chapter two – yama 

Yama thanked Kelsey for the egg-salad sandwich, bag of salt-and-vinegar chips, six cookies, and two Juicy Juice drink boxes. She put them into her knapsack, which also held a flashlight, two books, and Buster’s biscuits. Buster met her at the side door. She had decided that they would take a long hike upstream. Brad had told her after the previous night’s dinner that he had seen five does near the first beaver flowage. Yama would like to see some deer, although she was unconvinced that Buster wouldn’t chase them away. Why not? she thought. What are we here for anyway?

This was a big fish day for the camp. Everyone except Yama was on the water before six o’clock. But Mommy said that after last night’s story, perhaps Yama would prefer to be by herself and think about it. She thought her mother was right. All this talk about penetration was unsettling. She needed some time in the woods and at the hermitage. 

Yama decided that she and Buster would walk upstream quietly. Even if they didn’t see any deer, it was a beautiful spot for a picnic, according to Brad. If Buster didn’t see any deer to chase, he’d love to try to “snag” a squirrel, as Brad would say. Yama’s plan included a stop at the hermitage to pray and read, and then she’d return to the lodge for lunch, followed by more reading and a nap before Mommy and Daddy returned for sundowners. She liked to fish, but not all the time. So far she had gotten the biggest one, a two-pound, something-ounce trout and the most white suckers. She liked catching suckers. They tugged hard and swam straight to the bottom. Brad said that once they got their smoker together, he’d take all Yama could catch. She thought she would like smoked fish. She liked Mommy’s smoked sausage that looked like a fat pinecone. Maybe tomorrow she’d slaughter some more suckers. But right now, she needed a day off.

Yama saw wood smoke coming out the hermitage chimney. She knew that Brad must have gotten up very early to say his prayers. She opened the back door, but no one was there. She liked the loft room best, and she motioned to Buster to climb up the narrow stairs. She always tried to be quiet here. She thought of this place as her Zen Mountain Maine retreat. She felt alone today. She felt lost inside. 

Buster panted and looked down at Yama as she slowly climbed the stairs. The little room was as she had left it two days earlier. She lit three candles: one for Mommy and Daddy, one for Jiso Bosatsu, the protector of children, and one for the rest of the world. Yama believed that all creatures—all sentient or feeling creatures, as Buddhists believe—are in a process of waking up from everyday sleep. It seemed to her that after they woke up, they went back to sleep. She hadn’t met any enlightened people. Even Edward was grumpy sometimes, but he said that waking up was like electric sleep. People became more connected to everyone and everything. And, he said, they laughed a lot—well, some did. Others were more subdued, grumpy. Yama prayed that she would wake up and not get caught in someone like Mommy and Daddy’s odd, dull story.

Yama read the Morning Gatha:

Waking up this morning, I smile.

Twenty-four brand new hours are before me.

I vow to live fully in each moment

and to look at all beings with eyes of compassion.

She was thinking about eyes of compassion as she gave two biscuits to Buster. She ate half her egg-salad sandwich and drank one Juicy Juice. She looked out the window. The wind was picking up, and Yama could see whitecaps splashing on Crow Rocks. She hoped her parents were fishing in a protected cove. She trusted them in a boat. They had come ashore several times in the past week because it had gotten windy. They had had fun eating cold s’mores and drinking hot chocolate. No, she didn’t worry about them on the water. But off the water? She was beginning to worry about them. That was not a funny bedtime story that Mommy told her last night. Yama thought about it again.

Mommy said that in the Middle Ages, about eight hundred years ago, the Church—there were two then, the Roman Catholic and the Orthodox—allowed boys and girls to get married when they were very young. Sometimes marriages were arranged, like in India today. The girl had to be at least twelve, and the boy had to be around fourteen. Many times the girls married much older men because their first wives had died in childbirth—or just died. Plagues and Crusades and Inquisitions killed many people. 

Mommy said there was a girl named Simonis Palaiologina, the daughter of an emperor. Her parents told her to marry a fifty-year-old man named Croll, who lived in Serbia. The emperor wanted to unite his kingdom with the Serbian empire to form a bigger empire. The Church didn’t like it because the girl was only five years old. Mommy said that although Simonis might not have been happy about marrying this old man, happiness isn’t everything. So the girl married Croll, who penetrated her that night. 

Yama couldn’t believe it. Her parents talked a lot about her being happy, but they acted like happiness wasn’t a big deal for Simonis. Yama didn’t consider that a very good bedtime story, and it kept her awake, thinking of someone penetrating her. The only hope she had for Simonis was that the Serbian emperor had a small phallus. 

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