The Golden Ritual

Every morning at eight, Agnes Whitfield sat before her vanities table in the small dressing room off the bedroom of the Bloomsbury townhouse that she had inherited from her mother and her mother's mother before that, and she performed the ritual that her mother had performed and her mother's mother before that, and the ritual was simple: she opened the little gold box that had belonged to her grandmother, she took out the powder puff that had belonged to her mother, she dipped the puff into the powder that had belonged to no one in particular but which she had always assumed had been bought for her grandmother on her wedding day in 1897, and she pressed the puff to her cheeks and her forehead and her chin with the careful, measured movements of a woman who had been doing this for sixty-three years and who had therefore perfected the gesture to the point where it was no longer a gesture but rather a prayer, and the prayer was this: let me remember, let me remember, let me remember, and the remembering was not about the past but about the people who had come before her and who had sat in this chair and performed this ritual and had looked at themselves in this mirror and had seen not their faces but their lives, and the lives were not their faces but their choices and the choices were not their faces but the things they had not done and the things they had not done were not failures but were rather the very things that made life worth living because the not doing was the doing and the not living was the living and the two were, in some way that could never be fully understood but could always be felt, the very same thing.

Agnes was ninety-one. She had been born in this townhouse in 1897, the same year that her grandmother had bought the powder on her wedding day, and she had died in this townhouse in 1960 — no, that was wrong. Agnes was ninety-one in 1988. She had been born in this townhouse in 1897 and she was still alive in 1988 and she would die in this townhouse in 1992, four years from now, at the age of ninety-five, and in those four years she would continue to perform the ritual every morning at eight, and in those four years she would continue to look at herself in the mirror and to see not her face but her life, and in those four years she would continue to understand, with a clarity that was both liberating and devastating, that the ritual was not about remembering the past but about inhabiting the present, and that inhabiting the present was the same as loving, and that loving was the same as translating, and that translating was the same as listening, and that listening was the same as being alive, and that being alive was the same as being gone, and that the two were, in some way that could never be fully understood but could always be felt, the very same thing.

The ritual was golden not because of the gold box that had contained the powder but because of the light through which it was viewed — the light of a late October morning that fell at a low angle across Bloomsbury and turned every surface it touched into something that gleamed with a gold that was almost painful in its intensity, as if the light itself was trying to say something that cannot be said in words. Agnes sat before the vanities table in the gold light and she performed the ritual and she understood, for the first time, that the ritual was not about the powder and was not about the puff and was not about the box and was not about the mirror and was not about the chair and was not about the dressing room and was not about the townhouse and was not about Bloomsbury and was not about 1897 and was not about 1988 and was not about ninety-one and was not about ninety-five and was not about the four years that remained and was not about the four years that had passed and was not about the ninety-one years that had been lived and was not about the four years that would be lived and was not about the ritual itself but was rather about the space between the woman who sat in the chair and the woman who had sat in the chair before her and the woman who would sit in the chair after her, and that space was not empty but was rather full — full of the women who had performed this ritual and who had looked at themselves in this mirror and who had seen not their faces but their lives and full of the understanding that the not doing was the doing and the not living was the living and the not loving was the loving and the not speaking was the speaking and that the two were, in some way that could never be fully understood but could always be felt, the very same thing.

Agnes Whitfield sat in the chair in the dressing room in the townhouse in Bloomsbury and she performed the ritual and she looked at the mirror and she saw the woman who had been her grandmother and she saw the woman who had been her mother and she saw the woman who had been herself and she saw the woman who would be — not the woman she would become but the woman she already was, the woman who had sat in this chair and performed this ritual and had looked at this mirror and had seen not her face but her life, and the life was not the face but the choices and the choices were not the face but the things she had not done and the things she had not done were not failures but were rather the very things that made life worth living, and the living was not the dying but was the dying and the dying was not the living but was the living and the two were, in some way that could never be fully understood but could always be felt, the very same thing.

And then, on a morning in October — it was October 1988, the light was gold and certain and fierce, and the ritual was golden not because of the powder and not because of the puff and not because of the box but because of the light — Agnes Whitfield performed the ritual for the last time. She pressed the puff to her cheeks and her forehead and her chin with the careful, measured movements of a woman who had been doing this for sixty-three years and who had therefore perfected the gesture to the point where it was no longer a gesture but rather a prayer, and the prayer was this: let me remember, let me remember, let me remember, and the remembering was not about the past but about the people who had come before her and who had sat in this chair and performed this ritual and had looked at themselves in this mirror and had seen not their faces but their lives, and Agnes understood, with a clarity that was both liberating and devastating, that the ritual was not about remembering the past but about inhabiting the present and that inhabiting the present was the same as loving and that loving was the same as translating and that translating was the same as listening and that listening was the same as being alive and that being alive was the same as being gone and that the two were, in some way that could never be fully understood but could always be felt, the very same thing.

Agnes Whitfield died in her chair in the dressing room in the townhouse in Bloomsbury on a morning in October 1988, at the age of ninety-one, surrounded by the gold box and the powder puff and the powder and the mirror and the chair and the vanities table and the dressing room and the townhouse and Bloomsbury and the light, and she died with a smile on her face and a tear on her cheek and a feeling in her heart that was neither happiness nor sadness but was, perhaps, the thing that lives in the space between happiness and sadness — which is to say, the thing that makes life worth living, which is to say, the ritual.