lesson 1: stay grounded in limit-pushing ritual, like galaxies that orbit in constancy, with the vaccum of a blackhole besides it - the drop down potential is at any moment. the quote on the graveyard comes to mind - live life like a traveler with the understanding that the graveyard is besides you. - prophet muhammad
mid-morning. fruits at the grocery, then tea and study at leli's bakery/cafe on 36th and 30th. safi, the 30-something brunette from the neighborhood, who works there, asks how the studying is going, her dark eyes softening the bright lights overhead, as she collects the plates of half eaten food and cups from the table next to me.
cool, i say.
cool, she smiles. safi and i are cool. she's cool with my whole crew here.
take a practice test. get 22 out of 100 wrong. a 78. been in the 70's much of my life. born in the 70's. came to astoria in the 70's.
dimitri comes by. dimitri is a late-50 something, bull built, eccentric. his paisley silk shirt is open like a 70's travolta, under silver disco balls - except, instead of the top few buttons being open, the top middle and bottom buttons are open, all but the one or two below his navel. hair spiralled out his mediterranean skin like a wooly mammoth.
what do i need to do to slow down the ageing thing? dimitri asks me, overlooking the test taking i was doing. needed a break, and i have an inclination for adha (the favortive bangli pastime - hanging out).
well, a couple things, i said. move and coordinate your movement with breath. it could be asana, could be a jog. whatever it is, do it with breath alignment.
yeah. that makes sense.
two, sweat.
how?
go to a sauna. if you can't, get it out of your movement.
that'll get rid of toxins.
yeah. and three, figure out what your people ate, and eat it with raw fats from that diet - olive/coconut/etc-oil.
listen, dimitri said. i'm going to share something with you, cause i think you should know. when a master tells you something, you do it for 50 years, you know. dimitri's large wig-like red-brown hair leaped around like little house of horrors. his large handlebar mustache fell over the stubbles around his face.
you tell one of these doctors out here that you don't have to die, that you can live for 300 years, and they'll be like, the cell can only last for blah blah blah. man, these people have no clue. you gotta be kidding me. the masters don't want to hear that. you tell a master that, he'll look at you and be like: 'okay, i'll see you later.' they don't have time for that ish! listen asif, when a master give you a breathing technique, you do that for 50 years. we're not talking about 2 weeks. could you imagine? tell someone out here to breathe a certain way and practice that for 3 days and they flip out.
deep, i said, recalling the words of my yoga teacher: practice, practice, practice.
thing is, dimitri said, looking around, like someone might be watching us. these masters have been living for centuries. jesus' master is still alive. he taught jesus from 13 to 30. jesus went back there, to india, after being crucified, dimtri said. listen, time isn't a line. these people here think it is, so they die. people aren't dying cause of disease. they're dying cause they think time is this line and they fall into it. time is killing them.
whoa, i say, wrapping my head around his words - people dying cause of giving in to linear time.
noon.
black coffee, the balding guy orders.
yeah, i say. that's the way to go.
i'm going vegan, dude says. mostly vegan is the best thing you can do. alex, that's my name.
asif, i say.
have you ever heard of the byzantine diet?
nah.
the byzantine diet was mostly vegan. in fact they fasted from all meats for 40 days a year, and then fasted throughout the year.
alex is tall with soft curious eyes. he recalls some contemporary authors on diet and fasting.
yeah, i said, thinking of the prophet muhammad's prescription on intermittent fasting. ancient mathematics.
told alex about the new juice spot that opened across the street.
where? he asked. walked him out, pointed past the clutter of mostly new restaurants across the street.
1-3pm siesta. slept. slept so hard, dreams tried to wake me. siesta reminded me of how important it was, how there was a reason why things closed down from 1-4 in bangladesh, 1-7 in spain. nanabhaiya used to sleep right after lunch. everyone did back in '92 when we visited.
3:30 dropped into primary series, after stepping away for a week. the tightness of contracted muscles, resisted the moevement. dripped all over the rug and wondered if the living room would permanently stink like armpit.
5pm on my way to the cafe again, stopped by the 24 hour grocery again. online for some fruits, i hear some loud cuss words. look outside. this 13 year old with an afro that made his 5feet close to six, shouted, while pushing a shopping cart: F*^! your fruits!!! i can't stand it!
cafe...petra asks me if i want the coffee to stay or go. i tell her i always have it to stay.
you know that...
yeah, but i don't want to assume, she says. it could be different this time.
wow, i think. right. no two moments are the same. every moment is new, and pregnant with the possibility of something deeply different. when did i fall into such a rote?
5:30 chris walks in waves hi and sits in a corner on the opposite end. i go over.
didn't want to bother you, he says, speaking soft through razor sharp teeth.
how's your day going?
ah, well, it's good. somehow we get into a conversation about women and marriage and kids. he has two of them. both in canada. two different mothers, he says. chris tells me to sit in the two seater table. i tell him i'd rather stand, and continue to gyrate, shake and jostle, while he speaks.
i left my first wife for this other woman. he tells me, after being married for 22 years. i believe in family and maintaining this, but i'm an artist, you know?
yeah.
it was a mistake. the one pearl was my daughter. but i regret being with my second wife. she used me.
karma, i think. action, reaction. all our actions have a consequence.
6pm, i go for a walk, get some fruits for myself and a bag of grapes for petra. at the grocery, the chick behind the counter is the same one i'd purchased fruits from 7 hours earlier.
still here? i ask.
and your here again, she says. third time.
didn't think she noticed.
you must be tired, i say.
yeah, but it's okay. another few hours. done at ten. covering for a friend.
well, that's nice of you, i say. that's good karma.
she smiles. we exchange byes. the kind that is kinda tense, like you're kinda cool.
6:30pm dimitri comes in to the cafe and comes straight to me. he's in gym clothes this time. his sports jacket only zipped in the bottom so his entire chest and some of his stomach is exposed.
listen, dimitri says. i've been thinking of what you said, you know, breath and movement. well, the thing is, your right. most people out here don't want to believe it, but time doesn't exist. listen, dimitri says, while i keep my head low and watch his words through his mustache. age and death are a decision.
7pm abdul, who came by to say what's up, returns. this time he waits for his dad. we talk about working out, exercise, diet, religion.
movement is so important, he says. i see people in the bronx, and how fat they are, and think how man, i don't want to be like that.
abdul is clearly muscular. a slim but bulky dude.
i want to get bigger, he says.
why? i ask.
respect, he says.
9:55 victor and i walk out of the cafe together. we chilll at the park across the street from the crib, sitting by the chess tables, usually where the crackheads and drunks and elders from the senior center congregate. we delve into homosapien and neanderthal man immediately. he says that there were actually several species of humans, not one. they coexisted, but couldn't co-mate, as they were different species. victor is deeply-read, not just well read. he tells me that it is possible to learn alone, that making mistakes is essential to learning and that a teacher is not neccessary to this process. his long black hair blows over his large beast (from the x-men) shoulders/build.
i did it, he says. i spent a lot of time without friends, packing books and setting shop in various cafes and studying, practicing, and learning.
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