Chapter 7
Paige, Lindy, and I walked real slow back to the apartment. We were just digging the cool air, letting random melodies play in our minds, thinking that everything’s pretty hip.
I started thinking about my great friend Dannon back in San Diego, where I grew up. Dannon’s a number of year older than me and if you couldn’t tell in his appearance, you would definitely tell in his wisdom he’s racked up. We’re talking about a guy who once told me, “The one great sin is not taking joy in the life that you’ve been given. If you can get that, the rest should be a piece of cake.” And once he said, “Spirituality is nothing more than a sense of wonder at the world and your relationship with it.” And he was always spouting off wise lines like these like he was Master Kung or Socrates or someone like that.
It’s obvious, talking to Dannon, that he’s real jovial, looking at the world through happy eyes. Spiritually he was always on the lookout for magic. If you asked him what magic was he might say it’s a baby’s smile or romantic movement but if you really paid deep attention you’d notice he was looking deep and penetrating into the far reaches of your eye’s pupil and he was seeing his magic right in your very being. And that’s the kind of trip that makes you feel both that he’s special and that you are. Dannon’s a guy you can go to.
I was thinking about Jonathon and some of the stuff he was saying and I felt this insatiable urge to share it with good old Dannon and just see what he thinks. So as soon as we got home I grabbed the phone and crawled my giant body into the miniature alcove. I wondered for a moment if it was sacrilege to chat on the phone in the holy alcove but then I remembered that it would be Dannon on the other line and what’s more spiritual than that? I dialed his digits.
“Hello?” I heard his voice ask.
“I’m calling you from the alcove.”
“What? Hello?”
“I’m calling you from the alcove.”
“Is that you Jake?”
“You know anyone else who would call you from their alcove?”
“Jake, nice to hear from you. How are you and the girls?”
By this time Dannon was well aware that the three of us were perfectly well intentioned and loving friends...who liked to mess with him. Any time we would stumble across something offensive or non-politically correct we would immediately say, “We need to tell Dannon about this!” And the reason was because the look on his face every single time we mentioned prostituting ourselves or committing suicide by eating seven dozen donuts within twenty minutes, thinking that we’d need someone to assist because we would start throwing up and someone would need to keep cramming them in there until our stomachs literally exploded or the sugar in the bloodstream started some violent collapse. Every time we told Dannon about these stupid and crazy ideas he would just sit there for a few seconds, obviously taking it all in. His eyes would squint a little, just enough to crease his heavy brow, and he would pucker his lips slightly, adding to the confused effect. Then he would visibly gather himself and ask a totally practical question that would throw the legs right out from under our little scenario. He would say something like, “Okay...But you guys are poor college kids. How are you going to afford seven dozen donuts?” And we’d just look dejected and mumble, “I never thought of that” real sad-like even though we hadn’t the slightest intention to kill ourselves anyways. And that’s good old sweet Dannon.
“Oh Dannon, we just had an incredible lunch. The three of us were out in the town having a good picnic and out of nowhere comes freaking Lao Tzu to chat with us.”
“He must be aging well,” Dannon said quite seriously.
“Okay, it was a dude named Jonathon who was Lao Tzu incarnate I’m convinced. We had a fascinating talk about life and connection and it was just real magical and wise.”
Dannon understood this word “magical” like no one else I knew. And when describing events to him I used it with tremendous caution so as not to spit on it and undermine its integrity. When I said something was “magical” Dannon knew it was no mere hocus pocus but rather a big fat elephant disappearing and showing up in the center of New York smoking a cigar and singing old Dire Straits tunes.
He said, “It’s funny this happened today because not one hour ago I was eating a sandwich I made and like a flash of energy I started thinking about you guys and wondering what you were doing.”
“That’s funny,” I said quiet. I was thinking it was related to the prayer I sent him while meditating. I imagined a smooth green flash popping out of my navel and jetting across the whole of warm California and skidding to a halt by his doorstep and nailing him in the ear, going straight to his crazy mind. And he’d probably want to take some cu-tips to his ears if he knew that “flash of energy” originated in my hairy navel.
I told Dannon all about our intense conversation and he listened good and attentive like he’s famous for doing.
“It sounds wonderful. It sounds like you met a saint. I’m jealous,” he said after hearing the sweet story.
“Dannon, are you happy? Is life great? Cause sometimes I feel awfully down and want to just give up but at the same time I’m being pulled up real hard like heavenly angels got me attached to some jubilee cord.”
“First of all,” he replied, “you talk crazy. But as for me, I feel like each day I get up and roll some dice. Some days I’m a winner and things just fall into place. Other days are not so good. But just as in gambling, there’s always hope. And fortunately for me, the odds are a lot better here than in Vegas.”
Just as he was telling me this I had the sudden flash-back of a few years ago when Paige and I were driving in a car feeling deeply depressed and mournful, just talking about blackness. Then out of nowhere came Peter Gabriel’s voice on the radio - a real musical saint giving an interview over the airwaves. And our world turned over. I pulled right off the highway and sat there with Paige on the side of the road. I needed to turn off the car and just keep the radio on because at this point the engine was just too much. And Peter Gabriel talked about all the charity work he was doing and talked all about world music and reaching out and connecting. Paige and I just sat there, seats reclined, staring at the car ceiling, suddenly peaceful and warm. When the interview ended we got the engine humming and had a real joyous drive back home, smiling through and through.
“I know about the dice, Dannon. I know all about the dice.”
Dannon, Paige, Lindy and I used to have a famous meeting every week at a local coffee shop where we would do “homework” and bring it all to the table over hot latte’s and mocha’s. It was an effort to motivate ourselves to get something creative done. It got me reading Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamavoz over and keeping detailed notes and drawing pictures of some dark scene where Alyosha and Ivan get together and argue about whether Jesus is a jerk or not. It got Paige drawing an incredible and complex picture symbolizing the entire universe, with all the elements and their respective places. A brave venture indeed but if anyone could pull it off it was Paige. It got Lindy studying science and really looking into some subjects that affected her personally. Like a good rationalist she was trying to understand some complexities in an objective manner. It was through these homework assignments that I discovered what a great writer Dannon was. I knew he was incredibly well read, but this guy could turn out poetry and prose like nothing else. Sometime, sitting back and thinking about all this bundled up talent, I just sigh like a big breath directed toward heaven, thanking the angels and the demons too. For what is high art without the low?
“Dannon, you gotta keep writing. I think the world is counting on you.”
“Ah Jake, you’re too kind. You have to keep thinking. You blow me away. You’re brilliant!”
“Aren’t you using ‘brilliant’ a little strong here?”
“Not at all. I think you’re brilliant.”
“No, no. But you...you’re brilliant.”
And that’s what these conversations more that often turned into. Big ravings trying to outdo the other in compliments and the other, humble as all hell. It was never a show of altruism or empty language. We were sincere as ever. We just always wanted to make it clear that we loved the other, and that we didn’t take that love for granted. And so we were always dishing big sincere compliments just so nothing went unsaid.
At this point I was missing Dannon big time. Here I was at one end of California and he was at the other. And all I really wanted to do was sit in some homey coffee shop with him and the girls and philosophize and think big thoughts and argue and agree and sip down pots of dark brown coffee. The alcove in which I was encompassed started looking a darker shade of dark and I knew it was time to say goodbye.
Dannon and I said our goodbyes, knowing we’d see each other sometime, though definitely not the next day. I thought as I hung up the phone that if one could take anything from him it should be his sense of humor. This man felt the sadness of the world, and grieved right along side it. But he knew how to laugh too, and sometimes life’s just too absurd to miss the punch line.
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