The practice of god

It is Tuesday, the first day of winter in Melbourne. Princes park is empty. The sky is covered by grey clouds, the sun is hiding behind them, it is not warming me up much. A trendy bicycle rider crosses the park, he is in his late 20’s. Thereafter a pedestrian, he is in his teens and wearing a trendy winter hat too.

The park is surrounded by roads, which are surrounded by large terrace houses. I notice 2 outstanding vehicles parked in front of 2 neighboring terrace houses. One vehicle is a white creamy Chevrolet from the 60’s. The other one is a maroon four wheel drive. The 4wd is as explained to me, a bogan’s vehicle; a caravan is towed behind it. The owners of these vehicles are standing outside, leaning on a white fence and having an afternoon conversation.

Typically, you would see in American movies that talk about perfect families this type of white fence. The white fence is in front of a house that has a straw-like roof. That house has 4 long windows attached to each other. White curtains are hiding the interior of the house.

Richard is one of the tenants of the house behind the white fence. He is facing me. He is tall, I’d say almost 1.85cm. Richard has short, light-brown hair, and a mustache. He doesn’t like to go to the hairdresser, his haircut looks neglected. He is wearing a blue workers shirt.
Bob is standing near Richard; he has a black, red striped footy shirt.
Margaret is Tommy’s mother. Margaret and Tommy are also standing there. Margaret throws a tennis ball to Tommy, she tries to entertain him for as long as possible, so she won’t have to go inside and be alone with him.

Margaret is Richard’s wife. She likes him but doesn’t love him. Richard too, likes Margaret, but doesn’t love her. They both love Tommy. It’s their only child. Richard is a plumber. He is a trustworthy plumber, a serious plumber. Bob says that he is an intellectual plumber. It is not rare that Richard goes to a client, fixes a dropping shower, and then sits with the client around the table, talks about religion or actuality and eats sushi, curry or what ever is served on that table.

Richard loves the fact that he lives near a park. Often, when the air is quiet and dry, he puts on his navy blue flannel jacket, walks to the nearest by grass patch with his black bible, and steps on the grass to read; he walks towards the cricket ground and reads the bible. Walking and reading outside inspires him. Margaret does not approve of this, “you look ridiculous, you look like a priest,” she tells him every time. But in the bottom of her remarks there’s jealousy. Every moment that she has to stay home alone with Tommy reminds her that her life is flat and empty. Richard likes reading outside because he can get fresh air, feel the damp grass under his feet, and at the same time connect to god. Margaret does not connect to the same god as Richard. One wonders whether Margaret connects to Richard at all.

Margaret inherited from her dad the beautiful white Chevrolet. She also inherited from her parents the 5 bedroom house facing Princes park. In addition, 10 years ago, Margaret inherited from her parents a large sum of money. There’s in her possession enough money for a life time. It is enough money for her and Tommy to live comfortably without her ever having to take on a day job. Together with Richard’s salary they have more than enough resources.

Margaret’s parents thought they were doing her a big favor by leaving her that many resources. Margaret thought that they were doing her a big favor too. But Richard knows that they actually perturbed her.
Margaret feels redundant. She has no goals, no interests, no focus, and no reason to get out of bed in the morning. That is why Richard agreed to have a baby with her. In fact, he was sorry for her, sorry for her sensation of inutility.
They hoped that a baby will give her sense and direction. 6 years ago, it did. However, Tommy is now 6 years old; he goes to school, plays with other children, spends time playing computer games, and twice a week he participates in scouts activities. As time goes by, he needs his mother less and less.

Margaret has been taking anti-depressant pills for 8 years now; she started a psychological treatment 2 years after she got married. She lost a lot of friends in the process. She was so depressed that she was not able to explain her friends what is happening to her, so she stopped being in contact, disappeared. Her social life degraded even more after she had Tommy. She didn’t invest any time in the few friends she had left. For these reasons, Bob the neighbor is one of her only friends now. Before he had become a friend, Margaret considered him a bogan.

Bob drinks vast amounts of beer, and his house is dirty. His television is turned on from the moment he walks in through the door and till the moment he goes to sleep. When Tommy was born Margaret had to go to Bob’s several times and ask him to lower down the volume; she could clearly hear which program he was watching too, all the way through to her house. Strangely enough the conflicts about the television’s volume got her to know Bob.

One Saturday, when Margaret went to Bob’s to ask him to lower the Television’s volume, he opened the door for her wearing fluffy white clothes. This was quite a change from his usual jeans and T-shirts. “I am going to a meditation workshop,” he explained. Margaret was surprised. However, that day Bob introduced her to Osho meditation.

Osho is a unique guru. Bob and Margaret adore him. Together, they listen to his lectures and watch his video tapes. Margaret and Bob go 4 times a week, between 5pm to 6pm, to Kundalini meditation; this happens when the sun sets.
There’s also a Melbournian spiritual teacher representing Osho. He gave Margaret a new name - Maayana. He gave Tommy a new name as well - Sinai.
Richard however, refuses to change Tommy’s name. “He will have double personality issues,” he says. Richard gets crazy when he hears Margaret call Tommy by his Osho name. Moreover, he gets really angry when Margaret asks Tommy to call her Maayana. He, Richard, uses Margaret’s birth name only. He uses Tommy’s birth name only.
Richard is happy that Margaret found some kind of light in her life, he too believes in god, but lately Margaret has become extreme in her practice and belief. It has become a social barrier. Margaret has become a vegan, therefore they had to stop going to dinner parties. She stopped drinking alcohol, she wakes up at 5am to do the dynamic meditation, and she spends more time with Bob than with Richard. She constantly talks about divinity, higher power, the light, god, and Bob. Richard is tired. For years he had been losing his wife and the mother of his child to depression; now he is losing her to a religion or to some kind of eastern cult. He is sad.

On Wednesday night, Margaret and Richard finally go to bed at the same moment. Richard would have liked to make love to his wife, but they don’t do that anymore. He makes an attempt to touch her; he lies close to her while his body is touching hers. She whispers, “All I ever wanted is for someone to love me.” Then she turns her back to him, and moves to the edge of the bed. She puts distance between her and Richard; it’s as if he had some kind of a contagious disease. Tears come out of his eyes, how can she blame him for not loving her, she can’t even see him, she is obsessed with Osho, and Bob. She had changed so much.

Richard remembers living with his parents in the cattle station in the northern territories, it was always only the 3 of them – Richard his mom and his dad. They lived on a remote land in the bush; he used to feel very lonely, having only animals to play with. But now, in his wife’s house, near Princes park, in a city of 4 million people, he feels more lonely than ever.

There’s an Osho open day on Saturday, Margaret and Bob volunteered to help organize the event. They will stay there as of Friday evening and prepare the space and the activities for Saturday. They will have a dance meditation on Friday evening.
Richard and Margaret don’t see each other at all on Friday. Margaret leaves a note behind:

“Dear Richard, I am off to an Osho weekend, please look after Tommy.
Enjoy the weekend, Maayani.”

On Friday evening Richard has an early dinner with Tommy. He prepares Cod fish with Broccoli in the oven. Tommy is in a good mood, and talks about his day at school. While Tommy talks Richard thinks about his failed marriage, about his wife who solely is disappearing from his life. Suddenly, he realizes that the only way to win his wife back is to communicate with her on the same level! He must try and get into Osho as well, he must force himself to get interested in Osho activities, he must try and see the same light that Margaret sees. He smiles to Tommy. “What do you think dad?” Tommy asks, but Richard hadn’t been listening. “Sorry Tommy, think about what?” “Can I go play video games at Mark’s place tonight? His mother said I could stay overnight.” Richard thinks for a moment, “sure son, why not.” Richard drops Tommy at Mark’s place. He does some chatting with Mark’s dad and thanks him for the hospitality. He will come and pick Tommy up on Saturday afternoon.

Richard is alone in the car, his son is already grown enough to spend the night outside of the house; his wife too. What about him? He drives home, yet while driving he decides to drive to the Osho center to visit Margaret. He goes back home and checks The Melbourne Osho center website. They have rented the St Brigids Parish Hall in North Fitzroy for the open day. He gets in the car and drives over there.

There’s a young hippie, bold doorman at the door; he charges Richard 7$ to participate in the dance meditation. He says that it started 1.5 hours ago, but that they are only half way through so Richard could enter and join them.
Richard enters the large hall; there must be about 100 people there, all bare foot. He leaves his shoes at the entrance. There is an Indian like music playing on the background, mainly flute and percussion. There’s a large diversity of people dancing, all look pretty hippie. The women are wearing long colorful skirts, and fluffy white shirts. The men are mostly wearing fluffy white, red or black pants from delicate materials; their shirts are in matching color and material. Richard doesn’t see Margaret yet. He dares to walk into the crowd, he feels heavy and boring as he walks around the dancing bodies, desperately looking for his wife. He can’t find her. He leans on the left wall of the hall, and tries to scan the space carefully.

Suddenly he sees her, next to Bob, both of them moving their bodies very slowly, as if the music was twice as mellow as what it actually is. His instinct tells him to walk over there and drag his wife away from this sensual dance, but he stays put and watches them for a while longer. Bob is turning around Margaret; she has a steady smile on her face. They don’t notice his staring at all as they are busy staring intensely at each other. Bob touches her hair and tucks it behind her ears. From time to time they give each other kisses on the neck. Is this the practice of god? After about 3 quarter of an hour he finally walks over to them. Margaret spots him before Bob does, her look stays calm. She touches Bob on the shoulder to give him a sign that Richard is present in the room. Bob too keeps a calm facial expression when he sees Richard. He approaches Richard and shakes his hand. For no good reason, Richard actually shakes his hand back. Bob doesn’t let go of Richard’s hand and leads him towards a dance with Margaret and him. Richard dances with them for a while, until Margaret leans towards him and hugs him. She gives him a long warm hug.