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Positioning

Chapter 20   You are here

He looked at her with an incredulous stare.

“Madam,” he said in a tone of irritation,” I made that up.”

“But it's possible,” Susan replied. She was at wits end and had got red in the face from all the strain of traveling through the New Zealand countryside.

“I'm saying,” he repeated, “ that Moby Dick is a work of fiction. So when I told you just now that Captain Ahab actually killed Moby Dick at a location, 20 nautical miles south of the island, that is an absurdity.”

“Yeah, okay,” Susan replied. “But you said the author's notes ….....” Her voice had grown shrill and trailed off.

Dr. Steinberg had got up to boil some tea on the fire.

“Would you like some tea?” he offered.

“Don't mind if I do,” she answered, feeling encouraged about her own handling of the situation.

She thought it strange that a person would want to cook that way. The fire was on the ground, and a person cooking had to constantly bend over the fire, to stir or to add ingredients to the food they were cooking. It engaged a manner of standing over the fire, with the back bent and the legs set apart for balance.

When he finally rose, it was not without some indication of a back ache that he breathed hard on to adjust and mollify.

She took the tea from him. It was in a can.

“Thank you,” she said.

He took out, what looked like expensive cigars from a box and lit up. He offered one to her, but she declined. He lit up, dragged on it and took a sip from the tea. He seemed in some way, peaceable.

“I have a daughter who's about 32 years of age. She's into new age music and has been trying to break into the music industry for some time. As a father and as a scientist, I have certain obligations to both of these, to ensure that I stay true to them in my commitment.”

He sipped on the tea again.

“When Alice, of the wonderland fame....” he looked at Susan. She nodded. “When Alice of the wonderland fame came to see her father to sort out something, the father was in a heightened state of his own marriage and the nuptial load of obligations. He was at that time, the mad hatter, a man of many personalities. He was learning how to manage that productively but he couldn't help her.”

Susan creased her brow into a squint in her eyes. She had thought at the outset that it may have been a mistake to call Dr. Steinberg. The academic community is full of self fulfilling prophecies, always communicated with self conviction on the issues.

The address he had provided her was a maze of puzzles. She on the other hand was accustomed to maps that say, ' You are here,' and then guide you from there.

“Out here, in the Maori synapse of territories, a woman feels herself in a strange place and falls back to an accustomed manner of behavior,” He continued.

“By coincidence, that relates to my relationship with my own daughter.” He pulled on the cigar. “I am a Christian. I adopted that faith when I discovered that Jesus undertook an appeal to the masses in Judah at that time.....people with long flowing beards.....who were keen to pass themselves off as serious in their manner.” He paused to look at her again.” He had posed himself as the son to bring to the attention of Judah, that one doesn't have to create a semblance that way. “

Susan adjusted her seat on the log for greater comfort, but listened quietly.

“He communicated in a certain way to get his message across. It comprised a certain creative sense of the understanding of things, which might otherwise be complicated. Judah wouldn't budge in their customized manner of adult behavior. Not too long before that, they had enemies in Assyria, Akkadia, Egypt and the surrounding areas. They were a friendly lot and folks took them to be weak.”

He paused again to sip on the tea.

“It didn't work....what Christ hoped would be the honest, straightforward way of life of a people. “

“If you are seeking to bring such studies in a course program to the young generation today, you have to consider the rate of advances in our societies and the haste in which people seek to create an achievement for themselves, before their time.”

“It has to be undertaken with a clear flair for the art of communication, sympathy for your student's own past and present positions and to take into account their hurried sense of achievement. Its about not wanting to be left behind.”

He paused and laughed to himself. She smiled back in anticipation.

“I was thinking about my lecturing attitude,” he said. “ I'm out here in the mountains of New Zealand and I'm still lecturing.”

“It's all right,” Susan said. “ I appreciate the help you are giving. Its just that, it's not like any other curriculum development. This is about life itself.”

“I appreciate your position,” he replied. “ You have to bring some of yourself into the equation......be yourself.....be the woman that you are...the daughter to your father. Don't you see, a message from a woman, any woman, where it is reflective of her condition, is also a representation of the life of the society, in the life of that one woman.”

Susan felt a large part of her doubts clear up.

“I'm not as active as I used to be,” he said. “It takes its toll, on the heart, mind, one's loves, relations....its been a long haul. I want to simply relax and put myself in the hands of the one who guides all of us when we truly seek to know.”

He turned to look at the mountain peak and then turned back to her.

“There's no reason for you to go alone on this. I know a Australian abo who can make better sense of the experience......you'll have to rationalize it.....but it will give you the support you need.”

Susan thanked him. It felt a little like Alice getting pushed around from one person to another with no solution in sight. She had brought some notes with her and he agreed to look over them, provided it was only for one day.

East of the camp, Mt. Adam looked bold and fierce-some, after an age of having moved away from the proverbial garden of Eden. It seemed to have adjusted itself to its new conditions of life, and was looking forward to completing, what it might have started, a long time ago. The work was being carried out by even younger people today. It helped. It is about life, one ought to have some fun doing it.

Reviews

[patricia]

i had to laugh after reviewing the last chapter, and saying i was lost as to where i was up to, then saw the title of this chapter!
this is a very warm chapter, i liked the observations about back ache bending over the fire, you seem to take bits of trivia and bring them to life so well.
i smiled when he offered her the cigar. The rest of this from the cigar onwards, became interesting in the thought provokers again. You realy are a very good writer. Thanks.