Om
Sat Chit Ananda Parabrahma
Purashothama Paramatma
Sri Bhagavati Sametha
Sri Bhagavate Namaha.
Joan nods, as if now, at last, it makes sense. But, of course, it doesn’t. Aside from Om sat chit ananda, the mantra flows right through her head. She knows she will never remember any more than those four words.
“I’ll say each word of the mantra, and starting with Oliver, we’ll go around the circle and each person translates.”
“Om,” says Ela.
“We are calling on the highest energy, of all there is,” says Oliver, the young boy with skin pale as homogenized milk, an eight-year-old invoking the highest of powers, smiling so wide when he finishes, displaying every one of his milk teeth.
“Sat.”
“The formless,” says Oliver’s mother.
“Chit.”
“Consciousness of love,” says muumuu girl.
“Ananda.”
“Pure love, bliss and joy,” says Oliver’s father, smiling at Joan.
“Parabrahma.”
“The supreme creator,” says Camille Nagy, her eyes focused on Ela.
“Purashothama.”
The man of the identical couple pats Joan’s knee and says, “Who has incarnated in human form to help guide mankind.” She is relieved when his hand leaves her knee.
“Paramatma.”
“Who comes to me in my heart, and becomes my inner voice whenever I ask,” says the woman of the identical couple. There is something Joan hears in her voice that sounds just the littlest bit dirty.
“Sri Bhagavati.”
“The divine mother, the power aspect of creation,” says Young Man with Beard #1.
“Sametha.”
“Together within,” says Young Man with Beard #2.
“Sri Bhagavate.”
“The father of creation which is unchangeable and permanent,” says Young Man with Beard #3.
“Namaha,” says Ela. “I thank you and acknowledge this presence in my life. I ask for your guidance at all times.” She pauses, looks from face to face, then says, “Namaste.”
“Namaste,” everyone calls back.
“Does anyone want to discuss their meditation practice? The peaks and potholes you may be finding?”
Young Man with Beard #2 says, “I can’t seem to get past fifteen minutes when I’m meditating on my own.”
Ela says, “Be grateful for those fifteen minutes. This is not a challenge of endurance. Be kind to yourself.”
Young Man with Beard #2 nods and nods, wraps his arms around his skinny frame.
“See you all tomorrow,” Ela says, and then everyone is standing, taking their pillows to a corner, stacking them up.
“Did you enjoy it?” Camille asks Joan.
“I think so,” Joan lies. “I couldn’t catch on to the mantra.”
“If you keep coming, you will. You’ll learn this one, and all the others.”
“How many others?”
“I know two dozen now. Some teachers give handouts with the chants, but Ela doesn’t. She believes the words must come to you from the air, not from a page.”
Joan has believed the same thing, only her words, in the past, made it onto the page.
“You must come again. I am here every summer, from June through early September, and I’ve been practicing with Ela for years. It takes time, but this hour is specifically devoted to giving yourself that time. Come, Ela will join us, and we’ll go for tea.”
Joan would prefer not to spend the next hour discussing mantras, but Vita Brodkey would tell her that this is an experience she is meant to have.
“That would be lovely,” Joan says, and when she slides her feet into her golden sandals, the crystals splashing in the sun, she is acutely aware of telling her second lie so immediately after what is meant to be a purifying act.
“Nice shoes,” Camille Nagy says, stepping into her practical ones.
* * *
Ela, Camille Nagy, and Joan are at the Mcleodganj Teahouse, a canted house high up in the hill station, at a small table with three teapots, drinking Kashmir Kahwa tea from pretty white cups. When the server poured, he said, “This exquisite green tea has been used for generations to make the royal version of the Kashmiri Kahwa tea.”
Joan wanted to ask if that meant they were not drinking the royal version, and if not, why not, and how the two differed, but she didn’t.
“This is Ashby’s first time in Dharamshala,” Camille Nagy tells Ela.
“Welcome. What problem are you attempting to solve here?”
For a meditative woman, a teacher no less, Ela is very direct. And Camille, under the guise of refilling her teacup, pulls her chair closer to the table, closer to Joan, her head tilted slightly, to catch every one of Joan’s words.
Joan is not certain what she wants to say. And suddenly she is wondering whether Daniel’s theft of Words was a perverted way of turning his childhood dream real, and if so, hasn’t she been proven right, that Martin was wrong, and she should have listened to her instincts—pushed Daniel to find out why he stopped writing about his squirrel. And she remembers her worry, so deep and real, that throwing Henry away would mark Daniel for life, had perhaps already marked him, that there was an enormity to his actions only Joan seemed able to see.
“A tough time with one of my children,” Joan says to Ela and Camille.
“I am sorry,” Ela says. “But you are lucky to have them no matter the issues. Camille knows this about me, but I will share it with you. I was once happily married, a love marriage, which was much rarer in those days than it is now, but I endured three miscarriages, in the first, second, and third trimesters, in that order, and then a still birth in the ninth month, and my husband left me for a woman who could hang on to what he planted in her belly. I was desperate for quite some time, and I came here from Bombay to seek answers and I never left. Two pilgrimage weeks turned into forty-five years. And it has been a far more fulfilling life than I ever expected to live. Please no condolences. It’s all in the past.”
The information Ela has just provided sends Joan spinning. Ela’s been here in Dharamshala for forty-five years, after four tries at creating a baby? How old can Ela possibly be? She looks no older than Joan. Joan thought she and Ela were contemporaries and Camille was the older woman, but it might be Ela and Camille who are of the same generation. And Joan is simultaneously thinking, awfully, horribly, how she would have welcomed a miscarriage with the first one, how that would have obviated the second, but would Martin have turned sneaky, would she have had to become eagle-eyed, to ensure he didn’t deliberately mess with their birth control that had failed just that once.
And she is thinking how she has long subscribed to the truth that many people can be parents, but most can never be writers.
And she’s also thinking, given that she birthed two children whose existences she had acceded to, growing used to the idea, to them tucked up inside of her, that she can’t imagine Ela’s pain, the loss of so many potential wanted children, of losing a husband because her body refused to cooperate.
“And Ela knows this about me,” Camille says. “Never married. Never wanted a husband. No children of my own, but I spend the school year teaching painting to severely handicapped children who belong to others, so I have my fill.”
That Camille Nagy has never been married and has no children does not come as a surprise to Joan.
“What sort of children do you teach?” she asks.
“Children with developmental disabilities, traumatic brain injuries, autism, cerebral palsy, Down syndrome, fetal alcohol syndrome, Tourette’s syndrome, any child with a cognitive or physical disability, and the easy ones, those who are merely blind or mute.”
“What internal fortitude you must have for that incredible challenge,” Joan says.
“The same as any woman. The same as you,” Camille says. “Some can’t easily hold a paintbrush or identify the colors
that make them laugh or shriek, but every once in a while a child connects to their artistic nature, and it’s a sight to behold, that sudden empowerment, a confidence they’ve never felt before, no matter how long it lasts, five minutes, an hour. But Dharamshala is my summer escape from it all, to study Kangra art, to improve my meditation practice, and to paint.”
“Have you been painting a long time?” Joan asks.
“Yes, but long ago I abandoned my serious aspirations. Now I paint just for pleasure, another form of meditation.”
“She is a very fine painter,” Ela says to Joan, and turns to Camille. “Camille, you really should meditate about that, how to stop disparaging your own abilities.”
Camille’s face, always severe, lights up, a smile, a full smile, teeth and all. She is quite lovely when she smiles.
“I know, Ela, but one thing at a time. Can’t become perfect too quickly.”
Ela laughs and says, “Ashby, my friend Camille has just given us both very good advice. So if we’re finished with tea, and you both are willing, would you join me for a walk to Dal Lake?”
When Joan nods, Camille smiles again, at Joan, “Good,” she says. “It’s only a mile and a half walk there.”
* * *
They pick their way down the steep streets back to the main marketplace, and then walk along a road Joan has not yet taken, until the thick deodars thin and reveal a path that leads to a yellowish-green lake.
In Kartar’s guidebook, Joan read about Dal Lake, that it is sacred, and its source, somewhere very high up in the mountains, is sacred, and she expected the water to be clear, but it’s not. She also expected to find a lot of people here, but she, Ela, and Camille Nagy are the only ones.
They follow Ela to the water’s edge, until she stops and holds out her hands.
“Thank you for joining me. To celebrate my seventy-fifth birthday today on this earth, to celebrate Camille’s return for another summer and our good friendship, and to celebrate your first meditation with us, Ashby. This is what I propose—”
“Seventy-five?” Joan says.
“Yes.”
“My God, that’s hard to believe.”
“A life of reflection, of peace, is good for the skin. So are you game? Yes or no?”
“Game for what?” Camille says.
“Just yes or no,” Ela says.
“Yes,” Joan says.
“All right,” Camille says.
And then Ela is unwinding herself from her green sari, and Camille is unbuttoning her blouse, and Joan is unbuttoning her linen pants, and off their clothes come, and Joan and Camille look to Ela, who unhooks her bra, steps out of her underpants, and Joan and Camille do the same, tossing everything away, and they are so beautiful, Joan thinks, the three of them shaded uniquely, faded gold, ecru, and cinnamon, their fifty-two-, sixty-five-, and seventy-five-year-old breasts still fine and firm, waists indented, hips slightly swelling, legs strong and useful, and they are naked on the shore of Dal Lake, running into the water, yelling at how icy it is, and Joan holds her breath and dives in.
38
In the middle of July, Joan sets out from Hotel Gandhi’s Paradise. In her hand is Kartar’s neatly drawn map, a squiggly line for the hill down to the marketplace, a long line for the marketplace itself, a big rectangle for the Dalai Lama’s compound, and an X near the bottom of the paper where two roads collide.
“Right here, Ashby,” Kartar said, pointing to the X on the paper. “This is where you go right. Then just twenty minutes more walking, and do you see here, this circle, that’s when you will be where you are hoping to be.”
Down the hill, through the marketplace, past the compound with its heavy traffic—two cars zooming by, three thin men pedaling their rickshaws, a young boy on a bicycle—then another twenty minutes.
Finally, here is the required right turn onto narrow Jogiwara Road, edged, as far as Joan can see, with flowers. Weeds have pushed up through the dirt, a straight line down the center, nature creating two lanes for the people who use it.
She passes a parade of yellow-robed monks heading back to their monastery, laughing and patting one another’s backs. Ela’s unlined face has taught Joan that ages here are hard to predict. Those monks, contemplative men looking young as children, might be so much older than they appear.
Families laden with rattan baskets are on the road too, on their way to the marketplace, the bazaars, the temples.
Soon, Joan is alone again on the road, and she walks and walks until at last she reaches Kartar’s circle and the address written on the map.
The house on Jogiwara Road is an oasis, set back behind high lacy trees and low-slung latticed greenery. A cottage made of white bricks. A squared roof. Teak window frames. From where Joan stands, the extensive cottage gardens look like a natural version of the structured gardens and vegetable plots she and Fancy gardened into being, and Joan wonders if Martin is happy caretaking it all alone, his music turned up high, without her sitting nearby, reading a book, asking him to lower the volume.
She stares at the cottage, at the long stone path that leads from the road to the door. In the quiet warmth, Joan gathers herself, tries again to figure out what she might say, how to answer the questions certain to arise. She has been lucky that Eric has not sent any updates to his parents since her arrival here. She isn’t sure she could have ignored his emails, or replied as if writing to him from the house in Rhome. He doesn’t know she has been in Dharamshala for six weeks, but at least she has not had to lie, at least not yet.
A flock of tiny birds flies overhead, pale silver against the blue sky. There is time for her to turn around, to head back down the road, to return to her pine suite. She is considering doing just that, has made a quarter-turn in fact, thinking of walking in the front doors of Hotel Gandhi’s Paradise, when the cottage door creaks open, the sound freezing her in place, knowing she is caught, that the moment is upon her. Eric is in the open doorway, in a halo of light, surprised too to find her standing at the bottom of his stone path, in Jogiwara Road.
When she last saw him in January, he was waving at her from under the awning of the Oregon rehab center, coherent, returned to life, getting hold of his demons, and she had waved from the back of the cab taking her to the airport. He was pale then, his black hair cut ragged and short, and now it falls past his shoulders, and he is brown, and dressed like a local in the long tunic and matching pants. His feet are bare. He is a young, handsome Buddha, a vision in white.
It takes him no time to adjust, to realize the woman staring at him is his mother, and then he is walking down the long path, his feet slapping against the stones. His body is loose, his joy obvious, bright-eyed and eager, radiating good spirits, a calm inner balance, and she remembers when she was caught up in the early writing of Words, late to pick up the boys, racing down the hill in the old station wagon where Daniel and Eric sat waiting for her on the school steps. Even when she had forgotten about them and was late, they ran to her. She can still feel her palms cradled around their young heads. Like a synchronized team, they pressed their foreheads into her abdomen, requiring instant tactile contact, the swoosh of her beating heart traveling down to meet theirs, sliding their hands around each of her thighs, like baby monkeys ready to scale a beloved tree.
She knows instantly that Daniel has not confessed his sin to his brother. Eric’s radiant brown eyes reflect no sheltering secret. With his dark golden patina, his old recklessness has been smoothed away. The deep grooves between his eyes, the black circles he had just seven months ago are gone. He is alive and flourishing, standing on solid ground, without a trace of his time in Oregon. In her nightstand in Rhome are the notebooks Joan filled up each night after her days with him; pages splattered with the pain that leaked from his heart, that she saw streaked across his beautiful skin. She feels again the dichotomy that always did split her in two: aware that her son’s anguish had pulled not only at her maternal instincts but also at the dense writerly threads that formed who sh
e was, still tied her together.
She sees the new peace on Eric’s face, feels the serenity that reaches to his core when he hugs her tight. He is lustrous in his composure, poised and graceful. He does not question his mother’s sudden appearance outside his rented cottage here in Dharamshala, says only, “How wonderful that you’ve come. I was serious when I told you and Dad you ought to experience this place. I’m glad you’re here. I hope you’re going to stay for a good long while.”
He wraps Joan’s hand in his and leads her up the walk. “Did you know that Dharamshala is a Hindi word, derived from Sanskrit, and translates into spiritual dwelling, or sanctuary?” Eric doesn’t need, or expect, Joan to reply.
He leads her into the cottage, into a large open room glazed by peaceful white light. The room is celestial, lightly anchored by bookshelves off to the right, a sunken white couch, a deep armchair in heavy white linen. Off to the left is the open kitchen, spices on the shelves, canisters of tea leaves, an orchid with snowy white petals dashed by drops red as blood. Running down the middle is a long wooden table, with its nicks oiled, that reminds her of her old writing table.
At the back of the cottage, French windows are ajar, and she sees the tousled backyard, ringed by tall, tapered trees.
Eric ushers Joan from room to room. His bedroom is simple. Whitewashed floors and furniture, a dark-blue rug, a neatly made bed with a white quilt and white pillows. A cloudy mirror hangs above a four-drawer bureau, reflecting the blue vase filled with bursting purple blooms, a type of flower Joan has never seen before.
The second bedroom is furnished similarly, just as simply, with dwarfed yellow sunflowers in a jade green column.
“It’s all lovely,” Joan says, the first words she has spoken.
“It is,” Eric says. “You’ll come stay here.”
Joan smiles but says nothing. The seven years at home, with him and the others, day and night, are enough to last her a lifetime. She does not intend to move in with her son.
In the main room, while Eric fills up a kettle and sets it on the stove to boil, she inspects the bookshelves. Lots of books about the history of McLeod Ganj, the Kangra valley, the Kangra Fort, Dharamshala, British rule of the area in the nineteenth century, partition in 1947, the tribulations of the Tibetans, about the pictorial art of Kangra, Pahari painting, a book about the Maharaja Sansar Chand Museum, guidebooks for hiking and trekking in the Chambra valley, across the Dhauladhar range, over the Indrahar Pass, a slew of books about the Dalai Lama, and books written by the Dalai Lama, books about the prayer wheels, books about the Tibetan monasteries, the Sikh and Hindu temples in Rewalsar, slim volumes by Indian poets, and more.
The Resurrection of Joan Ashby Page 41
