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[5/12/2002 4:47:03 PM..............
Today there is no practice ou therapy with the kids, each one is at home right now, telling their moms how much they love them. Mother's Day, I write a letter to my mom in Campos Elísios. Been a long time since I last saw her. Need to go there one day to visit her. I miss the wind that blows throughout the land, that limitless blue sky, the childhood friends I don't even know if I can still find living in that city. I like Santos very much, but I know not many friends here. My life is full of tribulation, so I don't have time for friendship, chat with a circle of friends around a table full of bottles of beer, though I don't drink, I must recognize I miss these moments and hold them dear. Staying alone like this through nights and days can eventually make you think it's a natural thing. A voluntary isolation as the one preached by Rainer Maria Rilke, isolation we can learn to live together with ourselves with. There are people, and they're not few, whose greatest fear is to be alone. But not the fear of loneliness that is inflicted on so many people, it's the fear of catching themselves alone with themselves. Perhaps because it forces them to face the person they are most afraid of. I'm not like this, but must admit I can be really isolationist and self-sufficient at times. And I don't think people should be like this. Solidarity is getting more and more difficult to find, streets are getting colder and colder, especially for those who have them as their only dwelling. Thrown this way and that by municipalities from one city to another, without any roots or a place to call a home.
About Rainer Maria Rilke, there's a beautiful poem - as usual - I have found at The Rainer Maria Rilke Archives, called Autumn:
The leaves are falling, falling as if from far up,
as if orchards were dying high in space.
Each leaf falls as if it were motioning "no."
And tonight the heavy earth is falling
away from all other stars in the loneliness.
We're all falling. This hand here is falling.
And look at the other one. It's in them all.
And yet there is Someone, whose hands
infinitely calm, holding up all this falling.
Translated by Robert Bly
[5/13/2002 2:34:23 PM..............
Six-thirty in the morning. I heard the sound of the iron outside door open for the fifth time. And the kids were four. Galhardo and Morales seemed to know better than anybody who was coming our way.
"The big shot is coming", he said, "it seems he's recovered very well."
"Who?", I asked, still with Mr. Costa in mind.
"Panotti", he said simply, looking at Morales, before turning his eyes to me, "I know it's him because we were here yesterday when he came back and said he was coming today."
I had almost forgotten about him. I already have four in mind, not five. But it seems to me I'll have to make some more room in my memory. I only didn't know how much space I'd need for the operation.
And it was really Mr. Costa. But there was somebody else with him. And this was Panotti. But when he walked in, bright and nice-looking I fell prey to vertigo. I knew him. That face. Had seen it before, in another time, another place.
André. The same I lived with and wrestled with in Arcadia.
"Well, there's news, as I've already commented. Miss Grisam is here to work with you for the team's self-esteem and confidence... Miss Grisam, this is Panotti. Panotti, this is Miss Grisam..."
"André...?", I couldn't help but saying it.
The kid got scared from the top of his experienced eleven years of existence. He looked at Mr. Costa and at the others that were staring at me, all of us caught in a crossfire of looks you'd only see in games like Killer. I felt I had said the wrong thing. I could simply pretend I didn't know him from Adam. And I failed to do it. Now I'm about to reap what was sown.
"How come you know my Christian name is André???"
and he look at Mr. Costa, dumbfounded. Looked at the others. Astonishment was the order of the day. No one was able to escape it. No one had told me anything. No one commented much about him. No one would let me lie about it. Why would I lie to them?
"Who did you wrench information from if not from anyone of us? Were you investigating the archives of the association?", Mr. Costa seemed to be astonished and annoyed at the same time, in a mix of feelings that was bizarre and full of shades that would take him nowhere.
"It's a long story."
"We'll sit down and you'll tell us the story, blow by blow.", Mr. Costa said.
If I tell them what really happened, they'll find me a room in a psychiatric hospital. I have to make up a story. I tell them it was a dream with premonitory characteristics. Yet I felt they were somehow on the verge of calling a specialist to help me with my problem; what they really knew was that they had no better explanation for what had happened.
"Did your mother and sister get well from dengue?"
Well, it did worsen it all. The kid rose to his feet, started walking backward, always staring at me. Figueira, iconoclastic, had a field day, "what's up Panotti, are you afraid of the lady? She's not giving you a wrench, take it easy."
Even frightened, Panotti looked at Figueira with the typical air of those who are soon to pick a quarrel. I approached the kid to talk. He didn't know what to do with the novelty, not mentioning the fact he would have to see me every day, work together and all.
"I know it sounds strange, but I usually have this kind of dream. When I hear people talk a lot about somebody, it seems I get too sensitive about it. Memories of things I never lived started occuring to me, that's all."
Well, it took about half an hour until Mr. Costa went away not really convinced with my explanation. I wouldn't be convinced by it either. But what I can't deny is that they were completely amazed at it. They asked me if it was like The Sixth Sense, the movie with Bruce Willis. I laughed and said it was alike, without mentioning the state of vigil. André, that I will call Panotti from now on, sat at my side, but kept an eye on me. I put him in the picture - I needed to change the subject - of what we had done before he came back, because the rest, that is, my purpose here he had heard from Mr. Costa. He got highly interested in the trust exercise I had given the others and was willing to try. The first was Galhardo. Then it was Morales. And he would really let himself fall freely and the two would help him promptly, he was completely relaxed, heart and soul. With Zangrandi, he only managed at the third attempt, what really leapt to my eyes immediately. With Figueira, nothing happened I could not foresee: he simply didn't manage. Confidence here at point zero. I and Figueira exchanged looks, without any verbal agreement. He had fully understood the purpose of my "mutual confidence detector." At the counterproof the results didn't vary much from the last time, only Galhardo and Morales also gave themselves away to the fall when it was Panotti to hold them. Galhardo and Morales had also improved much their performance with each other since they first did it. The threesome were a united group within the team, I realized they were going to connect completely, mutually. Between Figueira and Zangrandi, there was no change I could notice; what I mustn't forget is that it's only the second time I apply this practice with them.
[5/14/2002 2:36:34 PM..............
Today Figueira arrived exactly at six. Had I arrived five minutes late, he'd have to stay outside waiting at the gates of Corporal. I hate keepings keys of a house that's not mine. It can breed the kind of comment like the absurdity of Mr. Costa when he said I tried to get information from Corporal's computer.
As he usually did, he didn't greet me as he walked in, looked around the practice hall, tied his right shoe. I thought it would be nice to ask him a question: how it felt working with Panotti.
"Nice. Just don't tread on his toes."
Then added he wasn't afraid of Panotti, but rather respected him. "He'd never teach me what he knows. But it makes no difference."
"I wonder if you can learn through observation."
He looked strangely at me and said certain techniques were too fast for his eyes to catch up with. I almost laughed and told him he shouldn't blink then. I didn't laugh because I thought I had better not laugh. Not at what he said but the way he said it.
"So Panotti is Malvadeza Durão", the king of the chicken-pen.
"We are no chickens", Figueira was offended by what I said, scowled slighly at me, ready to growl. I calmed him down with a story of use of idioms to express feeling twice as stupid as the comment about the chicken-pen. I think about my stupid irony, once in a while telling my impatients to fuck off in an almost subliminal way. About my ability to extract more hate from my impatients that are, specifically in this cases, violent because the sport they play is violent by nature. Because it's interesting on the street they are extremely polite and responsive. The times I saw him at the entrance of his building or at Palmares Square. I make the kids angry sometimes.
I can't help it.
"Can you see in the future?", inquired Figueira, shifting his focus.
"It's the future that can see me."
"I sometimes can't understand what you say."
I explained there were lapses of time I sometimes had. I usually remembered things that had happened at places I had never been to. With people I've never met. I would see things at the very moment they were happening. He seemed convinced there was a meaning in it. I wasn't convinced at all. Never get to put things together before everything goes off.
"Why do you want to know the future, Figueira?"
"I'd like to know if I'm getting better results in tournaments in the near future. I've been training more than ever these days."
"Yes, this is really hard work, observation, being quick to put it into practice when you most need it, this is no fortune telling. I'm no fortune teller, Figueira. But I know you are beginning to practice much more than you used to and this is very good sign to what you want."
[5/15/2002 6:23:31 AM..............
Well, I think about what Figueira said yesterday and wonder what Panotti knows. What such fast techniques are. Why he inspires so much respect. I think I should watch the practice more often.
[5/16/2002 4:20:25 AM..............
Arriving late at Corporal, I see Figueira and Zangrandi at the gate. Presto, I made them wait. I secretly hated myself for this for some time. When I came closer, they had a strange look on their faces.
"Where are you going, Miss Grisam?"
"Well, I intend to open the door so we can come in", I smiled, when I heard the sound of somebody falling, coming from inside Corporal.
"Somebody arrived before us today", said Zangrandi, "did you set it up half an hour earlier today?"
"Of course not", I frowned.
"Well, somebody did.", he said.
Another deep sound as the first and I ran to the iron door. And I find out I left the goddamned keys at home, to make things even worse. Ah, and there was this voice. The tone sounds like someone putting the house in order:
"Not always can I get the better of you. How can you prove it?"
Panotti, apparently in action. I looked at Zangrandi and Figueira and was willing to place boxes on boxes under the window to reach it. The two wouldn't even assist me. When I could look through the bars of the window what I saw was slightly frightening: Panotti was lying on his belly on the mat beside Galhardo. Panotti's and Galhardo's arms were entwined in a complex pattern like that of some handicraft, forcing Galhardo's body up like a bow.
"Can or can't I?", he asked Galhardo.
"It's not time for matches, Panotti, we need to come in", I said in my holy affected naïveté.
"Hey, we don't know you, right?", moaned a voice down there by the boxes where I stood.
The scene seemed to freeze in the room.
"Can or can't I?"
He started pulling Galhardo's arms forward. The latter came down moaning, falling on his own arms.
"Panotti, let him go! It's enough!!"
"You can!! You can!!! Always!"
The young man is an assassin. He is fearsome. Frightening. Presto, I'm ready to write up a report.
"Have you finished, gentlemen? Would anyone of you be so kind as to open the door?"
Panotti came to open. Galhardo had a bruise on the face. He didn't even look at me nor at the other two. We came in and Panotti tied his shoelaces in silence. When he saw us, he said he had lost the sense of time. I told him it was easy for me to see he had lost the sense of time.
"He's very friendly and open", said Figueira when we left Corporal, "but he's also bad", he winked at Zangrandi, "he is so very bad when gets those guys that say they are know-alls. Then things go crazy."
[5/17/2002 7:27:24 AM..............
Today I asked Figueira if he had told Panotti about our conversation and got a "no" as an answer. Zangrandi also denied doing it. He said Morales was likelier to have told Panotti.
"But did it have to be Morales, that's from the same circle?"
"They have an agreement. No secrets between them. At least when it comes to wrestling."
[5/18/2002 3:43:58 AM..............
Six twenty and we were all sitting on the mat. Galhardo was sitting exactly at Panotti's side. His loyalty is moving, almost pathologic, by the looks it came off that hard test completely clear. I started the meeting asking what submission was. Panotti protested:
"But not everyone calls it submission."
"It really doesn't matter, Panotti."
"How come it doesn't matter???"
"It doesn't matter who uses the word or not. I'm asking you what it means."
"Obedience", answered Figueira, definition I found really reasonable. I and the others, I think for being lazy at that time in the morning or for the want of better word. But I tend to think there's no better word to describe it.
"Humilliation", Galhardo said all of a sudden, his sad dog eyes turning to me. Panotti laughed at what he had just said. Morales, Zangrandi and Figueira didn't say a word.
"What are you laughing at, Panotti?"
You could hear a string of hair shocking with the ground as it fell down, so strong the silence was. I had five astonished faces looking at me, one of them astonished and almost outraged: Panotti. Still he explained his laughter.
"Galhardo said it's humilliation because it was what he lived through the day before yesterday. He ended up paying for his arrogance... That's all..."
"Does it make sense to you to have almost broken the arm of one of your team's member?"
"Does it make sense that I care about it when Corporal has never had a team trophy in any tournament?"
"No, it makes no sense. As much sense as thinking that just because Corporal has had no titles so far we can allow ourselves to cut down the chances still more with this kind of approach. Explain then the sense it makes to you."
With the exception of Panotti, furious, I had four terrified faces looking at me. I miss a camera sometimes, to be able to register these moments. But Panotti wasn't about to let my challenge come unseen.
"To be great at wrestling or at anything you decide to do, my father has taught me we need to have modesty. I can't put up with arrogance. I simply cut Galhardo down to size. And it's a memorable and great size, you better you bet... He is one of the greatest, he fights tough and gorgeously, but he is still not what he presumes to be. All I did was to show him he is still not prepared to say I can't always get the better of him. To be able to say that, he has to prove he can defeat me. And he wasn't able to the day before yesterday, as you could see by yourself through the window. He soon became a bag of potatoes in my arms, he really did." Galhardo sobbed. All eyes turned to him. He didn't even take the trouble to leave the circle to do what he felt he had to do. Panotti watched in silence as his tears rolled down his face. Figueira had a serious expression, but I'd bet inside he was gleeful, on account of everything Galhardo had been making him suffer during the practices.
"Galhardo, if you want to leave the meeting, no harm done", I said nearly consternated.
He shook his shoe-gazing head, sobbing and trembling. Panotti now talked to him, seriously, concerned:
"Good job, Galhardo, you really don't have to hide, you really don't. Real men cry, but they cry as real men. Show her she doesn't know you. I only wanted to show you the truth, pal... I didn't mean to bring you down, did it to see if you could do what you said you could. I did it so you could see yourself as you really are, no lies."
"Really, Panotti? Not the smallest chip of hurt pride for what he said about you?"
I was spiking him hard. I knew I didn't have to be pleasant. I knew a bit, or much of my profession consisted of taking my impatients some questioning. They frequently bring their own reasoning ready to use and refuse to see things differently.
"No, it was not." He was breathing heavily with calm rage and weary of trying so hard to control it so he could think clearly and make mincemeat of my arguments. "The time other wrestlers use to boast about what they think they do I use to learn more and more. Galhardo fights so very well, can you imagine what he could make of himself if he only put his arrogance aside to take all its energy to practice. What a helluva fight he could be fighting right now. He'd grind me. That's what Morales does. See 10% of what he knows about fighting in action and we'll talk about it later."
"If all you preach is what you practice we can look to the team bringing a prize very soon to Corporal, with you in command", it was all I could say.
Panotti looked at me, serious eyes, but eyes that let the triumph of argumentation show, triumph that was as hollow as true.
"You can believe it's true. Working together, you'll know me better than you do now. I'm sure you'll change your mind about me."
"I've already changed my mind, believe me."
Panotti put an end to the matter through his silence. He was satisfied by my surrender. He had gotten his point across. He was one of those who participate more in the meeting. He ended up asking me how I became a psychologist. I said we weren't there to waste time on my professional life. He asked what would answering a simple question cost and I said it would cost us time of our meetings and if he wanted to know, he would have to ask me during a break or time for rest. He was silent for some time while I resumed our discussion about submission. Figueira said he thought submission was to surrender to the fact we had been defeated, understand why we were and work it out to eliminate what caused the fatal flaw. Panotti was the first to agree. Galhardo nodded several times. No opposing voice could be heard in te hall against such sensible view. At last I could see them, for once in their lives, all agree about the same thing. For a moment, they seemed to be the dream team Mr. Costa had dreamed of for so long, the team that could dare to dream of conquering a prize as a team, not just as individual talents of a few wrestlers anymore.
[5/19/2002 8:59:40 AM..............
"What is freedom?"
That's the way I start the meeting of the group today, all of a sudden. No warm-up. I want to hear complaints about it being six-five in the morning, and that it isn't time for philosophy.
"Do you really mean it? No anaesthesia? No breakfast?", inquired Panotti.
"Then, all right, let's buy coffee, milk and bread and have breakfast before talking."
I and Panotti went to the bakery. A certain movement of the elderly that go out very early in the morning to get that day's their daily bread. The streets around, which have just sprung to life and daylight. He walks fast, with decided steps. He's decided at buying things too.
"What is all this for?"
"For the week", he laughed.
"Plain for all to see."
Well, we stayed in the kitchen of the Association, talking about things in general. I had promised to resume the issue, at least today, Sunday, only after breakfast.
All of them eat. And they do eat, believe me. The growing season. No one was saying a word. Only soft chewing noises. Zangrandi turned on the radio and turned up the volume. Figueira laughed and said to me very softly Zangrandi would do it for hating the chewing noises. He said he didn't like them either, but on the other hand had no patience to chew without just any noise. By Morales's smiling expression I could tell it was not only Figueira who knew about it, though he and Zangrandi were closer friends.
"What is freedom?", I said, resuming the conversation we had left undiscussed. The kids seemed to be bothered by the theme, so silent they were. But today, as if it were a miracle, Morales started the discussion.
"Coming and going. To be able to go where you want."
And he looked at me, "is it right?". I told him I was not expecting answers one could correct, just because it was feelings, visions from an intimate point of view.
"There's no right or wrong in it. What really matters is the way you see it. No one has the right to tell you how you should feel freedom. How can one feel freedom from a point of view imposed by others?"
Morales seemed to agree. Panotti said freedom was something difficult to get, "people have a right time to do everything, go to school, work, all you can imagine. How can one have freedom. Sometimes I think I don't have freedom even on vacation..."
"But I think the great seasoning of life is that these paradises we usually spend vacation at we can only see on vacation. If we could stay there all the time, it wouldn't be the same fun", I said.
"Well, I really don't mind doing only what I like, at the time I want", said Morales, trying hard to help.
"You say it now. Later, without discipline you'll get bored of the game, believe me."
Panotti didn't say a word, but deep inside him, kept the same opinion. It was too early in the morning for him to be building arguments against anything, I think. Zangrandi said freedom was the birds in flight. I said, as a joke, that apart from the law of gravity they had their other laws to comply with. He said it was symbolism what he had just said and I agreed, smiling at him. Zangrandi then added freedom was doing what one loved. That whenever it happens, it feels like vacation forever, because you do it for the sheer love of it. The others liked what he said and agreed. Galhardo said nothing when asked. Figueira answered for himself and for Galhardo, "I and my coach have defined submission yesterday. Now it's you who have defined freedom."
"Don't you and Galhardo have any opinion about it?"
"Do you believe one can have freedom doing what we're doing, Miss Grisam? Pinning the others, getting pinned sometimes? I don't know why, I think so", said Galhardo suddenly.
"Yes I think so, I see it much like Zangrandi does, I think if you do what you really love to, see a purpose in it and see it's good, yes, I think so. I remember a man who received a visit of an enemy in prison. The man didn't even enter the cell, of course. Said this man deserved the punishment he got, losing his freedom. Said he only could see him that way, behind bars. This man in prison agreed, but reminded his enemy that from his point of view he was able to see him behind bars too."
"Yes, but this is silly, his enemy could walk free and he couldn't", said Panotti and Morales almost at the same time. Figueira, Galhardo and Zangrandi only heard, paying attention.
"I agree, but many times what good is to be able to go where you want and find no friendly voice there, nothing but coldness, nobody to talk to and share emotions and thoughts with? What good is to walk physically free and mentally carrying a bag of concerns, problems and paranoias? The key I'm talking about is inside. It's the one which opens the doors. Don't forget the fact that to be able to pin the adversary you have to give up your freedom of movement too, or else the adversary will slide free from your arms. That is, you pin yourself to pin the opponent. Yet all the same the two wrestlers will experience the sensation of freedom it is to live in a community in which everyone lives intensely everything the activity that they master means and the freedom Zangrandi referred to, to do it as a labor of love, do it because it is your world, it is the way you manifest yourself as a human being that can create a whole universe. This is why we have a hard time trying to define freedom. There are so many things entwined and it is simple by nature at the same time."
[5/20/2002 11:58:51 PM..............
Today I went to the temple of consumerism near home, Praiamar Mall, hunt for CDs at Siciliano book store. A whole lot of useless things and futility to sell, superfluous things everywhere. I thought about the healthy madness of Gang Of 4, Leeds-based English group that wrote songs whose characters were portrayed living through situations only seen on TV commercials. "You know the change would do you good. I always knew it would", says the supermarket commercial portrayed in the song. The supreme redemption of consumers by the simple change of a product package or the geometric array of the supermarket shelves. But it's no CD you can find at Siciliano.
"Still haven't found what you're looking for?", said a voice behind me.
Morales. Galhardo and Panotti. I smiled, "In a U2 style today, hein, Morales?" He smiled, a bit embarrassed, reddish.
"We're about to have lunch", said Galhardo, looking at Morales and smiling. Panotti looked at me, without a word, then looked away to a point, always the same point. I said "Now, I am up to the same."
"You had better not sit with us", urged Panotti.
I frowned instantly at him.
"Could you possibly say why?"
He then again looked at the point. Turning my eyes where his were, I saw two kids at one of the countless tables of the mall's restaurant area. They didn't seem to be looking at us, but Panotti said they were. Morales said he saw them everywhere in the mall and saw them staring at the threesome several times.
"I'm talking to the security guard then", I said, motioning to leave. Panotti came my way like a wall, Morales and Galhardo blocked me sideways.
"No, you're not", whispered Galhardo. "They won't come around with us right here, Panotti. Miss Grisam can come, pal. No problem.".
I smell trouble around here. What is worse than this is the fact I never get fooled. I proposed that we left. Then I figured out it would be useless if they were really following the kids. They were two boys, shopping mall fiends - by the way, something Galhardo, Morales and Panotti were too. We decided to stay around and get ourselves some food. The threesome went for baked potato and I for Chinese food. They stood up and got the orders when the beep called them and the number of their order matched that of the display, something they did in a funny kind of relay. When they return to the table and start eating I see them and myself as in a comercial, like in Gang Of 4's song, what makes me laugh quietly inside. I looked into my dish, picking the food with my hashi. My reflections are cut right at this point, when I hear a sound of liquid being spilled. No problem, children are always turning glasses on tables, it's normal, but this sound of a body falling to the ground is not. I lifted my eyes from the dish and what I saw was Galhardo mounted on another kid, his two arms under the kid's arms, turning on his neck, hands supported by the kid's head. The other came on to kick Galhardo and Morales blocked his way, "Mind your own business or else you fall down too". The other kid took no notice, clenched his fist and departed. Morales caught the other kid's hand in a quick movement and pulled it behind so brutally the other kid was sent down spinning around his own body as a top would; almost at the same time, Morales pulled the other kid's supporting foot up with his own, collapsing together with him out of my field of vision limited by the tabletop. I stood up to do something, already hearing the haste of security guards coming our way. People around had left the nearby tables disorderly afraid of what could become of them. Galhardo had the first kid under control, lying on his back and having his arms in the same position, locking the first kid's two arms, exercising a whole lot of pressure on his back, what you could tell by the absurd tension in his whole body. In the kid's twisted features I recognized one of the two who were sitting at the table where Panotti was looking at. To think I didn't see them approach this table. When I managed to look beyond the obtrusive tabletop, Morales had formed a hoop with his arms, a hoop that crossed the kid's left leg, chained his neck and left arm in a single bear hug. And this rascal Morales tightened the chain more and more, pulling moans out of the poor kid. Panotti just kept eating his baked potato as if nothing surrounded him. And I prepared to talk to the security guards.
"Did you really need to say you were our psychologist?", meowed Panotti, as we left the mall, after I spent about half an hour talking to the security guards. "We will cut a very nice and pleasant figure, everyone in the mall that knows us will say we have psychological problems."
I looked at him and could just laugh.
"Something you definitely have not", I ended up saying, between my seizures of laughter.
[5/21/2002 6:43:25 AM..............
"You mean they squeezed the shit out of the guys?", Figueira trembled and shook with laughter at my narration of the mall adventure with the power trio. Zangrandi laughed his way too, discreetly but seemed to be having a heck of a time with my pictoresque passages. He asked me if Panotti got down from the table. If he intervened. I said he didn't even look at what was happening as if he was having lunch in the Garden of Eden.
"Very lucky they were", said Zangrandi, predicting a shady future to all those daring to interrupt a Panottian lunch. I just had to laugh.
"And you in the eye of the storm?", spiked Figueira, laughing.
"Fire Department", I said, getting in the heart of it, "how are practices?"
Figueira told me he continues to practice more than ever and has been watching Panotti with attention more often, watching his every practice. I ask him if he can remember things he can use. He tells me he's starting to understand better certain flaws in what he used to do. I need to come to watch the practices more often too.
Zangrandi is on the front line. He says some techniques have to be felt, first it usually happens when you fall prey to these techniques, trying to figure out why you fell into the trap, what the defense flaws were. He's been observing practices all the time too. I myself have seen the coach removing Zangrandi from the mat, from beside the players, the younger and the older ones lest they fell right down on him. He told the coach he didn't mind.
"I can see it closer this way", he said, winking at me.
[5/24/2002 2:42:08 AM..............
Right after our daily conversation, I stood watching the kids in motion, waiting for the coach to come; I sat in one of the chairs around the mat, when I got a glimpse of a movement out of the corner of my eye, the movement of a hand. I looked at the movement and saw Coach Rodrigo calling me. Odd. It's been a while since I started here and whenever I talked to the coaches it had to be on my own initiative. Think we should work as a team, but... It's interesting that he calls me anyway. We went to Mr. Costa's room and he shut the door. I stood gazing at the door, trying to figure out what he wanted from me.
"Have you talked to Figueira lately, Miss Grisam?"
"Yes, every day. When you don't find me here, it's because I have already gone away. These days I intend to watch the practices more closely."
He smiled.
"It was exactly what I wanted to ask you. I wanted to ask you to observe Figueira wrestling very closely."
"What's the matter with Figueira? What has he done this time?"
"Yesterday Mr. Costa caught him talking to Galhardo during the wrestle and scolded him. I myself got my share."
"Why couldn't Figueira and Galhardo talk? They had to pay attention to wrestling, didn't they?"
Rodrigo smiled once again.
"Yes they had to pay a lot of attention, Miss Grisam. Especially because it was them wrestling."
I started to laugh. Coach Rodrigo thought I laughed at my own mistake, but I laughed at the fact that two wrestlers would talk while fighting.
"Didn't you know there are wrestlers who talk to the opponent while fighting with him? Figueira is one of them."
"Well, now I know", I said still laughing, "what do they usually talk about?"
His laughing face then turned into a scowl facing me.
"They don't talk the way you imagine, Miss Grisam", he said in a cold mood, "it's more of a deal of one cursing the other. Not always does it happen this way, but it happens many times. The other problem is, I've seen Galhardo talk to Morales too. And I think Galhardo is catching Figueira's disease too. If Figueira gets caught talking in a tournament he can even be disqualified."
"Oh, I see. It breaks the rules."
"That's it. Figueira has already been disqualified for talking to an opponent when he was over him. Figueira would have won if he hadn't talked to his opponent."
After the warm-up, Coach Rodrigo had them run around the block. Four turns and I waited for the kids to pass and Figueira always played a joke on me as he passed by. Coach Rodrigo brought them back in and sent them to shower. Put a silver object in Figueira's hand and the kid ran down the corridor. I asked Rodrigo what it was. Rodrigo told me it was a nail clipper and an emery board.
He told me to sit on the mat, leaning against te wall and watch Figueira carefully. When the wrestle started and Galhardo and Figueira started wrestling on the mat, Zangrandi sat at my side, only watching. All of a sudden he elbowed me, pointing at Figueira and Galhardo, trying to show me what I could already see.
"Listen."
Figueira really talked. He was talking to Galhardo, that looked at me embarrassed, believing I thought he did it too. It was so funny I just had to laugh. Zangrandi laughed too, looking at Galhardo, that assumed an expression of lack of concentration. Rodrigo warned him he should fight; in that moment, Figueira was already over him. Galhardo kept looking at us, almost cutting Figueira dead. Coach Rodrigo interrupted the match. Galhardo and Figueira stood up and resumed the match standing. The latter ended up throwing the former to the mat. He was over Galhardo again, locking his right arm with his own, resting his hand on Galhardo's head. Galhardo shook his body as he could, trying to escape him and Figueira once again started talking to him. Rodrigo looked at me as if he was saying, "see for yourself", Galhardo looked at me under Figueira's pressure and tapped him on the left leg. Figueira let him go and he let himself fall on the mat. He was staring at me and said, "how come we're gonna take the guy to a tournament again talking like this?"
Figueira seemed sort of ashamed. "Come on, Speech, get a life!", Galhardo said, nicknaming Figueira, upset.
I definitely need to talk to this kid.
[5/24/2002 2:07:30 PM..............
I took the kids to have lunch at SuperVegetariano. They meowed, "but eating only leaves?" and I said vegetarian food shall not live by leaves alone.
"Are you vegetarian?", inquired Panotti.
"No, but I like the food here a lot."
Mr. Costa had driven us downtown to João Pessoa Avenue; he said he'd be back in one hour. The Rosary Church of Black Men's bell started tolling. Twelve strikes. No better time to have lunch. They invaded the restaurant in that typical rhino style stampede. They soon got their dishes ready and filled them with everything they thought tasted good.
At the table, they commented it was not what they had expected and eventually liked most of what they had eaten. What they enjoyed a lot was the fact they could fill and empty their glasses anytime.
The talk was about many different issues, especially, of course, wrestling. I commented I had gotten in touch with an American webmistress from Souderton, Pennsylvania, through e-mail. She had two sons wrestling and we were talking a lot about her sons and the five.
"About us?", asked Morales, frowning, "what have you said about us?"
"We have commented a lot about the way you see wrestling. She couldn't believe it when she heard about what happened at the mall. Said she wouldn't know what to do in such a situation if she were me."
"Well, you probably wouldn't like it if one of them opened your blouse and poured Coca-Cola inside, because it was exactly what they were about to do, the glass was already positioned. You didn't see it but we did", replied Galhardo staring at me.
"We didn't get at anyone, Miss Grisam, not even messed with the guys", added Morales, "but what a nice figure they'd have cut if we hadn't held them."
Zangrandi pondered, "but it's true what the Americans say, most of the wrestlers in our region are real hangmen", he said, "we can't just complain about bad reputation."
The others looked at him, including Figueira. And he said, "well I'm trying to learn more. Now I don't know if I want to do it for the blows I got in the past. I enjoy this madness though I know it's not what we would choose to do."
I said we talked a lot about Figueira and the American seemed concerned and disturbed by learning what happened to my arm when I first met him to talk. Figueira looked down and said he was sorry. Then, curious, he asked what exactly she had said. I said she and her son thought the description sounded a lot like World Wrestling Entertainment. Figueira's eyes glittered. He said, "I can't deny I like Hulk Hogan, Stone Cold... but I know it has nothing to do with what we are doing."
I was trying to remember something. The second name hit me.
"Now it was the name she told me her son commented you acted like, Stone Cold."
Figueira's eyes glittered some more.
"Ah, the kid knows a lot about it... what's his name?"
I said it was Matthew and his mother's name was Debbie.
"Aw, then Matthew is really cool it was nice of him to compare me to Stone Cold, he has good taste. I don't need to mention Hogan", closed Figueira, satisfied.
"Don't you think it's risky to comment about us on the net?", queried Panotti. Morales nodded at the question.
"I have the same doubt", he said.
"She's really nice, believe me. But you are more than a cultural shock. You are a cultural earthquake. I don't see what damage simple talk can do."
"Gee, it's not because of the Americans. Nice of them to be concerned, but..."
Panotti told me he asked me about it because he really wanted to know, not in order to question my intentions. Said he thought there was no problem. But he would always worry about something. I see the hacker-shaped paranoia has reached not only me in this region. I think his concern matches what he told me when we left the mall that day. Galhardo had already finished his second dish and threatened to fetch one more. Figueira and Zangrandi just chewed and looked like they were trying to understand our debate.
[5/26/2002 12:43:29 AM..............
I met Figueira and Zangrandi sitting on a concrete bench at Palmares Sq. Zangrandi was the one who saw me first. They remembered the vegetarian restaurant.
"I thought it was nice to hear about the Americans. They are right. It's good to hear it from people from the outside or else we'll think it's the right way forever and will never change.They think I'm the only one who thinks this way."
"I am glad to hear this is what you think, Zangrandi."
I asked Figueira if he thought what was said about him taking after Stone Cold was a compliment.
"No."
"So, you were ironic when you praised Matthew's comment."
He looked at me.
"No, I was not."
"Then, I'm afraid I can't work it out."
Zangrandi laughed. Figueira had a serious look on his face.
"I thought he was clever to identify what style it was. And I agree with what Panotti said, that it was nice of them to care anyway. Americans already have a long history of wrestling. When I think about us practicing to be wrestlers in Brazil, I think it is the same for an American to be a football player. We swim against the stream, Miss Grisam. This is the country of football, not the country of wrestling."
"It doesn't justify wanting to use your knowledge for revenge, Figueira."
Zangrandi shook my hand, in agreement.
"No, it doesn't, and I try hard not to do it, but I can understand why we misunderstand the objective sometimes.", said Figueira, looking at me, "when we don't even know what to dream of, what to expect from what we are doing."
Zangrandi was astonished.
"Don't you know what your goals are, Figueira?", he asked.
I looked at Figueira, who didn't look back to me. He gazed into the skate area, a calm and thoughtful look gazing into infinity.
"I didn't. But now I think I begin to understand certain things I had never seen. What I want in the end is to be better than I am. I want to lose my fear of losing. I want to lose my fear of people. I want to lose my fear of fear."
"How does it feel at a tournament?"
"Shivers up and down my spine", he said, "when we go to the mat there's no telling..."
"I feel it too, but it's not so great, Figueira", said Zangrandi, "when the wrestle starts, I forget about it, I have to be alert."
"You've been pinned a number of times, haven't you, Zangrandi?"
"Everybody is, sooner or later. When I was not, won or lost because of points, or pinned the adversaries too. It happens to everyone."
Figueira said he had lost most of the matches he played at tournaments. From the four undoubted pins he managed to apply, was disqualified in two, for talking to the opponent.
"What is that you talk so much to your opponent, Figueira? I watched you yesterday, was curious to know what you said to Galhardo."
"He encourages the opponent to wrestle", explained Zangrandi, "it is his call to fight he says."
"Is it true, Figueira?"
He had his eyes way down, trying to memorize his sneaker's brand. Didn't say a word. I shouldn't, but I insisted.
"Do you curse the opponent?"
"..."
"Do you curse him or not? You know you can't do it, don't you? Do you curse him?"
Figueira went red. All of a sudden he stood up and exploded, "No, there's no curse! I do call them to fight! I ask them how come they can be under me, under my control, holding my leg without fighting? I do call them to fight!"
"Easy, kid, she's just asking you a question..."
Figueira fell on the bench and was breathless. "This is why I was disqualified twice. This is the reason why. But I don't care, as long as I can call them to fight."
He looked at me. I saw his attitude there, something he hasn't channelled to something positive yet. Figueira is too emotional. But I can't help thinking a call to fight is a beautiful thing. It sounds to me like trying to wake someone up. And if he's being true to me, what I have no reasons to doubt, does it mean he gives victory away to celebrate the fight? I can't, just can't be that strange. I tried to ask him about it, but he was in no mood to talk about it anymore.
Today there is no practice ou therapy with the kids, each one is at home right now, telling their moms how much they love them. Mother's Day, I write a letter to my mom in Campos Elísios. Been a long time since I last saw her. Need to go there one day to visit her. I miss the wind that blows throughout the land, that limitless blue sky, the childhood friends I don't even know if I can still find living in that city. I like Santos very much, but I know not many friends here. My life is full of tribulation, so I don't have time for friendship, chat with a circle of friends around a table full of bottles of beer, though I don't drink, I must recognize I miss these moments and hold them dear. Staying alone like this through nights and days can eventually make you think it's a natural thing. A voluntary isolation as the one preached by Rainer Maria Rilke, isolation we can learn to live together with ourselves with. There are people, and they're not few, whose greatest fear is to be alone. But not the fear of loneliness that is inflicted on so many people, it's the fear of catching themselves alone with themselves. Perhaps because it forces them to face the person they are most afraid of. I'm not like this, but must admit I can be really isolationist and self-sufficient at times. And I don't think people should be like this. Solidarity is getting more and more difficult to find, streets are getting colder and colder, especially for those who have them as their only dwelling. Thrown this way and that by municipalities from one city to another, without any roots or a place to call a home.
About Rainer Maria Rilke, there's a beautiful poem - as usual - I have found at The Rainer Maria Rilke Archives, called Autumn:
The leaves are falling, falling as if from far up,
as if orchards were dying high in space.
Each leaf falls as if it were motioning "no."
And tonight the heavy earth is falling
away from all other stars in the loneliness.
We're all falling. This hand here is falling.
And look at the other one. It's in them all.
And yet there is Someone, whose hands
infinitely calm, holding up all this falling.
Translated by Robert Bly
[5/13/2002 2:34:23 PM..............
Six-thirty in the morning. I heard the sound of the iron outside door open for the fifth time. And the kids were four. Galhardo and Morales seemed to know better than anybody who was coming our way.
"The big shot is coming", he said, "it seems he's recovered very well."
"Who?", I asked, still with Mr. Costa in mind.
"Panotti", he said simply, looking at Morales, before turning his eyes to me, "I know it's him because we were here yesterday when he came back and said he was coming today."
I had almost forgotten about him. I already have four in mind, not five. But it seems to me I'll have to make some more room in my memory. I only didn't know how much space I'd need for the operation.
And it was really Mr. Costa. But there was somebody else with him. And this was Panotti. But when he walked in, bright and nice-looking I fell prey to vertigo. I knew him. That face. Had seen it before, in another time, another place.
André. The same I lived with and wrestled with in Arcadia.
"Well, there's news, as I've already commented. Miss Grisam is here to work with you for the team's self-esteem and confidence... Miss Grisam, this is Panotti. Panotti, this is Miss Grisam..."
"André...?", I couldn't help but saying it.
The kid got scared from the top of his experienced eleven years of existence. He looked at Mr. Costa and at the others that were staring at me, all of us caught in a crossfire of looks you'd only see in games like Killer. I felt I had said the wrong thing. I could simply pretend I didn't know him from Adam. And I failed to do it. Now I'm about to reap what was sown.
"How come you know my Christian name is André???"
and he look at Mr. Costa, dumbfounded. Looked at the others. Astonishment was the order of the day. No one was able to escape it. No one had told me anything. No one commented much about him. No one would let me lie about it. Why would I lie to them?
"Who did you wrench information from if not from anyone of us? Were you investigating the archives of the association?", Mr. Costa seemed to be astonished and annoyed at the same time, in a mix of feelings that was bizarre and full of shades that would take him nowhere.
"It's a long story."
"We'll sit down and you'll tell us the story, blow by blow.", Mr. Costa said.
If I tell them what really happened, they'll find me a room in a psychiatric hospital. I have to make up a story. I tell them it was a dream with premonitory characteristics. Yet I felt they were somehow on the verge of calling a specialist to help me with my problem; what they really knew was that they had no better explanation for what had happened.
"Did your mother and sister get well from dengue?"
Well, it did worsen it all. The kid rose to his feet, started walking backward, always staring at me. Figueira, iconoclastic, had a field day, "what's up Panotti, are you afraid of the lady? She's not giving you a wrench, take it easy."
Even frightened, Panotti looked at Figueira with the typical air of those who are soon to pick a quarrel. I approached the kid to talk. He didn't know what to do with the novelty, not mentioning the fact he would have to see me every day, work together and all.
"I know it sounds strange, but I usually have this kind of dream. When I hear people talk a lot about somebody, it seems I get too sensitive about it. Memories of things I never lived started occuring to me, that's all."
Well, it took about half an hour until Mr. Costa went away not really convinced with my explanation. I wouldn't be convinced by it either. But what I can't deny is that they were completely amazed at it. They asked me if it was like The Sixth Sense, the movie with Bruce Willis. I laughed and said it was alike, without mentioning the state of vigil. André, that I will call Panotti from now on, sat at my side, but kept an eye on me. I put him in the picture - I needed to change the subject - of what we had done before he came back, because the rest, that is, my purpose here he had heard from Mr. Costa. He got highly interested in the trust exercise I had given the others and was willing to try. The first was Galhardo. Then it was Morales. And he would really let himself fall freely and the two would help him promptly, he was completely relaxed, heart and soul. With Zangrandi, he only managed at the third attempt, what really leapt to my eyes immediately. With Figueira, nothing happened I could not foresee: he simply didn't manage. Confidence here at point zero. I and Figueira exchanged looks, without any verbal agreement. He had fully understood the purpose of my "mutual confidence detector." At the counterproof the results didn't vary much from the last time, only Galhardo and Morales also gave themselves away to the fall when it was Panotti to hold them. Galhardo and Morales had also improved much their performance with each other since they first did it. The threesome were a united group within the team, I realized they were going to connect completely, mutually. Between Figueira and Zangrandi, there was no change I could notice; what I mustn't forget is that it's only the second time I apply this practice with them.
[5/14/2002 2:36:34 PM..............
Today Figueira arrived exactly at six. Had I arrived five minutes late, he'd have to stay outside waiting at the gates of Corporal. I hate keepings keys of a house that's not mine. It can breed the kind of comment like the absurdity of Mr. Costa when he said I tried to get information from Corporal's computer.
As he usually did, he didn't greet me as he walked in, looked around the practice hall, tied his right shoe. I thought it would be nice to ask him a question: how it felt working with Panotti.
"Nice. Just don't tread on his toes."
Then added he wasn't afraid of Panotti, but rather respected him. "He'd never teach me what he knows. But it makes no difference."
"I wonder if you can learn through observation."
He looked strangely at me and said certain techniques were too fast for his eyes to catch up with. I almost laughed and told him he shouldn't blink then. I didn't laugh because I thought I had better not laugh. Not at what he said but the way he said it.
"So Panotti is Malvadeza Durão", the king of the chicken-pen.
"We are no chickens", Figueira was offended by what I said, scowled slighly at me, ready to growl. I calmed him down with a story of use of idioms to express feeling twice as stupid as the comment about the chicken-pen. I think about my stupid irony, once in a while telling my impatients to fuck off in an almost subliminal way. About my ability to extract more hate from my impatients that are, specifically in this cases, violent because the sport they play is violent by nature. Because it's interesting on the street they are extremely polite and responsive. The times I saw him at the entrance of his building or at Palmares Square. I make the kids angry sometimes.
I can't help it.
"Can you see in the future?", inquired Figueira, shifting his focus.
"It's the future that can see me."
"I sometimes can't understand what you say."
I explained there were lapses of time I sometimes had. I usually remembered things that had happened at places I had never been to. With people I've never met. I would see things at the very moment they were happening. He seemed convinced there was a meaning in it. I wasn't convinced at all. Never get to put things together before everything goes off.
"Why do you want to know the future, Figueira?"
"I'd like to know if I'm getting better results in tournaments in the near future. I've been training more than ever these days."
"Yes, this is really hard work, observation, being quick to put it into practice when you most need it, this is no fortune telling. I'm no fortune teller, Figueira. But I know you are beginning to practice much more than you used to and this is very good sign to what you want."
[5/15/2002 6:23:31 AM..............
Well, I think about what Figueira said yesterday and wonder what Panotti knows. What such fast techniques are. Why he inspires so much respect. I think I should watch the practice more often.
[5/16/2002 4:20:25 AM..............
Arriving late at Corporal, I see Figueira and Zangrandi at the gate. Presto, I made them wait. I secretly hated myself for this for some time. When I came closer, they had a strange look on their faces.
"Where are you going, Miss Grisam?"
"Well, I intend to open the door so we can come in", I smiled, when I heard the sound of somebody falling, coming from inside Corporal.
"Somebody arrived before us today", said Zangrandi, "did you set it up half an hour earlier today?"
"Of course not", I frowned.
"Well, somebody did.", he said.
Another deep sound as the first and I ran to the iron door. And I find out I left the goddamned keys at home, to make things even worse. Ah, and there was this voice. The tone sounds like someone putting the house in order:
"Not always can I get the better of you. How can you prove it?"
Panotti, apparently in action. I looked at Zangrandi and Figueira and was willing to place boxes on boxes under the window to reach it. The two wouldn't even assist me. When I could look through the bars of the window what I saw was slightly frightening: Panotti was lying on his belly on the mat beside Galhardo. Panotti's and Galhardo's arms were entwined in a complex pattern like that of some handicraft, forcing Galhardo's body up like a bow.
"Can or can't I?", he asked Galhardo.
"It's not time for matches, Panotti, we need to come in", I said in my holy affected naïveté.
"Hey, we don't know you, right?", moaned a voice down there by the boxes where I stood.
The scene seemed to freeze in the room.
"Can or can't I?"
He started pulling Galhardo's arms forward. The latter came down moaning, falling on his own arms.
"Panotti, let him go! It's enough!!"
"You can!! You can!!! Always!"
The young man is an assassin. He is fearsome. Frightening. Presto, I'm ready to write up a report.
"Have you finished, gentlemen? Would anyone of you be so kind as to open the door?"
Panotti came to open. Galhardo had a bruise on the face. He didn't even look at me nor at the other two. We came in and Panotti tied his shoelaces in silence. When he saw us, he said he had lost the sense of time. I told him it was easy for me to see he had lost the sense of time.
"He's very friendly and open", said Figueira when we left Corporal, "but he's also bad", he winked at Zangrandi, "he is so very bad when gets those guys that say they are know-alls. Then things go crazy."
[5/17/2002 7:27:24 AM..............
Today I asked Figueira if he had told Panotti about our conversation and got a "no" as an answer. Zangrandi also denied doing it. He said Morales was likelier to have told Panotti.
"But did it have to be Morales, that's from the same circle?"
"They have an agreement. No secrets between them. At least when it comes to wrestling."
[5/18/2002 3:43:58 AM..............
Six twenty and we were all sitting on the mat. Galhardo was sitting exactly at Panotti's side. His loyalty is moving, almost pathologic, by the looks it came off that hard test completely clear. I started the meeting asking what submission was. Panotti protested:
"But not everyone calls it submission."
"It really doesn't matter, Panotti."
"How come it doesn't matter???"
"It doesn't matter who uses the word or not. I'm asking you what it means."
"Obedience", answered Figueira, definition I found really reasonable. I and the others, I think for being lazy at that time in the morning or for the want of better word. But I tend to think there's no better word to describe it.
"Humilliation", Galhardo said all of a sudden, his sad dog eyes turning to me. Panotti laughed at what he had just said. Morales, Zangrandi and Figueira didn't say a word.
"What are you laughing at, Panotti?"
You could hear a string of hair shocking with the ground as it fell down, so strong the silence was. I had five astonished faces looking at me, one of them astonished and almost outraged: Panotti. Still he explained his laughter.
"Galhardo said it's humilliation because it was what he lived through the day before yesterday. He ended up paying for his arrogance... That's all..."
"Does it make sense to you to have almost broken the arm of one of your team's member?"
"Does it make sense that I care about it when Corporal has never had a team trophy in any tournament?"
"No, it makes no sense. As much sense as thinking that just because Corporal has had no titles so far we can allow ourselves to cut down the chances still more with this kind of approach. Explain then the sense it makes to you."
With the exception of Panotti, furious, I had four terrified faces looking at me. I miss a camera sometimes, to be able to register these moments. But Panotti wasn't about to let my challenge come unseen.
"To be great at wrestling or at anything you decide to do, my father has taught me we need to have modesty. I can't put up with arrogance. I simply cut Galhardo down to size. And it's a memorable and great size, you better you bet... He is one of the greatest, he fights tough and gorgeously, but he is still not what he presumes to be. All I did was to show him he is still not prepared to say I can't always get the better of him. To be able to say that, he has to prove he can defeat me. And he wasn't able to the day before yesterday, as you could see by yourself through the window. He soon became a bag of potatoes in my arms, he really did." Galhardo sobbed. All eyes turned to him. He didn't even take the trouble to leave the circle to do what he felt he had to do. Panotti watched in silence as his tears rolled down his face. Figueira had a serious expression, but I'd bet inside he was gleeful, on account of everything Galhardo had been making him suffer during the practices.
"Galhardo, if you want to leave the meeting, no harm done", I said nearly consternated.
He shook his shoe-gazing head, sobbing and trembling. Panotti now talked to him, seriously, concerned:
"Good job, Galhardo, you really don't have to hide, you really don't. Real men cry, but they cry as real men. Show her she doesn't know you. I only wanted to show you the truth, pal... I didn't mean to bring you down, did it to see if you could do what you said you could. I did it so you could see yourself as you really are, no lies."
"Really, Panotti? Not the smallest chip of hurt pride for what he said about you?"
I was spiking him hard. I knew I didn't have to be pleasant. I knew a bit, or much of my profession consisted of taking my impatients some questioning. They frequently bring their own reasoning ready to use and refuse to see things differently.
"No, it was not." He was breathing heavily with calm rage and weary of trying so hard to control it so he could think clearly and make mincemeat of my arguments. "The time other wrestlers use to boast about what they think they do I use to learn more and more. Galhardo fights so very well, can you imagine what he could make of himself if he only put his arrogance aside to take all its energy to practice. What a helluva fight he could be fighting right now. He'd grind me. That's what Morales does. See 10% of what he knows about fighting in action and we'll talk about it later."
"If all you preach is what you practice we can look to the team bringing a prize very soon to Corporal, with you in command", it was all I could say.
Panotti looked at me, serious eyes, but eyes that let the triumph of argumentation show, triumph that was as hollow as true.
"You can believe it's true. Working together, you'll know me better than you do now. I'm sure you'll change your mind about me."
"I've already changed my mind, believe me."
Panotti put an end to the matter through his silence. He was satisfied by my surrender. He had gotten his point across. He was one of those who participate more in the meeting. He ended up asking me how I became a psychologist. I said we weren't there to waste time on my professional life. He asked what would answering a simple question cost and I said it would cost us time of our meetings and if he wanted to know, he would have to ask me during a break or time for rest. He was silent for some time while I resumed our discussion about submission. Figueira said he thought submission was to surrender to the fact we had been defeated, understand why we were and work it out to eliminate what caused the fatal flaw. Panotti was the first to agree. Galhardo nodded several times. No opposing voice could be heard in te hall against such sensible view. At last I could see them, for once in their lives, all agree about the same thing. For a moment, they seemed to be the dream team Mr. Costa had dreamed of for so long, the team that could dare to dream of conquering a prize as a team, not just as individual talents of a few wrestlers anymore.
[5/19/2002 8:59:40 AM..............
"What is freedom?"
That's the way I start the meeting of the group today, all of a sudden. No warm-up. I want to hear complaints about it being six-five in the morning, and that it isn't time for philosophy.
"Do you really mean it? No anaesthesia? No breakfast?", inquired Panotti.
"Then, all right, let's buy coffee, milk and bread and have breakfast before talking."
I and Panotti went to the bakery. A certain movement of the elderly that go out very early in the morning to get that day's their daily bread. The streets around, which have just sprung to life and daylight. He walks fast, with decided steps. He's decided at buying things too.
"What is all this for?"
"For the week", he laughed.
"Plain for all to see."
Well, we stayed in the kitchen of the Association, talking about things in general. I had promised to resume the issue, at least today, Sunday, only after breakfast.
All of them eat. And they do eat, believe me. The growing season. No one was saying a word. Only soft chewing noises. Zangrandi turned on the radio and turned up the volume. Figueira laughed and said to me very softly Zangrandi would do it for hating the chewing noises. He said he didn't like them either, but on the other hand had no patience to chew without just any noise. By Morales's smiling expression I could tell it was not only Figueira who knew about it, though he and Zangrandi were closer friends.
"What is freedom?", I said, resuming the conversation we had left undiscussed. The kids seemed to be bothered by the theme, so silent they were. But today, as if it were a miracle, Morales started the discussion.
"Coming and going. To be able to go where you want."
And he looked at me, "is it right?". I told him I was not expecting answers one could correct, just because it was feelings, visions from an intimate point of view.
"There's no right or wrong in it. What really matters is the way you see it. No one has the right to tell you how you should feel freedom. How can one feel freedom from a point of view imposed by others?"
Morales seemed to agree. Panotti said freedom was something difficult to get, "people have a right time to do everything, go to school, work, all you can imagine. How can one have freedom. Sometimes I think I don't have freedom even on vacation..."
"But I think the great seasoning of life is that these paradises we usually spend vacation at we can only see on vacation. If we could stay there all the time, it wouldn't be the same fun", I said.
"Well, I really don't mind doing only what I like, at the time I want", said Morales, trying hard to help.
"You say it now. Later, without discipline you'll get bored of the game, believe me."
Panotti didn't say a word, but deep inside him, kept the same opinion. It was too early in the morning for him to be building arguments against anything, I think. Zangrandi said freedom was the birds in flight. I said, as a joke, that apart from the law of gravity they had their other laws to comply with. He said it was symbolism what he had just said and I agreed, smiling at him. Zangrandi then added freedom was doing what one loved. That whenever it happens, it feels like vacation forever, because you do it for the sheer love of it. The others liked what he said and agreed. Galhardo said nothing when asked. Figueira answered for himself and for Galhardo, "I and my coach have defined submission yesterday. Now it's you who have defined freedom."
"Don't you and Galhardo have any opinion about it?"
"Do you believe one can have freedom doing what we're doing, Miss Grisam? Pinning the others, getting pinned sometimes? I don't know why, I think so", said Galhardo suddenly.
"Yes I think so, I see it much like Zangrandi does, I think if you do what you really love to, see a purpose in it and see it's good, yes, I think so. I remember a man who received a visit of an enemy in prison. The man didn't even enter the cell, of course. Said this man deserved the punishment he got, losing his freedom. Said he only could see him that way, behind bars. This man in prison agreed, but reminded his enemy that from his point of view he was able to see him behind bars too."
"Yes, but this is silly, his enemy could walk free and he couldn't", said Panotti and Morales almost at the same time. Figueira, Galhardo and Zangrandi only heard, paying attention.
"I agree, but many times what good is to be able to go where you want and find no friendly voice there, nothing but coldness, nobody to talk to and share emotions and thoughts with? What good is to walk physically free and mentally carrying a bag of concerns, problems and paranoias? The key I'm talking about is inside. It's the one which opens the doors. Don't forget the fact that to be able to pin the adversary you have to give up your freedom of movement too, or else the adversary will slide free from your arms. That is, you pin yourself to pin the opponent. Yet all the same the two wrestlers will experience the sensation of freedom it is to live in a community in which everyone lives intensely everything the activity that they master means and the freedom Zangrandi referred to, to do it as a labor of love, do it because it is your world, it is the way you manifest yourself as a human being that can create a whole universe. This is why we have a hard time trying to define freedom. There are so many things entwined and it is simple by nature at the same time."
[5/20/2002 11:58:51 PM..............
Today I went to the temple of consumerism near home, Praiamar Mall, hunt for CDs at Siciliano book store. A whole lot of useless things and futility to sell, superfluous things everywhere. I thought about the healthy madness of Gang Of 4, Leeds-based English group that wrote songs whose characters were portrayed living through situations only seen on TV commercials. "You know the change would do you good. I always knew it would", says the supermarket commercial portrayed in the song. The supreme redemption of consumers by the simple change of a product package or the geometric array of the supermarket shelves. But it's no CD you can find at Siciliano.
"Still haven't found what you're looking for?", said a voice behind me.
Morales. Galhardo and Panotti. I smiled, "In a U2 style today, hein, Morales?" He smiled, a bit embarrassed, reddish.
"We're about to have lunch", said Galhardo, looking at Morales and smiling. Panotti looked at me, without a word, then looked away to a point, always the same point. I said "Now, I am up to the same."
"You had better not sit with us", urged Panotti.
I frowned instantly at him.
"Could you possibly say why?"
He then again looked at the point. Turning my eyes where his were, I saw two kids at one of the countless tables of the mall's restaurant area. They didn't seem to be looking at us, but Panotti said they were. Morales said he saw them everywhere in the mall and saw them staring at the threesome several times.
"I'm talking to the security guard then", I said, motioning to leave. Panotti came my way like a wall, Morales and Galhardo blocked me sideways.
"No, you're not", whispered Galhardo. "They won't come around with us right here, Panotti. Miss Grisam can come, pal. No problem.".
I smell trouble around here. What is worse than this is the fact I never get fooled. I proposed that we left. Then I figured out it would be useless if they were really following the kids. They were two boys, shopping mall fiends - by the way, something Galhardo, Morales and Panotti were too. We decided to stay around and get ourselves some food. The threesome went for baked potato and I for Chinese food. They stood up and got the orders when the beep called them and the number of their order matched that of the display, something they did in a funny kind of relay. When they return to the table and start eating I see them and myself as in a comercial, like in Gang Of 4's song, what makes me laugh quietly inside. I looked into my dish, picking the food with my hashi. My reflections are cut right at this point, when I hear a sound of liquid being spilled. No problem, children are always turning glasses on tables, it's normal, but this sound of a body falling to the ground is not. I lifted my eyes from the dish and what I saw was Galhardo mounted on another kid, his two arms under the kid's arms, turning on his neck, hands supported by the kid's head. The other came on to kick Galhardo and Morales blocked his way, "Mind your own business or else you fall down too". The other kid took no notice, clenched his fist and departed. Morales caught the other kid's hand in a quick movement and pulled it behind so brutally the other kid was sent down spinning around his own body as a top would; almost at the same time, Morales pulled the other kid's supporting foot up with his own, collapsing together with him out of my field of vision limited by the tabletop. I stood up to do something, already hearing the haste of security guards coming our way. People around had left the nearby tables disorderly afraid of what could become of them. Galhardo had the first kid under control, lying on his back and having his arms in the same position, locking the first kid's two arms, exercising a whole lot of pressure on his back, what you could tell by the absurd tension in his whole body. In the kid's twisted features I recognized one of the two who were sitting at the table where Panotti was looking at. To think I didn't see them approach this table. When I managed to look beyond the obtrusive tabletop, Morales had formed a hoop with his arms, a hoop that crossed the kid's left leg, chained his neck and left arm in a single bear hug. And this rascal Morales tightened the chain more and more, pulling moans out of the poor kid. Panotti just kept eating his baked potato as if nothing surrounded him. And I prepared to talk to the security guards.
"Did you really need to say you were our psychologist?", meowed Panotti, as we left the mall, after I spent about half an hour talking to the security guards. "We will cut a very nice and pleasant figure, everyone in the mall that knows us will say we have psychological problems."
I looked at him and could just laugh.
"Something you definitely have not", I ended up saying, between my seizures of laughter.
[5/21/2002 6:43:25 AM..............
"You mean they squeezed the shit out of the guys?", Figueira trembled and shook with laughter at my narration of the mall adventure with the power trio. Zangrandi laughed his way too, discreetly but seemed to be having a heck of a time with my pictoresque passages. He asked me if Panotti got down from the table. If he intervened. I said he didn't even look at what was happening as if he was having lunch in the Garden of Eden.
"Very lucky they were", said Zangrandi, predicting a shady future to all those daring to interrupt a Panottian lunch. I just had to laugh.
"And you in the eye of the storm?", spiked Figueira, laughing.
"Fire Department", I said, getting in the heart of it, "how are practices?"
Figueira told me he continues to practice more than ever and has been watching Panotti with attention more often, watching his every practice. I ask him if he can remember things he can use. He tells me he's starting to understand better certain flaws in what he used to do. I need to come to watch the practices more often too.
Zangrandi is on the front line. He says some techniques have to be felt, first it usually happens when you fall prey to these techniques, trying to figure out why you fell into the trap, what the defense flaws were. He's been observing practices all the time too. I myself have seen the coach removing Zangrandi from the mat, from beside the players, the younger and the older ones lest they fell right down on him. He told the coach he didn't mind.
"I can see it closer this way", he said, winking at me.
[5/24/2002 2:42:08 AM..............
Right after our daily conversation, I stood watching the kids in motion, waiting for the coach to come; I sat in one of the chairs around the mat, when I got a glimpse of a movement out of the corner of my eye, the movement of a hand. I looked at the movement and saw Coach Rodrigo calling me. Odd. It's been a while since I started here and whenever I talked to the coaches it had to be on my own initiative. Think we should work as a team, but... It's interesting that he calls me anyway. We went to Mr. Costa's room and he shut the door. I stood gazing at the door, trying to figure out what he wanted from me.
"Have you talked to Figueira lately, Miss Grisam?"
"Yes, every day. When you don't find me here, it's because I have already gone away. These days I intend to watch the practices more closely."
He smiled.
"It was exactly what I wanted to ask you. I wanted to ask you to observe Figueira wrestling very closely."
"What's the matter with Figueira? What has he done this time?"
"Yesterday Mr. Costa caught him talking to Galhardo during the wrestle and scolded him. I myself got my share."
"Why couldn't Figueira and Galhardo talk? They had to pay attention to wrestling, didn't they?"
Rodrigo smiled once again.
"Yes they had to pay a lot of attention, Miss Grisam. Especially because it was them wrestling."
I started to laugh. Coach Rodrigo thought I laughed at my own mistake, but I laughed at the fact that two wrestlers would talk while fighting.
"Didn't you know there are wrestlers who talk to the opponent while fighting with him? Figueira is one of them."
"Well, now I know", I said still laughing, "what do they usually talk about?"
His laughing face then turned into a scowl facing me.
"They don't talk the way you imagine, Miss Grisam", he said in a cold mood, "it's more of a deal of one cursing the other. Not always does it happen this way, but it happens many times. The other problem is, I've seen Galhardo talk to Morales too. And I think Galhardo is catching Figueira's disease too. If Figueira gets caught talking in a tournament he can even be disqualified."
"Oh, I see. It breaks the rules."
"That's it. Figueira has already been disqualified for talking to an opponent when he was over him. Figueira would have won if he hadn't talked to his opponent."
After the warm-up, Coach Rodrigo had them run around the block. Four turns and I waited for the kids to pass and Figueira always played a joke on me as he passed by. Coach Rodrigo brought them back in and sent them to shower. Put a silver object in Figueira's hand and the kid ran down the corridor. I asked Rodrigo what it was. Rodrigo told me it was a nail clipper and an emery board.
He told me to sit on the mat, leaning against te wall and watch Figueira carefully. When the wrestle started and Galhardo and Figueira started wrestling on the mat, Zangrandi sat at my side, only watching. All of a sudden he elbowed me, pointing at Figueira and Galhardo, trying to show me what I could already see.
"Listen."
Figueira really talked. He was talking to Galhardo, that looked at me embarrassed, believing I thought he did it too. It was so funny I just had to laugh. Zangrandi laughed too, looking at Galhardo, that assumed an expression of lack of concentration. Rodrigo warned him he should fight; in that moment, Figueira was already over him. Galhardo kept looking at us, almost cutting Figueira dead. Coach Rodrigo interrupted the match. Galhardo and Figueira stood up and resumed the match standing. The latter ended up throwing the former to the mat. He was over Galhardo again, locking his right arm with his own, resting his hand on Galhardo's head. Galhardo shook his body as he could, trying to escape him and Figueira once again started talking to him. Rodrigo looked at me as if he was saying, "see for yourself", Galhardo looked at me under Figueira's pressure and tapped him on the left leg. Figueira let him go and he let himself fall on the mat. He was staring at me and said, "how come we're gonna take the guy to a tournament again talking like this?"
Figueira seemed sort of ashamed. "Come on, Speech, get a life!", Galhardo said, nicknaming Figueira, upset.
I definitely need to talk to this kid.
[5/24/2002 2:07:30 PM..............
I took the kids to have lunch at SuperVegetariano. They meowed, "but eating only leaves?" and I said vegetarian food shall not live by leaves alone.
"Are you vegetarian?", inquired Panotti.
"No, but I like the food here a lot."
Mr. Costa had driven us downtown to João Pessoa Avenue; he said he'd be back in one hour. The Rosary Church of Black Men's bell started tolling. Twelve strikes. No better time to have lunch. They invaded the restaurant in that typical rhino style stampede. They soon got their dishes ready and filled them with everything they thought tasted good.
At the table, they commented it was not what they had expected and eventually liked most of what they had eaten. What they enjoyed a lot was the fact they could fill and empty their glasses anytime.
The talk was about many different issues, especially, of course, wrestling. I commented I had gotten in touch with an American webmistress from Souderton, Pennsylvania, through e-mail. She had two sons wrestling and we were talking a lot about her sons and the five.
"About us?", asked Morales, frowning, "what have you said about us?"
"We have commented a lot about the way you see wrestling. She couldn't believe it when she heard about what happened at the mall. Said she wouldn't know what to do in such a situation if she were me."
"Well, you probably wouldn't like it if one of them opened your blouse and poured Coca-Cola inside, because it was exactly what they were about to do, the glass was already positioned. You didn't see it but we did", replied Galhardo staring at me.
"We didn't get at anyone, Miss Grisam, not even messed with the guys", added Morales, "but what a nice figure they'd have cut if we hadn't held them."
Zangrandi pondered, "but it's true what the Americans say, most of the wrestlers in our region are real hangmen", he said, "we can't just complain about bad reputation."
The others looked at him, including Figueira. And he said, "well I'm trying to learn more. Now I don't know if I want to do it for the blows I got in the past. I enjoy this madness though I know it's not what we would choose to do."
I said we talked a lot about Figueira and the American seemed concerned and disturbed by learning what happened to my arm when I first met him to talk. Figueira looked down and said he was sorry. Then, curious, he asked what exactly she had said. I said she and her son thought the description sounded a lot like World Wrestling Entertainment. Figueira's eyes glittered. He said, "I can't deny I like Hulk Hogan, Stone Cold... but I know it has nothing to do with what we are doing."
I was trying to remember something. The second name hit me.
"Now it was the name she told me her son commented you acted like, Stone Cold."
Figueira's eyes glittered some more.
"Ah, the kid knows a lot about it... what's his name?"
I said it was Matthew and his mother's name was Debbie.
"Aw, then Matthew is really cool it was nice of him to compare me to Stone Cold, he has good taste. I don't need to mention Hogan", closed Figueira, satisfied.
"Don't you think it's risky to comment about us on the net?", queried Panotti. Morales nodded at the question.
"I have the same doubt", he said.
"She's really nice, believe me. But you are more than a cultural shock. You are a cultural earthquake. I don't see what damage simple talk can do."
"Gee, it's not because of the Americans. Nice of them to be concerned, but..."
Panotti told me he asked me about it because he really wanted to know, not in order to question my intentions. Said he thought there was no problem. But he would always worry about something. I see the hacker-shaped paranoia has reached not only me in this region. I think his concern matches what he told me when we left the mall that day. Galhardo had already finished his second dish and threatened to fetch one more. Figueira and Zangrandi just chewed and looked like they were trying to understand our debate.
[5/26/2002 12:43:29 AM..............
I met Figueira and Zangrandi sitting on a concrete bench at Palmares Sq. Zangrandi was the one who saw me first. They remembered the vegetarian restaurant.
"I thought it was nice to hear about the Americans. They are right. It's good to hear it from people from the outside or else we'll think it's the right way forever and will never change.They think I'm the only one who thinks this way."
"I am glad to hear this is what you think, Zangrandi."
I asked Figueira if he thought what was said about him taking after Stone Cold was a compliment.
"No."
"So, you were ironic when you praised Matthew's comment."
He looked at me.
"No, I was not."
"Then, I'm afraid I can't work it out."
Zangrandi laughed. Figueira had a serious look on his face.
"I thought he was clever to identify what style it was. And I agree with what Panotti said, that it was nice of them to care anyway. Americans already have a long history of wrestling. When I think about us practicing to be wrestlers in Brazil, I think it is the same for an American to be a football player. We swim against the stream, Miss Grisam. This is the country of football, not the country of wrestling."
"It doesn't justify wanting to use your knowledge for revenge, Figueira."
Zangrandi shook my hand, in agreement.
"No, it doesn't, and I try hard not to do it, but I can understand why we misunderstand the objective sometimes.", said Figueira, looking at me, "when we don't even know what to dream of, what to expect from what we are doing."
Zangrandi was astonished.
"Don't you know what your goals are, Figueira?", he asked.
I looked at Figueira, who didn't look back to me. He gazed into the skate area, a calm and thoughtful look gazing into infinity.
"I didn't. But now I think I begin to understand certain things I had never seen. What I want in the end is to be better than I am. I want to lose my fear of losing. I want to lose my fear of people. I want to lose my fear of fear."
"How does it feel at a tournament?"
"Shivers up and down my spine", he said, "when we go to the mat there's no telling..."
"I feel it too, but it's not so great, Figueira", said Zangrandi, "when the wrestle starts, I forget about it, I have to be alert."
"You've been pinned a number of times, haven't you, Zangrandi?"
"Everybody is, sooner or later. When I was not, won or lost because of points, or pinned the adversaries too. It happens to everyone."
Figueira said he had lost most of the matches he played at tournaments. From the four undoubted pins he managed to apply, was disqualified in two, for talking to the opponent.
"What is that you talk so much to your opponent, Figueira? I watched you yesterday, was curious to know what you said to Galhardo."
"He encourages the opponent to wrestle", explained Zangrandi, "it is his call to fight he says."
"Is it true, Figueira?"
He had his eyes way down, trying to memorize his sneaker's brand. Didn't say a word. I shouldn't, but I insisted.
"Do you curse the opponent?"
"..."
"Do you curse him or not? You know you can't do it, don't you? Do you curse him?"
Figueira went red. All of a sudden he stood up and exploded, "No, there's no curse! I do call them to fight! I ask them how come they can be under me, under my control, holding my leg without fighting? I do call them to fight!"
"Easy, kid, she's just asking you a question..."
Figueira fell on the bench and was breathless. "This is why I was disqualified twice. This is the reason why. But I don't care, as long as I can call them to fight."
He looked at me. I saw his attitude there, something he hasn't channelled to something positive yet. Figueira is too emotional. But I can't help thinking a call to fight is a beautiful thing. It sounds to me like trying to wake someone up. And if he's being true to me, what I have no reasons to doubt, does it mean he gives victory away to celebrate the fight? I can't, just can't be that strange. I tried to ask him about it, but he was in no mood to talk about it anymore.
Stella Freitas-Grisam was born in 1994 as a character I created for a fiction series I have been writing since the nineties. She is a psychologist and tries to help violent kids overcome the causes of their psychoses. Her patients are usually calm hooligans, spreading hate and violence everywhere, but in this selected case of Stella's archives of unsolved enigmas the kids try very hard to dominate the beast inside. Not always are they successful; especially Figueira, who wants to go far to understand the meaning of the word "victory". With or without any help, he'll go that far to try to see farther than he usually would.
_________________________________
From a four-part series:
The Wrestling Season Part 1.
The Wrestling Season Part 2.
The Wrestling Season Part 3.
The Wrestling Season Part 4.
* * *
_________________________________
From a four-part series:
The Wrestling Season Part 1.
The Wrestling Season Part 2.
The Wrestling Season Part 3.
The Wrestling Season Part 4.
* * *
© 2002 - 2024 matiasromero
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