The Coronavirus and the Pachakuti

March 23, 2020

It was just ten days ago. Ten days ago, I spent the day teaching, or "teaching", as many days before extended breaks seem to go. As I dismissed each class that day, I was at least cognizant enough to say, "Have a great Spring Break, and IF I see you in ten days, we'll do...(insert teacher speech here)."

That was another world: a world in which person-to-person contact was not only preferred, but often mandated; a world in which, at least here in the hinterlands of Iowa, we could imagine this virus being sort of an H1N1 type of thing, something we got our shorts in a bunch about but was kind of just a blip on the radar; a world in which a Dow Jones below 20,000 was highly improbable; a world in which, even if we got super bored (which generally didn't happen because there was so much going on), we could rely on live sports and arts to distract us.

10 days, and the world turned upside down.

***********

In the highlands of Peru and Bolivia, there is a word that exists both in Quechua and Aymara, the two most prominent languages of the Incan empire, that denotes a huge shake-up in the grand scheme of things, where those who were ruled become the rulers and vice versa, a world turned upside-down: Pachakuti.  They use the word mainly to describe two historical instances: when the Incas established their Andean empire and dominion over the smaller, weaker tribes; and when the Spaniards arrived and brought with them a new language, a new religion, and an unhealthy obsession with the silver mines up in Potosí. According to some, a Pachakuti arrives every few hundred years; for the indigenous of Peru and, in particular, Bolivia, some of the poorest people in the world, the Pachakuti can't come soon enough.

Of course, the word Pachakuti is not only used in these two literal instances; it is an idea, a philosophy, a descriptor for phenomena out of their control and beyond their comprehension, a way to make sense of being oppressed for centuries and a hope that one day it might not be like that. It's really not such a foreign idea. "The meek shall inherit the Earth," Jesus said, and some of his his most fervent followers believed that indeed, Jesus would bring about the end of the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and the imperial materialism of the Romans. For them, for some even today, Jesus would bring justice and peace to temporal affairs. Jesus would bring the Pachakuti.

**********

It is an interesting intellectual exercise to think about how the current Coronavirus crisis might reflect a Pachakuti. How often do we hear, or say: "This is unprecedented"; "We have never dealt with something like this"; "This will reorder the economy in ways we've never seen before". On a more banal level, as many sports fans have noted, Major League Baseball was played through two World Wars but has been ground to a halt by a microscopic ne'er-do-well.

Interesting, but ultimately unsatisfying and unsustainable. Just like Jesus' message of peace and equality was swallowed up and appropriated to serve the needs of the Roman Empire--just like many Christians today see their wealth as a sign of the Messiah's approval rather than the fruits of an unjust economic system-- certain members of the United States Senate are working hard, as I write this, to make sure those who already have so much--those whose lives will be least affected by this virus, who have more than enough to weather the storm--receive as much (or possibly more) help as the rest of us.

I shouldn't even start, because I won't stop. Okay, one example: the Big Four airlines spent 42.5 billion dollars the last five years on stock buybacks, dramatically increasing the wealth of the their shareholders. The didn't seem to sense the need for a rainy day fund in a cyclical industry. Now they want $50 billion dollars from the federal government, and Senate Republicans are ready to hand it to them, no strings attached, all the while squabbling over whether to grant ordinary workers 4 months of unemployment instead of 3, and criticizing them for not having savings from their $11 an hour job. In other words, our leaders are going to make sure the Big Four airlines, etc., will not end up on the bottom of any potential pachakuti.

Okay, I promised, just one. But you get the idea.

***********

Moreover, the entire concept of even entertaining the idea that the current times in Iowa reflect a Pachakuti speaks at once, and only to, a privileged class of people like myself who've scarcely faced adversity, particularly middle-class people in North America and Western Europe. Disaster--natural or manmade--does not equal Pachatuki, simply because it's generally the world's most vulnerable who bear the brunt of it.

Just in my kids' lifetime--the oldest will be 14 next month--let's take a global overview: in 2006, a tsunami caused by an earthquake ravaged the Indonesian island of Java; In 2010, a powerful earthquake rocked Haiti, the only place in the Western Hemisphere poorer than Bolivia; In 2011, another earthquake roiled Japan and precipitated nuclear radiation; that same year, rebel militias started to fight back against Bashar al-Assad in Syria, precipitating a refugee crisis that continues to roil the world; in 2014, Russian invaded Crimea and the Eastern Ukraine, while a plunge in oil prices coupled with economic mismanagement and American sanctions provoked a series of crises in Venezuela that led to a refugee crisis rivaling that of Syria; in 2019, the Amazon and Australia literally burned; and all the while, the countries in the so-called Northern Triangle--Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador--continue to experience homicide rates higher than Iraq or even Syria, while the drug cartels in Mexico do their best to match them.

But yeah, I have to stay in my house for a few weeks. Vaya Pachakuti....

**********

I first learned the world Pachakuti from a book I read with my eighth graders, La tierra de las papas (The Land of the Potatoes). The story is told by María, a middle-class girl from Madrid who has to move to La Paz, Bolivia, with her dad. María could easily be my son in female, and I could be her father: white, liberal, well-educated, well-meaning. One day, as he explains the concept of Pachakuti to María, the dad ponders what would happen after the Pachakuti. At first, he talks optimistically about a reversion back to old customs and enough food for everyone, but then he grows increasingly cynical (paraphrased and translated by me):

       Father paused, and said,"Oh, who am I kidding? If the indigenous suddenly ruled society, they wouldn't do any of that. They'd join country clubs and drink whiskey and buy Mercedes and dye their hair blond."
        Just then, a blob of jelly landed on his shirt. He said "Shit" and went to clean it up. I still don't know if he said "Shit" because of the jelly or because the indigenous wouldn't do the Pakachuti right.

Yeah, that guy could definitely be me.


Stay safe and stay in touch,

Mark

The Hermitage, the Deer and the Chakras: What the hell is a Chakra, anyway?

MY FIRST NIGHT AT THE HERMITAGE, I did not do too much. My only goals were to get an entry into my journal to mark the first day of 2020, and settle into my new surroundings. As soon as Sonia left, I accomplished the former, and then unpacked my food, accomplishing the latter. Then I turned on the oven to prepare one my frozen meals. After eating, I showered and then relaxed into the recliner with a John Sandford novel. Around 10:00, I felt tired and went to bed.

*********

I WOKE UP EARLY the next morning. It was still dark but my body was wide awake and so I got up and made coffee. I then sat on a bench seat at the window to watch the sun come up.  After the sky was fully bright, I did some reading and praying and journaling, and then I got dressed. I had an appointment at 9:00 with Ann Jackson at the guest house. 

At times it was hard to remember Ann Jackson was a nun. She didn't wear a habit; she was dressed in jeans and running shoes. She was incredibly worldly and didn't seem to mind when I threw the words "fuck" and "shit" into our conversation. Hell, I think she might have repeated them.

"What brings you here, Mark?" she asked.

How could I explain all the crazy shit that brought me here? I had two choices: underexplain, or overexplain. Something about Ann Jackson made me do the latter. I spewed words; as Lindsey Lohan's character says in Mean Girls, I had word vomit. I talked and talked, and I recall jumping from one thing to another, as if the death of my mother when I was 18 were somehow connected to my semi-spiritual relationship with the game of baseball. Ten or fifteen minutes I must have talked. Ann Jackson listened.

"It is clear," she said during a break, "that you put a lot of thought into things. Do you think sometimes you overthink things?"

"Absolutely," I said. "That is a huge flaw of mine."

"Try not to use the word 'flaw'. Try to think of it as a characteristic--neither good nor bad. Neutral. Now," she continued, "without thinking too much, what do you want when you leave here?"

"For shit to get back to normal. To stop worrying so goddamn much. To enjoy being alive again and not feel guilty about it."

"Have you felt that way before?"

"Absolutely," I said. "Sometimes, you know, life just feels like everything's clicking. And I know it can't be that way all the time, but right now, it just feels like I am constantly pushing uphill, and if take a break and fall asleep, which is all I want to do, I wake up at the bottom of the hill again."

"When you feel good--what's that like? Tell me about it."

"Well...I don't know. Like, I smile. And I'm funny. And I don't worry about every little thing I do. And I don't judge other people, or myself. I just roll with it."

"Try to define wellness," she said, "in positive terms. You keep saying what you don't have when you're well. Tell me about what you do have."

"Well...I don't know. I mean, I guess I laugh. I joke. I watch sports."

Ann Jackson listened. "Have you ever felt," she said, "when you're feeling this way--feeling good--that you have an energy, and that that energy could radiate around an entire football field?"

I thought about that. "Yes," I said. "That's exactly right. It's a connection between myself and the world and other people."

"Is that energy less right right now?"

Again, I thought. "Yes. To use your football field analogy, it's going only, like, three yards away from me right now."

Ann Jackson stood up. "I'm going to give you a book. If you want to take a look at it while you're here, or even take it with you, great. If it's not your thing, no worries." She handed me the book. "This book talks about your seven chakras. It's an ancient Eastern term used to describe the seven energy centers of the body. Many people have found that by exercising and becoming aware of their chakras, they are able to improve the energy levels within and around them."

It was becoming clearer and clearer that Ann Jackson was no dogmatic Catholic nun.

"Some would say," she smiled as if reading my thoughts, "that this kind of stuff is heretical, or blasphemous, or just plain loony tunes. But you know, to each their own. I, myself, have found great comfort in it."

We continued to talk. At the conclusion of our time, we arranged to meet on Saturday morning before I left, and then she asked me two questions:

"Can I give you a hug?"

"Of course," I said, and we embraced for five or ten seconds. As we separated, she asked:

"Can I pray for you?"

"Of course," I said. "I kinda need all the help I can get right now."

"Mark," she said. "I can feel your energy. You are hurting, yes; but you are stronger than you know. God has great things in store for you."

I smiled. "Thank you," I said.

**********

I HAD A BEATIFUL DAY, eating, resting, walking the grounds, walking the Labyrinth while some deer watched me, viewing the sun set. It was nice weather for January 2. After the sun set, I ate and showered, and then sat down in the recliner with Ann Jackson's book.

It was written by some British psychiatrist in the 1980's, who said she had "finally broken free from the artificial barriers between Western and spiritual medicine", and now felt free "helping patients with what I had known as a little girl--that I had a special energy, and if I had I had it, everyone had it." The chakras were "the seven energy centers of our body--the Root, Sacral, Solar Plexus, Heart, Throat, Third Eye, and Crown." Each chakra was influential in certain areas of your life--for example, the Sacral Chakra was decisive in your sexual well-being. "For each chakra," the author wrote, "I have included exercises and meditations to develop yourself."

A quick glance at the end of each chapter showed me that each meditation took a minimum of  one hour, and that furthermore, you would need a certain "colored stone" and a "bowl of purified water" for each one.

"Typical hippie ass mumbo jumbo," I thought. Who, in the real world, can set aside an hour several times a week to play around with some stones and chant about their chakra?

I really liked Ann Jackson, and I really respected her. I didn't think any less of her after looking at this book. But she was right: it wasn't everybody's cup of tea. It certainly wasn't mine.

I threw the chakra book back on the table and picked up the Sandford novel. Despite having woken early, I wasn't tired. The book was good and I read and read, purposely ignoring the clock. I didn't think about the chakras anymore, either.

Weeding the Garden

"Every now and then I pause to take a good look at my progress. More and more of my garden is weeded each time I look, but each time I also find new weeds sprouting where I thought I had made my final pass with the blade."

Daily Reflections


WHAT ARE THE WEEDS of my life? When I look back at my garden, what am I seeing?

     *Worries of financial insecurity
     *Judgement of and irritation with those around me
     *Concern over faraway political contests
     *Self-criticism and self-judgment
     *An attitude of "I know best"

Those last two would seem to be incompatible, but as a friend of mine once put it, "I'm an egomaniac with an inferiority complex."  I don't know how much of the population that describes (more than a few, I suspect), but I know it applies to me. The solution suggested is to weed the garden, with God as my scythe.