A TABLE IN THE WILDERNESS: chapter 3
CHAPTER 3:
Of course I did not understand anything about wars, then. I did not see anyone killed. I never saw the bodies of the dead, although I did see the wounded, when they were brought to my grandfather – but even then I only saw them quickly in passing, as they came through the side doors to the south wing, where my grandfather had the slaves set up rooms to house them while they were being cared for. Once the wounded began to arrive, I was kept well away from the south wing, and the amount of needlework I had to do seemed to increase with each passing hour. My grandmother, you see, set me to mending tunics, and when I wasn’t mending tunics, I was rolling linen strips into bandages. I was not allowed to tire of rolling bandages, or at least I was not allowed to say that I was tired and bored of doing it. My grandmother’s glance could be a terrible thing. Sometimes my grandfather would come out of the south wing, looking tired, and covered with blood, but I was not allowed to talk to him then – rather I should say that I tried to visit him, but all my efforts to see him would end with me being dismissed from his presence with a very sharp “child, you don’t belong here, now GO! ” while some slave or other took me by the hand and led me back to an adult in the main part of the house.
One day, however, I came into the south wing to deliver a basket of freshly rolled bandages, and everyone was rushing around. It was clear that my grandfather and his assistants were very short-handed. I took the bandages out of the basket, and carefully placed them in the cabinet on the lower shelves, where they would be easy to reach in a hurry. The bandages were different widths, some large enough to wrap around a man’s thigh, others smaller – the smallest for finger wounds, or stumps, rather. Men lost fingers often in battle. When I got done putting the bandages away, I found that my grandfather had been watching me.
" Granddaughter, go wash your hands and put on an apron," he said to me, "and be quick about it."
Without a word, I went into the room were the medical aprons and robes were kept. I put on a green apron, like the one my grandfather wore over his working robes, which were also green. I tied my hair up with a green ribbon, and put on a cap that was meant to keep my hair from falling into wounds. After preparing myself in this way, I returned to the room where my grandfather was working.
In this room there were ten wounded warriors laying in medical beds. The warriors all had serious wounds, and they were in various stages of treatment, one or two of them apparently just having arrived. My grandfather pointed at one of his assistants, and said to me: “Edana, go to Bricriu”, and then called to Bricriu: “Bricriu, show Edana how to clean a wound! We need the help!"
"Yes Master Aodhan," replied Bricriu, "as you wish, Sir."
I went to where Bricriu was standing, his apron covered with blood, cleaning pebbles and dirt out of a horrible gash in a warrior’s leg. Bricriu sighed and motioned to me to come to where he was.
" Young Mistress, this water is filthy," he said, "please bring me a clean basin full of very hot water, if you would."
I nodded and after a moment returned with a clean basin full of very hot water, and some clean linen cloths. Bricriu poured something from a small bottle into the basin which turned the water a pale gold color, and which also smelled terrible.
“Put a cloth in the water, and then quickly apply it to the leg,” he commanded. It felt odd to be commanded by my grandfather's assistant.
The leg he spoke of belonged to a naked, red-headed warrior, whose leg had been opened from hip to knee. Although his forehead was beaded with sweat, and his mouth a tight line because of pain, so much was honor and modesty in his blood, that he covered his genitals with the corner of a sheet so as to spare me the sight of his nakedness. We worked for a long time on this man’s leg: Bricriu cleaned the wound little by little, being careful that all the foreign matter was gone, and I following behind him packing the wound with cloths that had been soaked in an herb meant to prevent infection. Of course I did not use my hands to pack the wound, because as Bricriu said, hands are never really clean. Instead I used a tool that looked something like two small forks joined together like tongs.
When we finished, Bricriu gave the warrior a serum to drink that would kill pain and make him sleepy saying, “I gave him something when I started, but nothing really kills the pain unless they go to sleep.” The warrior, all during this procedure never cried out. We cleaned four more wounds of that severity, working for several hours. This was the first day of my training as a physician.
In our home, we did not worry about warriors coming around looking for chain luck. With chain luck, the warriors come and take free women for slaves, hoping to find that they’ve happened on a beautiful woman. The women in our home, although beautiful, were either older, like my grandmother, or insane, like my mother, or children, like me. My aunts were not in the home at this time, having been taken to their own families by uncles, and I had no sisters. I think now, too, that my grandfather’s position as a physician must have obtained the home a little respect, but I don’t know.
What I did know was that women were disappearing in other homes on account of the warriors, but no one came to us. I knew that because I was still doing my best to hide in corners and hear every conversation I could, when I wasn’t rolling bandages. Adults, I found, will say remarkable things when children sit either at their feet, or behind them. The adults talk, and they look at each other, but they don’t look around, and certainly they never look down. In this way, I managed to keep myself well-informed without having to ask questions.
The war went on for a long time, and on account of the war, the Festival of the Waiting Hand, and the New Year carnivals were not held. Because of this, our doors were not repainted, and there were no games, no carnivals anywhere to be found. We did nail some Brak Bush to the doors, and chewed the leaves according to custom, but purgatives are small comfort when what you really want is a carnival.
After the war ended, things went back almost to the way they’d been before. The south wing was re-painted, the floors re-tiled. Grandmother threw out all the furniture from the south wing, and the drapes, and so everything was refreshed and made new. My grandfather went back to his scrolls, and I continued to grow. After a while my body began to look and behave like a woman’s body, and my grandmother decided that it was time for me to wear veils on my head and my face. She brought me a long white veil, and showed me how to fasten it on my hair, which she first insisted that I braid.
"I don’t want to braid it, Grandmother," I said to her.
"Nonsense," she replied. "You must obey the rules of decorum. You must maintain a modest appearance. Do you want a man to think you have a slave belly? Do you want to be taken for a slave, and spend your life on your knees, begging for a man’s attention and wearing a collar like an animal?"
"I don’t see what that has to do with braiding my hair. It hurts my scalp," I replied.
"Edana, be quiet and braid your hair," she replied, "and take these three face veils.
The quilted one goes on top. Wear them, unless you want men to think you have face-stripped yourself for their pleasure. You are the daughter of a respectable homestone."
"I really don’t understand why this is needed," I said.
"Edana, one more comment from you and you will be punished," she replied.
Her eyes were starting to glow with irritation.With a dreadful, heartbroken sigh, I put on the head veil and the face veils. My childhood was over.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Of course I did not understand anything about wars, then. I did not see anyone killed. I never saw the bodies of the dead, although I did see the wounded, when they were brought to my grandfather – but even then I only saw them quickly in passing, as they came through the side doors to the south wing, where my grandfather had the slaves set up rooms to house them while they were being cared for. Once the wounded began to arrive, I was kept well away from the south wing, and the amount of needlework I had to do seemed to increase with each passing hour. My grandmother, you see, set me to mending tunics, and when I wasn’t mending tunics, I was rolling linen strips into bandages. I was not allowed to tire of rolling bandages, or at least I was not allowed to say that I was tired and bored of doing it. My grandmother’s glance could be a terrible thing. Sometimes my grandfather would come out of the south wing, looking tired, and covered with blood, but I was not allowed to talk to him then – rather I should say that I tried to visit him, but all my efforts to see him would end with me being dismissed from his presence with a very sharp “child, you don’t belong here, now GO! ” while some slave or other took me by the hand and led me back to an adult in the main part of the house.
One day, however, I came into the south wing to deliver a basket of freshly rolled bandages, and everyone was rushing around. It was clear that my grandfather and his assistants were very short-handed. I took the bandages out of the basket, and carefully placed them in the cabinet on the lower shelves, where they would be easy to reach in a hurry. The bandages were different widths, some large enough to wrap around a man’s thigh, others smaller – the smallest for finger wounds, or stumps, rather. Men lost fingers often in battle. When I got done putting the bandages away, I found that my grandfather had been watching me.
" Granddaughter, go wash your hands and put on an apron," he said to me, "and be quick about it."
Without a word, I went into the room were the medical aprons and robes were kept. I put on a green apron, like the one my grandfather wore over his working robes, which were also green. I tied my hair up with a green ribbon, and put on a cap that was meant to keep my hair from falling into wounds. After preparing myself in this way, I returned to the room where my grandfather was working.
In this room there were ten wounded warriors laying in medical beds. The warriors all had serious wounds, and they were in various stages of treatment, one or two of them apparently just having arrived. My grandfather pointed at one of his assistants, and said to me: “Edana, go to Bricriu”, and then called to Bricriu: “Bricriu, show Edana how to clean a wound! We need the help!"
"Yes Master Aodhan," replied Bricriu, "as you wish, Sir."
I went to where Bricriu was standing, his apron covered with blood, cleaning pebbles and dirt out of a horrible gash in a warrior’s leg. Bricriu sighed and motioned to me to come to where he was.
" Young Mistress, this water is filthy," he said, "please bring me a clean basin full of very hot water, if you would."
I nodded and after a moment returned with a clean basin full of very hot water, and some clean linen cloths. Bricriu poured something from a small bottle into the basin which turned the water a pale gold color, and which also smelled terrible.
“Put a cloth in the water, and then quickly apply it to the leg,” he commanded. It felt odd to be commanded by my grandfather's assistant.
The leg he spoke of belonged to a naked, red-headed warrior, whose leg had been opened from hip to knee. Although his forehead was beaded with sweat, and his mouth a tight line because of pain, so much was honor and modesty in his blood, that he covered his genitals with the corner of a sheet so as to spare me the sight of his nakedness. We worked for a long time on this man’s leg: Bricriu cleaned the wound little by little, being careful that all the foreign matter was gone, and I following behind him packing the wound with cloths that had been soaked in an herb meant to prevent infection. Of course I did not use my hands to pack the wound, because as Bricriu said, hands are never really clean. Instead I used a tool that looked something like two small forks joined together like tongs.
When we finished, Bricriu gave the warrior a serum to drink that would kill pain and make him sleepy saying, “I gave him something when I started, but nothing really kills the pain unless they go to sleep.” The warrior, all during this procedure never cried out. We cleaned four more wounds of that severity, working for several hours. This was the first day of my training as a physician.
In our home, we did not worry about warriors coming around looking for chain luck. With chain luck, the warriors come and take free women for slaves, hoping to find that they’ve happened on a beautiful woman. The women in our home, although beautiful, were either older, like my grandmother, or insane, like my mother, or children, like me. My aunts were not in the home at this time, having been taken to their own families by uncles, and I had no sisters. I think now, too, that my grandfather’s position as a physician must have obtained the home a little respect, but I don’t know.
What I did know was that women were disappearing in other homes on account of the warriors, but no one came to us. I knew that because I was still doing my best to hide in corners and hear every conversation I could, when I wasn’t rolling bandages. Adults, I found, will say remarkable things when children sit either at their feet, or behind them. The adults talk, and they look at each other, but they don’t look around, and certainly they never look down. In this way, I managed to keep myself well-informed without having to ask questions.
The war went on for a long time, and on account of the war, the Festival of the Waiting Hand, and the New Year carnivals were not held. Because of this, our doors were not repainted, and there were no games, no carnivals anywhere to be found. We did nail some Brak Bush to the doors, and chewed the leaves according to custom, but purgatives are small comfort when what you really want is a carnival.
After the war ended, things went back almost to the way they’d been before. The south wing was re-painted, the floors re-tiled. Grandmother threw out all the furniture from the south wing, and the drapes, and so everything was refreshed and made new. My grandfather went back to his scrolls, and I continued to grow. After a while my body began to look and behave like a woman’s body, and my grandmother decided that it was time for me to wear veils on my head and my face. She brought me a long white veil, and showed me how to fasten it on my hair, which she first insisted that I braid.
"I don’t want to braid it, Grandmother," I said to her.
"Nonsense," she replied. "You must obey the rules of decorum. You must maintain a modest appearance. Do you want a man to think you have a slave belly? Do you want to be taken for a slave, and spend your life on your knees, begging for a man’s attention and wearing a collar like an animal?"
"I don’t see what that has to do with braiding my hair. It hurts my scalp," I replied.
"Edana, be quiet and braid your hair," she replied, "and take these three face veils.
The quilted one goes on top. Wear them, unless you want men to think you have face-stripped yourself for their pleasure. You are the daughter of a respectable homestone."
"I really don’t understand why this is needed," I said.
"Edana, one more comment from you and you will be punished," she replied.
Her eyes were starting to glow with irritation.With a dreadful, heartbroken sigh, I put on the head veil and the face veils. My childhood was over.
TO BE CONTINUED...
posted by Unknown at 10:48 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home