by Tad Crawford
I locked the door to my room and sat at my desk. I looked at the model boat, the curve of its sails implying wind that moved it forward, toward some destination. My gaze fell lower, to the organ that with my wife had been puffed up and certain. Now shrunken, it burned from that unfinished connection.
It occurred to me that I could relieve the inflammation. I took hold of the wrinkled relic to give it a new life. But my touch made me think of her. Across the living room, behind a closed door, curled on the bed that had been ours. I could be with her in moments. I worked my hand more quickly, but the ruin showed no sign of aspiring to its former lofty architecture. No matter how gently or forcefully I caressed it, the small knob of flesh remained shapeless. I could feel its smallness, but it seemed to barely register the warmth and presence of my hand. A chill spread throughout my body, my spine quivered, and I wondered if it would ever rise again.
At last my focus shifted to the model on the desk in front of me. I had pushed the computer screen to one side to make room for it. Why did Pecheur trust me with such a delicate, painstakingly detailed miniature? It would be easy to label him an eccentric. After all, his life’s work was to find a way to use the energy of a storm to restrain its own destructive force—to make walls of waves and winds.
I searched on the Internet for “Junk China history.” Nearly eight million links came up, but I found myself absorbed by the first few sites I visited. In 1403 the warrior Chu Ti usurped the Ming Dynasty throne. Taking the advice of court eunuchs who knew of the wealth to be made from commerce, Chu Ti decided to build fleets of treasure ships and expand the reach of his empire. He appointed his most trusted commander, Cheng Ho, a Muslim, as admiral of these fleets. In 1405 an armada of 317 enormous junks, some reported to be as large as 500 feet in length and 150 feet in width, began the first of seven epic voyages that would take place over the next three decades. Traveling as far as the coasts of India, Persia, Africa, and even perhaps Australia, Cheng Ho’s armadas brought trade and tribute to China.
I could feel the excitement of this epic venture that had been entrusted to Cheng Ho. His discoveries surpassed those of Columbus, who sailed almost a century later. Wanting to know more about his life, I entered “Cheng Ho biography” and turned up 213,000 links. Going to a site about Muslim heroes, I found that Cheng Ho made the hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca. The site showed one of his ships superimposed over one of Columbus’s to illustrate that the Chinese ships were four or five times larger. In fact, Cheng Ho’s immense junk was portrayed as having nine masts and sails. Following a link to “Chinese Mariner Cheng Ho,” I discovered that he lived from 1371 to 1435 and, in twenty-nine years, traveled thirty-five thousand miles and visited thirty countries. His tomb, in the port city of Nankin, has been restored within the last generation. A memorial hall, built in the Ming style, houses navigational maps from his journeys and pictures of him. Outside, a series of steps and stone platforms lead to his reconstructed tomb. Twenty-eight steps rise to the summit of the tomb, divided into four sections of seven, so that each step represents one of Cheng Ho’s journeys to the west. On the top of the tomb is the Arabic inscription Allahu Akbar, “God is the Greatest.”
As I considered the great adventure and danger of Cheng Ho’s undertakings, I wished I had even a tiny fraction of the excitement and purpose that had been his. I had a desire to see Cheng Ho’s face and searched until I found a portrait of “the admiral of the western seas,” as he was known. It shows a large, handsome man dressed in an elegant, gold-embroidered white robe accented by the black of a thick belt, a flowing cape, and a tall hat. The embroidery covers his chest and abdomen and, in a separate wide band, goes around his knees. I looked for an image in the beautiful curving patterns but couldn’t find one. I studied his face. To me he appeared intelligent, decisive, and powerful, his left hand resting on the hilt of a sword. However, he didn’t look Chinese. The text that accompanied the portrait explained that Cheng Ho had lived in one of the last Mongol strongholds. Overrun by the resurgent Chinese armies when Cheng Ho was eleven, the captured boy had been made a servant to Chu Ti, then a Ming prince, one of the twenty-six sons of the emperor.
Reputed to stand seven feet tall, Cheng Ho possessed skills in both war and diplomacy. I discovered maps of his travels and studied the routes he sailed. On his fifth voyage, he landed in what today is Somalia and brought back a giraffe that the Chinese celebrated as a celestial unicorn. According to some sources, the Chinese might have landed in the Americas decades before Columbus if Cheng Ho’s explorations had been continued by a successor. I learned that Cheng Ho was probably not buried in his tomb at Nankin. More likely he died during his seventh voyage and his burial took place at sea.
One final fact left me pondering for some time. Cheng Ho was a eunuch. He had been castrated, at the age of thirteen, along with the other young prisoners with whom he was taken, and placed in service to Chu Ti. As Chu Ti rose to become emperor, Cheng Ho rose along with him. But had the sacrifice been worth the reward? Which meant more—his freedom, his Mongol heritage, and his sexuality, or his status and achievements as the admiral of the western seas? If it had been up to Cheng Ho, which would he have chosen?
13
“Your problem,” the doctor said, “isn’t uncommon. Fortunately new medicines have been developed—”
“I don’t want medicines,” I interrupted. My anxiety about my condition made me excitable. If I had a routine complaint, such as a sore throat, I would have shown far more deference to the six diplomas hanging on the wall. “I want to get better, be normal. I’ve never had this happen before.”
“A lot of men have it from time to time. It’s part of the aging process, sometimes stress related.”
“I’m not old enough,” I protested.
“There is no single age when sexual function starts to diminish. It has to do with health, genes, circumstances.”
“I’m not even forty.”
He glanced down at my chart. I had found him through the website for my health plan at work. I chose him because his office was close by and he could squeeze me in for an appointment in two days. A tall, lanky man with thinning curls of dark hair and a long white hospital gown, he had deep-set dark eyes that looked intelligent and concerned. I couldn’t understand why my condition didn’t alarm him. Perhaps I should have searched for other doctors or taken more time to study his credentials.
“Let’s start with the examination,” he said cheerfully, rising from behind his desk and opening the door into another small room. “Then we can discuss causes and cures.”
I followed him into the room, which had an examination table with some machines next to it, cabinets on the walls, a small sink, a red wastebasket with “Hazardous” emblazoned on its lid, and a rolling black-seated chair.
“Undress, please, and put on this gown.” He gave me a blue gown that tied in the back. “I’ll be back in a minute or two.”
I shed my clothes and reached behind myself to tie the gown.
Returning, he pointed to a metal stand at the base of the table.
“Step up there,” he said, pulling on translucent rubber gloves that he took from a box by the sink.
I did as he asked. I looked away as one hand moved aside the gown and the other squeezed my testicles.
“Cough, please.”
I coughed. His hand shifted.
“Cough again. Good. Now stroke the penis.”
Taking a firm hold on my penis, I gave half a dozen pulls from bottom to top. He studied the tip when I had finished.
“Okay. Now stand and face away from me. Place both hands on the table and lean forward.”
He took a tube of lubricant from beside the sink and casually smeared a glistening, translucent glob over the middle finger of his rubber-gloved hand.
“Relax. This will only take a few seconds.”
I felt his finger slip inside me. His fingertip pressed in small circles on my prostate. At last he removed his finger, handed me some tissues,
and pulled off the glove, which he discarded in the red waste receptacle.
“Nothing wrong there. Of course, we’ll do a PSA, but it’s nice and smooth. Stand and face me,” he said, pulling on a fresh glove and studying my penis again. “That’s fine. Now lie back on the examination table.”
I did, and he pulled out a support for my legs. He brought his chair around to the side of the table.
“This will be a little bit cold. I want to look at your bladder and kidneys.”
He put lubricant on a silver probe attached by a wire to a machine and pressed the cold tip of the probe to one side of my stomach.
“Bladder looks normal,” he reassured me, studying a screen on the machine. “Roll a bit toward me.”
He moved the probe to my left side and then my right.
“The kidneys are healthy.”
He rose.
“Lift up your feet.”
I wanted to ask why, but didn’t. He slid the metal support back into the table, then raised a bar from each side and placed my heels into what looked like stirrups.
“They’ve made tremendous strides in recent years,” he said as I felt the latex gloves opening the cheeks of my buttocks and applying lubricant again. “Astounding treatments, almost beyond belief. Some are experimental, of course, but a limited number of patients are invited into the testing process.”
I could feel a cold, metal object entering me. I wanted to object or question him, but his seamless patter didn’t invite interruption.
“They run a risk. There’s no doubt about that. Perhaps the treatment won’t work. It might even have harmful side effects. But if your condition is incurable, what risk would be too great? None I can think of. Ah, just as I thought. Please hold still a little while longer. Very interesting.”
I couldn’t imagine what could be interesting. In a moment he withdrew the object, pulled out the support again, and took my feet out of the slings in which they had been suspended.
“Please put your clothes back on and meet me in my office. Oh, yes, and bring a urine specimen with you.”
He handed me a plastic cup and left me alone.
“What do you think?” I asked when I placed the half-filled cup on the front of his desk and sat in an armchair facing him.
“It can definitely be treated,” he said. “In fact, you have a variety of options.”
What relief I felt!
“There are several directions we might pursue. It’s a bit like a detective story. We suspect this and then that, but in the end,” he smiled at me, “we always get our man.”
“What do you think caused it?” I asked.
“Simply being human,” he answered.
“What?” This answer caught me off guard. “But we all suffer from that. Why me and not someone else?”
“I mean that humans aren’t angels.”
For a moment I couldn’t speak. The doctor looked perfectly sane. He spoke in a normal way. He had diplomas on his walls.
“Um … ”
Sensing my confusion, he continued: “Angels are immortal and have no need for sexuality. An angel would never come to my office and complain about the loss of sexual function. It would be an absurdity.”
“Do angels come here?” I asked.
“Only with an appointment.”
I smiled dubiously at his joke.
“It’s a mystery, as I said before, and a good detective explores every possibility. What seems improbable at first may lead to the solution.”
“You said you have treatments. What are they?”
“I could offer you a prosthesis. I have a file here with some information.” He pulled open one of the desk drawers and started searching through the papers inside.
“I don’t think,” I said in a chilly voice, “I want a prosthesis. I want to be normal again.”
“Do no harm,” he said. “That is the essence of the Hippocratic oath.”
“That says nothing about curing.”
“Of course, but everything else will be invasive. Even pills in their own way.”
“But … ”
“I can offer you an inflatable insert. It involves a small surgical procedure, and then you’ll be able to use a remote to create erections at will.”
“That’s not what I want.”
“I don’t like it either,” he agreed. “I’m against surgery if it can be avoided.”
“What else?”
“I mentioned the new medicines. They’re getting more and more powerful.”
“I’d prefer not to use pills.”
“But we’re running out of options.”
“There must be something else. Exercises,” I offered, “or meditation?”
“No harm in that,” he agreed, “but no guarantee either.”
“What else?” I asked.
“There’s only one remaining option. It’s in the experimental stage, but I believe I could have you accepted into the program.”
“I’m certainly interested. What would be involved?”
“Pregnancy. New discoveries have proven that this is not only possible but desirable. What you see as a symptom, I see as the beginning of a cure. The very fact that you can’t have erections means you are ready to move beyond that stage of your life. You’re ready to hold a new life that will grow within you. You can cross the boundaries that have contained you for so many years. It’s only natural. We aren’t meant to stay forever the same.”
“I can’t have babies,” I protested quietly.
“Wait, let me find the articles.” He began to rustle through the sedimentation of papers in his desk drawer. “It’s only in the professional journals. The popular media haven’t picked up the story yet.”
“No!” I said forcefully. “I am not having a baby.”
“Calm down,” he said sharply, looking up at me. “Are you so afraid of being a pioneer? They said a sixty-three-year-old woman couldn’t have babies, and now that’s old news.”
“But at least she was a woman.”
He shrugged and asked, “What miracle is greater than birth? Think of the adventure—to be both a man and a mother. Think of the reward of holding within you something tiny, barely existing, and carrying it to term, giving it life from your life, delivering it into the world.”
I shook my head. I should have left earlier, but his enthusiasm cast a spell.
“No,” I said, “that’s not for me.”
“Too bad.”
“So, what can I do?”
“You’ve heard all the possibilities. You have to make a choice.”
“Tell me more about the pills.”
His lips pursed in disappointment. “So you’re determined to be the way you were before.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“The pills work for most men. I’ll give you a strong dosage. If you have an erection that doesn’t go away in, oh, four or five hours, you should give my office a call. Other side effects might include constipation, fainting, and blindness.”
“Fine.”
He scribbled on a prescription pad and passed the sheet to me.
“Give a call if you have any difficulties.”
“Yes, thanks.”
“And come back in six months for another checkup.”
I rushed to the neighborhood drugstore and waited for the prescription to be filled. Once I had the plastic bottle in hand, I slipped down an aisle to escape the gaze of the pharmacist and swallowed one of the bright-orange pills. At my apartment I locked the door to my bedroom, shed my clothing, and settled into the desk chair facing my computer and the junk with its puffed sails.
Gently I rubbed my inert flesh. I wanted to keep my mind blank, free of distractions and worries. Slowly, more quickly, slowly again, my hand moved and time passed as I worked to raise this ruin to its past glories. Stray thoughts slipped into my mind. Around the globe, at every moment, there must be millions, ten of millions, making a sexual connection. And when those lovers slipped apart, others were ent
ering or being entered, being touched and touching, in numbers beyond counting. My biceps began to burn from the repeated motion, and I looked down at my conscientious objector. What sort of mind did it have? How had it decided to take this leave of absence? Why had it refused to participate?
I stopped and gave my arm a rest. My eyes shifted to the junk, and I began to think of Cheng Ho, vaporous thoughts that rose under a pressure I could hardly describe. He’d been “cleaned” as a boy, relieved of the distractions of his sex to better serve his masters. Presumably he never made love to a woman. What would the purified Cheng Ho desire? Power? That he would have. Wealth beyond measure? That too would be his. But what of sexual desire? Had that been lost to him irrevocably? Or had Cheng Ho’s sexual pleasure become diffuse, spread over all his skin, into his organs, to his bones? The blind hear with such intensity. Wouldn’t the skin of a eunuch be one hundred times more susceptible to pleasure than it was before the cleaning? A simple massage might waken an ecstasy that would spread from skin to organs to bones with a joy that a normal man would never be able to know.
I protectively seized the shifting shape of my testicles in their scrotal sac. What horrid way had Cheng Ho’s balls been cleaned? With a metal device considered a modern innovation at the time? Or with a sharp knife wielded … by whom? A sadist? A bureaucrat? A healer? Imagining being without balls made me grasp my own more tightly, but they shifted away from my fingers like mercury.
Wasn’t the wind that swells the sails of the junk like the swelling of blood that fills the tube of flesh? If such a wind can send a ship from one continent to another, could it stiffen the penis of a eunuch? If not, was he not a he but a hybrid? One who had been a man and not become a woman? A eunuch could take the stiff penis of another in his slippery mouth—or his anus, buttocks slapped to engorge with blood and massaged with scented unguents to let the skinned column enter ever more deeply. Such a eunuch would be receptive, yes, entered, true, but would he have become a woman?
