A letter to an unknown namesake.
Article by Anonymous Art by Isabella Hageman
To my name holders,
My mom knows everyone. She recognizes the cashier at our local Wegmans: Gilad, a sophomore at the local university my older brother never should have gone to. She speaks of the new neighbors across the street, the ones whose names elude her memory, in defiance of the imposing wooden sign that swings from the once graceful maple tree that wastes away in their front yard. She’s acquainted with the maple tree in their front yard, whose leaves were once a melody of hues reminiscent of rich soil and burnt eggplant. They now slouch from the weight of bearing the swooping and almost eligible letters of their last name that she will never bother to read. She’s aware of every customer service representative she has ever talked to, the ones who apologize incessantly to the personable lady on the other line who spells her name through an orchestrated list of objects she is dedicated to acting out in every call— “it’s p like pen, a like apple, and m like maple.” She’s pictured the friends I speak about at school, the daily characters in my life that have replaced her and my family while I live states away. She recalls my sister’s boss, Albert, whose name she swears ages him— he’s only thirty. She is conscious of the fact that my sister thinks she will rot away by thirty. I guess what I'm trying to ask is if it’s silly to wish that she would have known the men whose names I bear. And what is it about you, particularly, that is unknowable?
I sat in class today for the majority of the time I was supposed to be writing, unsure if you counted as an ancestor, or one who I could stake claim on at least. I mean, we aren’t related. For one, I’m pretty sure, as I bear many of the same personality characteristics as my father, that you aren’t even aware of my existence on this earth. I say that as an admittance of sorts that I too like to let things just be without explanation. Usually, I do this under the guise that whatever I am omitting sounds more poetic without explanation. I like when my words aren’t ravaged like the carnage that was the poor texts I used to butcher in AP Lang. You should know that I hate rhetorical analysis and I am long-winded to a fault. Two things my English teacher in high school hated about me before you would ever know me.
I’ve always been curious why out of four kids my dad named me and not the rest. My sister is named Frances after my mother’s mom who passed away when she was around my age, which feels significant. My older brother is named Jack, which my mom likes to tell me is because she has never met a Jack she didn’t like. My other brother Max wears the sacred name she saved for when she had kids. And my name is Mattie. It may ring a bell because it is the feminine extension of yours, which I am told is not a coincidence. I know nothing of you. My mother has never met you, but alas, here I am carrying a name our family has no claim to. One of the few details I do know is that you may have been from Texas and that you played the guitar; asking my dad any more feels invasive because I have a feeling that you come from a time he has no desire to relive. Heck, I just learned a few years ago that he was born in Chicago, not Rochester as I had assumed. How the fuck did I not know where he was from?
The question is where would I start with my questions for you? The status of your life I am not too sure of. It’s strange to think that someone is roaming around within reach who bears the same name as me. I guess I would ask, why do you think I was named after you and what was my father like? I cannot imagine it. I think the touchstones of his personality would remain true, but I am unsure how they would have been expressed. It’s only fair that you are allowed to ask questions as well, which I’ll have to take my best swing at. I guess I would want to tell you that my favorite song is Sunday Morning by Johnny Cash because from what little I know about you, I feel like you would smirk at that. Are you the reason my dad hates country music? For some reason, the age that I picture you is around the age I am now because this is the time I would’ve assumed y’all would’ve been together. I imagine you being a bit rough around the edges with an appearance that showcases that you have worked a lot of hard days in your life. Leathery skin, a toothy grin, and some sort of sloppy haircut. Probably met in the military, Idk. Words taken straight from my mother’s mouth, “I know he was a Navy guy.” She has the zip codes of upstate New York memorized from her stint at the post office, but when it comes to you, you might have been in the Navy.
My dad keeps a standing wardrobe in the basement. It's tall like the one I had in my dorm freshman year. A muddy brown color with the emblem of Hard Rock Café in the top right corner. I wonder if that has any connection to his Hard Rock Café pin collection, which he tried to give me a few years back, but I returned it because it felt too much. There were pins from every place he traveled around the globe. There must have been hundreds, and I pushed them back with a comment on how he should display them for himself. Wrong answer.
The wardrobe is locked; however, it has the key sticking out as if to say, “open me,” which I have. Inside are old uniforms, which I suppose are his, and artifacts of his past that are so caked with dust I had to take a time out after a quick glance. At the time, I was incapable of placing the uniforms but now I have reason to believe they were from the Navy. Was he in the Navy with you? It's weird to think you would've seen him in these. I took his belt from the wardrobe. He technically gave it to me one day when I was searching for one. When my mother saw the black looped belt, she told me to be careful with it because the random numbers inscribed on the underbelly of the belt were some sort of identity marker for my dad, like a social. I wore it to middle school most days.
When I see you, the location is somewhere abroad. Somewhere dark. Somewhere he wishes never to return to.
If it makes you feel better, the only thing I know about Luigi from my mother is that “he was very Italian, apparently, and had chickens I think in the basement.” I’m getting a headache from all the ways I could interpret that; I am not sure which one of you is more of an enigma to me. The only thing Luigi has on you is that I dressed up as him for Halloween as a joke with my best friend from high school. She was Mario and I, Luigi. I can’t remember if that made my dad laugh or not. Luigi is the reason my middle name is “Lou” instead of “Luna” or “Lee,” which are both family names.
Anywho, I hope this finds you well, and well...not dead.
--Mattie