Escape from Zendik

books of my youth

madgelma@hotmail.com — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 23:37:41 GMT

I've been rewriting Chapter 2 - the chapter in which I arrive at Zendik - and in order to do so I'm having to revisit some books that influenced me in high school, and right before I moved to the farm. One of these books - Girlfriend in a Coma - I just borrowed from the Mid-Manhattan library. I have no idea what it meant to me when I read it, but I know it must be relevant because I wrote in my journal, after I'd been at Zendik for about twenty-four hours, that being there was like "the Girlfriend in a Coma vacuum, filled." What the hell was that vacuum? How did I think Zendik was filling it? The book's in my backpack. I'm about to find out.

Another book I need to find forthwith is A Crown of Fire, by Pierre Van Paassen, which chronicles the life and death of fifteenth-century fanatic, martyr, and "Bonfire of the Vanities" originator Girolamo Savonarola. I remember getting high off that book. I also remember that the author loved to use the word "puerperal." I finally looked the word up - seventeen years later - and discovered that it means "relating to parturition." "Parturition" is a fancy word for birth.

And the third book on the forthwith list is The Rule of St. Benedict. God, when I was fifteen, I so wanted to be a medieval monk! I used to read about this band of cenobites and that dispersal of hermits and wish I'd been born about a millennium earlier. Of course, almost all those monks were men. If I had in fact lived then I probably would have pumped out a passel of brats and then croaked in childbirth before reaching thirty. But anyway.

The more the Zendiks "change," the more they stay the same....

madgelma@hotmail.com — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 23:53:10 GMT

The official Zendik line these days seems to be: "We've changed! We're no longer a commune, we're an arts foundation! Never mind the bad old days!" (Um, excuse me, the correct term is "cult," not "commune," but maybe that goes without saying.)

A few thoughts:

For years, those Zendiks sent out onto the Internet to stab at conciliation have been disowning the bad old days - saying yes, bad shit happened in the past, what can you do, nobody's perfect, let's all be bigger than that and move on. In the early 2000s Zendiks were saying yeah, we did some harsh therapies in the '90s, we're not like that anymore. Meanwhile members were still being psychologically obliterated in group "therapy" sessions, mothers were still being separated from their children, etc. So yes, the outward forms had changed, but the essentially coercive and destructive nature of the place was very much intact. You'll excuse me if I take the current protestations of conversion with a shaker - no, make that an entire mine - full of salt.

What would make me believe the Zendiks had actually changed, not just in form but in essence?

Evidence. Cold, hard evidence. A property deed with every current Zendik's name on it. Photographs or photocopies of checks signed by a whole passel of different people. Debit cards issued - and used - in the names of the many. Confirmation - maybe five, ten years down the road - that a Zendik woman other than Fawn had given birth to a child and never endured a forced separation from that child.

Art. Introspective, honest art. Writing by Zendiks about the Zendik experience that admits of the contradictions within it, the pain & fear inherent in it, the degradation & sacrifice of dignity that has certainly been and most likely still is a huge part of living there. Writing that includes real, deep questioning of what the group is doing & why, and why that individual cleaves to this Zendik path & rejects all others. Writing that explores doubts about what Zendik is & does, doubts about what the writer is doing there. Show me a piece in the Zendik magazine describing the immolating fear of being demolished by one's peers - and there will be change I can believe in.

Apology. Humble inquiry. Arol has never humbly & precisely apologized to the people she's hurt & humiliated. Instead she rails against those who persecute her on the Internet. I'll believe Arol's changed when I read an account of her life that matches up with the account given by many outside the farm who've known her for decades. I'll believe Arol's changed when the Zendik website no longer portrays Wulf as a hero and her as a heroine. I'll believe she's changed when she can humbly write, or say, to specific individuals, "This is how I've wronged you. And this is why I'm sorry. What can I do to make things right between us?"

I do not say there is no agreement between follower and leader; I do not claim that we who took Arol as our mistress had no part in the carnage that followed. I do say she's never admitted her contribution to the ruins. I do say she raves.

Some seed the rumor that Arol's power over her minions has dwindled. This may or may not be true. What's certain: Her delusions remain.

in the shadow of the rock rose

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 20:47:38 GMT

Sunday afternoon in the office...we need to massage our lists in QuickBooks, as we are at the dawn of a new era of responsibility in record-keeping. Also we need to finish clearing out & cleaning the indoor part of the depot. It will be a place of spacious & immaculate comfort, once we're done.

A week from yesterday we leave for Maine. Which means this is the week of getting things done. The apartment must be cleaned & ordered, as must our affairs here at work. That way we'll be able to enjoy our first vacation in forever, hallelujah. I look forward to crickets at night & berry-picking in sunlight. Here the traffic roars outside our door and the Rock Rose building pants without ceasing. Who would have thought a behemoth of brick & metal would be capable of such ardent speech & heavy breathing?

digging in dirt

madgelma@hotmail.com — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 23:26:14 GMT

A moment to myself, after months in a whirlwind. Is it settling now? Perhaps. I'm looking to buy a computer, finally, having come to terms with the fact that I will not be hand-writing the final draft of my book on pristine moleskine. For better or worse, I am a creature of the keyboard generation, accustomed to cutting, pasting and saving as. The good news is I can take the purchase off my taxes.

New York City is, as always, a blessing and a curse. My boyfriend and I have moved to a one-bedroom apartment a few blocks from Penn Station. Thanks to the real estate bust we're only paying a few dollars more for articulated space plus backyard than we were paying for one-room studio plus fire escape. The yard is paved, save for a slight strip of highly suspect soil along the back wall. But that doesn't mean I can't grow food: A couple weeks after moving in I built two 3' x 6' raised beds for all manner of vegetables, and a couple weeks later I sheet-mulched the dirt strip and sowed it with blue potatoes and sunflowers. Who knows whether I'll end up growing enough this year to offset the costs of installation (which I also plan to take off my taxes)--even if I don't, though, I'll be gaining invaluable knowledge. I'd much rather learn--really learn, through trial and error--to grow food now, with truck-hauled sustenance as cushion, than wait in uneasy ignorance for the last seconds of ancient sunlight.

These are the days of miracle and wonder, yes? I have work that draws me into the bustling world and a boyfriend who's the soul of adventure. I wasn't planning on becoming a responsible adult, or paying rent, or juggling giant trikes for a living...but here I am, possessed, at last, of a place to stand.

the tiff between thinking and dreaming

madgelma@hotmail.com — Thu, 07 May 2009 23:35:46 GMT

It's always cold in the office. I'm told the tile floor is responsible. Will it be cool here in summer, then? Will this place be a haven when every other leaves me dripping and scorched?

I wonder what good transfusion will do. I've cried, "Amputate!" over and over, though the limbs to meet the ax are as dear to me, some days, as little children. Is it cynicism that whispers, We cannot do it all? Or healthy suspicion of wishful thinking?

For years I believed in magic, I saw our hope so bright. Now I find myself allergic to fantasies neither recognized as such nor duly plotted out.

Will your dream manifest because you believe and insist? Or will your grip on the whole of it kill the parts that are real, that do work, that shape rows of hard earth? Please--keep your rose-colored contacts--so long as they don't blur your vision.

whatever we lose like a you or a me

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 13:30:35 GMT

Saturday morning, sunny and warm. I suppose the coming of spring is always a big deal, but it's especially significant after winters spent trundling a 160-pound trike around in the cold. When you've no cocoon...the weather's moods sweep straight through you.

I tried pedicabbing again last night, and ended up in a puddle by the Hudson River. I'll try again today, and possibly tomorrow. What finally got me out there again, strangely enough, was not desperation for money or the myth of quick riches--it was desire to ride the trike. I itch for it when I don't do it. It's the city-street equivalent of pulling an endless stream of wheelbarrows over level gravel--tough on the lungs (sometimes), a boon for the muscles, luscious & fluid once steering has become second nature. Now I weave through stopped traffic for the fun of it, to see how tight a space I can negotiate. I'm getting used to the size of the pedicab body, which is slightly wider on top than the cargo box. It's just plain fun to drive a large pedal-powered vehicle through the streets of a city still largely hostage to the gas-guzzling metal box. Who knows what might happen? Who knows what adventure might unfold in the passenger seat? I have my troubles with selling, with approaching people--perhaps I always will--but there's something about this pursuit that enthralls me. It seems I'll keep going.

how we'll find mercy

madgelma@hotmail.com — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 14:56:10 GMT

I dreamed last night that I was captured, with many others, and taken to a red-rock-and-sagebrush land bordered by a high, spiked, wrought-iron fence. Instinct said, Disperse, so I set out walking a knobby ridge with a train track running alongside it. In the pink beginnings of dark a train approached--long and sleek, with warm orange light suffusing the cars and spilling out onto the landscape. I'd told myself that if a train came I wouldn't take it, but I had no food, and night was falling, and the train was tempting. Many fellow travelers on the train face of the ridge swept down the steep slope and into the cars. I considered doing the same. But I knew if I did I'd be sorry. So I kept walking and, when I peered down the far face of the ridge, saw that that side was speckled with many more who'd resisted the caressing tangerine glow--many more who knew that though the ridge was rocky and the light fading, we were better off adrift in wilderness than trapped in train cars.

After walking a little longer I decided to turn back and try my luck at escaping the compound bounded by wrought-iron fence. In sight of the gates, I told a boy, maybe ten or eleven, to cover the green vegetables in his blue plastic bag with a sweatshirt or something, so others wouldn't see the food and grab it from him. I kissed him, figuring if he never made it out he might never know how it felt to kiss a woman. I pointed towards the gates and told him, You could just slip out; they might not see you. Then I headed for the gates myself.

What does the dream mean? It's tempting to think we'll always have cars to ride in and movies to go to. But we may not. Hence, hugging the harsh work of home-making in rough country, as rain screams and wind howls around us, is, at last, how we'll find mercy.

the life of the world to come

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 16:11:43 GMT

What I dream about as I deliver cupcakes and catering and cleansing potions to people and entities who have far too much money is using the rickshaw van to haul vegetables, compost, firewood, water. I imagine a route dictated not by a succession of delivery windows but by who needs what most. What if I could see in my mind's eye the faces at the ends of my lines, the smiles of pleasure and grins of relief soon to greet me? What if I were dispatched not to the highest bid but the greatest need? What if pedicabs replaced family cars and cargo trikes became matters of fact? I know I have always had trouble obeying the whims of the market; I believe before long these shifts I wish for will come.

welcome to the machine gun

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 15:32:42 GMT

Yesterday outside Grand Central (on the west side of Lexington, just north of 42nd) I passed two cops: one sporting a K-9 badge on his uniform, the other wearing a pith helmet and wielding a machine gun. I know there are National Guard guys in fatigues hanging out in Penn Station--I used to see them when I took the LIRR to BBS in Bayside--but I don't remember whether they carry machine guns. The only time I clearly remember encountering a machine-gun-toting cop in New York City was last September, at the big protest against the bailout--one was posted along the march route, in front of some kind of emergency vehicle (an ambulance, maybe?).

Yesterday, as I walked by the brute-looking man with the deadly weapon, I said out loud to myself, "Why does he have a machine gun?" It was a rhetorical question, I guess, and the woman walking right in front of me was the only other human who heard it. I was speeding towards the Grand Central Market entrance at the time, hot to drop off my deliveries, and didn't really entertain the notion of stopping. But once inside the building I began thinking,"Why not ask the guy?" A citizen's response to a cop with a machine gun is supposed (by those handing out the machine guns, I guess) to be some version of the one I had: Don't look too close, hurry on by. You have the GDP to contribute to, and very little time. I felt that I should avoid eye contact with this man, I should not engage him, I should not get too close to him--my instinct to avoid him was as strong--and almost as involuntary--as my instinct to bear to the left when a semi is passing me on the right. This is a terrible problem. Why? Because we the people of New York are meant to become inured to this kind of sight, we are meant to quail before these shows of force, while growing used to them.

Inside the market, I came up with the idea of posing my question to the armed man himself, on my way back to my rickshaw. This idea scared me a little, but also seemed logical--if I don't want to form the habit of tacitly accepting military displays on the streets of my city, then perhaps I ought to open my mouth when I see them.

Alas, when I exited the market, I saw that the two policemen and their van had departed. Also I was relieved--I could certainly have faced hostility in response to my inquiry. This, again, is a problem: If the job of the police is to protect me from violence, why is it that the demographic I most regularly feel afraid of is...the police?

I've done a couple illegal things in my life: I've hitch-hiked on Interstate highways, I've attempted to get to Las Vegas on a Greyhound bus without paying for a ticket. Maybe I've done a few other things the law asserts I should not do. In general, though, I'm the kind of person who ought to have nothing to fear from those whose job is to protect and serve--if, that is, you accept the idea that cops are fair and only go after the guilty. In our current Error of Terror I feel as though I could be accused at any time of plotting against the republic, on the flimsiest of pretexts. The problem is not necessarily that this will happen, but that I fear it: Whoever's handing out the machine guns has got me where he/she/it wants me--in a state of perpetual low-level anxiety that I feel is personal to me, and therefore keep private.

My pet name for the area south of Chambers Street (which contains City Hall, Wall Street, the site of the World Trade Center) is "the police state"--I feel like I'm entering a scene from Soylent Green or Children of Men when I venture down there. The heavy, spiked blockades that look like clawed frontloader buckets sunk into the asphalt give me the willies--they make me feel like I'm subject to some insidious siege, whose purpose is being kept from me. And then there are of course the cops everywhere, one of whom sneered to me--while I was stopped at a red light a couple months ago--that my rickshaw van was the perfect vehicle for transporting suicide bombs. Does he feel even more fear than I do, as a result of perpetuating the terror delusion for a living? Or has his fear been transmuted into a rabid, adrenaline-fueled drive to pounce the moment a potential threat presents itself? I don't know. Seeing the man with the machine gun yesterday made me want to retreat to the hinterlands. The fact of his presence on a busy street at midday--unexplained and unjustified--was in itself an act of violence.

as for me I've come to know

madgelma@hotmail.com — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 02:08:49 GMT

"I can't wait to play the same species my whole life."

That was the line in my head this morning, upon waking. There's one thing I want it to mean--I don't know if I'm right.

You know, when you start wishing the cusp-of-morning oracle would give you some particular instruction, that the consequence of following said instruction is a thing you want, but fear to claim. The sentence could be saying anything; my fanciful interpretation tells me, I'm wishing I could stay.

the dark to climb over, the wand to come by

madgelma@hotmail.com — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 06:39:50 GMT

My Inbox is empty, save for one message received quite recently. Everything else has been dispatched, sorted, responded to. How beautiful. I never realize how sorely unanswered mail irks me, till I get it all taken care of.

* * *

We are having some troubles, here in Hell's Kitchen; we are having some fears. For the moment they've receded...and I'm certain they'll return. However: I just the other day (while aestivating) read a book called Embracing Fear, which advises replying to neurotic threats of what will happen if you dare with this all-purpose verbal shrug: "I'll risk it."

for those who missed my reading...

madgelma@hotmail.com — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 04:12:45 GMT

...I am going to post the two sections of my book I read thereat.

This one, which is about 9.5 pages long, recounts a selling trip I went on just after Christmas 2003. I was part of a girl crew deployed to hawk Zendik propaganda at Phish's annual series of New Year's shows in Miami.

Growing up in Brooklyn I knew what to expect every year, two days after Christmas: my favorite dinner of no-frills macaroni and cheese with ketchup; a homemade chocolate cake with the legend “Happy Birthday Helen” looped in purple, green and orange goop over a thick crust of chocolate icing; and a handmade card garnishing whichever cheap metal-plastic aggregate I was currently lusting after—a clock radio, a curling iron, a red-white-and-blue accordion like the one the rabbit-eared urchin in Gummo plays while perching forlorn on a toilet. I sprang awake at dawn on birthday mornings, eager to start my span of being special, and greet my personal new age.
     On December 27th, 2003—the day I turn twenty-seven—I bolt out of my sleeping bag for a different reason: to grab a slot on the potty before the other six members of my seven-woman selling crew begin stirring, and needing to pee. Today I am no cosseted birthday girl, but a Zendik revolutionary, preparing for the day's first unnerving mission: wresting cash from the gritty alterna-tourist crowd passing and patronizing Uncle Sam's music store, on Washington Avenue in Miami Beach. I must get “on,” I must spin my mirage of a beautiful world into money-making spells, in the swampy sunshine and surreal heat.
     At this, as of mid-afternoon, I am failing. Few are seduced by the gothic cast of my CDs and magazines—the slogan “Stop Bitching Start a Revolution” blaring from my t-shirts and bumper stickers—my lackluster, panic-tinged pitch. “Hey, have you seen this?” I shrill, as likely targets approach—“It's underground art.” I am dismissed with a shake of the head, a flick of the wrist—or skipped over entirely, by eyes fixed on the heavy gray-blue horizon. My partner Emily, on the other hand—a boisterous, athletic eighteen-year-old who's been selling Zendik for one year, to my four—is kicking ass, as always. Why? I wonder. Did she get a head start on proselytizing during her teenage stint as an evangelical Christian? Did she inherit a money-making gene from her dad, who's made a career of fundraising for the Boy Scouts? Was she learning ease with strangers from her bubbly mother, while I was learning quiet and shyness from mine? Or is she simply more committed to the cause than I am, more closely attuned to that righteous revolutionary vibration? I know I should rejoice in her success, since every sale she makes raises our trip total and helps sustain our farm—but the truth is, each twenty she pockets for a t-shirt makes me quake inside. How will I ever catch up? How will I ever explain? I can never outright blame “the scene” for a low number—since selling is “all energy” and energy is available in equal abundance in every situation—but still: The better she does, the more likely I'll be to get slammed for poor performance.
     As we walk back to the parking lot to rejoin our crew, Emily stops to badger a plump, pierced, shaven, black-clad man. I join in, keening to redeem myself by securing one massive, miraculous donation. He flirts with us for a good ten minutes, then giggles in feigned innocence and exclaims, “Oh, you're trying to sell your stuff! I don't carry cash!”
     My anger keeps me brittle till we reach the van. Then Emily asks if I'm okay, and the flood escapes: “No I'm not okay I've felt horribly competitive all day I don't know what's wrong with me I hate the way I feel.” I retreat to the far end of the bench seat and stare down at the worn red carpet, vainly attempting to calm the tremors in my voice, and hide my tears.
     Cata—who's been selling the longest, of all of us—leans heavily against the sliding door, already weary of this latest take on an oft-repeated scene. Having moved to Zendik fresh out of high school, she hasn't tried—and isn't tempted by—other ways of living. I envy her certainty.
     “Maybe you should stay here and sell by yourself tonight,” she suggests, her voice raspy with exasperation. “I don't want you dragging everybody down at the Phish show.”
     It's not a bad idea. Concerts make me nervous—sneaking in, dodging venue security—and if I sell by myself on the beach I won't have anyone to compete with. I'll get the chance to play out my fantasy of selling as it was a couple decades ago: each seller alone in her own spot, running her own show.
     “Think about it while we're in the store,” Cata says.
     The girls disappear into Wild Oats, to get jacked on sugar and—perhaps?—buy me a birthday cake. I know chances of this have slimmed since Emily proposed it earlier in the day but still I'm hoping—not because I'm especially keen on eating a slice of white fluff slathered in fake cream, but because I yearn to be recognized; most years I get lumped into the collective December birthday celebration, or I get no celebration at all. Whereas Arol, Fawn, the kids—even Wulf, who's dead—get their own individual cakes and parties. I tell myself that someday, when I've been around long enough—when I've proven myself true enough—I too will merit a separate fête. Also I'm prone to bitter dreams, come late December, in which I demand my own homemade carob cake with carob frosting. All I can do now is caution myself to expect nothing, and turn back to the overwhelming question: whether or not to sell solo.
     In the old days, I've been told, this was how it used to go: In the morning you got dropped off by yourself, in front of a movie theater, a health food store, a book store. You sold alone till sundown, when the van circled back to pick you up and take you to your place to stay. There you cooked and ate dinner with your host and crew—unless you'd chosen to go home with a cute girl or guy you'd met on the street, to get a little Death Kultur loving and maybe do a little Ecolibrium recruiting. Selling had started out as a social gambit—at a time when Zendiks supported the farm largely by appropriating inheritances, drawing welfare checks, shoplifting and busking, some of the more outward-oriented members had wished for a way to interact one-on-one with “Normals,” while retaining their heretical edge. The upshot was the magazine—originally a single mimeographed sheet titled The Cosmic Revolutionist—and the solo foray into the DK to sell it.
     I covet the sense of freedom and self-reliance I imagine sellers had, in the years before the industrial selling trip was born—no one watching you, no immediate pressure to make money. One hundred dollars was decent then (as compared to two hundred fifty to three hundred now); if you called home in a funk and Wulf answered he’d tell you to “shoot for forty.” The seventies and eighties seem to me like a simpler time, when money earned selling was more tightly tied to the basics of survival. Now the farm’s finances are a maze of bills and loans and mortgages and credit cards, sequestered in Arol’s and Fawn’s chambers; once we the sellers bear our offering of carefully counted and rubber-banded bills to the Addition kitchen, it disappears. If I make more money I don’t get better stuff. I don’t feel any more righteous about adding new socks, or colored markers, or eyeglasses, or a doctor’s appointment, to the shopping list. If I make less money I get slammed but I don’t starve. Occasionally even “power” sellers, like Cata and Emily, are ripped apart—for getting “ego-jacked” on the street—when they have brought in substantial wads of cash. No matter how many times I’m reminded, This is how we eat, I do not, in my gut, believe it.
     Selling by myself for one night won’t revive this basic correlation, I know, but perhaps it’ll jolt me to the raw truth of hustle-to-survive. Running my own show on Miami Beach I’ll have no one to measure myself against—and also no one to laugh with, no one to lean on.
     Then the girls swarm back to the van and Cata rescinds her offer. It would be an act of excessive cruelty, she says, to leave me to be eaten alive by the blood-red-fingernail girls and slicked-back-pompadour boys who prance the night scene in pairs and packs. “We want you to come with us,” she says, “and just relax and try to have fun.”
     “Here,” says Emily, handing me a paper bag. “We got some cookies. For your birthday.”
     So I sniffle a little more, but this time with hope, and settle into the back seat with two chewy peanut-butter-chocolate-chip morsels of delight. On the drive to American Airlines Arena I decide to give up on making money—to strip this next episode of pressure, and let it be a grand adventure. Instead of pushing, I’ll open to whatever plump, luscious possibilities are ripe for the plucking.

My first mark inside the arena hails from Oregon. He’s rolling or stoned or something. He extols the snow on Mount Hood, the idyll of dwelling high in the pine forest in a cozy timber cabin. I leave my magazines in my pocket, and listen. At the close of his soliloquy he hands me fifteen dollars for a sticker and a t-shirt, despite the fact that I’ve said next to nothing about Zendik. Magic! Maybe I’m on the right track….
     Just before the intermission I approach a tall, chubby man parked by the hot dog stand. His cheeks and eyes shine with sweat and chemically induced bliss. “Ah, Zendik,” he says. He knows us from Savannah, where he used to work as a bouncer at a nightclub. He’s not hissing, or warding me off with crossed fingers, so I figure he must be a friend of ours, worth chatting with for a while.
     Minutes later, the crowds pour out of the concert hall, and my internal alarm goes off. Prime time! It shrills. Ready-set-go-ten-minute-window to hit people up like crazy and make tons of money!
     But no. Tonight I will not salivate at the usual stimuli. Tonight I will breathe deeply, and continue my conversational meander…which turns to middle names, and other simple revelations that amuse both of us immensely, in our respective altered states.
     “Timothy!” he giggles.
     “Madgelma!” I reply.
     “Do you know what’s in my wallet?” he asks.
     “Something of value?” I guess.
     “Maybe….” he says.
     He gives me his beer to hold, and pulls out his billfold. Shuffles through it. Extracts a crinkly wad, and starts pressing crumpled bills into my free hand. My exquisitely honed large-denomination detector kicks in instantly—these particular patterns of green mean, This is big. That one scans as a U.S. Grant…that’s an Andrew Jackson…and another Andrew and another…and two Abes plus a few Georges…. I thank my benefactor like he’s just pulled me down from the cross, and give him a magazine, a sticker, a double-X t-shirt, and one of each CD. Then I scurry off to count the money: one hundred twenty-five bucks. More than any one person has ever given me…as far as I know, more than any Zendik seller has ever received from a single individual. O wonder! O joy! O deeply personal hands of truth, dispensing my psychic reward!
     And yet, I’m nervous. What if the bouncer sobers up, asks, “What have I done?!”, comes hunting for a refund? Certainly if I see him again I’ll run the other way…. But anxiety rings only a little ding in my delirium: Now I will float through the evening, assured already of doing well enough to avoid censure.
     I spend the rest of the night lilting from one leisurely colloquy to the next…steadily accruing cash as I sniff out hints of what I have in common with this collection of civilians.
     “Where’d you get that necklace? You made it? You make jewelry? It’s beautiful!”
     “You’re from Nashville? What kind of music do you write? I love country songs! I love the stories they tell, and how simple they are.”
     “Parks Highway…isn’t that in Alaska? Where in Alaska are you from? I hitch-hiked to Alaska once….”
     I follow each Phish-head down a different stream. And when one looks back and asks, “What’s that in your hand?” I say, this is our art. You can check it out if you want to. Often they do. And when they don’t I let the “no’s” flow harmlessly over me—I wasn’t expecting anything anyway.
     I notice that my switch to “It’s all good” mode changes whom I choose to hit up. In more desperate times I’ve focused on misshapen middle-aged males, thinking, They have money, they’re susceptible to the charms of a young woman. Now that I’m just hanging out, surfing the social scene, I feel free to approach a heretofore intimidating, hence off-limits, demographic: attractive young men. Who are plentiful at Phish shows, since I’m partial to hippies, and those who sojourn among them. I feel as though I’ve stepped through a tie-dyed curtain into a hard-nosed chamber of heaven—who would have thought I’d be able to make money and fulfill my revolutionary duty by flirting? Maybe I, like Fawn, will learn to use my sex appeal to recruit new Zendiks. As I sell, I daydream: Maybe this one will move to the farm…or this one…. If I were still with Kro I’d be battling these thoughts, I’d be seeking confessors…but that’s over. I urge them all to come visit.

When my selling crew departed North Carolina for Florida on December 26th, we were planning on a relatively short stint in Miami. We’d sell three out of five Phish shows, and then drive home on December 30th—knowing we’d be back in time for the farm’s New Year’s Eve festivities made it easier to countenance retreating from the general celebratory bustle to do road prep and selling meetings on Christmas Day. Our fourth morning in Florida, though, I sense our contract’s been extended—that’s my interpretation of the deepening commas at the corners of Cata’s mouth, as she mutters, “Uh huh…uh huh…uh huh…” on the phone with home. Of course she asks the rest of us before committing—but what can we say? Which of us wants to be Judas, choosing her own comfort over the cause? Which of us wants to be accused of “holding back” or being “precious”? “Only in giving is there living,” as Wulf used to say….
     My gut sinks, when Cata relays home’s request. I’ve done well three days in a row, and I’d like to get the hell out of town before I blow it. Also I know it’s useless to resist. And I’m so exhausted—so thoroughly in selling mode—so sorely bereft of a boyfriend at home—that I’m fine with another couple nights on the road. Once I’m a certain degree of fried I begin to crackle—my pupils dilate so wide the tripping hippies I’m selling to swear I’m tripping too—why not stay here? Why not ride the high? Why not live out of a van, follow the Phish-heads, subsist on tuna salad and rice and sell every moment of my life?
     The one wrinkle in the new plan is that Karma—a diplomat’s daughter who sells with the grace and charm of an accomplished socialite—has lost her voice to laryngitis. She needs drugs, if she’s to make money. So she and Cata and the others drive off in search of a pharmacy, while Emily and I repair to the patio of our place to stay, to fold paper towels from a roll into napkins. Carlos, our laid-back Brazilian host, doesn’t mind if we expand our operation to the outdoors; he’s been ceding his living room floor—and kitchen, and bathroom, and so on—to Zendik selling crews since the winter of 2000, when I recruited him at a juice bar in Coconut Grove. He tends to be especially accommodating when said crews are composed, as ours is, entirely of girls.
     Folding paper towels is my idea: Keeping a stack of napkins handy on the dashboard will encourage us to clean our stainless steel eating bowls, and I despise a pile-up of dirty bowls. Also, making napkins is kind of fun. It requires soothing, repetitive motion; it doesn’t require us to talk to people, or sell anything. And it helps us feel that we’re not just sitting in limbo, like civilians, while our fellow sellers are off on a mission. We’re doing something; we must always be doing something. After all, as Wulf said, “The Warrior waits for no one.”

On New Year’s Eve—the night of the final Phish show—Karma scores a pass to the VIP lounge. Which means she’s out on the VIP balcony, tossing complimentary cans of Budweiser down to Emily and me, as the Christian epoch turns two thousand and four years old. We stand at the railing and drink, watching Roman candles explode over the water, beyond the desolate, floodlit parking lot. For the moment, life is good: I haven’t bombed since my birthday, and tomorrow we go home. I feel young, rugged, desirable, committed…blessed to be a Zendik.

This one, which is just over 3 pages long, recounts the tale of Stuffed Station Wagon Man, whom I met in August 2002 while hitch-hiking to Alaska (during a 2-month "out" from Zendik).

Halfway between Anchorage and Fairbanks, just short of Denali, I stand shivering, with my thumb out, in freezing rain. Fuck this, I mutter, I'm going home. I'm about to cross the road to the southbound side when an overloaded station wagon pulls up in front of me. The driver is a thin, bright-eyed, middle-aged man; his passenger, squeezed into one corner of the back seat, is a very large husky.
     The man seems friendly, normal enough. He's just wrapping up a three-week sight-seeing/picture-taking tour up north, and is heading back to Boulder by way of Fairbanks. I take this as a sign from the Psychic Realm that I'm meant to get the hell out of Alaska. I wait patiently as the man removes various items--an atlas, a flashlight, a cooler, a camera, a dog bowl, a roll of paper towels--from the passenger seat and footwell. Then I climb in, relieved to know that within a few days, if all goes well, I'll be back at my brother's house in Idaho--home, for now.
     It takes us about five minutes to explore dusty downtown Fairbanks--a cluster of ramshackle frame buildings, half of which house saloons. Then we head south towards Chicken, where we'll cross the border into Canada. On the way I learn a little more about Stuffed Station Wagon Man. Back home in Boulder, he composes actuarial tables for a living, and flips antique rocking chairs, on the side. "Buy low, sell high!" He used to have a girlfriend, but she dumped him. "She didn't like how I kept my kitchen," he says. "She thought I shouldn't dry my socks on the stove, while I was cooking oatmeal. What's the problem? Just conserving energy."
     At the border crossing in Chicken, it's so cold and wet that the guard refuses to leave her booth. She glances quickly at our IDs, determines it would be impossible to search the car if she wanted to, and waves us on through to the Yukon. As Stuffed Station Wagon Man squints at the road ahead, which is vanishing into the gathering fog, he asks me what I think of the state of the world. "I think it's pretty fucked up," I say. "I think we need to create a culture where people are honest with each other, where there's no money and--"
He cuts me off. "Nah, we just need to get rid of the electoral college," he says. "One person, one vote. Solve everything."
     I scoff. "That's not gonna do a damn thing! You'll still have the same corrupt system, the same slimy politicians--"
     He interrupts again. "Nope! Everyone's equal, with one person, one vote. Y'ever hear of the Masons? You know, the pyramid with the evil eye on top, on the one-dollar bill? They got us into this mess.... Well just wait. Twenty-twelve." He nods, and sucks a little ketchup out of one of the opened packets gracing the dashboard. "Twenty-twelve," he says.
     I desist. In my two and a half years of selling Zendik propaganda on the street, I've learned it doesn't pay to argue with fanatics.
     The dog--who seems remarkably well-adjusted, considering her upbringing--keeps trying to jump into my lap. Glancing behind me, I can see why: She is losing seat to an advancing tide. Of Stuff. Tarp, tent, thermarest. Fishing pole, galoshes, gasoline can. Bungee cord, duct tape, binoculars. The number of Necessary Items he has packed into his car is truly insane. There's every possible thing you could need, to fix or fill or find something on the road. He is, apparently, traveling on a shoestring--and if that shoestring should break, he's brought a replacement.
     I'm no longer so thrilled that Stuffed Station Wagon Man is going all the way to Colorado. The proximity of our destinations means we could potentially be traveling together for days. That is, unless I manage to ditch him.
     Early in the second evening of our joint sojourn--when I've been with him for about twenty-four hours--he mentions stopping and camping for the night, even though it's still light out. I say I'd rather keep going. "But where will you sleep?" he asks. "And how will you get another ride, out here in the Yukon?"
     I shrug. "I don't know," I say. "But I'm sure I'll be fine."
     Finally, he decides to stop and camp at a gravel pull-out with a stinky dumpster and no toilet. I hoist my backpack to my shoulders, and bid him farewell.
     The problem is, as he has pointed out, this is the Yukon. Which means there are no people, just pine trees and more pine trees. A car passes maybe once every five minutes. None stops. I walk--mainly to get away from Stuffed Station Wagon Man--but I know walking won't do me much good. Not in the Yukon.
     Just when I'm getting worried--starting to scope out the sludgy tundra for a possible camping spot, without success--I hear the wonderful diminishing grumble of a car stopping behind me. What a blessing! A ride! I turn around, ready to grace this angel, whoever he is, with my brightest, most grateful smile--only to discover that my knight in rusty Subaru is, you guessed it, none other than Stuffed Station Wagon Man. That's what you get, for trying to ditch someone in the Yukon.
     What can I do? I get in. Or rather, I start to get in, but realize there's a problem: In my absence, Stuffed Station Wagon Man has rearranged his gear such that some of it is filling the the footwell of the passenger seat. "What do I do with my feet?" I ask.
     "You can sit cross-legged," he says.
     So I do. Laughing to myself, and fuming.
     The next morning I do manage to ditch him, Yukon be damned. Partly I succeed because I get up very early, well before man or dog is stirring. Partly I succeed because I am now approaching the town of Whitehorse, where most of the Yukon's population is concentrated. I am eternally grateful to get a ride with a normal young businessman, who's driving as far as town, and no farther.
     Past Whitehorse, it happens again. I get a ride from a snowbird in a camper, who's going all the way to Arizona. Maybe this one won't be psycho, I pray as I get in.

the leaving trike

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 00:18:36 GMT

It's Saturday night and I need to sort my stuff. The prospect daunts me, so I'm procrastinating. Also I'm feeling the end of an age...this place gave me strength and peace when I needed it. I've loved orange winter sunshine through south-facing windows for sixteen years. And I no longer live here.

I guess I'm moving on; I guess I'm growing up. What worries me most is the sense that some morning I'll rise without energy, without muscle for making money. Thus far I've always managed to care for myself; certainly adrenaline kicks in--should all else fail--when survival is at stake. Still--when I wake in the wee hours, I can't quite believe I'm doing this.

Wish me luck, orange sunshine; wish me luck, weathered rugs. Wish me well, ten-year-old turkey feet; wish me well, pearlescent trunk.

remember the new

madgelma@hotmail.com — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 20:05:23 GMT

It's the next stage of life, now. The Christmas frenzy has ended, the gardening season won't start for another three months--I get a little respite, some time to plot. Also the chance, this morning and afternoon, to sit with a single chapter and inquire what its purpose is. I've written so much of the story in moments, but the moments need meanings, and coherence. Those that don't fit will have to go; thank god this last patch of pouring self into other pursuits has hatched detachment. Now it's clear, I only need one road trip to Miami...I'm abundantly fine with killing my darlings, once they've turned to cardboard.

Gentle snow, against red brick...a black cat on a cushion at my elbow...who would have thought I'd find this kind of quiet on the busiest island on earth?

12/27 reading from zendik memoir at kgb bar

madgelma@hotmail.com — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 12:17:08 GMT

On Saturday December 27th I'll be reading from my Zendik memoir-in-progress (currently titled Luscious, Intoxicating, Rotten: Fruits of Five Years in a Hippie Cult) at the KGB Bar. My friends and fellow Byrdcliffe alumnae Nicole Skeltys (writer, musician) and Katherine Burger (playwright) will be reading as well. Below is a complete listing for the event. Hope to see you there!

STRAY STORIES...of jilted brides, cult rejects, and mysterious one-armed men. Nicole Skeltys, Helen Newman and Katherine Burger spin twisted, rollicking yarns at KGB Bar (85 East 4th Street, NYC) on Saturday, December 27 from 7-9pm. Free. For more info go here.

the look of the light

madgelma@hotmail.com — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 10:20:38 GMT

Yesterday near 6th and Canal the sidewalks and scaffolding were bleached in glare, and it was only faith in traffic lights that persuaded me to brave the crosswalk. I spent the day on foot, and in tunnels, which was not what I desired. But I learned that if you talk long enough, if you stand calmly in one spot and roll slowly over the same ground, someone who knows the terrain better than you do will most likely offer the one thought you were wishing for, but would never have come to on your own. I used to know that. I used to know the rules would bend for us, the gates would open--there was always a route around, a way in. "No" always meant "not yet" or "try again elsewhere."

It's time I used my powers for good. The powers themselves are neutral; the taint on them will fade with scrubbing. This is vital, as is practicing holding a handstand--how else will I invert my vision of what's possible? How else will I learn to walk on my hands?

first party superseded by third

madgelma@hotmail.com — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 01:38:22 GMT

I was going to go to Brooklyn Green Drinks at the Habana Outpost in Fort Greene tonight, but I got waylaid by the Ralph Nader event at Cooper Union. I figured I'd better go hear him, since I'll most likely vote for him and did not manage to make it through Crashing the Party.

He's pretty inspiring. Matt Gonzales is too. They both speak like real people. Nader made a great point about personal versus civic freedom. He said even in dictatorships people have personal freedom--to eat what they want, sleep when they want, watch the TV programs they want--even drive a five-thousand-pound car down the block to get a packet of Chiclets, if they want. This is the kind of comment you'd never hear from a McCain or an Obama--too much is riding on their every utterance, too many donors are whispering in their ears.

I would have stayed for the question-and-answer session with Nader, but I couldn't deal with the pressure-cooker fundraiser that preceded it. Some guy from Nader's campaign with about as much charisma as a toaster oven got up on the stage, rambled about how great Nader was, and then asked if one person would be willing to give $2,300 to the campaign, in exchange for an autographed copy of Unsafe at Any Speed. When someone finally volunteered, I thought we would move on to the next thing. But no. He then asked if someone else would give $1,500. At that point I got up. I do not enjoy participating in that kind of persuasion. As I was leaving, a lady across the aisle from me raised her hand.

pedaling the revolution

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 02:30:34 GMT

Things people on the streets of New York asked/told me today:

"Why are you walking so fast? Slow down! It's Friday!" (As if I walk fast under duress, as if time stands still on Fridays.)

"Who's beating you? You should call 911. I'm telling you, you should call 911." (Actually, the cargo trike has been beating me--when I first got on it last Monday I thoroughly banged up my left calf, while attempting to get used to it. I've read that in the Middle Ages outraged farmers used to try and convict animals for damage caused to crops, humans, property, etc.--but I don't think I could find a lawyer in this day and age to plead my case against a tricycle. Anyway it's only harmed me once since then...and I in turn--unwittingly, but still--have also injured it.)

"I thought you was a girl scout, selling cookies." (This is what happens when you dress like a tree sprite and wear your hair in two ponytails, and the guy sent to sign for the delivery is expecting a messenger of the male persuasion.)

"What do you got in there?" (I.e., what was I hauling in my cargo container. I got this question twice today.)

"Can I get a ride?" (I used to answer these guys by saying, "Sure, but there's no ventilation back there"; now I mostly ignore them.)

"The hills must kill you on that thing." ("Oh no, they make me stronger.")

And they do. I am developing quads of steel. It's a blast. And I'm still looking forward to going to work in the mornings, the job's still hanging lightly on me. This phenomenon continues to surprise and delight.

And one more exchange, before I go (this one occurred yesterday, on 5th Avenue):

Pedicab driver, stopped next to me at a red light: "Why don't you drive one of these? You make so much more money."
Me: "I don't like people."
Pedicab driver: "Oh, I see."

invisible to me

madgelma@hotmail.com — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 18:48:29 GMT

I got my manuscript back from my editor yesterday, along with copious commentary. One of the issues she raises is theme: What is the big one, in this book? What's the one idea I most wish to convey?

What came to me, as I sat on the yellow and orange F train thinking about this, were two images: a bright, round fruit, bathed in sunshine, nestled beside a shredded, flattened, scrap of tire; and a pear swelling inside a wine bottle. The miracle, I believe, is opposition: my strongest loves, gripped in my surest hate--triumph, wonder and closeness, swirled in with, and issuing from, a clutch of degradations. And the pear trapped in glass? I had life in abundance, within certain rounded boundaries, invisible to me.

The Internet Responds to Arol

madgelma@hotmail.com — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 00:25:33 GMT

Which of the accusations against you are untrue? Be specific, please. Give evidence of your innocence. Unless, of course, there is none.

strong-legging & -arming

madgelma@hotmail.com — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 23:48:39 GMT

Today was my first full day of work as a cargo tricyclist. I liked it. I spent a good seven hours driving one of these through the screeching streets of New York. Sure, people in cars honked when I wasn't going fast enough to suit them--but I didn't even get much of that. For the most part traffic flowed quite smoothly around me.

It seems kind of crazy to me that various New York Times analysts and reporters have decided that the bailout bill was defeated because of a "failure of leadership". What they're saying is, neither Congressional higher-ups nor the President nor the Fed was able to bully 205 Representatives into voting for a plan they didn't want to vote for. Sounds more like a failure of coercion than a failure of leadership. Since when is it shameful for individual politicians to make decisions of their own, and/or decisions consonant with opinions expressed in the mass of phone calls they're getting from their constituents? I suspectstrong- The New York Times as a whole--columnists, reporters, publishers, etc.--are simply panicked about their investments. How much money does Bob Herbert stand to lose if the Dow continues on its delightful downward slide?

Maybe some people no longer believe that a booming Dow and a swaggering banking industry are the best indicators of economic health. Maybe if the financial sector collapses, and we all survive, we'll once and for all realize that we can't breathe, drink, eat, wear or shelter under money. Maybe Ben Bernanke should take up the banjo...since he's having such tough luck these days with financial instruments.

you broke it, you buy it (the bailout is bullshit)

madgelma@hotmail.com — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 01:08:11 GMT

Last week I emailed and called all my Congresspeople, urging them not to vote for the fascist bailout plan. I also participated in a rally on Wall Street, bearing the theme "The Bailout is Bullshit" (the first raft of speakers said their pieces just downhill from the hind end of the big bronze bull that adorns a plaza ar the southern tip of the Financial Distrist). I don't know that any of these actions in any way contributed to the defeat of the bill in the House (my Representative, Nydia Velazquez, was not one of the four New Yorkers who voted against it) but still I grinned pretty widely when I heard today's delectable news. All this, and a tumbling Dow too! What more could a girl ask for?

In other news: I am about to start a new job, which I began training for today. I am going to operate a cargo tricycle for Revolution Rickshaws, in Manhattan. I am actually looking forward to going to work tomorrow! I can't believe it!

dark matter

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 12:42:58 GMT

Flux. Lots of it. In mind and life. It's been one of those whirlwind weeks, when agitation and opportunity link arms and twirl me in circles. The curtain rips and behold! A stampede! Last night I watched goats, some with red and blue spots on their flanks, run past me up a narrow indoor path, like the central aisle in an auditorium. I'd come to this ranch to look for one who lived nearby, but he wasn't driving up and I refused to call. I was considering buying a share in the ranch's gardens, a year hence. The gravel, grasses and mountains, washed gray, green and pink, were barely there. I stood on a hill overlooking the driveway, and watched in vain for traffic.

How do you absorb the worst cases, and still act to create the best? Lewis Mumford, quoted in Welcome to the Machine, said: "[F]or those of us who have thrown off the myth of the machine, the next move is ours, for the gates of the technocratic prison will open automatically, despite their rusty hinges, as soon as we choose to walk out." What does it mean to throw off the myth? And what does it mean to walk out?

when in doubt, read

madgelma@hotmail.com — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 15:29:37 GMT

This morning I dispatched my manuscript to a former writing teacher who's also a professional editor. Yesterday I attended to all essential errands. I'm not leaving for Maine till Sunday morning. Which means today I get to read.

On Tuesday I traveled to the Grand Army Plaza for The Blank Slate and The Glass Castle. In the vicinities of those books I discovered five others: When You're Falling, Dive: Lessons in the Art of Living, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, Promise Ahead: A Vision of Hope and Action for Humanity's Future, A Brief History of Anxiety (Yours and Mine), and On Becoming an Artist.

As you can see, I'm a sucker for authors peddling a blend of self-help, true story, and visionary transformation.

Advice to self, since becoming a sentient being: When in doubt, read.

last day in woodstock

madgelma@hotmail.com — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 20:32:41 GMT

I'm leaving tomorrow.

The apples are really dropping now, and after yesterday's rain the trees lining the winding roads give off a pine scent that reminds me of Idaho. I am savoring these last few hours of access to a cool, shaded studio and a huge, bright bedroom. Also I'm ready to go home. I've done what I came here to do. No, the book proposal isn't finished, but that's okay. I wrote a draft of the chapter outline, which is the hardest part. As for the manuscript--the current (next to last?) draft is finished. I even added chapter titles and changed people's names.

Now I have to figure out how to make money. I realized this morning that I'm no longer afraid of getting paid to write or edit. After two and two-thirds years of literary boot camp, I've been forced to surrender the delusion--when faced with a writing project--that maybe I can't. Also, now that my book is so close to being complete, I don't have to worry that writing for hire will detract from my own creative work. So maybe I'll write a persuasive cover letter, and start snooping around for opportunities to make money at the thing I do best.