THE WAYS OF WATER by Teresa H. Janssen: Excerpt

November 7, 2023 | By Women Writers Women Books | Reply More

THE WAYS OF WATER

As Josie Belle Gore, daughter of a Louisiana train engineer and Texas seamstress, journeys with her itinerant family through the deserts of the boom-and-bust American West and revolutionary Mexico, she learns that in her life, two things are constant: water is precious, and her role in her family is to save it.

When unforeseeable events force the separation of her family, Josie begins an odyssey that takes her from New Mexico’s Jornada del Muerto to Bisbee, Tucson, Los Angeles, and finally post-WWI San Francisco—experiencing betrayal, pandemic, and survivor’s guilt, as well as the compassion and generosity of friends and strangers, along the way. Once she lands in San Francisco, like a river meeting the sea, Josie has nowhere else to run—and she realizes that she must make peace with the past and good on her promise to the family she loves. Inspired by the author’s family lore, The Ways of Water is a lyrical tale of loss, hope, and forgiveness set in the rugged beauty of the turn-of-the-century Southwest that, like Josie, is growing up in fits and starts.

Excerpt: “Exodus”

Adapted from the novel The Ways of Water

By Teresa H. Janssen

It was during the late summer of 1909 that things changed. Papa lost his job and moved home. He wasn’t sick, so I figured it had to do with the railroad. We were seven in the house with no regular income but sporadic amounts from Mama’s sewing and the sale of our eggs. Papa got irritated when we made noise and was unnerved by Stevie’s crying. He picked on little Charlie for small failings and took over Mama’s rocking chair. Marv Fenton, the farrier who’d helped us out, stopped coming by. Charlie and I sought him out at the livery.

Papa started leaving the house to socialize with the section crew. Late at night I heard him come back home singing melancholic love songs, “Red River Valley” and “Daisies Won’t Tell.” I listened as he fumbled with the door latch, tripped over the sill, shut the door loudly, and bumped his way through the darkened house to the back bedroom. Some mornings I woke early to find him snoring on the sofa next to the stove. To give him peace, Mama shooed Charlie and me outside, where we played buckaroo, trying to lasso hens with our homemade lariats.

I was disappointed. All I’d ever wanted was for Papa to be home, and now that he was with us, I wished he’d go back to work.

One morning, when Irene and I were making bread, she told me the truth about Papa.

“He got fired,” my big sister whispered as she leaned over her ball of dough. “He broke the rules and got caught drunk running a train. Mama says there’s no second chance for an engineer who drinks.”

I pulled my hands out of my dough and stood up straight.

“Our papa?”

She nodded. “Somebody turned him in. Mama says it was bound to catch up with him sooner or later. She says it’s just as well somebody snitched before there was a crash, but Papa says it would never have come to that.”

Irene gave me a long, hard look, making me feel as old as she was. “He’s been blacklisted. Means he can’t run the hogs anymore.”

She began to pummel her dough with clenched fists.

My hands went limp. “What will he do now?”

“Dunno.” She flipped the round of dough and kept on kneading.

I was embarrassed for Papa and for our family. For a time, I couldn’t look at him without seeing the image of a black blotch. It was then that my stomach aches began, like coals smoldering in my gut…

***

…The next morning, Papa left for El Paso to look for work. Saying good-bye to him in the chill dawn seemed like old times, but I clung to his neck longer than usual. I didn’t know when I would see him again, and it would surely be in some new place.

That afternoon, Mama packed up everything—our clothing, a box of photographs and letters saved, the Bible, the bag of medicines, toys, linens, kitchen supplies, her sewing box, her spindle back rocking chair, and our jade plant. We sold our chickens to the Jacobs family.

I was sorry to leave Marv Fenton and Angel, the hound who’d lived up to his name. Guadalupe, who’d become my friend, gave me a jar of my favorite prickly pear jelly. Marv Fenton came by with food for our dinner basket—bread, sausage, and cheese—delicacies. He was quiet as always. He reached into the pocket of his work vest and handed Charlie his Hohner harmonica. “That’s to share.” Then he searched in another pocket and brought out a small black rock for me. “It’s called Apache tear. I got it up at the lava bed. It’s so you’ll remember this place. Angel’s going to miss you something frightful.”

The rock was as dark as jet, but when I held it up to the sky, it was as if I were looking through smoke-stained glass. The whole world looked cloudy.

Marv Fenton placed a five-dollar bill in Mama’s hand “to buy fixings for the children.” When she tried to give it back, he wrapped his calloused hand over her small fist, held it for a long minute, and shook his head. She probed his face and didn’t argue.

Before we headed toward the train, I turned around for a last look at the house. Its warped boards had seen no new paint. The tin roof was as awkward as ever. Above its peak, a V of honking geese winged by on its way to other lands. I couldn’t help thinking that something better lay ahead, maybe that land of milk and honey.

As we neared the depot, black smoke, like a bloated snake slugging through the sky, signaled the locomotive’s approach. Marv Fenton saw us aboard, touched the brim of his hat, and returned to his horses. I was glad he didn’t watch us go. We all knew that if you watched a train out of sight, you wouldn’t see those travelers again.

I sat calmly on my cracked leather seat, no longer bothered by the clamor and speed of the machine that had become a primary player in my life. The train was our safety line, rescuing us from our troubles, carrying us back to our roots. That blue-sky afternoon, as we roared south through the Jornada del Muerto, Irene and Ida chattered, Mama hummed a husky lullaby to Stevie, and Charlie knelt next to me, pretending to run the train. I clutched my jelly jar, feeling as sweet and sour as its contents.

I suppose that’s when the flow of our lives took a swerve, like a river run up against a boulder. Papa took one course and we another. Yes, I sensed it as a girl, but I see it clearly now. That was the first deviation.

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Teresa H. Janssen’s essays and short fiction have appeared in Zyzzyva, Chautauqua, Under the Sun, Ruminate, and elsewhere. Her debut historical novel, The Ways of Water, forthcoming November 2023 from She Writes Press, was inspired by her grandmother’s early life. She was a finalist for Bellingham Review’s Annie Dillard Prize and won the Norman Mailer/NCTE Award in nonfiction. She lives in Washington state and can be found online at www.teresahjanssen.com.