FILLIN' THE HOLES I DUG (A BICYCLE BUILT FOR TWO)

(from the Pollywog Papers 1998)

I dug holes for seven bucks an hour.  Now I fill them for seven seventy-five with obsolete mothers and fathers.  I dug ditches to take human waste away from ugly houses that cost a million dollars.

I dug holes, now I walk wasting humans to the holes, I walk them down pleasantly painted halls where the smell of urine and feces often rises.  I lead them toward the holes I dug and gently push them in once they are too tired to roam the halls of this world searching for some moment, any moment from their youth that eludes them now.

Some families react very well, they come and walk with us, they walk their parents with dignity and love into the holes I’ve dug. 

But most saw this place, these hallways, the tiny apartments within as a welcome hole in which to dump the waste of their parents.  They pushed their parents in the hole of this place and sped the car away from the discomfort of seeing their parents so wrinkled and confused.  They shut their ears to the precious life stories of growing up in one bedroom apartments in New York city with seven brothers and sisters.  They let a stranger hear of the days without any money, with little  food over decaf coffee and ginger snaps, singing:

“Daisy, Daisy Give me your answer do, I’m half crazy all on account of you…”

Walking down the hall hand in hand with a young stranger with short red hair and an awkward smile, toward the holes…

“It won’t be a stylish marriage,

I can’t afford a carriage,

but you’ll look sweet upon the seat,

of a bicycle built for two”

bum bum...

Bataan Faigao, R.I.P.

Naropa University has a history of attracting seekers and teachers.  I was saddened to hear of the loss of Bataan Faigao, one of its favorite teachers who kept seeking right up to his death.

I remember Bataan doing a demo of Tai Chi in Shambhala Hall in the historic main building.  A really big, cynical guy challenged Bataan after he talked about being as hard as steel or being extremely loose, depending on what the circumstance called for.  He invited the big guy forward and he towered over Bataan.  Bataan invited the big guy to try and push him over - the big guy tried with all his strength, but he couldn't budge Bataan, he was immovable like a mountain.  Bataan paused and asked the big guy to try again, this time Bataan stayed hysterically loose and flexed and bent as the big guy nearly fell over as he pushed hard and found no resistance.  The big guy looked stunned, confused, everyone laughed awkwardly then applauded loudly... I have many pleasant memories of witnessing Bataan doing Tai Chi, even practicing with him on occasion.  I practiced Aikido w/ Bob Wing, but was always in admiration of Batann's skills and wisdom and his practice and his stance in life... sometimes standing like a mountain, sometimes bending like a willow in the breeze.  Peace to you and yours and to Bataan.

Conan Malone

from Tambi Harwood, daughter of Bataan and Jane Faigao

I am finally posting what I read at Dad's memorial.

Both of my parents died the way they lived their lives. My mother went out in a blaze of glory. My father slipped away quietly. My mother was here and her death was tangible, witnessed and felt by a multitude of people, visitors who came to see her until she was too tired, her mind too far gone. My father died in a place of imagination and poetry. We can only imagine what it was like where he died, how he died. We make it up in our minds, like we have to do when we read poetry. We see images in our minds. Wu Dang Mountain, birthplace of T’ai Chi, happy when they brought him dinner the night before, and when they woke him up, no breath, no breath. We make up stories in our minds about how he died exactly where he wanted, when he wanted and how he wanted. And for us, it is true. And it is an illusion. They both died dramatically. My mom died a loud, dramatic death, yelling at Bataan for poisoning her, hitting, slapping, kicking, spilling water. And then she was burned at the stake, she always imagined herself joining her sisters being burned at the stake. My father died a quiet, equally powerful death. Powerful in its silence. Dramatic in its setting.

I want to tell you a story about my father’s death. The night after he died, I got a call from his tour guide. He explained in English with a strong Chinese accent how hard it was to bring my father down from the mountain, how much work it was, how much money it cost for all of the laborers. He explained in broken English that it would be very difficult to get his ashes and his belongings back to the United States. But he could do it for $15,000. He needed it right away. Just wire the money to New York, and his friend in New York would wire it to him in China. It was partially my fault, because when I found out that Dad had passed on in the hotel and told him to do whatever it would take, no matter what the cost, to take care of him. I took it back, that night. I said, I don’t have $15,000. What about $10,000 he said. Just wire of $10,000, but I need it immediately. Wire it to New York, and my friend in New York will wire it to me. My husband said, he’s trying to run the Nigeria scam with your dad’s body.

I did not send any money to this man who dressed my father in t’ai chi clothes, with socks, and t’ai chi shoes, at considerable cost to himself, and put a jade turtle in his mouth. None of this do I see with my eyes, it all happens in my head, in the landscape of my mind. It is poetry. My father is not just a poet, he is poetry.

The misty mountains in Wu Dang, birthplace of T’ai Chi, poetry. When I asked my father what he wanted to have done with his body after he died, because we talked a lot about life and death when he found out he had liver cancer this summer. When I asked him what he wanted, he said, just burn my body, and bury me in a cardboard box. He always talked about living in a cardboard box. That is exactly how we will receive his body from China, in a cardboard box. My father was not just a poet. He is poetry.

I thought this thing about the money was hilarious. I think my father would have found it funny himself. When he went to the Philippines 12 years ago, he told me a story about how he got lost and ended up in a whore house. They kept sending girls to his room. No, no, he said. I don’t want a girl. So they said, a 12 year old? No, no, he said. A man? No. He locked his door. But it was a good story. Like this, this is a good story. The story of my father on a pilgramage to the Wu Dang Mountain, the birthplace of t’ai chi, dying where he wanted, when he wanted, how he wanted. Not being a burden to his daughters who had already lost a mother. Because, after all, he wouldn’t be there to take care of it. And the story of the tour guide trying to run a Nigeria scam on his daughters with my Father’s body. My father was not just a poet, he was poetry.

When a Giant Falls pt. 1... in memory of Mike Sterchele

When a Giant Falls…

Anytime someone dies, a part of you dies with that person.  Thankfully a part of them lives on in you, in your memories, in the fabric of who you are, the closer they were to you the deeper the interweaving of their lives and yours.  I think this is why it hurts so much when those who have touched you, shaped you, always been there for you die, the tear in the stitching, the rip in the fabric goes right up your spine detouring along your ribs and ending in your heart.  The whole process seems to bypass your brain, other than then the memories that come to the forefront some of which may be ten, twenty, thirty or more years old.

This is how it was for me when I got the news that Mike was dead.  It hit me in the gut, in the chest, but my head really couldn’t even begin to process the reality of the situation.  I was at work and both of my brothers called within the space of half an hour.  Though the Cassidy’s were a small St. Al’s family, it seems there was a brother or sister who was in one of our classes, or in between grades – any big news to anyone in any of the families tugged at the hem of our shared upbringing and our shared mortality.  This was the case with the Stercheles and us.  Chaunce was close in grade to Steve, Tim and Tony were in the same class, Mike was in the class ahead of me and Jackie was in my class.  The shocking passing of big, strong Mike was an instant rip, tear across the St. Al’s family fabric, and all words fall short, far short, “the spoken word is a jacket too tight... –the only thing that speaks the truth is the eloquence of passing time…”

I sat at my desk, paralyzed unable to work.  I thought the news must be wrong, but the network of friends and family was reaching out and word was spreading fast and it was real, Mike Sterchele was dead.  I’d witnessed the death and dying of my father first hand, arriving just minutes after his last breath, sleeping the last couple of weeks on the family room floor in vigil should he need anything – seemingly countless relatives had passed, even a few young friends dying before their time like Mike, but this was Mike, Meesh, Moose, Sterch, though not Irish, my honorary Big Fellah. 

I remember piling into the Sterchele station wagon heading out on an adventure, to the Warren Dunes, to my first concert – Bruce Springsteen 1986 Soldier’s Field - or just going to a party or a friend’s house in Palos or nearby – every time out was an adventure with Mike.

He pushed my edges, he took me beyond my comfort zone, he laughed with me, maybe even sometimes at me, but he always pulled back just in time so I knew he always had my back. 

The tough guys rallied around Mike, but so too did the sensitive guys, they all did.  Mike attracted action, sometimes trouble, almost always fun.  I remember one summer we let ourselves into a recently abandoned school on 127^th Avenue in Palos that has since been replaced by townhomes.  It took some doing to get in, but we got in.  Mike was the one who found the chink in the armor and he was also the one who boosted one of the slighter guys up to scurry in through a boarded up window near the roof.  He then helped us force open a door.  From there, for several weeks we enjoyed a secret gathering place, complete with air conditioning and lights once we turned the power back on.  There was a small atrium outside the bathroom window.  It was completely walled in by brick in the middle of the building and a weed tree had sprouted up through the opening. 

Mike went out the bathroom window into the secret space and climbed up the tree, then used the wall where there was a foothold, back to the tree, back and forth, laboring until he got his stomach over the roof and disappeared from sight.  Mike had a natural instinct to explore and to seek the higher ground.  “Cass, come on up.”  It was difficult to refuse Mike even though I wasn’t quite sure I could make it, I started up the tree, used the same footholds and handholds until I was very close to the roof… but my arms weren’t long enough to reach the lip of the roof.  I was stuck.  I considered my options, a possible path back down, but Mike read my mind, “come on, you can do it.”  He lowered his hand – I could only make it if I grabbed his hand and let loose my foot and handholds and trusted him.  I knew he was strong, but I hesitated, he seemed certain, but I doubted. 

“Cass… grab my hand.”  I did.  I let out some sound, looked desperate, something, and Mike started laughing.  While laughing he couldn’t pull me up, I was dangling a couple stories up, my life in Mike’s hands, at least my ankles and unbroken bones, Mike couldn’t stop laughing and he couldn’t pull me up, but he didn’t let go.  I swore at Mike and he laughed even harder, he didn’t mean to, but it was truly funny, he couldn’t stop laughing, I couldn’t stop swearing, so I swung from side to side and Mike tried several times to pull me up, but he had no air as he was laughing and he did his best to hang on.  He did. 

He hung on, dropping me wasn’t an option.  Letting me sweat a little may have been, but dropping me was not possible, Mike had my hand and eventually he pulled me up.  He was still laughing, I punched him in the arm then I started laughing too.  We were only a couple stories high, but we were on top of Palos, we were on top of the world.

The night of the wake I was anxious.  I was uncomfortable in my skin.  I had a vodka or two before we left I’ll admit.  I sat in my house and cried, I balled, hard.  I hadn’t really cried since my father died, before that probably not since being a kid.  I’ve contemplated death with the Buddhists in Boulder, I’ve alter boyed many funerals, and seen death many times up close, but this was Mike.  I hadn’t seen Mike much in the past ten years, really the last fifteen, but no matter, this was Mike.  When I did see him last, it was as if nothing had changed – “Cassssssss” followed by his laugh which would shake his body and move his head down.  Next his arm would be around me – “I love this guy.”  I felt the same, no matter how many years had passed no matter what differences in philosophy we might have; this was the Big Fellah from my childhood.  It was the Mullin’s summer party and Mike was there with several characters from our childhood.  Mike ended up driving me home with Brian Bandyk and we of course went over the time Brian pushed me into his pool, late autumn on a dare.  Mike’s memory was he said wouldn’t it be funny if someone went in – and apparently I dared someone to push me in, Brian did.  When I got out of the freezing water in shock I chased Brian, but he locked himself inside his house.  I think I may have thrown some lawn furniture in the pool in frustration, Mike laughed the whole while – looking back I can’t really blame him, but he brought forth mischief like a trickster Lakota Shaman or crazy wisdom lineage Buddhist monk without trying.  I think this night I made peace with Brian… we laughed, they dropped me off and they drove off into the night – that’s how life is, you never know when it’s the last time you’ll see someone, if you did you wouldn’t let the night end.  It was late, we did our best to keep the night from ending, but it had to end and it did.  I think back now and I see Mike pull himself up and over the roof edge at that old school in Palos.  Mike disappears from sight.  The sky is empty where he was, I tell myself he is on top of Palos, on top of the world, but there’s a hole in my heart as big or bigger than the empty sky where Mike was.