Back at quarters Checo interrogates him. “What have you seen? Do you know who broke the perimeter? How did the El Jefe dispose of the intruders?”
Christopher reports the gruesome events, omitting only his strange waking dream and his confiscation of beer and Champagne. He’d hoped telling Checo would lighten his burden. This has been one of the worst days of his life. Unable to intervene while women are assaulted right before his eyes. Anguish. He’d thought, he’d hoped, Checo would understand his misery.
Instead while Christopher is dispirited, Checo is excited. He asks endless questions. A growing paranoia stalks Christopher. Suddenly he doubts Checo can be discrete. Can I trust him? Will he broadcast this day’s events, embellishing with his storytelling skills?
If El Jefe discovers Christopher’s presence on the beach today it will be his death sentence. Damn! I should have kept it to myself.
At dinner his worst fears are realized. Checo tells the tale as if he were the witness. Inmates laugh and sigh. Checo plays out the scenes. “Checo,” Christopher shouts. “Are you out of your mind?”
Publically mocking El Jefe!
El Jefe will kill the man who gossips about him.
Undeterred by Christopher’s steely eyed disapproval, Checo continues to pantomime the sloppy assaults. Hearing the violence cheered by Checo’s audience infuriates Christopher. He will never forget the helplessness not daring to intervene. While his table mates are spellbound by Checo’s reenactment Christopher is reliving the horror. Dinner tastes like burnt corn and ashes in his mouth. What a mistake. Checo is acting like a wild elephant on a rampage, unaware of the hunter with the assault rifle.
What did Master Jojo say?
“Buddha tells us the mind is a wild elephant. You are the tiny rider sitting on the elephant’s back. When the rider and elephant want to go in the same direction all is well.” Christopher recalls Master Jojo sitting straight backed on the cushioned dojo floor. He gestures with his heart hand. “However, when the elephant wants to go in a different direction to disagree is futile. You cannot argue with an elephant, especially an elephant on a rampage.”
Christopher thinks tonight Checo is the elephant on a rampage.
The rowdy laughter falls away as Christopher is caught in the memories of Master Jojo’s teachings; his serene intelligence, his comic faces. “The elephant is our mind’s power and strength, but undisciplined it will trample through our lives and the lives of loved ones and friends…”
“The tiny rider on the elephant represents the rational mind… The rider or rational mind, thinks he’s in charge… in truth, Buddha teaches, he serves the wild elephant.”
Christopher recalls right at that moment Master Jojo threw a baton at him. As it rocketed toward him, Christopher batted the missile away. Master Jojo laughed and said, “What part of your mind protected you from the stick? The elephant! The rider does not the rule our instincts.” He adds, “A myth.”
Christopher smiles remembering, Master Jojo’s teaching style best described as unexpected. Reaching across the mat, patting Christopher’s knee he said, “When you are fighting for your life the elephant drives your combat maneuvers. Rapport between the rider and the elephant will be your secret to beating the odds when overwhelmed with attackers.”
Master Jojo closes his eyes concluding the lesson. His final sentence the most important, “Learn to mediate. Quiet the wild elephant and forge a bond.”
Getting up from the table, while listeners are caught in Checo’s stories, Christopher heads for a quiet place near the beach. He sits with his back to the coconut tree and his eyes drift closed. He searches for inner quiet. For the last four years Christopher has sat in meditation. He has befriended the wild elephant dwelling within us all. Meditation frees him of some anxieties others suffer. But on Islas Tres Marias it’s impossible to extinguish the fear real and imagined that eats away at the mind. Utilizing meditation and martial arts Christopher calms his fears. As the rider he watches and assesses the dangers of the moment. Simultaneously he trusts the instinctive nature of the wild elephant that dwells within him and acts for his greater good without the need for thought.
This sets him apart from every other man on the island.
• • •
Christopher lives for Juanita’s visits. Their conversations are the elixir of his life. On one trip up the bluff, he tells her the details of his eighteenth birthday. “At dawn I left without waking my parents. My dad might have felt the rumble of the car.” He laughs, “It has power, sleek, streamlined, sweet power!”
He shudders remembering his errand at the tuck and roll shop, “a double-dealing skunk! His workers hid a kilo of marijuana in the passenger door!”
Recalling, Christopher’s gut wrenches, as if his car disappearing from sight, vanishing, is happening all over again. He can’t count how many times each day he relives the nightmare. Outrage and helplessness pour through him. He shakes his head, “The police! The Tijuana Police!”
Juanita horrified, feels his loss. His beating strikes in her body. A new ache in her soul, to hear he was abducted, kidnapped and beaten. She understands his tortuous path to Islas Tres Marias. They sit in silence, surf pounding in the distance. Christopher feels each wave, a tug, a singular inhale and exhale. In a quiet voice he adds, “The worst part? My parent’s worry. Knowing they are terrified.”
Grabbing his arm, squeezing, Juanita begs, “Christopher let me call them.”
Brushing her hand he says, “No Juanita.” He swallows hard against her offer, “too dangerous.”
After witnessing El Jefes savage treatment of the women on the beach Christopher is determined to keep Juanita safe. “I have to escape soon.”
“What? You spoke softly.” Shaking her head, peering into him, “What did you say?”
Changing the subject, he asks, “Do you learn ceremonies and healing prayers with La Currandera?”
He is protecting me. Hiding her sadness, Juanita nods vigorously, “Yes, and much more. I practice dreaming.” She laughs, just as he hoped she would, at his wiggling eyebrows. “There are many kinds of dreaming. Right now I train to walk between the waking and sleeping world.”
“I know that place!” Christopher shouts. “Sometimes I find myself both waking and sleeping. I try to hold onto both. It’s hard. Tell me more!” Juanita laughs. Rarely does she find people interested in her work with La Currandera.
“She teaches me the healing properties of herbs and stones. You’d be surprised at the slippery nature of this knowledge.” Juanita’s voice drops into a whisper. “I’ve learned words of power to pull my dreams from the invisible world into the physical world. And she reminds me to confer with my power animals.”
He nods, “You are the only person I’ve met who knows the animal close to them.” Frowning he asks, “I don’t know how to explain what I see. The animal is part of them?”
“Yes!” Juanita shouts. “Exactly! We all have an animal reflecting our instinctual nature.” She pauses, “Thank you Christopher for respecting my ways.”
Christopher has a surprise for Juanita. He smiles and says, “The first time I saw you, a swan peeked at me from around your waist. And I’ve seen lights sparkle around you.” They share a smile. Remembering his strange waking vision he asks, “Have you heard of a saying ‘the first and last lessons of redemption?’”
Juanita’s face brightens immediately. “Of course. Some call it ‘the first and last lesson of power.’”
Juanita brushes back a strand of hair lifted in the ocean breeze. “It means: You are alone. You are responsible for every aspect of your life. Lastly, you are interconnected with all of life.” Laughing she says, “La Currandera made a little jingle. She says, ‘live the first and win the last.’“
They are sitting at the top of the bluff. Looking across long vistas of endless sparkling water is infinitely beguiling and daunting. Humming aloud he says, “Hmmm… live the first lesson of redemption and you’ll win the last lesson of redemption.” Familiar.
Juanita watches him. Still trying to pull her hair out of her face, a question lingers in her eyes.
He shakes his head. “Tell me again. What does ‘the first and last lesson of redemption’ mean to La Currandera? What does it mean to you?”
Squeezing his hand with understanding she says, “La Currandera teaches the first lesson is you, everyone, is alone. We are each accountable, responsible, to every circumstance and situation we find ourselves.” She winces. “I know that must sound harsh. You did not plant drugs in your car…” Her voice drifts away.
Christopher sits up straighter. “You’re speaking truth Juanita. In my eagerness to prove myself, pride motivated me to drive into Mexico alone. It was foolish. I was unprepared for problems. I thought I could fight my way out of trouble. I’ve learned there are many faces of trouble martial arts cannot solve.” He gives her a quirky smile. “Okay the first lesson of redemption; I am responsible for my life.”
Juanita takes a deep breath. She too is captured in the endless horizon. “I’ve spent the last several years in the bedroom off La Currandera’s kitchen living the first lesson of redemption. Christopher, only I can translate La Currandera’s teachings into a personal wisdom. My engagement in the process is the difference between borrowed knowledge and wisdom that is vital, alive. This is the first lesson of redemption as I understand it.”
Juanita nods thoughtfully eyes still focused on the horizon in middle space. “The last lesson of redemption, hmmm. How can I explain? We are each part of, connected within, the landscape of life. In our ignorance we think in flat, two dimensions of reality. I’m referring to an inconceivable whole. The last lesson of redemption refers to us each as part of and responsible for the well-being of others.”
Chewing on the end of her ponytail, Juanita pauses. Christopher can sense her effort as she gathers her thoughts to describe something larger than words. “You’ve heard the saying ‘damage we do to the strand in the web damages the entire web?’“
Christopher nods. Juanita pulls out her ponytail. For a brief moment her hair flies free. Sparkles shimmer, her swan peaks over her shoulder. Christopher feels… tight. He longs to run his hands through her shiny hair. The sound of her words pulls him back from his reverie. As Juanita reties her hair into its ponytail his heart speeds up and his mouth goes dry.
“Let me start again. When you live accountability, when you dedicate yourself, thoughts and behaviors to a positive dream,” in Juanita’s pause Christopher counts her inhales; one inhale–two. “Life will gift you, provide aid. La Currandera calls them ‘serendipitous moments.’ We’ve talked around this before.”
“You’re talking about Beneficence?”
Juanita nods. “If we live in beneficence, beneficence will live in us. Does that make sense? Could this also be the last lesson of redemption? A global accountability to wellness and each other, acts of power and beauty?”
“You think beneficence and redemption are related?”
“Confusing,” Juanita sighs, “Yes. Beginning my apprenticeship with La Currandera she asked me, ‘Do you believe in Beneficence?’ Of course I said ‘yes.’ But she shrugged off my easy answer. She took hold of my shoulders and gave me a shake.” Juanita shrugs her shoulders her body remembering the shake from her teacher. “‘Can you fathom a goodness requiring you to create acts of power and truth that resonate out into the world? Goodness so powerful, living in your acts, creating waves of intention where the impossible becomes possible?’“ Juanita sighs remembering, “Honestly Christopher I had no idea what to say to La Currandera. She seemed to be asking me for a life-long commitment. I barely understood what she was talking about.”
Looking at Christopher she asks, “Do you follow?”
He nods, looking at her as if his life depended on her. Shouldering the burden Juanita said, “La Currandera made tea and sat me down at the kitchen table. She said, ‘Can you understand Beneficence as a morphological field created by truths, acts of power and beauty, the alignment of positive goals and behaviors?’ I drank tea and when I nodded she continued. ‘These acts of power and beauty magnetize beneficial circumstances.’“
Christopher sits up straighter. “Master Jojo said the same thing about the mastery of martial arts. He said mastery creates a morphological field.”
Juanita burst into laughter at the look on Christopher’s face. “A long answer to your questions about redemption.”
“La Currandera and Master Jojo sound like a scientists.”
Juanita nods her head solemnly. “Yes. Most healers I’ve encountered, excluding fakes, do speak with clarity. Theirs is not borrowed knowledge. They live healing traditions passionately, with curiosity, with love and purpose. They test a tradition to see if it’s true. In the process knowledge translates to wisdom.”
Sharing a look, sharing silent communication, they laugh. They are happy in each other’s company. Amidst the desolation of Islas Tres Marias they have found joy in each other. Christopher longs to hold her hand.
As months flow by they begin planning a future. They share words of encouragement. Christopher knows Juanita does not have the heart for crewing her father’s boat. Her father’s slow to replace her. If the Captain unintentionally hires crew with loose lips at a bar while shooting tequila… It could expose and ruin his entire operation.
Christopher reassures her. “You’ll soon finish crewing for your father. You’ll be a healer! As soon as I’m free of La Luna I will join you.”
Seeing her frown he rubs a hand down her arm. “Have faith Juanita. You’re my beautiful golden girl. I can’t wait to build a life with you.”
“Christopher, tell me about your family.” Juanita begs.
“Okay, okay,” he laughs. “The best word to describe my family, noisy. Dad comes from a big, Catholic, construction, family. He owns a cement truck. Developers use his truck a lot because he’s disciplined with time management. Construction schedules run around the concrete pour.
“My Mom’s not Catholic.” He gives her a lopsided smile. “This causes loud arguments. My Mom is Jewish.”
Juanita cocks her head looking at him through her left eye. She can see the aura surrounding Christopher. The edges black with grief, the center his family life, Juanita takes a sharp breath. “Oh! They taught you to chip away at obstacles until your dreams are within reach.”
Christopher nods. “Yes. My mom taught me. Do you know the term mitzvah?”
Juanita shakes her head. Eye to eye with Christopher she pulls on her hair. He has learned pulling on her hair means code for upset. He takes her hand. “What?”
Her mouth pulled down in an upside down smile she asks, “Do you think they’ll like me?”
Christopher’s face lights up like Christmas morning. “Juanita! You and my mom live life by the same code. You just use different names. A mitzvah is a good deed given freely and makes life beautiful for others. Mom devotes her life to mitzvahs; for family, friends, neighbors, or strangers. Like you, she devotes herself to kindness and creating beauty.
“She also taught me Shabbat, Friday evening, is a meal and a time of celebration. We set aside worries. Focus on our gratitude’s.”
Juanita sighs blissfully. Her eyes are soft and dreamy. “Oh, how wonderful. Your mother taught you to balance work and gratitude, love, and family.”
Although she lives with La Currandera and loves her teacher it has been years since Juanita has felt tended heart and spirit. She longs to belong to a family again. Drawn to Christopher she sees in him a person of strength and integrity. She hopes, she believes, together they will build a wonderful, intergenerational family, to share with his established family. Throughout the day she drops into reverie picturing their future. She falls asleep, replaying their conversations. She is filled with the deep powerful presence of Christopher’s love.