Snowdon’s Don and Other Stories

By Grace Moore

These stories are based on episodes and materials from my personal life, and are widely varied. Most are set in Montreal, between 1967 and 2012, while a few are set in Newfoundland, and 1 is set in Africa. They are about women, men, children, politics and community, and the conflicts, as well as the harmony, that arise from all of these.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Sep 8, 2019
• ISBN: 9781491706329

Grace Moore

Grace Moore is co-ordinator of a Montreal community writing group, Expresso Writers, and past teacher of community writing. She has an MA in ritual drama and enjoys acting and spoken word performances. She has published in community publications, as well as in The Canadian Authors’ Association Anthology, Montreal Branch

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Snowdon’s Don

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Jill had first known Ben from a writing group she attended infrequently. It met at the home of Marty Stevens and was composed of various young and promising anglophone Montreal writers, of whom Ben was one. These writers were all more promising and prolific than Jill, which was why she attended infrequently, being intimidated by the group.

Ben was the bad boy of the organization. He sat at the back of Marty’s living room and made rude but witty remarks. His life style was less conventional than that of the others. It was rumored he had even been in prison.

Mostly she laughed at his jokes. Mostly she liked him. She was not overly interested. As her life got busier, she had no time for the writing group. She wanted to write at a more basic level.

She did not see Ben again for years. She heard that he had founded a theatre group. She saw his picture in the papers. He looked like a medieval Jewish prince, with long black ringlets.

All this passed her by. She never went to Ben’s theatre. She went to Africa. When she came back, she settled in Notre-Dame-de-Grace in Montreal’s west end. The area usually known as NDG, which spawned more community groups than all the rest of Montreal combined. Not the least of these was the Anti-Poverty Group, which had largely been brought up from neighboring Verdun by none other than Ben and a young Italian woman named Gina Petrelli. Gina actually administered most of the group’s activities, while Ben was in charge of culture, and the founding of the Anti-Poverty Group’s writing group.

Far from all this power and prestige, Jill first became a member of the Anti-Poverty Group when she saw an advertisement for it in a local laundromat. She started out answering the phones.

Ben made a point of visiting members of the NDG community, and especially of the Anti-Poverty Group, whom he thought might be interested in writing with an aim to establishing a writing group for poor people. Jill was not excluded. He came round to her place to talk to her, and she set aside her work to talk to him. A writing group for poor people! What an excellent idea! she exclaimed. You have my total moral and artistic support.

There are enough people in this community to make it feasible, he said, I have only to visit a few more people, and I’m sure I’ll be able to let you know when and where the first meeting will be.

He didn’t stay long. She offered him coffee and cookies, but he refused. There were none of the nasty comments as in the old days. He was a man with a purpose, simply concerned about the task at hand. Jill was sure he would succeed. He was that good.

The first meeting of the Poor People’s Writing Group was held at Head n’ Hands, a local self-help group for youth. It was a small gathering of earnest souls. People read their half-finished poems and stories as Ben listened with extreme attention and professionalism, then gave advice to shape the work to come. He was patient. He was thoughtful. He was very, very good. When there was more general discussion, he participated in that as well.

They have gotten themselves an excellent leader, Jill thought. She hadn’t intended to fall in love with Ben. She had too much to do. But a deep loneliness inside her attracted her to him more than she realized. In him she recognized the quality of genius. She had known men who were conventionally bright, but not too many geniuses. After meetings of the writing group they would all sit around and Ben would regale them with his knowledge of history, religion - especially Judaism, philosophy, psychology, physics, almost any aspect of culture. He was a generalist, but one with more knowledge of most specific subjects than many specialists. He was revealed to Jill as an intellectual giant who devoted himself to the poor.

Jill was more than impressed. She was overwhelmed. Ben devoted the same expert attention to her writing as he did to everyone else’s. It’s no good, she would say, I’ll never be a writer. I know what I want to say, but it comes out all wrong. It’s cliché. It’s melodramatic. It’s all wrong. I’m no good.

But you are good, he would counter. The woman you write about here shows your amazing insight into feminism. And last time your analysis was basically socialist. Your development of psychology is excellent. You are just so multi-faceted, if you would only see yourself for what you really are, instead of in terms of the stereotypes you have incorporated.

It was Jill who surpassed the boundaries in their relationship. Ben did not want her sexually, but she came to believe she had to have him. It began when she started writing little notes to him, in which she poured out her passion. At the same time she insisted on her insanity. I love you, but only because I’m crazy was the essence of what she said. Not very flattering for him.

He appeared to ignore the notes, and carried on as usual.

She could not sleep for thinking of him and one night at 2 AM she got up, got dressed and walked to his place. It was mid-winter and the snow was deep. He was still up, along with his male roommate, and they were reading, Ben in his bedroom and Wally, his roommate, at the kitchen table. Ben was flabbergasted by her visit. He tried to pawn her off on Wally, but she wasn’t buying it. Instead, she came to his bedroom door. He got up to let her lie on his bed.

What is it you want? he asked, street drugs or medication?

She wanted neither of those two options. She wanted him. She stayed for a while, maybe an hour. Then she got up and trudged home.

Her next ploy was to invite him for supper. He would like that. Surprisingly, he accepted. She spent all day making special vegetarian dishes. He never showed up. She cried herself to sleep with enough food in the fridge for a week. As her involvement with Ben reached greater and greater levels of unreality, Jill’s mental health deteriorated and the impossible happened. She lost her job with Green Energy on the basis of her inappropriate behavior. She had been with the organization for 8 years. She was drifting. She had less to do with her time.

Those in the Anti-Poverty Group also thought her behavior bizarre, but Gina would hear none of it. Jill stayed on there and the Group took up some of her now expanded time. There were more surprises in store.

The biggest one came when she arrived early at the writing group meeting one evening to find the male members of the group all discussing her as if she weren’t there. It’s nothing less than sexual harassment that Jill has been guilty of practicing against me, Ben charged, and I’m not going to put up with it any more. I need your support.

The other male members nodded gravely.

They can’t be serious, Jill thought.

They were deadly serious. She should be thrown out of the group! Phil cried.

Let’s put it to a vote.

So they voted, right in front of Jill, who was not asked to join them. All the male members voted for Jill’s expulsion, but Jill did not vote against herself.

The next day she went to Gina, who said, It’s a lot of nonsense. Don’t pay any attention to it. You’re still in the group.

At this point, the writing group had its own office, which was under lock and key. Jill had been put in charge of the key, and the other members did not have a copy of it. At the next regular writing group time, she went to the office and opened it up for the meeting. Only a handful of people came, and they were all male members who had voted against Jill. Ben begged to have possession of the key, but Jill maintained a stony silence. After about half an hour the male members all left. Jill stayed until the regular time for the group to finish, then locked up and went home. The next week, Ben came alone to confront Jill, and to beg again for the key. She responded with the same stony silence until he gave up and left.

For the third time since her ousting, Jill came and opened the office for the group. This time no one came. Jill sat there for the whole three hours allotted to the meeting, then locked up and went home. The next day she handed the key over to Gina, announcing The Poor People’s Writing Group has folded.

Even her attempted ousting and the demise of the group could not, however, eradicate the powerful influence of Ben on Jill’s mind. She never saw him again after the folding of the group, but she did not lose the ability to fantasize.

She thought about Ben’s poverty. Oh they all were poor, but Ben was poorer than the average community worker. She had noticed that on her visit to his apartment at 2AM. Ragged furniture, few appliances, junk food in the cupboard. Had he actually been in prison? What had happened with his theatre group?

But she knew, it was well documented, that somehow, somewhere, he had done time in Bordeaux jail. She had no idea what for. Somewhere, maybe only in her own mind, she had heard conflicting stories. Confused, conflicting stories. People didn’t want to talk about it.