THE POWER OF STILLNESS
I didn’t get the Rothko Chapel. Then I needed it.
A couple stood in quiet admiration of the vast black canvas flanking the Rothko Chapel’s entrance. They were obviously moved. Staring at her feet, a woman in black sat stock-still on one of the wooden benches.
My boyfriend and I plopped down near her. I didn’t get it. They’re just big, black paintings in a windowless building.
After a while, a tear splashed on her shoe.
We left after five minutes. We had enjoyed the quiet, I guess, but we were no more at peace. What was I meant to gain? How could I be more at peace than I already was? My life was fine; our life was fine.
I credited my limited knowledge and appreciation of modern art and my similarly limited drive to learn about it.
“Eh,” he said, as we walked back out into sticky, gray June. “Not for me.”
I agreed. But then I started feeling concerned about my disconnect from a place that holds such significance for so many. It’s a cornerstone of the Houston tourist scene, the guest book filled with entries from all over the world detailing visitors’ spiritual journeys. More than 55,000 people a year come here to the corner of Sul Ross and Yupon in search of — what?
Grief has a way
Our life continued for the next year. We fought, we made up. We traveled. I got a new job. We fought. Then we broke up.
I moved out. He met someone else.
Somehow, I lost what peace I thought I had. Grief has a way of warping a personality, of hollowing you out until there’s nothing left but the most basic desire to want and to feel wanted. So I went back to the Rothko Chapel looking for something — anything — to make me feel better. Or to make me feel anything at all.
I pulled open the heavy doors and let my eyes adjust to the low light. The air-conditioning chilled the sweat on my neck. Sitting down on one of those wooden benches, I stared at my shoes and waited. Waited for the acceptance promised in the beautiful brochures, the tranquility I had heard people talk about. I didn’t want to pretend, I wanted to feel something, and this seemed like the perfect place to do it.
Silent watchers and art enthusiasts entered and exited the stage like actors following muddled cues in a silent stage production.
I sat and sat and sat and waited. Nothing. My mind was everywhere but here.
I thought about the end of my relationship and the losses that followed. What did I do wrong? Did I do something wrong? I missed my old life. I missed being comfortable. I missed that feeling of stability.
Not nothing
Being still and taking things in is inherently uncomfortable for me. Living in the moment is completely foreign.
Knowing myself, I imagined that after a while I would get bored and the serenity would evaporate as soon as I left. Being there, seeing others make the effort to make sense of the complexities of their lives, was something I thought I would have to pretend to relate to.
It’s easy to tell yourself that you got what you came for, that savoring the silence did the trick, and you’re set.
But as I sat there, the paintings, massive and dark as they are, started to offer a kind of comfort. They inspired a shared tranquility, and I found comfort in being just another person there, searching. Everyone was there for something. When I didn’t need it, the Rothko Chapel didn’t mean anything to me.
And now it did, now that I did.
I could think about what I wanted in there. I could come to terms with all the upheaval and the commotion. I was present, and that wasn’t nothing.
Weeks later, I would find myself coming back, late at night. I knew it was closed. It had been a good day, but I needed a place of my own to take a break.
A lone security guard walked the perimeter of the park. Shut out of the chapel, I turned to the “Broken Obelisk,” thinking back about the story of its conception, one almost as chaotic as my restless mind.
It wasn’t the paintings this time. It wasn’t the people. It wasn’t the moon in the reflecting pool. I sat and waited for the stillness to come again. Marialuisa Rincon is a journalism student at the University of Houston and the Daily Cougar web editor.