Living in The Past

Sometime ago I received a letter from a friend. "For Heaven's sake," it said, "stop living in the past. Face life."

On the other hand, Dr. Onesimo Teotonio Almeida suggested that I write my autobiography - something which I shall never do. I am no different from those who get up in the morning, walk down the driveway for the newspaper, have a cup of coffee, and, as the clock ticks, eventually get ready for work.
I have conquered no lands, served no armed forces, won no athletic prizes, never kissed a politician's pants, nor has anyone in politics ever kissed mine. In fact, I have never even bribed any politicians with either money, mistresses, or minions, nor achieved fame in any form, etc. I haven't even become rich in America. In short, mine has been a down-to-earth life. If my picture ever appeared on a book jacket, no one would recognize it, a fact that would prevent any publisher from ever being interested in me. The closest I have come to fame was about twenty some years ago, at the Karachi Airport, when I accidentally shook hands with Ayub Khan, the president of Pakistan. But, even then, the event happened because Mr. Khan mistook me for someone else. Why, therefore, write anything about such a dull person?

On the other hand, as my first friend indicated, I can't seem to shake off the past. This afternoon, for example, as I write, I feel depressed. It's winter in St. Louis and the day has been overcast. Psychologists and psychiatrists, of course, would be the first to tell me not to worry. Overcast days don't do much to get one off depressions.

On the other hand, it's not the day's shades that have me depressed. In fact, I like overcast days, something that I probably inherited from my childhood in the Azores. I remember more overcast than sunny days on Sao Miguel. But I also remember the roar of the Atlantic - and therein lies my depression.

As I look out my living room towards the garden and the open spaces around my subdivison, I reflect on having earned enough in America to afford where I live. At the same time, I am brought up short feeling that, although I like the scenery, it leads me nowhere. It's as if, in spite of their wintry beauty, the lawns and trees lead only into more lawns and trees. The ocean is nowhere to be seen. For some reason I can't speculate if tomorrow morning it will have knocked down all the dark volcanic rock walls that divide one's property from someone else's. Come to think of it, there are no dark volcanic rocks around these parts.
There aren't even walls separating one's property. The gardens are open, giving us a sense of expansion.

But not like the ocean's expansion.

Furthermore, out there, beyond the picture window, the world is calm and peaceful. Not like the expansions I faced in my childhood, when the ocean constantly seemed to wear "white beards" in the wintertime. At least whenever its waves died with a roar against the rocky shores.

A few years ago, late one night, I called one of those talk-show psychologists, a woman with a Greek name, whose programs were syndicated out of Los Angeles. I had seen one of her books in some airport shop during one of my travels, something that should have clued me in on the fact I was not talking to the greatest - or to one of the better - psychologists. Great scientific and clinical revelations are not generally found in airport bookstores - anymore than penicillin can be bought over the counter in the average pharmacy. In any case, I told her that, in spite of my love for America, I can't seem to shake off my azoreanism.

The woman tore into me. "You need help," she said, "and I suggest that you contact a counselor in your area to get rid of that feeling. It's not doing you any good. After more than forty years, as you say you've lived in this country, what you're going through is abnormal."

The reply surprised me, for I did not consider my feeling an affliction - or an abnormality. Whatever I was suffering from didn't even hurt me. On the contrary. You see, it is in those moments of depression that I seem to reach my potential. Something similar to what Brazilians say about the Portuguese - "the sadder the 'Fado', the happier the Portuguese".

Generally whenever that feeling gets to me, I start pacing up and down in my living room. It's large enough for that at 26 by 37 feet. Then, in order to slow down, I turn on the music, leading off with gentle, nostalgic, Latin American songs, usually out of the Argentine "pampa", that eventually evolve into loud and clear vibrant sambas, cumbias, chacareras, etc.. By the time the mariachis come on, I have been purged of life's weight.

Strange as it may seem, at no time do I need Portuguese music, or songs. In short, the depression serves me as therapy to help me reach beyond myself into a world where my childhood is expanded into the sounds I had never known as a child. I wonder if I could ever achieve that same feeling if I had stopped being an Azorean, as the psychologist suggested. Or could it be that, being an American, and working within the American psychological norm, she wished to have me cut off my Azorean feelings just as other forces have managed to cut other ethnic and racial groups from their roots, leaving them in a world of limbo that has only helped make this country one of the most violent societies on earth? Or could it be that the poor woman just did not know what she was advocating?

After all, could it have been that if I hadn't been an Azorean in America I would have ever thought of doing what I did last July as a form of liberation - and done so without going to the middle of a field with others of my sex beating on drums and denouncing my parents? I celebrated my sixtieth birthday, my forty-fifth year in America, and my thirtieth in St. Louis by giving myself an outdoor party the likes of which had never been seen in Olivette, Missouri. I doubt many Americans would ever do something as wild, particularly if their funds were as limited as mine. My garden, which measures approximately 33,000 square feet was decorated with white and blue balloons celebrating my azoreanism. My house was decorated by flags of the many nations I had visited. The tables displayed the Portuguese and American flags as a symbol of two languages and cultures that I dearly love. The food was a mix of tastes from several countries. The music, however, was Mexican.

My wife, who is of Irish American background, and a bostonian, wondered why I had chosen a Mexican group, when there were so many other musicians around that were genuinely American - and good. I tried to explain, although no matter how hard she couldn't understand. Suffice it to say that, by the time the evening ended, she was enthused by the whole thing.

And why not? My intention was not just to have a party. I felt that, now that I had reached the big 6, I just couldn't get ready to say "adeus a vida" without at least one more "arraial".
Granted the feast depressed my bank account, but what of it? If one doesn't do something explosive occasionally, then life is not really true living. Explosiveness is as needed in mankind as forceful and loud ocean waves beating against Azorean rocks are needed to make those islands what they are - a world of internal calm, and, if left to itself, peace.

I wonder if there was something in that feast that could have been useful to the American way of life. As indicated above, ours is a violent society. Supposing, however, that someday those in the know, like the psychologist, for the example, come up with a theory that to cut off humans from what they are without gearing their explosive energies to something creative and beautiful is more detrimental than all the rules that make one what one is not. Could the explosiveness generated by putting the theory into practice also in a way eventually help create a life of calm and peace?

Well, it's just a thought.

Manuel L. Ponte
St. Louis, Missouri, January 27, 1992