I have not the slightest idea.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sven Birkerts I am here in my room upstairs, at my desk, and she is here with me\u2014Andy, the painter. She\u2019s just outside the window. I\u2019ve been working, trying to carry on amid the sounds of scraping, hammering, long extension ladders being notched, trying to ignore the scratchy shushing sound of primer being applied, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":9074,"template":"","categories":[9,49,142],"tags":[2017],"class_list":["post-9073","article","type-article","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aquifer","category-literary-features","category-nonfiction","tag-sven-birkerts"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n