Canto Twenty-One – The Deserted Beach
I was all alone on the island for all I knew, so I immediately got busy on my best Robinson Crusoe plan. And then my headache made me rethink that, and I went back to sleep for another two hours. I think it was two hours, estimating by the sun, but I don’t really know how to estimate time by the sun, and as I decided the first order of business had to be to locate any useful wreckage from the ship that had washed up on the shore, my head started hurting again, so I slept again. Now, I know from re-reading this paragraph that I was probably sleeping way too much… and I didn’t know for sure that Chinooki wouldn’t come up on the sand to eat me, but, well… having this kind of horror-story adventure in the South Seas was really tiring.
When I did finally search the beach, I found almost nothing at all to help me. I needed a knife, or a hammer, or a gun, or a shovel… but all I found was this log book and a wooden crate full of Pink Fizz Cherry Soda Pop. Luckily, I also discovered I still had a pencil in my jeans pocket, otherwise I might’ve forgotten everything that happened before I could write it all down. I know my thinking was a little fuzzy at the time… or possibly Pink Fizzy… but I wrote down everything as truthfully as I possibly could so that whoever found the book would know what happened to the Reefer Mary Celeste and her crew.
Inland on the island was jungle… a rather thick jungle. But I desperately needed food and fresh water. And if I tried walking the beach until I either found civilization or discovered I was on a deserted island; I might die of dehydration and thirst before I discovered I was all alone for certain. So, I made a brief foray into the island. If I met headhunters or an evil killer gorilla, I couldn’t do any more about it than writing a scathing commentary on why they shouldn’t be eating me raw in this log book. I could write that I hoped to give them a fatal case of indigestion as long as they ate my writing hand last.
The jungle was very hot and humid, but I found a rainwater pool a short way into the jungle and was able to slake my thirst. Coconuts and bananas were growing in abundance near the pool. I also ate. And it was then that I saw her for the first time. She was a young girl. I admit, at the time, I didn’t really know how young. But she was lovely. She was Asian-looking with slanted eyes and caramel-brown skin. She had black hair and dark brown eyes that twinkled at me as she smiled. And she was standing on the edge of the pool completely nude. The only thing she wore was an adolescent red panda sitting on her shoulder and grimacing at me with a raccoon-like smile.
“Parlez vous Francais?” she said. “Tagalog? Maybe English?”
“I understand English,” I confessed.
“Ah, so good. I am liking practicing my English. We don’t be speaking it on this island. Maligayang pagdating sa masasamang isla. That means be welcome to Evil Island.”
I didn’t know whether to be frightened or worried about the name of the place, or be incredibly embarrassed that I was talking to a completely naked girl. “I… I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to spy on you while you were bathing. I will give you some privacy…”
“Huwag pumunta! I mean… don’t be going away! I be liking you. I don’t be wearing clothings on this island, but I am having a kimono back at my bahay… my house. I can be putting it on if hubad is wrongness for you.”
“Um, well, I…” I didn’t know what to say. I was seven kinds of flustered and at least three kinds of embarrassed.
“Please. Gwapong Lalaki and I are wanting to be talking to you. It is lonely on the island, waiting for sa galit na bulkan… for the volcano.”
“You… you are waiting for the volcano?” I looked up at the high mountain peak about a mile inland. Black smoke curled nastily out of the top of it.
“Yes. I am being the virgin bride. I am waiting for my husband to be.”
This of course sounded like some of the worst rumors I had ever heard about South Seas islanders. It seemed they intended to throw this beautiful, naked young girl into the volcano to appease an angry god or some such nonsense.
“We have to get you out of here,” I said as bravely as I could manage.
“Yes, yes, that is what I am waiting for.”
“Um, you are?”
“Oh, yes, my husband is to be coming and taking me away from here forever.”
I was determined to rescue the poor girl.
“What is your name, sweetie?”
“I am Malutu… the Red Flower of Matuling Lupa.”
“I don’t have a way off the island at the moment, but I can build us a boat or something…”
“First you are coming to the house of Malutu and Gwapong Lalaki. Follow us.”
She padded out of the clearing on bare feet and back towards the beach. She apparently had a house to live in while she waited for her evil people to throw her into the volcano. I followed her, not knowing what else to do.
“Um, Malutu? You haven’t seen any mermaids on the beach have you?”
“Mermaids? You are meaning sirena Chinooki?”
“You actually know about her?”
“Of course, silly man… She is being the one who brought you to me.”
Catch a Falling Star 
Dancing With Alan Watts
It seems sometimes, in a Judaeo-Christian society, that we are a constantly being scrutinized by a rather harsh all-knowing God who rewards getting the faith-words accurately correct, to the letter, and the faith-based actions perfect, without a single mistake. And He punishes missteps of word or deed with pain and suffering and the potential of an eternity in Sheol or Hell. And that is a tough God to live with. He is like a teacher who uses his or her God-like powers to reward or punish to lead his students all down an exacting, narrow path to a destination that does not have room for everyone when they arrive.
It doesn’t take long in childhood for a highly intelligent person to realize before childhood is over that this cosmology is actually a load of horse pucky. It didn’t even take long for somebody as semi-stupid as me.
What I like about listening on YouTube to the wisdom of Alan Watts is that he gives us an alternative way of seeing the universe and ourselves. This he can offer through his studies of Eastern and Buddhist philosophies. Everything appealing in John Lennon’s signature song “Imagine” comes from Lennon’s love of listening to the lectures of Alan Watts. He is obviously a wise-guy.
Alan Watts teaches us the pathways that lead to finding yourself, who you truly are, and how you fit into the universe as a whole. When Carl Sagan says that we are all made of star-stuff, he is not only telling us what is literally true, as the elements our bodies were formed from were literally made in the nuclear forges at the centers of stars that later exploded in nova-bursts to scatter the elements across the skies of everywhere. He is also telling us that what Alan Watts says is metaphorically true, that everything in the universe is part of the same thing and we are all one in this way.
There is plenty to worry about in my little life. I could easily drop dead at any time from any one of my six incurable diseases or even the return of the skin cancer I beat in 1983. I suffer from the consequences of disease daily, as I have for many years now. My sins are many. I broke my promise the other day to never show you the horrors of my naked body on this blog. I constantly eat the wrong thing and continue to do things that I know are bad for the environment and the health of my body. I am prejudiced against racists, stupidity, and the actions of dedicated Trump-lovers. In many ways I deserve God’s wrath and brutal correction. I have come to truly believe that climate change is going to end life on Earth. I am horrible.
But I have learned from Alan Watts that all of those concerns mean nothing. I don’t believe in Heaven or an afterlife. But I do not fear death. I am one with the universe. And the universe goes on even if I do not. And I will always be a part of it, even after I am no longer alive. The universe has a mind and is intelligent And I take part in that because one small part of that intelligence is me, and lives in my head.
There is comfort to be found in the words of Alan Watts. And living in pain as I do, I really need that comfort most of the time. That is why I have attempted to share a bit of that comfort with you.
8 Comments
Filed under artists I admire, commentary, feeling sorry for myself, finding love, foolishness, healing, health, humor, Paffooney, philosophy
Tagged as Alan Watts