As Christmas approached, the consideration and generosity of my friends and customers became positively orgiastic. Ruth Weiss called and said, “I’m telling everyone I know to send books and records for Christmas,” and apparently they did so. I have never seen so many art books sold at one time as on the day Dr. Freund and his wife, Geraldine, came in. Dr. Freund kept saying, “Lovely, I must have it,” to everything I showed him, until I became thoroughly embarrassed, and still he persisted in buying more. Sidney Morris sent books to all his architect friends, and the purchases of Morry Rosenfeld were so prodigious that May Goodman, my floor manager, was left speechless. The gentle Ira Rubel spent hours making copious selections, saying quizzically of each purchase, “Do you really think this is the most suitable?” A. N. Pritzker, Jack’s brother, made one of his rare appearances, and bought records—a little classical, a little operatic, a little ballet, a little jazz, a little popular, until he had a stack three feet high which he insisted upon paying for on the spot, although we were really too busy to figure up the amount.
It went like this day after day, until my embarrassment at so much kindness, and my inability to know what to say or do about it, became almost too much. Late at night, I would lie awake thinking about all these people rallying about me. And then my embarrassment turned to humble acceptance of so much caring, so much human warmth.
9
Bark Point
Whenever I travel, one thing is certain: that I will get lost. Perhaps if I could remember which is my right hand and which is my left, or tell north from south, I should be able to follow directions more successfully. But it probably wouldn’t help. I have an unfailing knack for choosing the wrong turn and a constitutional incapacity for noticing important signs.
It was therefore not surprising that, on a summer twelve years ago, while making my way toward Canada, I turned up Bark Bay Road thinking I had found a short-cut and very nearly drove off a cliff overhanging Lake Superior. Berating myself as usual, I looked around and observed a man working in a field not far from the road. He wore a battered felt hat, a shirt open at the neck, heavy black trousers supported by suspenders, and strong boots. His eyes were sky blue and his weathered skin, brown as a nut, was creased in a myriad wrinkles on the neck and about the eyes. When I approached and asked him how to get to Canada, he replied in an accent that I could not place. His speech was rapid and somewhat harsh in tonality, but his manner was cheerful and friendly, so I paused to chat with him. He said he was preparing his strawberry field for next year.
“This is beautiful country,” I said.
“Ya, it is that,” he said.
“I wish I owned some of it,” I said. “I think I could live here for the rest of my life.”
“Well, this land belongs to me. I might sell you an acre, if you like.”
As we walked across the field toward the bay, he said, “Are you a son of Abraham?”