Summering, and a Story Autopsy

The late afternoon light had that honeyed, impossible hue, like everything existed in the in-between, the blurred no man’s land that can’t (or refuses to) decide whether it’s real or pretend...

Yesterday, I stumbled across Střelecký Ostrov, the pretty little island enclave where city dwellers and tourists go to escape the heat and buzz of the crowded city streets.

As I trudged along the bustling main thoroughfare, people packed like sardines surrounded on all sides. I stared at the island from just across the bridge, jutting out from the Vltava River like a magical mirage. It looked so pristine, so peaceful.

Walking toward it, each step brought more relief. The blaring car horns faded in the distance, their honking harassing someone else into hurrying. The swell of the crowd making their way to to the Staré Město surged by me, leaving me relatively alone as I descended the staircase to what I can only describe as summer.

The moment I set foot on the island itself, the stark contrast from the harsh glare of the congested city concrete was impossible to ignore. It almost felt like I’d slipped through a veil.

The late afternoon light had that honeyed, impossible hue, like everything existed in the in-between, the blurred no man’s land that can’t (or refuses to decide) whether it’s real or pretend. Every bench was taken, every patch of grass spoken for, bodies sprawled in elegant disarray. Some barefoot, some with books. A girl with wine in a paper cup, a man with a speaker playing Bach.

The whole scene had this surreal shine to it, like I’d stumbled onto a film set where everyone knew their lighting.

It was giving East Egg energy.

Not quite Gatsby’s over-the-top manicured opulence, but a softer mirage of it. Less caviar and champagne, more Trdelník, caramelizing over open flames on little carts, sugar-tinged smoke spiralling up into the trees.

As I watched the Czech chimney pastry slowly brown and spin, something resonated in me. It felt familiar, this twisting display of culinary acrobatics.

My mind wandered past Gatsby, and settled on the collective we.

You and me.

Wrapping ourselves around expectations, around what’s wanted, what sells. Sugar-crust on the outside, hollow in the center, and just trying to hold shape while the world spins us over a spit.

I half-expected Fitzgerald´s Daisy Buchanan to appear. Barefoot, silk dress, gliding through the grass like a ballerina ghost. Her self-absorption trailing behind her like perfume. Not really seeing anyone, but painfully aware of being seen.

Beautiful, tragic, untouchable.

I remember in grad school, while discussing (more dissecting) her character, I was struck with how much it seemed people loved to hate her. Daisy, the selfish little Narcissistic fool.

But I don’t know…

As I sat there on my sun-drenched strip of grass, Trdelník sticky on my fingers, I couldn’t help but perform my own literary autopsy. While I sometimes hesitated in the past to admit to it, especially surrounded by other students who went so far as to use the word abhor, I have always felt a little sorry for Daisy.

Or maybe I just understood her.

Here was a woman who learned early how to preserve herself in a world that wanted to devour her. What looked like narcissism, maybe, was just survival, the best way she knew how.

The way Daisy moved through the world was described by Fitzgerald as “careless”, and I get what he is saying. But what if it was her actually being careful? Cautious of the world because she knew its currency? A ballerina twirling on stage, just trying to pay the rent.

We roll our eyes at her melodrama, her gauzy fragility. But what if all that flitting and sighing and sparkling was her version of armor? Society doesn’t often let women say they’re drowning, so they learn to twirl instead. To paint the outside pretty. To pretend they’re not twisted around expectations, burning in places no one sees.

I’ve judged her. I’ve been her.

As I look around and take in the scents and sights surrounding me on this little Czech island — picnics spread open on the grass, beautiful people eating sticky pastries with their fingers, laughing too loud, kissing too long, and not asking permission—I realize one wondrous truth…

This is not East Egg.

There is no glowing green light. No Gatsby haunting the end of the dock.

We are not characters at the whim of one puppet author pulling strings.

Our story isn’t already written. We get to decide how it ends.

For now, my story ends with cinnamon on my fingertips and sugar on my lips.

No self-castigation. Just summer.