2011年12月27日火曜日

Presence

Christmas. A celebration. A tradition. A feast. A consumerist splurge. A religiously biased and therefore contentious term in public relations. What else? What is christmas to you? 
I am not a Christian, but I am anthropologically and theologically curious, adventurous, and flexible. The chameleon is my totemic animal, and I tend to experience any colors I crawl across with my entire body, observing with rolling eyes the environment I have blended into. If I enjoy the sensation, I retain its memory in my scales for future use.
I grew up celebrating christmas as a day when fairy-tales come true, when families get together, when the house is decorated, when music is played, good food is eaten, and gifts are exchanged. Occasional snow and cold weather added romance and winter fun, and made the warmth emanating from cookie baking ovens and bustling family members inside the house even more precious. The tale of Jesus’s birth in the stable was part of it, too - served in christmas carols, kindergarten plays, and porcelain nativity scenes inherited from more pious generations - so even though I was not raised in a Christian household, I grew up immersed in Christian traditions, and I am happy for it.
Jesus is best known for dying a horrible death on the cross and rising from the dead a few days later, but it is his birthday that marks the most elaborate Christian celebration in most Christian countries today. Jesus of Nazareth brought significant gifts to many, including universal forgiveness for their sins, constant soul support and companionship, and eternal life in exchange for following his rules here on earth. When he was alive, he built things. He taught generosity, neighborly love, courage, charity, and honesty, and healed people from ailments and handicaps. The festive food eaten for Christmas - and traditionally shared with the poor - as well as the gifts exchanged are apt symbols for the honorable life style he advocated. 
Watching scenes of customers attacking competitors with pepper spray at Walmart to secure the best deals for electronic items on Black Friday, and desperately pushing our way through cities that seem to hemorrhage christmas spirit while consumption madness sprouts like a giant tumor from every commercial-ridden street corner, and christmas carols lull shoppers into more vexing desires, more tempting deals, and more outrageous splurges, it seems that the original spirit of christmas has become perverted and distorted in many minds and places. 
I, on the other hand, was blessed this year to celebrate christmas with a group of people who have chosen to counter-act this trend, seeking a life based on ideas like community, self-sustainability, exchange, and making the most of local resources. When a small core group of people started this community 20 years ago, they made a rule that no kids would be allowed on their land. Today, they have matured. We have babies, children, teenagers, adults, and elders, and there is talk of finding space for a cemetery. Whatever life style, whatever ideology you choose, being human, you cannot escape birth, disease, old age, and death - and all that they entail. 
The focus in community life is on walking the path of being human together. On eating the cake together instead of having it alone. On baking the cake instead of buying it. On sharing and thereby multiplying our strengths and possessions. On “Mend and make do to save buying new.” On giving and receiving. On nurturing our own and each other’s individual sparks; creating and disseminating skills, joy, and support.
The three main items on our agenda for christmas day express this philosophy in a nutshell. 
  1. Piñata - The children whack the piñata until it cracks open, and are rewarded for their efforts with copious supplies of candy. They are happy and high for the day. 
  2. Potluck: everybody makes and brings food to be shared.
  3. Everybody brings a present. Presents are exchanged in a game with the following rules: each participant receives a number. The number marks a person’s turn. Number 1 means, you get to choose and unwrap the first present. Number 2 means you get to choose the second present. As Number 2 you may either take the present Number 1 has already unwrapped or unwrap a new present. The game continues in this fashion, and each person has the choice of either taking away a present that has already been unwrapped, or getting a new present from the pile. After a present has changed hands twice, however, it is locked and can no longer be taken.
We have had two months of nearly constant rain in Puna that has turned our land into a swamp. Four-wheel drives are increasingly useful; diseases like sore throats, headaches, and eczema are going strong and must be kept at bay with saltwater gargling, hot drinks, ginger, garlic, and turmeric; leather, towels, window screens, fabrics, furniture, and yoga mats get moldy and must be checked and cleaned daily. 
One day I open a drawer and hardly recognize my passport under a layer of blue fur. I have to wipe a drop of sweat and a distraught look off my face as I grab a cloth to save my internationally mobile identity, threatening to be overgrown by jungle mold. When the blue-gray coating gives way to chipped golden lettering on wine-red leather, however, what I hold in my hand seems like a mysterious alien object from a long forgotten world that has nothing to do with myself. Spooked, I throw it back in the drawer and kick it shut. I might go back to this later. For now I am merging with the elements around me, exploring the chemical reactions that occur and the new materials they yield.  
We have all been dreaming of a dry christmas. And our wish is granted. Christmas day this year comes with rich blessing of sunshine. We enjoy the first glasses of home-made organic eggnog and locally brewed beer outside in the sun, hang the piñata from a tree, and let the kids pick up their candy from a patch of nearly mud-free lawn. 
Potluck today is bounteous. People have made extra efforts to piece together a special feast. In addition to my usual oat and raisin cookies I have made the second cheesecake of my life and decorated it with chocolate and whipped cream. Other dishes served include: brined roast chicken, kumquat skins filled with chocolate, grilled ribs of grass-fed Hawaiian beef, vegan sunflower paté with gluten-free gravy, English cheese, freshly harvested avocado, lemon pie, mozzarella and tomato with basil, filled wine leaves, oven-roasted vegetables, orange, green, and white tortillas, vegan and non-vegan rice pudding, mashed, and scalloped potatoes. 
After our bellies are filled, the most interesting part of the party begins: the gift giving game. In our community, company executives are rare. We have some licensed medical marihuana growers. Alternative medicine makers. Teachers. Homemakers. A clown. A translator. People scraping by on welfare and small jobs including market vending, crafting, cleaning, house-and dog sitting, etc. Creative genius and eccentricity abound. These demographics make for an exciting variety of presents.
But what is even more exciting is observing the dynamics of the game. How people handle getting something and then having it taken away from them. The choices they make: Do they go for the gamble of taking something they know and love that might be taken away from them again? Do they go for the safe choice of a present that gets locked in their hands? Or do they go for the surprise of unwrapping a new gift? 
Are they selfish? Or do they pay attention to other’s needs and valiantly hunt presents for their partners, children, friends, or parents? Are they active or passive? Bold or polite? Impulsive or calculating? Do they try to advertise unwanted presents to the next taker so they can conquer something new? Do they express their love for a particular present passionately as soon as they see it or quietly hide their feelings until they get a chance to grab it? How do they take the loss of having a loved present taken away from them? Crisis or opportunity?
As the gift giving game unfolds, I see all of this and more. D. almost cries when his machete gets taken away from him. T. pulls a sneak attack on my chopsticks. N. conquers a beautiful shawl for his wife; she tries to return the favor with a 30-minute full body massage for him, wrapped up in a mandala, but it gets snatched away from her again. Old G. who usually needs a walker, performs a hot little dance with his Hawaiian ti-leaf crown, waving two large leaves by his side in an enchanting hula imitation. 
I see people barter, rattling boxes of energizing mints to make them look more attractive, sticking decorative tiles in people’s faces to hide all their other choices. Some carelessly show off fashion pieces only to be flabbergasted when somebody else claims them. Participants blessed with precious gems hide their booty, silently looking away as the present hunter passes by to strike. 
Another interesting element is to see what presents are the most coveted. Watching the spectacle unfold I feel inspired to make an experiment and have people play this game in different communities, in different places and living scenarios to compare the most coveted presents. Gifts that change hands twice in our game include: a set of 3 cast iron skillets, a bottle of Jack Daniels, a machete, a full-body massage, a studded belt, and a pair of hand-crafted warm walking socks with snake tongues- and faces. 
It is an enriching experience to be exposed to all the forces and factors at play in the gift giving game. I start off with a beautiful set of handmade chopsticks. They get taken away from me unexpectedly. I go for a new surprise and get an equally beautiful shawl. Once again, I get robbed of it. I decide to open an interesting small envelope and am thrilled to discover a voucher for a quart of home-made yoghurt (expensive to buy here!) by a good and trusted cook. Once again, very unexpectedly, it gets taken away. This time, there is only one more wrapped present left, and I go hunting among the unwrapped loot for the first time. I decide to claim a gift box that contains a silver pen, an empty journal, and a calendar for next year - a fresh angel message for every day. 
During the game, I feel animated and emotionally engaged in the gift giving part, but really I am much more interested in the human dimension of it, watching everybody’s moves unfold like the chapters of a psycho-thriller leading to its resolution. While I have each present, I am happy with it. When it gets taken away from me I go through a short stage of slight disappointment, competitive indignation, or surprise, then happily grab the opportunity by the reins. 
After all I know what I signed up for from the beginning, and our founding father quite aptly describes this activity as “a Buddhist game” of non-attachment. While I was happy with each present I had, I feel I have ended up with the perfect present. If this development is any indication for how things are going to go next year, I see an abundant, happy year coming. Now, is this due to the way the game went, or to my carefully crafted attitude? I will never know, but I will always keep working on my attitude - just in case, and because it is all I can do. 
As the tumultuous, exciting, dramatic, and competitive mosaic of human relations, emotions, and individual psychologies comes to an overall happy end, I feel that really, it is not the presents that matter. It is the exchange, the gathering, the game. Maybe, what we should focus on as we try to make this annual celebration meaningful again is presence instead of presents. This seems to be much closer to the origin of christmas than greedy consumerist pepper spray battles. After all, Christ’s most appreciated gift to people is his continued presence. I’m sure you’ve heard fervent preachers say “Jesus cares!” or “Jesus loves you!” A caring, loving presence in our life is something we all long for, something we all need, and something we all can give, regardless of our circumstances. 
Darkness descends, a fire is lit, and music is played. Ukuleles, drums, guitars, recorders. Voices: some musical but uneducated, some the exact opposite. Listening to these songs, equally familiar and unknown, a smile spreads across my face. We are doing something important here. Regardless of our skills, talents, and backgrounds, we are actively striving for harmony. We are born, we get sick, we grow old, we die. This is the part we cannot change. But as long as we are here, we can do out best. We can give and receive presence. Mele Kalikimaka. 

2011年12月9日金曜日

Between Halloween and Thanksgiving

November 2011 was a month of sickness, work, and grief. Not bad, but sad. 
Right on time for Halloween I was struck down by a mighty virus. Falling under the category ‘communal funk’, a term we use in our community to describe the downside of sharing almost everything in our daily lives, it had been going around, hitting everybody at their weak spot - in my case thrusting its pointed blade straight at my left tonsil, an easy target, which, along with the other one should have been pulled out when I was a child suffering from tonsillitis every other month. 
This particular funk had an especially powerful beat to it. It knocked me out so thoroughly, I could not even muster up the strength to leave my bed and drag myself to the desk, never mind sit and work. Once again it opened my eyes to how vulnerable we are. No health, no wealth. I did, however, have something to cheer me up: I was filled with confidence that whatever had snuck into my system would retreat within a matter of days or, at worst, weeks. 
As my dear friend and mentor P. was on my mind, it struck me how my situation stood in sharp contrast to his. Suffering from something that according to the specialists would not heal, but take him rather rapidly to his grave, he was preparing for his departure. Having just met him in this condition, seen him laugh and make jokes, teach and practice aikido, sit and drink whiskey with his friends, gave my admiration for him another boost. 
I have always loved costumes and jumped at any opportunity to wear one. I once imposed a super hero theme on a Bath aikido party. Nobody else shared my excitement, which resulted in me being the only one wearing a costume. P. had come as himself, however, beating the heroism of my Lara Croft hands down, in spite of authentic gun holsters and pellet guns. 
This year I was forced to leave my love of costumes in the darkest corner of my wardrobe and forgo the spooky costume craze of Halloween. Instead, the face of life unmasked presented itself to me, grimacing like a reflection in a trick mirror, silently screaming out the blunt reality of being mortal and living in a circle of friends and loved ones who share this trait with us like the creeping shadow of communal funk, bouncing and bobbing in the sun, while we drag our cursed bodies along in the heat. 
This resulted in a truly spooky Halloween. My fever-shaken body fell into an uneasy sleep, heat threatening to coagulate proteins, shivers hammering in the pending reality of eternal cold like a jackhammer, mind maneuvering through the stormy strait between this world and that, between sleep and wakefulness, dream and reality. Then suddenly, into an expanse of calm, a vision unfolded. 
At first, I could barely make out the silhouettes of the two figures sitting opposite each other at the small table. But as I drew closer, the scene brightened like an oil lamp had been lit between them, and before I knew it I could see them as clearly as if I was right there with them, first hovering, then clinging on to the grapevine. 
At one side of the table sat my friend P., bent over slightly, clasping a glass filled almost half way with golden liquid, turning it left and right, left and right. Opposite him sat a tall skeleton wearing an ornate late 17th century tricorn on his head, sporting two perfect round eyeballs still attached to their sockets. Next to this grotesque pirate leaned a saber, which he swiftly picked up and swung about in a masterful circle, swishing past P.’s face, whizzing through his own spine at the neck, making his head jump up a foot before it landed crooked between his spine and collarbones. His eyeballs rolled around in their sockets, looking for help. His bony fingers picked up his head and re-attached it to his spine. 
He picked up his own glass of golden liquid, and raised it. ‘Tis the last day of autumn, my brother,’ he said with a voice worn down by liqueur and tobacco, then upgraded with the echo of eternal life. ‘The time has come to take stock and prepare for the cold winter months ahead. Come drink with me to that!’ He clanged his glass to P.’s and poured its contents through his jaws, from where they dropped straight down his rib cage. 
This captured P.’s attention. He had so far been watching the light play in his drink, dejected. Prepared for anything, but tired and unsure what to expect. Now he was following the drops of rum down his interlocutor’s vacant body, licking them with his eyes as the last trickle ran across his vertebrae. With refreshed curiosity, P. now lifted his own glass, raised it to the other, looking him deep in the eyeballs, and took the smallest sip. Testing and tasting it on his tongue, his teeth spread like pearls into a rare and precious smile. ‘Excellent.’ An explosive sound of monosyllabic laughter jumped from his throat, ringing bright and clear in the air, making the bones across the table vibrate loudly against chair and floor. 
In lieu of clearing its throat, the skeleton quietened its rattling and spoke up again. ‘I am not here to show you the sense-void emptiness of death. You are aware of it. You taste each sip of life with all your senses, you make each moment rich with deed, you exercise your flesh and work it through your spirit.’ ‘Spirit!’ P. chuckled quietly, and a mischievous look of love permeated his facial features. ‘I’ll drink that. I mean TO that!’ He clanged his glass on the pirate’s, looked him in the eyeballs, and relished another sip, joy and intentional indulgence spreading across his features. ‘YES, rub it in!’ The pirate retorted, crossing his arms in front of his rib cage, having poured down the contents of his own glass in one loveless sweep of futility. 
The warmth of the drink began to glow through P.’s cheeks, and he straightened his posture facing the pirate. ‘I like your eyeballs. Do I get to keep mine too?’ A gust of held back indignation swept against the pirate’s eyeballs from inside his bones and pushed the left one out, where it bobbed up and down, hanging on to a thin nerve like a spider on a desperate thread. He took the tip of a handkerchief tied around his left wrist and carefully rubbed the fallen eyeball clean. He popped it back into its socket like a lost contact lens and looked at P. with fresh brightness. ‘If you take good care of them, you might be lucky.’ P. blew a puff of amusement through his nostrils. 
The skeleton continued: ‘Now as I mentioned, ‘tis time to prepare for the cold winter months ahead.’ ‘I am a diligent wood chopper.’ P. replied and took another good look at the two eyeballs across the table. The pirate’s jaws opened into a garish display of shrill laughter. Two ribs clattered to the ground, and his spine cracked as he bent back and forth in frivolous spasms of senseless amusement. P. picked up a rib that had fallen on his side and clicked it into place as the skeleton was repairing his other parts. ‘You take good care of yourself!’ P. smiled and took another sip of rum. ‘Such a handsome body.’ The pirate’s jaw dropped onto the table, while P. laughed, indulging in his own joke without holding back. ‘Sorry,’ he finally managed to say. ‘I just had to see your jaw drop once. Go ahead. Speak.’
‘Thank you,’ said the pirate, cracking his jaw back into place. ‘Now, my diligent wood chopper friend, this is your lucky day.’ ‘One of them, no doubt,’ P. replied, gaining more and more color as the liquid in his glass receded. ‘What gives me the pleasure?’ ‘Tis Halloween, the time of year when the physical and the supernatural worlds are closest, and magical things can happen with ease.’ ‘Such as our meeting?’ ‘Such as our meeting.’ the pirate confirmed, now obviously talking business. 
‘So it is magical, not fated?’ asked P. The pirate clarified. ‘An opportunity, but not an imposition.’ ‘What a charming host,’ P.’s eyebrows rose. He grinned. ‘Let’s drink to that.’ He held up his glass and spotted irritation in the eyeballs across the table. ‘I’m sorry,’ he forced down his chuckle with another sip. 
The skeleton spoke up. ‘You have been feeling the tug of your final sentence on your days, and then the tug of your days on your final sentence. Your life is shrinking yet expanding.’ ‘I am my own event horizon.’ P. completed the pirate’s accurate description of his recent experience. 
‘You are an expert at Japanese martial arts,’ said the skeleton. P. raised his eyebrows, wondering what he was getting at. ‘You know the Japanese custom of seppuku?’ ‘A gruesome custom, yes.’ ‘Gruesome like your condition. But with an inbuilt clause of mercy. A helper who cuts off the disemboweled’s head to end his pain and shorten his throes.’ ‘O mercy.’ ‘You’ve seen my skill with the saber.’ He offered. ‘I felt it swish past my forehead,’ P. confirmed. The pirate elaborated. ‘I have come on this propitious day to tell you, you may call me if you need me, and I shall assist you.’ The room darkened as face and skull approached each other across the table, illuminated eerily from below by the waning flame of the oil lamp. ‘Who do I call?’ P. asked, and the pirate answered: ‘Saber!’
The light went out, leaving the room in complete darkness, and I suddenly felt cold. I woke up, cold sweat covering my body, teeth clattering like rattling bones. Chilled to the bone, my fever was receding. 
A few days later I got a message from P. ‘My life is getting shorter, but at the same time stretching. Maybe I am my own event horizon. One of these days I will have to invent my own version of seppuku. But not quite yet.’
My brave friend and mentor P. passed away between Halloween and Thanksgiving. I was drowning in an exceptional flood of finance and alien cult translations when I got the news, struggling to keep my focus, digressing again and again into conjuring up memories, mopping up tears, talking and writing to my dear friend. Work - like life: a blessing and a curse. 
Addicted to the shape I take on, the shape my words draw when I address him, I still write to him. No new feedback can contribute to the way I keep shaping myself. I can hope for no more custom-tailored advice. No more shared laughter or practical jokes played on each other. My task from now on is to cherish his life, his teachings, and his friendship, including the grief his passing has left; to keep putting his advice into practice, and encourage myself and others to emulate the essence of his teachings. He summed it up in a nutshell after informing me he had been diagnosed with cancer:
‘There are good things about this business. I have discovered that all I want to do is carry on doing what I am doing. This is good because it means that I always have been doing exactly what I should have been doing.’
In his native Bath, a host of friends, loved ones, and family saw him off with sparklers to Bob Dylan’s song ‘You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go’ as he had requested. I was unable to attend, so on Thanksgiving day, I used the occasion to give thanks to him on our lava platform, introducing him to Pele, Goddess of the Volcano, lighting a little fire, and imagining all his new shapes and adventures. 
Six Limerix
I once met a man in Bath
He put me onto his path
With a left-handed punch,
An enlightening crunch,
And a thweep that that me on my arthe.* 
*note to the reader not to be read: = “a sweep that sat me on my arse” said without front teeth 
Our fighting got better and bolder
I knocked out his tooth with my shoulder
He had a new story
I basked in my glory
It made us both richer and golder. 
Our first shared passion was fighting
The next we discovered was writing -
Soon followed by cooking,
A theatre booking,
And then the odd werewolf sighting.
To capture his essence is tricky
Though it does stick around like a hickey
Compulsive mischief was part of his kiss
Compulsive charity beefed up its bliss,
His humour was limericky. 
He may pretend to be dead
But he’s alive in my head
And kicking in my actions,
And frolicking in my distractions,
With all that he did and said. 
That lightning-struck night I heard him howl,
Saw thunder clouds roll back and scowl,
And reveal a full moon
To a well known tune
I take it he’s out on the prowl.