“Life Span: Impressions of a Lifetime Spent Crossing and Recrossing the Golden Gate Bridge” reviewed by Marlene Cullen.
“Life Span” by Molly Giles chronicles numerous trips across Golden Gate Bridge from her earliest memory (1945) to 2023.
I’m thinking of the quote “Something happened to someone. So what?”
While crossing and re-crossing the span, “Life Span” readers are treated to gorgeous writing, and perhaps inspiration to write their stories.
“Life Span” opens with, “If I start to behave like a normal three-year-old girl, my father will let me sit in the front seat of the moving van with him. But I have to crawl out from under the kitchen table, wash my hands and face, and stop snarling. He did not come back from The War to be attacked by a wild tiger.”
I like this little girl and I want to know more.
In the last chapter, Molly travels across the bridge during a storm with her twenty-one-year-old granddaughter, Nika.
“. . . perhaps Nika and Kai’s generation has lost the great gift of hope? And isn’t that our fault? Isn’t my generation to blame? But isn’t her generation saner in some way? Better attuned to the earth and its needs? More realistic? Kinder, for sure. I could never have talked to an older person as naturally as Nika talks to me. I had too much shame. I could never accept myself as honestly as she accepts herself and others. I was a mess. But I was also lucky, I tell her. I always knew what I wanted to do with my life; I always knew I wanted to write.”
In between the first chapter and the last, Molly reveals her messes and her shame in a candid manner, pulling readers in close as if they were best friends.
“Who am I? I can’t catch a ball, carry a tune, do my own taxes, or dance the tango. My favorite question is: ‘Can you keep a secret?’ I love it when people around me behave badly. I love it even more when they behave nobly. I scribble notes in locked bathrooms, parked cars, dentists’ waiting rooms. I don’t look where I’m going. I talk to myself, stare at strangers, eavesdrop, blurt, lie, spy, pry, betray and celebrate. I’m a writer.
I have no idea how I first thought of writing about going back and forth over the Golden Gate Bridge, but once I understood how deeply that frequent commute has informed my life, memory after memory tumbled in.”
