Annabel’s Friend Daniel Loomis
When Annabel Frasier found herself shipwrecked, washed up, trapped, (her words) she scarcely knew how to survey the sorry mess (again with the hyperbole) that was her life, and get on with the cleanup. After months of burdensome conjecture, a writhing displeasure over ever aspect of her daily life there was nothing she could do but read through her past and despite its self-absorption, a voice told her that she had reached this abyss through long hard effort, that in short, this was her life, conducted and lived in complete freedom. Never for a moment would she play victim - it had all been expressly created by her own movements, she had been following a prescribed path as easily as a speeding train rides the rail with no chance for untended meandering.
To put it in a less convoluted manner, Annabel, with nothing to do but think, began to ask a few too many
whys and
wherefores. I listened to her speculations and projections more nights than I had patience for. It was difficult for me to grasp that Annabel Frasier considered her life a failure. She had a lot going for her, always had.
Maybe you’re not interested in her background for your article, but as her old friend, going back to our second year in college at the University of Michigan, we had been great pals over the years and I think I may say without vanity that I was the friend she relied on the most, perhaps loved the most. She was with me when I came out of the closet, and with me five years later when I went home for my parents’ anniversary party and my sister outed me in front of my entire childhood milieu in Detroit. Annabel handled my father with what I can only describe as miracle-working subtlety and was able to stop my mother from breaking down completely while I dealt with my traitorous sister.
Annabel’s depression began when the magazine she worked for - nearly twenty years - told her they were not renewing the contract for her weekly column. The final kick in the teeth came when she was informed everything she had written for them belonged to them and she had no rights to it. They owned
…with a twist in its entirety. They also owned the articles and reviews written under her byline. She was leaving with nothing but her memories. Her bosses were surprised at her surprise. How could she not know? they exclaimed when she slammed into their offices, wailing and flailing. It was standard procedure. “We are being generous with your severance,” they said in an attempt to comfort the overwrought writer.
At fifty-three, Annabel had
une crise. She went through a phase of self-hatred that was pure pathos. Others had mishaps, falls from grace, bad luck, but no one was in such a sorry state as our Annabel. No one really knew what Annabel’s state of mind actually was as she often joked about her fate, while at other times refused to talk, to be around anyone or let anyone help. Annabel sometimes squirreled herself away. I believe she once referred to herself as a “deformity.” Those of us who were with her at this dinner winced when she said it. She who was anything but a deformity, had once been the most charming woman in our little crowd. We are all older now, we are not as charming or as easily charmed but we all remember when Annabel was at her best.
Recently, Annabel let down her defenses and told me she had discovered the reason for her failure, that it boiled down to one word:
unworthy. She said it was whispered to her in the night. She knew she had been given a truth, a tool, if you will, to allow her to analyze her journey, her life as lived up until then. It gave her a definition of her prime motive or lack thereof. She seemed relieved to be able to impart this wisdom. After discussing this with her therapist, he told her,
everyone’s truth was defined by one ingredient: that there was one facet of our being that colors every aspect of our life. He said Annabel's truth, unworthiness, was common and that she also had a secretive side that withheld, she was good at pretending, keeping distance between herself and others. More on that later.
She did have a cavalier attitude toward life but in all fairness to her, she never blamed others, or if she did was quick to dismiss the blame and reassign it to herself. For a woman so bright, it was distressing to see how low she was in her last year. I’ve many acquaintances without her sharp mind or blithe spirit who succeed with marginal talent or skills whereas Annabel faltered and failed while offering a far superior product. Her therapist referred to it as
fear of success, a phrase with a certain populist buzz, but Annabel never let him forget the word
unworthy which she said carried a different meaning. He was a little dissuaded by the “voice in the night,” he wanted her to discover her truth through his ministrations but went along with his patient.
Annabel could laugh at herself, make fun of the world and that was refreshing even though it was just another way of avoiding the deep wells of unhappiness she was swimming in, according to her therapist. She was aware of this also. She had undergone treatment in Jungian psychology but had more recently discovered the Maslow techniques and that is how she found her latest therapist; Dr. Miller advertised in her magazine. The ad, two words in an unusual font, white on a black ground, asked,
Trouble Being? Annabel was intrigued by the simplicity and made an appointment. She now had no insurance coverage and confessed upfront she could not go on with the doctor’s regimen but did want to hear what he had to say for himself. He said just enough to get her interested but she truly did not have money for additional sessions and was perfectly honest about it. That the doctor didn’t believe her was because Annabel had the look of success about her. She dressed well, carried herself with aplomb and spoke decisively and to the point. She admitted she had been turned loose by her employer. He was the second person to learn of this - I was the first.
Those of us who knew her, were aware of her vulnerabilities, that she was barely in charge of herself at this point though it took us all some time to realize this. She built a firm façade. I knew she was almost broke, hadn’t been saving much; she’d spent a good deal on her mother’s care before she died. She wasn’t sure if or where she would be employed again. She was scared witless, her words again.
Do you want to hear more about the past year of her life or do you want to ask me questions? How much of these details are you interested in? Okay, yes, her state of mind. If she really killed herself, is that it? Well, I don’t know, but I can tell you what I do know.
Annabel began, without a therapist, to take a look back in time to find out when was the precise moment unworthiness had taken over and colored her life henceforth. She wanted to identify when it had been inserted, like a knife, sharply. She wasn’t sure when the wound had been inflicted. Listening to others in a group session she learned that childhood abandonment by one or both parents was often the case. Annabel had not been abandoned by her parents…okay, yes, her father did move to France, in a sense abandoning her to her mother but she was hardly a child. Others in the group said they were belittled as children. Annabel tried to remember being belittled by her parents but could only remember a cousin laughing at her knobby knees in the car on the way to a natural history museum when she was ten. Annabel didn’t think this had lasting impact as she modeled during college in the age of the miniskirt. I can attest that her legs were the least of her worries.
She didn’t remember any other disparaging remarks buried in her subconscious until a week after this conversation when she called me to ask if I thought a teacher she had when she was in the sixth grade, a male teacher, her first, who had questionable methods, in fact had been fired, ridiculed her one day on a field trip, referring to her as a wild animal. She said he sneered at her when he said this. She went home completely deflated that day and asked her mother to help her with her hair that night so she might look put-together the next day. She wondered if that one remark doomed her with out realizing it. I said it didn’t seem so but she was still trying to find out the source of unworthiness that had been her guiding light forever, as she described this new phenomenon. I thought she took her “voice in the night” and her therapist far too seriously, and especially a group session that may or may not have a bearing on her own situation. I never knew how much to say when it involved her therapy. How honest should a friend be? I didn’t really believe in the wisdom of therapy necessarily but hesitated to say so.
Annabel grew up in a small town south of Albany. Although she had food, shelter, nice clothing, friendships and went to a decent public school her parents had an unstable marriage that contributed to feelings of insecurity. Annabel had a prickly relationship with her mother and that is where a therapist might like to spend some time, in fact had. Did Mrs. Frasier cause her daughter’s feelings of unworthiness? If so, how? By what means? Annabel said her mother had extreme moods that caused a lot of dissension in the home and yes, her mother did find fault with her on occasion. Annabel said she was an awkward girl, she showed us pictures to prove it. She looked like the average girl in the late fifties. The pictures she showed us of a high school girl are much more revealing - in them we see an outright rebellion. We see her glaring at the camera and when I mentioned this, she said she was glaring at her mother with whom she’d had a fight in the car on the way to the photographer. In this photo she had the good looks she would become known for though she was positively fierce and if one were to speculate on this seventeen-year-old, you would say she will go far - her will positively jumped out of the photo, she would not be repressed.
A few years later, in college, the pictures show a happier, more docile young woman with lighter hair. The hippie era was in full-flowering and Annabel had mellowed. She said once she wasn’t around her mother she became the jolly person she had always been. “That and marijuana,” she added with a mischievous grin. Never did she look like a person suffering from a lack of esteem or unworthiness and I must admit I was a little disparaging of the whole unworthy diagnosis.
I was interested to see where Annabel would land next, whenever the tortured self-analysis ended. I certainly did not think it would end in her death. I’m sorry I can’t say anymore…I’m too close to her memory…
No, I knew nothing of A.W. Saunders and it hurts me - you can’t imagine how much. I listened to her every little twitching thought for the past year, some of them highly personal, some of them downright banal and somehow she couldn’t tell me she was a published poet? I’ll never get beyond it; that she could be so thoughtless…so indifferent. I thought she was my best friend.
Annabel’s Childhood Friend Pamela Cohen
Annabel Frasier was my best friend since we were twelve years old. We grew up in the same neighborhood, our families were related though a few generations removed. Annabel was always the more spirited of our little group that consisted of five girls living within a few streets of one another. Annabel could be moody in a noticeable way but when she was good she was very good. She had a high-pitched laugh that came from deep within her throat and blasted out of her open mouth with uproarious hilarity. The laugh of a much older woman privy to delicious witticisms. That was Annabel at twelve. She became my best friend after I heard it; I said something particularly wry, my brand of humor. Who wouldn’t immediately love her, rewarded with that laugh? When I went home I said to my brother that I had just met the person who would change my life. I had no idea what that change would be but it was a sharp recognition worth rejoicing over. Before Annabel, life was bland in our little town, as small towns can be. After Annabel, I was never bored, never lonely and could see that the world was a bigger place than I had thus far experienced.
Annabel’s family had traveled some and had even spent a year in France before they settled in our little town in upstate New York. Her mother decided to curb her father’s wild streak by settling him in a dull locale. They bought a fixer-upper in the hopes of interesting Mr. Frasier in the fixing up, in domestic duty instead of drinking, partying and living the life of an irresponsible bohemian. With four children, Mrs. Frasier wanted stability after fits and starts at domesticity. She said it was time to stop fooling around and get serious. She thought by decreeing this, it would be so. It took a bit more than a ram-shackled farmhouse to calm Mr. Frasier but that is another story, only incidentally about the one I am telling. Mr. and Mrs. Frasier are an interesting part of Annabel’s story: they were completely unlike other parents in the neighborhood. They had what could be called “edge” and this too was a part of the excitement brought about with the arrival of the Frasiers to our sleeping town.
Mrs. Frasier had ambition. That was what singled her out from our moms who were contented housewives married to stalwart working men. Annabel’s mother had a job in the administrative offices of the local college and you had the feeling she wished she could be the president instead of an accountant. Nervous ambition was how I would describe what drove Annabel’s mother. Her father was the opposite; he worked in his brother-in-law’s building company but you could tell he would rather have been on the ski slopes or hunting wild game. He could often be found in the local tavern at any or all hours of the day but no one wanted to take too much notice of this. Except Mrs. Frasier who ranted and raved like a banshee at Mr. Frasier and did not seem to care who heard her.
Annabel’s parents fought. Or at least her mother did. You could hear her yelling in the backyard while pulling weeks from her garden, while driving their old car into town or mopping floors if you were playing in the yard. She lost control over minor things like mud tracked in her kitchen or the toilet seat not down. With four kids it seemed futile to be so uptight about housework but it was one area that seemed to rattle her unduly. Annabel had a lot of chores assigned to her as the eldest child. She had to iron baskets of washing including sheets and towels - things my mother never ironed that seemed like a waste of effort but Annabel said it was because her grandmother ironed everything and Mrs. Frasier feared her judgment. Annabel said her grandmother Frasier and her aunts were meticulous housekeepers and judged women by the cleanliness of their home and children. Once Mrs. Frasier got a job, she lived in fear of not keeping up the standards and made long lists every morning delegating the household chores. Annabel balked at this and they fought over housework so much that Annabel forever after was somewhat lax in her housekeeping though not nearly as negligent as her mother was wont to point out.
Annabel and her mother had a contentious relationship and both had a strong will. Neither would give in. I suspected this was the cause of Annabel’s moods: they had some dilly fights. None of us, the other girls in the neighborhood, dared talk to our mother as Annabel did, but then our mothers were not hard on us as her mother was. Mrs. Frasier had a lot to contend with; a husband who could not be controlled, four children, a job and plenty of critical in-laws in the area watching it all. You could not help but hear Mrs. Frasier’s laments; she kept nothing in, and her one mistake she felt, was moving back to our town where there wasn’t enough opportunity for her and too much opportunity for Mr. Frasier to slack off.
Annabel loved my mother who was placid, kind and simple. She stayed at our house as much as possible and often joked that she would be moving her things in soon. With my mother she could relax and was in turn helpful, folding laundry, sweeping floors and washing dishes without being asked. When my mother told her to leave it, Annabel said she wanted to be useful since she was hoping they would eventually adopt her. Annabel marveled that my mother would watch her stories, the soaps, leaving dishes in the sink or the vacuum sitting in the middle of the floor. This would never be tolerated in Mrs. Frasier’s home and Annabel found it highly amusing.
I was sometimes embarrassed by my mother’s simple mind and especially by her television viewing. Each weekday she stopped everything she was doing and watched
As The World Turns and
The Guiding Light. This routine got on my nerves - the weepy dialogue, the maudlin music, the very premise of soap operas. I thought of myself as a writer, an intellectual, and seeing my mother in her house dresses, often with rollers still in her hair, immersed in mawkish daily drama irritated me. Not so with Annabel. She sat down with my mom and together they followed the storyline day in and day out. Annabel only watch ATWT, leaving my mother with the second soap while she washed the luncheon dishes. Then she served my mother tea. This was in the summer of course, when we weren’t in school but I remember Annabel sitting on our old floral sofa with my mother discussing the latest travails of Lisa Hughes over a cup of Lipton and leftover cake. I scoffed at this but Annabel said the stories were not inane but were a source of knowledge on how families work. She said it gave her insight.
I had more admiration for Mrs. Frasier with her subscriptions to Harper’s Bazaar and Cosmopolitan and her smart career clothes. That’s the sort of insight I was looking for. I thought she was held back by her circumstances; a feminist stuck with a large family and a useless husband. Of course I never said this. Annabel thought she could be monstrous and her father misunderstood.
I never saw Annabel and her mother sit on a couch together or talk about anything. What they did do was shop together - trying on clothes, having lunch and driving around to all the stores in the area. I envied these mother-daughter expeditions, my own mother wouldn’t know a twin-set from a pajama top, a pump from a loafer. Mrs. Frasier could be called a clotheshorse if such a term is still in use, but in all fairness, she worked and needed a wardrobe. None of the other mothers worked nor did much shopping. My mother ordered from the JCPenney or Sears catalogs anything she might need which was seldom. I coveted nice clothes so I babysat and later worked in my uncle’s dry-cleaning business to earn money.
So mother and daughter bonded over dresses and suits, a way for Annabel to connect with a mother she was so at odds with most of the time. I know they never bonded over those endless baskets of ironing. Is this the kind of material you’re looking for? I haven’t been in close touch with Annabel for the past five years. We last met at our thirty-year high-school reunion. She was beautifully dressed, successful. Fun. We are both writers but she is the more well-known. Was, excuse me.
I’m perhaps going on unnecessarily about Annabel and her mother but I believe this early relationship is the reason Annabel could never quite form lasting relationships. She once wrote me in a letter when we were in our thirties that she was having trouble with a boyfriend. She wrote,
I told him I can’t do relationships but that if he were available on Saturday night for some fun, a bar, some dancing that I would be delighted to participate. Apparently the boyfriend was not satisfied with this and accused her of commitment phobia. In later life, Annabel never wanted to meet the parents or know the coworkers or friends. I believe she did not get that first relationship right and was never able to get any others right afterward. But what am I, an amateur psychiatrist? Annabel had enough of that, in my opinion.
She did marry - it lasted about a year. Arnie something or other. She didn’t want children and has had two abortions that I know of. The poor husband lost it when she informed him she had the pregnancy terminated and saw no reason to continue the marriage. I admired her self-awareness - that she plucked herself loose from tricky situations with composure. Our generation, our friends, fell headfirst into everything that came their way and lived life regretting one hideous mistake after another. Annabel seemed more mature. I attributed it to her ability to look at herself without flinching. She admitted she had trouble loving and being loved - her first therapist unearthed this revelation that most of us found insulting to not only Annabel, but ourselves.
What do you mean, you can’t love? Don’t you love me? Many people thought she was cold but she was one of the warmest people I’d ever known; the most self-actualized person I’d ever known, a popular term from those days when Transcendental Meditation and Abraham Maslow were in vogue.
Maybe Annabel was less actualized than I thought. Suicide is never ascribed to a healthy being. I’ll wonder about this for the rest of my life. Why would the lovely Annabel want to kill herself? It makes no sense and I am not at all convinced it was a suicide. I’m sure it could only have been an accident. So sad.
Annabel’s Therapist Dr. Reuben Miller
When a patient dies, if a suicide, it is a profoundly sad day for a psychologist. You tend to question your methods, beat yourself up a little. What went wrong? Why couldn’t you save her? In Annabel Frasier’s case, I could beat myself up forever but we’re not sure it was a suicide. There was no note, no real motive, no indication that she was in trouble. In fact, I thought she’d made a breakthrough in our last few sessions. I have trouble accepting she would kill herself - she wasn’t that depressed, on the contrary, she seemed more upbeat in our last session four days before her death.
I think I can speak about her as she is no longer with us. I don’t intend to breach patient confidentiality but will generalize if you don’t mind. Ms. Frasier was troubled by her perceived inability to love or to be loved. She thrashed this out thoroughly with a former therapist - the records show this is the subject of much of her work with her previous doctor whose name I’ll not mention except to say she is highly regarded in our field. I suspect you’ll be talking to her for your article.
Did I know Ms. Frasier was a relatively famous poet? No. No one did. It seems A.W. Saunders was in fact Annabel Frasier. She kept that secret pretty well. Of course, very few people read poetry - most would be hard pressed to name a living poet, Ginsberg perhaps while he was still living but then he was a shameless self-promoter, wasn’t he? The Beat poets have some renown but most poets are obscure. We do have a sitting Poet Laureate in this country but I think you would have to search high and low to find someone who could name the current holder of the office. Yes, yes, Maya Angelou is famous. What about Sylvia Plath? I hope you're not going to take a cheap shot by comparing them.
As you can tell, poetry is one of my passions and I know a bit about it. I’ve read some of the poems of Ms. Saunders/Frasier since the news broke. Her works have given me additional insight and one I particularly like, written in rhyme, I’ve learned by heart. I’ll recite it, it’s not long. It’s called
Today:
Let us suppose
for those in repose
that all goes away
and we are left - disarray
that beauty and bounty
go way with the wind
that skies never darken
abyss never ends
And let us suppose
for those indispose
that dreams are all ashen
that time holds its court
that we are forsaken
and memories won’t
that this is the breaking
and some of us don’t
For this is the morning
for this is the day
when all that we’ve asked for
has led us astray
what we have gambled
and what we have prayed
resides in a mystery
ourselves have betrayed
Quite nice that, wouldn’t you say? She does have a certain eloquence. Even her magazine articles and her column had a soothing rhythm and I believe that’s why she was so popular. She expressed herself from a soul level, I know that may sound exalted to you, but Ms. Frasier was often exalted. You had to know her. I had respect for her commentary on the arts as well as politics. I wonder why she kept her poetic life a secret. Never once did she hint at it, her family didn’t know, even her employer hadn’t an inkling. I heard they reviewed her first book without knowing who she was. Wouldn’t it have been a scandal if Annabel Frasier herself reviewed the book of A.W. Saunders? Annabel was so secretive it could very easily have happened, I dare say. In any case, since her death, the little booklets of A.W. Saunders have been getting media attention. Well, of course you would know, probably the reason for your article that you’re hoping will expand into a book. I know how publishing works, I’ve written a book myself; I hope to publish one day.
What I can tell you about Ms. Frasier is that she felt like a failure after losing her column and had mother issues that resurfaced during Mrs. Frasier’s illness. She had financial worries on top of those. Apparently the sisters were battling over who would take care of the mother, who was negligent, not fulfilling his or her duty, that sort of thing. Annabel agreed to let he mother live with her when her sister threatened to have a nervous breakdown if someone didn’t take Mrs. Frasier off her hands. You know her brother Everett, I believe that was his name, passed away and her other brother, Patrick, wanted nothing to do with the mother, in any case, lived in Europe, a military man, I believe.
So with the ultimatum, Annabel brought her mother to New York to live with her and hired a nurse to stay with her during the day. Annabel had not been seeing me at the time. She told me her finances weren’t in great shape and her mother’s care was expensive. In fact, each week she told me it might be the last session she could afford. I didn’t really believe her but one day she phoned and said she could no longer afford treatment. She thanked me for the help I’d given her. She sounded terribly depressed during that call. I know what patients go through caring for elderly parents. I gather Mrs. Frasier was quite a pill. Ms. Saunders’s last book of poems,
Anger, Dissension and Will, her most disturbing, says it all.
After Mrs. Frasier died, Annabel phoned me for a session to talk about her mother’s passing and the anger she felt in those months leading up to it. Three months, I believe. I can’t tell you much more, I don’t think I should. Perhaps you should look into the poetry of A.W. Saunders for insight.
Annabel’s Aunt Susan
My niece, Annabel, never was understood by anyone in the family but I suppose that isn’t all that unusual with gifted children. Families in those days, the fifties and sixties but not excluding other decades, could never conceive of anyone related to them as being anything special at all. I dare say some do not even subscribe to the concept of gifted or
special. When I was young, that would have been considered a vanity no one could afford or want attributed to themselves. How things have changed. Parents now go to extreme lengths to prove their child gifted, special, talented, above average, so needful to make up for their own history, one in which
special was a form of conceit. We now have a robust number of the population quite confident of their
specialness, ignore it at your peril. What it amounts to is a serious bout of precociousness that we have yet to know what to do with, precocious and gifted not necessarily analogous.
I have already digressed into social studies when I set out to tell of my niece Annabel who recently passed away. Some are saying it was a suicide but no one is really sure of that if you ask me. I am not at all sure; it could just as easily have been an accident. The funeral was in some ways a complex, guilty, questioning event, mired in the unsaid, the unverified and the fear of unspoken defection. It was a crowded affair.
Annabel knew a lot of people. I suppose at age fifty-three one has a history and people make up this history. There were childhood friends from our town, college friends from Michigan, a few old lovers I suspect by their over-sentimental collective self-consciousness, various relatives living near enough to make the trip, myself included, coworkers from the magazine she worked at for nearly twenty years, members of her volunteer group where she mentored the young and many people who did not know her all that well but knew
of her. There was a ragtag bunch of beatniks present; no one really knew who they were or why they were there. Well, she wrote a column in an established magazine so I suppose she had her followers. The elephant in the room was the unspoken question:
Why would Annabel Frasier kill herself? It made no sense. That is why I think it was an accident. But then again…
Annabel was the eldest child of my sister Dora who passed away two or is it three? years ago. Dora and her eldest daughter had a thorny connection while Annabel was growing up but things settled down once Annabel went away to college, well, not right away, but once Annabel moved to Ann Arbor, away from her mother, they both settled into a grudging though distant respect for one another. In truth, Dora was jealous of Annabel. Always had been on one level or the other. Dora’s troubles began with her marriage to the charming irascible Robert Frasier. They were a mismatch anyone could see it but Dora was bound and determined to land the catch of the day. He was that: good-looking, from a well-to-do family, athletic, smart, he had it all. If I sound like I’m describing a character in a novel, almost a cliché, I’m not far from the truth. Robert was also a born bachelor, anyone could see that, but many women would say
he has yet to settle down and I’m just the one to settle him. How many woman make that mistake? I did say all this to Dora before she got married but of course, she didn’t hear a word of it. Refused to. Robert’s father pushed the marriage with the same hope Dora had: get him married and settled, with a decent job, before he did any damage to the family name or its bank accounts. He was running on empty when Dora finally snagged him.
She became pregnant right away and Annabel was born, a pretty baby, bright, alert, the apple of Robert’s eye. I remember he carried her with him everywhere, played with her for hours, rocked her to sleep, fed her, read to her and bought her skis, a bicycle and built her a dollhouse complete with furniture before she knew what any of it was. Everyone was so impressed with his parenting skills Dora was encouraged to have more children by her in-laws. She ended up with four children before she was thirty. Unfortunately, Robert was enamored of his daughter Annabel because of what she intrinsically was, not because he was a splendid parent. No one registered this, it wasn’t something you looked closely at in those days. I was a school counselor and an amateur social scientist; none of the Frasier family-doings passed by me without analysis. My point is, Annabel, the poor thing, was born into this dysfunctional family and was cut from a different cloth. You had to feel sorry for her but she was the bright spot.
As time went on, Robert grew bored with the whole menagerie, and most especially his wife who had become sharp-tongued, unsatisfied and critical. Robert felt less inclined to humor her, did not care for the forty-hour work week so did not bring in enough money for a large family and had absolutely no ambition at all. For all of his charms and capabilities, he was amazingly lackluster. And he started to drink. This Dora could not abide and it was all downhill after the fourth child, Everett, was born.
The family moved to France shortly after Everett’s birth though it was confusing. Why France? It turns out Robert’s best friend Stewart had settled in the Languedoc region, owned a vineyard and invited Robert to come and work for him. This was exactly like Robert - pick up a family and move them overseas but it was not at all like Dora, a practical type, her wily marriage notwithstanding. I learned later Robert had started up with a barmaid and it was about to become known so Dora, seeing an oncoming train, removed herself from the track and bundled her brood off to France and a new start. They stayed there for two years approximately until Dora thought it safe to come home. It turned out France was not such a great getaway: the wine was plentiful, the hours erratic, cleanliness negligible and adultery considered normal. No place for an uptight, ambitious woman who knew what she was about. Back home they came with a job offer for Robert in his brother-in-law’s construction business just outside of Albany.
I give you the Frasier family background though how much it matters I’m not sure. Annabel, gifted with words, a keen sensibility, missed none of this and grew impatient with her mother. She adored her father and thought the lifestyle he wanted was not in the wrong, she understood what he wanted and wished her mother would open her mind to his ideas. And stop the yelling and bickering. This hurt all the kids. She made a fool of herself, Annabel said to me. She was embarrassing, following him around, trying to pick fights at inappropriate times. But Dora was not an open-minded woman, never had been and what she wanted was what she would settle for. She hated France, the decadence, the frivolity. She said the only thing she hated more than the French were the Italians. Bigotry was acceptable in those days but not for much longer.
I visited them in France, on a school trip while I was finishing up my master’s. Dora was harried and out of her element. Robert was charming to me, he always was, but I could see he had left Dora and her aspirations - left in the sense of mental distancing. The children were confused, often ill-behaved and frightened. All except Annabel. She delighted in France. She had a wonderful teacher who taught her to speak French,(the only one in the family who learned it)how to sew and grow vegetables and flowers. Annabel was thriving while the rest of the family was coming apart. Robert and Annabel wanted to stay, begged for more time to adjust, but Dora always ruled.
Dora again bundled her brood and came home, this time with a different agenda. She was going to get a job, and when the time came, as it surely would, blow off Robert and his ways. She could still make something of herself and she would waste no more energy on Robert Frasier, playboy drunk. They arrived back in the states in time for Annabel to start middle school. They settled in a small town where the houses were cheap and Dora did get a job. Robert went to work in the building trade but his heart wasn’t in it and he spent more time in the woods than on the work sites. He was exceptionally good at bricklaying so was kept on. He did what he had to but no more. He wanted to return to France and when they divorced when Annabel was in her senior year, he did go back. He remarried, died there about twelve years ago, still broke. Annabel went over with her sister Laurel to have his body sent back at their grandmother’s request. Annabel told me he lived just the way he’d always wanted to with a garden, a lot of animals, everything simplified, primitive and warm. “Mother would not in a million years have lived his lifestyle,” she told me. She couldn’t seem to grasp how different her parents were from each other. “What brought them together, Aunt?”
“Your mother saw a handsome guy from a good family and wanted him.”
“What did he find in her?”
“I don’t think he was looking to find anything - his family wanted him settled and your mother was in the right place.”
“What a waste of time.”
“Well they had you. That wasn’t a waste, my dear.”
“Yeah, I guess…”
But she wasn’t sure. All she could see was that two people misjudged horribly and her mother ended up alone and bitter and her father ended up in a foreign country without his children. I think it really bothered her. She said more than once she would never trust herself to marry. It was too gruesome. That was the exact word she used. Oh yes, she did make a slight error, youthful indiscretion if you will.
Annabel’s Ex-Husband Arnie Saunders
I was really tore up when I heard of Annabel’s death, whether it was a suicide as some people are saying, or not. I suppose it could have been a suicide, Annabel did have some black moods, I should know.
We were only married for about a year and for the record, she’s the one who filed for divorce. I wanted to work things out but after the abortion I did lose patience with her and may have said some pretty rough things. Well, it was my kid too. Why don’t a father have a say? I was pretty shook up when she told me what she’d done - who wouldn’t be? I married her in good faith, prepared to offer her a good life. I work hard. I’ve always been a family guy, got three kids now with my second wife June, but it was not to be with Annabel.
She was really great when I first met her. We just graduated from high school and were in our first year at the community college where I was getting a degree in law enforcement. Annabel didn’t think it was good enough for her but her mother thought it was more economical to get the first two years out of the way on the cheap since she got an employee discount for tuition. Annabel was studying all the airy fairy things like literature and art and philosophy. Once she enrolled in that philosophy course her troubles started. She began to question everything; she didn’t seem as easy going, would get gloomy after visiting my parents, who by the way, loved her. But not as gloomy as she was after visiting her mother - that bitch, excuse my language, made her crazy. Old Dora sure had the knack for pushing Annabel’s buttons. I got along with her okay, I would joke with her, but she could be a real downer to Annabel. Never satisfied, always complaining. You could tell she preferred her sons to her daughters, they could do no wrong and we all know Everett was no angel. I shouldn’t speak ill of him, he’s dead now. He was a troubled lad, I’d say but the dead cannot defend themselves. I don’t mind talking about Annabel because she was a little more sane than Everett but how sane is suicide, if you know what I mean?
We married at my parents’ church, Episcopalian we are - when we were twenty. I had my degree and started working for the sheriff’s department. Annabel was restless and wanted to see the world, she said. I paid for a trip to France to see her father before he died. I thought she would settle down after she got home, maybe start a family but you see where that got me? I don’t know what happened in France with her dad but she came back more unsettled than before she left. She just didn’t know what she wanted from life, I could see that but I couldn’t see how to help her. I’m no genius, I guess that’s what she needed. But she never remarried. She became one of those women’s libbers, you know, mad at men, but that wasn’t really Annabel. She was sweet and a lot of fun for the most part. That’s how I remember her.
I don’t know how her life played out after she left and went to Michigan to get her degree. We lost touch - well I remarried pretty soon after. I was sore about killing my kid but I never held a grudge, I got over it. Had three with June, I think I mentioned. I often wondered if Annabel found what she was looking for. Oh, I know she was a successful writer for that magazine, but was she happy? She was just too darn smart for her own good. That’s what my mom used to say. She was a good ol’ girl all the same. That’s all I got to say. Rest in peace, Annabel honey. I haven’t forgotten you.
Annabel’s Publisher David Fairfeld, Fairfeld Publishing of Boston
No, I did not know Annabel Frasier the columnist and A.W. Saunders were one and the same. Yes, I did meet with Ms. Saunders several times and yes, she would do an occasional reading in New York or Boston where she had a small fan base. No, no one seemed to have recognized her from her photograph in the magazine. She changed her hair frequently, wore spectacles and created quite easily, a second persona. It’s not as if magazine writers are recognized everywhere they go. No, Ms. Saunders seemed a recluse, poets often are. I think she enjoyed what fame she had, I know she enjoyed being a published poet, was proud of it. She sold the usual number of books poets sell and as I said, had a small fan base after she did a reading in New York backed up by two jazz musicians. It was quite a performance, stunning actually, I’ll never forget it. She sold books after that, was referred to as a jazz poet in the newspaper articles and literary magazines but she wasn’t really. She wrote free-verse, yes, but it had a nineteenth-century flavor, if you will, although her third book, the popular one, she referred to as her
avant garde phase. But she often wrote in traditional poetic form, using fixed meters. Her last book is selling since her…oh, I’m sorry, it has not been determined it was a suicide. Nevertheless, the notoriety is selling books and it is in her favor that the public perceives…forgive me, that’s odious.
A.W. Saunders was a charming woman with a versatile style. We at Fairfeld Publishing shall miss her. Yes, we are doing another print run of all her titles. Yes, we are planning a compilation; a selection of her stronger poems. Yes, I’ve been in contact with her sister, Laurel, regarding royalties. No, it is not true my publishing house is being sold to a major New York firm. Yes, I’m told there is a video recording of her performance in St. Mark’s Church on YouTube. Yes, it very well could increase her book sales. No, I have not seen it - I was at the performance, it was riveting. She had a gift for oratory as well as verse. Some say she had the divine spark and that may be. Please excuse me now. I have nothing more to add. May she rest in peace, she was a very fine poet and that is no small feat.
Annabel’s Landlady Mrs. Chung
No, I was not aware of a gas leak in my building. No, I do not believe I was responsible for the death of Ms. Frasier. No, I do not know how the gas leaked into her apartment. I cannot, and will not speculate on how Ms. Frasier died. I’m very sorry, she was a lovely woman who always remembered my birthday, was always bringing me little treats from her office parties. She was a perfect tenant, and never a cross word. Well, except when her mother came to stay. That woman was no walk in the park: demanding, cantankerous. How she raised such a nice daughter is beyond me. I felt sorry for Annabel at that time. I’d see her leaving for work with an expression I’d never seen on her face before: absolutely riled up. When she came home, she looked sad, weighted down. If you had met her mother you would have no trouble figuring out the reason for the sad face. Course, I kept my distance. I don’t nose into my tenant's business.
For the last time, no I did not know of a gas leak. I’ve had the building inspected top to bottom, what more can I do? The city has been all over me. I’m terribly sorry about Ms. Frasier’s death especially if she did it to herself. We just don’t know at this time. I can’t even rent her apartment until the investigation is over. I’m losing money here. Yes, I’m aware of her sister’s pending lawsuit. I’ve got all the trouble in the world, that’s all I have to say. She was lovely and sad. If she had to die, I wish it hadn’t been in my building. Good day.
Annabel’s Former Boss, Interweave Magazine
Yes, we plan to publish some of Annabel Frasier’s better columns in a book format. No, we did not know she published poetry under the name of A.W. Saunders. Yes, we terminated her column. Yes, we are planning to replace her with a fresh voice, and yes, that will in all likelihood be someone younger. We are interested in social networking, that sort of thing for a columnist. What’s that? No, I certainly cannot speculate on whether or nor Ms. Frasier committed suicide. I believe it is still under investigation. No, I don’t believe her firing had anything to do with it, she was much more than just a columnist. She could have gone on to any number of other fruitful endeavors. A very talented woman. No, I have not read her poetry but the magazine has reviewed one or two titles. Yes, I have spoken to her sister regarding royalties but
Interweave owns the rights to the columns. What’s that? No, I do not care to offer any insight. Thank you. No, that’s all we at
Interweave have to say in an official capacity.
Annabel’s Sister Laurel
My sister Annabel was always more sensitive than was good for her. Things that would pass by others without notice, she could obsess over. Like our father, for instance: She was always worried about him after our parents divorced. She wanted to live with him in France. Mother wouldn’t allow it and they fought bitterly over it. I remember when Annabel was a junior or senior in high school, Annabel accused our mother of throwing him out with the trash, as if he weren’t a part of our lives. But let me tell you, it takes two to ruin a marriage. He was no saint and Mother had every right to do what she did.
Annabel and Mother were always fighting about something but accusing her of killing Everett, our brother, was beneath even Annabel. Mother just about died hearing that. She and Annabel never spoke to each other for nearly twenty years. For the record, Everett was high on cocaine when he was killed in the motorcycle accident. Everett was a daredevil. He was always in some trouble, often drunk and belligerent, a pain in the you know what, Annabel wanted to save him - her little brother. No one could save him and she took it hard. It was after his death that she started writing poetry. Just like Annabel to keep it a secret. She was always hiding things, writing in a diary with a lock and key. I’ll never forget the day Mother broke it open and read a few pages at the dinner table. I’ve never seen Annabel so wild. I thought she would strike Mother. Mother just laughed and accused Annabel of having no sense of humor. Annabel lunged at her, knocking over glasses and Mother slapped her hard. Dad hadn’t come home yet, was late and Mother was in a mood anyway. This was right before they separated. Annabel never forgave Mother for the “invasion of privacy.” A prima donna is what Mother called her. None of us knew what that meant. Mother said this was her house and there would be no secrets from her. Anyone who knew our mother could have told you that you couldn’t keep a diary, she’d read it. Annabel wasn’t facing reality with that one but then again, she hardly ever did. Mother ruled the roost and there was no getting around it.
Well, with such a slacker for a husband, she had to be on top of things, didn’t she? He was the limit. If anyone killed Everett it was him. A bad example with his drinking and reckless behavior. His playboy attitude. Both Everett and Annabel wanted to move to France with him. Eventually Everett did go over. Dad was remarried to a French woman named Adele. Everett didn’t care for her and came home after a month but Annabel seemed to get along with her okay. Annabel liked to speak French, one of her pretensions.
No, I’m not, nor have I ever been jealous of my sister. Aunt Susan accused Mother of being jealous of Annabel when she got that job at the magazine in New York. Social commentator: What’s that? Aunt Susan said Mother was a frustrated career woman who never got further than a low-level accounting job because she did not have a college degree. Aunt Susan went to college. This irritated Mother because she’d married Dad young and had a pack of unruly kids and spoiled her chances. Aunt Susan could be a pain herself. She thought she was so smart, so literate, read poetry, listened to high-brow music. She was just your typical old-maid aunt. A busybody if you ask me. I think she was secretly in love with Dad. They used to discuss art and politics. While Mother was slaving away in a crummy office, they plied their pretensions. Annabel gets her affectations from Aunt Susan.
No, I didn’t know she published five books of poetry. Who reads poetry? Why she needed to keep it a secret…well, that’s Annabel. Sneaky.
No, I do not know if she killed herself? No one does, really. Unless a note surfaces somewhere. She did have a boyfriend of sorts. Ask him. He was a secret too. Married no doubt. Annabel had a string of married lovers. Her shrink would probably tell you she sought out unavailable men because she herself was unavailable or some such rot. She couldn’t commit to anyone. I made her take in Mother when she became too much for me and Charlie, my husband. Serves Annabel right. Hadn’t so much as sent a card in nearly twenty years. She
is our mother. Was. Annabel shirked her responsibilities long enough. It was time for forgiveness. Anyway she was only a few months with Annabel before she died. She wasn’t put out that much. I had her for two years and it wasn’t easy. My husband was quite put out, I can tell you. But she was my mother so what can you do? Annabel was…just so privileged.
No, I’m not happy she is dead, fuck off. I loved my sister. I’m just saying she wasn’t without her faults. She wasn’t as perfect as everyone thought, all those people at the funeral crying, gushing over how beautiful she was, how talented, how soulful. Just because she had a little fame. If you had heard the ridiculous things she wrote in her diary in high school you would not be all that impressed.
Annabel’s Current Boyfriend Alphonse Lurie
I loved her. That’s all I can say with certainty. Yes, I heard she was the poet A.W. Saunders, she wrote poetry all the time. I thought it was her hobby. That’s what she called it. She loved words, played all sorts of word games. She said poetry was like crossword puzzles; something she did while waiting. She would write haiku in public, you know, in cafes, bars, on the bus. I’ve got some of them around, I’ll show them to you later. She was a terrific writer, I’m glad her columns are being published in a collection. She had great insight into American culture. She was brilliant, much more so than anyone knows. She was shy, not a self-promoter. And extremely sensitive. She would have made a good mother. It’s too bad she never married or had children. Yes, I did know she had an early marriage - about a year - but who counts that? One year does not a marriage make.
Yes, I met her mother. She was a piece of work but she was ill when I met her so I don’t want to give the wrong impression. Anyone would be crabby housebound and feeling poorly. No, I’ve never met her sister. I did meet her brother Patrick in Germany when we went to Europe one year. He was okay but distant. They hardly seemed to know each other.
No, I am not an unavailable married man. I am long divorced. I did ask Annabel to marry me but she said it would spoil things. Said she didn’t like living with anyone. Annabel sometimes said she couldn’t love; had got off on the wrong foot, missed that first connection and was now doomed to a loveless life. Her goddamn therapist put that in her mind. She was just as capable, if not more so, of loving than anyone I’ve ever known. Are you kidding me? She didn’t have an unworthy bone in her body. You’re not writing some shitty tell-all, are you? She deserves much better than that. No, she did not kill herself. Absolutely not. She believed in God.
Here are a couple of the haiku poems she scribbled on a napkin in a restaurant just before she died:
a wild rose from you
soft pink on Sunday - breathing
Monday, brown - fleeting
She said, do not leave
He replied, but I must go
soon after, the rain
I know you are talking to a lot of people with different opinions: But let me tell you, Annabel Frasier was one hell of a woman. That’s how your article should begin. Do right by her, man. She was absolutely the best. What's that? No, man, I am not selling her "stray" poems to anyone. Why? Is someone buying?
