Saucy Tales and Bikini Veils (Excerpt)

I DON'T REMEMBER GROWING UP. I remember being a little baby, I actually do. I remember craving milk, sleeping in a cradle, and looking at people from far below. I remember holding experiments to find out things like 'does the refrigerator light stay on when its door is closed' and 'do noises and sounds actually dampen when I shut my ears -in other words are my ears the volume knobs to the world or are they just mine?' And I remember being a dorky little kid who read till he dropped. I just couldn't stop reading. I remember listening to my elderlies' and school teachers' saucy tales and asking them questions they didn't answer. I remember them telling stories about why they wouldn't, and I remember me thinking, and eventually saying, that they probably couldn't. I remember stubbornly arguing with everyone about almost everything. I was rarely satisfied.

Now apparently I've 'grown up' and, suddenly, I see myself getting smiles, often sympathetic, sometimes hypocritical, and at times empty. I hear myself being branded with both good and bad adjectives. I'm frequently reassured that I'm only reacting, that I'm passing through a phase, and that I'll change with time. Who doesn’t! Every moment in life is a phase. That doesn’t change what’s going on in its span.

Now that, I guess, I've grown up, I realize that I maybe right or wrong on issues. And although I am not completely sure about anything, I do know some things. I know that I belong to a veiled, censored, and often violent society. It's veiled, both physically and morally. Some women wear head veils, others wear bikini ones. The men? They're just as veiled as the women. Individualism has been dying in this society. But then again, maybe it was never exactly kicking. The veil extends to many areas of society: music, movies, books, the media, and all forms of expression. Is it a coincidence that Lebanese artists and writers have traditionally been unable to make it in our society? The list is long starting as far back as Gibran. Today, we are seeing glimpses of change. I hope this trend will mature and prosper. Still, most of our collective talent is scattered around the world, lamenting their luck, stuck in 9-5 jobs in Dubai or Saudi, or struggling to make it day to day in the west. All our society does is take foolish pride in them. Those who dare come back may be threatening their intellectual freedom and span. The boundaries of our collective intellect are LBC in the north, the name of the airport in the south, Crystal nightclub in the east, and the large unending sea of mediocrity in the west. We have killed each other so many times, and we may just do it again. Once around before there’s no one left. We prolong our own suffering by grasping on to worn-out political and social traditions and regurgitating the same slogans without pondering their meanings. It never occurs to us to rethink our ways. We can’t think further than our own hairdo’s. Bleak picture? The bad news is that instead of anyone constructively criticizing, trying to know the real story and telling it as it is (after all, that would be the first step in bringing about positive change, wouldn't it?), everyone is caught up in what I like to call the Rahbani syndrome: singing praise of the beauty and perfection of our country and of our ways. We grew up with a nauseating national pride. We knew we were it. The country. The history. The heritage. Don't get me wrong; it's fine to say that Lebanon's beauty is the envy of the rest of the world. My problem is, where is this beauty today? OK, so you drive a while and you find some of it untouched, kind of. But how long would it be till someone else finds what you have found and does the perfectly Lebanese thing to do -cut it up and sell it? It's great to take pride in the commercial success of our Phoenician ancestors, but what about their literature and intellectual heritage? Where is it? All right, it's also fabulous to boast about our monotheistic traditions and of our being the ‘model’ of inter-religious coexistence, whatever that means! But, say we accept that coexistence is a good thing, my question remains, where is it? Where is this coexistence? More importantly, how is this spirit of coexistence affecting tolerance of others who are disqualified by monotheism? What issues is the political establishment debating besides who puts up which tents? Will my asthma ever get better given the levels of pollution and smoke in public places? How many more people have to die before we enforce traffic laws? When will I be able to see a movie, read a book, or even receive a mail package without the active participation of our lovely censors? Who decides who thinks what?

As my generation began 'growing up,' with Fayrouz and Sabah’s patriotic songs ringing in our heads, many of us started comparing notes: Oh, oh! We're not the greatest society in the world. We're not better than everyone else. Actually, in many ways, we are a bit worse! Oh my God, Lebanon is not God's paradise on earth. A goat’s dwelling in Lebanon is not the envy of the whole world. The result was a black hole in our minds. Some of us couldn't, or wouldn't, see the forest because of the trees. They denied what they plainly saw and played on with the charades. The rest treated this new insight in one of two ways. Some trusted their vision and stuck to their ideas. They revolted against the status quo and waged little wars, facing little losses, little gains, or general marginalization. Others started looking for another paradise on earth: Canada? The US? France? The Gulf? What, they're all the same? They all have faults? So many of us today are caught up in limbo, living somewhere and waiting to grab the chance to move back or forth somewhere else. In, out, tick, tock, or so the story goes for our lot. Are we finally waking up and smelling the coffee? Or is it the smell of mendacity, as Tennessee Williams so delightfully put it, that’s finally awakening us? Are we growing up? How can we know if we are?

I am forty years old. How in the name of all Broadway shows did I get here? I still habitually forget that I’m not 17 anymore. When did I start realizing all the above? Why don't I remember growing up? I have thought about this glitch in my memory and have found a few potential explanations for this bizarre phenomenon.

The first is that I was never a child. Maybe no one ever is. Maybe we're all born as grown ups, but we're limited by our physical appearance and by our elderlies' need to prove that they're better. I mean juvenile voting is a legitimate idea. Articles have appeared in respectable reviews about it. Could be.

The second is that the process of growing up is so slow and routine that it is impossible for anyone to remember growing up. Instead, though we don't always ponder the meaning of them, we remember growth enhancing incidents such as losing one's virginity and reading long meaning-infested books. Therefore, there is a possibility that the issue is not just mine but a symptom of the human condition. The problem with this logic is that it feels to me as though it's the opposite. The passing of time is not slow at all. On the contrary, it is really fast. It’s still a possibility though.

The third possibility is that growing up is such a hard process that people just push it away from the accessible parts of their brains. Maybe growing up in my society was so hard that I too unknowingly pushed the set-aside button in my brain. That's understandable when we consider the violent mess that my generation grew up in. It's even more understandable when we consider that my generation is being charged with the economic and social cost of resolving that mess and rebuilding the country.

The fourth possibility is that I haven't grown up. Maybe no one ever does. Maybe that's human nature. Maybe we're all just children. That would explain the way we look down on juvenile intellect. We could be jealous that we no longer exercise it. On the other hand, maybe people do grow up, but it's just me and my society that haven't. Maybe we need to finally decide that we want to grow up. Only then can growth take place. Could be.

Revisited excerpt from Edentown, a self published work. www.edentown.org