The rain splashing across the splayed paddles of the Traveller’s Palm outside my window makes me feel like a child again.
It’s the noise of the rainstick, the sheeesh and tip tap of water landing on broad waxy leaves. I love this plant, which stands guard outside our front gate and is lovingly tended (possibly even owned) by our neighbours. It’s proper name is Ravenala madagascariensis and the very fact that it has its origins in Madagascar makes it even more romantic to have it leaning imposingly on one’s gate post, as if it has stopped there to rest and draw breath before hurrying on it’s exotic way.
This palm is an existential paradigm, new leaves thrust up through the middle of the plant as the maturing leaves make way by taking their place further down the hierarchy of the fan. Every leaf holds the same plane so that the plant is a monologue from the side and a curtain call of the entire cast from the front. By the time the leaves have reached half way through their passage towards the ground, decay is already visible..the brown fingers of each leaf begin to curl and the flexing petioles start to pale as the sap abandons them for the new kids in town that search for the sun.
They are called Traveller’s Palms for two reasons, either one of which might save your life so please do leave a note on this blog if that should ever happen. The first reason is that the sheaths of the splayed stem of the plant hold water that a thirsty (and quite desperate) traveller, who didn’t mind drinking brown coloured liquids, might use to slake his craving. This might be apocryphal but the second reason I can verify empirically: the Traveller’s Palm grows on an East-West plane. I think this really could be helpful, always dependent, of course, if the traveller knew if she had approached the palm from the North or the South. Thinking about this I can invoke the panic I feel when I walk out of a shop in a shopping Mall and have no idea if I entered from the left or the right. Finding myself facing a living longitude might not help me…
I’m thinking about these things this week because I am temporarily confined to barracks having been poleaxed by my second dose of Pfizer vaccine. I’m mildly encouraged by my body’s vigorous response because I have read that younger people seem to experience a stronger reaction and so I’m taking that as an indicator that I am no more than 50% down the Traveller’s Palm hierarchy, at very worst (paying no mind for now to my distinctly fading petioles). Of course when you are immobilised by ill health you tend to make connections to other moments in your life when you have been curled up under a duvet waiting for life and light to return to your ecosystem.
This reaction has been not entirely unpleasant but it has been incapacitating. It is as if I have overdosed on the sort of pre-anaesthetic sedative shot that they give you before wheeling you into surgery for a major op. In that sedated but still conscious condition, your senses still work but your body is reluctant to move. You hear conversations about dire things with equanimity; you quite enjoy the passing ceiling lights as you travel through corridors covered only in a blanket towards the cutting room; you greet your butchers warmly and worry not at all as they slip another chemical into your bloodstream and all becomes nothing.
I do wonder if I brought this on myself by writing last week about losing things that you don’t appreciate until they are gone. The loss of the ability to move from the sofa for two days, has certainly been more drastic than the loss of a scaphoid bone and now I have come to appreciate that marginally handicapped state as nirvana. We humans are never satisfied.
There is always a bright side, however, if you look for it. Temporary incapacity forces reflection and after a day of simply moving from one sleeping venue to another, day two allowed me the capacity to keep my eyes open for longer periods during which I was able to read. From my pile marked ‘Bought ages ago, must find time to read’, I pulled down Buddha’s Brain (1Hanson and Mendius) and this is a learning treat that I commend to everyone. To show I am learning: First Dart: I didn’t read a really good book. Second Dart: I am so terrible at getting around to reading what I buy, why am I so disorganised?
“Some physical and mental discomforts are inevitable. These are the first darts of life. When we react to the first dart with one or more of the Three Poisons of greed, hatred and delusion (broadly defined)…we start throwing second darts at ourselves and others” (Hanson and Mendius, 62)
This is a wonderful and affirming read and a fantastic resource for those of us who coach. The neuro-science of self limiting beliefs and negative narrative loops is writ plain in these pages and will, I believe, help me to be a better coach.
So it really is an ill wind that blows no good and I have three ‘goods’ to celebrate in conclusion. First, I am vaccinated and I thank my lucky stars to be one of less than 10% of the world’s population who can say this. Second, I’ve been forced to stop and reflect. Third, I’ve read a great book that will make me an even better coach.
All from a needle I couldn’t see without my glasses on. It’s been a good week.
1Hanson, Rick, and Richard Mendius. Buddha’s Brain. Oakland CA, New Harbinger Publications, 2009.
