My parents left Utah right before I was born. They moved to a new suburb of Los Angeles that would later be called Little Watts, for it became a microcosm of racial tension and hatred found in the ghettos. When the burning and shooting began, we moved to the fringes, where we watched in fear, as racial anger seethed and exploded, marking the landscape with as yet unbridled, unfocused passion. Prejudice I saw, but prejudice I did not know, not the oomph, not the squeeze, not the searing pain, not yet.
In the early seventies I silently plotted my escape into history: to England, to Scotland and to Spain. I dreamed of sitting and talking to Picasso, of bearing my soul to him of how Guernica, his painting that evoked the agony of genocide, ripped me apart, I knew not why. I longed to escape my roots and my youth, slaughtered with wrong choices. I purchased a one way plane ticket to London, England and let destiny take care of the rest.
I still can see the English farmland, covered in a cloudy darkness, as I first saw it from the sky. The plane circled above the sheep who ate undisturbed by the familiar sounds of large aircraft. I can still taste, with sweet longing, my first hours in that new and strange place.
A friend of a friend met me at the gate and took me to his mothers home where I stayed that first night. In the room above the staircase, there was barely space for a tiny bed. Hanging from the top of the only window, as it had hung for the last thirty years, were blackout curtains from World War II. I could only think of the Guernica these people lived through and obviously still feared. The blackness of the room, the void and the thousands of miles which now separated me from the people I loved educed millions of tears like I have never cried again in my life. When dawn arrived I lifted the black-out curtain to meet a bright sunny morning, goading me on. The past was in the past. I had to move on.
I stopped first at the American Express to exchange my few American dollars for the English pound and pence. In the line just ahead of me was a young woman, near my own age, with a weathered pack-pack hanging from her shoulders. I watched pensively as she exchanged her pounds into dollars, thinking that she must be on her way back to the States. My stares bore a hole right through her, for she turned abruptly and gave me a deep, curious once over.
“Your back-pack looks new. Have you just arrived?”
My face was no doubt wearing what a year ago was painted all over hers: fear of the unknown.
She spoke again, her American accent divinely wrapped in something foreign, “Do you want to go get some coffee?”
Yes, yes, yes, “YES,” I could barely slip through my lips.
She possessed all I wanted: the knowledge of how to get through this. We talked as we walked, sharing our personal backgrounds, first mine then hers.
Tall, light complected, with long sandy reddish hair, Jenny told me why she had come to Europe and how a Dr. Schaefer had saved her life and he could do the same for me.
“I was once one of Charlie Manson’s followers, imprisoned for trying to smuggle him a gun. When they cut me lose, I pan-handled my way to New York, then pan-handled enough fare for a plane to England. Dr. Schaefer, a famous theologian, found me in Egypt and effectively changed my life. I left a young son in the States and now I am ready to go back.”
She was very frank. And though the name Charles Manson evoked fear in me, something in her demeanor made me trust her. We were soul sisters with many things in common.
“I think you’d really like Dr. Schaeffer. Why don’t I give him a call, see if he’d put you up in Switzerland, where he lives?” She stood up and went for the phone near our table, dialing Huemoz, Switzerland. The pause in conversation gave me time to pinch myself. Was I in England? Was I just offered a place to live, in Switzerland? Am I dreaming?
“Sorry Jenny,” said the person on the other end of the phone, “he isn’t here, not until day after tomorrow. He’s doing a radio show in London.”
Fate was laying out the road before me. Within hours we reached the address where he was and we were begging for entrance from the “no one can bother him” guard at the door. As we turned away, Dr. Schaefer caught a glimpse of Jenny through the window and ran to the door.
“What are you doing here? How did you find me?” Excited to see Jenny, he invited us to lunch. It was evident that he loved her dearly, after all, she was one of his ‘miracles.’ Once, briefly, when I was staring into his eyes, I thought I saw the shadow of Charles Manson. I didn’t know any of these people. I imagined all kinds of shadows lurking. Across the extremely long dining table, covered in beautiful white linen and candelabras, Dr. Schaeffer turned his attention to me. He probably wondered if any C. Manson’s drove me, alone, to the shores of a foreign land. I prepared to withhold my soul from this stranger, but he saw beyond my hazel eyes, he knew what I refused to tell. He offered me the same life he had offered Jenny. I said no.
No comments:
Post a Comment