A Story a Day #52: Truman Capote

April 11th, 2020

"Among the Paths to Eden"

Truman Capote

A widowed man goes to visit his wife's grave, not particularly because he misses her, but rather because he needs some exercise. While there, a younger woman comes up and talks to him, offers him some peanuts which he takes. He thinks she is decent looking enough, but then she sings and he realizes she is more than decent looking. They chat and eventually she asks if he'd like to come over for dinner sometime which he politely puts off. She admits that she was given advice about finding a husband by going to cemetaries and reading the obituary column. He laughs and finds this funny but says he doesn't want to remarry. He thinks he is too old. At the end, a younger livelier man enters the cemetary.

I am in some debt to Truman Capote as he made one of the things Kansas is most famous for. Unfortunately, it happens to be a murder which is the basis of the famous novel he wrote, In Cold Blood. Admittedly, I've never read the book. In high school, we got to decide what we read and I chose Their Eyes Were Watching God instead. Plus, I've never been someone that is interested in true crime. I can barely sit through a Dateline episode so it wasn't really going to be my kind of book.

This story, however, I found rather pleasant. While the narrator had some clear faults, I appreciated the honesty that the readers were clued into throughout the story. It felt fun and humorous and light despite occuring in a cemetary.