What We Were Thinking Of, 2

“Where is my daughter? Who are my sons?”

What We Were Thinking Of is available for full productions and readings. Interested parties may contact me through my Substack email address.

⇐ Part 1, “The words and the things we do”

⇒ Part 3, “The water's edge is a good place for secrets”

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What We Were Thinking Of: Table of Contents

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Recap last week: David has briefly introduced his, Bud’s and their fathers’ histories and recalled inauguration day 1961, when Bud challenged his father’s CIA past and did not attend JFK’s inauguration.

This week: As David conducts a book tour for Culture Wars, he receives a mysterious and disturbing letter. The complicated relationships of his life are revealed.

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(Lights come up again as Jarrod and Kate wheel on a television with VCR, and cross to David, now in his office. The three stand together and watch.)

(On the screen above, Clausewitz, from On War: "War is a continuation of politics by other means.")

KATE

(in the voice of a television talk show host)

So what you're saying, Professor Rich, is that the current debate over "values," education, and the like, isn't really a new phenomenon at all, but just a continuation of the conflicts of the 60's — in new forms.

JARROD

(as David on television)

You've read my book.

KATE

(as the talk show host)

What are the implications of that, do you think?

JARROD

(as David)

I'd say the implication is — to revise Clausewitz — that culture has become a continuation of politics by other means.

(as himself, to David)

That line is my favorite.

KATE

(as the talk show host)

Our guest has been Professor David Rich. The book everyone is talking about is Culture Wars.

(Jarrod and Kate laugh and applaud as Jarrod shuts off the television. David nods his acceptance of it in good fun, enjoys the attention.)

DAVID

Thank you. You're very kind. It may cheer you to know that the end result of all your hard work, the bright light like a city on a hill that you've both been pursuing with such naked ambition, is one day to appear on a television talk show and make pompous asses out of yourselves just like that.

JARROD

(laughing with Kate)

And be academic flavor of the month.

DAVID

I'll see you on Thursday with the rest of the class. We'll kiss the semester good-bye with a little brandy and some other treats.

JARROD

Brandy? How about some tequila?

DAVID

I don't think so. Lacks the veneer of the academy. Don't worry. You'll catch a buzz.

JARROD

We still on for tomorrow? My outline?

DAVID

Three o'clock. Finnegans.

JARROD

You buying the beer?

DAVID

You're selling your soul, my friend. The least I can do is buy you a few beers.

(Jarrod wheels the television away.)

(George Gray passes by, pauses.)

GEORGE

Caught you on TV yesterday, David. It's reassuring to know we'll be putting the Center for Cultural Studies in the hands of someone who wants to lead it according to the principles of Clausewitz's On War.

DAVID

(a pained smile)

Thank you, George. I knew you'd be pleased.

(George moves on, yes, pleased with himself.)

(Kate digs around in her briefcase, on the floor.)

(David suddenly remembers the envelope in his hand.)

DAVID

(continuing, to the audience)

But the letter!

(David opens the envelope and reads the letter. He is stunned. On the screen above: "Where is my daughter? Who are my sons?")

(Kate pulls a manuscript from the briefcase.)

KATE

Chapter one: Kate's dissertation. For your bedtime reading. I was hoping we could discuss it over lunch tomorrow. You have no classes, right?

(beat, as David seemingly ignores her)

Hello? Remember me? I've been standing here?

DAVID

(absently)

I flunked you, didn't I?

KATE

Oh, I don't think so. I am your protege, your muse, your intellectual heir, the ripe fruit of your furrowed farming — the youthful light of your advancing middle age. To flunk me would be to fail all that is best in yourself.

(Pause)

Hey, I'm overwrought with cleverness here. Where are you?

DAVID

Right here.

(Beat)

Twenty years ago.

KATE

That’s intriguing. What are you looking at?

DAVID

A letter from an old friend.

KATE

How nice. Who?

(slowly)

Bud Powell. We were best friends — almost brothers, really. I'm not sure I ever told you about him.

KATE

A minor oversight, I'm sure, during our pillow talk.

DAVID

I haven't heard from him in nearly eleven years.

KATE

You grew apart?

DAVID

In a manner of speaking.

KATE

Okay. And so you are or you're not glad to hear from him again?

(David doesn't answer)

I love you, you know. I'd like to think you share things with me. I'm suddenly feeling a little doubtful.

(David offers Kate the letter. She takes it uncertainly.)

KATE

(continuing, reading the letter)

Very strange.

DAVID

(facetiously)

You think so?

KATE

Who is his daughter?

DAVID

(beat)

My daughter.

KATE

Hannah?

(beat)

There is so much you haven't told me.

(beat)

Why is he writing you -- that -- now?

DAVID

I don't know. I'm not sure.

KATE

Hm. You going to write him back?

DAVID

How exactly does one respond to a letter like that? There's no return address.

(beat)

I need to think what to do.

KATE

Why do you have to do anything? It's odd, I admit, but --

DAVID

Because...I do.

KATE

(feeling rebuffed and shut out)

Got it.

DAVID

Stop.

KATE

Stop what?

DAVID

Pouting. I had a life for forty-two years before I met you. I can't tell it all to you in a single afterglow.

KATE

You bastard.

DAVID

I don't even necessarily --

KATE

You're such a bastard when you're troubled.

DAVID

-- I don't even necessarily want to tell it all to you. You think I'm so immeasurably fascinating --

KATE

Hardly.

DAVID

-- that I don't have warts, ugly fucking warts, with pus running out of them even, that I don't actually want to "share" so that other people can have the comfort of "knowing" me.

KATE

But isn't that the excitement of it? That we might think you're so fascinating.

DAVID

We?

KATE

All glowing and new -- without any of the weaknesses or failures I suppose your wife was so aware of -- because you don't have any history with us? You get to be reborn every time. What romance.

DAVID

(beat)

You're a little young to be nastier than I am already. It doesn't bode well for your development.

(David takes Bud's letter from Kate's hand.)

DAVID

(continuing)

This is troubling.

KATE

I know. I gather. I just don't know why, exactly.

AJA

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⇐ Part 1, “The words and the things we do”

⇒ Part 3, “The water's edge is a good place for secrets”

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Poet. Storyteller. Dramatist. Essayist. Artificer.

ajayadler.com