800 words on 800 words

It has been over a week now since I finished the series 800 Words on Acorn. It’s fair to say that it has made an impression on me. Certainly, there’s the incredibly beautiful surroundings that New Zealand is well known for – leafy waterfalls and forest cheek-by-jowl with perfect beaches – but there is more than setting to it, and more than rounded characters who actually grow and change in mostly believable ways over the course of the episodes. 800 Words is a homage to communication, to words of every kind (spoken, written, unspoken) and their ability to provoke and to heal, to bear witness to what is sacred, to grow and to explore.

We begin, for example, with the posing of the problem: the silence of an absent partner, the riddle of a move made seemingly with little justification to a place whose ties to the family are at best tangential. It is easier to believe that what drives George is the desire to get away, to remove himself from the reminders of place and people that tie him to Laura than to believe in his stated goal of starting over. His move relocates him from large city to small town; from family to strangers; from a comfortable, modern home to a fixer-upper with a dodgy septic tank; from memories of Weld as a childhood vacation paradise to the adult reality of trying to fit in a gossipy small town dominated by a single family.

The one thread George retains is his column. Exactly 800 words, non-negotiable – a rule, in the chaos, to live by. The column becomes a character, a public-private interlocutor, patiently listening as George probes for meaning, untangling the knot of aspiration, hurt and self-doubt inside him, and at the same time pushing that expression forward, demanding something from him when others are not in a position to do so. It communicates George to George, and through his eyes, communicates Weld to Weld, bridging George into the community in a way that his actions otherwise would not. Through it, he becomes the “real author” talking to the book club about everything except his writing, and the dignified though understandably heart-broken husband dealing with his grief without the need to collapse emotionally or throw furniture. In honest communication, George finds catharsis. The kinds of hurts that are and remain too deep to express fully nevertheless are eased one spec at a time, one wave after another, though the solace of repeated pattern.

Moreover, what is true in the grand scheme is also true in the everyday turn of events. Communication, even done badly, even done intentionally badly, is better than no communication at all, for where there is communication, this is potential for improvement. George’s house, egregiously misrepresented by Monty, becomes an anchor point in the friendship George builds with Woody, and a safe place for people in transition. George’s misguided challenge to “the Orca,” issued out of pride, becomes a community celebration. Jan’s openness about the multiple possible fathers for her twins allows the three men to come together in a mutually supportive way when they might well have been adversaries.

Conversely, in the world of 800 words, lack of communication is always a source of problems. The silence after George’s first date with Katie; Woody’s use of the invoice as a proxy for his jealousy over George and Tracey’s friendship; the hidden details of the plans to turn Weld into a space port; and Shay stealing her mother’s ashes (among many examples) are all signs of something broken that requires dialogue to resolve.

From this point of view, it was obvious from the first few episodes that George ought to end up with Katie. While Fiona is more impressive and driven, Tracey is more witty and adventurous, and Hannah is more fun-loving and free-spirited, Katie is the most willing to engage at a deep level, naturally empathetic, self-expressive, creative and nurturing. Nonetheless, all four women as well as Woody, Big Mac, George’s children, and others contribute something important to George’s progression, the sum of their collective influences pushing George in the different directions of discomfort he needs to go, and supporting him when he falters.

This last point is, perhaps, why I will miss this series the most: communication is best in community. As 800 Words progresses, George’s column becomes less important as an emotional reflection as its role is transferred to the friends around him. What begins in estrangement, even from his own children, ends in a chorus. The triumph of 800 Words is not the existentialist portrait of a lone individual coming to know himself, but rather a man finding self-knowledge and recovery through belonging, integrated and woven into the self-knowledge of others. In a time of so much isolation, this is a hopeful truth.