WHO TO FIX MY BEADS, THERE WAS THE RUB
Joe Fiorito

Toronto Star
April 9 2008
Canada

Used to be a worried man. No more worried songs here; in truth,
I was not worried long, a roundabout story:

I went to Armenia years ago. On the way home, I saw a tray of worry
beads on sale in the airport gift shop in Yerevan. The nicest of these
were black basalt, smooth and heavy in the hand; also inexpensive,
and I had a little money to get rid of.

I fiddled with my new beads discreetly on the plane to Paris and from
there all the way home, where I was soon in the habit of working them
as I made my way around town.

I never was good at that casual click and flick the way some old men
are, and yet the beads were a comfort in an idle moment.

One day, they broke.

The string snapped and the beads spilled. I did not lose any of them,
but I wasn’t sure how to string them back together, nor am I good
with knots.

For years, the beads sat like tiny black marbles in a small dish in
the top drawer of my dresser.

I would notice them from time to time while rummaging; a glossy black
rebuke, formless and unstrung.

The other day, it occurred to me that there ought to be a solution.

There are, after all, plenty of Armenians in this town.

I called a guy I know who works for one of the Armenian political
organizations. We normally talk about the genocide. My plea intrigued
him for a moment, but he was concerned with weightier matters and
did not seem to share what was beginning to feel like urgency to me.

I dug out the phone book and looked up "Armenia" in the yellow pages.

I made a couple more calls. No luck. But I am nothing if not
persistent. I looked up "Ararat."

Tricky, this: Mt. Ararat, the symbol of Armenia, is in Turkey.

Armenians look at the mountain every day. Relations between the
two countries are uneasy, and I did not want to find the other when
looking for the one.

I took a chance on "Ararat Fine Foods."

As an aside, I ate simply and well in Armenia. I remember lamb on
skewers grilled over charcoal late at night in a small hut by the side
of a cold road, just as I can recall the taste of the harsh red wine
and good clean bread. I watched the stars after eating, and that is
as close to paradise as it is possible, or necessary, to get.

The man who answered the phone at Ararat Fine Foods listened to me
rattle on about my beads. He was not at all perplexed.

And here, it occurs to me that I might have been perplexed had someone
made certain assumptions and called me out of the blue with a question
about the restringing of a rosary.

The man at Ararat said his name was Peter. I told him about the beads
and where I’d bought them and how they broke, and explained I wanted
to find someone who could string them back together and tell me a
bit about them.

He told me to call Indo-Iranian Rugs in Richmond Hill and ask for
Georges. He said that Georges was the man for me. He gave me the
number. I made the call.

Georges picked up the phone. I repeated my request. Georges was
courtly. He invited me to come up and see him, and said he had many
beads and he would show me his collection as he strung together mine.

I went by bus.

More on Friday.