Sometimes it is the unexpected, the unplanned for, that is the most rewarding and ultimately the most satisfying when it comes to stories. When I set myself the prompt " A Day at the Beach", I really had in mind something light and frothy. An easy story with a certain charm and lightness. I had no idea what I was in store for with Elizabeth Poliner's As Close to Us as Breathing.
It is a book I have long had on my shelves and would pick up and look at but never quite get around to reading. A story set in a place known warmly by the families who spend their summers in Woodmont, Connecticut as "Bagel Beach" for the influx of Jewish families who assemble there. For the Syrkin sisters it is their special place to escape to. 1948, however, would be a pivotal moment in all their lives. There were the years before, and then the world after, and the moment that changed everything. That moment, and you find this out in the very first sentence, was the moment the youngest son dies in an accident.
So there is always this weight somewhere at the edge of your imagination as you are reading the story, but it is so well told and so engaging are the characters you just allow yourself to be drawn in to the lives of this extended family. It is told mainly by the younger daughter of one of the three sisters. Molly is Ada's daughter--sandwiched between the elder Howard and the forever young Davy who you grieve for even before the accident happens knowing the end before the story has a chance to play out. The story shifts in time and place, but you never quite lose track of things so tightly is the telling. You fall into the rhythms of the lives of this family--the men who stay in the city to work during the week. The children who find their summer freedom, yet the restrictions placed on them both literally and figuratively. Their little squabbles and happy discoveries. The lives of the three sisters, their histories and disagreements that set the tone for everything that follows.
Vivie, Ada, and Bec are the three Syrkin sisters who are equal owners of the cottage they return to each summer. Their parents didn't get to spend quite as much time there as they would have liked but it is a respite from regular life for the sisters and their families. They arrive each summer and not even taking time to open the house properly they walk down to the beach and reclaim their space. Ada and Vivie both have husbands and children; Vivie's daughter Nina just a little older than Molly and forever in competition with Howard. Bec, though, has a career and a few secrets of her own. Bec isn't the only one carrying a secret or two and over the course of that summer some secrets remain hidden deep inside and others come out crashing down. So many small things come into play the day of Davy's accident, which will forever change the lives of the family.
The Syrkins are Jewish and their religion dictates how they shall live and behave--at least for the elder family members is it accepted as such, but the children are ready for a new world and new choices and opportunities that are not so closely tied to their faith. 1948 is not just a life changer for the Syrkins, but also for Israel, and while the action is mostly taking place at the beach, hovering on the periphery are the events that take place that year abroad. There is the independence of a small country which changed the lives of so many refugees from the war and the earth shattering event that occurs in one small community at home.
When you have a good reading experience, like I had with As Close to Us as Breathing, you tend to look up the author and want another story by them to read. Elizabeth Poliner, though, is a poet. She has a book of interlinked stories and a book of poems. I am not surprised to hear she is a poet, so beautifully done is this narrative. It was not quite the breezy story I was expecting, but it was much better--a story of a family that feels flesh and blood touched by tragedy and making the best of life as they can. Life doesn't always work out the way we hope and dream, but sometimes it can be just as satisfying.