Authors: Lisa Alther
Steve and I watch openmouthed. The contrast between this haughty hottie and those babushka-ed sugar-beet slaves â between the robed dervishes and this gyrating gigolo in his double-breasted tux â sums up the schizophrenia we've sensed all over modern Turkey.
The next day we drive to Konya, the capital of the Seljuk Turks in the eleventh century and the target of thirteenth-century European crusaders (the forebears of the conquistadors). Prior to the Turks, Konya was occupied by the Byzantines, Romans, Persians, Lydians, Phrygians, and Hittites, all the way back to 7000
B.C
. In A.D. 50, Saint Paul preached here and so offended his audience that they ran him out of town. Now Konya is best known as the site of the mausoleum of Rumi, whose masterwork
The Mathnawi
contains 25,000 rhyming couplets. His sarcophagus lies in a former Sufi monastery that features two domes, three minarets, and a tiled turquoise silolike structure. This monastery also houses a casket said to contain a hair from Muhammad's beard.
The fundamentalist Islamic guards at the tomb, looking like Aladdins who've lost their lamps, welcome Steve. But they eye me with distaste, despite the long sleeves and scarf I've donned for their benefit. Clearly they think I should be out hoeing sugar beets. They remind me of the scowling men who line the parade route during prochoice marches in Washington, seething with hatred for women who refuse to conform to their demented rules.
I recall a bracing quote from Rumi himself: “Don't let your throat tighten with fear. Take sips of breath all day and night before death closes your mouth.”
Drawing a deep breath, I summon the image of Inez Milholland on her white horse, leading Greatgrandma Pealer through the deranged mobs in her fruit- and flower-bedecked bonnet. I march past the surly guards right up to Rumi's coffin, which is shrouded with a stiff velvet cloth heavily embroidered with gold.
One reason I like Rumi is that his poetry seems to flow from the same source as Cherokee beliefs. For instance, he says, “What strikes the oyster shell does not damage the pearl.” Ever since Dr. Ozdagan pointed out at a Melungeon conference that Turks and Native Americans are cousins from the Altai Mountains of Central Asia, I've been doubly intrigued, wondering if the two systems might be streams from the same river. Many researchers describe Sufism as Islamic mysticism. But my Sufi friends in London assured me that its roots are much more ancient than Islam. But could they be fourteen thousand years ancient, so that the belief system crossed the Bering Strait with those who became Native Americans? Or is Dr. Ozdagan correct to entertain the possibility of a more recent infusion of Muslims into American Indian tribes? Or both?
Scarfless, I watch Steve insert his cash card into an ATM slot. Our cards work at some banks and not others. When they do work, they yield the equivalent of only about five dollars. So we play every ATM we find as though it were a slot machine.
A woman shrouded in black with only her eyes showing glares at me from across the street. She, too, thinks I should be hoeing sugar beets rather than hanging out bareheaded at an ATM kiosk with a good-looking blond infidel.
Steve shrugs at me sympathetically. Then the machine starts spitting out cash. After he collects it, we high-five one another as our somber chaperone shoots daggers at me with her contemptuous eyes. Although I've never been an especially fun person, I feel like Lucille Ball alongside this woman. Her grim gaze makes it clear that we should be gone from Konya by sundown.
Driving toward the Aegean, Steve and I pass through a town where Brent reported giving a talk and afterward meeting a young Turkish man. Having learned in the talk about Brent's extra fingers, the Turk explained that he, too, had six fingers on each hand, as do many Anatolians. He told Brent that they're called
altiparmak
â six-fingered ones.
I've become an expert on polydactylism (as we experts refer to extra digits). A recessive trait, it tends to appear in inbred populations. But it's more common in some such communities than others. Ina saw it in several children when she taught special education in rural East Tennessee. Researchers have found it in the Jackson Whites of New Jersey and the Wesorts of Maryland, both “tri-racial isolate” groups similar to the Melungeons.
Native Americans are four times more likely to have extra thumbs than Europeans or Africans. The trait is more common in males and more often found on the right hand. The
alti parmak
of Anatolia seem to provide yet more evidence of some genetic link between Turks and Native Americans.
Evolutionarily speaking, five fingers are thought to have won out over six because those with six fingers would have been clumsier and therefore less likely to survive to pass on their six-fingered genes. I've often wondered if extra fingers might not explain why so many Appalachians are such good banjo pickers.
The earliest mention of six fingers that I've come across is in the Bible at 2 Samuel 21:20, “And there was yet a battle in Gath, where was a man of great stature, that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four and twenty in all, and he also was born to the giant.” This giant father was Goliath, and his polydactyl son was killed by the brother of David, the slayer of Goliath.
In India, people with six fingers are sometimes recruited as holy men. On the other hand (so to speak), Anne Boleyn had six fingers on one hand, and Marilyn Monroe was rumored to have six toes on one foot, and things didn't go too well for either of them.
Steve and I arrive at a small fishing port on the Aegean called Cesme. A sign identifies its main street as Wise Caddesi. As a result of Brent Kennedy's efforts, Cesme has become a sister city to Wise, Virginia, and the two towns have won a Sister Cities International Award.
Many men from this Anatolian coastal region fought for the Ottoman sultan in his sixteenth-century sea battles with Spain and its allies. Some never returned and are believed to have been either killed or captured by the Spaniards and turned into galley slaves. Some of these slaves would have served in the Mediterranean, and others would have been transported to colonies in the New World such as Cartagena.
An assistant to the mayor of Cesme takes us to lunch, during which he introduces us to some of his fellow citizens. Many have “the look” that I've noticed at the Melungeon conferences: they're lean, wiry men with wavy dark hair, tawny complexions, and bright blue eyes. When I ask my host about the omnipresent blue eyes, he mentions Alexander the Great, and I get a sinking feeling that I've just located a Turkish cell of the Virginia Club.
As we tour Cesme, our guide tells us that his hobby is designing and sewing dresses. Steve raises his eyebrows at me.
We arrive at an ancient stone warehouse on the wharf, from which hangs a sign that reads in English “Melungeon House.” My guide explains that men from Cesme were no doubt among the slaves freed by Sir Francis Drake at Cartagena and then dumped on Roanoke Island, from which they headed inland to become the Melungeons. At Melungeon House, they would have boarded the boats that carried them to their destiny in America. He asks if we think this landmark will attract American tourists. Despite misgivings, I assure him it will.
On a hill above Cesme, we come to lovely rolling woods. A signpost reads in Turkish and in English translation, “This forest area is arranged in memory of the people of Cesme; later named Melungeon, who were taken away to America by the Portuguese people in the sixteenth century.” I can see that once handed a ball, the citizens of Cesme really run with it.
My guide explains that the masts for the ships that carried the soldiers and sailors from Cesme to their destiny in America might have been cut from this very forest. I try to think of a synonym for
destiny
to suggest for his use in future presentations. But all I can come up with
is fate
, which sounds so much more dreary.
Our guide drives us back to his house for coffee. A comfortable stuccoed villa with a yard full of flowers, it's located in a neighborhood that resembles a modest American suburb. From a trellis above his garage hang beautiful clusters of purple grapes. While he cuts us some, I notice a stack of cassettes alongside his tape player. Sorting idly through them, I discover that they're all by Barbra Streisand. This time, I raise my eyebrows at Steve.
Upon reaching New York, I continue to Tennessee, jet-lagged and discouraged. I don't know what I hoped to uncover on my journey. Certainly I observed some hints of possible Portuguese and Turkish connections to Melungeons. But there are so many hints, and they're all so distant in time and space and so impossible to prove. The DNA study offers the only glimmer of hope, but the results won't be reported for a couple of years.
As I drive to my parents' house, I discover that Kroger's, our neighborhood supermarket when I was growing up, has been transformed into a Christian nightclub called the Fire Escape. This makes me feel even more hopeless. Islamic fundamentalists have occupied Rumi's tomb in Konya, and now Christian fundamentalists have occupied Kroger's in Kingsport. Where will it all end?
“What in God's name do Christians do in a nightclub?” I ask my father as I enter his room.
He's sitting in his recliner before the TV. He shrugs. “Drink Virgin Marys?” He clicks off the set with his remote.
I plop down in a chair.
“Brent stopped by and plucked some of my hairs for that DNA study,” he says, diverting me from the depressing topic of Christians at play.
“That must have been a challenge.” My father is almost bald. He takes pride in this, attributing it to excess testosterone.
“Imagine that,” he says, shaking his head. “I'm eighty-five years old, and I don't know who I am. And I'm not sure that I care.”
“Me either,” I mutter.
As I head out to the farm, I'm almost too demoralized even to notice the church signs. But I look up in time to read:
GOD LOVES YOU WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT
.
WHEN DOWN IN THE MOUTH, REMEMBER JONAH
.
HE CAME OUT ALL RIGHT
.
IF THE GOING GETS EASY, YOU'RE HEADED DOWNHILL
.
GO OUT ON A LIMB.THAT'S WHERE YOU'LL FINDTHE FRUIT
.
NEVER GIVE UP, EVEN MOSES WAS ONCE A BASKET CASE
.
These messages seem designed especially for me as I wander in this Melungeon wasteland. Then I really start to worry, because only schizophrenics are megalomaniacal enough to believe that they're receiving personalized billets-doux from the cosmos.
I
âM HELPING SARA LEAN FORWARD
in the hospital bed so she can push harder when the baby suddenly slides into the waiting hands of the doctor. This may be old hat to the medical professionals in the room, but I'm still awestruck by the whole thing. I've been having flashbacks â to my grandfather holding me after my father's departure for boot camp, to my mother displaying Michael in the hospital window, to that snowy night during deer season when Sara herself was born.
The nurse hands Brett the scissors, and he clips his son's umbilical cord with an unsteady hand.
While sponging Sara's face, I realize that I'm studying the baby's hands from the corner of my eye. But an extra digit or two would no longer alarm me. To the contrary, they might qualify him to become a shaman.
As the doctor carries him over to the infrared lamp, the baby gasps the first of what I hope will be several hundred million breaths. Brett follows to watch the nurse clean up his son.
“Is he okay?” Sara whispers, exhausted.
“He's wonderful,” I assure her.
I'm looking out at Lake Champlain through the window of my new condo. In my arms is my grandson, Zachary, wrapped in a mint-green flannel blanket. His harried mother is showering upstairs. I've moved to Burlington, and Zachary and his parents are now living in the farmhouse in which Sara grew up. Our family recycles houses the way others recycle outgrown clothing. My grandparents gave their house to my parents, and my parents gave their cabin to us kids. All our dwellings are crammed to the rafters with ancestral furniture, artwork, and tableware. Each generation serves as curator to all previous ones.
Although it's still cool, the traffic on Lake Champlain has picked up, and I watch a parade of windsurfers, canoers, kayak-ers, and sailors. Yankees are very busy and fit people, especially in contrast to Tennesseans, whose idea of a cardiovascular workout is to carry a cooler filled with Budweiser to the top row of the NASCAR bleachers.
I once attended a NASCAR race at the track near Kings-port. The BMIs (body mass index) of most spectators probably exceeded their SATs. Many men were shirtless, their bellies hanging out over the waistbands of shorts that rode so low that their butt cracks showed. The women wore halter tops and short shorts several sizes too small.
The incessant whine of the circling cars would have driven mad anyone who wasn't drunk. The only moment of relief was when one car crashed into the wall. The crowd went wild, like a bullfight audience when the matador is gored, or Romans in the Colosseum when the lions brought down a Christian. As the fans exited after sizzling for hours on the aluminum benches in the hot sun, they resembled a clan of Tomato People, with toothpick arms and legs poking out from round red globes.
I glance at Zachary, who's sleeping peacefully, his pursed lips making sucking movements, like a slumbering pup whose legs twitch as he dreams of the chase. I study his fine, fair hair and tiny perfect features.
I've been reading up on genetics in hopes of understanding the results of the Melungeon DNA study once they're announced. I've learned that we humans share 60 percent of our protein-coding genes with chickens, from which we diverged 310 million years ago. Chickens descend directly from dinosaurs. Humans also share 96 percent of our genes with chimpanzees. And we share 99 percent of our DNA with one another. A handful of the genes that differ governs our visible physical characteristics such as skin, hair and eye color, and body type. Which version we end up with is determined by interconnected processes that aren't yet fully understood.