An Interview With Dennis On the subject of courage, legacy, and a gremlin called George.
The interview was arranged for 2pm. Dennis arrived at 1:47 and immediately began inspecting the hinges on the door. He had to be gently redirected twice before sitting down. He was offered tea. He accepted enthusiastically and then forgot about it entirely.
The interviewer asked, to begin, whether Dennis would describe himself as brave.
Dennis laughed for quite a long time.
Oh no. No no no. I'm a lunatic. That's different. People have said so. I've blown up a lot of things. There was the Portugal situation. There were several situations before Portugal that were sort of leading up to Portugal without anyone realising.
Brave is — no. I just. I do the thing because the thing is there and it needs doing and I don't — I don't really think about the other bit.
He gestured vaguely at the other bit.
The falling-down bit. Whatever. It usually works out.
The interviewer asked about George.
Dennis stopped.
This was unusual enough that the interviewer noted it. Dennis had not, in the preceding fourteen minutes, stopped for anything.
He picked up the teacup. Set it down. Picked up a small component from his pocket — a spring, or part of one — and turned it over in his hands.
He appeared to be choosing his words with a care he did not normally apply to words.
George.
A pause.
Right. Yeah. George.
He turned the spring over again.
So. Here's the thing about George. The thing that I don't think — I want to get this right. This one I want to get right.
He set the spring down on the table.
George is scared.
That's the first thing. That's the bit everyone needs to understand before the rest of it makes sense. George is scared. Every time. I know because I've watched him do the before-bit — and then he does it anyway.
A pause.
That's the thing.
The doing it anyway.
The interviewer asked if Dennis found that admirable.
Dennis looked at them as though they had asked whether gravity was relevant.
I've thought about this a lot, actually, because I wanted to be able to say it right. I had some help with how to say this bit.
You know the moon?
There was a man who landed on it. Armstrong. And the whole world knows — the whole world remembers — that it happened. Not just him. The fact of it. That someone went there. That it was impossible and someone did it anyway, and now there's a flag up there.
It's not about the flag being his.
It's about the flag being there.
It's about the world knowing that someone went.
He was quiet for a moment.
George is like that.
Every time George does the thing — the scared thing, the thing he doesn't want to do, the thing that takes him ages and he talks himself into and he does anyway — that's a flag. On a moon.
And nobody —
his voice changed slightly, just slightly, in a way that was not quite describable
— nobody's been writing it down. Nobody's been saying: there it was. There was the flag. Did you see that.
I want them to know George was there. That he was scared and he showed up anyway. That that's what it looked like. What it actually looked like.
I don't need — it doesn't matter who built the thing. I need the flag to be there. I need George to be remembered.
He turned the spring over once.
Because he deserves it.
The interviewer asked whether Dennis thought George saw himself that way. As brave.
Dennis appeared genuinely puzzled by this question.
No.
No, he — George thinks he's just getting through it. Surviving the thing. He doesn't know about the flag.
That's the problem with being the one on the moon, isn't it. You can't see it from up there. You need someone on the ground going: there. That was it. That's what that was.
A pause.
I'm on the ground.
He said it simply. Not heroically. Just as a fact.
Someone's got to watch for the flags.
The interviewer thanked Dennis for his time. They asked, as a final question, whether there was anything that required courage from him.
Dennis picked up the spring. He turned it over. He was quiet for longer than he had been quiet at any point in the interview.
I don't — I'm not brave. I told you. I'm a lunatic. I just do the thing.
The words are — sometimes the words are hard. They move around. Like ball bearings. And I have to — I had to ask someone to help me say the George bit right. Because it was important and I didn't want to get it wrong.
Everyone else just has them. The words. They're just there. I have to —
He stopped.
I have to go and find them first.
But that's not the same thing. That's just — you do what you have to do. You ask for the help. You get the words. You say the thing.
He stood up. Remembered the tea. Looked at it. Decided against it.
Someone's got to watch for the flags.
He left.
He had been there for forty-seven minutes.
He had not once looked at his own flag.
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