Retrospect: the lighter

Self-tutoring about people and events from the past: the tutor mentions a change in an environment he noticed.

Years ago I knew someone who seemed like a smoker. However, when you got to know him, you realized he definitely wasn’t. In his apartment was no trace of smoking – and that was in the era when people could smoke in their places. Anyway, let’s call him Mr X, for the sake of a name.

I didn’t know Mr X very well, but a lot better than most. The books on his shelves spoke of worlds he was interested in – such as horror fiction – that he never brought up in conversation. Obviously he was a very private person: he didn’t want people to know his thoughts. At the same time, he was open to conversation.

I went over to his apartment occasionally. I always brought coffee because he didn’t drink it. He’d typically have a beer – one only. We’d conversate spontaneously.

For a long time, his apartment didn’t change; everything was always neatly in its place. Then, one time, it did: a white lighter showed up on a table. It was so incongruous to his non-smoking lifestyle, I expected him to explain it. He didn’t owe me an explanation, of course. However, I thought it would become a conversation piece.

Notably, the lighter didn’t seem to have a “place” to be, while everything else in his apartment did. He didn’t leave things lying on tables or the counter; everything was always put away. That the lighter wasn’t, made me think it was temporary: perhaps someone had left it there, then so had he, so they’d see it when they returned.

Yet, six weeks later, the lighter was still there, in that same, strange place out in the open on a table. It had become part of the landscape, apparently. Yet, even the most casual visitor could see it didn’t belong there.

Mr X never explained the lighter to me. Eventually I left town, never to return to his apartment, even though I’d say we parted on good terms. I still wonder about that lighter, and what it meant. He knew I noticed it, yet we neither acknowledged it.

Jack of Oracle Tutoring by Jack and Diane, Campbell River, BC.

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