The Human Boy, Narrative #1

The Boy

Uluru, and the Sacred Nut

Far off across the great sea, in a different land altogether, something was happening. In the heart of the desert, at a base of the giant sacred monolith, a young mute boy with brown skin and black hair sat cross-legged, his bare feet resting upon the red-orange sand. He was naked in the warmth of the desert air except for the loincloth that he wore. The mountainous monolith with all its nooks and crannies held the heat of the day’s departing sun, and small fire of gathered sticks burned nearby.

Hookum the wise-man sat across from the boy in the sand with his back against the warm rock face. Hookum’s face was a kind face, browned by the sun, with a large nose and an easy smile. His hair was aged with gray short wisps, whimsically disheveled. Although he was an old man, he was still full of life and humor. His body was still strong and sturdy, and yet his mind was thoughtful and wise.

The boy sat with brown curious eyes wondering what Hookum would show him next. Hookum wore his usual leather pouch around his neck with its mysterious contents, and his walking stick was propped up against a nearby boulder. Hookum began to speak and his voice was warm and aged.. “The dream walk-a-about! It is a way to come to your senses. You always carry a stick. A stick is a sacred tool! Did you know that? A walkabout can happen in your dreams, or in real life, but you see, life itself is a dream as well -there is no difference!” The boy watched as Hookum undid the leather drawstring of the pouch and produced forth a small brown withered object crisscrossed with lines. “Take this seed, for example, it has potential! It is a nut. Meditate on the nut itself - the nut of creation!”

The boy watched, and gazed at the nut in the man’s open palm. The boy waited.

“Let me tell you a story,” Hookum said: “Let us say there is a being somewhere. Imagine that this being finds this nut. Imagine that I cast this nut from the mountain top and it falls into a river and flows out to sea. You see?” Hookum face broke a smile, and he mimed trowing the nut off into the distance to illustrate his point. “Space is like a river and dreams are like seeds!” He explained. “Where does this nut wash ashore, you think? Hmmm?

Hookum paused and looked and the boy seriously. The boy’s brown eyes scrutinized Hookum, wondering. He looked at the nut. He looked at the brown warm rocks behind Hookum, the sacred rock, Uluru and he waited for Hookum to continue.

The man’s face broke into a smile. “I will tell one possibility!” Hookum Laughed and picked up his walking stick and began drawing a bunch of wavy lines the sand near his bare feet. He pointed as his sand drawing; “This is the ocean of dreams, the waterhole in the night sky! And here is the nut.” He placed the brown withered nut on the wavy lines. “The rainbow snake of creation which is the great ancestral spirit that exists through all things will carry the nut on the waves of ocean time. Imagine that It washes up on a shore... some distant shore where it grows into a wondrous tree on a sandy beach of some island. Perhaps beings would come from all around to marvel at this beautiful tree that is unlike any they have seen before. Or perhaps a sea turtle eats the nut, or buries it deep within the sand, Like this!” Hookum stabbed into the sand with his stick, laughing. The picture in the sand was scattered and destroyed and Hookum laughed uproariously. He turned to look at the boy, and shrugged. “Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps!!! -but it is up to you do decide what happens! …the potential!, it is the potential.”

The boy thought about this and looked at Hookum's smiling face. Hookum’s own weathered, face full of lines, looked like a brown nut with a beard and hair, the boy though.

“Oh ho ho ho?!!!” laughed Hookum, uproariously, looking at the expression no the boys face.

After a moment, Hookum handed the boy the stick, “Perhaps you would like to draw something.” The boy started to draw in the sand. The boy liked to draw things very much. He scratched in the sand. First he drew a circle. He liked to draw things just so. A circle felt good to draw, and for a while that is all he drew - a circle was all that was appropriate. The boy had a special gift, his left eye saw colors and his right eye saw pattern. If he put one hand over his right eye, his left eye saw the world in soft colors, yet fractured, like the broken ripples of a pond. His right eye saw the forms of things, like a black and white image. He liked to combine both ways of seeing in his drawings. When he looked at the images that he drew, sometimes he even saw the images move. This was what it was like to draw his dreams.

The sun was just beginning to set behind Uluru and Hookum set back and watched the boy as he placed a few more stick on the fire. The boy loved the old man, and had come to be very familiar with his company. He loved his stories, the smiles lines around his eyes, his warm sense of humor. He looked up and noticed that Hookum's face was more serious then usual as he met the boy’s eyes.

“Let me ask you something...” began the man, and as he spoke his leather pouch rose and fell on his chest. “Would you like to go on a special trip with me?”

Yes... Yes I would. The boy wanted to learn everything the old man had to teach him. Hookum had taken the boy to Uluru a few time times this season, and every time Hookum had taught him something new. The boy nodded.

“Oh... Yes? ...Well then if that is what you want, I must ask you a very important question first.

The boy nodded.

“What is the most important thing to you?”

The boy thought hard, what was the most important thing? He thought of the important people in his life. He thought of his sister-friend back in the village. She was one of his favorite people. He thought of the other boys and girls. The boy thought about his mother. He looked up at Hookum and wondered what the correct answer was. There were too many thoughts in his mind. They cluttered his mind like too many images crammed into a small place. How could his mind hold so many images. I don’t know.

Hookum looked hard at the boy, “You do not know? What is more important to you then anything else?”

The boy looked down at his feet and at the stick that was in his hand. A sacred tool. He thought about how happy he was when his sister told him that his images where beautiful. He thought of all the times Hookum had taken him to this sacred place. Images.. he thought. Are my images the most important thing?

“Perhaps you must think about it some? It is alright if you do not have the answer. I will ask you again later.” Hookum stood up then, and looked into the setting sun, “I have something special I must do now. You must not follow me. ...Think about what it is that I have asked. I will be back soon. Will you tend to the fire.”

The boy watched Hookum walk off with his walking stick amongst the smooth rocky outcroppings, his bare feet upon the orange sand in the fading light, until he disappeared around a fold in Uluru. The boy knew that Hookum sometimes went to secret places inside of Uluru that only older wise men where allowed to go. The boy knew that Uluru was a very special place but Hookum had never shown him the most secret places.