Barry Graham: Illusory Flowers in an Empty Sky
Novelist, journalist, poet and Zen teacher from Glasgow, Scotland, now based in Portland, OR, USA
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Posts tagged "conditioning"
So much of the meaning of what we read is derived from our own conditioning. Growing up, I often didn’t have enough to eat, and, though I think I’m unlikely to go hungry again, my conditioning says otherwise.
In the novel I’m reading, there is a scene in which the protagonist, waiting for a friend in a small restaurant, orders two hot dogs, one for him and one for his friend. He realizes that his friend is being attacked nearby, and goes outside to help her. Mayhem ensues, after which he returns to the restaurant with his friend in tow, and they find their food waiting for them on the counter. Shaken by the violence they have just experienced, they don’t feel like eating, so they just have drinks instead.
Even though they are in physical danger, and the protagonist’s life is crumbling around him, all I could think of was the wasted food, those two hot dogs going cold and uneaten.
About 16 years ago, I spent New Year’s in Santa Fe, NM, with some friends who lived there.
Early in the evening of New Year’s Eve, my friend Bett and I had dinner with two friends who were older than us, and who intended to make an early night of it. Bett and I had other intentions - we were going to the big party at the Railyard. But that was still hours away, so we headed into town in search of mischief.
We stopped briefly at a restaurant where Bett’s girlfriend was having dinner with some friends. As we talked with them, even though I had just eaten dinner, I ordered some food.
As we left the restaurant, Bett mentioned that many of the town’s art galleries were open, and were serving free drinks. We agreed that alcoholic freeloading would be a fine way to pass the time before the party, and off we went.
It turned out that some of the galleries offered free food as well as booze. I partook mightily of both, even though I’d just eaten dinner followed by an appetizer.
As I chomped on some buffalo wings, I saw Bett looking at me.
“You can’t turn down food, even when you’re not hungry, can you?” she said.
“You’re right,” I said. Even before I explained why, she already knew and she already understood.
There had been many times in my life when the only way I could eat was to steal food. When I was a child in Maryhill, Glasgow, food of any quality was seldom available to me. One of the most painful moments of my life, a moment of pure grief, pure loss, was caused not by the death of a person but by being deprived of a meal.
I was in my early teens, and I had just been handed a plate of chicken. This was a rarity. My diet was almost exclusively one of fried processed meat - usually cheap sausages - potatoes, eggs and white bread. Chicken was an expensive luxury, so I was excited.
Before I could eat any of it, a woman who was supposed to be taking care of me came into the room. She was drunk at noon, and she didn’t like me. She said something unpleasant to me, I responded in kind, and she knocked the plate of food out of my hands. As she stomped the chicken into the dirty carpet, the hopelessness I felt was so huge that there was room inside me for nothing else.
That woman is dead now, but, more than 30 years later, I can still see the look of dumb malice on her drunken face. In the years to come, I was to mourn the loss of that meal more times than I could keep count of.
There were other times, times of inadequate food or no food at all. And, when these times were over, I still lived in fear of their return. I could never bring myself to pass up a chance to eat. I still felt that I had to take it whenever and wherever I could get it, because if I ever had to go hungry again I did not want to have to remember the times when I could have eaten but chose not to.
As Bett and I walked through the snowy, dark streets of Santa Fe, I told her all of this, and the love between us eclipsed the pain and fear that always came with the memories.
Things started to get better after that night. The memories still come, too often, but they don’t have the power they used to. This morning there is plenty of food in my fridge, but, not feeling like eating breakfast yet, I am only drinking tea.
Early in the evening of New Year’s Eve, my friend Bett and I had dinner with two friends who were older than us, and who intended to make an early night of it. Bett and I had other intentions - we were going to the big party at the Railyard. But that was still hours away, so we headed into town in search of mischief.
We stopped briefly at a restaurant where Bett’s girlfriend was having dinner with some friends. As we talked with them, even though I had just eaten dinner, I ordered some food.
As we left the restaurant, Bett mentioned that many of the town’s art galleries were open, and were serving free drinks. We agreed that alcoholic freeloading would be a fine way to pass the time before the party, and off we went.
It turned out that some of the galleries offered free food as well as booze. I partook mightily of both, even though I’d just eaten dinner followed by an appetizer.
As I chomped on some buffalo wings, I saw Bett looking at me.
“You can’t turn down food, even when you’re not hungry, can you?” she said.
“You’re right,” I said. Even before I explained why, she already knew and she already understood.
There had been many times in my life when the only way I could eat was to steal food. When I was a child in Maryhill, Glasgow, food of any quality was seldom available to me. One of the most painful moments of my life, a moment of pure grief, pure loss, was caused not by the death of a person but by being deprived of a meal.
I was in my early teens, and I had just been handed a plate of chicken. This was a rarity. My diet was almost exclusively one of fried processed meat - usually cheap sausages - potatoes, eggs and white bread. Chicken was an expensive luxury, so I was excited.
Before I could eat any of it, a woman who was supposed to be taking care of me came into the room. She was drunk at noon, and she didn’t like me. She said something unpleasant to me, I responded in kind, and she knocked the plate of food out of my hands. As she stomped the chicken into the dirty carpet, the hopelessness I felt was so huge that there was room inside me for nothing else.
That woman is dead now, but, more than 30 years later, I can still see the look of dumb malice on her drunken face. In the years to come, I was to mourn the loss of that meal more times than I could keep count of.
There were other times, times of inadequate food or no food at all. And, when these times were over, I still lived in fear of their return. I could never bring myself to pass up a chance to eat. I still felt that I had to take it whenever and wherever I could get it, because if I ever had to go hungry again I did not want to have to remember the times when I could have eaten but chose not to.
As Bett and I walked through the snowy, dark streets of Santa Fe, I told her all of this, and the love between us eclipsed the pain and fear that always came with the memories.
Things started to get better after that night. The memories still come, too often, but they don’t have the power they used to. This morning there is plenty of food in my fridge, but, not feeling like eating breakfast yet, I am only drinking tea.
Note: Someone I know has been having the kind of problems that so many of us - perhaps most of us - have when we get into relationships. When she first started dating her partner, it was fun and she enjoyed him. Now that it’s a “relationship,” she obsesses about what he might be doing (with nothing in reality to suggest he might be doing anything untoward), and tries to control who he interacts with. She obsesses about what he might be thinking, feeling or wanting, and her happiness has become increasingly dependent upon how often he calls her.
Why is this so common? Because relationships are, by their nature, pathological. I wrote her the following suggestions. She said they helped, so I thought they might be worth posting here:
This is what kills what’s good in relationships. We attach, and so we want to control, and so it becomes entirely self-centered with no room for anyone or anything but our own greed and ego.
Try to look at what you wrote [about what she was thinking and doing] in a compassionately detached way. Can you see any love in there? It’s entirely proprietorial, entirely about control. It turns your partner into an object, a possession, to be guarded from others.
This is why relationships don’t work, but union does. You meet someone, enjoy being with them, and everything’s wonderful. Then you attach. And what happens when you attach to anyone or anything? You try to control them. Suddenly, there’s no love, no enjoyment of the relationship, because you’re too busy strategizing ways to manipulate and control what’s going on. This is the very opposite of love.
Love is not relationship (two separate things), but union. Love serves the relationship, and doesn’t seek anything in return. And, of course, when you do that, you receive everything.
When you’re engaged in “the practice of marriage,” and marriage is the master you both serve without thought of self, you’re happy and you enjoy each other. When you fall into attachment and desire for control - a self-centered story about what “I” want - you immediately stop communicating and start fighting.
And here’s the best way to destroy a marriage, or any partnership: Expect it to make you happy.
