It was a blind alley. Between the theatre and a few shops here and a few shops there in the San Juan Plaza ran an alley, with another blind one turning off at 90° behind the cinema. In Farmington you didn't walk around at night, so I was told - you ran the risk of being harrassed, or mugged, or raped, or whatever, or so one heard. Well, if anyone ever stepped out of their safe pickup trucks to even ventrure out alone, in their swaggering cowboy boots and beer-stained Stetsons, I'd have been surprised, and for my part walked the town's streets carefree and regularly regardless of the hour.
My humble abode was a far enough walk from my two jobs to encourage my use of this particularly blind alley for my morning or late evening prostrations and sitting practice. It was really ideal since no one in his right mind would think of going down there at night, pitch-dark as it was, and it served no useful purpose by day, I noticed - not even to piss or sneak a joint. It was indeed reserved for my use, clean and free of trash, only had to be swept once. It afforded me the privacy I needed, just outside the din and away from the periphery of passers-by. I could carry on with a light bit of yoga, with sitting meditation, with prayers and prostrations - even at certain odd times, the singing of a hymn or two. It was truly my cave away from home, where I had only to unroll the unobtrusive mat I kept with me, and voilà: lights, incense, magic, roll 'em.
Now Farmington had lots of cowboys and truckers, it had Navajo ruins and ruined Navajo. It had whoopin' white teenagers and its share of Mexicans, but no Blacks. The only black fella I remember knowing there was Jerry, a guy I worked with in this Plaza, slinging hash and burgers in a 24-hour family restaurant called Hobo Joe's. I shuttled between two full-time jobs on the cook line, the other being Village Inn down the road a piece. In my "cave" was the refuge I needed when time didn't permit a trip to my bare humble flat, and I could perform my devotions avoiding notice better than using some back lot or park. It made perfect sense.
As my sitting meditation drew to a close late one evening, and I was due for work in about another twenty minutes a few doors away at Joe's, I was passingly aware of a commotion coming from the main alley pssageway. This posed no bother in itself, as I felt very calm, my breath deep, and – I was somewhat interested in what all was afoot out there. My instinct was in any case, to remain rock solid and at least outwardly unconcerned with whatever phenomena occurred.
No black youth in Farmington, I said, but right on the money here came five or six – sent from central casting, no doubt – quite seemingly looking for mischief. I followed my instinct further for once, and learned a great lesson while having fun with these guys. At age 26 I was about to release some baggage I'd been lugging around since my early school years all the way through junior high, high school and college.
My stillness and moreover the profound stillness of that "cave" if one can imagine it, so affected the lads they stood stalk still and one would honestly have thought they'd collided with a mama grizzly. That they even noticed or were the least concerned with this empty, uninviting, nearly pitch black blind alley instead of just glancing once if that, and running on looking for trouble, was really remarkable in itself. They shouted, they threw pebbles. I did not flinch, partly because I was in such a rich feeling of space at that moment and partly because I was preparing us all for a startling encounter.
They proceeded toward me one by one – with great caution. What objects they carried, if any, I could only guess; my left profile was all they had, and I strayed not a hair's breadth. This was not from fear but to create a learning experience for myself, using what was there, and for some likely benefit for all concerned; in other words, I was feeling friendly. What was happening was occurring on three levels.
Deep in myself I was really enjoying this. Outwardly I inadvertantly presented an ominous confrontation to these teenagers. Nestled between these two perceptions were all the thoughts and emotions I was diligenty studying since the visitors actually caught me at so opportune a time.
What came up for me and how I approached it went as follows: as they stood there grouped at the mouth of this "cave" shouting out "feelers," I was inspired in turn to remain as I was, resting on my heels, and relax deeply in contemplation that "me" and "them" were one – and on a gut level, or it wouldn't have been authentic, would not have been substantial for me. I had to abstract and suspend the images of fear which arose full of subjective associations about former encounters with precisely similar groups of unruly teenagers, observing very carefully how my mind held the range of possible directions this story could easily take, and I became clear that it would go according to how I chose to "write" it. This made me feel very generous in contrast with the intimidation I might have felt, and had felt when their clamor first struck my ear.
I turned my attention to this body, to the physical rather than the emotional, and all of that mental energy was not wasted or leaked out into the range of proximity I shared with them, where they could have picked up the germ of my paranoia (as that is how things work) and I did not stifle or sell out – all that mental energy, that simple concentration of thought, of prana, breath directed by will, was trained on my body, my physical form. This was the decisive difference, and it beat me how I'd figured it out. Training my thought entirely on my body, where I knew the whole drama was really taking place (not in that alley), and excluding all else, I focused on the sensory responses in my gut, the pounding in my chest (of which I alone was aware but was convinced it could be heard at a yard's length), and on the impressions which surfaced along with this.
When there is a physical pain or trauma to the body, the placement of a hand to the immediate area, along with a steady and calm mental current projected into the place (whereas the normal reaction is to recoil, tighten up and withdraw from the traumatized part precisely the urgently needed nourishment, acknowledgement or validation, or detached sanity) brings the body back into equilibrium as psychic resources are rallied to unify and to integrate.
Just so did I manage to hold and influence, by breathing into those areas, the network of reactive mechanisms set off by the encounter. I grasped the immediacy of this circumstance: that any empowerment of “numbers“ which they had, I'd given them; as I disempowered that notion – for my part – I disempowered it in them, and in the warmth I felt toward each individual, the recognition, even appreciation, we became a group which included me and them. They felt no fear from me and nothing there for me to defend.
Indeed, the Buddha was in the palm of my hand. Using a sense of timing to maximum enjoyment of this moment, I finally opened my eyes fully and turned to them, actually receiving them as guests, as though they'd walked into my living room rather than a bare concrete dark alley. And they felt it.
The next ten minutes were spent discussing meditation, as that is what they caught me at. Some remained standing, some crouched or sat. I answered their various questions briefly, to the point, but with a relaxed humor, I felt they deserved my honest attention. After all, why else was this totally unlikely event happening? They even accompanied me "protectively" the couple doors further to my job, assuring me that this way nothing might befall me, as one never knows. Had I not been due there for graveyard in a few mintues, we all would have been sitting together, that was fairly certain. "No," I'd answered one question they threw out in the alley-cave, "meditation isn't necessarily about leaving your body, it's often much more about being in one."
I believe this sort of turning a situation inside out is what the Sikhs call pratyahara.
I saw them on one occasion after that, the night they slashed a couple random bike tires which happened to be mine, that was it.
