Chapter Four

     Just as it is said that a picture can show the meaning of a thousand words, so it is that a word can voice the sound of a thousand meanings. When I was in my later twenties, beginning to give a hand to putting words together on paper to image some meaning, and beginning to dip my brush into pools of color in search of other ways to speak meaning, I coined a phrase to guide me on this new path I was following: Run After Beauty.

     Born in part I think from my Love of running as exercise, along long empty pathways through forests and fields, in search of the pace where my heart and lungs became one with the air I was swimming through, where my legs and my arms were not trying to get anywhere except in tune with each other, and the only sound in my brain was the balance between inhale and exhale. There was the place I as looking for as I set my pen to paper and brush to canvas. Such a simple thing to run for, the word with a thousand meanings.

    Run After Beauty.

     Thursday the seventeenth evening. Time for boots on the ground. Time for dodging traffic and looking out of both sides of my head while crossing intersections and filtering out the honks and beeps that are imminent from the more general background of unceasing cacophony, keeping ever especially mindful of lumbering buses turning through intersections.  There are stoplights and traffic cops, and a measurement of management and order, and I take my cues and stay close by other street crossers who are native to this system. Tuesday after breakfast, it’s west on P. High Road in search of a post office branch I’ve been told is down the street opposite the Blue Diamond hotel. The branch is more of a twig, and a small twig at that, nestled inconspicuously and unmarked amidst a nest of other little shops. Three women sit at their desks marking notes in their ledgers in this quiet little room, do not bother even looking up when I enter, and a helpful woman nearby confirms that this is indeed a post office. Mission accomplished for today. I’ve only wanted to find this place, and I stop at a nearby stationary shop to buy an envelope. Walk half a mile down the road, go across a couple of large intersections, sit at a bus stop to watch the comings and goings, detour through some other streets of shops, keeping ever alert and mindful of every step along the way.

     Wednesday morning head south across the overpass above the railroad tracks, catching an overview towards the East, following busy streets and negotiating intersections, getting the feel for how it all works, towards the huge, several acre complex of government museums of archaeology, anthropology, art, with library and what not, all in huge old nineteenth century red stone buildings, all requiring a fee. Not much into museum browsing now, just walking the grounds and snapping a few pictures of statues of gods and goddesses dancing or giving blessings. This walk is about a mile each way and I’m getting a bit limbered up.

     Thursday morning first east and then south, across another overpass above the railroad tracks to a narrow street following the curve of the Coovum river. This kilometer long stretch towards the arterial Anna Salai road is clearly the nest and central hive for the hordes of three-wheeled yellow auto-riks that endlessly ply the streets of the city. Shop after shop after shop of yellow auto-riks in all stages of disassembly and ongoing repair, even as the street itself is endlessly busy with a continuous flow of these denizens of the city’s traffic spectrum.

     Finally make it to Anna Salai where not far down the way is my old favorite, Higginbotham’s book store, landmark and refuge, air-conditioned and quiet. Looking for something to read since all I’ve had these last couple of weeks have been daily newspapers and the Lonely Planet guide book. And here is the Gem. Tales of the Sun, or Folklore of Southern India, compiled and told by Georgiana Kingscote and Natesa Sastri, first published in 1890, in a fresh hardcover edition. Thirty–three stories in three hundred ten pages, collected by the authors from their native servants and the old women of the bazaars. From what I’ve read so far, masterful tales in the spirit of what moderns would call magical realism. A treasure trove for the imagination.

     Then a little hitch up Anna Salai in the other direction for a visit to a major post office, the trunk of the tree that little twig from Tuesday is somehow attached to, where I can buy some stamps and  drop a letter to a friend across the ocean. Overall, a longer walk, perhaps a mile and a half each way, and back to the guest house for a shower and one o’clock lunch. Getting the feel for being out there, mixing it up with the crowd.

     Sunday evening, December twentieth. My final day in Chennai draws to a close as I prepare to depart for Pondicherry tomorrow morning. Thirty-two days since arrival, thirteen days at the school, nineteen at the YWCA Guest House. Meeting with Kiran Amarnath – Ray of the Sun’s Light – has been by far the most noteworthy occurrence of this entire period.  Many were the afternoon we found time to sit together at neighboring chairs in the lobby, or at a table in the dining room, or across one another in his office, for an hour or two or sometimes even three, and simply let the conversation evolve, sharing stories, making observations, and recognizing the common themes of understanding that inform our lives.

     This seventeen day stretch since I came here on Friday the fourth after the monsoon deluge that struck the city and likely had something to do with my sickness, has been my real initiation period, my coming to terms with this new world I have entered. Familiar enough in some ways from having been here before, but still a bit of a jolt from the life I had lived in America. From a household of too many things keeping me in a state of perpetual busy-ness and confusion, and social connections keeping me running from one end of town to another in circles of conversational amusement, I’m all the way back down to what I carry on my back to the bus station while keeping mindfully alert for that rare person who will cross my path with whom the heart can make a conversation. While memories, dreams and meditations from daybreak to nightfall to daybreak and then nightfall again continue, as the non-stop, twenty-four-seven entertainment center keeps the cameras rolling.

     I guess I can call these thirty-two days Act One of this play I am watching unfold. And tomorrow after breakfast, I’ll be wishing some sort of greeting in departure to the staff I have become familiar with here in the dining room, in the lobby, and in the hallways of my Chennai hacienda.

     Woke up this morning with the image of sitting with my two brothers and two sisters in the upstairs front bedroom of our childhood home, engaged in pleasant, sharing conversation, when a blue jay flies in through the open front window and finds a spot amongst us in which to perch and begin to preen. Interspersed amongst his bright, blue feathers are some bright red feathers, suggesting the influence of a cardinal into who this bird is. A reminder I think of the St. Louis Cardinals mythos that informed our home town aesthetic. I notice then that the bird is carrying some string-like thing in its beak, and I am unsure about whether the bird wants this thing or not, so I reach gently down to take it from him. The bird simply lets go and drops it without a second thought, then spreads its wings and lifts off and flies out through the window towards its freedom under the wide blue sky.

     Winter Solstice, December twenty-second, nine o’clock after the darkness has settled over the City by the Sea. A miracle walked into my life yesterday afternoon in Bharathi Park in Pondicherry. Her name is Louise Rose. She is tall like myself with red hair pinned up at the back of the top of her head, a fair and lovely woman from U.K., now forty-seven years old with ready smile and easy laughter through our conversation on the bench I have called her over to. She’s been in India a month living in Auroville, and will soon be going to an ashram in Thiruvanamalli for a retreat to be held from January first through eighth. I passed her by on the street earlier in the afternoon, in silence we walked by, and I wondered if we would meet again, and we did. Yesterday was my first day in Pondy and I was out for my first stroll after finding a rather dumpy guest house to set down my baggage. I was on my way to see the ocean’s horizon three blocks down the street, and here she comes in orangey Kalwar Chemise with green leggings, and here I am in my jungle pants and safari hat with sky blue shirt, and we had to find each other that second time to make the perfection complete. She needs to catch her bus back to Auroville by six and I promise to take the noon bus the next day, today, to meet her and continue our conversation, for there are mysteries that need to be explored.

     And there on the upstairs open-air patio for lunch, the miracle is magnified into a meeting of minds my words on paper will never be able to describe, as I tell her the story of my book, how it evolved from its inception, and I show her my most recent version. She follows my story with an attention, an interest, and an understanding that transcends any experience I’ve ever had in sharing my book with someone. We meet with tears of joy rolling down our cheeks over what is going on. She knows she has a role in bringing this book out into the world, as do I, while neither of are guessing about what her role will be.

     This journey of mine to India has just taken a quantum leap into new levels of understanding for what I am doing here. I thought I would be on the alert for people to show this book to, yes, but never did I imagine such a meeting as I have had with Louise Rose. And now I am planning for the when and the how to travel the three hour bus ride to Thiruvanamalli to participate in the eight day retreat at the ashram Louise is going to. Which will be conducted by a woman named Jaya whom Ray at the YWCA Guest House told me about.

     Louise also has an extensive experience in India from seventeen years ago, and had a direct visual meeting with the Dalai Lama that went to the center of her heart. So that all of these little occurrences I am encountering along the way are adding up to something quite beyond anything I can say is due to my sense for planning. Not only did I abandon my idea for teaching at Ambi and Shantha’s school, so I could go to the YWCA Guest House for two weeks so I could meet Ray, I had to spontaneously and unexpectedly decide to head for Pondicherry on Monday the twenty-first, so I could meet Louise and visit with her on the eve of her departure from Pondy.

     For my first night in Pondy last night, I had a most remarkable and lovely dream with Kristin my friend the anthropologist, and Diane my poet friend from Santa Fe. Those two don’t know each other, but there they were, and there we were together in the wishing well, and it was all magical. All in one of the dumpier little hotel rooms I’ve ever stayed in in India. Now I’ve got three nights in a wonderful little room at the New Guest House, one of the Aurobindo Ashram guest houses. Dinner last night and tonight at La Terrasse restaurant where my traveling partner of four years ago and I visited a couple of times.  A rather open air, thatched roof affair for those of us who favor simplicity and elegance in one sitting.

     Louise and I visited the art gallery at Auroville this afternoon during our five hour visit where we saw the lovely drawings of Aparajita Barai. Her visions are through ink on paper, re-visionings and interpretations of some of the gods and goddesses of the Hindu pantheon. We meet Aparajita and I’ve signed up for a presentation and workshop she will conduct at this gallery tomorrow from three to six.

     This morning began with the ocean’s waves rolling in and rolling in, and breaking against black rocks, while a young fisherman steps into the waters just beyond the rocks to cast his net into those waves and then haul it back in as he searches for this day’s possibilities.

     Wednesday the twenty-third around noon. Poetry in Motion. Notes on the road. Pondicherry sunrise over the ocean’s misty horizon. Waves roll in, swell, fall all over themselves, and crash against the black boulders at land’s edge. Two and three man fishing boats dip and bob through the waves as the pale pink pearl of Surya emerges through the mist. Masala Dosa and a hot Latte for breakfast and a five day extension for the room that will take me to the thirtieth. Peace of Mind for my place to stay till I depart for the ashram retreat at Thiruvanamalli. Walk the Rue Romain Rolland through mid-morning pedestrian and scooter traffic to the Aurobindo Ashram where I pay my respects to the Source of this spiritual complex, Aurobindo and the woman known as The Mother.

     Find a travel agency shop where I can change some dollars into rupees. Find where I think I should be waiting for a bus and skip it for an auto-rik to the Auroville visitor’s center. Exit the rik, give the driver a tip, and on my path walking towards the visitor’s center, there is Louise on a stroll to visit her friend Annette for lunch. Call out to Louise and we chat for one minute as I confirm my intention to go to Thiruvanamalli for the retreat for the first week of January. Give Louise a rupees three thousand advance to pass on to Annette as down payment for the retreat. How did this happen? How is this happening?

     Café Latte and a slice of coffee cake at the visitor’s center, where I now sit writing these sentences. And of course the auto-rik driver idle at the corner where I stood waiting for the bus that was not due for an hour had to want a fare so badly that he offered me a ride to Auroville for the bargain price of rupees two hundred. Methinks there are in this equation more variables then I can put me finger on.

     Wednesday the twenty-third evening, at the New Guest House where my stay has thankfully been extended by five days till next Wednesday. I can see where the nature and focus of this logbook might begin to gradually deconstruct and reconstruct itself as information overload begins to settle in. All part of the fun. Just one side of my brain talking to the other side, as they debate with one another about what to think and talk about and how.

     After my Latte and coffee cake at the Auroville visitor’s center, walk the path to the Tibetan pavilion where I am the only visitor. Climb the inner stairwell to the large hardwood floored meditation rooms, with large open windows, some Thangkas hanging on the walls, and an altar area at one end of one of the two rooms. The sense of quiet serenity infusing these rooms annialates distracting thoughts. It would be so easy to sit up there for a very long time, but I am only a visitor this afternoon, so I bathe my mind in the emptiness for a while before rising, returning downstairs and passing through the gate to the rest of the world out there.

     Which in this instance is the presentation and workshop given by Aparajita Barai, who has authored the current exhibition of her drawings, India Beloved. About twenty of us are there, some on mats on the floor, myself included, and others on chairs against the wall. Aparajita engages each of us to first find an image of ourselves in pencil, then to color it with sharp-tipped colored markers, asking us to ask ourselves why we represent ourselves as we do. My self portrait emphasizes my blue eyes. I look at people a lot, and every once in a while, someone will comment on the blueness of my eyes. We are asked to create an environment for ourselves with objects that symbolize the things and traits that are important to us, and again, to ask ourselves why. I draw my river, my tree and my mountains, and come to an understanding that one thing I like about trees is that no matter how old they get, every year they put out new buds, as their sense for growth and reaching for the sky is with them until their final dissolution. My path up the river towards its source has always been with me, as are the mysteries I look towards in faraway mountains. Finally, a metaphorical personification we carry, and mine is the flying turtle, slow and determined on the ground, hard shelled for protection against the hungry world it walks through towards its single minded objective. And then, from time to time, out from under the sides of that shell emerge and unfold the wings of a great bird, wings that catch the wind and carry him high into the sky where he can soar and see the world he’s been walking through with his nose to the ground. Until he finds another patch of ground that he wishes to explore close up, where he lands, folds his wings beneath his shell, and begins another walk. I’ve met this feathered turtle before and this workshop has revived my awareness for who he is.

     Aparajita runs through a series of slides of well-known Hindu goddesses, explaining their attributes as symbolized through their arms, the objects they hold, and their attendant animals. Finally, she gives us about ten minutes to meditate on some important problem that we harbor, and to consider how we might approach that problem through some insight we might have developed during our exploration into our metaphorical inner worlds. For myself, I consider that I am precisely on the road to solving a wide range of problems I’ve been carrying around, simply by having deconstructed and disengaged from the life I had been living in my American world. This life I’ve been living here in India is barely more than one month gone, and the lights have been multiplying and leading one to another in truly inspirational alignments.

     Arriving at the art gallery forty-five minutes before the workshop was to begin, I sat on an entranceway step. A tall, slim young woman comes along, our inquiring eyes meet and I greet her. Very soft spoken and quite young she is and I tell her the Tibetan Pavilion is nearby where she can visit and she walks down that path. After the workshop, there is complimentary tea and cookies. Her rich, liquid eyes find mine and she begins a simple inquiry about how I liked the workshop, where I’m from and what are my plans. She is from Luxembourg, just a few months out of high school, has been in India for one week and is staying at one of the Auroville Guest Houses. She has plans to visit Nepal in March, and from there to Dharamshala, an itinerary similar to mine. Her voice is soft, her words are precise, her eyes pools of selective, receptive inquiry. Our conversation of mutual inquiry continues quietly along the path from the gallery until her direction and mine separate. We exchange email addresses and I give her the website address for my book, and I wonder if we might meet again in Nepal, which she says would be nice. I feel rather grandfatherly towards her, and feel like I’ve had a privilege in meeting this woman as she takes her first steps into the great mysteries of India, a girl who as she grows into her maturity, will surely become a woman of wisdom. Delphine.

          Thursday, December 24, 2015 at five in the afternoon with a lemon soda at

La Terrasse. So the big deal is about writing it all down. If I didn’t write it down, would it still count? As for what? Being real? The book has been about writing it all down. The book, writing it all down, is what brought tears of joy to Louise’s eyes, and to mine. If there was no book, there would be no tears, and if there were no tears, there would be no rainbows. And there would be no thoughts to share in writing with people whom I have never met, and will never meet. I am sending thoughts through words in writing that can truly only be sent through the voice and the eyes. And calling that my Life’s work!

     Words on paper saturate the reading mind, and the mind was not designed to spend its time in reading. Yet so I have become, and so I will continue, just as a musician, once he has found his instrument, will not easily set it down. And in fact carries it with him everywhere he goes. Shall I set my pen and paper aside, and walk through the world with only raw experience for company? Writing is the sieve through which I filter the fine from the coarse, and the reader is the source of Light for the words that flow from this pen.

     Meaning is an impossible pursuit, except when it flows through the eyes of two minds who have found each other, as Louise and I found one another two days ago. There is the meaning that cannot be described to anyone else. Do I even really know what was going on in Louise’s mind when her lips quivered and she could no longer hold back those crystal drops of joy that overflowed from her eyes? Could she even tell me, in so many spoken words, where those pearls streaming down her cheeks came from? Would I understand, in so many spoken words, even if she did?

     We met through our stories, we met through my book, and the tears were rolling down her face even as she only first held this book, as she looked at the cover, before she even read the first page. She knew the story of my drawings.

I had shown and explained to her the complete set of black and white drawings.

She held in her hands the culmination of the story of my thirty-eight year odyssey, the last chapter, the final version, and her sense for my sense of completion touched her heart in its depth, and her tears welled forth. And all I could do was cry with her, as we shared the essence of meaning.

     Friday, December twenty-fifth. Full moon time. Morning. “Why are you going to Pondicherry?” the bus conductor asks on Monday, at the rest stop along the way from Chennai. “Cod-L  Parkalam” To see the Sea, I tell him. At Dawn, before the sun disc emerges from the watery horizon, I have two short blocks to walk to the shoreline of black boulders where waves roll in, crest, then crash and spray a thousand tiny droplets into the cool salt air. Here there is no counting, only motion unrelenting, endlessly repetitive, endlessly singular. The horizon is mist with pale gray clouds, and veils the disc from view as She crosses the horizon. For the disc can be as feminine as well as she is masculine. Usha is her name and Surya is his, and they are both part of the new day becoming. Above the horizon between water and mist, here her soft red glow shines forth. Here is what I came to see. Sunrise over the ocean, and to listen to the heartbeat of the ocean’s timeless Rhythm. She rises from her softness and becomes his glaring light, casting bright reflections across the endless motion of the waters. The world awakens, the day is here, there are choices to be made, and streets and avenues to walk, and questions to ask, and answers to find. And places to discover, and memories to recover.

     Poetry in motion.  Friday morning walk to Mission street and the Aurobindo info center, where I capture an image of The Mother as a young woman, perhaps around as old as Delphine now is. A couple more blocks along the way is a Hiiggenbotham’s bookstore branch, where I am directed towards an internet connection location where I can respond to family and certain friends, and get the basic info from Annette on the Anantta Niketaan Ashram retreat coming up in one week. Then, along this street is a Tibetan gift shop and tea house where I have a plate of ten momos and a glass of cool Lemon Ginger tea. Note the brass Ganesha riding on his swing on the window sill. Then, connect with a money changer around the corner for sixty-six rupees to the dollar, the best price I’ve gotten so far. Then, pass by a major Vodaphone store which is now closed, but at least I now know where it is. Then walk to the beach where I connect with the Oceanside twenty-four hour coffee shop. Great find! Then sit on the rocks and watch the waves and pose for some photo requests, first with four teenagers, then with a man from Assam and his small son. A smallish white dog, clearly past middle age, picks up my trail and keeps me company till I find my way to the tourist office where I pick up info on a full scale Braratanatyam dance performance to be held Sunday evening. Sit on a park bench with an unknown friend, not long before an auto-rik and turning motorcycle slam it at an intersection, spraying ten thousand pieces of glittering headlight glass onto the pavement. Amazing that apparently there are no injuries, and my friend and I sit on our bench together for the time it takes for all parties involved to resolve their issues and drive off.

     Return to the black rocks where the waves continue their crashing and spraying until I step back into the city and find this WiFi coffee shop, the Boutique St. Laurent. Such is the day in exploration thus far at four in the afternoon.

     Next, find and try the Artika Café Gallery on Labourdonnais at Rue de Bussy, for a Ginger Lemon Honey tea, and at which place there is also WiFi, in an open air setting. Today is for sampling, this place and that, with my only objective to browse and discover in leisurely fashion the hidden gems behind mysterious doorways. On to the Café des Artes on Rue Suffren for a cup of Masala Chai, another WiFi spot in a garden setting under some large leaved coconut palm trees, along with a noisy crow until he decides to leave. From one cup of tea or coffee to the next I wander through the afternoon. Got to wonder who is out here who would recognize me as someone whom she is interested in meeting, as Louise was on Monday. European faces appear from around corners, and at nearby tables along the way. Recognitions that matter are usually mutual from very early on. Soul Mates are out here, partners in Spirit, and there is nothing for me to Do except Be Here Now, moving in tune with the planets and stars until we align.

     Louise is not my traveling partner on the ground. She has her relationship, grounded in Sweetness as she says, back in the U.K. She and I have something else, as Real as anything I’ve ever experienced. Soul Mates is a plural, and perhaps, just perhaps, I will meet my traveling partner along the way. As long as my mind is in its clear receptive place, the path is as the crystal of the Wish Fulfilling Gem. I’ve been on this path a very long time. What happens, will happen, and I cannot help but wonder what will happen next.

     Golden Glow sunset from Bharati park, then to the black rocks at the shoreline where the orangey full moon has risen over the ocean’s horizon. Winds are strong and waves are rolling high and crashing hard against the rocks, sending high arcs of spray into the air, and misty droplets reach my face. As Luna rises higher, her reflection in the waters widens and brightens until an avenue of Light reaches towards the horizon, rippling with the waves.

     Saturday, the twenty-sixth. Morning, out to the shoreline rocks early enough to catch Jupiter shining straight overhead and bright morning star Venus high in the East, with faint Mars between those two, while full moon sets to the west over the city as Usha heralds the Dawn over the Eastern horizon and Sun-Surya glimmers through the far away low-lying clouds. Time now to plan another day and the days remaining before departure on Wednesday. There will be four more morning sunrises over the ocean. Then the bus ride to Thiruvanamali for the retreat which closes on Friday the eighth, after which I may return to Pondicherry, or shall I move in another direction? And what direction would that be? What kind of extended stay possibilities are there here in Pondy? Questions, questions, Questions!

     Sunday morning, December twenty-seventh. Clouds are deep across the horizon, rising high into the blue that almost isn’t there. Waves are rolling strong and heavy, cresting and falling relentlessly. Venus and Jupiter above are hidden behind gray mist, and the soft glowing pink pearl of Sun-Surya will not shine through this morning.

     Answers to yesterday’s questions. Walk to the Vodaphone store on Nehru street by slightly before eleven to meet with Iyyappan and decide to buy a basic Indian phone. Two thousand rupees, about thirty dollars, and another five hundred rupees for 286 minutes to be used within three months. Will stop by tonight at eight to pick it up. Walk back to the Oceanside beach twenty-four hour coffee shop to sit with a large latte and soak up some ocean breeze in a palm tree’s shade. Now begins the search for where will I stay when I return from the Thiruvanamali retreat. The Aurobindo Seaside Guest House is clearly for the more affluent Ashramites. Then walk the several blocks to the North Boulevard turnoff where the Paradise hotel is booked solid till March. The Executive Hotel’s basic room is twenty dollars per night, too much for me unless I really have to. Then to the Aurobindo Garden House and other such places that are all unavailable, and I’m directed to the long walk to the Maravadi street locale for other possibilities. Stop at Chez Nous – La Maison Auroville for a latte and chocolate cake and a shady rest at one-forty. House of many pizzas, and Hey Jude filters through from another patron’s speaker phone. Mahavadi street is a decidedly quiet, native street along the northern shoreline. Small huts and houses along the seaside, larger homes along the other. The French lady at Mother’s House says she is all booked up. Around the corner I walk to Ayodya Bhavan, and I feel like I’m running out of options and possibilities are evaporating. Push the gate open and there is a European fellow, lean and fair, about my own age, and he says come in and let’s see. I request a month starting January eighth and he’s got something for me at the astronomically low price of two hundred rupees per day. The second floor room with balcony is a gem.

I walked all the way to the very end of my rope, and here is Lakshmi’s blessing!

Nowhere else in India will you find any such room for two hundred rupees per day, and my heart takes a quantum leap of relief for this room in this building where I can feel at home.

     Ismo is from Finland, and assures that my inquiry is timely, for all rooms will surely be fully booked within a couple of days. I leave my five hundred rupee deposit, and look forward to not only the room, but to the company of Ismo and other most likely like-minded residents. Exit for the return walk along Mahavadi street, and after a couple of hundred yards find that I am catching up to a more leisurely walking older European fellow. He stops at a seaside viewpoint and I walk over to greet and see if he speaks English, which he does, and he is receptive to our meeting. Shall we have a coffee or tea, he asks, which I surely welcome, and he leads me through some turns through some narrow side streets to a nice three story building where we climb a narrow stairwell to a full-sized multi-roomed apartment, well furnished, with a full kitchen, and a room with a complex computer setup on a large desk.

     Here is Jean-Pierre from Paris, who knows Santa Fe, whose business has much to do with web site development. He is a philosopher and psychiatrist by training, who follows the Freudian school. Here again is a man of around my own age, with full mustache and hair on his chin, who likes to smoke cigarettes and has recently returned from Paris where he’s had some medical procedures performed near his heart. He is really quite fascinated with modern medical technology, and is quite a liberal minded thinker. He brews a full pot of coffee which he and I drink trough our conversation at his dining room table. He’ll be going back to Paris for about six weeks on January eleventh, so it’s not likely that I will get to know him much more unless I wind up staying in the neighborhood beyond that time, but he says I am always welcome in any case. We are finished with our coffee by around four-thirty, and I’m back to the return walk along Mahavadi street, which I will be getting to know very well in the weeks to come. I’m on the complete opposite end of town from where I’m staying at the New Guest House, and will not be returning there now, as I’ve got an eight o’clock appointment with the Vodaphone man, so I sit on the black rocks on the shore and watch the waves roll in for a while with a renewed sense of some vague, undefined purpose and attachment to this City by the Sea.

     As the evening throngs take over the promenade, walk back into the inner streets in search of the Café des Artes for a quiet place to sit. Find a small cobbler’s shop along the way, and stop in to get my feet measured for a custom made pair of sandals, which fine pair will be ready Tuesday evening on the eve of my departure for the retreat.

     Then find the Café des Artes, and sit with a pot of hot Masala Chai till closing at seven, then head on over to meet Iyyappan at the Vodaphone store for my new electronic communication device. Then walk the long walk back to my room at the New Guest House by around nine for a refreshing shower to wash the sweat of the day down the drain and be thankful for all of the day’s decisions, accomplishments, and blessings.

     Monday evening, December twenty-eighth. Getting my head ready for my Wednesday trip to Thiruvanamali. Sunday afternoon walk along South Boulevard to the not very far away train station. Schedule does not fit. Then walk further to the bus station, where departures are frequent. Then to the Juice Wagon at Bussy and Mission for walkabout intermission before heading on over to the dance program that starts at six.

     Here at the Juice Wagon, pen and paper is my friend. We keep company and make observations. We like quiet tables at quiet restaurants, especially during long walkabouts, like we did back in Chicago when I was in my late twenties and early thirties, and wanted to be a writer even though I had never taken a writing course and I did not know anyone else who thought of themselves as a writer. Some kind of a Lone Ranger was I. Juice Wagon has ten tables, six tables for four and four tables for two. Wonder if the owner ever works a packed house. Two orange-pineapple smoothies hit the spot for me, on my way to the Bharata Natyam dance performance as the afternoon fades.

     The dancers are a Joy to watch. Mostly younger to older teenagers, with a few younger girls, and some that might be in their younger twenties. Have to be old enough to have studied and practiced for enough years to have gotten as good as they are. The nine emotions of Bharata Natyam, each in its own vignette, each in a story from Tamil mythology or history, or from that storytelling place that blurs between history and mythology.

     Navarasa: The Nine Fundamental Emotions of Bharata Natyam.

First, the invocation dance to Lord Vinayaga, the dancing elephant-headed Lord, he who helps us overcome our obstacles, he who is the Obstacle to Obstacles.

Then the sequence of nine stories through dance. Beginning with Singara – Love, as portrayed by Lord Rama and Sita Devi, when they see each other for the first time and lose themselves in each other’s loving gaze. 

     Then Haysa – Mirth, as Draupadi laughs at the plight of Duryodhana when he foolishly trips and falls over his own mistake. Illustrating the saying: Laughter is the best Medicine.          Third we have Compassion, as illustrated by Saint Vallalar’s compassionate empathy for all life forms, even to the sight of withering crops moving him to tears, until miraculous rains fall down to revive them. 

     Fourth we have Roudra – Anger, when righteously brought forth, as when Kannagi’s anger is directed at the Pandya king who unjustly killed her husband, her anger so powerful as to cause the fiery immolation of the beautiful ancient city of Madurai. 

     Fifth, there is Valor, and the historically recent story of Tiruppur Kumaran who laid down his life to defend the honor of the flag of the Indian freedom movement. 

     Sixth, there is Bhaya – Fear, “the unnerving experience of a trembling body afflicted with a muddled mind that causes all to be lost.” Princess Kunti pleases Maharishi Durvasa with her devotion and receives the boon “to summon and beget a child from any God at will. She fears social condemnation as an unwed mother after bearing a son from Lord Surya. The terror of the unknown for both herself and her son Karna overtakes her as she leaves him to his fate in the wild river’s waters.”

     Seventh is Beebatsa – Disgust, which “manifests when we see, hear or feel things that are gross or bitter. The bitterest of the bitter experience is manifested when we witness human beings behaving in a sub-human animalistic manner.”

Shameful behavior is illustrated when the King of Dharma, Yudhisthira, violates Dharma by wagering and losing his kingdom. “Disgusting behaviors are there like a temple priest selling the idol, and the watchman himself stealing from the house he is to guard.”

     Eighth is Abhuta – Awe, the ecstatic feeling that takes our breath away when experiencing any grand spectacle. “What greater astonishment can there be than seeing the young Poompavai being brought back to life from ashes by the song of Sambandhar?”

     Ninth is Shantha – Peace, as shown through Buddha’s encounter with Angulimala, “the infamous highwayman who waylaid and killed his unfortunate victims. . . .Upon meeting the Buddha, Angulimita loses all sense of violence and attains an inner quietude and peace.”

     Altogether, a troupe of about forty dancers, many of whom went through several costume changes as the series of stories progressed. I had an open view from a third row seat with no one in front of me, and could watch the facial expressions and intricate movements of the dancers in pristine detail, surely a view to be treasured for a dance that is designed and choreographed to illustrate and express emotional nuance.

     Monday morning is again thick with clouds on the horizon and the waves continue to roll in with vigor and crescendo, and again the fishermens’ catamarans are idle in the sand where, on calmer days, they would be coming in now with their netfulls of the  morning’s catch. Go out for a late morning visit to the St. Laurent coffee shop, boutique, and WiFi spot. Cannot make the connection, but find the poster for a Tuesday night Bharata Natyam performance at the Katashreya Aurodhan Garden on the North side of town. Will certainly plan to be there. Walk to the Artika Café and WiFi hotspot where I make the connection, have two cups of hot Lemon Ginger Honey tea, and read emails relevant to the forthcoming Thiruvanamali retreat.

     Thursday morning, the twenty-ninth. Horizon clouds are low, and incoming waves not so high, bright Venus is with us this morning, and the red glow of sun-Surya shines through the far away mist. At some unknown hour in the early morning darkness, I am being led by one of those large, black water buffaloes that paddy farmers follow in their fields. This animal has some characteristics of hairiness and the hump back of the American bison. I am following this animal through some misty portal until my eyes open and I am utterly convinced that I am lying down on a cot in the living room of my childhood home. I’m looking at the dark black screen of a T.V. and feel for the words coming to my throat, mildly choking words that are hard coming forth, and I must willfully force them through my voice. “My eyes are open, and all I see is darkness.” I say this sentence three or four or five times to make sure I’m saying these words right, that I’m hearing them right. I am consciously awake in this room and am convinced of this location until my mind sorts itself out and I see this guest house room I’m in. But there is no doubt that my ears have heard me speak these words, so difficult and so necessary in coming forth in vocalization.

     So what is this all about? I recall the two years between graduating high school and going off to the University in Champaign – Urbana. I worked at the AT&T building in mid-town St. Louis, a square block of a building several stories high full of communications equipment where I spent forty hours every week, performing routine and troubleshooting tasks. I made a few new friends there, but my high school world had evaporated, those friends had gone off in their various directions, and my family was going through serious financial hardship while my unemployed father was trying to redefine his life, having left the torture chamber of the Chevrolet factory behind. He had a plan, but the plan was not going well, and for a year my modest starting income at the phone company was the major support for our family. My plans to save for college were delayed and I had lots of empty time to think about where I wanted to go and what I wanted to study. Nancy, the youngest sister at seven and eight, was growing and the sleeping arrangements in our small house changed. I went to the couch in the downstairs living room, while parents and brothers and sisters slept in the two rooms upstairs. I had no homework or tests to study for, only a dream for going away to some other place to college. I turned the pages of many college bulletin books, analyzing costs and programs in Engineering, looking forward to the day when my dad got back on his bearings with a reasonable position and income, which he eventually did, and I then saved money like a miser for the chance to pack my bags and be off on my way to begin the new life of my own.

     Our family has a good spirit of togetherness, but I could not help, as I was reading and sleeping in the living room at night, like the caretaker of my family upstairs. Patiently waiting through an ocean of loneliness in my heart for the time when I could step forth into the new world of learning, a new world of visions becoming, a new world of friendships. Those were the times when sometimes when my eyes were wide open, all I could see was darkness. Why this dream is here now, I don’t exactly know, except perhaps as a reminder of how far I have come. There is some light now in my life. Perhaps there could be more. Perhaps there will be more. For now, sunrise over the ocean’s horizon, and fresh winds from across the waves, are my most excellent friends.