7. Dionysian Dreams and The Holy Grail

Somewhere somehow someplace someone speculated sometime ago how the ascetic Desert Fathers are somewhat distant blood brothers to Buddhist monks. The someone who was suspected of speaking those  words was Sundance . He said that

 

“ detachment, solitude, meditation were common characteristics between the two groups. A living communion of earthly saints in training.  Rituals of chopping wood and carrying water filled the minutes and hours of each day. Being present to the now is everything that one needs. Mantras are prayers and prayers mantras. Blue skies or rain, it really didn’t matter.  Cries of the intermittent cicadas during the light of day and the chorus of crickets welcome the darkness sing  the same song differently. Change is the only constant. One energy is the thread that nourishes all things. Without the silence between tones called notes music doesn’t exist.”

 

All this intrigued Jake. He really didn’t think about such things on his own. However, Sundance would have to explain how he didn’t recall ever discussing this matter.

 

“You must have been dreaming.”

 

Billy Barrows, resident philosopher of Wanderers, they say he was the first to cross the line, signed Jake’s yearbook with a phrase Jake never forgot, “ Be who you are. And you will be who you are supposed to be.” He used to say that one couldn’t buy peace.  Al Hendle signed his picture in the yearbook by just writing “peace.” He found complete peace before Jake or any of the  “Wanderers.” Sundance scribbled  “. Go forth!” in Jake’s yearbook. Jake forgot what he wrote, if anything, in other yearbooks.

 

Jake had no idea where any of these words or concepts came from.

 

“What is the spark that fuels these words and these ideas to exist and be expressed and to shine anyway?”

 

Both Sundance’s and Billy’s ideas and words resonated when Jake plodded piously down placid paths of the pastoral grounds of the Jesuit Retreat House just outside of Morristown, New Jersey during their high school senior retreat. He discovered that the spartan living conditions at this home away from the world were uncharacteristically appealing. He admitted he didn’t know much about Jesuits or Ignatian spirituality.

 

Jake stopped in the middle of a path, sat and jotted

 

“The song of the wind-chimes of freedom sing responding to the breath of God and the occasional solo of the morning bird interrupts the silence but in doing so the solace and solitude are enhanced  . At the moment of  “just about dawn” the local union owl speaks out asking me the haunting query repeatedly until I gave in responding

 

‘Me!’”

 

Sacred polyphonic chants of gratitude graciously filled the air surrounding the wandering spirits welcoming the birth of that new day on those holy grounds of this Jesuit safe house. When the light of day eventually disappeared from sight the solemnity of the voices returned echoing in and out of halls and walls…  humbled and thankful for the river of constant consolation .“Angelus Domini nuntiavit Mariae; Et concepit de Spiritu Sancto.”

 

Memories filled and bounced around Jake’s head as he became distracted imagining that Sundance’s inner sanctum of scholarly and spiritual solitude at Fairfield University to be the mirror of the retreat house he visited years earlier.

 

“Those Jesuits and their influence seems to be the same no matter where they hang their black robes .”

 

His exposure to things of the Company of Jesus was a little limited and his imagination would run away on him . He imagined that Sundance’s dorm room would be a perfect monastic prayer closest where “no thing” would interfere with the consolation and transformation of one’s spirit and mind.

 

It was no surprise that the hallowed residence hall was part no-tell motel and part prison-block in appearance.

 

Sundance muttered

 

“Excuse the stench. It’s normal here.”

 

Suddenly half naked waste high toweled young men chased and screamed like pre teen girls running in Marx Brother precision in and out the doors along the hallway. Jake shook his head and Sundance’s smile was a blend of pride and embarrassment as he quickly unlocked the door to the solo sanctuary. On queue Sundance hummed to the melody to a Brian Wilson song in which Jake was all to familiar as he whispered the opening lyrics,

 

 “There’s a place where I can go and never be afraid…in my room.”

 

A red-yellowed Avedon Lennon portrait hung adjacent to a black and white of Groucho poster adorned Sundance’s self-proclaimed Sistine ceiling with all eyes watching every move of the pilgrims’ comings and goings.  A “Free Booby Seale” banner curtained the window. Novels, textbooks, and vinyl records thrown and stacked here and there. Cigarette butts and ashes poured over on the desk next to the key worn selectric typewriter. Unedited notes on a thesis on Joycian influences on Behan and Donleavy stacked proudly on a corner of the dresser almost hiding the annual Christmas holiday Cassady family photo. The requisite crucifix crookedly hanging above the doorway was both a persistent reminder and warning. This place was not at all what Jake expected. He smiled…

 

“Wow, this place is great!”

 

Sundance was so excited about Jake’s arrival that he forgot that the great traditional weekend bon fire planned by the members of “Lost Fraternity of Fairfield” was cancelled by the administration. Students used this ritual as the rite to celebrate spring by burning away the past and to drown old sins by drinking beer celebrating the forthcoming season.

 

Sundance explained

 

“You see this Anastheria Dionysian celebration was considered a little too hedonistic and counter-catholic by the many in Jesuit administration of the university. Bonfires were a little too reminiscent of witch burnings,  I guess and may have been reminders of the regularly scheduled celebrations in the past for the local puritanical Fairfield village. “

 

Sundance tried to rationalize further

 

“Well, you know the best laid men of mice and plans often go astray.”

 

Pre-occupied as usual Jake didn’t laugh and thought for a moment about asking for a grand tour of the university reserved for special guests. He didn’t get the tour. He didn’t know why but he maintained a curiosity about the Society of Jesus. Jake fantasized that just walking onto this perceived Holy Ground of Sundance’s university would somehow transform him. He continued his drifting in silence.

 

“Will I hear some profound message? Would there be a metanoia?  Would this just be another day in paradise? Something’s gotta to happen. It always does”

 

He always had trouble letting go. He didn’t see any priests that night and that was probably a good thing. There was only one solution for him…

 

“When in doubt drink and drink a lot…(of alcohol of course.)”

So where’s the local watering hole where we can get a burger and a beer?”

 

Sundance chimed

 

“Ah, burgers and beer, the communion meal of wayward acolytes.

I know just the place and maybe we’ll get lucky and get invited to a Yale party!”

 

Sundance continued

 

“Beer and parties are perfect bait, the words themselves are soulful sounds of the Sirens for posing as waitresses singing for wandering single sailors seeking safe passage. Lost souls consuming alcohol helps increase less concern about long our wayward sojourns. “

 

Jake drifted again, he did that a lot lately, and recalled for Sundance how something always seems to happen when he went to a bar. He reminded Sundance that it was in the same bar where Jake would eventually meet Isabella that he, Billy, Art and a couple of would get into their first bar brawl.

 

“We took Chase to some bar on Staten Island to celebrate with Chase the  birth of his son and God dammit wouldn’t ya know Chase had the balls to make a very overt pass at the first waitress he saw. Unbeknownst to us the waitress’  ‘US Marine fiancé on leave from Vietnam was at the other end of the bar and like a flaming rocket threw a flying fist at Chase’s face. Before one could yell “bar fight” Chase, Billy and me were assaulted by half dozen of locals as our philosopher fried Billy screamed

 

‘I’m a lover not a fighter’ “

 

Sundance smiled

 

“That’s my Billy!”

 

Jake not laughing

 

 “Well it wasn’t very funny or cool as it was about six guys who took me down and knocked me out cold .”

 

“It was probably just one or two,”

 

whispered Sundance.

 

“ I was beaten to a pulp and woke hours later in Chase’s car that had it’s headlights knocked out and windshield smashed. Chase drove and cried all the way home blubbering

 

‘How am I going to explain this to my wife?’ “

 

Sundance shook his head and couldn’t keep from laughing as he said,

 

“And that’s my Chase!”

 

“Well that’s when I decided I was going to be a conscientious objector and peace activist or something like that”

 

Jake suddenly shifted gears …and added

 

“As they say the show must go on. The next night after the fateful fight I had an important gig with my then band. “

 

Sundance thought

 

“When is he going to grow up? He’s always in some band or something.”

 

Ignoring Sundance’s physical turning away pretending to shuffle this or that on he desk, Jake continued.

 

“Well my new image of wearing sunglasses with a bandage on my chin all the time was born. The girls thought the new look made me cooler than cool. Though at first it was just an attempt to hide a big puffy black eye and a three-inch gash on the chin it became my look. Those scars never really healed completely. (I guess scars never do.) That night led to an unexpected bar fight and transformation of how I saw myself”

 

“So?”

 

“I’m done with bar fights and the idea of going into an unknown tavern in Connecticut is a little scary, ya know. ”

 

“But going to a bar, like the one where you were knocked out, is how you met Isabella!”

 

“Exactly! I can’t take anymore surprises or changes!”

 

Sundance tried to explain that no one partied in the town of Fairfield. It still maintained it’s puritanical roots. It was a lonely town for lonely people.

 

“They role up the sidewalks and fold up the trees at sunset in Fairfield. Besides who would want to stay here when you have Yale parties just a few minutes away and everyone across the country has heard about the infamous Yale parties! You don’t understand we need to go to get out of here.”

 

When Jake was going through his blue period after Mary Lou vanished Sundance sent Jake a post card of the Statue of Liberty with a brief message on the back

 

“When you need to be free – don’t forget to quench your thirst. When you need consolation– drink from the cup of life. It will help you realize that you can be free from the traps in this world that try to suck you into the belief that nothing will make you ever make you happy. Drink so that you feel only peace as you walk away from the wreckage. ”

 

Jake was convinced that Sundance was writing about beer.

They were off to New Haven.