Incense Burner

Kathmandu, Nepal, 1979

My family moved from Arlington, Massachusetts, to Plainview, Long Island, in 1963.

There was almost nothing I liked and very little I remember about growing up on Long Island. On special weekends, though, my parents would make a trip to the huge enclosed flea market at Roosevelt Field—built near the airport from which Charles Lindberg had begun his nonstop transatlantic flight in 1927.

The vendors at Roosevelt Field sold mainly clothes and purses and costume jewelry, packaged foods and knickknacks. It was a great place for a kid to wander around. My default destination was a stall selling imports from India. Amid the kitsch was a display of incense burners, and boxes of cone incense: sandalwood, pine, rose. For some reason, these obsessed me. The exotic scents were like trading cards—even on my limited allowance I wanted to collect the complete set.

Another memorable institution on Long Island was the Westbury Music Fair. The theater had a circular stage, somewhat below the surrounding seats. In April 1968 I saw The Doors perform there; tickets were $5. A few months later, Ravi Shankar played. During his concert an incense burner sat on the stage, and a trippy aroma permeated the room. After the concert ended, and the musicians had left, I hurried down to see if there were any partially burned incense sticks I might take home. Indeed there were. As I was gathering my loot, I felt a hand on my shoulder. “What are you doing, young man?”

It was Ravi Shankar. Stammering, I explained myself. “Wait here,” he instructed. He walked off, and returned a few moments later with a long, foil-wrapped package. “These were made especially for me, in Bangalore,” he said. “Please enjoy them on special
occasions.”

Inside were three long, fragrant sticks of Ravi Shankar’s personal incense. I lit the final one 11 years later, age 25, after safely returning from my first journey to Nepal and India.