The Translator’s Tale

The Translator’s Tale-3

Oh, sure, he said. It’s not like I need to talk to them. It’s just kind of nice when they do. And I can’t say no.

So my husband had a hobby that didn’t take up a lot of his time. That was okay with me. Everyone needs a hobby, and most of the time he was available to me. I felt like the kind of woman who needed her man a little too much. It bothered me, at first, but I let it go.

Meanwhile, my translation business took off. I had discovered my talent for languages in college. After I graduated, and before I met my husband, I had gotten work translating owners manuals for cell phones. It was boring work, but very fast and lucrative. Once I did a few, a whole world opened up to me. Soon I was deep into translating all kinds of documents. It became my world.

I can’t explain what it did to me, but it transformed my view of the universe. Suddenly, the babble of voices all around me were tamed. I could navigate the ins and outs of meaning with little problem. Nothing was difficult for me anymore. People and their ways of speaking were an open book to me. It was as though the incomprehensible babble of the world flowed from the chaos of the air and coalesced in my brain.

I took on more work. I spit out more words. It got to the point where I was translating every phrase I saw on a road sign or a billboard. I could not pick up a utility bill without seeing the words in a dozen other languages.

I saw that I was going to harm myself if I continued. I sought to tame my predilection for translation, but it didn’t work. Not really. Something had turned my brain over, or slipped it into another dimension. Something. My mind became a translating machine.

And that’s when I met the love of my life.

The train pulled into the station of the capital city of Slothin, also named Slothin. Maybe such a small county has room for only a small imagination? Not that I was being critical. It just gave the impression of being even more provincial than I had expected.

We got off the train and a young man with a bicycle pulling a two-seat trailer approached us and asked, in broken English if he could take us to our hotel.

I answered in perfect Slothin that we would be happy to take him up on his offer.

His face brightened considerably and began talking in rapid Slothin, asking me who my relatives were. He assumed I must be a native. I assured him that I was merely a visitor to his fine city and country.

But you know our language. he said.

I do.

He smiled. Please get in, he said. I will take you to your lodgings.

My husband and I climbed into the trailer and the man exerted himself considerably to get the pedals moving. I saw the sinews on his arms raise themselves like snakes writhing. We went perhaps three blocks. Slothin is not a large city. We stopped in front of a seven story building.

Is this the building where Nionc Tingo’s nephew died? I asked.

The man nodded. Yes, yes, he said. Very sad situation. Do you know him?

I know about his aunt.

His aunt, said the man, was a great woman. She makes Slothinites very proud. She makes the sheep magical.

Yes she does, I said.

What’s all the chatter about? asked my husband. He was cranky and tired.

Shush, I said to him. I’m getting a feel for the country.

Your bags will arrive in a few minutes, said the man. They will be delivered to your room.

I thanked him and handed him a few dollars. He put up his hand. No need, he said. I am paid by the government of Slothin.

I put my dollars in my pocket. Perhaps, I said, you can tell me where Tigo’s papers are kept.

He nodded vigorously. Yes, of course, he said. They are in a safe location outside of town, near the cemetery. Kept in the mausoleum.

Truly? I asked.

Yes indeed, he said. Very truly indeed.

I thanked him and me and my husband checked in and took the the stairs to our sixth-floor room. Slothin, it appeared, did not abide elevators.

We should have gotten a lower room, said my husband.

I agreed with him. I wanted the view, I said. I didn’t know about the elevator situation.

He wanted to tell me I should have thought of it, but he refrained. He could be polite that way, when he wanted to be.

Our room was pleasantly spacious. A big window opened up onto the city below and the countryside beyond. Really, it was more appropriate to call Slothin a town, not a city.

The stone walls looked even more breathtaking than I imagined they would. They spread out beyond the town limits like an art piece. Both my husband and I stood at the window looking at them for a long time. Sheep dotted the spaces between the walls.

We also saw a few people walking with the sheep, and some dogs. But it was the walls, more than anything, that stood out.

I looked over at my husband. He licked his lips and got this blank look in his eyes.

You think there’s spirits there? I asked, knowing the answer.

Without a doubt, he said.

Before we knew each other, we were walking the shores of a beach in Washington state at the same time. Of such coincidences are lifelong partnerships generated and sustained.

Both of us were on vacation. Both of us were passing the time aimlessly, walking on the beach. We had both been attracted by a particular rock in the sand. It rose up to a dozen feet or so and was encrusted with moss, seaweed, and barnacles. We stood beside each other, admiring the rock.

I wonder what it would take to move it, he said.

I wonder what it’s trying to say to us, I said.

We looked at each other, forgot about the rock, and began walking along the waterline together. We fell into an easy pace, immediately comfortable with each other.

He spoke in English. I heard him in at least seven other languages. This was becoming a problem for me, but with him, it wasn’t. With him, I felt completely at home. He sensed something in me. He couldn’t put it into words, but he knew I was something special.

Nothing more appealing than a man who thinks you are exceptional. Without that, well, where can a relationship go? Without that, it can only devolve into bickering and resentment.

I think. At least, that’s what I’ve seen in others.

As for me, I’m not sure I saw anything exceptional in him. I did see that he was solid. He wasn’t going to go off and behave in some strange manner, or do something that would harm him or me. I could see that immediately.

So we spent the rest of the day together. Then the next day, and that led to a few nights together. Before long our lives were divided into two: the time before we met and the time after. That’s when we knew we were for each other.

The wedding was a simple affair. I had a friend with me and he had a friend with him. We didn’t tell either of our families until it was all over. Then we went on our honeymoon and I found out that he wasn’t quite so rock-steady as I had thought.

But we got over that. I think.

Actually, I’m still not exactly sure of that because soon after, maybe a month into our marriage, his accident happened.

That night, after he had talked to police and the accident investigators, after he had apologized to the dead man’s family, tearfully and with heaving convulsions, he returned to our house and spent the remainder of the day not in the comfort of my arms but with the spirits in the walls.

I’ll leave you with that picture for the moment. Imagine him in the twilight of the evening hours, sitting alone in the dark.

I had offered him some food, but he wasn’t hungry. I had offered him an embrace, which he accepted, briefly, but which did not comfort him as I had hoped it would. I even offered him a drink, but he refused that as well. Instead, he immersed himself in the voices coming from the walls.

Now flash forward three decades.

I think I want to go down to those rock walls, he said.

Of course, I said. Let’s go.

We navigated the stairwell again. It was much easier going down. The kid who took us from the train station was there waiting for us. He offered to take us out of town to some of the rock walls.

Some are better than others, he said. I can show you the really good ones. He didn’t exactly grin at us, but he did have this ebullient air about him. It was as if he really wanted to help us, even though I knew he was only doing this for the money. He couldn’t really like helping visitors to Slothin. Could he?

Well, I won’t try to fathom the minds of people working in the tourist industry. Instead, I asked him to steer us toward a good wall near the cemetery. He grinned and nodded. No problem, he said.

My husband would just as soon have gone out to the countryside on his own, but he reluctantly agreed to accept the young man’s help and we got in the trailer of his bicycle again and off we went.

Slothin City had no outskirts. It wasn’t big enough for that. The central core of the city was about four blocks wide and six blocks long. Once we were out of that grid, we were in the green hills.

We went past many stone walls. They rose to about six feet or so. Plenty big enough to hide a view of the countryside from our eyes.

We were forced to consider the land of Slothin in little chunks, surrounded by stone walls. Each enclosure was a few acres. The kid stopped at gates, got off the bicycle, opened the gate, got back on the bicycle, rolled through the entrance, got out, closed the gate, got back on, and continued pedaling.

It was a decidedly slow means of transport, but it had its charms nonetheless, chief among them a view of the walls. They soon seemed to tower above us. The rest of Slothin disappeared from my imagination just as much as from my view.

The country, so small to begin with, created an illusion of expanse by closing off the view. It made your mind think there was an immensity beyond the walls.

Hearing any voices yet? I asked my husband.

He had his senses tuned to the stones, piled up all around us in stately walls.

Nothing yet, he said.

Sorry, I said.

The kid kept up a chatter as we went slowly along the roads. The walls are thousands of years old, he said. Sometimes rocks fall to the ground. People put them back. All of Slothin works to keep the walls in good repair. The rocks don’t come from Slothin. They were brought here from other parts of the world. Early Slothinites spent their days collecting rocks. We don’t know why. The sheep came next. We love to have sheep in Slothin. It is every Slothinite’s dream to have a flock of sheep. Are you comfortable? There is a small inn up ahead. We can stop and have refreshments. You must be warm.

I translated some of this chatter for my husband. He took it in but seemed distracted. Uncomfortable, actually.

Everything okay? I asked.

He waved his hand with some irritation, as if to say something like: Stop pestering me. I recognized the gesture, but didn’t press it. He wanted to be left alone for a while, that was fine with me.