SIDEWALK SATORI:
A Play by
A. Daniel Thompson
CAST OF CHARACTERS
J.R.
Old alcoholic, alias the
Dean, hairy
Clean-cut white man, in
midlife crisis
Mentally-ill large Hispanic
woman
Runaway teen prostitute,
pretty boy
A park with trees, three
benches, J.R. on center bench amid empty bottles,
Mary wrapped in dirty clothes
and papers on bench stage left, from right…
enter Richie, leading Ed
by the arm
Richie:
Here you are. This is J.R.
He sometimes helped me out when I was first on the street. J.R., this guy says he needs help cause he’s
homeless. Doesn’t look like it to me,
but I brought him anyway. Thought maybe
he’s just shy, pickin’ me up, ya know?
Come on...
(strokes Ed’s arm and
chest)
Ed:
No, really, not that. I do need help.
J.R.:
So, you say you left your
family. You left? (no answer) And
you want to be out here, with us? You
think you have what it takes?! To join
us, the few, the proud (posing, upright, sways) Well, we’ll ask you a
few questions and find out. Your
name? Name? Know how to talk??
Ed:
Yes, of course, I’m a college
graduate. I...
Richie:
I don’t care. I’ve got work to do. So, anyway, I brought you.
Ed:
Yes, thank you.
Richie:
Thank you? Fuck you!
J.R.:
He wants something, Mister…
Ed:
Ed. Um, I don’t have any money. I left it all.
Richie:
Worthless asshole! What a waste.
Let him rot, J.R. I hope he is
homeless. He deserves it. Nobody jerks me around! (to Ed)
Give me your watch.
J.R.:
Relax, Richie. Let’s find out what he’s about. We’ll grant him an interview.
Ed:
Thank you. That is, I’m sorry, an interview?
J.R.:
That’s right. Do you want the position? First off, that’s Richie. Heroin, that’s why he’s so skinny, not hungry
for food anyways. But he’d do anything
for a fix, including sell his soul.
Richie:
My soul? Shit, I wish somebody’d buy that worthless
hunk of shit. Like the devil!
(sticks tongue out, growls
demonesque)
J.R.:
So give him your watch for starters, then.
Ed:
No way!
J.R.:
Good! Very
good, for your first test… Now, down to
business. I’m J.R. They call me the Professor. (takes swig from cheap wine bottle
periodically)
Richie:
Whatever old man!
You’re fucked in the head. I’d
rather be fucked in the ass. At least I
get paid that way.
J.R.:
You may call me Dean, since I will be deciding your
fate.
Ed:
Look, I’m not sure this is, um...
Richie:
Oh, this is rich!!
Which one is loonier?
J.R.:
Quiet you, urchin.
Have you no respect for your elders?
Richie:
Oh, sure, look what they’ve done for me! (poses)
J.R.:
The poor boy, destitute, turned to prostitution. He’s not bad really, an orphan.
Richie:
(in British accent)
“Please, sir, may I have some
more” (holds ass apart at them)
Bad to the bone, baby, you’d better believe it!
Ed:
Look, I’m sorry to have troubled you. I’ll go.
J.R.:
Don’t go yet!
We were just getting to the interesting part- you.
Ed:
I don’t know.
J.R.:
Courage, friend.
We just want to see if you can make it before we take a chance on
you. You know, it’s not for
everyone. The pay’s not much, and the
hours...
Ed:
But the benefits, the freedom, no one to tell you what
to do, counting the clock, covering...
J.R.:
That’s right, one long vacation in the sun!
Richie:
You guys are wacked out! What vacation? You fuckin’ never get vacation. Everyone be tryin’ to tell you what to do,
the case workers, that Referee, the shelter guys, fuckin’ breatherizing you for
a fuckin’ bed. You are always on, on the
street!!
J.R.:
Don’t mind him.
He’s in a bad mood, jonesin’.
You’ll see... lots to learn.
Ed:
I’m a quick learner.
J.R.:
Good, neophyte.
Now we’re talking!
Ed:
Just call me Ed.
I have no last name anymore.
J.R.:
How romantic!
Children?
Ed:
I’m through with that, all the blame. I tried to stay home for ‘em, then when that
didn’t work I stayed away, always at work, alone anyway. Fuck it!
J.R.:
Temper? Never
mind- that’s an asset out here- in the great beyond...
Richie:
(sitting stage right, singing, shooting up) Break on through to the other side...
Ed:
And who’s she? (pointing to Mary)
J.R.:
(in loud mock German accent) I’ll ask the questions! No, just kidding. She’s Mary.
Richie:
(singing)
Cross-eyed Mary.
J.R.:
An angle, poor gentle creature, mad Mary la Guadalupe,
the virgin…
Richie:
No virgin!
J.R.:
Mary has a handicap and nobody to care for her.
Richie:
Yeah, right.
She ain’t got no handicap, ‘cept perhaps a little crotch rot. She’s just lazy as all hell. And dumb- not deaf though. You can hear, can’t ya?! Boo!!!
But she don’t ever talk, ever.
Never makes a noise, even when these old fucks have their way with her,
she don’t scream, don’t say nothing, not a word. Just looks, like now, like she’s asleep, but
with her eyes open. Referee, the social
worker, is always trying to do something for her. But she won’t budge; couldn’t drag her into a
shelter- strong as all hell! (at
J.R.) And the shelters always kicking this other one out! Don’t make any sense.
J.R.:
Don’t be bitter, boy.
The world is your oyster.
Richie:
Yeah, slimy and smelly! Like that cum dumpster! (points to Mary)
J.R.:
Back to brass tacks.
(to Ed) What makes you qualified for this... life style?
Ed:
Well, I’m… flexible, dependable.
Richie:
Sure you are!
Ed:
And are you really a... (to Richie)
Richie:
Hoar, honey, yeah!
And a magnificent one, don’t deny it!
Ed:
But why?? Must
you...?
Richie:
Hell, if I was good enough for my old man, and he
didn’t even provide. Who the hell are you?!
J.R.:
Back to the interview.
What do you think you’d like most and least here?
Ed:
I don’t know.
The food least, I guess.
Richie:
What about getting beat up? The food’s fine- if you can keep your
teeth. And the drink.
Ed:
And most, most of all I’d like having no one depend on
me, no deadlines, no stress, the open air, adventure.
J.R.:
What would you do if you won a million dollars?
Ed:
What?!
J.R.:
That was the best question any interviewer ever asked
me.
Ed:
You?
J.R.:
Yes, good sir, and?
Ed:
Well, give it away, I guess.
Richie:
I’m gonna kick this guy’s mother-fuckin’ ass!
J.R.:
What would you teach people from this position?
Ed:
What would I teach?
J.R.:
That is my question.
We have a responsibility, you know!
Ed:
I have no idea!
Why did I even...? Oh, who knows!?
J.R.:
God knows.
Look, here’s what you’d be doing:
I’ll give you a little orientation, assume you as my apprentice, an
abercaderian. Follow me and watch.
J.R. move upstages, followed by Ed, into spotlight; background blacked out
J.R. addresses the crowd, Ed watching behind, periodically checking his watch
J.R.
Spare any change.
Got a quarter, lady? I will tell
you: I have just had an epiphany, a genuine epiphany! Long had I thought, and not just I, that this
life is so empty, a void. We try to fill
it up with things: gods, systems, material things, or others we can never
grasp. Nothing fills this hole in our
being. How long, oh Lord, how long? Then, I thought, this is absurd! Who can fill this abyss if not I myself? So I threw myself, my Self, into the great
void- either to fill it completely or to lose myself completely forever. The ultimate leap of faith! Praise be!
Joy of joys! (aside to Ed,
behind his hand) I once made the
jump- in front of a train! (back to crowd, moving closer and closer, more
and more in their face, stinking) At one glorious time, all souls soared
free in the heavens. Then there was a
revolution in the stars, a fall. That
fallen angel- it is You!- was condemned to live here below in the sin and
samsara and mara seeking satori and such and... (breathless) wallowing,
blissfully, in the exalted dirt and grime sublime of existence. But we wanted it! We chose the Fall, the playful split- to
taste, to taste- the forbidden fruit, sexual, nay sensual, fruit of the tree of
knowledge and sorrow, to season delight, tree of evil, to spice up the
good… Is not Satan, the fallen one, is
us? Fallen angels all living out lives
of lies, bittersweet rotting meat and sour grapes, soulfood, a taste for Life…
(enter Nat, looks at Ed, waves, then stands listening)
But we can soar free again anytime we like! We chose this mortal coil and sting and we
can shuck it off. Revel in your Choice-
to come down and feel, be, become, love, lose, laugh, cry! We have all come
down to die on our crosses for the sins and glory of all. The world is allone. (to audience still) YOU!! You make the world whole, complete! You are
the Center, your Nature true. We will
all be joined in the universal union.
What is yours and what mine really, ultimately? It seems to me illusion, or reality, or
Memorex!
Nat:
How do? (to Ed) He’s on a long one. (point
at J.R.)
J.R.:
Nirvana is in Samsara.
Death is a breath of air, the reincarnate digesting its best merit to
give it again character and form, plunge back down into the depths to struggle
and to strive. Why? To uplift the rest until all is enlightened,
Amen! Karma points galore, shoot-
score! Liberated. So, have you never wondered why? Why are we so deluded, attached, endlessly
desirous, struggling, suffering? And why
have we forgotten? If we have lived, and
lived- countless lives upon lives- why have we no memory- Praise be!- of all
this knowledge? Would that you
knew! This is the greatest gift of all,
to ourselves: It is not a test, but a
chance, a fresh start, a clean slate, tabula rasa, all our sins and
dispositions wiped away, all our accumulated attachments dissipated like husks
after the harvest by the cosmic winds of oblivion. We come into the world free and clean with
every chance to realize - that is to recognize, not to create- perfection,
enlightenment, even paradise for ourselves and for all sentient beings yearning
to be free. Oh, Glory! They say the meek shall inherit the
earth. It is commonly interpreted, I
think, as meaning that those who seem weak for refusing to indulge in physical
violence, or perforce verbal, will one day move in to inhabit the gilded
palaces of earthly delight. Could it not
also be understood though, I ask you, as implying that those who, for whatever
reasons, have not the force to battle and vanquish the ultimate foe, their
selves, will indeed be burdened with this terrestrial testing grounds until
such time as they can at last move beyond?
Well, what say you?!... Gimme a quarter.
Ed:
You’re raving!
J.R.:
The tourists like it.
I can’t play harmonica. It’s
important that the truth lie outside them.
Ed:
What’s for real here?
J.R.:
You are- maybe.
Are you late, mad hatter?
Ed:
Perhaps, though I’ve nowhere to go.
J.R.:
Then back to the interview.
Lights come back on backstage as Mary mumbles on one bench, Nat surveys Richie passed out on another, then puts his arm around J.R. with a glance at Ed.
Nat:
How ya been, J.R.?
Who’s this?
J.R.
That is the question I am attempting to answer. (to
Ed) Have you heard of koans, little
zen riddles sort of like the sound of the clapper less bell and all that? No, well, here’s an existentialist nursery
rhyme for you then, to put you back at ease...
Ed:
Please, look, I don’t understand all this. Do I get it- or not? Am I accepted? I really want this. I need this. I’ll do anything, almost...
J.R.:
(loudly)
Fuzzy-wuzzy was a bear. Fuzzy-wuzzy, was
he there? Fuzzy-wuzzy, was he? (pause) Have a drink. (Ed takes the proffered bottle.) So, tell me what you think of this one, a
parable:
(red lights)
This man trades his soul to the devil- and for what?
To what end? Power? Riches?
Fame? Love perhaps? Revenge even?
No, only a trick, that the Devil let loose all the other souls that he
has thus stolen, won, or otherwise acquired and come upon by sin and all. Isn’t that right, Mister social worker?
Nat:
Yessir, I suppose, depending.
J.R.
Nat, this here is hapless Ed, on a Quest. I must quell his world-thirst quickly. I continue:
This Man, having renounced all worldly pursuit, greed,
and such, a slave to religious sacrifice, instead of just reward, a world
utopia, the redeemed, come down to smite his foes et al.- he decided to
renounce all this and make the supreme sacrifice- his soul. And let us not believe he sinned in doing
so. He made the deal direct- with the
devil herself!! And there was a great
light and lifting of wings of grace, the chosen, (spread arms) and the
Gates of Heaven were thrown wide open, never to shut again and the man was
granted death and peace and his soul again, eternal life, freed from the
Devil. And the Devil himself was freed
from his heavy burden, his unceasing task- with no more unholy host (unemployed
he was) the Devil himself was uplifted on dusty, cobwebbed wings of scale and
feather fine- lifted out, transcended his eternal servitude and God was
glorious in grace, and Man a hero and angel redeemed and redeemer- at good long
last. Hallelujah! What do you make of that?
Ed:
Listen, Mister J.R., whoever you are, can’t you just
accept me? I don’t understand any of
this. I need to...
J.R.:
Belong. Fit
in. I thought you didn’t want to answer
to anyone anymore. I’ll give you one
more chance. Try this one...
J.R.:
In the beginning was not chaos.
Nat:
Casenotes: Monday evening.
J.R.
In the beginning all was One, the Initial One Great
Union: the word, deed, whatever. Then
came the division into opposites, day and night, dark and light, yin/yang,
good/evil, and especially- female and male.
It divided in order to have a play partner!
Nat:
Park on forth street.
Subjects present: Richie (doped), Mary (delusional), J.R.(drunk), and a
new case, Ed (desperate).
J.R.:
I mean, can you conceive of a world without woman and
man, the desire, primal urge, instinct to union- it’s what we live for! So, the world was divided- into harmonic
tension in flux.
Nat:
Observation: J.R., fair health, good humor.
J.R.:
And so time began- and then was chaos- Now! Sacred chaos from which we create order,
strive to consensus, comprehension- but we are deluded, suffering too, but we
willed it, see, we chose this- freedom.
And we have tasted of the tree of life and knowledge and sex and who
would give it up and starve- who?! None,
well, welcome then. Bissimila! To Reality, good god glorious reality. But who can see it clearly?
Nat:
Auditory and visual hallucinations, schizoid
manifestations, no sign of suicidal ideation anymore.
J.R.:
Man was longtime in darkness, then there was
light. Mir licht were Goethe’s last
words, he who said nothing human was foreign to him! But first, darkness. Man turned around and
around searching. He groped for
something and found... an elephant! And
elephants all the way down. Man felt the
tusk and said it was a cup. He felt the
tail and said that it was a rope, felt the trunk and said it was a snake, felt
the four legs and called them columns, felt the ears and said that they were
screens, felt the body and called it a mountain. He knew not that it was an elephant, kept
imagining it was a butterfly. So it is
with us, the world, existence. We live
in illusion, alone in darkness, desperately seeking.
Nat:
Subject presents mania, seems to be trying to initiate
new person, this “Ed”, whoever he is.
Is this a set-up, a prelude, a con?
J.R.
Then there was a light again. He followed it looking for its source. It stayed with him ever, constantly close,
but its source eluded him. He searched
for it in forests and desert, deep valleys and atop clouded mountain
peaks. Finally, he looked in the water
and he saw his reflection, the light emanating from its source, an illuminated
diamond point on his own forehead above the eyes, from a glowing thousand
pointed lotus blossom of luminescence.
And he grasped at it still blindly, rippling the water and damping out
his light- for he held, could hold- nothing and lost the light. Man was longtime in darkness... Get it?
Ed:
(drinking lots now) Huh? (the light in the park is getting darker and darker)
Nat:
J.R., you seem good, lots of energy. Did you go to the hospital again? (long pause) No, huh? How about you tell me about your new
friend here then? That’s exciting.
Ed:
No time for that.
Ed, come here, this is urgent!
This time as they move upstage, the background remains dimly lit to show Nat writing casenotes over Mary and Richie, occasionally touching them, kneeling, even going through Mary’s rags.
The spotlight meanwhile flickers rhythmically as a
train noise plays softly.
J.R.:
Remember the time in the train, old boy? (distant gaze ) Nobody saw my halo in
the tunnel, my hollow aura. The guardian
angels threw me off- into the labyrinth.
Modern man thinks he is flying, but he doesn’t realize that he is really
falling, the eagle weighed down by the serpent, forever falling. That is existence! Hence our uneasy feeling, man’s lament, cause
there is a solid earth mother down there and one day perhaps, if we realize or
forget- Splat! (hits hand) But wouldn’t that be a relief: a foundation
that gives the ultimate grant? Get a
piece of the rock. We’d love to climb
back into that womb, our original sin, division. But don’t blame Oedipus. His father started
it! Life: this carrot dangling ever
before us, never attained. Life is an
evidence, not an essence, not a Being but a Becoming. You say you want eternal life, heaven or
hell- it’s all the same. Sweat it out
on your treadmill, your hamster wheel.
There’s your ceaseless life, love.
We’ve got it already, good riddance.
No escape, huis clos, on a wheel, rack of fate, mandala, samsara. So called civilization is just stagnation,
dont’ya know? Here’s the deal:
Ed:
No more deals!
J.R.
(wipes
forehead) No return to the El
Dorado, Lost Paradisio golden age, noble savage. The Garden is closed, for repairs. So it is and so be it. So have I heard. Forget Jungsters and patchwork
new-agers. Does not our vehicle seem to
follow the Way effortlessly, and we in it?
Bless the big basket! (pause) There,
look, see! For why not we? Weeeeeee! (laughs)
What would good old practical Confucius say and Isis
of old, let’s not forget? By no
means. Mythology: that’s what we call
religions of old. Heresy! That people believed mere stories: Loki, Hermes and all that, the crazy fox, the
blood clot, coyote. Made up! Make-believe! Airy Fairytales! Catch a leprechaun by its tail. While meanwhile we continue believing
fervently, fanatically, ferociously our own mythology of modernism, millennial
malaise, money most of all. Money, a
religion without faith. Empirical
evidence of evolution and all that. So
today we worship the dollar, symbol of our freedom, tool of our slavery?! Meanwhile assuming all the time that
redemption, salvation and all that bebop jazz bebop will still weave the
familiar charm of good ole Paul (a Helen in disguise), forgetting Jesus, that
old Jew, his eschatology- which means, my friend and brethren, supreme
world-negation- the Kingdom of God cast before swine…