3
“SHE MUST HAVE BEEN quite rattled when you burst into the house complaining about your name,” I said.
“Was she!” said Ariane.
“I can imagine that scene.”
“Can you?” she asked. There was a bit of a challenge in it.
“Yes,” I said, accepting the challenge. “You came home from school one day with that book that generations of Babbington’s youth used in Mrs. Fendreffer’s class—”
“—the one with the indigo cover that made your hands turn blue—”
“—Ancient Myths for Modern Youth—”
“—and I said, ‘Hey, Mom, what the fuck—’ ”
“Not likely.”
“All right, so I said, ‘Maaaa, what on earth made you name me Ariane?’ ”
“And she said something like, ‘Oh, I don’t know. It made me think of nice things—like dancing, summer breezes, chiffon scarves, that kind of thing—and I liked the way it sounded. Don’t you?’ ”
“ ‘Yeah, I like the way it sounds, but do you know where it came from?’ ”
“ ‘Well,’ she said, with some pride, ‘it’s French. I know that!’ ”
“ ‘You’re right about that, but that’s not all there is to it. It’s the French form of Ariadne, Ma. From Greek mythology. I just found out from this book.’ I tossed it on the kitchen table and went over to the sink to wash the blue dye off my hands.”
“ ‘Oh?’ she said, even prouder now.”
“ ‘Ariadne was a daughter of Minos and Pasiphaë. Minos was a king of Crete, the son of Zeus and Europa.’ ”
“ ‘A big shot!’ ”
“ ‘Yeah, but, Geez, Ma—Pasiphaë—she was sort of a slut. I mean, she did it with a bull!’ ”
“No, no, no,” I said. “You wouldn’t have said that to your mother—nothing remotely like that.”
“Well, how about, ‘But Pasiphaë had another kid, Ma—a monster—half man and half bull!’ ”
“ ‘Just like your brothers!’ ”
“ ‘But, Ma, stop and think about it for a minute. How do you suppose that happened? How do you suppose she got this monster child? Think about it.’ ”
“ ‘Oh, my God!’ ”
“ ‘It’s not a pretty picture, is it?’ ”
“ ‘I see what you mean.’ ”
“ ‘Well, then you see—’ ”
“ ‘It is kind of interesting, though—I mean, how do you suppose she—and how would he—or it—I mean—wow!’ ”
“ ‘Ma!’ ”
“ ‘Listen, I think it would be a good idea if you didn’t tell your father about this—it’ll only upset him.’ ”
“ ‘But, Ma, what about me? I’m already upset. Think what the kids at school are going to say when this gets around! How could you do this to me?’ ”
“And you went off to your room to sulk.”
“To brood.”
“To brood, then. Perhaps to brood about the rest of the story.”
“Sure, and to ask myself whether I was somehow linked with Ariadne by bearing her name. I had an active imagination, and I was inclined to be superstitious. I could imagine Ariadne on Naxos very clearly, waking up, stretching herself in the morning sun, happy, still tingling with the caresses of her lover—her boyfriend, to put it as I would have put it then. She was thrilled to be there, out of the reach of her parents, to have set out on her own life at last. Rising, she looked out to sea, and there she saw the sails of Theseus’s ship, and she understood all of it at once, in a single crushing moment. She dropped to the sand and called out to him, imploring him not to do this to her, as if he could hear her over the wind and the sea.
“So, I worried. Was there a Naxos in my future? Was there a Theseus in my future—some bastard who was going to seduce me and abandon me? Was my mother’s naming me Ariane just chance, or were the Fates sending me some kind of warning?”
“But didn’t things work out all right for Ariadne in the end?”
“Depends on the version you choose to believe—if any. In some, she kills herself, you know. In most of them, she becomes the bride of Dionysus, the god of good times, and they live happily ever after, drinking wine and dancing in the moonlight, I suppose. In the happiest variations, she is herself a god, quite the equal of Dionysus.”
“So, maybe it isn’t such a bad name to be stuck with.”
“Maybe not.”
[to be continued]
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