Getting out of the mud when you
don’t know you’re in it
Part three of three
By Woody Carter
In
everybody’s life there is some suffering
and pain along with love and happiness. Now,
let me tell you a story about being in the mud
but not knowing it.
Soon after returning in 1968 from two years of volunteer service
as a Peace Corps teacher in Harar, Ethiopia, I went off the deep end. You see,
I had been living on the edge of the Ogaden desert that stretches between the
Ethiopia highlands and the Somali border and had returned to a densely populated
New York City, where women were wearing brightly colored shorts called hot
pants. I was living in Harlem off 125th Street and St. Nicholas Avenue and
studying acting at the African American Studio for Acting and Speech.
During
the day, I worked as a social worker with young black boys in foster care,
and at night, I studied acting and performed in black plays. But after the
lights dimmed and the performances were over, I would find myself walking the
streets of the city, talking in my head or out loud to myself. I kept the dialogue
under raps during the day, but at night, when I was alone and tired and walking
the streets, I would let the madness out.
One weekday night, I found myself
at 3 a.m. walking past a dark storefront window in Grenwich Village. I thought
I saw someone in the window’s reflection walking beside me so I turned
around. No one was there. So I walked back to the storefront to take a second
look, and what I saw frightened me. Someone I didn’t know was staring
at me. It took a moment to realize that who I saw in the window was actually
me. I looked dog tired. I needed a shave. My clothes were disheveled, and the
marijuana that had become my nightly companion had given me a throbbing headache.
I needed to be at home and asleep, but there I was, standing in front of a
dark looking glass talking to myself. My body began to shake, and I felt frightened.
The next day, I telephoned my friend Tony, who had been my roommate while I
was a student at Howard University in Washington, D.C. I remembered that he
meditated, and although at the time I considered myself an atheist or agnostic,
I knew that the very moment Tony sat down to meditate, a quiet feeling invisibly
invaded my room. I never asked him about his daily “quiet time” or
even discussed my experience living with him. But after that night, walking
like a zombie in Grenwich Village, I called him.
“Tony, I feel like I’m coming apart and need
to talk to somebody so am calling you,” I blurted out after some small
talk. I explained that I had been walking at night in exhaustion, talking gibberish
to myself. “Woody,” he said, “you go and see Luther. He’s
a friend of mine, and I’ll call and tell him you’re gonna call
him. … He’ll know what to do.” He gave me Luther’s
address and phone number, and soon after, we hung up. About two weeks later,
I knocked on Luther’s door. He lived in a small, one-bedroom apartment
in Upper Manhattan. As soon as the door opened, I started talking a mile a
minute. I really didn’t know Luther or why I was even there. I rambled
on about acting and working. I started making comments about the yoga books
that I was reading. I knew I wasn’t making much sense, but my mouth just
wouldn’t stop. I wanted to impress him with my education, my learning.
And as my motor-mouth rambled on, I noticed that Luther’s tiny living
room was lit only by candlelight. Floral incense filled the air. There was
no television. On and on I talked until Luther said very quietly and calmly, “Woody,
come sit down.” I was nervous, perhaps because it was so deadly still
and quiet in that room. I was uncomfortable in the silence, thinking that it
was unnatural to be so quiet and still in the middle of New York City.
Luther was a short, darkskinned man who spoke with a slight
Southern drawl. I would later find out that he had retired from working all
his adult life at the U.S. Post Office. He hadn’t made it past the eighth
grade in his education. He never married nor had any children. But this first
evening in Luther’s presence, he remained a mystery. As soon as I sat
beside him, he reached for a piano stool that seemed to roll out from nowhere.
A rectangular wooden box sat on top of it. Luther unlocked a small metal hook
on top of the box. It released a type of bellow. He pressed his hand against
the rear side of the box that began to move like the side of a small accordion.
This instrument, which I later found out is called a harmonium, began to make
a one note drone as Luther pressed and released his hand against the side of
the box.
“What’s that?” I interrupted. I began to wonder
why I had come here. Where was this all leading? The drone continued, and then
suddenly he said, “Close your eyes and watch your breathing. Don’t
control your breath in any way … just watch your breathing as the air
goes in and out.”
I tried to get my mind to settle down and do what Luther
asked, but I kept thinking about other things. I felt my leg twitching and
thought that I should scratch it. I wondered if I would get out of his apartment
in time to call my mother before she went to bed. On and on my thoughts passed
through my mind like wild horses that would not be tamed. And then I heard
the drone and Luther’s calm voice saying once again, “Try to sit
still and watch your breathing … See if you can find the space between
your in-breath and out-breath … when there is no breath at all … just
watch your breath,” he whispered. “Don’t control it in any
way.”
So I settled down to try once again. Luther began to sing, “Mother,
I give you my soul soul … soul call. You can’t remain hidden anymore. … Give
my mother a soul, soul, soul call; she can’t remain hidden anymore. Come
out of the silent sky; come out of the mountain glen. … Come out of
my secret soul, Ma; come out of my secret soul; come out of my cave of silence,
come out of my cave of silence.”
And as Luther repeat this chant over and over, his voice
got stronger. I began to recognize the words and wanted to sing along with
him, but could not. I was afraid, uncomfortable, embarrassed. Then, suddenly,
I knew, with such clarity and directness that the thought almost lifted me
off my chair, that this man was chanting with all his heart a love song to
the Divine. He sang with such love and devotion that his singing made me uneasy.
I was uncomfortable because I felt no such love, devotion or communion with
the Infinite. I had never heard anyone sing like Luther. I knew that if I sang
along with him, I would be a fraud. I didn’t feel worthy to join him
in chanting such a prayer-song. I was in the mud, and now I knew it. Instead,
I quietly began to cry. It was then that I began in earnest to watch my breath … breathing
in and breathing out.
And as the months passed, I visited Luther often. At
times, I’d come talking gibberish only to leave feeling a deep sense
of peace and calmness — a centeredness. Sometimes, there were others
in Luther’s apartment, sitting wherever they could find a place to meditate
and chant.
Eventually, I knew that I wanted to be like Luther McKinnie (1907-2002),
and as awkward as I felt, I, too, began to sing, “Mother, I give you
my soul … soul … soul call. You can’t remain hidden anymore.
You can’t remain hidden anymore.” And my own uneasiness began to
gradually melt away.
Some 39 years later, meditation remains a part of my daily
life. It enables me to live up to the four principals of Critical Mass Health
Conductors. As conductors, we commit to: 1) assuming personal responsibility
for our health and wellbeing; 2) advocating for cultural messages that promote
and embrace healthy lifestyles; 3) asking for support when necessary to make
healthy lifestyle changes; and 4) removing the inner obstacles in our lives
that prevent the power and the voice of Spirit from working within and through
us.
If Luther were alive today, he’d make an ideal Health Conductor.
For more information on Critical Mass Health Conductors, visit the Bay Area
Black United Fund’s website at www.babuf.org or contact Toya at the BABUF
office at (510) 763-7270.
