quite some time trying to find clues, looking at every detail, but I did not feel anything different.
I decided to try the other spot. I quickly pivoted on my knees and was about to lie down on my jacket when I felt an unusual apprehension. It was more like a physical sensation of something actually pushing on my stomach. I jumped up and retreated in one movement. The hair on my neck pricked up. My legs had arched slightly, my trunk was bent forward, and my arms stuck out in front of me rigidly with my fingers contracted like a claw. I took notice of my strange posture and my fright increased.
I walked back involuntarily and sat down on the rock next to my shoe. From the rock, I slumped to the floor. I tried to figure out what had happened to cause me such a fright. I thought it must have been the fatigue I was experiencing. It was nearly daytime. I felt silly and embarrassed. Yet I had no way to explain what had frightened me, nor had I figured out what don Juan wanted.
I decided to give it one last try. I got up and slowly approached the place marked by my jacket, and again I felt the same apprehension. This time I made a strong effort to control myself. I sat down, and then knelt in order to lie face down, but I could not lie in spite of my will. I put my hands on the floor in front of me. My breathing accelerated; my stomach was upset. I had a clear sensation of panic, and fought not to run away. I thought don Juan was perhaps watching me. Slowly I crawled back to the other spot and propped my back against the rock. I wanted to rest for a while to organize my thoughts, but I fell asleep.
I heard don Juan talking and laughing above my head. I woke up.
'You have found the spot,' he said.
I did not understand him at first, but he assured me again that the place where I had fallen asleep was the spot in question. He again asked me how I felt lying there. I told him I really did not notice any difference.
He asked me to compare my feelings at that moment with what I had felt while lying on the other spot. For the first time it occurred to me that I could not possibly explain my apprehension of the preceding night. He urged me in a kind of challenging way to sit on the other spot. For some inexplicable reason I was actually afraid of the other place, and did not sit on it. He asserted that only a fool could fail to see the difference.
I asked him if each of the two spots had a special name. He said that the good one was called the sitio and the bad one the enemy; he said these two places were the key to a man's well— being, especially for a man who pursuing knowledge. The sheer act of sitting on one's spot created superior strength; on the other hand, the enemy weakened a man and could even cause his death. He said I had replenished my energy, which I had spent lavishly the night before, by taking a nap on my spot.
He also said that the colours I had seen in association with each specific spot had the same overall effect either of giving strength or of curtailing it.
I asked him if there were other spots for me like the two I had found, and how I should go about finding them. He said that many places in the world would be comparable to those two, and that the best way to find them was by detecting their respective colours.
It was not clear to me whether or not I had solved the problem, and in fact I was not even convinced that there had been a problem; I could not avoid feeling that the whole experience was forced and arbitrary. I was certain that don Juan had watched me all night and then proceeded to humour me by saying that wherever I had fallen asleep was the place I was looking for. Yet I failed to see a logical reason for such an act, and when he challenged me to sit on the other spot I could not do it. There was a strange cleavage between my pragmatic experience of fearing the 'other spot' and my rational deliberations about the total event.
Don Juan, on the other hand, was very sure I had succeeded, and, acting in accordance with my success, let me know he was going to teach me about peyote.
'You asked me to teach about Mescalito,' he said. 'I wanted to find out if you had enough backbone to meet him face to face. Mescalito is not something to make fun of. You must have command over your resources. Now I know I can take your desire alone as a good reason to learn.'
'You really are going to teach me about peyote?'
'I prefer to call him Mescalito. Do the same.'
'When are you going to start?'
'It is not so simple as that. You must be ready first.'
'I think I am ready.'
'This is not a joke. You must wait until there is no doubt, and then you will meet him.'
'Do I have to prepare myself?'
'No. You simply have to wait. You may give up the whole idea after a while. You get tired easily. Last night you were ready to quit as soon as it got difficult. Mescalito requires a very serious intent.'
2
I arrived at don Juan's house in Arizona about seven o'clock on Friday night. Five other Indians were sitting with him on the porch of his house. I greeted him and sat waiting for them to say something. After a formal silence one of the men got up, walked over to me, and said, 'Buenas noches.' I stood up and answered, 'Buenas noches.' Then all the other men got up and came to me and we all mumbled 'Buenas noches' and shook hands either by barely touching one another's finger-tips or by holding the hand for an instant and then dropping it quite abruptly.
We all sat down again. They seemed to be rather shy — at a loss for words, although they all spoke Spanish.
It must have been about half past seven when suddenly they all got up and walked towards the back of the house. Nobody had said a word for a long time. Don Juan signalled me to follow and we all got inside an old pickup truck parked there. I sat in the back with don Juan and two younger men. There were no cushions or benches and the metal floor was painfully hard, especially when we left the highway and got onto a dirt road. Don Juan whispered that we were going to the house of one of his friends who had seven mescalitos for me.
I asked him, 'Don't you have any of them yourself, don Juan?'
'I do, but I couldn't offer them to you. You see, someone else has to do this.'
'Can you tell me why?'
'Perhaps you are not agreeable to «him» and «he» won't like you, and then you will never be able to know «him» with affection, as one should; and our friendship will be broken.'
'Why wouldn't he like me? I have never done anything to him.'
'You don't have to do anything to be liked or disliked. He either takes you, or throws you away.'
'But, if he doesn't take me, isn't there anything I can do to make him like me?'
The other two men seemed to have overheard my question and laughed.
'No! I can't think of anything one can do,' don Juan said.
He turned half away from me and I could not talk to him any more.
We must have driven for at least an hour before we stopped in front of a small house. It was quite dark, and after the driver had turned off the headlights I could make out only the vague contour of the building.
A young woman, a Mexican, judging by her speech inflection, was yelling at a dog to make him stop barking. We got out of the track and walked into the house. The men mumbled 'Buenas noches' as they went by her. She answered back and went on yelling at the dog.
The room was large and was stacked up with a multitude of objects. A dim light from a very small electric bulb rendered the scene quite gloomy. There were quite a few chairs with broken legs and sagging seats leaning against the walls. Three of the men sat down on a couch, which was the largest single piece of furniture in the room. It was very old and had sagged down all the way to the floor; in the dim light it seemed to be red and dirty. The rest of us sat in chairs. We sat in silence for a long time.
One of the men suddenly got up and went into another room. He was perhaps in his fifties, tall, and husky. He came back a moment later with a coffee jar. He opened the lid and handed the jar to me; inside there were seven odd-looking items. They varied in size and consistency. Some of them were almost round, others were elongated. They felt to the touch like the pulp of walnuts, or the surface of cork. Their brownish colour made them look like hard, dry nutshells. I handled them, rubbing their surfaces for quite some time.
