Chapter 6: Walking Through Walls
A Journey of Addiction, Music, Healing, and Rediscovery
Day Six: Thursday August 21st, 2003
6.15 a.m.
I have been woken up by one of the adorable kittens that lives in the Monastery. I’ve been lying in bed playing scratch with him for about half an hour, one of the games I play with Floobin. What is confusing with the cats here is they don’t have the ‘eye smiles’ that cats have back home. The chef let me cook egg and chips today for breakfast. Feeling a million miles away from old Albion, I am very at home here now. But… a fried breakfast is very nice thank you.
I listen to Van Morrison with C and D and N in the shop. The cat is now sleeping on my shoulder. Something else which is hilarious: all the way through breakfast I could hear Heavy Metal blasting out of the shop. When I peer over, the monks are all sitting around the stereo really getting into it. Monks dig Thrash! Then, I observe that the bass-line of the song playing was the same pattern of notes as one of the monk’s chants I had heard in the temple. I wonder if the monks know?
My meeting with Mrs. Rambhai went very well. She will be arranging a meeting with the abbot and myself, possibly in the next few days. She liked the idea I have about writing songs in my indie rock style, with Luang Por’s method of using the patterns from the Earth. She doesn’t think it will be a problem. I am still quite nervous about it, but I know somehow, it’s something that is meant to happen.
This afternoon I also had a great time in the English class with Phra Peter which was reversed so that the students taught me some Thai. The language is so musical that it is important to forget one’s own natural intonation, and embrace a musicality which is actually just as important as the words themselves. A Thai person cannot understand well if a foreigner gets the word correct and the intonation wrong, but can work out what you mean if the intonation is good, even if your accent is a little ropey. I have not remembered all the words that I learnt, but I learn a lot about the pronunciation and the unique way sentences are formed. I have five minutes until I have to join the others for the sauna, so the class of monks and nuns request I do one song for them before I leave. I perform “Go” and they seem to enjoy it, applauding at the end and asking for more, but I have to go and join the others.
Can this get any weirder? If it does, I’ll just love it all the more.
I forget to bring guitar picks, so I have just gone to the office to get a card from my wallet to cut it into a plectrum. I also arrange to make a phone call tonight.
The potatoes have arrived!
I peel and slice them all into chips, then leave them to sit in water and salt for an hour.
The bell rings and we do our sweeping duty. I get a headache and decide to drink a litre of water.
WATER IS THE ANSWER TO ALL PROBLEMS
I return to the kitchen and blanche the chips in oil (like I learnt in Mahoney’s the pub where I used to work in Kensington) so that Malee can fry them for a few minutes and they will be ready if someone asks for chips. My time helping in the kitchen is helping me a lot. I feel a lot better after working with food all around me.
Well, I have done my last medicine and I puke till I drop. I actually finish a whole bucket of water, which according to Phra Jan, is very good. I still feel a bit sick, but not as sick as the third day. I can even feel the medicine pushing out the poison through every pore of my body. I have a sauna with the guys which helps the uneasiness a bit, but I guess I am just exhausted after five days of projectile vomiting.
I return to The Hay and find Phra Hans outside playing my guitar. He plays very well, but makes a joke about being very rusty, and says that monks should not really engage in such activities. It’s nice to have such a wise one playing my trusty Lowden guitar. It’s seen a lot of unwise things over the years! I sit down in my nausea and listen to him play for a while. As I lie down, I realise I have done sixty sit-ups a day since Tuesday and, if I say so myself, my stomach looks a little bit better!
Regarding relationships……
I discover a problem about myself that I haven’t noticed before, and that is when I am feeling fine and confident, I can be quite cold to others and independent to the point where those around me feel I don’t need them, which I think is hurtful for some.
I only recognise this because, in the moment I feel I need them, they usually feel used or taken for granted. I don’t know what it is. I just feel very cut off from everyone else when I am busy in my own mind. It’s not because I don’t care about other people. I just don’t understand why it’s such a big deal that I’m hyper concentrated on whatever is going on in my head. I don’t know what it is, but I just don’t seem to have a functioning radar for other people’s feelings.
Today when I felt I needed care from those around me, everyone was very nice and showed compassion, because I suppose they are going through the same thing as me.
It’s taken being here to understand this because, if I had been home and gone from strong to needy, most of the people I know would not feel it was fair for me to expect their love or care, and rightly so maybe? I feel quite undeserving of care most of the time. But not here. Here seems to be okay and ‘safe’ to be vulnerable.
I support these organisations who are shaping a system change to integrate mental health awareness and well-being into the music industry. Please do read about their work.
The Creative Well
Music Minds Matter
Waterbear College of Music