Moments of Glory in India

KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA — After giving a talk at the Gandhi Museum, Madurai, India 2007

I really didn’t want to do it. I was on a three-week vacation, after all, and didn’t want to do anything that resembled work.

But I couldn’t say no to my dear friend Rengasamy when he asked me to give some public programs during my visit to Madurai, India in 2007. We knew each other from when I was a college student in Madurai in 1974-75, when he assisted the American students there for study.

On my return visit, I had scheduled just a few days in Madurai, and had hoped to wander the busy streets, visit old friends, and walk around the famous Meenakshi Temple.

But Rengasamy thought I should offer my vast wisdom and experience as an American to the people of Madurai. After years as a professor of economics at Madurai University, Rengasamy was now director of the Gandhi Museum, a post that gave him much satisfaction. He was respected by many. And here he was trying to honor me by asking me to share my perspectives and knowledge.

He wanted me to give an illustrated talk at the Gandhi Museum for the staff and some local college students, which required me to search the internet for photographs for a PowerPoint program. He also wanted me to talk to teachers and students at a local school. Just a small talk, he said.

But he had informed me about these talks just a few days before the planned events.

I agreed to do it. He and another official at the museum discussed with me possibilities for the talks. They assured me it was no big deal. Just a few interested people would attend. They wanted me to talk about my work as a park ranger, national parks, preservation and such. Okay, I could do that—at least for the Gandhi Museum talk.

But the school talk puzzled me. I would be speaking with a group of teachers about my work. I envisioned sitting around a small table with a dozen or so teachers, having a cozy chat for 15 minutes or so, and a question and answer session. I could be informal. But then I would do a presentation to the students. Eegads, what would I say to them?

Rengasamy’s daughter suggested I talk about life for teenagers in America. Great idea. I had two teenage sons. I could draw from my experiences of being a mom and the students would find it fascinating, or so I thought.

The fateful day arrived for the school talks. I was driven to a local secondary school and fed a delicious traditional lunch. The founder and head mistress of the school ate with me in a small room and she commented on how little I ate. That’s because I don’t usually eat three cups of rice as most Indians in the south do for lunch. I remember there was a curried eggplant with the meal. I assumed the teachers would file into the room after lunch and we’d have our cozy chat. Nope. She led me out of the small room down some hallways and through a door.

Into an auditorium. With hundreds of chairs lined up. There were at least 60 teachers watching me enter. Mostly women, sari-clad, with dark faces and white teeth flashing. A podium with a microphone was in front of the audience, and a vase of flowers sat on a table nearby.

My worst nightmare had just materialized–my recurring dream of walking onstage in front of an audience naked, or showing up to an examination not knowing what I would be tested on.

I could feel the sweat dampening my armpits. And it was probably running down my temples, too.

The head mistress introduced me and I greeted everyone.

“How much time do we have?” I asked.

“Oh, an hour,” she said.

I’m usually good at this type of thing. That is, standing in front of an audience and saying something intelligible. But at that moment I was seriously doubting my abilities. I had not prepared an hour talk for 60 teachers, I had prepared a talk for some teenagers and nothing for my cozy brief chat for a handful of teachers.

My mind whirred. I probably swallowed. I probably smiled. I probably looked composed. The adrenaline was flowing and they were all looking at me.

I launched into a talk, of sorts. I wandered from one topic to the next, following my intuition on what to say. My job, historic sites, preservation, the importance of places of the past, a range of topics. Somehow, somehow, most of it made sense, (I think), and the teachers were warm in return.

At the end, teachers approached me and asked me to spend a few minutes talking with a class about tropical rainforests, another about patriotism. Hmm, patriotism. I would encourage the students to not blindly accept what their country does, but question always, and voice their objections. I briefly entertained a patriotism talk, then declined, explaining I had a tight schedule.

As I recall, I had a bit of a break before the next talk. But my armpits were still dripping. Soon the students filed in, girls on the left, boys on the right, crisply uniformed and all looking nearly identical. They filled the auditorium.

Now I can have fun, I thought. This should be a breeze, talking about things I’ve personally experienced. Raising my two sons.

I was familiar with the typical life path for a child in India. Work hard in school, memorize examination material, earn “top marks” in order to enter university, study a subject chosen or approved of by the parents, perform well in order to get an outstanding job, earn financial stability and achieve material wealth to attract an appropriate marriage partner—usually chosen by the parents, get married and have a child within a year. The “issue” would repeat the cycle.

My sons were not following that path. As I talked that day, I didn’t hold back much. I talked about how my older son dropped out of school at age 16, and went to work as a welder. Although a brilliant child, he just didn’t thrive in the school system. My younger one was still slogging away in school, however. I noted a few troubled looks on the students’ faces, and the teachers still hanging around probably didn’t know whether to stop me or applaud.

My sons were both on the wrestling team, a sport that has a long tradition in India but is not as popular as other sports such as cricket and soccer. I told them my son’s first match was with a girl. There was an audible gasp from the students and many covered their mouths in shock.

Then I talked about kicking my son out of the house when things were getting a bit tense from some problems. That’s when those proper Indian teenagers with their predictable lives really looked troubled. Mouths were hanging open. Someone asked a political question about President George Bush to change the topic.

Not all of my banter was so scandalous, however. I’m sure I covered mundane topics about raising my two sons. But I think the students were relieved when we moved to the question and answer session.

Then it happened. A girl raised her hand and asked, “Will you sing your national anthem?” Other students were smirking, wondering what I would do. I was trapped.

And stunned. The Star-Spangled Banner? Everyone knows that song is nearly impossible to sing. And it’s about fighting and killing and so depressing. But how could I refuse to sing my country’s national anthem?

The one thing I knew was I had to start on a low note so I could hit the high note later. Into that microphone I began singing the national anthem. Or at least my version of it. Just me and that auditorium full of students and teachers. I sang it loud and I sang it proud. But wait, are the ramparts gleaming or streaming? Who knows, I mumbled something and kept going at a lively pace so I could get it over with. I even inspired myself at the end when I was acutely aware that all eyes were on me. I had to end with a bang, so I leaned into the microphone.

“…Or the land of the freeeeeee, (big pause….) and the home (pause) of the (pause) brave!”

Yee-haa, I did it. A lone student started clapping, he was so moved by my rendition.

A student from the audience stood up and said, “Well, we have had such an unusual speaker today. We would like to thank her for her warmth and honesty.”

The students clapped and I was feeling good. Or maybe I was just relieved it was over.

Rengasamy had not attended, but he picked me up from the school.

I described my singing and the unusual twists in my talk.

“I will NEVER forget this day, Rengasamy, NEVER!” All Rengasamy could do was giggle.

The talk at the Gandhi Museum the next day seemed rather anti-climactic. Somehow, I muddled through, and I was again asked to sing the national anthem. Rengasamy laughed and laughed at the side of the room and stared at me as I mentally smacked my forehead. Not again! But I could not refuse, so I sang. And I still didn’t know whether the ramparts were gleaming or streaming.

How I Learned

My first-grade teacher, Mrs. Hume, wore horn-rimmed glasses and dark dresses. I remember little else about her, except that she placed me in the bluebird reading group and seemed very old.

The year was 1960, an election year. Even though I was only six years old, I was aware that two men, Kennedy and Nixon, were both hoping to win the contest for president.

person dropping paper on box My father did not like Kennedy at all. Whenever he appeared on television, Dad called him names and gritted his teeth. Both he and my mother were voting for Nixon. If I had been old enough to vote at that time, I would have voted for Nixon also.

On the day before the election, Mrs. Hume brought it up in class.

“Who are your parents going to vote for?” she asked. Perched atop a small desk, she listened and nodded slightly after each child in each even row of desks responded. A couple of children did not know who their parents were voting for. But by the time about half of the children announced their votes, it was apparent that Nixon would win. The rest of the kids knew it too, so the remaining ones yelled out Nixon’s name as though they were running his campaign. The few who quietly admitted their parents’ choice of Kennedy heard boos and hisses from the rest of the class.

After everyone had proclaimed their parents’ vote, several children asked Mrs. Hume in chorus, “Who are you voting for?”

Her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open. “Oh, no, I can’t tell you that. It’s my secret.” She clutched her throat and raised her eyebrows as she said the word, “secret.”

Silence swept over the first graders as we digested this announcement. We had just told her how we—our parents—were voting, but she wouldn’t tell us how she was voting. We each had told her because she had asked us. We had no choice. She expected a response. She could do that.

The silence continued as the powerful truth settled. This truth gripped me through many of my student years. She was big, I was little. She was old, I was young. She was teacher, I was student. She could do and say just about anything, and I would not challenge it, not until I was big, old, and a teacher also.

Thus began my formal education.

My Mom’s Criminal Past

Earlier this year my 96-year-old mother passed away. Mom assigned me to tell this story at her funeral services. When I was a girl she and Dad had bought a small farm in Indiana, where on weekends he enjoyed playing farmer and she enjoyed out-fishing her husband. The kids fooled around mostly—we swam and fished and hiked around and pulled ticks off our legs. Then we drove back to our home in Cincinnati and looked forward to the next weekend at the farm.

Mom made me promise to tell her story the night she, Dad, and I went to dinner, after they had sold the farm some 25 years later. We all had a drink, and were getting kind of loose-tongued.

That’s when I learned Mom was a criminal.

She said she’d always wondered what all the fuss was about with marijuana. She decided to find out. At age 60 or so, when the kids were gone and she was spending a lot of time at the farm, she started her own cannabis patch. She said she’d gotten some seeds from one of her children. It wasn’t me, so that leaves one of the other three. Seeing that they looked similar to radish seeds, she said she stored the dope seeds in a radish seed envelope she had emptied. I thought that was clever.

One day she collected a bucket of composted manure from the barn, and hauled it to a place she said will never be revealed, but it was near a wooded area. She dug a hole, filled it with the fertile compost, and planted seeds. Rain did its work, and two seedlings emerged. One of them in particular thrived, growing as tall as my mother. She visited her cash crop every other week or so, monitoring its progress, hoping that the farmer neighbors wouldn’t get suspicious at her going to this place on her land which she would never visit otherwise. She said Dad knew what she was doing. He thought she was foolish but didn’t stop her.

Mom was cautious and conservative in a lot of ways. I don’t remember her ever talking to me about drugs. I do know that she served on a jury where the accused was charged with something having to do with possession of marijuana. She told me the jury convicted him, one of the reasons being that she thought marijuana was a gateway drug and he was headed for heavier stuff.

So back on the farm, Mom raised this really big healthy marijuana plant in conservative rural Indiana. The details about consuming her gateway drug were a little fuzzy, but she does remember that she harvested some of the leaves and took them to the farmhouse kitchen. She vaguely remembered having some white paper, and generating smoke by burning the leaves. She said she got smoke in her mouth, but she never inhaled, just like the president. Her husband, who was watching, told her, “Get that stinkin’ stuff out of here.” Which she did.

As she told me this story, I was incredulous. For one thing, she smoked the leaves, not the buds. What a waste of homegrown weed. And what happened to her plant? She said she stripped it of its leaves so no one could identify it, and never visited again. For all we know, it continued to grow, reseeded itself, and now a healthy patch of marijuana is growing in the backyard of some unsuspecting farmer who now owns the place.

Recently, when I spoke with Mom about her adventure with drugs, she said, “I was stupid. It probably would have been very bad.” And she begged me not to write the story down, but I reminded her that she made me promise to tell the story, so I had to get it right. It is, after all, your legacy, I argued. She was laughing over the phone, quite tickled over the whole thing. I asked her, “Mom, do you really care if people think you’re a criminal for what you did 35 years ago?”

“Not really,” she said, and added one more thing. “Back then, I couldn’t understand why it would be so bad to grow a plant.”

After reading this account to my memoir-writing class, the oldest student, at 88 years, said, “I want to meet your mom.”

I wish he could have.