Leah
A SEVENTY-FOUR-YEAR-OLD AFRICAN MASAI WOMAN
Eve
SORRY I DON’T eat bread.
Leah
I forgot. You’re American. 90210. What kind of place is it? In Africa, we are desperate for food, we have so little. In America, where you have all the food, you either eat too much or not at all. Your bodies are just pictures to you. Here we live in our bodies, they serve us, they do our work.
Eve
Do you like you body?
Leah
Do I like my body? Do I like my body? I love my body. God made this body. God gave me this body. My fingers, look at my fingers. I love my fingernails, little crescent moons. They lead right up to my arms—so strong—they carry things along. And my legs, my legs are long, Masai people, we are tall, I get there fast, my legs can wrap around a man and hold him there. My breasts … My breasts, well look at them, they’re mine, my breasts so long and …
Eve
(Interrupting) Leah, wait, I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to be in my body, I can’t get past my stomach.
Leah
What’s wrong with it?
Eve
It’s round. It used to be flat.
Leah
It’s your stomach. It’s meant to be obvious. It’s meant to be seen.
Eve, look at that tree? Do you see that tree?
Now look at that tree. (Points to another tree) Do you like that tree? Do you hate that tree ’cause it doesn’t look like that tree?
Do you say that tree isn’t pretty ’cause it doesn’t look like that tree? We’re all trees. You’re a tree. I’m a tree. You’ve got to love your body, Eve. You’ve got to love your tree. Love your tree.
Love my tree. Turns out I’m a tree. Love my tree. I’m all tree. My partner surprises me in Africa. We spend the night in a hut in a netted bed. The sound of wild hyenas in the dark. I’m all tree. I’m all naked dancing tree. I’m all tree inside me. I’m all …
Eve
Honey, do you love my tree?
Partner
Every leaf, babe.
Eve
Huh. I didn’t see leaves.
Partner
Yes, leaves and a solid trunk.
Eve
Solid … trunk?
Partner
Yes, solid, sturdy, trunk.
Eve
Sturdy. There is nothing sexy about sturdy. Sturdy is like a brick house; sturdy is like a boulder.
Partner
No, babe, no. Sturdy is here. Sturdy is present. Sturdy turns me on.
Eve
I was going for willowy. Trees are willowy.
Partner
But you’re athletic, Eve, you’re strong. Full.
Eve
Full. Are you saying I’m fat?
Partner
No, full like fit, like sturdy.
Eve
You just said I was fat.
Partner
I thought you were a tree, Eve. Trees aren’t fat. I thought we were dealing with tree.
Eve
Tree is gone. You chopped down tree. Now I’m a broken shrub.
Partner
I didn’t chop down tree. Tree was clearly never really here.
I am so sick of your stomach, your shrub, your trunk, your stump, whatever it is. I can never get it right. I don’t have an issue with your stomach. I have an issue with you. You’re not here. I want a relationship with Eve. I am not going to compete with your stomach anymore.
My partner leaves the next day. Only his olive pits remain, and there are lots of them. Maybe the programming’s just too deep. I’m bereft. I can’t go home. I’m all alone.
I go to India. I’m supposed to work, but I can’t, I don’t show up. I get lost. Beggars, missing limbs, purple silk saris blowing on the beach at sunset, sacred cows lying calmly in mad traffic, saffron and marigolds and spinning wheels, the dead exposed in daylight, their ashes floating on the river, bindis and henna and curry and lassis and birds and monsoon downpours. Something comes undone in me. Something lets loose. My heart, my stomach, my sorrow. The longing for a mother. The betrayal by my father. The desperation to receive my partner. This emptiness. The compulsion to be more and more. The need to go further. I am falling, falling. I panic. I eat nan. Lots of nan. Warm fluffy nan. I medicate myself with nan. Just because it’s called nan doesn’t mean it’s not Satan.
I’m a tub. I am a tub of nan. I hide in layers and it’s really hot. Fat and afraid of everything, I go back to the gym. I can’t believe I’m in India and I’m at the gym. (The ball bounces at Eve and she kicks it back.) I’m on the treadmill. Four days later I look down on the treadmill and it’s stuck on random. I am walking insanely to my end.
All around me Indian women in saris and Nikes are giving me the evil eye.