‘But maybe now,’ said Carlos, ‘you look at the situation with the eyes of someone who realizes that she has given away too much. Abraham Maslow used to say that if you only have a hammer, every problem in the world looks like a nail. One reason why we asked you to imagine you were four years old is so that you could come to the problem freshly.’
‘Ya,’ said Carol, ‘I see what you’re saying, but we’re all individuals, right?’
‘Yes,’ said Carlos, without sparing a thought for what the other Carl might have said on the subject.
‘And maybe what I did wasn’t what you and Martha wanted to show, but maybe it was right for me.’
‘We’ll see how you feel about it at the end of the week, dear,’ said Martha, cutting short this rebellion. ‘Now, the ones that showed your treasure, why did you do that? What’s your name?’ she asked Blue-Eyes.
‘Paul.’
‘And why did you show your treasure, Paul?’
‘Well, you know,’ said Paul, rubbing Karen’s back, ‘Karen reminds me of my mom, and she was such a great lady I couldn’t refuse her anything.’
‘Oh-oh-oh,’ wailed Karen, ‘I think I’m going to cry.’
‘Plus,’ said Paul, ‘I’m pretty active in my local Zen centre in LA and I’ve taken vows of generosity…’
‘Well, it’s great when we can act from principles,’ said Martha, ‘but when we can do what’s right spontaneously, that’s even better.’
Her fingers meshed again, but this time on a vertical axis, the right hand swooping down to meet the rising spread of her left hand.
‘How about you?’ she asked Jason. ‘The great communicator.’ She turned to the group and wrinkled her nose humorously.
‘You’re the great communicator,’ said Jason. ‘Forget women who love too much. What about women who talk too much?’
A simmering disapproval passed through the group.
‘What about arrogant British men who shoot their mouths off?’ shouted Flavia.
‘This is typical Jason,’ said Haley, sensing the opportunity to graft her grievances onto the group’s burgeoning hostility. ‘I give up, I really do.’
‘You know,’ said Martha to Jason, ‘there’s a lot of aggression in what you’re saying.’
‘God, they didn’t give you that psychology degree for nothing,’ said Jason. ‘You do have a psychology degree, don’t you?’
‘My background is in Gestalt and EST,’ said Martha proudly. ‘I also trained as a chiropractor.’
‘Oh, well, we’re going to be all right from the neck down,’ said Jason. ‘It’s just from the neck up that I’m worried.’
‘What are you worried about in particular?’
‘Well, for a start, we were meant to end at ten o’clock and it’s already ten-thirty…’
‘Big deal,’ said Flavia. ‘Jesus, you should be grateful that Martha and Carlos are giving us so much of their time.’
‘No, no,’ said Martha, ‘I want to thank Jason for pointing that out. I’m not very good with time and anybody who wants to leave at the advertised time can do so. If I get excited and I see that things are cooking, I just like to stay with it as long as anybody needs me.
‘But tell me, Jason,’ Martha went on, ‘what are ya really mad at? Remember, the way you behave here is the way you behave in life, so what are ya getting in touch with here? Is it your relationship?’ she said, pointing to Haley. ‘Is it your parents? Is it your work?’
‘No,’ said Jason breezily. ‘As Haley’ll tell you, I’m a very superficial person, and I’m angry with what’s happening right now.’
‘Well, that’s great. You know, a lot of people have a problem with living in the present. But as I like to say, it’s a real gift, and that’s why it’s called “the present”.’
Several people expressed their wonder at the insight afforded by this pun. The African Queen strained to catch Paul’s eye, hoping for acknowledgement that she had already quoted Martha’s self-quotation to him in the hot tub, but Paul was still pondering whether Martha had been rebuking him for lack of spontaneity. He felt that he was a pretty go-with-the-flow, spontaneous type of guy, and he didn’t want the group to think that he was some kind of Zen robot.
Failing to connect with Paul, the African Queen sank back into the exasperation of realizing that if she hadn’t been a man in a previous lifetime, the flow of sacred feminine energy would have been strong enough to free her from the patriarchal cringe which had made her obey Martha’s deceptive authority instead of following her own perfect instincts.
‘Yeah,’ said Jason, ‘but sometimes “the present” is the spiritual equivalent of the archetypal pair of socks your granny gives you for Christmas.’
‘Have you got an issue with your grandmother?’ said Martha.
‘No,’ said Jason, temporarily thrown.
‘Ya see,’ said Martha, ‘I don’t believe it when you say that your anger isn’t rooted in the past.’
‘You sort of win the argument in advance by using the word “rooted”, don’t you?’ said Jason. ‘Where else can anything be rooted?’
‘According to Terence McKenna,’ said Flavia, ‘who happens to be a genius, instead of an arrogant British jerk, history is rooted in the future.’
‘What’s your fucking problem?’ said Jason. ‘Your English boyfriend walk out on you? He must be a happy man.’
‘You bastard,’ said Flavia.
‘Children!’ said Martha.
‘All I’m saying—’ shouted Jason.
‘Go, go, go, Jason,’ said Martha, ‘get in touch with that anger.’
‘All I was saying,’ Jason resumed, ‘is that I was in a perfectly good mood until I had to listen to you and Carlos Jung here blathering on past my bedtime.’
‘You have a bedtime at your age?’ asked Martha. ‘Or is it Little Jason who has a bedtime, and Little Jason who’s mad at us?’
‘I was interested that you use the word “archetypal” about your grandmother’s socks,’ said Carlos.
‘I wasn’t talking about my grandmother’s socks,’ protested Jason.
‘Sometimes we are correct to resist the idea of a personal crisis,’ explained Carlos, ‘because what we are in fact experiencing is a transpersonal crisis.’
‘Listen, Yungos,’ said Jason, ‘I’m not experiencing any sort of crisis, except that I’m about to gag from listening to the two of you.’
‘Why is Little Jason being such a bad boy?’ said Martha. ‘Does he wanna be spanked?’
‘Not by you, darling,’ said Jason with a curt laugh.
‘This is real dynamic,’ said Martha excitedly. ‘We don’t normally get the energy moving this much on the first session. I wanna thank Jason for getting us all stirred up.’
‘Any time,’ mumbled Jason.
‘Now is it past everybody’s bedtime,’ asked Martha ironically, ‘or do we wanna play one more game?’
‘Let’s play,’ replied a number of voices, now united against Jason.
‘You know,’ said Martha, ‘when we’re children we know how to play but we need to learn how to work. Now we know how to work but we need to learn how to play.’
‘But this play,’ said Carlos, ‘is work.’
‘Don’t tell them that,’ said Martha in mock consternation.
In the next game they paired up again and the shorter person had to start as many sentences as possible with the phrase ‘One thing I don’t want you to know about me is…’ Then they would swap again.
People milled about the room looking for new combinations. Carol, seeing Jason shunned, went over to his side and offered to play with him.
Haley, furious with Jason, attached herself to Paul, who she thought was attractive in a sincere sort of American way.