What Would the Dalai Lama Do?
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I first came to baby signing the same way I imagine a lot of parents do, even if they won't admit it: I saw someone else's kid do it and was jealous.
I was in the park with my 10-month-old son, Harding, and gave a push to the baby in the next swing. Margo, still quite bald but with an impressive number of teeth for someone a year old, purposefully brought her palm to her mouth and gestured outward. I looked to her mother for an explanation. "She signs," her mom said. "That was 'Thank you.' "
I turned to Hardy, who was gazing off into the distance at a tree or a bird or a cloud. Time to get to work, I thought.
I started with animal noises: I dutifully panted every time a dog crossed our path, and flapped my arms whenever we saw a bird. For three weeks, nothing much happened. Then one morning Hardy pointed at a large, strutting pigeon before I'd even started my dance. He looked at me expectantly, and I flapped my arms harder than ever and said, "Yes, yes, a bird!" The next week, Hardy did his own flapping. (Not exactly official American Sign Language, I realize.)
By age 1 he knew 30-ish signs — for hat, scrambled eggs, and so on — mostly drawn from a baby sign language book. When I heard the Dalai Lama was coming to town, I got really ambitious: I decided to teach Hardy a new sign to welcome His Holiness.
Hardy, his mom, Cathlin, and I live on the campus of Union Theological Seminary in New York City, where Cathlin works. I'm a stay-at-home dad, and Hardy and I spend most of our days exploring the seminary's Gothic wonderland. We search for gargoyles, stare at the glory of stained-glass windows. But those carefree days were in the past. Our focus now was on impressing the hell out of our visitor.
So I started right in as we headed out of the apartment for our daily walk. "Buddha," I said. Then I brought my palms together and bowed, repeating the sequence — oh, about 30 or 40 times. My plan was to whisper the code word to Hardy when we met His Holiness, who would be duly wowed.
But Hardy just laughed and turned an imaginary doorknob, his sign for wanting to go outside. He flapped his arms and brought his fists to his mouth, pretending to nibble them like acorns.
Bass, the doorman, laughed. "Hey, mon," he said. "Can't you see the boy wants to go outside to see the birds and squirrels?" Like almost everyone at the seminary, Bass knows all of my son's signs.
It started out innocently enough. One day, I had Hardy demonstrate how he asked for yogurt by moving his hand up and down as if he were milking a cow. After that, the hits just kept coming. We'd do the elephant sign, where Hardy raised his arm up to his nose so it looked like a trunk and gave a bellow (a crowd favorite). Then we'd segue to signs for flower, taxi, and the entire cast of Old MacDonald's farm. His audience, who'd usually never heard of baby sign language, would shake their heads in disbelief and declare Hardy the smartest child they'd ever seen. I'd nod and shrug, but inside I was bursting with pride.
One morning Cathlin gently asked if I thought I might be getting carried away. "With making Hardy perform all the time," she said.
"But he loves it," I said.
"He loves that you love it."
"That's crazy talk," I insisted. "Besides, we're really on to something with this Buddha sign."
On the big day, I was tense but tried to seem relaxed for Hardy's sake. We were warming up when Cathlin called to say that the Dalai Lama would be coming down the seminary's northeast hallway in 20 minutes. I turned to Hardy and said, "Showtime." He raised his hands in the air, which could mean (1) a tree or (2) he wanted to eat a raisin. I ignored it and went for the gold. "Buddha," I said. He nailed it.The hallway was filled with Secret Service guys. One let Hardy take out his earpiece, which Hardy promptly stuck up his nose. "Sorry," I said, wiping it off with a burp cloth. I hastily changed the mood by asking Hardy to do some signs for the men.
We started with the chicken, where Hardy tucks his hands in his armpits, clucks, and struts. The Secret Service guys went nuts. Then I took him through penguin, piggy, and frog. Hardy was in the zone, and when I said, "Buddha," he bowed, in turn, to all four men. One guy dropped his walkie-talkie. The earpiece man gave Hardy a high five. Then suddenly all the walkie-talkies began squawking, and at the far end of the corridor I caught a glimpse of saffron robes.
I broke out in goose bumps and couldn't quite catch my breath. Hardy went quiet in my arms. A Tibetan neighbor had told me a white scarf means you'd like to be blessed by His Holiness, so I'd draped one around Hardy's shoulders. Sure enough, when the Dalai Lama reached us, he stopped, leaned forward, and put his forehead to Hardy's. He said something I couldn't understand, then turned to me and said, "Beautiful."
His voice was very deep, as if he were pulling it up from his gut. But it was his face that transported me. It was radiant, with cheeks smooth as skipping stones. His one wrinkle, a deep forehead crease, actually looked like a smile. I was speechless. The Dalai Lama patted me on the shoulder, and then he was gone.
When I regained my senses, I was deeply disappointed. In the moment of truth I had forgotten all my plans. There was no bowing, no delighted astonishment from one of the world's foremost spiritual leaders. That was it: I wouldn't be getting another chance.
Later, I sat in a pew with Cathlin listening to the Dalai Lama's talk. Because humans create war, he said, they can also create peace. But global peace is possible only through our individual inner peace — which we push away with our endless desires and our inability to be here, now.
Cathlin nudged me. "You didn't fail," she whispered.
"What do you mean?" I said.
"You were in the moment," she said. "Instead of thinking about making Hardy perform, you stayed in the present and had a true experience."
She was right, of course. When the Dalai Lama approached us, my mind didn't suddenly go empty. Rather, it became so full — of the moment, of his voice and touch and spirit — that I had no time for something as trivial as my desire to show off my son. How many other times, I wondered, had something miraculous passed me by because I was so preoccupied with looking like the greatest dad in the world?
From now on, Hardy and I are stopping to smell the gargoyles.
