Two Years Later

Mary Oliver says, “ Meanwhile the wile geese,

High in the clean blue air, are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination

Calls to you like the wild geese,

Harsh and exciting –

Over and over announcing your place in the family of things.”

It’s ironic that I am once again reminded of her words.

Almost two years after I first came across them in this same country.

As I once again try to find my own place in the family of things.

In August of 2011 I had no expectation that my life would be changed.

Now here I am, reminded at every minute, with every smiling face, silent tear, and joyous laughter of the person I was before and the person I am now. Reminded of the strength that out lasts fear and joy that out lasts pain.

In October of that year rain destroyed everything. Killed the baby at Casita Blanca. Washed the women down the road. Left my family cold and hungry.

Last week I sat on Angelica’s patio, writing only by the light of the candle, at peace even after the storm knocked out the power because we still laughed and danced and cooled off in the rain.

In December I said goodbye and I thought the world was sure to end.

Now here I am, after memories became distant. After names took a moment to recall. After a 122 day countdown started in January. 4 weeks in El Salvador. Back in the United States. Certain life has continued, that the world will not end.

A year later, things were better. I wrote to wake up, fell in love with St. Louis.

Then this past December, when my mom was diagnosed with cancer, the reality of losing a parent was still so distant.

Then on June 9^th, we lost Samuel, our beloved micro driver, father and friend. Nelson said, “when this happens one can only imagine themselves in the same situation”. And it hit me.  Now my mom sits in her rocking chair, no hair on her hear. Squeezing her eyes as I giver her her shots for the day.

 

Then Spring time brought flowers and sun, long walks in the park and the love of woman named Ann Manganaro.

Now I’ve been to Guarjila. Walked the grounds of the clinic. Met up with Marilyn and translated the mass for Ann’s twin and sisters. Stories, chocolate, and pan dulce were shared. Everything came full circle. Eyes filled with tears for loss and for gratitude.            

           

On May 25^th I boarded a plane, seeking validation that the experience I had, the love I felt, was real not imagined.

In four weeks I spent no more than six hours alone. I was accompanied by mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, most constantly fighting to survive. All with a power to pray, to give thanks, to offer blessings, food and beds.
Two years later, babies have been born. Lives have been lost.

Two years later El Salvador is still home.

Two years later the love is still real.

Two years later, we still sore, like Mary Oliver’s wild geese, trying to find our place in the family of things.

What Each Breath Felt Like

Inhale…

Sitting perches against the wall

Watching every raindrop

Toes just an inch away from the falling water.

Safe.

Trying to understand how this all came to be.

Trying not to hate the rain.

Recognizing the life it brings.

The corn, the coffee, the beans.

Contrasted with this morning’s funeral.

Samuel’s life taken by cancer.

While my own mom awaits the next phase of her treatment.

Fear.

Where time flies yet seconds can last a lifetime.

Constant accompaniment.

Millions of questions.

Everything aligns.

And it makes sense that nothing makes sense.

Beauty.

Exhale…

Como Ya Sabes/ As You Already Know

Como ya sabes that the men act a certain way.

That mauchismo is alive and well.

In Tepecoyo. San Salvador. St. Louis.

Como ya sabes that the men drink

Don’t come home until morning

After their daughters go looking for them.

Como ya sabes that they waste the money they earn.

While their wives and children go hungry

One tortilla shared for each meal.

Como ya sabes that men think they are stronger

Even as women run households

Build concrete pillas

And fight to seguir adelante every day.

Como ya sabes that the men don’t wash dishes.

Or cook.

Or clean.

Como ya sabes that we walked to the US to be with my husband

And then he left me and my children alone with nothing.

Como ya sabes that men rape and beat their wives

Girlfriends

Children

And the innocent woman coming home from work in the darkness of the night.

Como ya sabes Linsita que así es la vida.

Yes I know…

But why does that make it okay?

United States of Ch'an

Reading Penelope Fitzgerald is ch'an
Stretching out on the beach is ch'an
Quitting your suckey job is ch'an
Sitting and not being productive is ch'an
Befriending your arch-nemesis is ch'an
Attending to your 13th patient of the day is ch'an
Expanding, radiating, and dissolving is ch'an
Remembering to pull out the paintbrush from the enormous pile of stuff is ch'an
Kissing the beloved is ch'an
Washing the lettuce is ch'an
Knocking on the front door is ch'an
Driving with no music  playing is ch'an
Bowing to the ducks in Forest Park is ch'an
Repeating the form 1000 times is ch'an
Texting a troubled friend just the right gatha is ch'an
Drinking a glass of cool water on a 95 degree day is ch'an
Remaining unfazed by the spectacular is ch'an
Smiling while being stood up for 40 minutes is ch'an
Being OK with not being OK is ch'an
Holding your friend's hand while she is holding yours is ch'an
Brushing your teeth with brio is ch'an
Swimming one  mile, biking 25, and running six is ch'an
Looking at your tattoo is ch'an
Looking up at the blue, blue sky is ch'an
Seeing Buddhas every which way you look is ch'an







--Zen is the Japanese word
that translates ch’an
which is the Chinese word
that translates dhyana
which is the Sanskrit word
for “meditation.”

Insertion

Wherever you have refugees, you have vultures who feed off them.

–Kuan Ying, quoted in Lady Borton, Sensing the Enemy: An American Woman among the Boat People of Vietnam [101]

Three worlds collide in this memoir by a more or less Quaker (“I’d never joined a Quaker meeting” {59}], Lady Borton: the world of Vietnam (Quang Ngai)  where she spent two years, 1969-1971, working with AFSC; her life as a school bus driver in rural Ohio where for years she had tried in vain to write a novel about Vietnam; and her six months on Pulau Bidong, West Malaysia as a project director for Vietnamese refugees.   She went because “I felt I needed to shake my introspection. I wanted distance from books and I thought the six months might provide perspective. Or maybe, if I were honest, I’d say I fled.” [16]  She herself was descended from Quaker boat people of three hundred years before.

The refugee camp had such areas of concern as the following: education, administration, engineering, language interpretation and translation, security, labor recruitment, social welfare, sanitation, and health.  [25] “As an administrator, I didn’t write memos, letters, feasibility studies, and project assessments in quadruplicate. Instead I ran errands. And I listened.” [35]

She took a hard look at what is happening to the refugees, either on the high seas, or at the camp.  “I checked on eighty-three new arrivals, among whom were twelve women and girls who’d been raped by Thai pirates. One girl was nine years old. [37]  “No one knows how many boat people never made it. The Vietnamese said more drowned than landed. Some Malaysians stopped eating fish; they said it tasted of decay.” [62]

She was honest, too, about her own weaknesses, like wanting to leave: “Much of the time I was tired and when I was discouraged, which was often, I counted the months until my departure in August, wishing for silence and someone to hold me.” [40] “Monika and Jim’s obsessive work frightened me, drawing me back into that destructively compulsive drive I’d felt when trying to write. With them I felt like a recovered alcoholic surrounded by soused drinking buddies. I never learned what drove them so; and they never learned what drove me.” [45] “A heaviness began to press on me. I wanted to be elsewhere, anywhere else but on that island and in that stark room with its cell-like walls and its louvered windows with bars made of glass.” [154] She recorded her anger as well, directed here at a  supercilious European mouthing off on how messy the Vietnamese are:  “You overstuffed rodent, I thought. Why don’t you go clean your plate in some chic restaurant?” [163]

Unsurprisingly, the boat people left Vietnam because of “the Communists.”  She heard one refugee lament the Communists: “The Vietnamese Communists are cruel. They give only three kilos of rice per person per month when an adult needs twenty-one. There’s no gas for motorcycles nor batteries for radios. And there are no jobs to make money to buy anything.”  Lady Borton reflected, “I nodded, knowing that there in the crowded hut on Bidong I’d never be able to explain how American dollars had created a market among Vietnamese for Western consumer goods unavailable before the war and unaffordable after.” [66]

I wonder what her views are now of “worthy victims.”  Just last night, I was perusing Eddie Adams photos of the boat people, which  were evidently used for U.S. propaganda purposes.  How was her book first received?

As the author would admit, six months of an American’s life—its hardships and aches—is nothing compared to the boat people’s or the Vietnamese who remained in Vietnam and attempted to start a new life under impossible circumstances. In the last chapter, she wrote “…I felt as if Bidong had cured me of a long, painful illness. I was ready to go back to America.” [175]

This book helps me try to visualize what a family  I met in the 1980s may have gone through.  As Tho said: “When we arrived on Bidong, I felt jubilant. Now I understand that Vietnamese like me must scatter over the earth. Our country is lost to us. This island is our last Vietnam.” [73]

Thich Nhat Hanh has said, “Plum Village is everywhere.” So, too, is Vietnam, as you can see on South Grand in Saint Louis, Missouri.

Toward a Curriculum for an Institute for the Cultivation of Slowness

For Lindsay

Morning Aspiration: Upon first waking up in the morning, recite this gatha from Thich Nhat Hanh:
“Waking up this morning, I smile:
Twenty-four brand new hours are before me.
I vow to live fully in each moment
And to look on all beings with the eyes of compassion.”

Experiment:  On the highway where the speed limit is 60, go under 55.

Reflection:  Consider the following from India mystic, Meher Baba:
“A mind that is fast is sick.
A mind that is slow is sound.
A mind that is still is divine.”
When and how is your mind sick?
When and how is your mind sound?
When and how is your mind divine?

Reading: Marx, “The Working Day,” in Capital, v. 1.

Experiment: Go for one week and eat your meals only when sitting down (not standing, not driving, etc.).

Training in appreciation: Take a stroll along Flora Avenue and notice what catches your attention. Do one block in 10-15 minutes.

Experiment: Get up a half hour early each day for a week. See how this affects the rhythm of your day.

Training in focus: Instead of doing four things at a time, try doing two.

Reading: Tolstoy, The Emperor’s Three Questions.

Training in letting go and being present: On a weekend, leave your cell phone at home when you go out (A) in the morning or (B) in the afternoon. Enjoy being unreachable for this short time.

Experiment: Slow down in speech.  Practice the Suf Three-Gate Rule for an afternoon: “The Sufis advise us to speak only after our words have managed to pass through three gates. At the first gate we ask ourselves, Are these words true? If so, we let them pass on; if not, back they go. At the second gate we ask, Are they necessary? At the last gate we ask, Are they kind?” (Eknath Easwaran)

Training in unflappability: Deliberately go to the grocery when it is crowded.  Take 2 (or even 3) times as long  to do your shopping. Move your cart calmly; let other people go ahead of you. Maintain an attitude of courtesy and consideration for others. If you’re in a long line at checkout, use a breathing gatha to stay in the present moment.  Afterward, write about the experience for 10 minutes.

Reading: Wendell Berry, Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

Writing practice: Imagine a future society that manifests a healthy pace. Go for 30 minutes.

Experiment: In the midst of a  very busy day, take two one-minute pauses to regain your composure.

Candor

When we ran into each other
On the sidewalk in front of Gelato Supreme

And I asked you, "Hey
When can we get together again?

Last Monday was so long ago!"
You raised that fine left eyebrow of yours

Ever so slightly as if I was joking
Au contraire Mein Herr:

Why wouldn’t I want to  spend a little more time
With someone who is smack in the centre of his center?

You might not be so interested in me
(I admit: I’m unsteadily eccentric)

But I’m interested in you
So carpe fucking diem

Tomorrow, noon?
Bella Levenshtein

--novel-in-progress, Our Heroic and Ceaseless 24/7 Struggle against Tsuris