beyond the pale

So, I’ve been studying Irish History recently.

Sensible, I thought, since I’m going there in less than two months and I want to understand, this time, what I’m seeing.

I’m studying in typical homeschool style (well, our homeschool, anyway).Went to the bookstore, browsed the Ireland section until I found something that sparked my interest (written by an Irish storyteller, telling the history of his country through tales of its people), bought it, brought it home and started reading it. Then, each time I hit upon something interesting, I buy another book about that part of history (or get one from the library) until I have a huge stack to wade through. The Pocket History of Irish Saints. Michael Collins. Irish Writers’ Essays on Writing, An Illustrated Guide to the Irish Civil War, A Pocket Guide to Irish Rebels…the stack just keeps getting higher until I’m overwhelmed and end up going off to do something else, like watch Liam Neeson portray Michael Collins on film. Or peruse the Eyewitness Guide to Ireland I’ve been carrying around for six years, eager to go back.

It was while distracting myself with THIS book that I stumbled upon a map with a little section around Dublin in purple, the rest of the country green, the purple labeled “The Pale” (see page 134). Following a rabbit trail, I found myself flipping through the pages of bright photographs until I found the little box describing “The Pale”:

The term “Pale” refers to an area around Dublin that marked the limits of English influence from Norman to Tudor times. The frontier fluctuated…Gaelic chieftains outside the area could keep their lands provided they agreed to bring up their heirs within the pale.

The Palesmen supported their rulers’ interests and considered themselves the upholders of English values…Long after its fortifications were dismantled, the idea of the Pale lived on as a state of mind. The expression “beyond the pale” survives as a definition of those outside the bonds of civilized society.

I closed the book in satisfaction. I had learned something. Day well spent.

So I’ve been thinking about this phrase, “Beyond the Pale”. It’s been bouncing around in my head all week like the ball in a pinball machine; harmlessly wandering around until it gets hit just the right direction, then bells and whistles start going off, and the points start racking up, usually in the form of questions.

How far beyond the bonds of accepted society you have to be, to be considered beyond the pale. How primitive? How different?

I like thinking that I’ve spent most of my life beyond the pale. I might be wrong; I might be over reaching the bounds of the term, might be over-analyzing the whole thing, of course. I’ve never really been accused of under-analyzing anything.

I know that I grew up beyond the pale. I wish I lived there still. I think the root of my dissatisfaction with life, now, is that I feel somewhere along the way I stepped over that invisible boundary and into the land of expectations, the land of propriety and competition, of professionalism and “success”; the place where I’m expected to uphold the ruler’s interest. I’m not sure what to do in this strange land, not sure what to say, how to act, how to handle the feeling that everyone is staring and pointing and wondering where I came from and whether I really belong.

Some days I feel I belong and I go to work, I wear a dress shirt and put on makeup. I keep my calendar. I go to the mall. I talk fashion and music with an adult, and manage to avoid expressing any unconventional opinions. I don’t accidently say something about using an outhouse, or surviving without electricity. I don’t mention how much I want to run away from the city. I remember that a town of twelve thousand is not, in fact, a city. I don’t mention butchering turkeys the day before Thanksgiving. I don’t talk about being in my parent’s bedroom, watching my siblings be born on the bed where they were conceived. Maybe I don’t even mention being a homeschooler. And I go home at the end of the day, proud of myself for fooling them all. For making them think I belong.

I can do this for a few days. Maybe a month. Then I notice that I’m nervous. On edge. Tired. Lost. I feel I’m floundering. Not sure who I am. I’m afraid I’m losing some of the pieces of myself. Afraid that if they disappear entirely, I won’t be able to get them back.

And so I sneak away to the property of the midwife who missed my brother’s birth by twenty minutes. I breathe the forest air, let the music of the creek heal my soul. I take my shirt off and lie in the summer sun, soaking up the velvet softness of moss against the bare skin of my back. I sleep in her teepee beside an open fire. I write with an ink pen on loose-leaf paper. I lock my calendar and my cell phone in the car. I paint something no one but me will understand. I eat mangoes naked.

I go home, and pick brightly colored peppers from the little garden I’ve planted in my back yard. I pull green beans off the thin stalks, and gently pluck tomatoes from their vines. I take dry beans out of five gallon buckets, and cook them in a pressure cooker. I make tofu by hand and stir it into the wok, douse it with soy sauce and garlic, throw in the bright peppers and the green onions. I take off my shoes and cook barefoot in my kitchen, Sherman the rabbit hopping around at my feet before running off to harass the cat.

And I know that whoever drives past my curtained windows will see only a white house with vinyl siding and drive on past, never knowing that the walls of my house are the borders and the secret refuge of my kitchen, my bedroom, my basement full of home-canned goods, are the last fortifications of the Pale. Behind them, beneath my makeup and professional clothes, I will always live beyond the Pale.

By Tesi, January 2010