This friend of mine, Felix, is an artist. He was at a certain juncture in his life and things were not coming easily. His soul was depleted, he was exhausted. What to do? His choice was quite brave, really brave in fact. He disappeared into Africa, lost himself in the savannah going walkabout with nothing but the shirt on his back. He said that he was going to return to the beginning, to where it all began, to start again. That was his joke, his jest, as he embarked, as he waved us goodbye at Tullamarine airport.
It must have been three years or so later, one Friday afternoon, when I received the call. Felix was back, just for a few days, could we catch up? When reunited with a dear friend the intervening period is as nothing. We embraced, drank heartily, shared a meal, a herby vegetarian goulash stew. While we soaked up each other's company we mopped up the rich sauce with chunks of sourdough. Finally our conversation turned to what had been happening in our own lives and he related his tale.
Felix was good to his word and upon arriving in Africa he made his way to the most remote villages, as in Marlow in The Heart of Darkness, towards the centre. At one of these places, a larger dusty run down town that was struggling with poverty, nothing much was working here aside perhaps from the human spirit, he awoke to find his bags missing, his wallet gone. He had nothing. A young man took pity and invited Felix to stay with his family in a nearby village. Felix was welcomed with open arms and was thus born into his new African identity. He even took a new name, or rather was given one, something that insinuated crazy white man he says. He learnt the language and rolled up his sleeves and participated in every aspect of village life that he could. Felix celebrated any responsibilities that were bestowed upon him, any duties that were required of him. He taught the children English. His soul stirred yet still no artistic impulse would come.
His arrival at the village coincided with the beginning of a drought. There was no rain. Soon the land began to suffer. The drought persisted for many months. Crops failed and supplies were running short but his new community, his new family always wore smiles, there was always laughter. Finally the rains came. What rains. Felix had never seen such rains. The rains came and they all danced about and there was joy.
Have you heard of the mopane moth, the emperor moth, of Africa? There is a symbiotic relationship between this species of moth, the mopane tree whose leaves the moths consume and some bees that make their hives inside this tree. The thing with these moths though is that when when the land is parched and all is hunger and suffering, when the land is terribly parched and the rains come, when the first rains come, millions of these moths hatch from the soil. They emerge as worms and feasting on the mopane tree's leaves grow quickly into fat and juicy caterpillars. Everyone comes, all of the savannah’s creatures come to the trees to feed on these caterpillars, to be replenished. Even creatures who usually keep their distance join together, hunger bringing them to the same table. A sudden abundance, enough for all, enough to bring all of the savannah's inhabitants back to health and vitality, enough to save what might otherwise soon have perished. To be near a mopane tree and witness this festival of life is to witness the beginning and the end says Felix, the whole cycle, compressed into a week.
The life script of these moths is incredibly precise. Hatch, eat and grow into juicy caterpillars, burrow underground to pupate, to transform and then reemerge and fly around in the moist air for just a few short days to mate and lay their eggs again, so many eggs. Only a few of these moths manage to fulfill the script though, one in a million. So many are eaten, others fail. They are the source of so much food, a boon of nature. The moths are called into being by the rain just when the land needs them and live their short lives against incredible odds, a sacrifice to the greater good. Their huge numbers ensure that some, enough, will succeed.
I’m sure by now you can already guess. As the rain fell Felix's drought broke too. A surge of creativity pulsed through his veins as he fed on these caterpillars. Their juice was the elixir, the very ambrosia of creativity itself, so full with nature's creative forces. Don’t think ooh yuck, caterpillars! Felix says their flavor is sublime!
According to Felix what he learnt from all this, from this overabundance of swarming moths, was that life is always swarming around us if only we choose to notice. When we open our eyes or ears we are greeted, bombarded even, by an overabundance of sense impressions, of sights and sounds, of impressions, each asking us to notice them. How grateful the rose that is admired! The rose is designed for attention, “look at me” it pleads, what vibrant color, look! Out of these impressions, within this ever blooming creation, we place our attention and select what to notice, choose what to digest with our thoughts. Sense impressions are the food of the soul. Without them we would surely vanish, we would fall silent, our minds would cease. Nature provides a veritable bounty of creation to hold us up and sustain us. With our attention we honor her and are born into creativity ourselves. Felix felt as though he had discovered a secret and from then on the way he looked at things, the way he gave his attention, would never be the same.
Felix also wondered about his own life cycle, his own life script, the human script and maybe a Felix script. Do we face similar odds? Is there a chrysalis, a transformation, awaiting each of us too? He certainly felt transformed. Would he fulfil his script and make it to the end? It was here in the midst of this festival of caterpillars that Felix felt his own creativity being called back into being and he knew that his chances of succeeding, of fulfilling his life plan, depended on it.
