Round Rock - Michelle Huneven [54]
Hakuono cracked three of the eggs into a jar and stored the jar in her cupboard. The other three eggs she cracked into an identical second jar which was distinguished by a small daub of red nail polish. Hakuono held the second jar in her hands for two hours every day. “I held it as I talked on the phone, as I watched TV. I held it in both hands as if it was something very precious, something alive.” In six weeks, the untouched eggs in the cupboard were, according to Hakuono, “foaming up and looking very toxic, very scary,” whereas the eggs she had held for a minimum of two hours a day were as bright and fresh-looking as the day they were laid.
Hakuono and her eggs have made a number of appearances on local television talk shows. Several leading scientists at U.C. Santa Cruz have vowed to re-create her experiment under laboratory conditions. “Some people may be surprised by such results,” says Hakuono. “As a massage therapist, I merely saw new proof of what I observe daily in my work.”
“Doesn’t surprise me,” Red said. “In AA meetings, you can see people relax when they hold hands for the prayer or hug each other.”
“Ugh,” said Lewis. “Hugging and the Lord’s Prayer. What I hate most in AA.” He jabbed the article with his finger. “Did this massage therapist open that jar of eggs? The real proof would be if she scrambled ’em up for breakfast.”
“I bet she could’ve,” said Libby. “I’d like to try this experiment.”
“Why?” said Lewis.
“What if it’s true?” Libby asked. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“No.”
“I have fresh eggs.” Red opened the refrigerator. “Dropped off this morning.”
“Are you guys serious?” said Lewis.
Red and Libby rummaged through the cupboards until they found small, matching jam jars, which they sterilized in the water Lewis had boiling for pasta. After the jars cooled, they carefully cracked three eggs into each one. One jar went into the pantry next to cans of Progresso soup. Throughout dinner, Libby held the other jar on her lap, cupping it when she could.
Both Red and Libby became positively religious about those eggs. Lewis would find Red at all hours, at the table or watching television, clasping the jar as he would a crystal ball. “Hey,” he’d say, “how’s Operation Stinkbomb?”
Red would hold up the jar, three slumpy yellow orbs in two inches of viscous, slightly cloudy fluid. “Looking pretty darn good, don’t you think?”
LAKE Rito on Sunday morning was the color of tarnished silver. The damp morning air was heavily spiced with sage. The sun was up elsewhere, but not in the narrow inlet where Libby and Lewis set up the poles. Libby cut the bait, pork livers that looked like clumps of solid blood. Lewis couldn’t watch or he’d gag. Instead, he positioned the chairs, secured poles against them, divided up the Sunday paper.
They each manned two poles, drinking coffee from a green metal Thermos. Fishermen trolled past, their engines a low throb. Libby wrote in her journal. Lewis meditated. A Tibetan Buddhist monk was drying out at Round Rock—a guy from Cincinnati named Simon—and he’d given Lewis meditation techniques, such as counting out-breaths up to ten, over and over, which supposedly could quell the ceaseless inner dithering. Lewis practiced this every morning for twenty minutes. Here at the lake, the sun appeared as a thin red line between his eyelids. The wind funnelled empty space into his lungs. He experienced infinitesimal stretches of mental rest.
Lewis rubbed his eyes, stretched his legs, pulling out of his meditation. Libby kept scratching away in her little cardboard-bound notebook. That killed him. Here he was, the published essayist, just loafing, while she filled page after page in her almost-daily journal.
Lewis touched her arm. “Hey, Lib. Read me something from your journal. I won’t be critical.” He jiggled her shoulder. “Something about me. I know it’s in there.”
“Don’t be so sure,” she said, and thumbed through pages of her symmetrical, clever handwriting. “Here’s where you and Red and I talked