by Ira Wood
“Pneumonia?”
His half smile was an expression of patience. “In Finding the Shaman Within they herded us into a freezing lake.”
“Somebody could have had a heart attack.”
He nodded as if remembering it fondly.
If I hadn’t sunk $500 into “the training” I would have headed back to my own car and home. Had I actually believed I’d learn to “connect with the lost masculine power within?” I knew it was all a crock back at the free introductory evening (cost to be applied to tuition) when we were lectured by a hirsute jock spouting dialog straight out of Dances with Wolves. Est, primal therapy, Transcendental Meditation, The Forum: just like this one, scams every one, I knew it, cults, quick-fix fads. But I simply didn’t know where else to turn. I hadn’t been in a fight since the lunch line in junior high when some nitwit stuck me in the butt with the needle of a drawing compass and I kicked him in the kneecap and ran. Now I was forty years older, my lip split, my face bludgeoned, two stitches in my eyebrow, and I mailed off a check in the hope of learning “to become the man I always wanted to be.”
When the doors finally opened we poured into an overheated hallway smelling of floor polish and chalk. Men in white shirts and pants and identical brown vests herded us into a single line, shouted instructions, and ordered us not to speak. My little friend did not rush into the building with the others but lingered at my side. “At least we’re out of the wind,” I said, when a thick palm dropped on my shoulder. “Are you deaf? Zip it up. No talking.”
Waiting until he passed, I whispered. “What kind of bull shit is this?”
“It’s a little like The Inner Path of the Wayfinder.” My friend sounded impressed. “They physically restrained people in that one. Tied them up in the dark for a few hours until they cried for help. The key is to locate your personal level of fear. Where does your ego stop and the true courage within you begin?”
“Tied them up in the dark?”
An enormous block of a man strode straight for us. He had a wide protruding forehead that cast his eyes in shadow and wore a cheap toupee with sideburns, like a helmet made of stiff brown hair. “Knit your lips, Asshole.”
“Talking to me?” I asked.
“Who else?”
The entire line of men awaited my response. Would I stand firm? Shout back? Run? My little mentor lowered his eyes and placed his palms together, willing me to hold my tongue. What the fuck was I doing here?
I’d had the fight over a month and a half ago. My wife and I were in the car, returning from the annual Oyster Festival. Town was full of partying tourists but the only thing on my mind was the screenplay I’d recently submitted, the final draft, on schedule to the day, and that I hadn’t heard a word from the producer. It had been over three weeks and I had to assume she hated it, that the script upon which I had based my hopes of a screenwriting career was not only bad but beneath comment. My entire weekend was tension amped to near hysteria. I had no appetite. I couldn’t concentrate. Driving the country road back from town I noticed a car following too close. He flashed his hi-beams. I tapped my brakes. He blasted his horn. I dropped my speed. He screamed out the window. When I flipped him the bird he tapped my bumper. When I pulled off the road, he drew up behind me. “Where are you going?” Marge grabbed my sleeve as the doors of the car behind us flew open. “Get back in the car!” she screamed.
We were marched into a classroom with eight long tables. Helmet hair handed each of us a release form. I AGREE THAT UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES WILL I HOLD THE INSTITUTE LIABLE FOR PHYSICAL OR PSYCHOLOGICAL DAMAGE. We were further prohibited from publically divulging any aspect of the training and requested to list the names of our physician, closest living relative, health care proxy, incidence of heart failure, and blood type (if known).
I glanced apprehensively to my side.
“In Empowering the Inner Shape-shifter,” my friend whispered, “masked men held us at gunpoint.”
Long green shades were drawn across the gymnasium skylights to block out the mid-morning sun and we were ordered to stand at military attention as the thugs in brown vests strode between our ranks and pushed us into uniform rows. Anyone who spoke was dragged out of line. One guy insisted on using the bathroom and was not allowed back in. It was standard large group awareness training, of course. Harass people, break them down, make them feel helpless, and then reverse the process. In fact, it was textbook, the same bogus technique they used in revival meetings. Once the entire group was in despair the leader gave them hope. Everyone experienced a collective endorphin high and was softened up to receive “the message,” whatever crap they were serving. After standing in line for over an hour, I felt a kind of kinship with the guys around me, as if we were all inmates in the prison yard. We whispered jokes about the “guards” sotto voce and passed around a contraband package of gum. After another hour of shouting orders, Helmet hair barked, “At ease,” and everyone started talking at once.
“What’s your name?” I asked my friend.
He gave a short disdainful laugh. “It’s not the name we’re given but the deeper meaning we reveal about ourselves.” He stared at my forehead, at the stitch marks that cut a deep jagged gorge through my eyebrow, already forming a permanent scar, then shrugged, as if to say forget it, you’re learning. “I’m Green-Forest,” he said.
“Glad to meet you, Green.”
“Green-Forest,” he corrected me. “My last name is Everyhuman.”
A long limbed and willowy man wearing harem pants whipped around. “You’re Green-Forest Everyhuman?”
Green-Forest brought his palms together and lowered his chin to his fingertips.
“I met you in Dance of the Spirit Walker.”
“And you call yourself. . . . ”
“River Freebody.”
They threw their arms above their heads, made an arch with the flats of their hands, swirled around beneath it, took a step backward and bowed. River Freebody gave me a hard look. “Did we meet at Omega? Circumcision?”
Could he tell? Did it matter?
“He means the workshop,” Green-Forest explained. “Circumcision Healing: Reconnecting With Our Loss.”
A drumbeat, a far-off pounding at first like the throbbing of a wild beast’s heart, came close, closer still. Bop-BOM. Bop-BOM. Soon another drum joined in. Bop-bop-BOM-bop. Bop-bop-BOM-bop. Then another drum and another until the entire room seemed to vibrate and then above it all came the shrill cry of a man in pain.
“Brothers! Warriors, help me!” the voice beseeched us. “I am dying!” followed by a cry of agony more wrenching than the first. “In the midst of battle I die alone. Blinded by my enemies, I wander the earth alone.” His cry was piercing. I was not the only one who felt it. The entire group was searching for the wounded man in pain.
Blue spotlights came up on a dark stage. A smoke machine cranked out an eerie mist. Long fat sticks of incense glowed like torches. A stout naked man stepped into the circle of light.
Green-Forest leapt up, ecstatic. “It’s Golden!”
“Golden . . . what?”
“Harvey Morris Golden. The workshop leader. Shhhh. . . .”
He was a round boulder of a man wearing a loincloth made of fur. I thought of a sumo wrestler as he lifted his heavy thighs. His pectorals, once muscle, rested flat on his belly like an old woman’s breasts. But sumo wrestlers shaved their skin while Golden’s was a thick mat of curly black hair. “Where is my tribe?” His voice was an impassioned incantation that cracked for effect like a cantor singing Kol Nidre. “For decades I have searched. Once we were intrepid hunters! Once we walked the earth together in strength! Once we left the women to their planting and gathering and trekked the earth with our elders for game. Now we turn our backs on our brothers. And we die alone.”
“You’re not alone!” Green-Forest shouted.
“Once we spoke in council. Once we fought our enemies back to back. But now we are weak.” For over an hour he lambasted us with our failures.
We failed to raise our young. We failed to take responsibility. We gave our lives to our work, to girlfriends, to the internet, to the media, to every meaningless pursuit modern culture had to offer and ignored each other. Each of us was alone. Each of us was in pain. I was dizzy from standing so long, from breathing incense. My eyes were stinging from smoke. Golden talked for another hour and what seemed another, haranguing us with shame until he fell silent, hung his head and raised his arms to the sky. “Where are my brothers?” he moaned. “Will you let me die alone?”
“No!” Green-Forest rushed the stage. River Freebody sprinted up the aisle “No! No!” A mass of men followed until Golden was surrounded, a large animal swarmed by its wriggling young. “Feel our strength!” Golden’s voice rose above the basketball hoops and echoed among the banners that read Division One Champions. “Feel our strength!”
Bop-BOM-bom-bom. Bop-BOM-bom-bom. The drumbeat resumed. Green-Forest tore off his sweater and waved it above his head. He kicked off his Ugg boots and wriggled from his pants. What the fuck was going on here? Soon every guy in the room was scrambling out of his clothing, tossing it above his head not caring where it landed, or carrying it to the foot of the bleachers and folding it in a neat pile on top of his shoes.
I jumped when River Freebody tugged at my shirt.
“Join us,” he said.
“But my keys, my wallet.”
“Are you held back by your possessions? Are you defined by your clothing?” He mocked the imprint on my jeans. “Is your name Calvin Klein? Did your forefathers not stalk the wild prey while wearing the skins of animals?”
“I don’t know.” The shouting. The drums. The fumes of incense were overwhelming. ”They were from a shtetl near Minsk.”
“If you fear weakness, we’ll be your strength.”
Now they were spinning in circles, now they were dancing. Naked men dancing, how pitiful was this? Flabby men, frail men; men of all ages. One with shriveled legs bobbed in sync to the drumbeat while sitting in his wheel chair; another, who looked to be 90 years old, wore only a stained undershirt, his long scrotum swaying like a water balloon. As the gym swelled with body heat and the odor of sweat, I only knew that I didn’t fall for this kind of theater. I wanted out. It was all a humiliating charade. I cursed myself again for having been taken in. Maybe it was modesty, or pride, or fear. Maybe it was just as Golden said, I was doomed to wander alone in the desert. Whatever, I didn’t want any part of it.
When their games began, I took off my shoes, my socks, my shirt, but no matter how loud I cheered or how fast I ran, kicking the plastic buffalo skull across the gym floor, I knew I was faking it. I could never be one of them.
Green-Forest appeared through a cloud of smoke. “Trust your body, Man of Deep Scars. The mind deceives.”
“Man of Deep Scars?”
“That’s who you are, isn’t it?” He lightly touched the bruise on my forehead and waited as I fingered the buckle of my belt. I dropped my pants, my underwear. If I looked no more asinine than any other fool it was small consolation.
The games continued until the sun went down and the gym was a mass of shadow. The evening feast was served around a ritual fire. In another age men shared the carcasses of the hunt but the majority of the men here, we were informed, had checked off a preference for vegetarian on the application form and now we sat around the glowing embers of a lava coal gas grill from Sears, passing heads of cabbage which each brave warrior dipped in a communal vat of Russian dressing, chewed with grunts of satisfaction, and washed down with diet cola served in souvenir plastic mugs imprinted with the name of Golden’s institute, Heartsong of the Warrior, Inc.
After the meal, Golden stood in the middle of our circle waving a long crooked stick laced with rawhide and feathers. “We have kept our pain from one another for too long,” he said. “It is time to unlock the secrets. It is time to heal our wounds instead of hiding them. Who has courage among you, Warriors? Who has the courage to bare your wounds?”
The naked tribe settled around him, sitting cross-legged or squatting on their haunches in silent anticipation. The big chief was calling for his braves to pierce their skin and release the spirit, to puncture their defenses, he said, like shards of bone through the flesh. “Wakan tanan kici un!” he cried.
“Wakan tanan kici un!” they responded.
“The wounds of the battlefield, Warriors! Battles with wives, with mothers, with lovers! Battles in business! Family battles! Money battles! Sexual battles! Wakan tanan kici un! May the Great Spirit bless you! Share and heal.” He threw down the stick. “Share and heal.”
A soft murmur began. “Share and heal. Share and heal,” until the words were no longer English but some transcendental ritual chant. I was searching instinctively for the exits when River Freebody broke to the center of the circle in tears.
“I was married to a woman for fourteen years,” he began. “I worked my way from associate to junior partner. To make money for her! She said we weren’t spending enough time together, so I bought a home theater package. For her! She said I didn’t know my kids, so I built a pool in the backyard. I spared nothing to make her happy. Nothing! She said I didn’t excite her in bed so I had a hair transplant. And out of nowhere, after fourteen years, with no warning. . . . ” His voice cracked. The veins in his neck constricted, tight as the roots of a tree. He started to shake. Three men rushed to hold him up. “She walked out on me. She said it was over. Over!” he wailed, and sank to his knees.
“It’s from soap operas!” one guy cried out. “They get it from watching soaps all day.”
“It’s the feminists,” came another voice.
Share and heal! Share and heal! The drumbeat resumed.
“I. . . .” A man stood up, voice quavering. “I. . . .”
Share and heal! Share and heal!
“I can’t get it up with my wife anymore!”
“Who can?” came the response from the dark.
“That doesn’t mean I’m less of a man!”
“No! No!” came the response. “We love you, Brother!”
If I was supposed to identify with this binge of self-pity it wasn’t working. I felt trapped in the middle of a testosterone-soaked encounter group, except that I couldn’t deny their nerve, their audacious willingness to share the most embarrassing secrets of their lives. Clearly the price of entrance to the tribe, however bogus the notion, was the courage to speak the unspoken and one guy after another strode to the center of the circle, astonishing me with his ability to do just that. What they got out of it I couldn’t say but even as I inched to the edges of the crowd, I remained transfixed by the spectacle.
I could never risk the ridicule, and even if I tried, what did I have to offer? What were my petty troubles compared to a son’s guilt for refusing to visit his mother with Alzheimer’s? Compared to the anguish of a man who had been abused by his grandfather for years? Another who had fathered his own brother’s child?
“Man of Deep Scars!” It was Green-Forest, calling me that idiotic name. “Man of Deep Scars! What are you hiding?”
Share and heal! Share and heal! It was me they were looking at, calling me out.
River Freebody took my right arm and Green-Forest my left, leading me to the center of the circle. Even if I wanted to speak, I couldn’t. Spill my guts to a gym full of naked strangers? Ridiculous. But they were watching me, waiting. It was a setup, plain as day. It was a cowardly act not to speak. I had to give them something, anything. “I was addicted to coke!” I yammered. “I spent thousands of dollars of our savings on coke.” But they scoffed at that. It meant nothing to them.
“Hope it was good shit!”
“Got a toot for a Bro?”
I didn’t know what they wanted. I hadn’t fucked up in some major, dramatic way that deserved sympathy. My problems were the plaints of a middle class neurotic. I hadn’t published a book in years, big deal. I was a small town political hack, a compulsive backyard gardener preoccupied with sex. E
verything about me was mediocre, including my failures. Sweat collected in the corners of my eyes. My forehead felt about to explode.
I had to get out of this. Who cared what these losers thought? “I don’t make shit for money, okay! I live off my wife! She supports us, all right! My wife supports us!” It was out. I had said it.
“That’s all you got, Scarface?”
“What’s her number, man?”
“Whose wife don’t work? Mine has three jobs.”
They’d given up on me by now. They were waiting for the next guy to take the stage. I was off the hook. I had passed with a C. I could stroll out of the spotlight unnoticed, dismissed. They actually thought I was afraid of their orgy of self-pity. Frankly I didn’t give a fuck what they thought. “I GOT THE SHIT BEAT OUT ME IN A FIGHT, OKAY?” That got their attention.
“We could see that all right!” came a voice from the dark.
But they didn’t see it and they didn’t feel the fist hit my face or the echo in my head like a metal cage clanging. They didn’t see the bigger man’s proud little dance step as I staggered backward, tasting blood as I bit through my tongue, or my wife running from the car, flailing her arms with a high-pitched scream. They didn’t feel my shame as I tripped and fell and tried to get to my feet as another man, the guy’s son, ran at me from my blind side and kicked me in the head. “BUT THE ONLY REASON I DIDN’T GET HURT WORSE. . . .”
There wasn’t a sound in the crowded room now, just their faces on mine, watching me, and the billowing smoke of the incense. I felt weak, hollow except for the shame that seemed to fill me, even my lungs, and I gulped for air as that morning came back to me, the cars slowing on the side of the road, the gawkers gathering to watch two tall men advancing on a much smaller one and a tiny woman forcing her way between. Marge advanced on the father—a mass of sunburned fat and muscle in a tight polo shirt, three times her size—her fists up ready to battle, as he cursed the crazy woman and turned away, called his son off me and back to the car and drove off in an angry cloud of noise and sand. “SHE SAVED ME, ALL RIGHT. I WAS IN A FUCKING FIGHT AND GOT MY ASS KICKED AND THE ONLY REASON I WASN’T HURT WORSE WAS BECAUSE MY WIFE TOOK THE GUY ON! MY WIFE!”
