In college, our dorm director had a policy of silence during finals week, to encourage study, of course. No loud talk in the halls. No loud music. And so forth. One Tuesday night, during finals, there was a great deal of extra noise in the hallway. My roommate Gregg, with an extra g, (which gave me the idea to spell Fredd with an extra d the entire year) goes out into the hallway and screams, “QUIET!” About then, the dorm director appears at the end of the hallway preparing to kick butt and take names. Of course, by now, everybody shuts the hell up and disappears behind slamming doors. And only Gregg and I are left standing there staring down the director. He points at Gregg and says, “Come here.” I went with him because I was standing right behind him.

He escorts us into his office and proceeds writing a disciplinary referral to the Dean of Men. Gregg, with an extra g, goes, “I was just doing what they were doing. How come I’m the only one getting written up?” The dorm director was an Aztec Indian from Guatemala or somewhere. He goes, “If someone else put his hand in a fire, would you put your hand in the fire, too?”

Now Gregg, with an extra g, is REALLY pissed. He turns to look at me and tries to swallow his tongue. I’m not brilliant, but I had a sudden blinding flash of insight all of a sudden. I go, “Dr. Yriarte,” (Yeah, he was also the professor of Aztec studies or something). I go, “If someone threw something into the fire that I couldn’t do without, I would stick my own hand into the fire to get it back. You bet I would.” The good Doctor just kept writing.

Gregg, with an extra g, had to pay, like, a twenty-dollar fine or they wouldn’t release his transcripts or something. He paid it. Yeah, word got around. And there was peace for the rest of finals week.

Two funny things I learned from that inept proverb Dr. Yriarte tried to pull: First, don’t explain yourself when you’re kicking butt and taking names. Second, don’t let go of something you can’t do without. And there is probably one singular thing that none of us can do without: Peace. Most people manage without grace. As we age, we have to do with less and less power. And anyone reading this personally knows a hundred people who live long, happy lives without a whisker of wisdom.

Money. Love. Sex. All come a distant fifth, sixth, and seventh behind peace. We will pretend peace. Escape from life for it. Read a book for it. Watch a violent movie to get it. Drink it from a bottle. Smoke it from a weed. Fake it.

Once, during an all-school assembly (our college enrollment topped out at 752 my senior year), Dr. Yriarte gave a symposium on the Hopi people of northern Arizona. During questions, the guy in front of me, Walt Frasier, stands up and goes, “Why do they live out there in East Jesus?” “Excuse me?” says Dr. Yriarte. Then Walt goes, “I mean, why do they live up there on that dry desert? On those things. Those . . . mesas. They’re a a thousand feet above fresh water, for the love of Christ.” (Walt had already fired up a hooter that morning, so his mouth was dry. He finished with a degree physics and became an architectural engineer. He made a career designing commercial air-conditioning to support his five kids and three ex-wives). Dr. Yriarte looks down at the terazzo floor in a moment’s contemplation. Then he looks up and goes, “It’s peaceful.” You could feel the relief exude from the assembled students and professors. “You remember, Walter, the name Hopi refers to a person seeking peace. They cherish peace above all things.” “I guess people leave ’em alone up there, huh?” says Walt. Dr. Yriarte’s teeth flashed in his round face. “They were up there before Shakespeare was born, yes.”

The Franciscan friars failed to beat Jesus into the Hopi because the Hopi had already been living the essence of the thirty-fourth psalm for centuries: “Seek and strive after peace” (Psalm 34:14). No amount of fighting or training or breaking bricks will serve us if our goal is not peace. If someone throws your peace into the fire, stick your hand into the fire to get it back.