by Adam Tervort
Yo-yo Ma wrote an amazing essay for NPR's “This I Believe” series. In it he talked about the challenges he had in deciding which culture he came from. He is ethnically Chinese, born and raised in France, and lives and works in the USA. Each side pulled at him to accept what they are as what he is, but he wanted to be more than any one because he saw the value and beauty in each of the cultures that were a part of him. He didn't decide, he just made his own culture. This explains a lot of why he can weave together groups like the Silk Road Project with musicians from many different countries and musical traditions into one cohesive whole. He can accept the good in any culture. I'm glad that I have lived in Asia long enough to see that there isn't any one "correct" or "best" culture, they are all valid and have aspects that could improve lives. You don't have to choose, just absorb any good culture into the culture of you.
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I wish that I could say that the poem "Invictus" is a long-time favorite of mine and that Victorian poetry is just one of the many still waters that run deep in Adam land, but alas (and alack) 'tis not true. Like a lot of people, I first learned about this poem from the Clint Eastwood movie "Invictus" about Nelson Mandela and the South African rugby team. It isn’t a long-time favorite of mine, but a recent favorite. What have I learned from my time in Taiwan?
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
(by William Ernest Henley)
So are you. Go out and live like you already know it, even if you don't. Learn that it's true, because it is. You are the master of your fate; the world is open to you. Take it, live your life to the fullest, because you are the captain of your soul, make your journey the most magnificent it can be.
Epilogue
I guess I've come full circle.
This epilogue isn’t about minimalism or simplicity or any of the other nice things that I usually write about. It’s about hate and rage and murder. It’s about the audacity of an evil marauder who has invaded my house and upset the balance of my life. It’s about fear so strong that it makes you want lie down and puke all over yourself. That’s right, I’m talking about spiders.
And not just any spider, the spider which, for the past 10 days, has made its home in my office. Now, since I am a minimalist, you know it’s not a proper office, it’s really just the room where you find my desk that I work at, our family’s books, and our closets. It isn’t a big room, but I guess spidey likes it all right, he’s decided that he’s going to call it home.
He invaded on a rainy Sunday afternoon. The problem with living in a semi-tropical country like Taiwan are that there are big spiders and snakes here. Maybe someday I’ll tell some of my harrowing tales of near-death that involve snakes (big exaggeration, but I have seen a cobra!), but today we’re sticking with the eight-legged freaks, OK? Stay focused! So, when it rains hard, the spiders might decide that your nice, dry apartment looks like a better deal than the rain-soaked outside world. This hasn’t happened to me but a few times in my eight years here, and it’s a good thing or I would have gone into cardiac arrest long ago.
On Sunday, February 27 I was enjoying a nice Sunday afternoon nap with the family, when the phone rang. My wife came back from taking the call to inform me that there was a “really big spider on the ceiling,” as if this is something that I would really want to see. After arming myself with a broom and wishing that I could suddenly take up whiskey, I laid eyes on the fiend for the first time. He was huge, more like a small gorilla than a spider really. Hunched there on the ceiling, looking pleased as pie that I was so terrified that I might lose my lunch and my bladder at the same time. My wife patted me on the shoulder as she went out (the call was for her to take something downstairs) she told me she knew I would protect the family, voice dripping in sarcasm almost as thick as the venom I could almost see dripping off the spider’s fangs. I held tight to my trusty broom as I tried to get up the courage to face this horrific foe. The first time I tried to rush in and attack, my legs turned to rubber and I had to drag myself back out to safety before the enemy could sense his advantage and finish me off. When I finally worked myself up for a second attempt, he was gone! Vanished, poofed away into thin air. It took but a moment for me to see how serious this development was; I would not be able to do anything in that room now. A killer was lurking there, and it would only take one moment of unwariness for him to pounce on me from behind and sever my spinal cord with his massive fangs and put me out of my misery. Does my life insurance cover death by spider? It better, even though this one could surely qualify as a natural disaster or act of God.
The coward stayed hidden the rest of the fretful day. Just entering that room became an elaborate dance. Head in the door, check the ceiling, head out. Head in, check the wall by the light switch, head out. Hand in, light switch on, jump inside with a war cry sure to send fear into his little arachnid heart. And every time, no spider (and ridicule from my family. My wife thinks I’m so yellow that I should be called banana, and my kids thought this was a great way to enter every room in the house, without realizing this dance might save their father’s life someday.) That night when I got on Skype to call a friend, the villain returned. He was on the door of my closet, and ran away so fast it was obvious he knew what kind of warrior he was up against. He stayed hidden until yesterday, probably driven mad by the knowledge that he would either starve or be forced to face me in a final showdown.
Yesterday morning I was up early, as usual, writing in the office, having almost convinced myself that the bugger had bugged out and wouldn’t return. My spider dance had long since ended; I had entered rooms like a normal human for days now. As I was serenely typing away, very in the writing zone, thank you very much, I heard the horrid click click click of arachnid feet on wooden dresser. I spun around just in time to see him running back to his hiding place, looking gaunt and withered from a week of fear. (Or maybe that was me, I’m not sure.) I knew a final confrontation must be coming. I armed myself with my trusty broom, and found an old bottle of Raid. Surely with these tools I could vanquish the foe once and for all. Writing completely forgotten, I sat there waiting for him to meet me on the field of honor, but he gave me no satisfaction whatsoever. When it was obvious his fear was so overwhelming he wouldn’t come out, I was forced to return to real life and go to work. Baaah!
I asked my brother-in-law about spider killing last night. He is the extended family’s apparent expert. He laughed at me and told me that no one ever kills spiders with brooms, what I really needed was rubber bands. (Huh?) He says four rubber bands will take out two or three legs at once, and then you can take the spider down at your leisure. I was so excited, I felt like I was in the presence of a great hunter. He said he’d help on Wednesday evening. Finally, I thought, only 48 hours and I’ll be rid of this horror.
This morning I was up at 5, into the office (with no dancing, thanks,) and didn’t even see the spider who was waiting at knee level next to the door. He was so scared of me he didn’t move a bit, and it took me a few minutes to realize that he was there, in the open. Broom in hand, reaching for the Raid, I knew that this could be it. And then he ran again, into the space made by a partially opened drawer of the dresser. I furiously attacked with the Raid (understanding fully that I was guaranteeing myself a morning of laundry, and finding this a small price to
pay for victory) spraying both sides of the drawer, and then waiting for the monster to emerge. He did, covered in the stuff, and dodged two brilliant blows with the broom which made me howl like a berserker, surely waking up half of the residents of our building and earning their unending animosity. And I still didn’t get it! It made it back around the corner of the dresser and to safety.
All morning now I have been daydreaming of its slow, painful, Raid-induced demise. Surely it caught a lethal dose, I saw the stuff all over its body. I can almost hear its neural connections breaking like the strings of a grand piano in an inferno, twang! twang! twang! I hope that its exoskeleton melts away, that whatever essential internal organs the beast happens to have are turned into a poisonous soup and run out through its eyeballs, that it loses itself in a decent into madness as its central nervous system is attacked by the weapon of arachnatical mass destruction I have released on it. And I hope that it has the decency to crawl back out into the middle of the floor to die so that I will know it’s really done for.
Well, glad I got that off my chest. I’m sure I’ll get back to writing about nice, fluffy things like decluttering and house cleaning soon unless the spider comes back. In that case I’ll probably be spending a couple of weeks in a place with padded walls, nice and safe.
About the Author
Adam Tervort was born in northern Utah and grew up in the Kansas City, Missouri area. Since 2005 he has lived and worked in Taiwan as a writer and English teacher. His wife, Mei-yun, and three children, Emerson, Langston, and Adriana consider him to be a bit wacky but mostly harmless and lovable. He welcomes readers to contact him as long as they have less than eight legs, if you happen to be a spider then keep to yourself.
He can be reached through Adam Tervort.com, his blog Lean, Mean, Minimalist, or by Twitter.