as small as a world and as large as alone, deadhorsebrooklyn: While reading Aleksandar...

10:39pm March 14, 2013

deadhorsebrooklyn:

While reading Aleksandar Hemon’s The Story of My Lives on the train, I started to cry. The book is superb. I know I will finish it tonight. But here I’m only talking about one chapter: Dog Lives. Hemon talks about the Irish Setter his family had before the war hit Sarajevo. I was on the edge of my seat about this dog, Mek. Would his family bring Mek with them when they escaped to Canada? What would happen to the beautiful Irish Setter that Hemon lovingly wrote about? In the scale of destruction, perhaps many would hardly care about this dog. I started to think about Hermes, the Irish Setter we left behind in Poland when we escaped, because he has cast a shadow over our family ever since. We’d hear stories growing up about how smart Hermes was, how he’d go on the caravan raft trips with my parents and their friends when they were newly married, how beautiful he was, and how much they loved him. We’d look at his pictures and my parents would cry because leaving him behind would be something that they would never get over.
Hermes was so smart and devoted that he ran from Łódź, where my grandparents were caring for him, all the way to Bedoń, my mother’s hometown village, where he would spend his summers (and where he was photographed with my mother in the late 70’s above). He came looking for her, for us. He could not recover from the loss of us and kept searching.
And so when Hemon wrote that his mother would never get over the loss of Mek if they left him behind, I understood. I know what that looks like. I called my mother after I read the chapter and tried to tell her how uncanny it was that Hemon’s family had an Irish Setter and how they were faced with the same impossible choice. She didn’t want to talk about it because she said it was the worst thing she has ever done.
Anyway, it’s strange how other people’s memories sneak up on you.

While reading Aleksandar Hemon’s The Story of My Lives on the train, I started to cry. The book is superb. I know I will finish it tonight. But here I’m only talking about one chapter: Dog Lives. Hemon talks about the Irish Setter his family had before the war hit Sarajevo. I was on the edge of my seat about this dog, Mek. Would his family bring Mek with them when they escaped to Canada? What would happen to the beautiful Irish Setter that Hemon lovingly wrote about? In the scale of destruction, perhaps many would hardly care about this dog.

I started to think about Hermes, the Irish Setter we left behind in Poland when we escaped, because he has cast a shadow over our family ever since. We’d hear stories growing up about how smart Hermes was, how he’d go on the caravan raft trips with my parents and their friends when they were newly married, how beautiful he was, and how much they loved him. We’d look at his pictures and my parents would cry because leaving him behind would be something that they would never get over.

Hermes was so smart and devoted that he ran from Łódź, where my grandparents were caring for him, all the way to Bedoń, my mother’s hometown village, where he would spend his summers (and where he was photographed with my mother in the late 70’s above). He came looking for her, for us. He could not recover from the loss of us and kept searching.

And so when Hemon wrote that his mother would never get over the loss of Mek if they left him behind, I understood. I know what that looks like. I called my mother after I read the chapter and tried to tell her how uncanny it was that Hemon’s family had an Irish Setter and how they were faced with the same impossible choice. She didn’t want to talk about it because she said it was the worst thing she has ever done.

Anyway, it’s strange how other people’s memories sneak up on you.

Notes: