Touch Anywhere to Begin

Mark Anthony Jarman Goose Lane Editions

In Touch Anywhere to Begin, Mark Anthony Jarman carries us through turmoil, moments of time standing still, to the divine comedy of all that is unexpected in travel. Jarman, author of 19 Knives, My White Planet, New Orleans is Sinking, Knife Party and more, is an old hat at the travelogue. He inserts us directly into the narrative as buses rush by in Mumbai, warm hearths and fiddles enrobe us in Ireland and suspend us in the moment as “roads fall to the sea from heights above the white desert.”

Jarman’s collection opens in a panic we can all strangely recollect; February 2020 in Italy, just as the cafés and theatres begin to close in Venice, and the throes of a mysterious “vee-ros” has yet to fully take flight. Jarman’s essays add depth to the reverberation of ancestral spirit, yet give us the fluidity of time. When we travel, we are the past, present and future in this gorgeous, elastic way.

“Liv at my door just a moment, her brother’s truck waiting, she is arriving and leaving, that hovering moment in the portal when your life can go either way,”

As famed travel writer Pico Iyer says, “We travel, initially, to lose ourselves; and we travel, next, to find ourselves.” Scanning his life experiences, Jarman brilliantly weaves personal narratives through his past into present, including an homage to memories of friends and days passed on, remembrance and what we are indeed here for.

He reminds us that “sometimes, when GPS fails and error guides you, you stumble upon olive groves, sage, and the most gorgeous views,” and that in perpetuity, through travel: “over and over we unravel, we unlearn.”

This juxtaposition of narrative and time creates an interesting structure. Scenes and dialogue buzz electric as we race through the script and dialogue of the drama, always set to a descriptive backdrop. Scenes upon scenes effortlessly come and it only helps that travel is built of spectacle, of misunderstanding and uncertainty.

The traveller must heed all of these, no matter mood or melancholy. The author does not spare any of the inconveniences: being lost in Vienna, the red swell of bedbugs in China or Venice in “puzzling warrens and wrong turns and beautiful dead ends.” Even a hospital bedside where life hangs in the balance.

Jarman’s tone takes us through the historical dips and veers of each of the places he visits. He includes a profile of Chairman Mao in Shanghai’s French Concession, the breath of the Iron Age Vikings in Ireland and the Japanese warships of 1937.

Jarman also speaks of villains closer to home, including Samuel de Champlain’s discovery of a big river in New Brunswick. “Local natives told Champlain the river already had a name, it was called Wolastoq. Champlain said their input was deeply appreciated and that they could look forward to Airbnb and smallpox.” Read this memoir for the editorial alone.

Readers will also identify with the weight of their own discomfort around the colonialism, migration and time. “Migrants move around us as we move, but they are not visible. Armenian and Kurdish refugees are not sipping Earl Grey tea on this sunny terrace, refugees from Syria or Sudan do not study the lovely seascape statues.” There are no excuses made for British soldiers and Irish mercenaries, although the architecture and social systems are prominent from Mumbai to Shanghai.

Through the meat mazes of Venice, Croatia, Ireland, China and back to the Mediterranean, Jarman lays thick the theme that travel changes us. Through the “atonal orchestras” of Mumbai to the “rhythmic constellations” of street dancers, it is apparent that life is a dance, and the end notes not necessarily always where we meant to go.

Perfectly encapsulated in the thought, “Am I digesting Europe, or is Europe digesting me?” we vibrate with movement, feeling and acceptance, all just short stops within each other on the journey.

When steeped with the voices of the global chorus, Jarman reminds us that we have the same access to consciousness in our own backyards. I liked the poignant reminder that, “In my yard four crows watch me, a kingfisher on a low branch watched the river, then becomes a bright blue rocket hitting the water head first.” We can always slow down, we can always watch crows, and as the Italians say, at the table you never grow old. ■ MO DUFFY COBB is the founder and editor of Pownal Street Press (pownalstreetpress.com). She has an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts in creative nonfiction and is the author of Unpacked: from PEI to Palawan, The Chemistry of Innovation: Regis Duffy and the Story of DCL and Crescent Moon Friends.