A Salamander's Tale by Paul Steinberg

Author:Paul Steinberg
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
Published: 2015-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

So, my gods are gods of action. One can get too much of prayer and meditation, too much also of passive Marxist determinism. We can engage in excesses of most anything. As Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis is purported to have said in childhood, “Not lobster again tonight, Mother!” Chinese Daoists tell us that too much joy leads to heart disease.

A new vow began to evolve for me in the mid- and late 1980s, in the months and years just after surgery and radiation: I will make every effort to find a balance, to avoid excesses, to be conscious of the yin and the yang. I will be aware of potential errors of commission as well as potential errors of omission. I will be aware of the benefits, at times, of action and the benefits of inaction. I will find a balance that includes plenty of joy in the midst of grief. Some lobster, and yet not too much lobster.

Some people find their gods, their spiritual selves at the beach, at the ocean or sea with its endless horizons. I, though, wanted the solitude and privacy of a mountaintop—perhaps my own Mount Sinai. So, within months of the initial diagnosis, within months of surgery and radiation, I started heading up to the Shenandoah mountains—admittedly more like tall hills—ninety minutes from Washington, DC.

I found a mountain path just off Skyline Drive. It took only thirty minutes to climb to the top; and at the top I found an outcropping of rock fifty yards away from the trail that was at least fifteen or twenty feet higher than the elevation of the trail. It was an ideal spot for me to sit or stand or lie down as I talked to my gods, and it offered a swell view of the Shenandoah valley and river three thousand feet below and to the west.

My spot was far enough from the beaten track to allow me to rage against the gods, to cry uncontrollably whenever I wished, without being carted off by some worried hiker to the closest Virginia state mental hospital. Going up there monthly or bimonthly on a weekday, I rarely, if ever, encountered other hikers. My spot was always available—there were no other angry Job-like criers in this wilderness.

On my third visit, as I was meditating and talking to my gods, I noticed a small plaque nailed into the southern end of the rock outcropping. This metal plaque from the US Geological Survey noted that this very spot from which I was reaching out to the gods was the highest point in the Appalachians south of the Adirondacks. Had I randomly happened upon the Appalachian redneck equivalent of Mount Sinai? It even had its own insignia and polestar.

This modest find, this simple plaque, opened up the floodgates. All I could do was wail and rail. As much as I love rock ’n roll, wailin’ and railin’ is sometimes essential. These gods of my own creation, these illusions—not necessarily the God of my ancestors—accepted and tolerated all of my cries, my wails and rails.

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