Enlightening Nonsense

Between working 1-on-1 sessions, teaching a class and taking an advanced class, it was a busy Tuesday night at New York San Da for me. Seafood had just paid me in greenbacks and I put the money in the Velcro enclosed pocket of my street shorts and put them in my locker and changed into my faggy, flowy “san da” shorts. Just then Fagstone popped his head into the changing room and asked, “Do you have a 7:30?”

“Yeah,” I replied, ignoring his lingering look at my Johnson and hussled my butt out of the dressing room, inadvertently not locking up my locker. Now I am pretty much the only one on staff who puts a lock on his locker. Well, Spandex does but he never locks his lock so I’m not really sure if that counts. I’m guessing even the most moronic reader at this point knows where the story is going—and it ain’t Kansas, Dorothy.

At the end of the night, I put on my shorts and stuck my hand in the pocket where the money was. Key word: was. At this point it “was” not. I thought that maybe it was in the other Velcro enclosed pocket, as the shorts were kind of bunched up and maybe at the time I put the cash in my shorts I was like a guy who just drank five beers, stuck his forehead on the end of a baseball bat with the other end on the ground and ran around in a circle ten times fast—a little dizzy and ready to hurl. It also “was” not.

I still tried to think positive, well, more towards my impression of humanity than some New Age poser declaring, “Ah, who cares about money—flowers are blooming!” I thought maybe it fell out of the pocket, despite the Velcro safe that would more than likely prevent such a happenstance. I cleared out my locker, twice, and the money still “was” not. I looked on the floor, under the lockers. Was not. Now even my dumb ass couldn’t deny that someone stuck their hand in my pocket and instead of jerking me off before taking my money, they cut out the middle man—which was my dick—and went right to the money removal unhappy ending.

I told staff member A-Dyke privately about this. Since Seafood has taken care of a lot of us over the years—from giving me equipment and letting me train for free after I put in my 7-year tour of duty with the Fight Team, to taking in one of our fighters Knee Tzar into his home rent-free when he had nowhere to stay (come to think of it, maybe I can move in!), to paying one month of Fagstone’s rent as his irresponsible ass went out and got an expensive tattoo and got high, to paying over $1000 for all of us to train in a weekend intensive with a former UFC fighter and coach paired with a master grappling instructor, to giving a bunch of us dummies who have little skills other than punching and kicking people in the head jobs instructing—he said, “Seafood will take care of you.”

Now I don’t doubt that if I told Seafood about the theft and said, “Now I can’t pay my rent this month,” that he would most probably lend me the money. Key word: Lend. While he must have had a momentary lapse of temporary insanity giving Fagstone money with no attachment, Seafood is a Jew and Jews give an I.O.U. with every handout. [Interestingly, Federal Reserve Notes (what you know as paper “money”) is essentially the same thing: a debt notice or I.O.U. and has no inherent worth besides the paper it is printed on, as well as a way for people to remember who some of the Presidents were in spite of our decrapitating education system.] Knowing Fagstone, Seafood might have gotten a little anal for his investment.

But I knew that A-Dyke must have ran the baseball bat swirl to think that Seafood Warbucks would just hand me some more cash and say, “Hey, no problem. Just try not to lose this wad—but if you do, I will replace it as well. Speaking of losing wads, I have an appointment with Fagstone now.”

I sent Seafood a text message telling him about the situation and acknowledging that it was my responsibility for leaving my locker open. While he can be very generous with hook-ups, he is also typically non-sympathetic regarding one’s emotions; even if it involves his Korean wife crying because the dead cat she got from a Chinatown alley to boil up for dinner wouldn’t fit in the pot, he usually just chokes her out. I received a text message back that said,  “We are no longer a little family gym this is the downside.”

His message, while lacking a beating heart, was not devoid of verity. I remember training at the school 15-years ago when it was a kung fu school. Everyone pretty much knew everyone else and the only chance you had of someone stealing from you was Seafood’s business partner, Adventura, not paying you for your services. Come to think of it, my broadsword and three-sectional staff disappeared from the storage closet but I’m guessing you may find it along with the body of a dead hooker in Adventura’s closet. I had found myself transported from enjoying straw picnic baskets packed by Auntie Em to having jaw my locker unpacked by Cousin Douchebag.

On the other side of the sympathy fence was Ogre, who in times of crisis usually took a break from telling me what a jerk I was. I texted her about the four hundred clams sucked from my shell and how this was a lot of money for me. She responded:

“That’s a lot of money period! That’s awful! Fuck. You must want to pull your hair out or punch something… Any ideas who?”

The first person that came to mind was Adventura but I had heard he left his business with his students sending emails like, “I went by the school on Monday and it was closed. Uh?” and ran off to Florida. Regardless of any detective work, I knew I could count on Ogre for sympathy and for a curse word or two.

But Ogre did what most of us do: we apply how we would feel in a given situation and assume the other person must feel the same way. Because we don’t live in a cookie cutter world, this doesn’t usually apply. A simplistic example is a guy telling his girl, “I don’t get it. If I wasn’t giving you any and then walked in on you banging some dude, I would totally understand!”

She wasn’t out in left field enjoying an Auntie Em picnic basket while the left fielder was like, “Uh, can you have your picnic somewhere else? We’re in the middle of the World Series here—are those home-baked biscuits?” Just about anyone would be a little “off-center,” shall we say, if someone’s fingers did the walking with their cash. But, for the moment, as much as I knew how I was supposed to act, I wasn’t feelin’ it.

In the NOW I knew that I didn’t need money. I wasn’t starving about to pass out if I didn’t get a home-baked biscuit. My rent wasn’t due tomorrow and even if it was, I have heard that if you just stopped paying rent altogether it would take a minimum of 10-months before they were able to throw you on the street and repo your apartment. I was barefoot walking with Abandon in Highland Park and she was smiling and having a good time pissing on things and my feet felt Goldilocks “just right” with the soft, cooling grass playing the role of Dr. Scholl’s. In the NOW I felt pretty good and life was just as it should be. Every now and then a, “Dammit!” came to mind and even mouth but it would quickly pass as Abandon would come up to me with an incredulous look on her face and say, “You’re not going to believe what I just took a piss on!”

Ogre and I had been having so many disconnects that her sympathetic, and pretty fair, text assumption left me feeling once again like, “She just doesn’t get me.” In her defense, I am not that easy to get, unless “get” means sleep with, in which case I’m as easy as a Dominican whore, but I am redundant.

“Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.
”

- Mark Twain, a Biography

I knew the Universe took my money from me to teach me something. Talking to the Universe I said, “I appreciate your lessons but, bitch, don’t be touching my money!” She told me to shut my pie hole, that she had seen a new pair of shoes from Top Shop and “I just had to have them!” It was at that moment that I realized the Universe was really just a disembodied Ogre and for the first time in my life the thought of suicide didn’t just cross my mind but instead parked for a while, like two lovers at Make-Out Point.

But, whether I was barefoot with a happy, urinating dog or not, I knew things were just as they were supposed to be and that there was a lesson in here somewhere. I prayed the Universe wasn’t just giving me a friggin’ story to write. “You see how perfect this is—I get the knew cute shoes with the tassels and you get a story.” That’s about as unfair as an exchange of oral sex, where a girl gets to embrace her guy’s manhood with her lips while a guy has to dive into a clammy, fishy, dark and dreary hole and come out of there with lockjaw and smelling like he just came back from a double shift at the fish market.

When my parents come in to have dinner with their least-favorite child so they can write me off as a dependent on their income tax form, at one point in the night my Dad usually pulls me aside—usually when my Mom is like, “I have to drop the granny panties and take a piss,” which always results in an uncontrollable gag reflex. When I’m done spitting up and swallowing the contents of my stomach, my Dad usually hands me a wad of bills and says, “This is between you and me,” as in “Mum’s the word—which means don’t tell Mum!” making me feel like a little English boy whose wet his knickers.

I’ve always been one whose silence can be bought, like when the government came to me and said, “Yes, we were behind 9/11 but if we buy you a raw vegan lunch will you stop writing about it?” to which I negotiated to make sure it included both appetizers and desert, and so I take my Dad’s hand-offs with the typical, “No, I can’t” mock protest, and don’t say boo to anyone, unless I happen to be wearing a sheet over my head because it is Halloween and I am a ghost, as opposed to just another typical Friday night when I meet up with my Ku Klux Klan boys for a night of rabble rousing.

This dinner my Mom went to change her Depends undergarments and my Dad went through his “This is between you and me” routine. While my Dad is not just handing me a fiver and saying, “Go buy yourself some dental floss—generic,” this wad was particularly thick, which is reminding me of my last visit to the sperm bank—or was that working the glory hole…? It added up to $400.

Now one might end this story, “…and Swami X lived happily ever after,” but that “one” isn’t me, as my stories usually end, “…and Swami X lived forever thereafter without the use of his legs, alone with his wet knickers.” If I had both four hundred dollar piles, I might actually be able to pay off a larger portion of my Amex bill before the discounted interest rate jumps up to loan shark rates or buy Abandon a rattle or something and when she says, “You get $400 and you buy me this crap??” I can retort, “Go piss on it, bitch!” Still, the fact that the numbers added up told me that the Universe might have picked up Her shoes but those feet that were meant for walkin’ were staying put long enough to remind me that she is always looking over me, which will make it a little discomforting the next time I jerk-off.

I ended up writing a letter and posting it on the wall in the men’s locker room at New York San Da. This is what it said:

THEFT

On Tuesday, July 5, 2011 at around 7:30 p.m., I ran to a client and inadvertently left my locker open. This resulted in the discovery at 9:30 that $400 was taken from the pocket of my shorts in my locker.

I wanted to believe that I just misplaced or dropped the money, as I have been affiliated with this school as a student and instructor for about 15 years and considered this my second home consisting of family. But I clearly remembered putting the money in my velcro’ed shorts’ pocket and after clearing out my locker twice, it was clear that someone took the money. I have been informed that other pieces of equipment have mysteriously “walked” from the school as well.

There is a mistaken understanding of the term karma; most think it means that the Universe will punish you for any wrongdoings you commit. Karma comes from a root that means “action” and for the most part it basically means that any action will have consequences. The person who took the $400 probably didn’t consider that his action could result in me defaulting on certain bills this month or not feeding my dog or me in the way that we require. THOSE are immediate potential consequences that are not in anyway “metaphysical” but very physical.

I am not a moralist and don’t really care to preach moral behavior—just awareness.  It saddens me that many act in such an unaware manner, selfishly because I don’t like to be around unconsciousness but compassionately as well, because a life lived unconsciously is not a fearless and complete life and I don’t wish that upon any of my brothers and sisters.

As someone who over my lifetime has on occasion acted in ways that have not always been considered moral, or even legal for that matter, and has also explored consciousness, I totally “get” why you would take my money. Fear that there is not enough; resentment and laziness that, “Why work my butt off for the man when I can just get over right here and now?”; a desire for “stuff”—which means crap that you don’t need; self-worth tied to money.

Regardless of your reason for taking the money, I would like it back. If you are embarrassed by your act, you can anonymously slide an envelope with the cash on the front desk or into my locker with my name on it. If you actually come up to me and give me the money, you will receive immediate forgiveness with no resentment, as I would consider that you actually learned and grew from the experience as expressed by your action. I might even give you something in appreciation for your expression of strength.

Because most people are not willing to accept their weaknesses in order to turn them into strengths, I won’t hold my breath that I will be seeing the money again. But while I won’t hold my breath, I will still hold onto some faith, not just in getting my money back but also in a human’s ability to transform himself.

Swami X, NYSD Instructor & black belt

A few people I knew read the notice and said some words like, “Man, I read what happened. That sucks,” to which I’d reply, “Dude, show your empathy in greenbacks.” It wasn’t until I did my laundry a few weeks later that suddenly non-fiction turned into fiction.

I had finally done laundry after weeks of wearing my underwear inside out, then back to front, then using socks instead. I had folded and bagged it at the Laundromat but when I got home I was not in the mood to put the clothes away so they remained on the floor in the two bags for another week. When I finally came around to putting the clothes away, a strange discovery happened that was almost as shocking as the morning after my first wet dream when I thought I was way too old, but not way too old, to be pissing myself. There was a hard lump in the back pocket of those shorts and I wasn’t on the subway so I suspected it wasn’t the result of some pervert leaning up against me.

A part of me hoped it wasn’t what I thought it was, as I value truth and this would turn truth immediately false. Well, now it “was.” I had inadvertently put the $400 in one of the Velcro back pockets, pockets I had never used before. It took me a whole 30-seconds to get over the fact that I had cast aspersions on the clientele of the kickboxing studio. Abandon looked at me and said, “Keep the fuckin’ rattle.”

I remember once forwarding some email to everyone I knew which said how the members of Congress were big jerks for having their own retirement plan that was separate from Social Security or something like that. One woman in the freedom movement wrote me back and told me that this email was as accurate as the “Bill Gates is beta testing a program and will pay you $250 to send forward this to ten people” emails. I had to set the record straight and so I sent everyone on my list an email that said I was wrong and apologized for wasting his or her time. I had egg on my face and being predominantly a vegan, it didn’t feel good. But I thought it had to be done.

More recently, as in last year, I came across a video of some people surrounding a few kernels of popcorn with their cell phones and then calling them and the popcorn kernels popped. I forwarded the video just to my family and told them something like, “Now don’t tell me cell phones don’t emit radiation!” Lo and behold, the video was a fake and now instead of egg I was wearing a dunce cap. The apology letter made my, “Now you believe there are conspiracies?” into a “You know, maybe 9/11 wasn’t an inside job.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V94shlqPlSI

I thought about telling the guys at the school and posting a new letter that said, “Hey guys, funniest thing. You know that money that was stolen from me? Yeah, well it wasn’t really stolen after all. It was in my back pocket the whole time! Isn’t that funny?” Then I thought again and justified it with some spiritual nonsense, the same way some a yoga teacher justifies teabagging a young devotchka while she is in corpse pose.

One of Osho’s wrote to Osho more of a statement than a question which said how the students are put in a difficult situation when some fact that Osho has said turns out not to be true. Osho pretty much answered:

“That’s your problem. I’m here to share my teachings and I will use whatever I can to bring them to you; whether fact or fiction is not my concern. It is your ego that gets hurt having to defend your master.  You don’t have to defend me. I am not worried about such false notions as ‘honor’ and ‘morals’ and ‘truth.’ You don’t even have to listen to my words; just be with me and you will grow. And if you find yourself in a jam, make up something metaphysical. This usually befools most.“

I justified my lack of coming clean with the same logic. That while the overall “story” was false, there are many truths in the letter I wrote and posted that were worthy of being shared, such as simplifying the term karma and talking about the strength that is involved in acknowledging wrong and doing one’s best to correcting a situation and making things right, a lesson I will not follow in this case.

Still, after finding the missing money in my back pocket I took the letter down. While the lessons were still valid and useful, I didn’t want to continue to cast false aspersions on the students of the school. Unlike Osho, I still have a mild amount of attachment to the truth, except when it comes to the phrase, “I won’t cum in your mouth.”