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Illustration by Catherine Chan
In the winter of 1996, I arrived on the doorstep of Canadian poet P.K. Page’s Victoria home clutching a tape recorder and tiny cassettes like a lamb to the slaughter.
My father’s car idled at the curb. From the porch I batted the air in his direction fearing evidence I was a still-living-at-home student, without a car or a licence, might undermine my journalistic credibility. Wielding the small-b bravado afforded a student of Creative Writing 101: Introduction to Journalism, I rang the bell.
Weeks earlier, I’d pitched my choice of interview subject for a first feature assignment. Once he’d read my proposal, my professor took me aside to ask if I was sure P.K. Page was the right subject to tackle. Not a question, exactly. I can’t remember the careful words he used, but the effect was clear, even if I realized it too late: P.K. didn’t suffer fools. I glimpsed the imposter journalist in the reflection of the front door but determined running would be futile. The tail lights of my father’s car were already disappearing at the end of the block.
I remember wondering if the elderly man who answered the door was P.K.’s ancient butler or gardener. In fact, he was Arthur Irwin – P.K.’s husband, former editor-in-chief of Maclean’s and one-time diplomat. But I knew none of that. Back then, I had only the faintest idea of what a diplomat did besides rack up points on a travel card.
I followed him down the hallway. He must have sensed my hesitation. “Go ahead,” he nodded toward the basement stairs. His warmth gave me hope things might not turn out badly. In retrospect, he was offering one final kindness.
I turned into the cool air of the basement lounge and there was P.K. Dressed in black and wearing a turtleneck that signalled curatorial remoteness, her posture was impeccable. I don’t think she smiled.
The details of our exchange are opaque. It seems to me we sat across from one another, and that I was adrift in the middle of the couch while she was tucked into an occasional chair. Perhaps it was the other way around.
I was armed to the teeth with questions – some decent, some awful – but altogether too many to squeeze into the allotted timeframe. I teed up only the first of these before P.K. raised a palm to stop me. “Would you consider asking your question another way?” It was clear she would tolerate only what she would and no more.
Throughout our exchange, I sensed she was assessing me to determine what I was about, how much time I warranted. I worried this mind I longed to understand would dismiss mine as unworthy, my questions as amateur. No doubt they were.
At one point, she asked about my ambitions and what could I say? “To be a writer like you.” Where was the objectivity in that?
After a while, P.K. halted our conversation and stared at me quietly. I never doubted her prerogative to hold me suspended there, wondering what came next. She considered me carefully – a long, searching look. Finally, she said: “I’d like you to come and visit me again.”
My heart soared. I’d done it. I’d survived, maybe even thrived, despite long odds. Survival felt like winning a Webster, maybe a Pulitzer. In an instant, my writing career spooled ahead of me like a red carpet. There was just enough time to celebrate before the caveat landed with a thud: “But not too soon,” she added. They are words you don’t forget. Still, once inflated, the bubble refused to burst.
When she spoke again, P.K. directed me to fetch a handful of items from the kitchen upstairs: two small crystal glasses, a bottle of sherry, and a Tupperware container from her freezer.
I took the stairs, two at a time. There I was in P.K. Page’s kitchen unsupervised, wearing a demented grin. I was digging in P.K.’s freezer. She had enjoyed our chat! I didn’t dare touch the magnetic poetry on the fridge in case it was a work-in-progress.
Back downstairs, we sipped the sherry and ate cheddar biscuits that were cold to the touch. Immediately, the sweet warmth of the liquor spread through my anxious tissues. I felt myself becoming incautious and giddy to be sharing private moments with an icon, though I sensed a single misstep would force me to slide my glass and half-eaten biscuit back across the coffee table. But for a moment, it was not about who she was and who I was not or the gulf between us.
When I saw her later in interviews and documentaries, I thought, I know that woman. I’ve seen the inside of her freezer.
I considered writing to P.K. years later to thank her for indulging a tedious student rather than marching her to the door by the shoulders. That our meeting had transpired was enough. It was a reason to write and to keep writing, even decades on.
Sarah Pollard lives in Victoria.