The Traveling Death and Resurrection Show - Ariel Gore [47]
Despite tremendous opposition within the Carmelite order, she got permission from Rome to found a strict convent in Avila. No jewelry or lapdogs there. Her nuns lived in quiet and poverty. No table or chair graced Teresa’s small cell. She wrote kneeling on the floor under a window. She didn’t reread her work, and she did no editing.
Bathed in rays of brilliant gold, she likened prayer to a garden, made it sound almost simple: Step 1 is meditation—slow and laborious, like drawing water from a deep well by hand. Step 2 is simple quiet—you still your senses so your soul can begin to receive guidance. More water is drawn, but less energy is expended. Your attachments to earthly things begin to fall away. Step 3 is union—no-stress contact with God. It’s as if a little spring has bubbled up and the garden becomes self-watering. Step 4—well, step 4 is done by God herself, raining from above. You faint into a swoon of perfect receptivity.
After Teresa died at the age of sixty-seven, a heavenly scent permeated her tomb. When her body was exhumed, it was sweet smelling and incorrupt. Pieces were amputated as relics. Her heart, hands, right foot, right arm, left eye, and part of her jaw are on display at various sites around the world.
If you suffer from headaches, fear heart attack, or long for a direct line to God, invoke the Roving Nun. Build a simple altar with a heart, an arrow, and a book. Follow the steps and cultivate the garden. Be gentle to all, and stern with yourself. Say thanks to Teresa by testing the limits of faith and authority. And when things get rough, repeat after the earthy mystic: Let nothing disturb thee, let nothing affright thee. All things are passing. God alone abideth.
I slip my T-shirt back on, dry now, but not my jeans, and crawl to the edge of my granite hill.
The little boy below has a huge hammock of a net, wears nothing but a pair of Spider-Man underwear. He attaches one end of his hammock to a tree stump near the water’s edge, swims with the other end in his fist as he sings.
I watch his wide arc.
“Gotchaaaa!” he cries, grabbing a flapping silver fish from his net and running through the water with it like it’s a home-run baseball. He drops it into a plastic bag hanging from the branch of a pine tree and he’s back in the water.
I miss Manny something fierce—his bellowing songs, his bright morning face.
“I come from Alabama!” the little boy yells. “With a big ol’ banjo on my knee!” He seems as pleased when he doesn’t catch a fish as when he does.
“Son?” a low voice calls through the trees.
The boy darts from the water, rushes for his bag. “I caught a fish, Dad! I caught one!”
A rustling of pine needles.
I wait on the rock as father and child break down their tent and pack up with their fish. When I’m pretty sure the coast is clear, I make my way down from my sunny perch, wade into the lagoon to inspect the old hammock net the boy left. It’s got a few big holes in it, but I tie them off. I hold the unanchored end of the net, follow the little boy’s arc through the blue chill. A small school approaching, I splash-run to snag them, trip over a slimy rock. None of the fish catch in my net. I shake my head at the fates. If a seven-year-old singing “Oh, Susanna” can catch a fish, why not me? I rock-hop back to the beginning of his arc, pull my net through the lagoon again and again. “Oh, Susanna,” I start to sing, “don’t you cry for me!” But it’s hopeless. A half dozen silver fish approach, sniffing at my stupid net. I grab both sides, pull it fast around them, but the fish just scatter like shadows. They’re not stupid. Me, on the other hand—I’m dumb as a bag of marshmallows. I want to cry. The afternoon sun is sinking in the sky and my net is empty. I’m famished. I could make myself bleed I’m so damn hungry, but who would come to my rescue?
It occurs to me that my trick is kind of passive-aggressive.
I bend to my knees, the lake-bottom gravel rough against my skin. “Fish,” I say, “it’s true I’m trying to kill you, but, see, Dorothy’s expecting