“I'm going to kiss you,” said Lana.
“Okay,” I said.
“Me too,” said Amanda.
“Okay,” I said.
They were looking at me expectantly. Something more seemed to be required.
“Should I kiss you back?” I ventured.
“No,” they said, and that was that. They left. Maybe they'd just wanted to make sure I was really amenable.
Lana and Amanda are obviously not their real names, but as you've probably gathered, they didn't mean it That Way. This was the hall of our high school, and they were talking about the upcoming National Honor Society induction ceremony. They were members, and I was shortly going to be. One of them had to put the sash over my head and the other had to hand something to me. And, as they had just informed me, they planned to kiss me too.
I swear that it was not my fault that I was getting inducted. Lana and Amanda had been in since, god, at least sophomore year, whereas now we were seniors. Every year, a letter had politely informed me that I was “not outstanding enough.” (Man, the laugh 'Paula' and I had about that when I showed her the card that one time.) And don't get the idea I was actually applying, either. Consideration was automatic.
But somehow, now, I'd been chosen. I don't know why. I didn't take it seriously—and I had seen what happened to girls who did. I was actually in the room once when a girl confronted one of the teachers about why she hadn't been chosen that year. The teacher couldn't give her a clear explanation, and the disillusioned girl went for the jugular: “I see now that this is just a political organization. You let in who you want and keep out who you don't.”
Well, I did not want to be wanted. I have vague memories of throwing things when I found out. Certainly I dragged through the whole run-up like a wet blanket.
At least there was no time to actually be forced to participate in anything. The ceremony happened in April. We graduated in June. I went to exactly one meeting. (You're scratching your head. “Shouldn't the induction for each year happen, like, at the beginning of that year?” See above, re: not taking seriously.)
But the ceremony.
I was one of the first to process. I shook the principal's hand, tightly. (Paula *and* Jocelyn had both been kicked out of school by this time and I was not happy about it.) I went across the stage and received my benediction from Lana and Amanda. Lana left an imprint of her lipstick on my cheek.
Lana and Amanda both had really unusual hair, by the way. Lana's was brown and Amanda's was black, but the texture of both was thick and curly and very soft. It floated in a gel-assisted nimbus around their heads which probably sounds bizarre but was perfect if you could only see it. Lana was an exceptionally tiny dancer who drove a stick shift; Amanda was one of our Catholic school's few Jewish students and had traveled to Italy and France.
Having been decorated and kissed, I took my seat on the stage, which was in the front row before a table which had a candle on it. There was a lot of ceremony still to come. Determined to be polite and gracious despite my boredom and my hostility towards the school administration, I decided to focus on that tiny yellow star.
I'd never meditated before, and I've never meditated since, but I can tell you that I went all the way to Nirvikalpa Samadhi in that flame. I did not hear a single word that was said on that stage. I did not move. I was *in* that bright star. There was only its light, and the darkness it cast over everything else. There was only my pride, holding myself to that point.
Fortunately I retained enough residual awareness to snap myself out of it when the ceremony was over. I walked out feeling a little bit displaced and weird, but quite good overall; I felt I had been very proper and correct and well-behaved despite my seething hostility towards the organization, the school, and life in general. (Hey, I was eighteen.)
A girl came up to me. “Oh, my god. How did you DARE?”
Another one. “You freaked us out, Savannah. How did you do that?”
Another one. Another one. Another one.
“Huh?” I said.
My act of stern politeness had come across as a single-pointed rebellion. The candle was my symbolic middle finger, which my unmoving and unblinking focus had raised to the level of some kind of curse.
I hope it was a curse of peace.
