Whatever untruths you may have heard me tell—and there
have been many—let me make one thing perfectly clear: I'm not a
liar of my own volition. I can't help it; it's in my blood, and there's nothing
I can do about it. I come from a long line of ashoughs ("ashough"
is variously translated from the Armenian as "storyteller," "minstrel,"
or "troubadour," but "liar" is perhaps just as accurate)
who in olden times wandered from village to village spinning yarns in exchange
for food, liquor, or other considerations. It is because of this heritage that
everyone in my family, including myself, is a liar, speaker of untruths, prevaricator,
and bearer of false witness.
In any case, to call what I do "lying" is perhaps unduly harsh. "Lying"
carries with it associations of malice and criminality-- the bigamist covering
his tracks, the confidence trickster bilking elderly widows out of their bingo
winnings-- that simply don't apply to me. I don't lie for personal gain. I simply
say things that, through no fault of their own, simply happen not to be true.
If the universe has failed to be interesting that day, who am I to call attention
to its shortcomings by slavishly reporting the drab truth?
For example, on days when I meet no one of any particular interest, I simply
invent weird characters out of whole cloth to fill the void. This impoverishes
no one, and enriches me greatly. Later, you might overhear me telling a friend,
"I saw a man in full evening dress, including spats and a whangee cane,
standing at the bus stop at seven o'clock that morning-- whistling the
Marseillaise, no less, can you believe it?" My listener shakes his head
in bemusement. "Wow," he says. "The universe can be a really
weird place sometimes, man." I ask you, who have I harmed?
I admit that, in spite of my benign intentions, I have from time to time wondered
if this need to embellish is entirely healthy, much less normal. Why, precisely,
do I feel compelled to fictionalize what happens to me when I go to the market
to buy a packet of cigarettes? The fact that my preferred brand happens to be
Gauloises hardly justifies the insertion of a cameo by Maurice Chevalier. I
suppose that at times it does embarrass me that I fabricate scenarios whose
sole purpose seems to be to make my life seem more interesting, and I sometimes
feel guilty for doing it. But, like a kleptomaniac furtively pilfering framed
family photographs from his unsuspecting host's mantel, I seem to have no control
over it.
For example, I might start a story with the words, "So I'm walking home
from the hospital the day Milton Wilson died." This is plausible, fact-checkable.
Births and deaths are a matter of public record, and everyone knows that I walk
often. This provides a hook for me to then say something like, "And as
I'm cutting through Laurelhurst park, by the pond"-- my listeners nod,
they've seen that pond, with their own eyes-- "there's this graffiti on
the path. The graffiti takes up maybe sixty yards of space on the sidewalk."
At this point, audience listening closely, I might pick up a cocktail napkin
and scribble a diagram on it. "At first," I would say, "it looks
like just a bunch of scribble, but upon closer inspection I notice that my name
is written on the path, three times, but it's spelled wrong, with an 'i.' A-l-i-n-a.
Alina Alina Alina, it says."
Unfortunately, this particular story happens to be true. I say "unfortunately,"
because, as someone who has spent her whole life carefully skirting the boundaries
of credibility, I know this story crosses the line. As you'll soon see, it's
too weird and creepy to believe. It is the truth; of course, and you can ask
the gypsy if you don't believe me. However, since it sounds like the sort of
thing that I would make up (on an off day), I'm using it as an example of how
to weave a weft fascinating-but-unverifiable fancies through a warp of dull-but-indisputable
facts to create a tapestry of plausible fiction. (Later, I'll teach you how
to strain a metaphor through cheesecloth to create turgid prose, but that's
a story for another time.)
Incidentally, when attempting to get your audience to swallow an improbable
coincidence, it's always a good idea to have that coincidence a bit skewed.
It makes the story seem more plausible. Hence my name being spelled wrong. Of
course, as I've said, this story happens to be the honest-to-God truth. But
if it weren't, this slightly imperfect coincidence would help it sound more
believable.
A bit of background is necessary at this point. My friend Milton Wilson went
into the hospital on his 81st birthday. I'd gone over to his house to take him
out to dinner, but he wasn't there, so I left a note tied to his front door
with the string from a tampon: "Milton Wilson. Happy Birthday. Where in
the hell are you? I though we were going to dinner. I tried calling you about
20 times. Is your phone broken? Call me. I love you. Alena." Two hours
later, I got a call from Milton's landlord telling me he'd taken Milton to the
hospital that morning.
Back to the story, which sounds like a story but which is, I assure you, true:
"So I look down at the graffiti and start to examine it further. It looks
like an abstract expressionist painting in yellow, pink, blue, white and green
sidewalk chalk. Milton Wilson, by the way, was an abstract expressionist painter."
By now my audience would be rapt, drinks forgotten, cigarettes burning unheeded
in ashtrays. "There are scribbles of hearts and rainbows and weird symbols
and arrows pointing in different directions, but all in the direction of my
house-- which is two blocks away from where I am standing."
At about this time, if this story were fiction, it would be good narrative practice
to thicken the plot by introducing another character to the story. But this
isn't fiction, so it is entirely coincidence that: "I look down at
the graffiti, where my name is written three times, and see what may or may
not be a giant signature that reads 'VALREV' in some weird looking script. I
say to myself WHAT IN THE HELL and that's when I notice this Chinese or
Indian guy sitting at a park bench under a tree about five feet away."
Detail is another key to believability. "He is wearing glasses, a beige
windbreaker, a shirt and jeans. I don't get a good look at him. As I am
standing in the middle of a triangle formed by my name written three times saying
WHAT IN THE HELL this guy hurriedly gathers up a stack of papers and a backpack
and scurries off into the park.
"Suddenly I'm feeling really creeped out and I head home-- following
the arrows scribbled onto the path, there is more graffiti and some weird initials:
'C.O.B.' I stop, and turn and the Chinese or Indian guy is standing maybe 60
yards away watching me. He sees me see him, and turns. I decide I really want
to know just WHAT IN THE HELL is going on. I take two steps towards him, change
my mind and haul ass back to my house, terrified that the Chinese or Indian
guy is following me and is going to break in and disembowel me while I'm in
the shower. I decide to take a circuitous route home and take a seat on my neighbor's
porch and wait for her to come home. Luckily, I don't have to wait long."
Any crook can tell you that alibis are the most important ingredient to a good
lie. If you can get someone to collude on at least one part of the story it
increases the believability quotient by tenfold.
"Ask Sandra," I'd say. However, it's even better if you have more
than one accomplice. "You can ask Taylor too; he was there."
"Wow," at least one listener would almost certainly say. "That
is really weird."
"Well," I might say, "it gets even weirder."
And this is where a simple yarn would turn into a fable, if this story were
not in fact true. However, as I have repeatedly assured you, the story is true,
so the following's similarity to the climactic sequence of a well-told lie is
entirely coincidental, though still instructive to those seeking examples of
well-told lies.
"I take Sandra and Taylor to the park. There is a woman of indeterminate
age, she has totally gray hair and the flawless face of a 25-year-old lounging
on top of the picnic table where the Chinese or Indian guy was sitting. She's
reading, and there's a rusty antique bicycle leaning up against the picnic table.
As I'm explaining what happened to Sandra and Taylor the girl/woman/pixie"—
in the actual telling of the story I would pronounce the punctuation, saying
"girl-slash-woman-slash-pixie," to remind the listeners that this
was a story worthy of being written down and, possibly, published— "the
girl/woman/pixie gets up, walks over to me and asks me what is going on.
"'It's too weird,' I say. 'I don't think I can explain it.'
"'Try me,' she says. I explain quickly and simply. 'My friend Milton Wilson
died today. He was an abstract expressionist painter. As I was walking home
from the hospital I came across this graffiti.' I point to the graffiti. 'My
name is Alena,' I say.
"'Wow,' the pixie says, "The universe can be a really weird place
sometimes, man.' Then she says, 'I hope the next time you and Milton see each
other it's a joyous occasion.' Then she climbs back onto the table, and
goes back to her reading as if nothing has happened. And I'm standing there
wondering what the hell she means. 'I hope the next time you and Milton see
each other it's a joyous occasion?' Like she's sure we'll see each other again,
but not so sure it'll be under pleasant circumstances.
"'If I were you I wouldn't think about it too much,' Taylor says.
"This isn't much help. Not think about it too much? How can I not think
about it too much? I go home and smudge the hell out of my house-- or try to--
with sage, light a candle, put on Mahalia Jackson and cry. Then I go over to
Sandra's house and sit on her porch. It is a beautiful day and suddenly
the wind picks up, and the afternoon is filled with the sounds of wind chimes.
Then every dog in the neighborhood starts howling in unison."
Thinking the story is over, the listeners lean back in their chairs. One of
them takes a sip off her drink and says something like, "That's a beautiful
story."
"It gets weirder," I say.
Truth lies in the way stories are told. Every now and again silence is needed
so that the words and images have a chance to soak into the listener's brain.
I pause, have some of my drink and smoke a cigarette. Veracity is questioned
in this moment of silence. I shake my head at the unbelievability of it all
and continue.
"That night the hot Romanian gypsy I'm dating comes over. He is an
Aikido instructor." I emphasize the words AIKIDO INSTRUCTOR so that the
next chapter of the story resonates with the listeners more strongly.
"He comes over about eleven o'clock that night. I pour him a glass
of wine, we smoke a joint, I tell him the story and show him the diagram I drew
of the graffiti while Sandra and Taylor and I were in the park.
"'I have to see this,' he says. I'm wearing a sexy pink slip. I put on
tube socks, tennis shoes, glasses and a Levi jacket. I grab some sage, hand
him a candle and we head off towards the park. We're joking and giggling
about vampires and werewolves and we get to the graffiti and after looking at
it for a while he says, 'Wow, this is really weird. I wish I could tell you
I did it.'
"'I wish I could tell you I did it on some multiple personality mission
on my lunch break,' I say, 'But I can't.'
"'Is there any more?' he asks.
"'I don't know,' I say, 'I wasn't about to look.'
"'What if there is?' he asks.
"'I don't know,' I say.
"'Let's go see,' he says. So we head off deeper into the park. Mind you,
it's midnight and I shit you not, there is a full moon. So the hot Romanian
gypsy AIKIDO INSTRUCTOR and I are walking through the park, burning sage and
we come around the lake, directly across from where the graffiti is written
and what do we see?"
At this point I would pause and take a sip of my drink and a drag on my cigarette.
If all is going well—and there's no reason to suppose it wouldn't be with
a story like this—my audience would be rapt once again, leaning forward
in their chairs. I would wait, letting my audience squirm, wondering if I was
going to be so theatrical as to actually make them ask, "What? What did
you see?" before telling them. But a good liar does not go in for that
degree of theatricality. If you appear to be trying too hard to command attention,
even the best storyteller loses credibility. So I tell them.
"We see three to five people dressed in ninja outfits practicing martial
arts on a hill, at midnight, under the light of the full moon. The gypsy and
I giggle nervously. 'They were the most expensive part of this prank,' I joke.
It doesn't seem that funny. We quicken our footsteps because at this point
everything is too weird, too surreal to comprehend. As we're leaving the park
I notice something out of the corner of my my eye written on the ground where
the path forks off into two different directions. More graffiti, written in
the same weird hand. There are letters and arrows and I look at the gypsy and
I ask him, 'Rick Dale, what does s-t-a-b spell?' He starts laughing. It's my
joke, but I don't think it's very funny. We leave the park.
"The next day I decide to walk through the park because I've made up my
mind I'm not going to let fear stop me from doing things any more. Nothing
out of the ordinary happens."
If this were a story or a fable and not the truth, this would
be the moral of the tale. Perhaps one last strange thing would happen, pregnant
with significance and symbolism, that would tie up the whole story into a neat
package, clearly labeled so you'd know precisely where to store it in your mind.
This moral or coda would allow even the most dull-witted reader to trot the
story out in his or her own conversation whenever a putatively true anecdote
was needed to illustrate some greater truth (and by "greater truth,"
I mean "convenient fiction") of life-- that truth is stranger than
fiction, perhaps, or that there is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of
in someone else's philosophy. But that will be your problem. I've finished my
story, and now I need a drink.
Alena Nahabedian is a regular contributor to Lime
Tea, and Marty Smith is the editor. This collaboration is their first
story together.
