Confessions of a Closet Mystic

As I've been traveling around the country, talking about the book and meeting readers, the number one question I hear is, "How much does Maya remember from your trip?"

Not "What does she remember from your trip?" or "Who does she remember from your trip?" but "How much?"

I find this a curious question, since I can't imagine what difference the quantity of a child's memories, nine years later, could really makes to a reader. So there must be a question behind this question, some impulse that makes people shape their inquiry this way even though there's another piece of information they really want to know.

I spent about the first six weeks of the tour trying to figure this out, and the other night at Women and Children First bookstore in Chicago, when an audience member asked the same question, an insight came to me in a rush.

I think people are asking this because what they really want to know is how much of the wonder and magic of early childhood gets carried into the pre-teen years and, by extension, how much of it might still survive in our adult consciousness today.

I'll try to explain.

A few weeks ago, I was having lunch with a friend and I was telling him how, despite all that happened to us in Belize, I'm still a skeptic at heart who applies a cynical eye to much that comes across my path.

He said, "Actually, I think you've got it backwards. I think this whole skeptic thing you've got going is just an act so people don't accuse you of being too woo-woo. I don't think you're a closet skeptic. I think you're actually a closet mystic but you're afraid to admit it to anyone, even yourself."

I immediately started crying when he said this, which means he's probably right.

Since the beginning of this tour, I've been trying to position myself as Everywomen, so that I can look out at an audience and say, "See! I'm actually very normal! I'm just like you!" in the hope that this will help them identify with my family and my story. When in fact, the more accurate statement might be, "I'm a normal person, yet I nonetheless have these beliefs. You're a lot like me!" Because I know that if you peek beneath the surface of most people, you'll find one or more stories of experiences they've had they defy easy explanation, or cross over into the mystical and cannot rely on common language for description. Whether it's a story of an incredibly coincidence that made you stop and say out loud, "What were the chances of that?" or a dream in which you received information you couldn't possibly have known when awake--it's something that can't be explained but that we nonetheless know can happen, because we experienced it ourselves.

So the reason I think so many people ask me "How much does Maya remember from your trip?" is not even because they want to believe that the open door of childhood can persist into the teenage years and beyond, but because they already know it can and are looking for validation through hearing our story.

Here's what I think: that we're a whole society of closet mystics who've been conditioned to believe only in the sanctity of scientific proof, yet who nonetheless carry within us the deep knowledge that a whole lot is going on that the scientific method cannot explain to our own satisfaction.

What would it take to get more of us to come out?

Reporting from the Sacbe

Dr. Rosita sent me an email the other day that said, "Still on the Sacbe?" and it made me laugh out loud. Sacbes were the ancient Maya white plastered roads that ran from town to town, and between key points within cities. Yes, I'm still on the metaphoric sacbe, until November 19, at which point I get to go home and...take a three-day nap.

I'm in the Portland Airport now, about to take flight number 15 of 18 in total. Last night I did event number 21 out of 29. Whew.

Seriously. It's the longest sacbe ever!! Walking from Chichen Itza to Cozumel would be faster. But probably, with the mosquitoes and snakes and everything, a lot less fun.

A View from the Bay

Yesterday in San Francisco, I appeared on a local daytime TV show called The View from the Bay. It's been a while--at least two years--since I've done any TV, and to say I was rusty was a big understatement. I arrived at the ABC studio on Front Street minus a clean copy of my own book (bad, bad author!) and without any prep or practice at all.

Amazingly, it went well anyway.

These are the nicest, and I mean the nicest, staff and hosts I've come across in a long time. Everyone from Spencer Christian, who was one of the interviewers (remember him from ??) to Jason the segment producer to the guy who miked me before I went on stage was friendly and funny. Rarest of all these days, they all seemed to actually like their jobs.

This immediately put me as ease, so when a surprise of a question--"What did you expect to happen in Belize?"--was tossed my way and I blurted out, "Well, nothing!" and we all cracked up, it actually came across (I hope) okay.

The show is now Reason #357 why I'm in love with San Francisco. The fact that it's such a writing city and the existence of North Beach restaurants rank way up there, too.

You can see the show online here.

The Thing About Airports

Well, a couple of things about airports.

Carpeted hallways are much, much better than tiled ones. Way less noisy, and less likelihood you will slip and almost break your laptop while running to make a connecting flight.

Those little golf carts with the blinking light in front and the siren...how come I never notice them until they're just about to run me over?

I'm not convinced boarding people by groups speeds the process up at all. It might keep people from fighting for position, though I've only ever seen that happen in Tel Aviv.

Any coffee company other than Starbucks is a welcome sight.

Air blowers in the bathroom: are they really necessary?

Portland has the best airport stores. Los Angeles has the nicest Admiral's Club. At Cedar Rapids, you almost never have to wait in a line, and your bag is likely to get the single baggage carousel before you do.

If you leave anything on the plane like, say, the four decorated Halloween cookies you bought in Iowa City to bring home for your daughters in L.A.--forget it. They're already gone.

A gray Midwestern morning...

...is lifted up by a steaming cup of coffee in the right cafe, with free wireless access as an added plus. This morning it's Cafe Deluxe on Summit Street in Iowa City. For those of you who don't know Iowa City, Summit Street is a beautiful, wide, treelined street lined with big Victorian homes with large yards. I don't know for sure, but I'd guess that the town bigwigs of the early 20th century all lived here. It's got that kind of look.

About maybe 8 or 10 years ago, a little cafe opened in a tiny house right next to the railroad tracks. It's got the aura of another era--not the 1920s, but more the 40s and 50s--chrome swivel barstools, cast-iron tables and chairs, and a big glass display case up front filled with homemade cookies and cupcakes. Some kind of low-throated acoustic blues music is playing over the speakers pointed my way. It's the kind of place where you can only get half and half to go with your coffee, never milk, never lowfat milk god forbid, and the only kind of sweetener available is an old-fashioned glass sugar canister full of white granules. Domino Sugar, I'm guessing.

My daughters and I come here every summer. It's one of our favorite local spots. We usually stop by on Saturday mornings, on the way out of town to the Amish farmers' markets in Kalona. We pick up a coffee to go (for me) and a cookie and tea for them. Or banana bread. For the road.

It's too far from campus to be a student neighborhood but close enough for professors and families to bike into downtown, and as I'm sitting here now through the big glass windows up front I'm watching yellow leaves fall in the gentle wind and locals biking past. Not on the ubiquitous beach cruisers that have overtaken LA, but still on mountain bikes and true retro Schwinns with elegantly curved handlebars and triangular seats with exposed springs in the back. Today is the kind of autumn day that reminds you it's closer to winter than to summer now, with a heavy sky that's like a white lid pressing down on the town. This morning my friend Jennifer, with whom I'm staying for these three days, said if this were spring it would be a risk-of-tornado day, but being October it's just an autumn tipping point.

Many authors feel the best part of book tours is being in the midst of readers, appearing at bookstores, sitting in studios answering challenging questions (hopefully) from radio hosts. Ideally, back in a city you know well, and have friends, or where you once lived. But for me the best part is these quiet hours in the middle of the day when I'm neither in transit nor on the stage, just sitting by myself to regroup, refresh, renew, in a familiar environment. Cafe Deluxe. Definitely fits the bill.

Live taping in SF on 11/3--free tickets!

On Tuesday, November 3rd I'll be taping a live daytime TV talk show on ABC in San Francisco. The show has very generously extended an invitation to tickets to any of my friends who'd like to attend. If you're in SF and would like to come, here's the info from the show's audience coordinator, Rachel Wyatt, below:


I would like to extend a special invitation to Hope Edelman's friends, family and colleagues to be in our studio audience the day that she will be appearing on “The View From The Bay” Tuesday Nov. 3rd, 2009.

Meet Spencer Christian and Janelle Wang and get a chance to see the behind the scenes of a live television broadcast. Tickets for the show must be reserved in advance. Audience doors open at 2:15pm with a cut-off time of 2:30pm, the show is live from 3-4pm.

To reserve your seats please call the ticket request line at (415)-954-7733 or visit www.viewfromthebay.com and click on “be in our audience” and fill out a ticket request form.

Please be sure to note under “comments” if you are requesting a specific date to support someone scheduled to be on the show.

Please note that all seats must be reserved in advance. Tickets that have been requested will be sent via an email confirmation with detailed instruction on where and when to arrive at the ABC studio. Also note that audience members come in a separate entrance and time than guests appearing on the show. If you are a guest on the show and you will be bringing your guests with you they will need to check in with me (Rachel Wyatt) by 2:30pm to be seated in the audience.

Imagine This

After last Tuesday’s Oprah show, I received a flood of emails from friends and readers. The episode detailed the challenges and hardships faced by a Los Angeles family raising a 7-year-old daughter with severe schizophrenia. Their story first appeared in the LA Times this summer. Jani Schofield is a child who lives half in our world and half in her own, where dozens of animals and people compete for her time and attention—animals and people only she can see.

When I read the article online in July, I immediately emailed the link to my husband. “I’m not saying anything,” I wrote. “Just read it and tell me what you think.”

He emailed back within twenty minutes. “That was chilling,” was all he said.

To hear about a seven-year-old schizophrenic is troubling for any parent. It was especially so for us. As Jani’s parents revealed, their daughter’s hallucinations started at age two, when she began speaking of an elaborate posse of imaginary friends who goaded her into aggression. At first, they thought she had an overactive imagination. But then they became concerned that her behavior was taking an atypical turn.

As most of you know, our daughter also had series of “friends” at that age. This alone was not a problem. I had an imaginary companion as a child; my sister did, too. Ours came and went freely, and appeared completely benign. My daughter, on the other hand, talked about one of her “friends” constantly, in a manner more articulate and detailed than one might expect a two-year-old could manage. She described with utter conviction the island where he lived, a whole world she claimed she could see. As the months progressed, my husband and I became more than a little concerned.

Creativity or delusion? We couldn’t tell.

“It’s a normal developmental phase,” the pediatrician assured us. “She’ll grow out of it,” the therapist with whom we consulted said. When my daughter's behavior became mildly aggressive and she attributed her actions to her “friend,” we were told this, too, was within the normal range. But we were the ones who’d witnessed our daughter’s development every day since her birth. We felt that something else was going on, that the rote explanations we were given somehow weren't adding up.

Our quest to help our daughter eventually brought us to Maya healers in the Central American country of Belize. The trip yielded inexplicable yet effective results--a wholly unexpected outcome for a self-professed cynic like me.

To say some readers have disagreed with the parenting choices I made puts it mildly. Some have labeled me over-reactive and overprotective. The more blunt ones have called me a total nutcase.

What can I say? I also questioned my judgment, my motives, and my sanity nine years ago, and again as I wrote the story down. What kind of mother, I wondered, alows her imagination to tumble into such extreme and dramatic territory? Why couldn’t I sit back and let the “friend” disappear on its own? And then I read about the Schofield’s plight, and it confirmed that labeling (and self-labeling) a mother as an over-reacter is nothing short of maternal censorship. Sometimes, a mother’s intuition is her most powerful tool.

I don’t believe my daughter had early schizophrenia. Such a condition is incredibly rare, affecting only one out of 10,000-30,000 children, depending on the study quoted. I still don’t know what she had, only that in Belize its most negative aspects went away.

It’s possible she had a little-known phenomenon called a “paracosm,” a child’s fantasy world populated by people and animals, with its own geography and language. The Bronte siblings are believed to have had one; W.H. Auden, too. (Think of Terabithia, and you’ve got the idea.) Some researchers say paracosms are markers for extreme creativity in adulthood. It’s as atypical as childhood schizophrenia, though in a very different way. But to a parent who doesn’t understand the distinction, they look very much the same.

As every parent knows, raising a child is a journey, a rollercoaster and, above all, a mystery. We begin with the best intentions, only to discover we don’t have total control. No matter how many books we read, experts we consult, or plans we make, there is an unquantifiable element at work here, an enigmatic, indescribable ingredient that determines whether a child grows up happy, grows up secure, grows up safe. Parenting is as much about ambiguity as it is about certainty, as much about intuition and wonder as it is about fact.

It’s a tenuous, miraculous task to shepherd a child safely into adulthood. Yet we all carry within us the gut-wrenching, unspeakable knowledge that despite our best intentions, things can still go horribly wrong. It’s not hard to read about a family like the Schofields, a good, loving family that wants the best for their daughter and is determined to provide it, and think: if not but for the grace of god goes my family, too.

Frankly, if not but for the grace of something unknowable and unseen that guides parents—call it whatever you will—go us all.