After our earliest ancestors crawled out of the oceans, how soon did they feel the desire to crawl back in?
At age nine, I stepped into the pool at the YWCA. I didn’t know how to swim, but the other Indian boys had grown salmon and eagle wings and could fly in water and sky.
Wouldn’t the crow, that ubiquitous trickster, make a more compelling and accurate national symbol for the United States than the bald eagle?
Okay, that Indian-boy salmon-and-eagle-wings transformation thing is bullshit, but I’m trying to tell a creation story here, and by definition all creation stories are bullshit. Scientifically speaking, we all descend from one man and woman who lived in what we now call Africa—yes, we are all African at our cores—but why should we all live with the same metaphorical creation story? The Kiowa think they were created when lightning struck the mud inside a log. I think the Hopis are crash-landed aliens who are still waiting for a rescue mission. Christians think God built everything in a week—well, in six days—and then rested. Yeah, like God created the universe in anticipation of the Sunday funny pages.
Q: In the singles bar, over nonalcoholic beer, what did the Palestinian say to the Israeli?
A: “Your holy war or mine?”
But wait, before I get too critical or metaphysical, let me return to that YWCA on Maple Street in Spokane, Washington. I stood alone in the shallow end while my big brother, cousins, best friend, and little warrior enemies swam in the deep end. I was so ashamed, but then our female swim instructors shouted my name and challenged me to dive off the five-foot board. Fuck that! I jumped out of the pool and ran into the locker room.
There is a myth that drowning is a peaceful death. I’ve heard people say, “I would just open my mouth and breathe death in.” In truth, drowning is torture. The fear of drowning is used as torture.
At the YWCA, I quickly dressed and waited for the other Indian boys, who mocked me for my aquatic cowardice and locked me in a towel bin. But I escaped and made it onto the bus that took us to the Fox Theater for a matinee showing of Jaws, the blockbuster that changed the way our country looks at sharks and at films.
Did you know that when a shark stops swimming, it dies?
As we walked past the endless line of movie lovers, the other boys kept pitching me crap, but then our female swim instructors, one Japanese and one Korean, shouted my name again and insisted that I join them in the line. “But what about us?” my brother asked. “You go to the deep end,” the Japanese girl said.
A wise man once said that revenge is not more important than love or compassion. Until it is.
I was nine. The Asian girls were sixteen. I sat between them and they each held one of my hands as we watched a great white shark devour people. At one point, when a little boy was in danger, I hid my face in the Korean girl’s chest. Oh, it was the first time I had ever been that close to a woman’s breast.
Do you think the universe is expanding or contracting?
I wish I knew what happened to those Asian girls. Are they still living in Spokane? Do you realize how much they mean to me? Did they love me? Or was I just a sad-ass kid who needed their help? If I could talk to them, I would tell them this creation story: “A bonnethead shark in Omaha, Nebraska, conceived and gave birth to a baby that soon died. But this mother shark had never shared water with a male. Scientists were puzzled. So they performed a DNA test and discovered the dead baby only had its mother’s DNA. Yes, that bonnethead shark had given virgin birth. Do you think this is amazing? Well, it’s not. Dozens of species of insects give virgin birth. Crayfish give virgin birth. Some honeybees give virgin birth. And Komodo dragons—yeah, those big lizards give virgin birth, too. Jeez, one human gives virgin birth and that jump-starts one of the world’s great religions. But when a Komodo dragon gives virgin birth, do you know what it’s thinking? It’s thinking, This is Tuesday, right? I think this is Tuesday. What am I going to do on Wednesday?