The Collector

by James Callan

Between a super volcano to the north, and the “coolest little capital in the world” to the south, a small town of less than 2000 provides a nice toilet break for travelers on State Highway 1, a perfect place to stretch one’s legs on the long journey from point A to point B. Bladders empty, gas tank full, coffees in hand; spirits are high and the road no longer seems endless, but inviting. Yet before the young couple –the Germans or Canadians or Wellingtonians– before the jet-lagged family from Japan, from America, settle back into their seats to stare out the window for five more hours on their way to the Auckland airport, first: a portrait in front of the local attraction, the giant corrugated iron boot.

When you tell people you are from Taihape, you hear it enough, those three or four limited responses. The place with the giant boot? People ask, sometimes declare, satisfied with the trivia that clutters the cupboards of their limited memory cells. You nod, offer a practiced smile, wishing there was something else to pin your little town on the map, or in any event, one less giant boot to define it.

There are variations on a theme. But it’s all the same tune. Mild amusement, confusion, occasional disdain. Taihape, is it? They scan their brains and squint. That Podunk drive-thru where people throw Wellies? They pass through on long weekends, city slickers with sculpted haircuts and superiority. The overseas tourists struggle with pronunciation. Where? Eventually, they laugh, become amused when they realize they are in it –the town they’ve never heard of. So that’s how you pronounce it! More smiles. More practice.

Infrequent, always surprising, is the occasional enthusiast. Those who look at the boot with something more than coffee on their mind, something more than full gas tanks and stretched-out legs. You tell them where you were born and bred, right here in Taihape. They love you for it, and you’re not sure if it feels nice or perverse. Hands on hips, big, genuine smiles on their sunburned faces, they look at you like you’re the rare one among the two of you. So you grew up right here, huh? The gumboot capital of New Zealand?

In whatever way they ask, the answer remains the same: a simple, dispirited Yes.

It’s no reasonable claim to fame, being from the place where folks hurl footwear as far they can. But it stays with you, unavoidable, like tattoos or regrets. It becomes a part of you, a useless, aching organ. It’s baggage, heavy and out of fashion. It’s embedded in you, is you, like DNA, a vestigial link to your upbringing, your identity, a point of reference for all other places beyond the long shadow of the giant, iron boot. This is what it is to grow up in Taihape.

*

If that was the extent of it, I just might find room to be proud. I might tattoo a boot to my bicep and own my birthright, flaunt my heirloom on exposed flesh. If it ended there, I might relate to others who have grown up in Taihape, perhaps even bonding with my neighbors. Sadly, as it were, my case is unique beyond the other 2000. Regrettably, there is more. My angst comes seasoned. There is plenty of salt in the wound. It comes down to nuance, to plain-and-simple, unlikely bad luck.

I was born on April 9th, 1985, the first official “Welly wanging” observance –Inaugural Gumboot Day. Like a boot in flight, I was tossed from the womb. I landed here, in Taihape, where decades have hardened the mud into rock. No matter how hard I try to pull myself free, I am bound, like a 2000-pound galvanized boot, a steadfast anchor wedged into the earth. After so many years, one stops trying.

Then she came, like a magician, like Merlin himself, only beardless, female, and American. She placed her hand over mine, and together, effortlessly, we removed Excalibur from the stone, wiggled the gumboot from the cloying mud. She came into the petrol station where I had been working and paid for her gas. Leaving, she paused at the door, turned back, and asked me when I was off work, if I wanted to ride north across the desert road, if I wanted to join her on a roadie throughout the country I was from but knew so little.

My shift had just begun, but outside the window I caught a glimpse of a gumboot tailored for Godzilla. I decided right then and there: I had seen enough of that godforsaken Welly. I’m off right now, I lied, and abandoned the counter, knowing I’d be leaving my job for good, but more importantly, knowing I’d be leaving Taihape and, what’s more –with her.

At her insistence, we posed in front of the Taihape gumboot, which made me wince, made me second guess my impulse to follow a stranger into the desert and beyond. But when she put her arm around me for the selfie, I melted into the ground, smiled for the camera without the need for all my prior practice. Down the street, the queue at work was building, car horns sounding, and my Mobil work shirt put me on the spot. Folks had tanks filled with petrol and no way to pay. Folks had cars filled with families and no explanation, no snacks to stifle the ornery cries of sedentary children. In front of the giant gumboot, in uniform, I felt 4000 eyes branding me a defector, a mutineer who had jumped ship only to drown.

But her rental van would be the vessel that would take me away. Das boot. And now, at my own insistence, she agreed: Let’s hit the road.

*

Her name was Kris, which, phonetically, is my own. The spelling is different, but we were speaking, not writing to each other, so really, for our purposes, we shared the same name. With my home town well behind us, the iron boot somewhere far over the horizon at our backs, I felt compelled to ask my savior’s name. And when she told me, I nodded, as if I knew. Somehow, it seemed right.

I have always been effeminate, mistaken for a girl throughout my childhood all the way into my late teens. I think it comes from growing up with three older sisters, a mother who also played the role of a father, a father who left long before I learned my first word: boot. To this day, if I am clean shaven, if I grow my hair long, the odd stranger misinterprets my sex, calls me Miss or Ma’am. Maybe it’s in my mannerisms? My Care Bears tattoos? To be honest, my own assessment of my masculinity is muddled. Often, when I eyeball a woman who I consider sexually attractive, I find myself on the fence of two longings. Do I want to fuck her, or do I want to be her? Usually, the answer is both.

So Kris, my phonetic twin, was the Chris that would be me if I were actually a woman. This is what I told myself as I sat in the passenger seat of her rented van, as I envied her streamline body and easy confidence. Do I want to fuck her, or do I want to be her? This is what I asked myself as she drove way too fast down the desert road.

Outside the window, the scenery scrolled by, stunning as ever. But I am used to it. I looked to the mountains, amber with dusk, but shifted to Kris. I watched her, covertly as I could; her casual, one-handed grip on the steering wheel; her free hand picking her cuticles and chipped, black nail polish; the little hairs on her throat which caught the low sun and sparkled like gold as she craned her neck to take in the view of Mount Ngauruhoe. Most tourists make references to Lord of the Rings, to Middle Earth, to Mount Doom. But when Kris looked across the fields of blonde tussock to a somber, brown mountain rising out of the dry earth, she didn’t go Tolkien on me. She nodded, squinting in the sunset, and said I bet you could snowboard the fuck out that bitch in the winter.

*

Later, at our motel in Paeroa, we shared a bed but did not have sex. Kris fell asleep in moments, but I remained awake for most of the night. I laid there, excited, aroused, and nervous. The only women I have ever shared a bed with were my sisters, when I was child. The only times I’ve had sex were with older, bored, and local women who had sons my own age, who had husbands that were elsewhere or uninterested. I always fell in love, and they always laughed when I told them so. They’d tell me I was sweet, then ask if I was up for more. I always was. But for me, it wasn’t enough. When I’d leave their home in the night I’d see the gumboots on the boot rack, muddy soles and worn, casting long shadows in porch light. In the distance, I’d see the monument. Another boot. And as the door closed behind me, I’d wonder if all of Taihape was conspiring to mock me. I was overanalyzing, as I do. But for all the world, it felt like these tired mother’s were using me, then giving me the boot.

Kris snored, which somehow wasn’t a turn off. It was agonizing, actually, how much it aroused me, along with the rise and fall of the sheets that framed her small breasts. It occurred to me, lying there with an erection all night, that my hunger had transcended loneliness. In the end, I quietly masturbated in the bathroom –twice. I thought of Kris’ chipped nail polish and raw cuticles wrapped around my cock. Even then, the only thing that calmed me, got me to fall asleep, was thinking of Taihape, far, far away, an oversized gumboot many miles south and a super volcano wedged between us.

*

In the morning we skipped breakfast. Kris doesn’t do breakfast, she told me. So it was coffee. Lots of coffee.

It’s one thing you Kiwis do way better than Americans, she held up her takeaway cup and studied it adoringly.

Only one thing? I asked

Well, you Southrons sure know how to throw a boot.

I winced, but against my will, I swelled with pride. I told Kris I was born on Gumboot Day, that I came into this world like a Welly in flight. She looked at me with genuine amusement, with unfiltered joy. In her delighted smile, her gold-brown eyes, I saw that she was younger than me, far younger than other women I have shared intimacy with. She wasn’t bored. She wasn’t tired. She was free. Totally untethered. And here I was, falling in love yet again.

After our coffees, we visited the Big Lemon and Paeroa Bottle, a 7-meter statue of a soft drink receptacle. It was older than the giant boot, more revered, and oddly, I felt a pang of jealousy as Kris looked at it with boundless enthusiasm.

It was ugly. Tacky. Brown and yellow and red. It was crude and cheap, but it contained history, something magic inside, like a genie bottle. The original L&P, Lemon and Paerora, was made from adding lemon juice to the naturally carbonated water of local springs. Now, it is manufactured by Coca-Cola. It is no longer magic, but the memory remains.

It’s enchanting!

Kris was over the moon, her arm was around me, and we were posing, once again, in front of a kitsch monument in a nothing town. The crook of her elbow was wet with summer up against my neck and I found ample room to fill the moment with joy. Later, back in the motel, we did have sex. Afterwards, we quenched our thirst with local L&P.

*

In her rented van, we sailed north and south across a sea of green, undulating hills dotted with sheep. Never far from the coast, we sped on, hemmed in, east and west, by waves as blue and radiant as sapphire. We took the ferry to the South Island and, like pirates landing ashore, raided the sleepiest of small towns, gathering treasures in the form of local, large statues.

In Springfield, we posed in front of a 6-ton, pink frosted doughnut with rainbow sprinkles. It was gifted to the Canterbury town of less than 500 people by 20th Century Studies to celebrate the release of The Simpsons Movie, a perk of sharing the same name as the fictional, cartoon Springfield. Kris and I climbed the giant dessert and popped our heads through the hole in the center, posing for the local who was content to share her town’s pride and joy with faraway travelers as she took our picture for us.

In Gore, where 8000 Kiwis live at the cold, southernmost tip of the South Island of New Zealand, Kris and I picnicked under the shadow of a beached leviathan. We lay on our backs on the grass and looked up into the angry eyes of a fish out of water, a leopard-spotted, orca-sized, brown trout. We popped feijoas like pills, kissed, tasted from each other’s tongues the unique flavor of a local fruit I knew well, but Kris had never heard of. We got frisky, and the locals got vocal. Get a room, they shouted. And we did.

Gore is the self-proclaimed brown trout capital of the world. Its 9-meter statue in the center of town is there to remind you, in case you may have doubted it. Gore is also New Zealand’s country music capital, which, apparently, is worthy of distinction. More than that, it is worthy of a monument. There is a giant guitar to reveal this claim. In Gore, good things come in threes. In honor of the breed of animal most commonly slaughtered and sheared across the nation, there stands a statue of The Romney Sheep. There is one more claim Gore has seemed to overlook: it is the capital of statues to commemorate capitals.

Back on the North Island, Kris and I saw the giant kiwi slice in Te Puke, Bay of Plenty. We saw a three-meter spider in Avondale, Auckland. In Te Kūiti, town of 5000, we gazed up at the seven-meter tall statue of a shearer. I looked around me and there was no mistaking it: we were there, in the shearing capital of the world.

Eventually, Kris and I landed in Ōhakune, a stone’s throw north of Taihape, a gumboot toss from where we had begun. Under an 8-meter carrot, we made love in the bushes. Then, drunk on sauvignon blanc that we had collected from wineries in the south, we looked at the stars, the constellations foreign to Kris, the southern cross that graces New Zealand’s national flag. It seemed to me a good time to tell her that I loved her. But then everything went quiet, silent as a carrot, giant or otherwise. Snoring, Kris fell deep into dreams. And eventually, I did too. I slept under the stars, under a mammoth root vegetable, and dreamed of my travels with the woman who had shown me how to live large.

*

I woke up at dawn, hungover, and despite it being midsummer, very cold. Worse –I woke alone. I stared up at a carrot the size of King Kong’s cock and labored to my feet, swaying on my legs, ankles rubbing against empty wine bottles.

I wandered through town, calling out her name, asking around, scanning the empty streets for her rented van, my lifeboat, the female pirate who had pillaged my town, stolen my heart, and now, apparently, absconded to unknown shores. I spent the day on the curbside outside shops, and later, when the afternoon became hot, inside the supermarket, wandering down its refrigerated lanes.

Among the produce I saw feijoas, kiwifruit, and carrots, fruit and veg that reminded me of Kris, of our many moments and monuments along the road. Down the meat aisle, I saw lamb, maybe Romney sheep, and sides of fish, perhaps brown trout. The bakery had doughnuts, pink with rainbow sprinkles. I closed my eyes and was back in Springfield, holding her sweaty hand. Among the snacks, I saw ugly, L&P bottles, Lemon and Paeroa, and it brought me back to those early days, the buds of flowering love.

Love. Had she heard me when I told her how I felt? She didn’t answer, except in snores. But she couldn’t have heard me. Or perhaps she did. Perhaps that is why she had left.

I had no transport, no money, but Taihape was nearby and traffic heading south to Wellington was constant. I hitchhiked back home, picked up by an older woman who reminded me of my many past lovers. She turned down the radio to a whisper –country music, which made me think of Gore– so we could talk during the short journey south. She told me of her sons, who were about my own age, she guessed. She told me she lived alone, most days, and even told me her address, which wasn’t far from my own. When she dropped me off, she gave me her number and a look that reminded me of my own when I look in the mirror. Desperate. Starved. But more than anything, lonely.

I pocketed her number in my denim trousers, but weeks later, when I went to retrieve it, I discovered what looked like ash, the remnants of receipt paper obliterated in the wash. I sighed, stared out my window at a boot the size of a mobile home and, as I often do these days, thought of Kris.

*

Eventually, I found her.

Her wide smile stole my very breath. Her gold-brown eyes sparkled, as if a beacon. I looked at her image like a totem of some god, a deity worthy of my worship. I wept.

She stood in front of a monument. Not in Taihape. Not in New Zealand. Sadly, not in the flesh. In my living room, in the glow of a computer screen, I saddled my erection with a loose grip and stared at the digital effigy of an American angel. I sampled the fruits of my social media detective work, the catalogue of her many travels –Kris’ worldwide exploits and endless poses in front of endless statues, with endless different men.

In New Brunswick, Canada, she beamed in front of the world’s largest lobster. Arm in arm, she posed with an athletic man whose face was sunburned as red as the 11-meter crustacean at their backs. In Norway, she knelt beside wooden trolls. The men with her were tall, often blonde. They looked like vikings, and had names like Erik, Leif, and Henrik. Well traveled, Kris made it to the far east, where she modeled in front of a mammoth Chinese war general, the Guan Yu Statue in Jingzhou. Kris held hands with a man who may have been local, an Asian dude named Mùchén. Together, like insects, they stared upward into the stern glare of a military man, a scowl 58 meters high.

In Rio, it was Christ the Redeemer, the son of God, and Cristiano too, the suave Brazilian boy. This reminded me of us: Kris and Chris, which made me sad. In Australia, it was the Big Banana in Coffs Harbour, New South Wales. The surfer lad’s own banana was at half-mast in the photo as he and Kris kissed. All over America, there were giant statues of this and that: a ball of twine, a squirrel, a peanut, an alligator, and on many occasions, Paul Bunyan and his Blue Ox. There were beavers and bears and beers and boys, always boys, a different man for every statue.

And boots. And me.

I found our photos posted with the rest. In Taihape, in Paeroa, in Gore. Among all those giant objects, it made me feel small.

She collected them all. Small town men. City Men. Men of the world. Their hearts. She collected snapshots and selfies with giant fish, oversized fruits, titan vegetables, animals and saints and sky-high generals, cars and household items, miscellaneous this and that, objects as numerous and variable as man.

I closed my computer, and the room went dark. I looked out my window to a familiar sight, a corrugated iron eyesore. I felt heavy, stuck, discarded, and alone. I felt anchored to this town, like a 2000-pound galvanized boot.

 

James Callan is the author of the novel A Transcendental Habit (Queer Space, 2023). His fiction has appeared in Carte Blanche, Bridge Eight, The Gateway Review, Mystery Tribune, and elsewhere. He lives on the Kāpiti Coast, Aotearoa New Zealand. Find him at jamescallanauthor.com