Contemplating Czechoslovakian Check-Outs: Staring at a Wall to Meditate Again
Or: Justin Soto #2
During my birthday weekend, I found myself in State College.
My foodie friend had enrolled in an ice cream class (hilariously titled “Ice Cream 101”) and had asked me to tag along. I’d been feeling called to escape the vortex of Pittsburgh - albeit briefly - and took great delight in the prospect of traveling during my birthday but not specifically for my birthday.
It’s been a long time since I celebrated my solar return by getting drunk, but I still wanted to do something to mark the occasion. So on the afternoon of the beginning of my 38th trip around the sun, I found myself staring at a wall again.
“Bro, you sure you don’t want a ginger ale or something at least??”
Once again, my friend Justin Pickul and I agreed to sit for 30 minutes and then send each other prompts.
I settled my bum onto the footrest ottoman of the cuck chair in the hotel room, found a seemingly unremarkable spot on the wall, and got busy doing nothing.
During this sit, I disappeared for half a blink into the fabric of spacetime. I felt like I was out of my body, like Doctor Strange knocked me into the astral realm. And two messages came through. The first was: There is nothing to overthink because everything already is. This is a bumper sticker statement to be sure, but dang if I didn’t FEEL it during this sit. The second message was for me, but definitely felt universal: For the love of God, let people help when they offer.
Pictured: A hotel wall, the fabric of spacetime, or a close-up of a yassified lizard.
If you’d like to try this practice yourself, here are the prompts Justin sent. Below them you’ll see my stream-of-consciousness response followed by a slightly tidier version.
Prompts:
By means of a lottery, you are chosen to marry into royalty.
In what ways does fear keep you small?
A stillness entered the forest…
My unedited response:
According to my mother, her grandfather was betrothed to a Czechoslovakian princess. Now I wonder if it was a lottery, because if we came from nobility, where did that affluence go? What would it take for someone to reject that? According to my mother, her grandfather fled the country rather than marrying. I can't ask her for more details, nor can I really trust her. Did this mistrust stem from that fall from nobility? I'm beyond blaming my mother - even in my worst victim days, I think I'd have a hard time blaming her beatings on a runaway groom. But if epigenetics is to be believed, my great-grandfather could have passed that - and other - traumas on to the child who would become my Tata; her father. What if it was the first time that line betrayed itself, saying yes when they really meant no, and realizing on the way to the chapel that they could take control of their narrative. Maybe to this great-tata, nobility was like the internet - common, ubiquitous, boring. Maybe running away was his first true act of creation. I think about the first time I tried to run away, how I hid in the part of the lower yard we called Secret Garden, hoping my mother would drive by, then deciding to ask her for a ride to the highway. I was ready to go - I had packed a bag filled with essentials (most likely books, matches, and a lantern). I don't remember how she convinced me to stay, but maybe that was a replay of the incident with her grandfather and his betrothed. Freud, eat your heart out! Who knows where I would have been had she let me go? Who knows where he'd have been had he stayed.
My slightly tidier version:
According to my mother, her grandfather was betrothed to a Czechoslovakian princess. Now I wonder—was it a lottery? Because if we came from nobility, where did all that affluence go? What would it take for someone to walk away from that?
According to my mother, he fled the country rather than marry. I can’t ask her for more details, nor can I really trust her. Did that mistrust start with this supposed fall from nobility—from the idea that a life of privilege could vanish overnight? That stories about our past could be just that—stories, shifting with the teller? Maybe she learned early on that truth was fluid, that history could be rewritten, just like her grandfather rewrote his.
I’ve long since stopped blaming my mother—even at my worst self-pitying victim days, I don’t think I could blame her beatings all the way back to a runaway groom. But if epigenetics holds weight, my great-grandfather could have passed that—and other—traumas on to his child, who would become my Tata.
What if that moment was the first time our lineage betrayed itself—someone saying yes when they really meant no, only to realize, somewhere on the way to the chapel, that they could rewrite their story? Maybe, to this great-tata, nobility was just background noise, like the internet is to us now—common, ubiquitous, dull. Maybe running away was his first true act of creation—creation of freedom, or anonymity, or maybe simply creating a new story.
Maybe that instinct to create a new story was passed down, too.
I think about the first time I tried to run away. How I hid in the overgrown part of the lower yard we called the Secret Garden, waiting for my mother to drive by. How I eventually decided to ask her for a ride to the highway. I was ready—my bag packed with essentials (most likely books, matches, and a lantern). I don’t remember how she convinced me to stay, but maybe that moment was a kind of replay of the one with her grandfather and his betrothed. Freud, eat your heart out.
Who knows where I would have ended up if she had let me go? Who knows where he would have ended up if he had stayed?
