A Visit to the Plastic Sturgeon

I don’t know why I decided to do it, yet once I made my mind up there was no going back. I really didn’t like re-thinking a decision once it was done, even if it was the wrong one. Thankfully I wasn’t a fire fighter or a doctor but a graphic designer, so my wrong moves didn’t kill people. Heck, maybe they saved a few lives. The visit happened a couple years back. I remember on the morning in question the rain on the trees and grass outside sounded like when a TV channel goes off late at night and there’s just white noise. I don’t know if that happens anymore with digital TV but it did when I was a teen. I used to watch seven hours of nothing straight, one show after the other. It didn’t matter what it was as I didn’t discriminate between Scooby-Doo and titties. And then at some point in the early hours the TV show I was watching would suddenly end and white noise followed. It was such a lonely sound because it meant that even the TV programmers had gone home. Even they left me.

I sat down to breakfast and thought about the dream I had the night before. I only had five minutes to analyze it because if I spent any more time then I’d be late for my visit. My dream was about a blue fish up my ass. It was literally sticking out from my bum cheeks and I didn’t know if it was trying to get inside me, or trying to leave. I had no idea what it meant; yet it seemed fairly symbolic of something. Turns out it was very symbolic of a lot of things in my life at that time. Outside, the drone of traffic joined the white noise as I hopped on a crowded bus. My mom would never think of doing what I was about to do that morning. She ate organic food; didn’t use the antibiotics her doctor prescribed because she said the side effects weren’t worth it, and had let her hair go grey at 50. It was the first time for me, even though a few of my girlfriends had been getting work done for years, and went back regularly for ‘pick-me-ups.’

My then-boyfriend texted me.
—Great day at work beaut-eeful.

I didn’t text where I was going. Best not to tell him until it became obvious.
The waiting room was small with angular chairs and posh lighting. Fresh-cut flowers in tennis ball shaped vases and magazines decorated two glass coffee tables. Three women waited. One had a clown smile, long and rubbery. Another had short grey hair yet no wrinkles on her forehead—smooth as an indoor skating rink. The third had drawn-in cheeks and her brows were higher than they probably were a decade ago. I was 42 and thought that was old to start, as my friend Leonora was 33 when she had her first eye lift. Initially she looked like someone punched her in the face. Though after, when she healed up it seemed they grafted skin from a baby’s butt and stuck it to her lids. She let me touch them and they were so incredibly soft. I teased her at the time saying she should put baby powder on her lids so she wouldn’t get a rash. The receptionist’s complexion was pore-less. She was in her mid-twenties and had a face that was photoshopped like women in magazines. Her blue eyes shined as an avatar or Manga character; it almost hurt to look at her. Maybe she would release laser bullets from her irises and strike me dead. After a few minutes I was directed to a room and told the doctor would soon see me.

I stuffed my dripping umbrella and purse beneath the chair, peeling off my wet trench. My blue rain boots with laces up the front made water spots all over the glassy white tiles. It looked unsightly as if I just urinated on the floor. Twenty minutes passed and the doctor still hadn’t come. I thought it was probably his method for weeding out people who weren’t ready for cosmetic surgery. I pulled out a photo from my wallet taken of me five years ago. I admit it seems strange to carry around a picture of myself like a fetish object. Well, it wasn’t that way at all. I just wanted to show the doctor because I half-convinced myself that it was the only photo of me where I was actually myself. In my fantasy world, all other portraits of me were body doubles, and poorly conceived ones at that. I had the picture enlarged and framed, and then set it on a side table in my living room. My boyfriend, friends and family all commented on how beautiful I was. Then, just like that, my narcissistic reverie was blown to shit when I recalled a horrific story about a Russian woman who traveled to India for cosmetic surgery because it was cheaper. She asked the doctor for liposuction. He flatly refused, yet she kept insisting. When she woke up she was mortified to discover the doctor had removed her lips instead of removing unwanted fat. A linguistic misunderstanding that changed the woman’s life forever.

I gazed into the mirror that was strategically placed for patients to view themselves. The light was probably intentionally bad to reinforce feelings of rapid aging and inadequacy. It worked on me like a charm. I thought I had aged so much in one month: dark circles under my eyes and crow’s feet splaying at the sides of my face. My cheeks were falling. I was developing jowls like my mom. A marionette mouth that opened and closed mechanically. I hate it when people assume women get cosmetic surgery to please their husbands or boyfriends. That wasn’t it at all. My ex-boyfriend was always saying how sexy I looked, how well I dressed—just like models on the runway. He used to exaggerate for affect, yet he definitely thought I was hot when we dated. Besides, I figured it was a logical step for women of a certain age who had the money. I wasn’t rich by any means yet had put away a tidy sum from all my years as head of a graphic design company.

Most of my clients were corporations wanting something that looked edgy but wasn’t really. I suffered through days of long meetings, listening to their rationale for why they wanted their logo to be a certain way. Most knew nothing about design, yet pretended they did. After all that time wasted I almost always got my way, though my clients figured they were the ones who won out. Surely it was a gift to make people listen. Yet apart from money and the satisfaction of getting what I wanted, the work felt dull for a long time. Sans importance as the French say.
A fish trophy hung over a big oak desk at the back of the room. Under the fish, a brass plaque with the words,

LAKE STURGEON
CAUGHT BY
Dr. Neil Merryman
LENGTH 38” WEIGHT 24 LBS
LAKE WINNEBAGO
JULY 7, 2001

I was bored and so got up to examine the trophy more closely, tapping its hard belly and staring into its plastic, yet lifelike eyes. It had natural greenish-gray coloring, re-created by paint and spray-on plastic coating. Its whiskers were thick and stiff like wire, very unlike what I’d seen on real sturgeons, dead or alive. My granddad caught a few sturgeons in Lake Huron. They were once very abundant but few people saw them anymore. My dad taught me to gut and clean a fish. As a kid I was terrified seeing the slippery body flopping back and forth on the dock that first time, its pinkish mouth gasping for air. I thought there was no way I could ever eat a defenseless creature who I just watched struggle to stay alive. Yet I surprised myself. When it was dead and my dad carved it up, I sat by the fire and ate the fish with my family. I began to love the smell of fresh fish cooking on the campfire. The feel of the warm flesh next to cold, shriveled fingers after a day swimming and playing in the woods. Though I never could wipe the picture from my mind of the fish fighting for its life. One time my dad caught a six-footer and asked a taxidermist friend how to preserve it for mounting. The guy told him to wrap the dead fish in a towel, cover in plastic then stick it in the freezer. We didn’t have a big enough freezer to accommodate the big-ass fish so Mom and Dad sliced it up, wrapped it in dinner-sized portions for a family of four and we ate fish all winter long.
It was about that time, while sitting in the doctor’s office rehashing childhood memories, that I heard him speak.

—What are you doing here?

His voice was deep and haunting. I walked over to the fish, tapping its belly once more. The sturgeon’s head twisted in my direction, though stiff as if caught on a line.

—Hey watch what you’re doing.

Sweat was dripping from my armpits and down the sides of my body. The nape of my neck grew moist from fear, like when I used to watch the fish my dad caught tossing its tail, and hear the slapping sounds it made on the dock with its rebellious body. Only that time I was the one gasping for air.

—How long do you think I’ve been here?
—Since the doctor caught you.
—Smart girl. Do you know how old I am?
—No idea.
—Over two million years old. That’s how long sturgeons have lived on Earth.
—I’m 42.
—No, you’re much older than that. You’ve been here for around 200,000 years. That’s nothing compared to me. All the same, it’s some time.

I wanted to cry out for help, yet what would the beautiful people think of me? They probably wouldn’t operate on me if they knew I heard a dead fish speak, and that I spoke back. I tried to calm myself. It was a dream, I kept saying over and over. Outside the window, wet pavement gleamed with streetlight. Cars blurred past. The fact that things looked normal out there helped me breathe better. I stank of sweat and fear. I hated my vanity even though other women didn’t seem to care if they were vain. The fish grew quiet, its snout pointing straight ahead, yet its eyes were on me the whole time. I could feel them boring into my skull, sucking out every possible thought that was mine alone. My phone rang. It was my mother. I turned it off, as I knew I would be unable to talk to her without bursting into tears. Then I thought maybe I should just come clean and say where I was. No, wasn’t ready for that. There was an odd sound coming from the fish. It was whistling at me!

—You’re quite a looker. When’s the last time you had sex?
—I don’t answer personal questions.
I was afraid he would start whistling again and so told him.
—Two days ago.
—Pretty good sex life. I take 20 years to reach sexual maturity and procreate only once every four years. One of the reasons I’m dying out. They used to throw me away I was so abundant. They wanted other fish, not me.
—Why didn’t they eat you?

I had dabbed a tissue over my wet face trying not to ruin my makeup.

—I was too plentiful and the white men found me an easy catch—too easy I guess. Eventually my homes were dammed up, rivers and lakes pumped with chemicals and they were using me as fuel for their steam ships. Then they realized just how good my meat and eggs were so they caught too many and now I’m almost gone.

—I’m sorry.

When I was seven years old, my grandparents, mom, dad and brother rented a cottage at Sauble Beach. One afternoon Dad and Granddad walked up the dock from their boat, their hands holding the biggest fish I ever saw. A sturgeon. The giant shimmered in the hazy summer light as if it was an apparition before my eyes. I passed my fingertips over its body, grey and leathery as an elephant. I knew then it was really old, as it didn’t look like any other fish I’d seen before. Later that day I drew pictures of the sturgeon as I lay on the dock, pencil crayons scattered around me. First I drew its snout, eyes alert and knowing; whiskers jutting out like jellyfish tentacles. Then I drew its tail using my brightest colors. It was very bony and so had bumpy lines on its skin, like the kind you see on the shore that look like ribs, and are made from the water currents. My fish drawings soon filled a large format sketchbook my mom gave me for my birthday. I called the collection Fossil, as I knew the word meant something very old that also held secrets from the past.

—I asked why you came here?

Years went by without exciting stuff happening. I was only truly happy working on graphic design projects a handful of times in 15 years. Back then things were good with my boyfriend, yet he wasn’t interested in moving in or even in marriage though we’d been together for three years.

—I don’t really know.

—You’re just bobbing along with the tide wondering what the fuck?

The fish nailed it, though I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of saying so.

—Might as well change your appearance because your life is clearly beyond repair.
—You know nothing.
—I know you. I see you struggling. Isn’t that enough?

Dad would speak to me that way. He was the only one. Before the cancer chiseled him into a pale and sickly ghost barely able to hold a hairbrush in his wispy fingers. By that time I started blubbering; wads of snot gushing onto my silk blouse. Maybe I’d go through with it all the same, I thought. After all, I didn’t like to go back once I made my mind up. Have an eye lift, some collagen pumped into the creases along my nose and mouth. I had money for two or three procedures. My watch showed I was in the room almost one hour and still the doctor hadn’t come. Then I looked at the fish and saw it too was crying; its tears were thick like jelly.
—Stop! You’ll ruin everything for me.

—I’m dying. We’re dying.
It looked at me, its grieving eyes reaching out through tears.

I wiped its ruddy snout with some tissues from the desk, yet it didn’t let up.

The receptionist rushed into the room.
—What’s the matter?

I looked at the fish, its face thick with gobs of tears.

—It’s him.
The pore-less woman stared blankly at the doctor’s trophy.

—What? There’s nothing there, just a plastic fish.

I hid my face in horror. The fish began to whistle at me again and the high-pitched strains entered my ears, hair follicles, nipples, belly, and the space between my thighs. Leaping from my seat, I grabbed my purse, umbrella, and lunged over the desk to snatch the fish off the wall. In the cool rain my lungs expanded, becoming so big that, as I stood in the parking lot I realized I was inhaling the cars, trees, winter light, passersby and all the other things I could see or sense around me. The receptionist was chasing me and yelling for me to stop as I made a run for it. Shortly after my visit to the plastic sturgeon I understood that I had fooled my clients into thinking I was the woman in the picture of five years ago, the woman who made good brand decisions so they could sell their deodorants, hairsprays, colon cleansers and cars. Yet really I was the girl drawing a fish on the dock in the blinding sun. Trying in a naïve way to capture secrets held inside its ancient skin. I pulled the wool over everybody’s eyes including my own. But isn’t that exactly what growing up is supposed to be about?