Be The Change

Everything wood or leather is growing mold. The delicate, fluffy, green kind. It sprouts from my bodhi seed mala (if I don’t do mantras every day) and coats the lining of my leather flats (that I never wear anyway). It’s been raining for twelve days straight, and the humidity is through the roof. Sometimes the rain is interspersed with periods of brilliant sunshine. The birds go crazy and palm trees sway in the tropical breeze and Damien goes out on the lawn and yells through billowing curtains, “Hey! Come out here. Look how incredible it is. Everything is so lush! It’s SO alive!”

Then it starts raining again.

It’s dusk and I just told Damien to leave. I’m flaked out on the sofa feeling waterlogged. The mold is about to take over the entire house. It’s like my own simmering rage, I keep wiping it down but it pops right back up again.

The few books I own are off the shelf and scattered around the house wherever they can get some air flow. I hate mildewy books! My journal, usually hidden under the bed, was minding its own business on the coffee table and I guess that was just too tempting for Damien.

Honestly, I don’t know what we’re doing together most of the time. D is like the polar opposite of me. All he ever thinks about is how to make money. I never want to think about money at all and he thinks about it all the time. He always has a new idea for a gig or a business or something. He gets so excited so I listen and try to be encouraging but I know he’ll never actually do anything about it. If he does he’ll lose interest and be on to something else before he makes ten dollars!

I got home about an hour ago, just before it started to pour. Damien whipped around like he was startled then tried to act normal. It looked like he was holding something behind his back. “What are you doing, D? What’s behind your back?” He knew he was busted so he brought it out.

“I wasn’t reading it,” he stammered, “I just picked it up and this fell out...“ I grabbed the journal from him and the folded, orange paper.

“Get. Out.” I couldn’t believe the force and clarity in my own voice. “I don’t care where you sleep tonight but it’s not going to be here.”

“Jess, listen… I’m sorry, really I didn’t see anything… But that paper… just talk to me… Where did you get it? I might know what it is.”

“Go.”

The anger gave me strength I didn’t know I had. I stood straight and steely eyed until he silently walked past me, and out the front door. I heard his old Celica pull out of the driveway then I collapsed on the sofa. Now, It’s getting dark and I’m wading through a torrent of emotions. I don't think I ever spoke so strongly to anyone! I keep wanting to apologize for being so hard on him but I actually know he deserved it.

I sit up and unfold the orange paper, the numerology that I can’t make heads or tails of, the coded message for “be the change.” Instantly I’m back in Hans’ tent with his tapestries and carpets. This is why I never look at the paper. I realize that I resent Damien just because he isn’t Hans, which is crazy because we spent all of six hours together. Six hours of being fully seen and heard and completely understood. (The ingestion of certain molecules may have contributed.)

It was Burning Man the night before breaking camp. We knew we didn’t have much time and we decided to make the most of it. His tent transported us. I could hear people around but they sounded far away. The patterns and colors were intoxicating and there was a hint of incense in the rich, fluid air. We made small talk for a while, then Hans got quiet. I could feel things moving to another level. When he looked up, he was so there, so present with me it was unnerving. “What do you want?” He asked. The question stopped my mind. It wasn't like do you want more mint lemonade or even what do you want from from tonight; it was the big what do you want.

The truth is, I never wanted much. I always have what I need so I don’t think about it. If I have a really good year, I go to Burning Man. If I don’t get enough massage clients, then I drink my coffee at home. Simple. Or it was before everything changed. Now there are no tourists, the hotels are empty and the locals are counting every penny.

Hans repeated the question, “What do you want?” I fumbled, muttering something about saving the environment and having everything I need but neither of us was buying it. Then from out of nowhere I said, “I want to paint again. I want people to see it. And I want to make a living from it.” I had no idea where that came from. I did go to art school but hardly felt a burning desire to pull out my easel. Plus it’s next to impossible to make a living at art.

That opened the floodgates. We talked about our deepest desires and fears, our frustrations, the little things that keep us going everyday, and the things we can’t stand about ourselves. “When there’s something about yourself that you don’t like - you want to try and change it,” I said. “Like always being resentful of people,” I paused, “but if you want to change something about yourself, that means you don’t fully accept yourself. You’re cutting off from a part of who you are.”

“I get that!” Hans exclaimed. “You keep feeling the same negative, harmful feelings again and again but when you try to change them, to be a better person, it just makes you feel tight and disconnected.”

“Yes!”

Neither of us said anything for a long time. Then it dawned on me. “You have to be. Those things you want to change, they aren’t really the problem. They‘re parts of you and are only trying to get your attention and acceptance. They have energy and important gifts but can only give them when you can stop trying to change yourself and just be.”

“Be the change,” Hans murmured in a state of wonderment. We looked at each other trying not to smile, then we grinned foolishly and finally and rolled on the ground laughing uncontrollably. We had plumbed the depths of our souls and unearthed a platitude!

The rain intensifies and the sound drowns out everything else. It hits me how things come full circle. I never connected the dots but I did start painting again. With no massage clients, I had the time and it happened naturally. Plus I’m so broke that I was even going to tell Damien I might try his idea for selling art online.

“Jess, I can see it,” he’d say, “You need to make videos of yourself painting the way you do outdoors. People will eat that up! It will make them want your paintings. Then you can teach classes. Online. Lots of people are doing it. And making tons of money!”

But now I don’t want anything to do with Damien and it’s a shitty idea anyway. I would hate all that techy stuff: websites, using social media to shamelessly promote myself. I told him that I want to paint. I don’t want to be a frickin’ business person! I don’t need a lot of money anyway and if my paintings get good enough people will find them - I’ve always known that.

I pull a thin blanket over me and drift off fitfully on the sofa, the plush fabric damp against my cheek.

I wake to bright sunlight and find that we’re almost out of coffee beans. The island coffee is so ono but it’s expensive! It’s okay though - I’m sure someone will book a massage before we run out completely. I brew a delicious cup and sit on the lanai with my mala beads. I’m about to go inside for more when Damien pulls in the driveway.

He walks up timidly and I let him sit next to me on the bench. “I’m sorry, Jess. Really. I had no right to touch your journal. I’ll never do it again.” D is incapable of hiding anything I know he’s sincere.

“Apology accepted.” His relief is palpable and we sit gazing out at the hibiscus bush with its white flowers. “But if you ever touch my little black book again, you’ll wake up with centipedes in the bed.” From the look on his face he actually believes me.

“Hey,” I turn to him, “not that it’s any of your business, but what were you gonna say about that orange piece of paper.”

He starts getting excited, “Do you even know what that code is?”

“Numerology? Someone gave it to me. I was hanging around some pretty far out people at the time.” When Hans handed me the paper I thought it was his phone number and tucked it into my journal only looking at it much later.

“What about the ‘BTC’?”

“That stands for ‘be the change.’ It was something we talked about. Why?”

“Well, it also stands for Bitcoin. That code looked like a private key to a wallet. It might be bogus or empty but it’s worth checking. It could be worth a lot of money!”

We go to my laptop. D is in his element. I like seeing him this way. He walks me through the process of setting up my own Bitcoin wallet. We type in the code (which takes forever) and sweep the paper wallet into my new digital wallet. “Now we have to wait,” D says.

We walk to the cliffs and watch the waves crashing on the rocks. It’s sunny, still no sign of rain!

We get back and fire up the laptop. My new wallet shows 2.00000500 BTC. Damien is falling over himself. “Two Bitcoins do you know how much that’s worth? Around $20,000. Twenty thousand! Jess! We could send it to an exchange and cash it in right now. I can show you how. Or we can just leave it in the wallet. This time next year it might be worth fifty or a hundred thousand.”

A wave of relief sweeps over me. I didn’t even know I so was worried about money but now I relax, just knowing there's something to fall back on.

And thank god I don’t have to do that online business thing, I think. But then that doesn’t sit right. A part of me feels drawn to try it. The tech stuff might not be so bad. It could be fun to share my creative process.

“Let’s leave the coin in the wallet for now.” I say, “Maybe we won’t need to touch it at all. For now I want to let it grow.”

A part of me still wishes Hans had given me his phone number. (I don’t even know his full name!) But for whatever reason he gave me something else instead.

“Did you sleep with him?” D asks.

“It was so much deeper than that.” D looked crestfallen. “Don’t worry,” I assure him, “it was before I met you... Hey D, do you think you could still give me a hand with that idea you had, selling my paintings online?”

He lights up. “Jess your paintings are the real deal. They’re not like what you see in these tourist galleries. It’s like you talk to the land when you paint, You’ve got to get that stuff out there!”

A gentle wind dances through the tall grass at the edge of the yard. Maybe D does get me after all. At least more than I give him credit for.