The Journey Within
An odyssey is similarly defined as an extended adventurous trip, an intellectual or spiritual quest of discovery. No-one tells you about the journey within the journey. You discover it surreptitiously along the way and maybe that’s one of the delights of launching one’s waka (canoe) into the flow of the stream and simply allowing yourself to drift.
When my children were growing up, we played Pooh Sticks down on the Canterbury river not far from Dulwich Hill, NSW where I lived in a converted warehouse. “It’s a simple game that’s played on any bridge over running water; each player simply drops a stick on the upstream side of a bridge and the one whose stick first appears on the downstream side is the winner.”
The thing about drift is you never know how you’ll fare until the sticks come bobbing out the downstream side. Things happen. They happen at the throw-in, during the drift and sometimes under the bridge. The winner is never usually that clear cut. Perhaps that says something about life in general too. You just never know.
The drift was unusual because I’m not sure my waka actually emerged from beneath the bridge. I found myself thinking deeply about a film we’d watched. Shall we Dance? (2004) a Hollywood remake of the award-winning Masayuki Suo Japanese film, Shall We Dansu? (1996) More specifically, I was thinking about something the Beverly Clark character played by Susan Sarandon said.
Briefly the film unfolds thus: John Clark played by the ever gracile Richard Gere, a lawyer with a busy working wife and a surprisingly normal family, still feels that something is missing in his life. Every night during his commute home he sees a beautiful woman staring out the window of a dance studio. Her expression to him seems lost.
Haunted by her gaze, he impulsively jumps off the train one night, and signs up for ballroom dancing lessons, hoping to meet her. At first, it seems like a mistake. His teacher turns out to be the older Miss Mitzi played by Anita Gillette rather than the Jennifer Lopez character Paulina.
When he does meet Paulina, she icily tells him she hopes he has come to the studio to seriously study dance and not to look for a date. As his lessons continue, John falls in love with dancing. Keeping his new obsession from his family and co-workers, he feverishly trains for Chicago’s biggest dance competition.
His friendship with Paulina blossoms, as his enthusiasm rekindles her own lost passion for dance. But the more time John spends away from home, the more his wife Beverly (Susan Sarandon) becomes suspicious and hires a Detective.” There’s a conversation between the wife and the Detective I found enormously thought-provoking and bit me in my heart. It occurred to me that it’s universal loveliness was worth repeating so you’d get my drift.
She says on the subject of why people marry, “we need a witness to our lives. There’s a billion people on the planet. I mean, what does any one life mean really? But in a marriage, you’re promising to care about everything. The good things, the bad things, the terrible things, the mundane things. All of it, all of the time, every day. You’re saying, “your life will not go unnoticed because I will notice it. Your life will not go unwitnessed because I will be your witness … ”
I feel myself wanting to rush to the downstream side of the bridge. The winner is really the screenwriter’s sentiments (because the reality can be much harsher). The sentiment reaches into people’s arid lives and invites them to create an oasis from these simple words, “your life will not go unnoticed because I will notice it. Your life will not go unwitnessed because I will be your witness … ”
I’ve personally taken those words and spoken them into the lives of some people I know in the past week. Their effect has been profound. The waka (canoe) has moved out into the middle of the stream. Enter the paddle, into the water. This journey within a journey, is picking up its pace.
