Storytellersunplugged

Frank T. Wydra

TGIFers crowd the Gonquin, but Al keeps our table open until we dribble in. Edgar, Bram, and Mary, the regulars, are there first. From the glass count, Edgar’s already on his second round. I sit down and order my Jack-on-the-rocks, and, before it arrives, Steve Crane slaps me on the back and takes the seat to my right ordering his whiskey, neat. Irving–somehow neither I nor the others can bring ourselves to call him Washington, so he answers to the last name—along with Papa come in, arms linked, arguing over the superstition surrounding the day.

Smile as bright as the full moon, Irving says,” Let’s put it to the group.” And Papa with his trademark laconic shrug agrees.

Al, seeing the newcomers, is there with their regular drinks, which is one of the things I like about the Gonquin; Al knows our tastes and caters to them. But, now, rather than retreat, Al hovers, waiting to hear the sides in this debate.

Papa, pointing a stubby finger, says, “I’m telling Irving, here, that today, Friday the thirteenth, has the reputation as a day of horror. No, he says, there is no more horror associated with this combination of day and date than with any other.”

Lanky Irving looks askance, “If you don’t mind, I will state my own case, which is that both the day, Friday, and the date, the thirteenth, have unlucky connotations. But luck, in my mind, is different from horror, which is a reaction or response, so a day and date can not, by themselves, represent horror.”

“Ah yes,” Steve chimes, “but can not a day be horrific? If so, what is being quibbled is nothing more than semantics.”

Irving gives him a look with just enough malice to suggest that he would willingly subject this Crane to the trials that befell Ichabod.

Mary, too, bristles. “I would think that, to us, semantics is everything.”

Bram says, “Actually, Friday and the thirteenth are linked together, in ways that foreshadow horror. The day itself, is named after Freya, the golden teared Norse Goddess of fertility.” He raised his eyebrows, “You see the connection, fertility and the lunar cycle of twenty-eight days, which, of course–”

Mary interrupting, “We get the point, Bram.”

Deterred, Bram continues, “Well, yes, and, as I was saying, legend has it that a dozen witches of the North met in a cemetery on Fridays–which was their black Sabbath–in the dark of the moon. On one such night Freya came down from her mountain and presented the group with a cat. To honor the occasion, the witches decreed that the number of witches required for a coven would be thirteen, their number that night plus Freya. So, if you associate witches with horror, then it is but a step to Friday the thirteenth being a day on which horrible things happen.”

Papa smiled, though it was not certain whether the cause was Bram’s point supporting his thesis or the Daiquiri he had just downed.

Steve says, “This discourse reminds me of my scribbling. Listen,” and he recites,

“Think as I think,” said a man,
Or you are abominably wicked;
You are a toad.”

And after I had thought of it,
I said, “I will, then, be a toad.”

There is laughter around the table. Except for Irving, who scowls and says, “Treat this lightly, if you will, but Mary said it best; words are what we are about. And when we accept a notion, build it into our prejudice, it flavors our perception of reality. Friday the thirteenth may be many things, but is not a day of horror. It commemorates no holocaust, forecasts no Armageddon. At best, it is a day where the squeamish are cautious, lest luck betray them. And Bram, Friday was named after Frigga, not Freya.

Bram raises his eyes to the ceiling. I assume it is for Irving’s new quibble.

Edgar, eyelids at half mast, raises a glass, “To Irving, the man has spine.”

Some of us take up the toast. Others, do not. The field, it seems, is evenly divided.

Mary says, “But what of luck? Why should this day presage luck, either good or bad?”

Al, who has been listening, surprises us by saying, “What I hear across the bar is that through history, both day and date have an unsavory reputation. Even Chaucer in his tale said, ‘And on a Friday fell all this mischance.” And there are those who consider thirteen as unlucky simply because that was the number attending Christ’s Last Supper. Now-a-days, many hotels skip thirteen when numbering floors. No other day of the week or date on the calendar has a similar distinction. But, in truth, the pairing of the two into significance is recent, sometime around the turn of the last century. Best I can tell, the earliest reference to the combination was in the New York Times, in 1908. But, say what you will, some people do, in fact suffer from paraskevidekatriaphobia.”

Open-mouthed, we look at our bartender. Who expected this of him? He smiles, asking, “Any one for another?”

Finally, I find my tongue. “You know, whenever the urban myth started, I think we’d all agree that today, at a minimum, Friday the thirteenth is considered an unlucky day. And, here I agree with Irving, luck—even bad luck–is different from horror. Luck is chance. It is random. It happens or it doesn’t. Horror, even horrific deeds, are not random chance, they manifest evil. We may experience horror as a result of bad luck, but I do not think horror can be associated with a day or date. Rather, it flows from an event. I suspect, Friday the thirteenth’s reputation morphed into horror with the release of the slasher movie, ‘Friday the Thirteenth,’ where Jason has an unlucky accident and his mother avenges his death.”

Now the table looks at me as if I were Al. I find refuge in the Jack.

“Not just the movies,” Edgar says, “If you have 13 letters in your name, you will have the devil’s luck. Remember Jack the Ripper, Charles Manson, Jeffrey Dahmer, Theodore Bundy and Albert De Salvo? Count them. All have 13 letters in their names.” He rolls his eyes. “They epitomize horror. More than coincidence, I’d say.”

“Steve says, “I’m still not getting it. Who really cares?

Papa says, “You know, you may be right. Luck, horror, what’s important is the story.”

Irving says, “I care. Distinctions are important. The Bard says it for me, ‘This above all. To thine own self be true. And it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.’ How can you write a story that does not share a truth? If we delude ourselves to the nature of things, where is truth?”

Heads nod. Chins shake. Glasses are raised. Words flow. And so it goes. Sometimes it seems that around the table it is more important to explore an idea rather than reach a conclusion. That is the horror of a table such as this. Just my luck to have a seat.

frank.writestuff@gmail.com
Friday, October 13, 2006