C. W. Smith - A Throttled Peacock: Observations on the Old World

Copyright 2020 C.W. Smith

All rights reserved

EPUB edition

ISBN 978-0-9896329-8-0

White Rock Books

6521 Malcolm Dr

Dallas TX 75214

Originally published in clothbound edition by The DeGolyer Library at Southern Methodist University Copyright 2015

First Edition

ISBN 978-1-878516-09-1

eISBN 978-0-989632-98-0

Printed in the United States of America

Cover photo: Statue of Gonzalo Ballester sculpted by Fernando Mayoral in 2000 and photographed by Pravdaverita in the Caf Novelty in Salamanca, Spain, October 14, 2010. Creative Commons 3.0

Cover design: Kellye Sanford

To Marcia

Wing to Wing / Oar to Oar

Praise for C. W. Smiths A Throttled Peacock: Observations on the Old World and other works.

C. W. Smith. takes pains to point out that A Throttled Peacock is not a travel guide. He sought rather to record the psychological, emotional or intellectual shifts that have come from being estranged from [his] usual life.. With a (mostly) pseudo-curmudgeonly humor, Smith muses on a wide range of subjects. He learns that all manners are local when a French chef is insulted by their brie-carving skills.. The sometimes anxiety-inducing necessity of trusting strangers in an unfamiliar place where you dont speak the language inspires The Brotherhood of the Backpack and Smith discovers that what we thought were our instincts about other people or a situation were feelings that depended upon an elaborate system of coded signals derived purely from a cultural context.. Smiths imagery is richly evocative. On a wintry day in Geneva the sun is a pearl button behind a gauze of high cirrus; the wind sweeps away its pale white light. And at sunset in Oxford: [T]he stone had caught the yellow light and held it. Spiced-mustard light, dusty dusky-yellow, wine-yellow, apple-yellow light thick as warm candle wax. A Throttled Peacock is a combination of the prosaic and the profound, of droll humor and thought-provoking observation. I recommend it for travelers planning to strike out across the globe on summer vacations and for all Texans abroad. - Michelle Newby Lone Star Literary Life

Smiths experiences range from his description in the books opening sentence of wanting to kill his wife (When your only friend becomes your worst enemy ) to memories of watching a young con-woman weasel money out of her marks in a town square. All-told, there are 12 essays inspired by the six-month trip, written with a confident humor and humble self-deprecation that keeps the pages turning. White Rock Lake Weekly

Americans have reputations for boorishness and complaining while visiting foreign countries. Yet Europeans often can be hidebound and even vindictive when confronted with our relaxed attitudes toward food, tradition and the cultural context of how things are supposed to be done. Dallas writer C.W. Smith pleasantly skewers both sides in this entertaining collection of12 essays drawn from travels to several countries. Dallas Morning News

About Understanding Women - Brilliantly executed, Understanding Women takes as its surface theme the bewildering discovery that women of all ages and walks of life have a special mystery that defies male comprehension. Texas Observer

Teens will adore Jimbos awkward obsession with lust and its consequences and will identify with his naive belief that only he can set things right. Booklist

About Letters from the Horse Latitudes - Set in Mexico and the American Southwest, Smiths stories have a rugged informality. Their sense of intimacy is so great that the reader feels he has discovered a cache of personal letters or is overhearing a late-night conversation between friends. the world that Mr. Smith dramatizes is both contemporary and convincing. New York Times

Smiths ability to climb inside the minds of his characters is exceptional; there are no one-dimensional cutouts to be found. No one is perfect, no one is quite satisfied, no conclusion is the end of anything other than some of lifes ongoing episodes. And thats the magic here. Fort Worth Star-Telegram

About Buffalo Nickel - The novel is a roomy, slow-paced picaresque whose serious themes (the abrading of Indian culture, the gradual disappearance of space and wilderness) emerge with haunting clarity from a prose that continually suggests and dramatizes, never once breaking into sermon. Buffalo Nickel may well be the years best novel. USA Today

About The Vestal Virgin Room - That Don and Dottie manage to ride out the turbulence in their marriage and emerge as survivors makes this a lovely and tender book. Publishers Weekly

Contents

Foreword

Although the experiences I describe occurred while I was traveling, A Throttled Peacock isnt a travel guide I have no recommendations to make about food, lodging, or transportation. Ive tried to describe what happens to your head and heart when youre estranged from your usual life, by being where nothing seems the same, where new feelings and notions arise from being in new locations. Traveling in foreign countries inevitably if not compulsively encourages comparison and contrast and calls on dormant and unused parts of your psyche the way using new weights in a gym results in new aches and pains but also new strengths. Thats what my focus became in writing about these experiences: what new ways of looking at my world and myself startled their way into my awareness when I was where I am a stranger?

Some of these pieces were published elsewhere, and I want to thank the editors of those magazines and periodicals for their generosity. Getting to Know You and A Franco-American Brouhaha appeared in Hemispheres; We Teach the French About Texas Chili, Sort Of appeared in Texas Monthly; Views of the English at Oxford was in Pembroke; and In Praise of Stone was published in Texas Architect.

And of course I want to thank my travelling companion, my wife Marcia, for being such a terrific trouper on these journeys and likewise all the citizens of those places that gave me the experiences Ive recounted here.

When your only friend becomes your worst enemy.

Searching for the flower clock in Genevas Jardin Anglaise, I think of nifty ways to kill my wife. Maybe force-march her barefooted over Siberian tundra while prodding her with a stick, since she seems to feel thats what Im doing now.

Its cold, she whines. Weve been out all day long!

All day? Its 3:30, and we didnt start until 9:37. We walked to the Palais de Nations okay, farther than I promised, the weather colder than expected but I paid by returning to the room for 11:00tea and a rest (she rested, I drummed my fingers). After lunch, we browsed in book shops in the Vieille Ville, saw the Petit Palais Museum, then hiked to the park off the Place Neuve, where chess players moved knee-high plastic pieces. I marched us over to the Muse de lHorlogerie et de lmaillerie, where Marcia sat in the foyer while I studied a chiming clock that dramatized the Annunciation with wooden figures.

Then I agreed to go home. My map said wed pass this flower clock, but weve been weaving around the garden facing a stiff wind off Lake Leman, andno clock!

Its over there. I point toward home; its a ploy.

You dont really know.

She wont navigate but criticizes when I do. Do you want to see the map?

No, I want to go home. Weve been looking for hours.

Wed be there if you wouldnt drag your heels.