Ruth’s Last Shot

Lavinia Rivers, Doctor Lavinia Rivers, she tried to insist to herself, because she knew a professional woman should accept being competent, was nearly finished. Yes, she had always tried to convince herself that the degree mattered, and she hoped it did. Her parents had believed it, too. They had been right about a lot of things.

Part of the career that degree had made possible for her was teaching in higher education. That was a good thing. She had never wanted to teach children, but adults were fine. She could talk to adults (eighteen and over), never to children. It was odd, but she knew it was true. She sometimes wondered what there was about children that frightened her so, but had never stopped to figure it out.

Now the academic was trying, as usual, to play by the rules and was finishing her report on her sabbatical research. There were materials of various sorts, from photocopies to pdfs to catalogs of exhibits of Ruth’s photos. There were a few recorded interviews and more than a few email exchanges with a pair of persons who were also studying the photographer’s work, although from different perspectives.

Lavinia knew her research had been well carried out and that it would be a worthwhile contribution to her field of Gender Studies. She’d improved her knowledge of the Galician language and that had helped retrieve information. So clever of her, so devoted to her profession.

So what? She thought to herself. A few months off campus had given that all a rather unpleasant stiffness. No, that wasn’t it. The months away had helped her see what that place was and what it wasn’t. It seemed like somewhere that had minor volcanic eruptions that flared up from time to time, like any other place of employment. Professional obligations and challenges. All to be expected. She assumed.

Lavinia looked around her modest bedsit and knew she would miss its simplicity, its starkness, so swept and ordered. Her whole life could, if it had to, fit inside those four walls. All her possessions, too, since she had done remarkably well for all those weeks with what fit in a large suitcase and a carry-on. Fortunately, much of what she needed to submit back home was on line. Only a growing pile of books on the stand beside the bed revealed that something more than Ruth Matilda and her photography had been on the researcher’s mind during her leave.

She had used her time in Galicia well - too well, even. She had discovered and confirmed all the aspects of the research she had expected to carry out. Expected, or promised. Or committed herself to. Or for institutional satisfaction, she had signed her life away, guaranteeing a successful stay abroad. At one point Lavinia had felt as if she were a school girl again, trying hard to be accepted by the elite crowd. It felt as if there were negative evaluations to be submitted at any given moment if she were to misstep. It was one of the drawbacks of the profession. She tried to ignore it. 

Her work had been on Ruth Matilda Anderson, the woman who had traveled from her native Nebraska to the east coast, and there had studied photography. From there, under the auspices of the Hispanic Society of America, Ruth had traveled to Galicia - more than once - and had taken photographs that captivate viewers today. Except mostly the viewers are Galicians. Were and are. The trips Ruth had taken were mostly in the 1920s. Her book on Coruña and Pontevedra had seen only one edition and was still not out of print. One could buy it, online.

Lavinia sighed. It seemed tragic to have done so much and to have been virtually forgotten for close to a century. However, the same thing had happened to other women and gender studies were helping to create awareness, she thought, not as convinced as she would like.

Professor Rivers had come to Galicia to learn more about why Galicians were so drawn to Ruth’s photography. A woman admired and forgotten, despite her training and knowledge, her intense travel abroad experience. A perfect topic for a sabbatical leave, for a paper, an article, even a book. She had found the presentation so easy to prepare and was smiling at the certain reaction of a couple of colleagues who had found nothing of value in Lavinia’s proposal, even daring to vote against it. 

She looked around the simple bedsit and could just imagine the moment when she would present her research. The department had the tradition of having the returning professor give a public talk. Some attendees went for the information; others went for the wine and cheese. Everybody just had to play the part of the intellectual, looking interested and…

Dr. Rivers was in the faculty meeting room. A few colleagues from art and history were also present. She had prepared a number of slides, showing Ruth Matilda Anderson’s skilled eye and lens. She had also included a map of Galicia, then one of it within the Iberian Peninsula, pointing out that it wasn’t to be confused with the Galitzia that straddles the border between Ukraine and Poland. (Wry looks.) She briefly pointed out that Galicia aka Galiza had its own language, more related to Portuguese than Spanish. (Bored looks.)

Ruth had left Nebraska for New York on her own initiative, to study photography at one of the best schools.

(The members of the audience, looking at her, waited for Lavinia to say something interesting. The fact that this had been before 1920 hadn’t raised any eyebrows. No questions were asked. Of course New York was more attractive to an unmarried woman than Nebraska.)

She entered the employ of a well-funded cultural institution, one in which all the staff were women and more than one was hearing-impaired. This was the wish of the President.

(The members of the audience, looking at her, waited for Lavinia to say something interesting. Her comment might have been taken as inappropriate, except that the hiring practice was indeed unusual. Hadn’t Lavinia looked into that in her investigation? No, she hadn’t, because as she had structured her project, the focus was on Ruth in Galicia as photographer, not Ruth in New York as collaborator or archivist. A real career woman. 

(Some in the audience didn’t look convinced. They weren’t all that impressed by a woman who had been prone to traipsing off to foreign countries. They hadn’t heard of this Galicia place, either, so it couldn’t be much more than some backwater across the ocean.)

She made five trips to Spain, and also traveled to Latin America. She learned Spanish and Portuguese. She produced several excellent translations of complex verse.

(A few were mumbling to each other, still unimpressed. There was no sign this situation was going to improve.)

Dr. Rivers mentioned a number of other points, including how much research Ruth had done prior to traveling, during her stay overseas, and after her return. The copious notes she had made while in Galicia were invaluable documents now, and were in the Hispanic Society’s archives. Future researchers would want to consult them.

(From the looks on some faces in the audience, they weren’t likely to do that.)

Afterward there was a question-and-answer session, quite animated, that had to be cut off after seventy minutes. The problem was, most of the questions were invitations to Lavinia to justify having spent so much time on her research topic. Nobody said it, naturally, but their eyes told all. There was no sign of curiosity or discovery in their remarks, and instead there was a sort of lively sparring, challenging the conclusions, discrediting the need for further research on the photographer of far-away places.

Then Lavinia’s daydream, which was actually a nightdream, as it was now nearly midnight, ended abruptly. She knew the scene she had conjured up was not realistic, that her colleagues wouldn’t react that way, that they weren’t the type to contest her findings.

If not, why had the disappointing scene presented itself? She was feeling odd, because she liked her job as an academic, liked teaching and research, felt she was following the rules for success. And the sound of that sickened her. She had no idea why. When she looked around the bedsit for answers, she found none. And immediately after that, she felt like she was suffocating. The calming white walls with but a single print on one of them had turned cold, like a gray November néboa. Her suitcase held nothing she needed now. The modest closet held even less. 

Lavinia knew what she was looking for, and went out to find it, in the misty, néboa-filled rúas of medieval Santiago de Compostela. She would be leaving the city soon, but it seemed unwilling to release her without a fight. All right, she would go for a midnight stroll, say her farewells after all these months, knowing her reentry into home territory wouldn’t be easy. It was necessary, though. Back home she had a job, a career, a purpose (perhaps). In Santiago she had the moist, black night; she had scallop shells carved on granite posts and building façades; she had slick steps in the shattered moonlight that splayed over the crazily historic square known as the Quintana dos Mortos. 

And there was more, Lavinia knew. She had to go out, late as it was, but wasn’t afraid. There would likely be other lone walkers still out. It wasn’t going to rain, but she had learned during these weeks: she would hook an umbrella over her arm.

Once outside, under a street lamp that turned rough stone walls into flattened cotton, she paused to decide where to go, what path to take. She wasn’t thinking metaphors, though, so she didn’t realize how everything was coming together or, conversely, falling apart. She had been driven to leave her modest but warm residence and go out into the heart of darkness that the old city was at such a late hour.

Every stone simmered and shushed, the nocturnal breeze pushed her toward the Igrexa das Ánimas and up toward the Praza de Cervantes. She had lost track of where she had walked and was about to turn back to her place in the San Pedro neighborhood, when she felt an arm slip through hers. Her spine went stiff, the stone slabs beneath her feet felt like the Pyrenees, but she didn’t panic.

Ruth was looking at her. The photographer was a tall woman, clumsily dressed yet agile at navigating the uneven path, and Lavinia discarded her fear. She could see that her companion from Nebraska was going to take her somewhere, guiding both their steps so as not to fall. Ruth turned in the direction of the large Obradoiro Square in front of the cathedral’s famous Pórtico da Gloria, but she did not stop. 

The two women walked a few more steps, reaching little Fonseca Square. From a bench there it was possible to catch a glimpse of the street where the Biblioteca Xeral, the main library of the university, was located. The other entrance, through the courtyard with a statue of Fonseca, was shut up now. Almost everything was closed, except for a few bars. Except for the soot-black sky, the stars gashing its surface, the néboa winding along like a living shroud, the ashen shadows. Everything ruled over by stolid streetlights and the scent of gargoyles.

Here, in the lonely yet dense, full, life-binding streets of the old city, there were no academic presentations, no politely bored questions, no doubts. There were no ivory towers, but there were bell towers of exquisite design, arches of perfect workmanship, cantigas and incense. There was a page from an ancient codex adorning a shop window, a tower where contaminated pilgrims’ rags had hung, and the air that had been carved out of acibeche, the jet that had written part of the history of the city.

There was nevertheless nothing stiff about Santiago as its centuries flowed around Lavinia, billowing like the clouds that frame Santa Escolástica in San Martiño Monastery. And still Ruth had said nothing; she simply waited for Lavinia to focus.

———————-

She had given it one last shot. She had written out her report in detail. She had outlined both a paper for a conference and an article for a volume on women photographers. She had…

Why?

So that, when the last shot had been fired and had missed its target, Doctor Lavinia Rivers would realize which of the two parts of her had been real and which had not.