

### Stars of Glory:

### An Odyssey in Reality

by

Bryson Hughes

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2010 Bryson Hughes

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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Table of Contents

Introduction Prologue

The Youth Our Being Our Communing

Section 1: "The Preludes"

Providence of Nations A Key Moment in History A Key Interpretation Priests vs. Prophet Legion of Flies Death Labor The Calm Beginning Captivity Pharaoh's Slavery Mercy Meet the Dragon The Root of Darkness Opium's Secrets Scrying Shame Animal Archetypes Lilith Summon the Wind His Arm is Revealed The Bird Nest of Eden The Meshiach Effect The_One_Eyed_Union Whisperings Dogs A Cool Black Dog Worm Medicine Magic Walks Someone I Want You to Meet In My Face Invisible_Men_and_Demons_from_Hell Getting in My Hair Grinning Goat Pasech Wilderness Journey Mothers'_and_God's_Love Witnessing_the_Crucifixion Abstract

Section 2 "Conflict"

Over Speed Reading the Gospels Media Speaks More Stars Magic Walk: Apollo Magic Walk: Clouds Calling the Sun The Squeaking Gate Colors of Duress Graceless Severity All Things Mine Revelations and Confusion Herald Vampire I Intercession Impression Christian Group Counseling Tricked The_Creepiest_Singing_in_the_Universe These Afflicted People Realization A_New_Modus_Operandi Medicine A Wicked Hand Occupying Time Medical_Testing Occultation Prose The Day We Die Get My Walking Papers Me_Cat_and_Mouse_Star Escape from Bedlam The Deal is Honored Humiliation_or_Humor Hallucinations Shotgun Wedding Mountain Folks Secondary Benefit or Dignity More Bible Reading The Red Vial The_Purple_Messenger Keep of the Stars Sunshine Says it's Wrong The_Last_High Seeking New Friends Son of God Test Duress of the Bird They_Talk_to_Me The Serpent Watchers Following a Star Flying Away The_Trucker_and_the_Nutcase Destination Slammer Pokey Life Naked In Jail Exodus Changes Called to Work Signs of Smoke and Fire Missing Rita Grandpa's Protest The Dream Joint Androgyny Tammy Returns Star_Gnat_Humiliator Be Not Amazed The Roaring Star From Thin Air Ha_Mikvah The Broken Cross Dragon Eyes Do Cats See Dazzled Oblivion On Trial Hair Issues Guitar Issues Covenant with Hell Driving Issues Dream_Raider The City Four Square The Birth of Faith Starry Warfare

Section 3 "Climax"

Identifying With Israel Baggy Clothes Flight of the Dove The Watchman Spitting_Fire The Cursing Beauty Back to Abilene Bubbles Flash Spiders Old_Guys A Job Prayers Suffering a Witch Prayer for Diseases A New Disease A False Teacher Falls The Eagle Above the Stars A Gift of Robes Confronted_by_Sampson Clouds on the Horizon A Jamming Trumpet His_Sign_in_the_Sky He Lifts Up His Countenance Upon Me

Section 4 "Epilogue"

Where are the Babies? Anti-Climactic Jesus Careful Witness Work Sheep

Author's Closing Contact Invitation

Benediction

Introduction Prologue

"The Youth"

In 1978, I was a youth of eighteen years old. That was the year I became embroiled in the most bizarre spiritual experiences anyone could ever imagine. Things began to happen to me that were so unbelievable and so foreign to human ability to relate to, that unless I had been going through them myself I would never have believed it. I went from ecstasy of being, to roiling and terrified in mind bending events, with no one to turn to for answers. These were real events, unable to be avoided or escaped by me. They were enforced by a will greater than imaginable, that these things must be experienced.

Even though I sought people's advice, it was just futile. It wasn't long until I realized that absolutely nobody had any answers. For in every authority of any form in this world, I witnessed convincing displays of insanity. All adults, all authorities, all cultures, all disciplines, were unconsciously insane and unworthy to counsel me in any way. The only refuge of steadfast sanity that I found, was the same as I had always had all my life. It now seems profound to me, that the only real refuge of reason and sanity, was manifestly my Father and Mother. Their love and care exceeded all the rest of the world's combined wisdom and counsel. Despite all their human frailty and limits, God made my parents wonderful gifts of love and strength to me. It's strange that I'm now an old man before I see the divine order of parental love.

I was nevertheless on my own to grope through the darkness of my ignorance of the mysteries confronting me with overwhelming apparentness, in searching for answers. But I wasn't really completely alone though. I had a very strange teacher, who is human in a sense, but not really of this world. I wasn't alone in another sense as well. I had the company of thousands of other beings who are not human at all, but who were teaching me great lessons in strange ways. Those were lessons that at the time, I existed in utter dread of learning.

People often ask me, "Why you?" Was there anything special or outstanding about me? Was I predisposed to some talent? Did I have a gift? All I can say is that I consider my youthful self, to have been about the most ordinary teenager as ordinary could be. I was ordinary in schooling. I barely graduated High School in the summer of '77. My romantic side was boringly ordinary; perfectly lacking most of the time. Yes I had sweethearts; but to no great degree. Was I somehow a moral ideal of a youth that deserved a blessing from God? Well I wasn't that bad of a guy, but I wasn't that good either. I was a bit of both, like all the other really ordinary types. So I certainly didn't earn any merit badges.

I had no special gifts. I didn't have any extreme sensitivity to spiritual realms that so often gets touted. I didn't have profound insights. I didn't have some kind of really cool guru type of personality. Honestly, I was suspicious if there even really was a God, though I thought God probably did exist. I was fascinated by the accounts of Native American Bujeros, who took mind bending concoctions in order to encounter strange entities of some intelligence. But a lot of ordinary people were fascinated by that stuff whether fact or fiction. All in all, I was about as ungifted as the next person.

There may be a few things about me that are a little bit out of the ordinary. But nothing that it would make me some kind of spiritual wise guy. For example, I happen to be bright minded. Not in the effervescent bubbly mental activity kind of bright, nor the forceful horsepower of a fast strong mind; but bright in a quieter, deliberate and focused way of finding the essence of things.

I was also physically very strong. In my youth I had developed a very impressive physique and I could chin myself with one arm at a time. I wasn't the strongest of course, but I looked very impressive with my shirt off. Things have sure changed since then.

Another trait that I think deserves mentioning, is that I was quiet a docile young man. Principles compelled me to never dominate, bully or any of that other kooky "alpha male" childishness. Roughneck, aggressive, bully or redneck, were not terms often associated with me. Oh, I loved a good competition and even a tongue in cheek bragging session with my other overly muscled friends. But violence and fighting were something I loathed. In my heart I thought of myself as a flower child, a hippie at heart. Love, peace and harmony were my ideals to live by, and I tried to live them. I was largely successful at living out those ideals in those days. Even now, I still have good success at living out these principles.

I think a unique thing about me, is that I must have some kind of perception deficit when it comes to people. People can lie to me, and if it sounds plausible, I'll believe them even when other people seem to realize right away that it's a lie. I recall as a small child, that when an adult would tease me, I would believe them completely at face value. Later on, after learning they were teasing, I wouldn't see the humor in their play. Other children, I've noticed, will immediately pick up on the humor and play along with an adult who's playfully teasing with them. But I recall feeling stressed by adult kidding. Even when I did learn the adults were just playing, I recall feeling victimized by their pointless taunting.

I've also had it mentioned to me by others, certain expressions they see in people's faces, leaving me to realize I didn't know what those expressions looked like, nor did I perceive them. A person mentioned some envious looks he saw being directed our way. Now that was something I didn't get. Envy was something to never allow and I was rarely exposed to such a thing. I simply didn't realize there was an expression for envy. While this person I was with was noticing envious looks, I was completely comfortable among the people giving us the envious looks. I was oblivious to their envious looks being directed our way, though I now realize it was true. Maybe I was just sheltered from such expressions, or maybe I simply didn't perceive them. But to this day, because of instances like this, I feel I must have a slight social dysfunction, in that I am missing some obvious clues in the gestures, expressions and voices of people.

Once my wife mentioned to me the look of love that an actor gave toward the heroin in a sweet movie we were watching. Once again I was struck by the realization that I didn't see that expression. It's an odd feeling to consider the ramifications of realizing you are missing clues about people. I asked my wife what the look of love looked like. She tried to explain it, and I think I see it now. But it makes a guy feel a bit uncertain about himself when he knows basic things are going by him unnoticed.

I had always thought of this lack of skill in interpersonal discernment, as a unique degree of gullibility that is just a part of who I am. But now I really wonder if there is something deeper causing my obliviousness. Maybe this gullibility, and my awareness that I go by what is literally spoken, is why I have become such a lover of plain speech. What an irony it is, that so much of what I'm sharing with you in the following account, is full of double meaning and symbolism. It's kind of funny, but the story can't be recounted in any other way.

There is also a trait I possess, wherein my show of any discomfort, humiliation, suffering, embarrassment or even physical pain, somehow causes people to laugh. There is something very humorous about my pain. It's universal, and nobody seems to be immune from the need to laugh. Girls tend to be more susceptible, including my wife, my mother, my sister and especially my daughter. At least it has the side benefit of causing people to love me. I take it good naturedly. I typically tease them back for laughing at "my pain". So I'll excuse you in advance if you burst out laughing when I am spilling out my soul over some intense situation.

So you see there is really nothing special about me. So why did it happen to me? I suppose that's a question only God knows the answer to. Something I want to be very clear about though, is that I'm glad it was me. I may tell you about the troubles, the trials and terrors, but be perfectly clear: I am very glad for everything. Don't mistake my recollections of tough things, as being resentful or griping. I just want to help you understand the events by conveying to you the feeling of everything. Bear in mind even as I share those events and experiences with you, that I actually am very grateful.

"Our Being"

Allegory, symbolism, metaphor! How can a person see life in general, and existence individually lived, as if they are a set of allegories and metaphors, symbolic of another reality? Yet it is very common for people to interpret life this way. The Bible and other traditional Jewish literature, is permeated by allegory, ritual, symbolism, cultural buzzwords, meaningful associations and object prophecy. Jewish people obviously see life this way, as well as people who follow Jesus.

Even if you don't enjoy deciphering symbolic things, to understand a difficult book like the Bible and its accounts, you have to draw upon some double perspective mindset. With practice you get better at it so long as you have the discipline not to allow your imagination to run wild and start filling in the blanks with ill-conceived notions. But my main point in mentioning this is that the story being told herein is a challenge to you to let go and see the symbolism, allegories and metaphors existing in these real life events which harmonize with, resonate, and depict another higher reality.

Not everyone is so prone to seeing meanings in events. It depends on which perspective you take, and at what level you seek meaning. People who are rationalist and people who are down to earth types, tend to resist seeing higher meaning in events. But spiritual people and idealist tend to see meaning in every event that goes beyond the objective perception of the events themselves.

If you think about the events of your own life, maybe you can recall something strange and wonderful that involved you; something which happened and made you say to yourself, "God made all this happen"?

Now these are the BIG QUESTIONS:

Can our existences actually be manifestations fulfilling the shadowy prophetic promises of the past?

Can our present existences actually be allegorical depictions of things that took place in the past, or even, that which shall openly manifest in the future?

I say that our lives can poetically be those things. I hope you will suspend your skepticism for the sake of the story I'm sharing, allowing yourself to contemplate the double meanings, wherein I hope to vividly illustrate a very mystical life experience. The meanings of these events are not fully explained by the story itself, yet the seeds of those meanings are there all the same. I hope you can find the overarching statements in the events. Many deep and mystical things are touched upon in this story. The reason I haven't clarified each episode is for the sake of the story itself. It is told to you purely and with very little interjected thought so that you may experience the story as it actually took place.

Concerning allegory, symbolism and metaphor; it seems that a lot of people, like me, don't especially enjoy this kind of thing. Some people do happen to like such abstract interpretations of life experiences and existence. That's just the difference in people. However, it seems to me that God just loves expressing himself in those ways, using humanity as the medium of his abstract artistic expression and the quill of his penmanship. In the area of higher spiritual expression, it's consistent with God that a lot of the things expressed by Him, come to us in these forms of expression written in human experience and events. That's a good reason why you should be encouraged to be receptive to these accounts.

The theological term for getting meanings out of accounts, where the meanings aren't stated directly is, "Allegorical exegesis". An example of it might be where you see a figure like Joseph becoming the Vice Pharaoh of Egypt, and taking it to mean Jesus will become the Messiah in similar circumstances.

Another term that is more contemporary in describing these hidden meanings is, "Synchronicity". I don't know much about the origins of this term, but I can describe the basic concept. "Synchronicity" is a term used when a person perceives events and finds them so compelling, so beyond mere chance, that they cannot refrain from finding some kind of meaning being expressed in those events. It has little to do with "synchronize" and little to do with "coincidence", as some people tend to think when trying to grasp the concept of synchronicity. What it means is that a person perceives some unseen force, agency or intelligence, which is effectively influencing events, and leaving in those events some perceptible meaning, expression, or evidence.

If there's actually nothing being expressed in events, when you might think there is, then you are the victim of an over active imagination. You are being superstitious, or hyper-spiritual. Or in the worst case, you're being delusional. But I hold it to be true, that synchronicity does happen. Synchronicity is the very thing from which faith grows. Consider the Biblical definition of faith: "Faith is the evidence of the unseen..." You can see people rely on this effect in a lot of cultures and settings: The guy with a conspiracy theory, the superstitious person with their omens, people of faith.

What it means in practical terms is that you experience events and find some kind of meaning in them. Thus synchronicity can become a tool of conceptual form, for the detection of unseen intelligences, if those intelligences leave us the clues, and we have the acute perception to recognize those clues.

The downside of all this is that it can lead a person to be insane when he finds a meaning in things that really have no meaning at all. So heed this WARNING: Don't let the things I describe to you, make your imagination run so wild that you think you've found the secrets of the universe! I want people to believe and understand my accounts. But I don't want to see a person become a nutcase because his imagination is running wild.

"Our Communing"

The term "religious fanatic" is a term I happily embrace. In fact, I have a few homespun proverbs about religious fanatics: Bryson 1:1 "I may be a fanatic, but I have a good act." That is an example of one of my "Fanatics Proverbs". I have others as well, but I'll spare you for now.

It has been my experience in my encounters with other religious fanatics, is that they tend to have very loosely connected ideas. In explaining their views, the fanatics flow through these abstract connections in such a way that I often couldn't follow their reasoning. The meanings were obvious to the fanatics though, since in their minds it was all connected. But it wasn't really so obvious, even to a fellow fanatic, much less anyone else listening to them. I have a personal commitment to being clear, and speaking to the end purpose of conveying understanding to those I speak to. But honestly, being clear or making the connections will be a challenge in a lot of the accounts I want to share. In order to share the feelings of being lost, in some cases I'll have to leave you a little lost as well. I will at least inform you of what I was thinking concerning some event, action or decision. To avoid suppression of my present thoughts altogether though, I will leave you cryptic clues in the title headers of many of the episodes.

My bizarre experiences started so long ago, that I'm afraid that I can't recall all of it. So don't take me to task if I make an obvious mistake in timing or the sequence of events. I also want you to realize that I am using pseudonyms for some of the people. The reason is in the interest of consideration for some of the people involved. The details might not be so flattering to them, and they might just as well prefer that I use a fake name for them.

Next is the actual beginning of the story. Several seemingly disconnected events all begin to converge in themes and meanings as part of the crescendo toward the moments of decision and realization, and a fantastic climactic event. Themes such as sanity, metaphor of life, unseen intelligent agencies, underground groupies, and the struggle to understand and reconcile such things, begin to emerge. It begins with an allegorical story of heartbreak. Enjoy!

Section 1 "The Preludes"

"Providence of Nations"

Tammy was my sweetheart. We were young when we met, and we had become romantic. I especially enjoyed Tammy's most vivacious sparkling personality. Tammy was as harmless as a dove. She was ever fun, buoyant, and captivatingly interesting. In all the time I spent with Tammy, I don't recall a single cross moment or sour disposition. Every memory of Tammy is of cheerfulness, bravery, and loving kindness. I also enjoyed the adoring looks her big ole' pretty doe eyes would cast my way. She had made me into her hero, and I just reveled in it. Tammy Weinstein is in her core nature just a truly harmless lamb.

But of course there had to be a complication. I had an old wound of a heart break in my chest; a painfully struggling flicker of a flame for the object of my passionate desires. It was the memory I held of another beautiful young girl named Rita Mea. The old wound divided my heart and prevented me from reciprocating the abandoned love toward Tammy, as Tammy extended toward me.

I realized there was an imbalance of love, and felt bad about not feeling the flames of love for Tammy as strongly as I thought I should have felt. Having had my own heart broken by Rita, my flaming desire, in which the roles of love were just the opposite, I understood the situation Tammy was in as if I were in her shoes myself. I had been concerned that Tammy would be hurt if my love never grew to be as strong as hers. But I gave our relationship time to grow, thinking that maybe my fervent love or passions would grow for her. Then love would be mutually strong and all would be well. It was as fair as I could think of being toward Tammy. So onward in time, she and I cruised. Even though I didn't give Tammy all the attention she deserved, she never complained, and was always joyful toward me. Just recalling her makes me realize what a fool I was for not seeing how very special Tammy actually is.

Though I never mentioned it to Tammy, I often thought of marrying her. But if my love for Tammy was not properly and appropriately strong, it would be unfair for both of us to move toward marriage. She deserved as strong a love toward her, as I would also want toward myself. It was the same reasoning I had used to console myself over Rita. Rita had just not felt the same for me as I had for her. It would have been unfair for both of us if our relationship hadn't ended. This is why I wanted to feel breathless throbbing love for Tammy, but that kind of feeling just wasn't there. I was afraid therefore, of doing something tragic for both of us if I led us in the direction of marriage.

In retrospect, I now realize I will never feel the exact kind of love for anyone like I experienced for Rita Mae. Rita was heady ambrosia for my love, and she was intoxicating to me. I realize now that true love is not just the feeling of that numbing, dizzy, intoxication love. Love comes in many beautiful forms. I simply didn't have enough maturity to realize this as much as it concerned a precious gift named Tammy. Tammy was actually loved, but in another profound, conscientious and deep way, which I couldn't grasp at that time.

I recall vividly the meditations I had concerning Tammy one day. Would you believe I was concerning myself over her Jewishness as far as her being a marriage prospect? I found myself very attracted to her Jewish features, such as her large beautiful doe eyes and her tanned olive tones. There was also something quirky and charming about her humor and spunk that I have come to realize is an ethnic personality trait called "Jewishness". It wasn't for things like this that I was concerned. It was religion! Me of all people thinking about religion!

But I was thinking like this: If Tammy and I got married, we would have children. There might be a God, and if there is, I don't want to cause my children to lose out. If there is a God, Christianity would be the right religion. But Tammy might not go for that. She doesn't seem too concerned about religion, but that could change! I might change! She might! Just to be on the safe side, maybe I should look for a Christian girl to marry.

Suddenly, I stopped thinking about Tammy. It was more than not thinking about her. It was virtually a case of amnesia about her. It was wonderfully strange how I didn't seem to think about Tammy for a period of time. I did think about somebody else though. She was a Christian girl. There was one name among all my peers that was always spoken of in quiet respectful tones. She was a girl that no one would speak badly of. It was understood among us all that she was respected. She also was a lamb. Her name was Dena Davidson.

What made my prospects pretty good with Dena was that she and I had shared strong puppy love crushes when she and I were just youngsters in elementary school. Dena and I used to sit together on the school bus ride back home from school. It makes me smile to remember back then, that it really was a sweet crush that Dena and I shared.

So like the misdirected fool that I was, I called Dena up out of the blue and made overtures toward her. She was a bit surprised and confused, but it was fine all the same. We arranged times to see each other and hang out. Even so, I was a very bad slacker about seeing her. I was just a crummy boyfriend if there ever was one. Only Rita had ever drawn me to her helplessly enchanted by her summoning.

One afternoon, Dena and I met at the softball field on New Hope Road to watch the girl's church leagues play. She and I sat together on the bleacher stands just chatting away, when I saw my sister Jalana also arrive to watch the games. Jalana climbed up on the bleachers that were down from where Dena and I were, and TAMMY was with her! I hadn't even thought of Tammy for a couple of weeks. What had happened to my mind? Why hadn't I even remembered her?

Jalana and Tammy sat on the bleachers over from Dena and me, when they both saw me; and I was sitting there with Dena! Suddenly I didn't want to be sitting there with Dena. All I could see was the realization in Tammy's eyes, and the thunderous pain of betrayal that visibly went through her whole being. Jalana and Tammy immediately left the game. Tammy couldn't stay.

How had I forgotten about Tammy?! I was ashamed and angry with myself. Sickened with remorse, I left the game soon after Tammy and Jalana left. Suddenly I no longer had any interest in Dena. I only wanted to heal Tammy's broken heart. But how could I ever heal this mess? I disgusted myself and felt deep shameful remorse. I found myself confused and mystified by my lack of recall. I just couldn't believe Tammy had left my thoughts until she appeared at the game.

Jalana loved Tammy, and stayed with her a lot of the time to be a friend during Tammy's grief and feelings of rejection. If only Tammy had known that in my heart I was not rejecting her at this moment. I longed for her presence in order to comfort her. But she was deeply injured, and I stayed away since I was the dirt who was the source of her pain. Jalana told me that Tammy cried her heart out for three days solid. I hated myself for hurting Tammy.

Thank goodness Dena had been oblivious to all this. She broke up with me soon afterwards because a disgusting gossip had told her that I had said something bad about her. Her parents insisted she end the relationship. She ended it alright, only after I was ambushed and confronted by her angry parents when I stopped by her house. It was convenient for me to have this ended. But ended on a bad note like this wasn't what I had in mind. I protested in earnest my innocence, so that Dena would know that I never, ever, slurred her. Now I was angry about a gossip and I had hurt Tammy to boot.

Jalana told me that Tammy was angry and that her new word was "cynical" concerning everything. I felt her pain deeply. I understood her wariness and mistrust. Who could blame her? I didn't deserve anyone's trust. I felt the same feelings of fearing to trust and be open hearted anymore, after Rita had dumped me. It was hard to understand how one's deep love could just be shelved like that. If only Tammy knew my sorrow and deep remorse, she would feel better and forgive me.

"A Key Moment in History"

After the torment I had put Tammy through, I thought the best thing to do was to give her some space and just let some of the hurt fade away. But I knew I was going to apologize and ask for forgiveness from her. I was hurting for Tammy. I just knew she would never again have the same trust for me, the same abandoned love that was innocently free from concern. I sensed I had done something to permanently damage sweet Tammy's spirit, like Rita's rejection had done to me. I knew that I had felt suspicious and wary of showing my love after I was shelved by Rita. I thought the same thing may have been happening to Tammy. I so wanted to see her, but I had to respect her need to be to herself as well.

After a couple of weeks had passed, there was an evening when my great friend Johnny Prescott came pulling up in our family driveway. He was looking very good with his new rounded hairstyle that took full advantage of his natural curl. Johnny had also started wearing sharp looking sports suits that he had inherited from a deceased brother in law. Johnny looked like a very sharp young millionaire. The coolest thing was Johnny's car that his parents had given him. The car was a 1973 Buick Electra 225, midnight blue, white vinyl top, and chariot looking spoke hubcaps. This car was a bad boy's car that rode low to the ground, smooth and powerful. That car was so very nice to ride in while we listened to the eight track music tapes that Johnny kept in good supply.

Johnny came on inside into the warm light of the house. Presently, as Johnny and I were just chatting along, the front storm door opened again and in stepped Jalana, who gave me a signaling glance that was telling me something was up. Then another person came in behind Jalana, and it was Tammy! I was cool on the outside at Tammy's arrival, but I was joyful on the inside. I was so glad that Tammy had been able to drop by! I knew the courage it took for her to come over. I tried to be sweet and cheering to Tammy, without being too overt about it. Tammy was being brave and cordial, but she really wasn't her usual effervescent self. She was so very emotionally drained, and here she was dealing with it silently right in front of me; the rotten guy who hurt her.

Johnny was unaware of all the tensions in the air among our group, and was ready for some fun. He suggested that we all pile into his car and go for a night drive up to a nice area of the lake. Jalana liked the idea, and I thought it was a good idea too. Tammy was obliged to go along even if her heart wasn't really in it. Naturally, Jalana jumped in the front seat with Johnny, and I got into the rear seat with Tammy, who said not a word. I was feeling her every pain she felt with her. I was determined to cheer Tammy up somehow. I knew this night would not pass until at the very least, Tammy realized I cared.

On we rode in that soft riding chariot with Johnny and Jalana chatting amiably up front. Tammy and I were just riding quietly. Johnny drove us that night to a remote part of Percy Priest Lake, into a recreation area called Vivrett Creek. It was a nice spot because the moon shone brightly there and it was right next to the gentle water. He parked the car facing uphill which made us recline all the more inside the big Buick. Thankfully, Johnny and Jalana seemed very content to visit each other and they kept to themselves in the front. The sound of "Boston" music was playing softly enough for conversation to be easy.

I looked over at Tammy in the soft night light. My heart was just breaking over all she had been through. She was sitting there staring straight ahead with her large beautiful eyes shining fearfully in the night light. I turned to face her and the only thing I could think of to tell her was "Tammy, you sure look pretty tonight". This may sound kind of lame and shallow, but my rational was to let her know that I appreciate her. In a sense the real meaning was: I accept you, I'm sorry, will you accept me? Aside from that, it was true that Tammy was very attractive that night, even if she looked a bit down.

Tammy somehow listened to my heart, rather than just my plain words. Tammy wasn't looking at me as her large glistening hurting eyes stared straight ahead into the gentle night. She sat stiffly for a few seconds as I faced her. Then something inside Tammy just seemed to break open and she noticeably released out her held breath. She just relaxed and her shoulders slumped forward a little. She lowered her head and those enormous eyes in such a way, that it welled up all my feelings of compassion for her. I can hardly bear remembering that precious lamb in that moment. I wanted to comfort her all the more, but I refrained myself.

I did manage to take the clue from Tammy's gestures. What they meant was: "You've hurt me! You've been wrong! Somehow, I forgive you." Feeling Tammy's helplessness to have forgiveness toward me, I very gently took her right hand and turned to look at her face to face. I can't recall what else I said, or that she said to me. I do recall that everything I said to her was intended to be gentle, healing words of tenderness. Tammy seemed to have relaxed, and was looking at me with reconciling eyes of forgiveness and affection. Tammy and I were reconciling in a true and real way. I hope she realized somehow, that these were gestures of love, though I didn't understand it myself at the time.

It was then as Tammy and I looked into each other's face with reconciliation, that I noticed a slight glow above Tammy's head. I raised my eyes to look at whatever was glowing just above her hair. As I looked at the glow it was just a fuzzy blob of pale light. But then as I observed, the light began to take form and resolved first into a fuzzy edged shape, and it then became a very clearly focused image of a Benjamin Franklin type of key, composed of light. The light of the glowing key seemed to be a light blue or lavender tone.

I didn't react or respond to the appearing key except on the inside. For in a strange way, with Tammy and I reconciling, the key over her head seemed appropriate to the situation. I wasn't in the least bit startled by its appearing. After seeing the key of light, my immediate thought was, "Something is telling me I have the key to Tammy's heart." "I bet it's some kind of invisible spaceman, who's watching us. He really dug the beauty of our reconciliation, and he just had to say something."

"A Key Interpretation"

Do you see any meaning to a key appearing over a young broken hearted Jewish girl's head while she is being reconciled with the object of her love? If you don't understand it, you aren't alone. Even though I personally experienced this expression from the unseen visitor, I didn't really understand it either. It was twenty years later before I finally did fully grasp the real meaning behind the expression of the key, in concert with the reconciliation between Tammy and myself.

In a strange way, even though I don't think I ever made Tammy aware of this, the spirit and soul of Tammy lingers in my heart. She was a part or two wonderful spiritual expressions while she was in my presence. There have also been two spiritual dreams in which Tammy was involved in them. What I would really love is to be able to tell Tammy about the spiritual events myself in person. I imagine a joyful visit in a coffee shop or diner, where Tammy and I have time to just chat. I could tell her how she figured in, concerning these things. Ah well, if only life was that simple! Even if I had ever had a chance to tell Tammy about this stuff, she probably would have absolutely no confidence in it, or in me. I was after all, soon to be her fallen hero from the age of our transitions from children to adulthood. But who knows; one day maybe.

I'll go ahead and explain the visitation and the sign of the key, sparing you from the task of twenty years of speculating on the meaning:

Tammy and I were actors in an allegory portraying another story of heartbreak and reconciliation. The story is that of the relationship of God and the Hebrew nation. In this case I was portraying God, and Tammy was Israel. Dena herself represented the Fullness of Nations, the Christian Nation of the United States. What about Rita? If I had to say Rita represented something, for me, Rita was like the Garden of Eden; a memory of a wonderful lost paradise.

"Priests vs. Prophet"

In the years while I was still in school at DuPont Sr. High, the armed services came to administer a test to every student in the school. I think the school year was 1975 / 1976. The name of the test was an acronym: "ASVAB". It stands for Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery. Since I wasn't getting graded by the school on the test, I felt quite relaxed taking the exam when it came my turn.

The testing took a long time; most of the school day in fact. But it was interesting so I enjoyed looking at their pictures, matching the shapes and doing the math. Some of the math was over my head, but hey! I figured out some of it. They had sections on writing and other things. All in all, it was somewhat enjoyable and curious to take the ASVAB test. It wasn't exactly the drudge that I thought of most school work as.

Well in a couple of weeks I received a notice in the mail from the United States Navy, in which my scores were noted along with a big pat on the back telling me they were great scores. I was instructed to contact a particular person immediately, which I did. I was informed by this person, on how the scores were based on a percentile of the all the people who took the test. In four categories I scored above the 99th percentiles and in the fifth category I scored above the 68th percentile. What this meant was that I scored higher than 99% of all the people in those four categories and higher than 68% of those tested in the fifth category, which was on clerical skill. Well I felt pretty good about being the 1% in four categories.

The Navy recruiter that I had contacted asked if I would be willing to take more testing in just math. I enjoyed the testing before, so I agreed to do some more. So on the agreed day, they sent an attractive Navy lady to my house to pick me up and take me to the testing facility. She took me to a large multi-story building in downtown Nashville. We went up several floors and entered a room full of Navy personnel. They sat me at a desk, handed me the math testing book and worksheet, and set the timer. They said "begin", and so I sat there doing math for about two hours. A lot of it was over my head again. I did the problems one after the next instead of skipping to the next ones I did understand. In the process I managed to figure out a lot of the problems that were initially too hard for me. But this sequential approach slowed me down, and some that I could have solved, I ran out of time before I got to them. The testing administrator informed me that I had one minute left. I had 13 problems left to go. I figured out a couple of more problems, and as the clock ticked down, I had eleven problems to go. So I figured I would get a fourth of them right if I marked all the last ones the same. I chose to mark the last eleven as the answer "C", just as the clock ran out.

The administrator collected my testing score sheet and placed an answer key grid over the top of it. Through the holes in the grid there showed the correctly marked answers, and the ones not marked correctly didn't show through the holes. He counted carefully how many holes showed the correct answers and wrote the score down. Then he stated, "You've qualified with eight to spare". I asked him, "How many of the last eleven did I get right?" He quickly looked at the last eleven holes and said, "You got one correct". I thought that was misfortunate, as I expected at least three to show correct even though I didn't actually work them.

After he scored the results he stated to me, "You've qualified for two programs the Navy offers. You've scored well enough to qualify for the top program, which is the Nuclear Power Program. The other option you could take would be Advanced Electronics. But you have good enough scores for the Nuclear Power."

Whoa! Me, the school flunky who thought everyday there was drudge and imprisonment. The guy who got failing grades when he didn't bother to do the drudge they assigned in classes. The guy that the school administrators had an instinctive disliking for, just qualified for the Navy's top program! HA!

I was then taken to visit a recruiter, who told me about the terms of the Navy's enlistment obligations. If I decided to accept the Navy's offer, he told me the obligation would be for six years; two of which would be schooling and the other four would be active duty. He said it started several pay ranks higher than the typical enlistee pay scale. He informed me that re-enlisting after the first obligation, would include a huge bonus. If I didn't re-enlist, I would have high demand skills in the Nuclear Industries job market. All the schooling I would be getting over the first two years would be in various places around the country for different aspects of it. The Navy recruiter valued the schooling as worth forty thousand dollars! Man I felt like a hero! Finally somebody knew what I was really made of.

I was told that even though I was only fifteen almost sixteen years old, that I could sign up now, and then when I graduated at seventeen, I would be just old enough to report to the Navy and begin my Navy schooling. Then the travel would begin as I went to the various schools. I liked the sound of all this and was seriously thinking about it. We left the Navy facilities and the Navy lady drove me back to my house.

I began to think of everything. The pros of joining the Navy were already stated. But I began to have a few negatives come to mind. For one, being fifteen years old, a six year obligation to be in the Navy, sounded like a lifetime! Indentured servitude for SIX YEARS! I didn't like the sound of that. We are also talking Nuclear here. What was the life expectancy of nuclear workers in these days? Was it thirty five? Then could I expect cancer from exposure to nuclear pollution? I saw the news about nuke workers in Kentucky having problems with exposure, and how they were suing their employers with class action lawsuits. I heard how so many of them got cancer, and other diseases and how some of them had died. I think I even read about these kinds of things in Readers Digest or some other publication.

But the clincher for me to decide not to join was a matter of conscience. I thought about all the nuclear bombs and what would happen if the "Cold War" I was always kept in anxiety about, was to heat up and become nuclear annihilation. I wasn't against war or anything, and even told myself that in a war, if I killed a hundred enemies, I wouldn't have regrets. But wouldn't it be my luck to have to be part of blowing up a million Russians! A MILLION in an instant! I can't kill a million people! Those Russians are just like me, ordinary folks who deserve to live. I'm no better than they are. I just can't do it!

So between the short life expectancy of nuclear workers in those days, and my pains of conscience about instantly killing a million Russians, I decided I would slide on the Navy's offer. For a long time I didn't bother thinking about it anymore, even though the Navy sent me mail pretty often and even occasionally phoned me.

The years passed, and I finally graduated from High School. I had decided to not do any schooling for at least a year. Then after a year of sabbatical, I would start thinking about college. Being the youngest, or nearly the youngest person in my grade every year at school, had always been a big drag to me. Waiting a year for college would remedy that problem.

But then I started thinking about that I did have the potential to do the Navy thing. Well maybe I was a bit hasty and uninformed about the Navy. I wondered, how did military ranks work, and what exactly is the structure and life of a Navy man? I knew nothing about anything military. Maybe I wouldn't be blowing up a million Russians. So I decided to go talk to the Navy people and get more information about the Navy scene.

The only place I had ever had any contact with the Navy was in the building downtown. So I decided that's where to go to find out the information I wanted. I went downtown and found the building. I went inside and went to the floor the Navy offices were on, and then went to their offices where they were working. When I went in, all the Navy personnel looked at me like I was a Martian! I wondered what their problem was. I informed them I wanted to ask some questions from them about the Navy.

The Navy personnel wanted to ask me some questions as well, like, what I'm doing there. They sure were looking at me funny and they all seemed real uptight and clammed up. They did their best not to be informative and they started whispering. Then I overheard the words, "Crazy" being tossed around. That made me angry, so I decided I didn't want to be around these weirdoes who can't even talk to a regular guy, for all their gawking and big goo goo eyed looking at me. They were really starting to creep me out!

I looked for the door out of there and started working my way back toward it. I said my goodbyes to the Navy folks, and hit the door. I hastily went back out of the building, straight to my old Buick. I jumped in the mighty old bomb like it was a getaway car. I fired up the rowdy engine and got out of there feeling like I was escaping before somebody came after me.

Once I had left, I was really offended and angered by the Navy personnel. I decided the Navy was stupider than I could have possibly thought. I thought to myself, "I sure am glad I didn't get involved with people like them, if this is how they end up acting. They really had the nerve, calling me "Crazy"!

This was the first time of many that I encountered the term "Crazy" being directed at me. In fact I even apply it to myself in a light hearted way since functionally it does seem to apply. However, I have never thought of myself as actually being crazy, and fought the perception hard to prove myself as a reasonable fellow. The struggle I felt, to have some shred of dignity, was hard and often fruitless. Yet the struggle against this term had begun. And to think, it was the Navy which fired the first salvos of this indignity toward me. I might have been a great and innovative scientist for them if they had some grace and helpfulness about them toward me. Now we will never know.

So what if I accidentally went to the wrong place to find the information I wanted! Isn't that understandable considering my youth and inexperience? Sometimes we all seek answers in the wrong places and settings. That doesn't make us crazy! Sometimes even in those settings, we serendipitously find out things we weren't really seeking to know, but which are profound and helpful anyhow.

Just look at the prejudices of the establishments which don't respect our seeking. That establishment only sees our floundering around as evidence of our threat to them because we didn't go through their official channels! Then they swiftly demonize us and insult the seekers among us. How they lose the opportunity to win us. But instead they drive a wedge between us and them, because we acted outside of their official establishments and protocols. Whether the institutions are governments, religious, medical or even academic, those who seek, or who sought, outside of the institution's scopes or authority, are swiftly denounced.

History bears out, that it is the unorthodox seekers among us which bring the real breakthrough innovations to society. History also bears out, that it is the establishments which became the persecutors of the innovators. Who knows what those establishments with their "higher" authority or sense of "duty" will do in their zeal to persecute the innovators and the unorthodox. The establishment organization's suspicions are boundless.

After my encounter with the Navy people, look at what I actually found out. They are seriously paranoid and blindly insensitive. It wasn't what they intended for me to realize about them and their bureaucratic culture. Who knows what they might do. The Navy people seemed crazy to me at the time.

"Legion of Flies"

A year or more before the strange events of 1978 started, I was sleeping in my bedroom which at that time was upstairs on the north side of the house. I was disturbed by a fly buzzing around and getting on my face. I finally got up, turned on the lights and began trying to kill the thing. I managed to swat a fly and then there were two more which I started trying to swat. Each time I swatted a fly, there would be more to swat. I realized the room was rapidly filling with flies and swatting them was futile. Soon the room filled with thousands and thousands of flies. I had seen enough. I went downstairs and awoke my mother.

Mom groggily asked what I wanted. I told her my room was filled with flies. This sounded strange enough to awaken her fully with some curiosity. She got out of bed to see this for herself, and went with me upstairs. As I opened the door, the light in the room was on and Mom looked inside! She gasped at the spectacle she saw. Thousands upon thousands of flies were now in the room and the walls and ceiling were blackened with the ones not flying around. The air was so full of flies that you could not go in without being brushed by them by the hundreds.

It was like some strange scene from an Alfred Hitchcock story to look into my room that night. I decided to bring out the big guns and went downstairs and got a can of Raid Insecticide. I went into my bedroom and started bombing it, putting as much insecticide into the air as on the walls and ceiling. Then after liberally spraying it around, I shut the door and slept downstairs. In the morning I went upstairs and the floor was blackened with dead flies. I cleaned up all the flies and the event never repeated. It was strange though.

Was this plague of flies some kind of breeding event and the stupid flies decided to come into some narrow passage into my room? I'll never know. Was it meaningful? I didn't think so at the time and I don't know now. But there is that question of meaning, now that I have more reason to ask it. I can imagine, but I can't say that I know, what the cause was. I look back at the scene of the event as an abstraction of the legions of dark demonic specters being depicted by a swarm of flies invading my peace and rest.

Sometimes the imagination needs to be restrained by the presence of a solid practical intelligent individual to give you the logical explanations. I like these kinds of people and value them greatly. Sometimes I envy what they don't know or consider, and do my best to emulate this grounding and centering way of thinking.

No, surely there was no meaning behind the event with the flies filling my room, except that maybe I needed to clean the room and stop attracting flies! No, surely this was some instinct driven event and the flies were only following their natures, which by chance caused them to invade my space. Surely, don't you think so?

"Beelzebub", one of the names of the Devil: It means, "Lord of the flies".

"Death Labor"

Rex Oldham is the stereotypical artist personality: Not too excitable, cool and laid back. He's a soft spoken and gentle fellow who's lacking much motivation, but is passionate about what he loves. Rex is a medium slim fellow with his hair combed in the outdated style of the mid-sixties teens. His easy smile and his light sensitive glasses gave him the overall look of a mid-sixties hipster out of time. Yet Rex is a very cool fellow.

Rex ended up getting married when he was only seventeen to an evangelical preacher's daughter from the sticks of eastern Tennessee. Her name is Vashti. I suppose this youthful marriage set up a pattern for them, in which youthful irresponsibility lingered as a mode of living.

But Rex was my great friend, even though he was a few years older than me. We both had a love of freedom with few responsibilities. Smoking marijuana and just hanging around were what we liked doing most of the time. He was cool and mellow and I was docile, so we made good pals.

I suppose Vashti must have started prodding Rex since he wasn't working. But Rex boasted to Vashti that he could get a job right now! So Rex and I piled into his car and off we went "job hunting".

Rex's family had been masonry contractors, and so he was familiar with that kind of work. He hated doing it, but it was a job he could get. We drove into Mt. Juliet and passed by the High School, and there was a lot of work going on there. There had been a fire that burned the gymnasium to the ground, and they were rebuilding it from the ground up. So onto this job site Rex and I went. Rex spoke to the masonry foreman and the next thing you knew, Rex was hired to lay blocks and he got me a job as well to be a mason's tender. We agreed to show up the next morning and start work.

The next morning was hot already since it was mid-summer. It was a bright cloudless day. I was anxious to get to work because I was excited about all the money I would make. Rex of course was nonchalant about it as we drove to work. I didn't have a clue about how to do my job, but I figured that it couldn't be that complicated.

When we arrived, the foreman for Alexander Shankle Contracting, assigned Rex to go lay blocks on some area of the building, and then pointed me in the other direction. Right out in the middle of the jobsite, out in the direct sun, the foreman pointed to an overweight guy down in a ditch. He asked me, "Do you see that guy?" I said, "Yes". He said, "Go keep him supplied with mortar". Well that was fine with me. I figured a big heavy fellow like that guy, working in the direct sun in a ditch, couldn't be very demanding. He was after all kind of hefty. How hard could he work?

I went up to the mason and asked him what he needed. He said "Mud!" I got a bucket, filled it with mortar and carried it over to him. Then he yelled for block. Well I got him block. He yelled "Mud!" He shouted "Block!" He always seemed to be out of materials and waiting on me! I figured I would wear him down soon enough, but it never happened. He yelled more and more and I was getting exhausted in about half an hour after starting work. The sun was getting so hot! I was really starting to hurt! That big guy was grumpy too! He started making comments like, "I wish you would hurry up!" So I tried harder and worked with all my might. The sun got blazing hot out there in the middle of that dirt jobsite, and I was really suffering. I started longing for lunch break just to recover.

After a while the foreman came up to check on the work. When he looked at me he looked really concerned and a bit shocked. He said to me "You don't look so good! Are you okay?" I told him the truth on the spot, "I don't think so". The truth was, I was in very bad shape. I was heat stroking and about to fall over dead. That large guy in the ditch had pushed me hard. It wasn't really his fault though. He just happened to be the most naturally gifted block layer that ever lived, and it really would take at least two men to supply him. His name, I later found out, is Ronnie Petty. Now the foreman immediately said to me, "You're done for the day! I don't want you to do anything else for the rest of the day. Go inside the building where there's some air conditioning. Lie down and cool off." I obeyed the foreman and sought the cool and some rest. I felt defeated and ashamed, but I knew I was in bad shape. All my life and vigor was gone. That foreman saved my life, but I didn't realize it at the time.

Rex drove me home and I went to bed that afternoon. I rested until the alarm went off the next morning. It was time to get ready for work again. I arose and felt very sick and weak. I put on my work clothes, forcing myself every step of the way. Rex arrived to pick me up and I went out and got into his car. I rode to work with Rex, and on the way, I realized I was simply too sick to work. I was strong starting the day before, but now I was as weak as a rag. I hurt in all my body in every place. I knew I was no good.

When I arrived on the job site, as much as I regretted it, I had to inform the foreman that I was just too sick to work. He seemed to understand. Rex decided to quit his job as well. I rode back home and went back to bed. I stayed in bed for three days, too sick and weak to get up until the pain, headache, nausea, fever and vertigo, went more or less away. But even after three days, I was trembling and weak. In fact I felt weakened from then on. Even after regaining most of my strength, I felt I couldn't tighten my muscles. Instant fatigue burned in my muscles when I used them just a little. I felt like I was permanently diminished, as if I had lost in those few hours of hard labor, a fifth of my strength and stamina, never to return. In fact it did take several years to fully recover my strength.

After seeing how I was injured from the heat, the strain, and the exhaustion, I decided masonry is the stupidest work there is, and I would never do it again for the rest of my life! And I meant it! I worried about my physical recovery. Now I wonder what effect it had on my mind.

Bryson 1:2 "Never" is a word that's rebellious against the person saying it.

"The Calm"

The summer of '77 had seen me in summer school getting a half credit of science that I needed to graduate High School. I didn't mind summer school so much, and actually enjoyed the change of scene going downtown each morning to a school in Nashville.

After school was finished I spent my time hanging around my gentle friends, not even thinking about work, especially not masonry work. We spent a lot of days and nights at Percy Priest Lake recreation areas with our car stereos playing music out of speakers set on the tops of our cars. Sometimes we would go shoot some pool or play arcade games. Sometimes we just hung out. I spent a lot of time at Rex Oldham's house.

I loved all my friends, and the times were peaceful and gentle. We smoked marijuana often and kept smiles on our faces. But in the midst of all the partying, there was something I was thinking about my friends and my relationship to them. I asked myself fairly often, "Am I really loving toward my friends by being a part of all this dope smoking with them and encouraging it?" I repressed the question with the rationalization that I couldn't decide for them what they shouldn't do. Yet the question came back over and over. I repressed it every time.

By this time Tammy had not really been expecting much of my attentions. Tammy had moved out of the neighborhood and was doing her senior year of High School at Mt. Juliet High. I had my eyes on a couple of girls that were among my peers. But they were both married, even though I never saw their husbands. I found myself really attracted to either of them. "Am I a wife stealer?" I asked myself. The answer to that question came from an unlikely place.

One afternoon I was just hanging out in my ever so cool bedroom, which was now downstairs on the north east corner of the house. There happened to be a Family Bible in my bedroom. I never did read the thing. It was just a relic. Yet on this day I picked it up, probably just to look at the artwork in it. The Bible just happened to fall open to a certain place, and I began to read. It was the place where King David is warning his sons about bad women and what happened to a young man who was tempted by a married woman. He stated the young man would be struck by an arrow. Obviously King David meant the arrow would come from a jealous husband. I stopped reading and started thinking about the two married girls. Suddenly the words of King David sounded so right and reasonable. I decided then and there, that I was going to stop entertaining any idea of being with either of those girls. In fact, I thought that my influence on them was probably bad at this point. So I completely stopped giving them any attention other than as friendly acquaintances. It wasn't a religious decision. King David just sounded right to me. Considering the consequences King David described, I actually became a bit afraid of married women.

I had an old car, a 1965 Buick Special. I hated that it had four doors. But it was a reliable car and was it ever fast. Yes, I raced it a few times against a '69 Chevelle, a '69 Mach 1 Mustang, a Ranchero, and a few other cars. Only the Mach 1 Mustang even gave me a run, and I still pulled ahead. The old Buick never lost. Maybe that 350 engine from a wrecked full size station wagon that my dad had installed in it, was too much engine for this car. But the lightning fast revving of the motor and the body twisting torque was too much temptation for an irresponsible young man. Thankfully I never had a wreck. But I remember how stupid I was, and how stupid young male drivers generally are. I have considered the mistake my father made in trusting me with such a powerful car, and certainly have resolved not to make the same mistake. But this was the life I was leading as a youth graduated from school.

One day I was riding around on a Sunday morning with Rex. We were in his fine dark green metallic '73 Ford LTD with the uber pleasant dark green interior and the fine stereo system. Life was so good. Rex and I were sharing a bottle of wine as we cruised around, and we had smoked a little pot. I was feeling quite contended when we drove by a church. There I saw all the peoples' cars parked by the chapel, and I thought of all the people inside. I felt absolutely piteous for them. I said to Rex, "Look at all those lonely people going in there huddling together trying to find some comfort in their dull existence. They're wasting their lives when they could be out enjoying themselves like we do. They could be smoking a joint and be with friends listening to some good jam." Rex listened and just kind of gave a grunt and a little nod. But I recall how deeply piteous I felt for those lost and lonely church people.

"Beginning Captivity"

I had recently been working at a company which installed heating and air conditioning systems. It seemed like a reasonable line of work to do, since I loathed masonry work. On the morning of my eighteenth birthday, things began as usual. I went out to the old Buick, fired it up. The engine rumbled satisfyingly and the exhaust note was eager. I let her warm up and defrost the windshield. Once I was ready to go, I got my eight track tape of the band called "Sweet", shoved it into the Kraco under the dash mounted player, and began playing the busy hyperactive music of the "Give Us a Wink" set. All was normal and good and I felt life was splendid. I was happy to finally be a legal adult. I would get this day of work over, and in the evening when I got home, I expected my mother to have a birthday cake ready for me. We would have a good time celebrating this milestone of my life. Yes finally, legal adulthood!

I drove on to work and performed my duties throughout the day. It was November 23, and I was anxious to get back home. When I got off work, I left from there in my old Buick and turned onto an entrance ramp to get onto the interstate. On the entrance ramp I saw a young man and girl thumbing a ride. He was a long haired young guy and she was an attractive girl. They looked like the kind of young people I related too, so I decided to give these young peers a ride, instead of flooring the gas up the ramp. I stopped the car and the young guy and girl came right up and greeted me. He was gabby and cheerful. I invited them to hop in the throbbing old Buick. Doors flew open and they piled right in as natural as could be. They seemed like fun old friends already.

I wasn't disappointed. He was an extroverted fellow just full of gab and enthusiasm and she was a quite cool thing. We all got along great. We exchanged information about where we were going. I decided that since I liked them so much I would go ahead and drive them to the small town north of Nashville where they were going. I had plenty of gas and it would be a few hours before Mom would have my birthday cake ready for me anyhow. I was loose and feeling good. A ride just north of Nashville would fill the time and offer some fun with two cool folks.

As we rode, I offered to light up a joint for us to smoke. I had a small box on my front seat that always went with me. My stash was in there along with the paraphernalia I used and collected with pride. We fired one up and before long we were a bonded clan of mellow smiling youths. I put the soapstone back in the box and closed it as we rode along, gabbing and listening to music. The young guy mentioned that he was having a hassle up in the town we were going to, and the cops wanted to talk to him. That was no big deal because that was just the way cops were. A hassle with the cops was something many of my friends went through from time to time. It didn't mean we were bad folks. It's just that the laws were so uptight about just about everything, like pot and getting high, and anything else. Having fun was just illegal, and it was the problem of the establishment to get over it, as far as I was concerned.

When we arrived in the small town of Greenbriar, the young guy directed me to the house of a relative of his, where he was planning on staying. I pulled in the drive and stopped and let them out. Thanks and goodbyes were exchanged and the young pair started to go into the house. But then a few steps away, the young man stopped in his tracks and appeared thoughtful. He then turned to back around to me and with grandness of spirit, very courteously invited me to come on inside and hang out for a while. He was so friendly that I just decided to hang out with them for a little while, and then head home. We sat in the old kitchen at the table gabbing happily. The young guy asked if I would mind taking him around the corner to a market to get some stuff. No problem there, let's go.

We got in the Buick and he directed me. As we pulled up to a stop sign at an intersection, I noticed a cop car parked beside the small yellow building to my right. I thought that cop car looked kind of like it was trying to hide or something, but doing a very poor job of it. It seemed oddly a bit out of place, but that was no big deal. I decided to just ignore it, figuring cop cars have to be parked somewhere. Nothing about it seemed really relevant to me.

I made the left turn and started to drive up the road. Before I could get the Buick out of low range, suddenly out of nowhere there came rushing all around my car about four police cruisers with lights on and sirens blaring. Honks and buzzes going off, and boy were they aggressively crowding me! It kind of made me mad how they were driving at my old Buick like they would ram me. What in the world do these nutcases want? I was mystified and figured it was nothing real, but some kind of mistake. I pulled over and waited for them to come and ask me for identification or something, and we would get the matter cleared up. I was shocked to see them running toward my car, and all of the sudden I was looking down the barrels of about ten big pistols and shotguns which all made the very noticeable sounds of being cocked to fire! Now I knew I was facing a bunch of crazies and I sat very still! Gun safety rules never allowed you to point weapons at people, and these guys were going over the top. I just knew a gun accident was about to happen, which would not be good for me.

The cops yelled and acted like a riot was going on. I just sat very still in silence. They told the young guy next to me to step out of the car. He complied. Then they turned their attentions to me. "Uh, do you guys want to see my driver's license?" "KEEP YOUR HANDS WHERE WE CAN SEE THEM!" "Alright!" I said. Then I spoke up where they could all hear me and said, "Hey would you guys mind not pointing those guns at me? It's not safe and an accident could happen. I'll show you my driver's license!" At this point I think my humorous absurdity, like I was correcting the Police for such gun safety recklessness and implying they had over the top methods for just seeing a driver's license, disarmed them and they saw the humor. They all as a group hesitated for a few moments, and then they all realized the guns were unnecessary. They collectively started lowering their firearms and putting them away with a lot of uncocking sounds that guns make. WHEW! Thank goodness my reason prevailed over their craziness.

The next thing that happened was one of the cops reached through the driver window into the car and held a picture right in front of my eyes to see. He asked sternly, "Do you know this person?" I looked curiously at the picture which showed a mug shot of some long haired blond fellow. I absolutely didn't recognize him. I had no idea who it was. So I told the cop, "No." Then they started saying, "We better take him to jail." among themselves, and they told me to get out of the car. I got out and they started looking all in the old Buick. I thought, "GREAT! My box of stash is sitting right there on the front seat and they're about to bust me." For some reason they ignored the box and decided there was nothing in the car they were concerned with. DOUBLE WHEW!

The next thing I knew I was being driven to jail in one of the cruisers, and the cops weren't being very informative. I got finger printed and my mug shot taken. Then they led me to a jail cell and in I went. The cell was a small thing painted off yellow with one bunk. They slammed the door shut and there I was, jailed and mystified.

What really bothered me is the indifference they had once I was locked up. They told me nothing and simply disappeared for hours. This got me really upset. After several hours, my frustration and anger began to boil up. Gone was the mellow feeling of a good buzz and now I was getting really mad. I finally jumped to me feet, took a few rage energized steps and leaped up high in the air above the bunk and stomped on it with all my might as I landed. It made a horrendously loud bang that reverberated all through the jail. I sat back down with surly anger, just seething all through myself. Then the peep door opened and a cop spoke to me from outside the cell. He asked, "Are you alright?" I answered with frustration, "Yeah I'm alright! How long are you guys going to keep me? I need to get home. My mom has a birthday caked waiting on me." The cop told me to just relax and that they would get to me in a little while. I started thinking, "What a way to begin my adult life! Sitting in Jail! What a bad start! I hope this isn't the way things are going to be for me as an adult."

After a long wait, the cops finally came for me. They took me to a room to interrogate me. It was two cops together and me. The first thing they asked me was, "Why did you tell us you didn't know who was on the picture?" I said, "I don't know who it is! I've never seen that guy in my life!" They asked about the picture several more times going in round about ways to get me to say I recognized the picture. I realized this questioning again and again was some kind of trap and they wanted me to hang myself. But I honestly had no idea who the picture was of. After awhile, realizing the risk, I just point blank asked them myself, "Who was the guy in the picture?" I was now a bit curious about the issue and I felt safe enough in my honesty, that it negated the risk of being trapped in my words. After my getting to the point for them, the cops decided to inform me the guy in the picture was the guy in my car that I was giving a ride. WHAT? I suppose my shock was apparent to the cops. I told them, "The picture didn't look like the guy. The guy riding with me has black hair! You showed me a picture of some blonde haired guy!" Then I realized he must have dyed his hair dark to disguise himself. The cops asked me how I knew that guy. I told them I didn't know him at all. I explained that I picked them up hitchhiking and gave them a ride up here. At this point the cops told me they were trying to decide if they should charge me with harboring a fugitive. They asked me if I knew he was fleeing from the law and was wanted. I admitted the guy had told me that the cops wanted to talk to him, but that didn't seem like an issue to me. It didn't matter to me if he had dealings with the cops for something. As far as I knew it might be a traffic ticket or something. I didn't know he was a fugitive. After a while the cops went ahead and told me the guy was wanted for robbing a store or something. I told them I knew nothing about it. I was just a good guy giving two cool folks a ride. That's as long as I've known them and that's all I knew.

The cops decided to let me go and told me it was time to go home and get some cake. It didn't sound good the way they said it was time to "get some cake" to me, and I felt like they were being sarcastic. We all walked me out of the interrogation room. As I was passing by some of the cells, the young guy looked out of one and said to me, "Man I'm sorry I put you through this!" He really was sorry, I could tell. But I was a sorehead and just grunted my grudge at this whole episode instead of accepting his apology. I wish now that I had accepted his apology as graciously as he offered it. The cops drove me back to my car, which to my surprise was undisturbed. It was now dark. I got in my car, put the keys in the ignition and fired the old Buick up. The cops had told me how to get out of town, and that they would follow me until I was beyond the town limits. Before I moved, I looked over at my box of stash and ventured to peep inside it. Everything was still there! Thank goodness! I drove the direction they told me to the get out of town. The cops followed me right on my tail, and did I ever mind the speed limits! Before long they backed off and did a U-turn, and left me alone on the highway. As for me, I went home and had cake. I explained to my folks what had happened, and why I was so late. They gave me some sympathy. What a beginning to adult life!

"Pharaoh's Slavery"

I mentioned before that Rex's family was in the masonry business, and that Rex preferred to stay out of it as much as he could avoid it? Well it happens that when your own house is near to your parent's house, they tend to exert some pull on you. Well this was the case with Rex, whose father lived just a stone's throw from him up a hill just out of sight from Rex's house. Rex's dad's name is Pharaoh Oldham, who himself was the eldest of several brothers, and the leader in their family enterprises. It was Pharaoh who got the whole lot of the Oldhams involved in masonry. But these fellows were becoming elderly men and their business enterprise was well past its hay day. Yet the Oldhams continued running the business; which was the very exact thing Rex really wanted to avoid.

Pharaoh and his brothers came from a time when men were lining up to get a job in masonry. It was their mindset that you didn't deserve the job unless you gave every last bit of strength you could to it. They also maintained the delusion that somehow men still lined up waiting just to get a chance to have a masonry job. But the reality of the age was that nobody really wanted to do masonry. It was hard work! And men like Pharaoh and his stern brothers, didn't make it any less difficult. In fact they often took it upon themselves to persecute a "schoolboy" or some other type of person and make sure they learned not to be high minded. Such a victim would find himself doing the most horrid and difficult aspects of the work on a steady basis. Pharaoh and company were actively seeking the failure of their victims.

Needless to say, working for these men would be even less joyful than masonry inherently is not already. In fact if you look in the Bible, the Pharaoh of Egypt used masonry work to keep the energies of the Hebrew people drained, and to punish them with hard labor. Masonry was no less difficult in modern times. You still had to lift heavy dirty burdens for many hours, in searing heat or cold raw conditions. Your hands bled from cracking open and your clothes became rags. I simply cannot exaggerate the tremendous endurance of toil the job requires. I had nearly died from my first experience with it.

Well, I went over to Rex's house and we were sitting around there as usual, when Rex mentioned to me that his dad, Pharaoh, wanted to know if I would be interested in a job. I asked what kind of job, and Rex told me it would be working for Pharaoh's masonry company. Well for some reason I got amnesia about how bad of an experience I had suffered with that line of work already. So like a lamb to the slaughter, I asked about the money, and told Rex that I would be interested. Rex passed the reply on to Pharaoh.

Before a few days went by, another message from Pharaoh was conveyed to me via Rex. I was invited to dinner at Pharaoh's house at an appointed time. Well I felt obliged to go and made sure I was timely arriving at Pharaoh's place. I didn't want him to think I was a tardy type of guy who wouldn't be a decent employ. So I arrived at Pharaoh's at "supper time" and was invited in. We chatted about a little of nothing and soon the table was set with food by Rex's mother. So we all sat down and dishes of food were passed around in the ritual manner that some people do.

In a matter of a fact way, Pharaoh mentioned that there was no salt used in any of the food while it was prepared. Pharaoh seemed intent to make sure that I understood that I might want to salt it some. Well it wasn't a big deal to me anyway. I just figured the old guy was on a salt restricted diet or something, like a lot of the really old guys are, and he was just giving me a heads up. I wasn't one to complain about the hostesses' efforts, and I used very little salt myself, so I simply didn't mind or even care that it was saltless. I was more concerned about the feelings of Rex's mother, and wanted to enjoy the meal just as the hostess had made it.

Once we were finished with the ritual serving, I went to eating my meal in the purposeful manner in which I eat food, which is to get fed and get finished with it. Yes it was a little on the bland side. But not being a finicky eater, and typically not enamored with the joys of food, the food was just fine by me. But Pharaoh was obviously not so certain about this situation, and seeming a bit over concerned to me, asked me if I was sure I didn't wanted some salt. I politely replied the food was fine and went on eating. Pharaoh was still concerned. A bit later he asked again, "Are you sure you don't want some salt?" I told him, "No I don't." I was feeling like I was a big enough boy to decide when I wanted salt! The shaker is right in front of me. If I want salt, I can pick it up! Good grief! I was feeling out of place now, and proceeded to finish my meal. With the end of the meal we chatted a bit about nothing again, and so I left after it all was done.

A few days afterwards, Rex gave me the message that Pharaoh wants me to show up at the jobsite to begin work. That was fine with me. On the appointed day I went to the jobsite with Rex, who had also somehow been dragged into this deal as well. And that day was cold! In fact it was snowing.

The masonry project was a new fire station being built in East Nashville. The water barrels were full of ice, and fires were being built to melt things that needed melting, and warm things and people that needed warming. My first thought was that these guys sure acted desperate to work in bad conditions. But I hung in there with them. The crew batched mortar and Pharaoh took reports on whether the mortar was freezing or not. The masons replied that mortar was freezing around the edges of the board. Well Pharaoh and company sounded convinced that it would warm up a very soon, and they ordered to proceeded with the work! Just about three more degrees of warming weather and all would be grand! Pharaoh looked triumphantly proud and happy as he pronounced the weather is going to be fine. The mortar would set before it had a chance to freeze later that evening when the temperatures would dip back into the teens.

I was as lost as I could be on a jobsite. I found myself always about to get in the way of something, and I really couldn't figure out exactly what I was supposed to do at any particular time. I wished for a task, with a clear objective. But the uncommunicative nature of these men meant they didn't really have time to explain things to some youngster. It was frustrating from the onset. Rex did fine though, since he grew up with this type of scene. He explained things to me that mattered.

So here I was in masonry again, which I had sworn off, working in the falling snow, on a firehouse, for slave driving men. My hands cracked, mortar dust was in my nostrils, all my muscles burned and I sweated in the freezing weather. I was constantly confused about what was expected of me at any given time. I had to be a mind reader! Derisiveness and disapproving gestures were offered in abundance.

After a few days, I was at Rex's house and Rex was asking me about the dinner I had at his dad's house. It came to my mind that something sure was bothering Pharaoh concerning salt. I mentioned to Rex, that Pharaoh seemed awfully concerned about salt. Rex just laughed, and explained that it's an old trick to invite a potential employee over for a saltless meal and to mention that the saltless food may need salting. That way the prospective employee can be tested to see if he has orderly senses and can handle a job. The test is to see if he will salt his food first and then eat it, or taste the food to see if it needs salt, and then salt it. The guy, who salts his food before tasting it, doesn't have enough sense for a job. The guy, who taste it first and then salts it, can have a job. Rex wanted to know what I did with the salt. I told him I ate the food the way it was made and didn't use any salt, not a bit, not even once. Rex laughed when he heard my answer, because he understood why Pharaoh seemed so concerned: I had managed to thwart and nullified Pharaoh's test. Personally, I now wish I had just picked up two salt shakers and dumped them on the food before I ever took my first bite. Maybe I would have been spared from ever doing masonry again.

Well there was a clash of values if I ever saw one. Pharaoh thought I should have cared about salt, and instead I cared about the hostess's feelings. I wonder if Pharaoh had ever met a guy who thought so differently from himself, as I think. I can just imagine meal after meal with guys going on about the importance of salting their food just right! Good grief! These masonry guys are nuts.

"Mercy"

As winter progressed into the next calendar year of 1978, I had somehow managed to hang onto the most confusing and strenuous job of a masonry laborer. But the men I worked for were still loath to explain anything in a comprehensive manner. I think they had a sense of, "knowing something you didn't", that somehow made them feel superior or validated about themselves as knowing tradesmen. I personally thought all this behavior was counterproductive, and it was frustrating trying to get a handle on the various aspects of the job. Some of the men had intense Tennessee country accents that sounded like nothing but mumbling to me. Whenever I had trouble understanding their mumbley mouthed muttering, they would act frustrated or angry, then mumble mouth a little louder and start wagging their heads while I drew blanks and said, "Huh?" But at least Rex or Ike would explain things to me.

While I was working one morning, I got a demand to do a certain task. In the usual smart mouthed tones I was instructed to get up on the scaffolding and joint the masonry work. This is trade jargon for taking a metal tool called a jointer, and running it along the mortar joints to smooth them and give the mortar joints the rounded concave shape everyone has seen on a block wall. I did as I was instructed and worked on a section of wall smoothing the fresh mortar joints.

I had a persecutor who worked on the crew. The man's name was Ron Tanner. For whatever reasons, he had issues that compelled him to assert dominance over somebody and he seemed to have chosen me. I had already had about enough of his redneck antics, but his referring to me in the feminine sense, was about to boil me over. I hadn't complained because that's just the way I am. But calling me "sweetheart" and "honey" was angering me over a period of time.

While I was jointing the masonry work, in a manner in which I had been instructed as to how it is done, Ron Tanner stepped over to me and snarled that it had to be done another way. Ron said this way first and that way next, which made little sense to me. I had already learned everyone had their way of doing things, and if you listened to one person's ideas the next person would correct you for doing it that way. Well before I was going to do anything, I figured I should get Ron to explain the rational behind his brusque demands. So I asked him, "Why do you do it that way?" He responded with snarling anger, "Because I said so!"

That kind of reasoning was just not good enough for me, since it explained nothing. I also sensed this was just some crazy redneck antic of Ron trying to be some kind of alpha male thing. Well I was finished with this kind of stuff from this redneck clown. I decided it was time for a showdown on the spot, to test him, and see if he had anything to back this game he played or if he was all hot air. So I got really angry acting and cursed him all kinds of names I would never say now. I told him how low and stupid he was and on and on throwing in some ultimatums about the "Sweetheart" and "Honey" terms he used toward me. I made it clear to him he wasn't my boss. I was ready for a fight right then and there. I was trying to get Ron fighting mad and get him to make a move. He was angry, but to my surprise, he said nothing else and just turned and walked away. Just as I figured, all bark and no bite once the bully was called face to face.

Later on in the day it came time to take a lunch break. Rex and I decided to go some place to get lunch, and we both got into his really nice car. We sat there waiting for Ike to join us. As we waited for Ike, Ron Tanner came walking toward us on my side of the car. I had my window down and so he walked near and said, "Hey Bryson". I turned toward him to say "What?" just in time to meet a leather gloved fist which landed on my nose with a lot of power and crunchy sounds. The blood flew from nose, and the blow had crushed my septum. But my mind was sharp and I never feel pain. I was far from beaten by this ambush from the likes of this weak minded redneck. He tried to hit me immediately again, but I had instantly done a boxing style face cover and Ron pounded my forearms a few times in utter futility to punch my face.

His next tactic was to try to drag my head out of the car so he could beat on me unhindered. He had grabbed my hair and started pulling my head through the car window. That was fine with me because I didn't want to be in the car. So instead of resisting his pull, I went with him and used my feet to push myself right out of the car window. I nearly tore the side mirror off of poor Rex's sweet ride going out the window. Just then, the nature call I had intended to take on lunch break, called for me and I defecated my pants. That got me mad!

I was out of Rex's car before Ron knew what to do next. He never got another chance to swing his fist. I hit the ground on my feet and stepped into the fight with a rush bringing my charge chest to chest with Ron. Even though the man was larger and heavier, and in prime manhood, he hadn't known the strength of the young man he assaulted. Under all those bulky work clothes were muscles, he had never seen.

I rushed Ron with my body low in order to lift him when we met. A man up in the air has no balance and can't fight. As I met his chest I lifted my chest beneath his, swinging my right arm under his left and executed a very swift and strong pancake maneuver sending him up and over my left shoulder as I flung him down face first into the ground. It's an old wrestling move which I had used once before on a very friendly workout partner, resulting in an accidental broken leg.

There Ron laid flat faced down on the ground before he could even understand what was happening. He was thrown like a rag doll and he never had a chance to get back to his feet. I straddled his back, pulled his head back with my strong right arm like a vise and had him hamstrung and helpless in mere seconds. I intended to stretch him into a backwards bend and make it hurt. I intended to cut off his air at the same time. My grip under his chin was so strong he could neither open his mouth nor scream. I could have punished him in this manner for a good long time until he passed out or I became satiated.

But cruelty was in my heart and I was intent on torturing him. I took my free left hand and poked my finger deep into his left eye socket and reached behind his eye and slowly and cruelly started pulling out his eye. It was horrifying torture for Ron. Every nerve of his body began shuddering. As I pulled his eye outward, there was the horrified scream of agony and terror coming from Ron; not out of his mouth, but muffled out of his nose, since I had his jaws clamped shut with my right arm.

Maybe he was calling on God in his heart. I don't know. But a man having his eye extracted while he is helpless, would be prone to call on God. All I know is that in an instant, there was a deep identification with Ron that I felt. All of the sudden, I put myself in his place. I felt pity for him. He was hurting, helpless, terrified and screaming out of his nose as his eye was being pulled out.

I suspect God was reasoning with me at that moment. God does things like that; plants impressions into us causing us to think things and feel things; even forget things or fail to think of things. God is a master of controlling and altering our perceptions. All I know is I suddenly felt deep compassion for Ron and the feeling was profoundly irresistible. I had him defeated; that was good enough. There was no need to torture him or blind him. Why did I feel compassion just at the moment I was about to blind him forever?

I couldn't help myself. I took my finger out of Ron's eye, released my grip around his throat and chin and then started letting him rise under my weight which I slowly raised off of him. As soon as I let him free, he scrambled away and grabbed a piece of brick laying beside him and spun around screaming "Get away from me!" He was holding the brick bat up threateningly, as if to throw it in defense if he had too.

So there Ron was: A beaten and terrified redneck still afraid of another manhandling. I was calmly looking at him, not even bothering to respond to the threatening brick in his hand. Some of the men now intervened and the fight was over. I went back to the car with Rex and told him I needed to clean up. My nose bled pretty badly from the sucker punch and I had soiled pants. Rex took me home and I was fired from the job. But the men and family of Ron Tanner finally saw Ron get beaten badly in a fight. Ron had a reputation as a bully and I suspect the men all kind of liked the humbling he got.

So why am I even telling you about all this violence and wickedness? It's because being a redneck is cultural insanity. Also because of the questions that have resided in my heart all these years: Why did I feel such overwhelming compassion? Did God extend mercy to me, because I gave mercy? Did God intervene by telepathically pleading into my mind, reasoning with me, to prevent my act of cruelty? Was I responding to some deeply implanted instruction from God in those moments of conflict, to identify with the man I was about to blind? Did God bless me because I had mercy on the eye sight of another, and so God reciprocally granted me more sight than others? Did the broken septum in my nose affect my brain?

The day's accomplishments: One broken nose, one defeated redneck, one act of mercy, one gigantic fighting man reputation, and one lost job.

Speaking of getting fired, Pharaoh shouldn't have done that to be fair to me. But he needed Ron to lay blocks more than he needed a green helper. Pharaoh never did me any good whatsoever even though he seemed to want to be a mentor figure to me. He was all the time interested in telling me his homey values and ideas that seemed like clever common sense to him. The only lessons I ever learned from Pharaoh were lessons in hardness and cruel disregard for ones fellow man, exploiting him for profit. Later on, a man died on another jobsite Pharaoh's company had the masonry contract for. He died of heat exhaustion. I knew the score though. Pharaoh and company had pushed the man too hard like they always did everyone; as if the workers' humanity was a trivial concern. They loved pushing for too much work as if it were a virtue.

Pharaoh had money, a fine house, and the dignity of being perceived as an accomplished and capable man. Pharaoh had nothing I wanted to emulate, although seeing his success at masonry caused me to be deluded into thinking there might be prosperity in it for me. I didn't want him for a friend. I saw no virtues to imitate. I had no trust of him for my benefit. I didn't have any use for his hard and proud type. Pharaoh was pride incarnate defending itself against feelings of inadequacy and insecurity at an elderly age. He was still proving his worth to himself, covering his feelings of inadequacy compared to others, leaving victims in his wake as his twisted concepts of virtue were accomplished. He was toxic despite his dignified demeanor.

His son Rex, had a reputation as living poor, not working, drinking, pot smoking, being undependable and generally suspicious. But Rex has a heart of gold and I still consider him a friend.

"Meet the Dragon"

I've mentioned Ike's name already and you've probably already figured he's a friend of mine and Rex's. But Ike Brusher is an enigmatic and very uncommon individual. There is no way to start describing Ike except to begin with his appearance, which is the first impression everyone got when they encountered him. Ike looked really dangerous.

Ike was tall and lean with some lanky muscularity, a white country boy with course curly brown hair. But the thing that made the greatest impression was his face. By no means was Ike either handsome or ugly. He was ordinary. It was his eyes. He had dangerous eyes. He never glared or sneered, or made angry faces to intimidate. It was just his natural look that his eyes lacked any fear or tenderness in them. Despite the smug grin Ike wore incessantly, those eyes told the story by themselves of who Ike was. His eyes said he was a loner by nature, strong and dangerous, and not to be messed with. Young rednecks who liked to mess with people and act with bravado, became tame dogs around Ike. Ike quietly owned the space around himself and people tended to respect it. Ike's hairline was slightly higher than average and this tended to make his natural afro hair style seem to be situated slightly toward the back of his head. This only made those eyes all the more noticeable. Ike tended to have a pleased grin on his face all the time as if he knew something. I always thought there was something very snake like about Ike's eyes and about Ike in general. A missing front tooth and his backset hairstyle added to the impression. He seemed like a snake turned into a man to me.

But for all his dangerous appearance, Ike was always friendly to me. He was actually a closer friend to Rex than he was to me. Like Rex, Ike was several years older than me in his mid twenties. But we both were Rex's friends so we ended up hanging out together with Rex. Over the years I gradually knew Ike a little better. But knowing Ike was difficult since he didn't talk about himself much and was secretive. You always wondered what in the world this guy had been into. Occasionally I did venture to ask him a few personal questions about himself. Ike maintained a personal wall though, and his answers to my questions about him, were often more mystifying than not. Ike created the strong impression that he didn't want you asking questions. So for the most part I left Ike to his privacy. For me to speculate about how Ike came to be as he was, would amount to saying something untrue, since I can't say that I know.

In all the years I never actually saw Ike misbehave toward another person. No fights, no abuse or anything. He simply left people alone. So despite his appearance, he was peaceable in a dangerous looking sort of way, if you can imagine it. Maybe it was his evil look that brought Ike's peace to him, because nobody wanted to cross such an intimidating looking fellow.

But there actually were secrets to Ike and his existence. Secrets that in my stating them outright, are hard to believe. What wasn't a secret about Ike was the jovial mood he got into when he had enough beer, enough marijuana or some other drugs, which he really loved. This much, Ike let you see about him. But Ike's real secret was that he knew things ordinary people just don't know. Ike wasn't just knowing, but living in the secrets of an unseen reality beyond this world. How Ike came to be this way I have no idea, and Ike would never say.

Once about a year before my strange experiences began, I was at Rex's house and Ike was there at the kitchen table, indulging in pot, whiskey, beer and valiums. He was getting stoned, drunk and high, and really laying it on. I was more interested in playing guitar and sat in the den right next to the kitchen, where Ike was sitting at the table. He was really enjoying himself and looked euphorically happy in a sagging sort of stupor. I wondered about his judgment at getting so intoxicated.

Ike decided to get up and go into the living room. He was so intoxicated that he could barely walk as he stumbled through the den toward the living room. The floor of the living room was elevated about a foot above the den floor at the doorway. As Ike came to the steps going up to the living room, he missed them and stumbled forward falling through the doorway into the living room.

Something really weird happened to Ike as he fell. Of course, he couldn't catch himself from the fall because he was so intoxicated. As Ike fell face forward through the doorway, he stopped in mid air for a second or two, then fell about a foot or so and stopped again. Then he fell another little bit and stopped again. This repeated several times as Ike fell in stop slow motion all the way to the living room floor where he settled as gently as a feather. This gravity defying headlong journey to the floor was insane! I watched the whole thing and it amazed me! Once Ike was lying on the floor and I saw that he was alright, I burst out yelling, "Did you see that! Ike just fell in slow motion!"

Rex hadn't seen Ike's fall. But Ike recalled it and talked to Rex about it a few times with some great amusement in his face as he described how it felt. He really enjoyed emphasizing how he couldn't do anything to stop from falling face forward, until the floor came up and gave him a nice warm gentle hug! It didn't hurt the story a bit that I backed up Ike's version of it to Rex.

What I had immediately conjectured to myself, was that Ike had some kind of invisible friends who were catching him as he fell, letting him down easily, and protecting him. I didn't know what they were, but speculated this sinner might have angels or something. Or maybe the things breaking his fall were not angels at all, but maybe some kind of beings more mutual to Ike's aura of dangerousness.

It's strange where you will hear true things that nobody else can tell you about. This was the case one evening with Ike and me. Rex had moved into his father's house to keep an eye on it while Pharaoh had gone to South America on an extended holiday. It was still winter of early 1978, and it was a dark and cloudy evening. I drove up the silent road to where it dead ends at the turn around, and parked facing the driveway entrance of Pharaoh's house. I saw that Rex wasn't there, so I parked to wait for him to return. I figured he was on an errand to get some beer. Shortly, Ike also pulled up and parked. Ike was driving a big old white international pickup truck that he had borrowed from a slavish friend of his name Kerry Legion. I went over to the truck and climbed in so we could visit while we both waited for Rex.

The idea that Ike resembled a snake, turned into a man, to me was food for my thoughts and imagination. In fact, I had played with the idea that the spirits or traits of certain creatures were part of the personality makeup of people. I know this idea is silly and wrong now; since we are all created in God's image. But the last thing on my mind at that time was basic religious doctrine.

As Ike and I sat there in the dark, I ventured to ask some personal questions from Ike despite what response I expected to get from him. I was feeling the apprehension that I may be about to tread on private ground, but I began at any rate and asked Ike the question, "Ike, if you were some kind of animal, what kind of animal would you be?" I'll never forget the smile that came over Ike's face as he quickly answered, "A Dragon!" I thought to myself, that a dragon is just a glorified snake, and felt vindicated in my assessment of Ike. I responded with the question, "A dragon?"

Ike continued, "Yes a dragon. Dragons are real. If you look in the Bible, it talks about dragons. People read the Bible all the time, but they don't understand what they're reading about. There're lots of things in the Bible that are real, but people don't understand it. But if you read the Bible you will see there are dragons in it."

So I thought maybe the spirit of Ike is a dragon turned into a man. Well that's a bit more uppity than a mere snake. But if that's what Ike wanted, it was fine with me. I was also intrigued by this dangerous seeming fellow who was anything but a saint, resorting immediately to the Bible.

The conversation was now spiritual, so that was the direction we continued. I asked Ike, "Can you see a dragon?" emphasizing subtly the word "see". The reason I emphasized the word "see" was because I had been reading about the Indian Bujeros, who used the word translated as "see", in the sense that they could perceive the mystical realms and spiritual entities. Somehow Ike understood exactly what I meant.

He answered, "You might see a dragon one day, or you might never see one. But they exist. There are lots of things that exist that people can't see. I'm not trying to prove anything or teach. I'm just telling you."

"Ike, the Indian Bujeros use all kinds of drugs to open their perceptions to see things. Do you do anything like that?"

"That's one way of doing it. It's not the only way." Ike answered.

"It's not the only way? What other ways are there?"

Ike replied, "There are other ways. See I'm occult. Not "cult", like people think of a religious cult. But "occult" which means hidden. I'm hidden. Like I said, I don't teach people or try to prove anything. But I'm occult. I'm not the only one and you've met others, but you didn't know it."

After all this time of knowing Ike, this was the first time he ever opened up even a little bit, and all my suppositions about him were nearly right on. I had often envisioned him being part of some secret traditions hidden in the sticks of Tennessee for generations. No wonder he's so different from other people. I was intrigued by the idea that I was around people who were occult and I didn't know it. The occult exist even though it is hidden from sight. Other hidden things exist, such as things in the Bible, was also Ike's point. But it went over my head since I was now more intrigued by the illustration than the point he was making.

I asked Ike, "Who were the other ones"

He replied, "I can't say. But if you watch for them you can find them."

I asked, "What do I watch for?"

"I don't know how to tell you. You just watch for them and you'll spot them."

"How many have I met?" I asked.

"You've met several that I know of. There are others you haven't met."

"How many occult people do you know, Ike?"

Ike answered, "About eighty".

Now I was really getting curious. I decided to start spotting these folks and the idea of a hunt was very interesting. The idea of being an occult person sounded pretty unattractive to me. But spotting them sounded like fun.

So I asked, "So being an occultist is another way to see, Ike?"

Ike, "It's just one way. There is no single way."

I asked, "What are you wanting to see?"

Ike smiled hugely again with a knowing expression and said, "Astral bodies!"

I asked, "Astral bodies?"

Ike continued, "Astral means star. I want to see star bodies. Star bodies are in the Bible too, but people don't understand it when they read it. They just read right past them and never understand what they've just read."

I asked Ike, "Have you ever seen astral bodies?"

Ike answered, "Once I was at my mother's house and I had taken a lot of PCP. I got so high I sat down in a chair in her living room. The whole room filled up with what looked like snow."

"You were seeing astral bodies, Ike?"

"Like I said, Bryson, the room looked like it was filled with snow"

Now, I pictured that in my mind. I could see a severely intoxicated Ike sitting in a simple chair in a well lit room, with a virtual snowstorm of astral bodies whipping about him. I also noticed that Ike didn't mind creating the doubts for me about the truth of his perceptions. He made it far too easy to say it was just a drug induced state. Yet he was telling it as if he had seen astral bodies. Why did he emphasize describing it like "snow"?

The conclusion was mine to make and he left it up to me. Ike simply didn't mind if I believed him or not. Maybe that's the way the occult stays hidden; is that they create a lack of credibility about themselves. Thus a person wanting to find the occultist, can find them, and a person not wanting them, would deny they exist. To find them you would have to surmise they exist, and then proceed as if they do. This mode of offering deniability was apparent to me immediately. Oh, that's tricky! Little could I understand just exactly what was true in Ike's words, or the ramifications of those truths. Spiritual matters seemed curious, yet trivial to me. I perceived no ramifications. But I did think about maybe reading the Bible some, to find those hidden things, "that people don't understand", that Ike kept referring to.

Was Ike always full of truths? I have no idea. I learned a few more things about him through some experiences I suffered, in which he was involved. But the honest thing to say about Ike is that he is still an enigma to me. I would still be wary of him to this day. Not in the fear sense of wary, but in the fact that I know he's in two worlds at once and he is very conscious of it. Yet he doesn't seem to care or mind. To me, his allegiance simply doesn't overtly seem to be with God, and that gives me a wary feeling. There is just something very different about Ike. It plays on the imagination to ponder what exactly makes Ike so different from other people.

"The Root of Darkness"

It was this winter time of year that I also decided to try my hand at concocting a batch of a hallucinogenic drug. A common weed in the area was hearty enough to remain standing through the winter and several stalks of it were handy, though it had died the previous fall.

But what the hey! It seemed like a great experiment to see if I could get a batch of extract from it and delve into the altered states of consciousness idea. I now realize this is about a stupid idea of course. But what is being a youth but being stupid in the extreme, like I was about to be?

I went into a field and grabbed one of the stalks of the weed and pulled it up by the root which was still strong and moist without any spoilage. I cut the thick root away from the rest of the plant, washed it really well and proceeded to the next step. I fashioned a make shift mortis and pestle and really tore into that tough old root with some good energy. I was having fun now. Finally, I got it all mashed to smithereens and started soaking it in water. I waited for the prescribed amount of time and then tried to strain the fiber from the water. Then I let the fluid settle until the heavy stuff went down and the water on top cleared. I poured off the water on the top carefully to avoid losing the settled part. After a few repeats of these steps the final part was to let the remaining water evaporate and hopefully end up with the perfect goo.

Well after waiting for a few days it finally dried completely out and it wasn't goo at all. Instead it was a batch of caked up tan stuff that crumbled to dust when it was handled. And handling it was tricky because the air tended to blow it away. But I managed to collect a small amount and put it into a pill bottle and thought about whether I should try the stuff or not. Of course I should! That's how stupid I was in those days.

I got a glass, which was actually a Bama Jelly jar, and filled it about two thirds with water. Then I got the pill bottle and went outside in the bright winter noon sun on the south side of the house. I decided to try about a teaspoon of my failed goo powder. I spooned it into the glass of water and got an immediate surprise when I observed it. Instead of dissolving into the water, it tenaciously floated on top of the water like shredded Styrofoam. I couldn't get anything about the stuff to mix in with the water.

I realized that I had concocted a perfect batch of dry woody root fiber. Hmm! Not much potential there!

My next decision was to try to salvage the situation. I had to improvise and try drinking some of the water with this waterproof batch of dust bunny fiber floating repellently on top of it. Hmmm, I'd have to gape open my mouth while I poured the stuff in and hope some of the fiber would go in with the water. I sure would look silly, but nobody's watching. I opened my mouth wide open and threw my head back as I slowly poured the concoction into my mouth. I was carefully attempting to pour just the surface water and the fiber bunnies into my mouth. I must have looked like a fool with a mouth full of water and a wet chin where excess water had squirted from my mouth when I tried to close it to swallow. I did manage to get some root fiber in my overfilled mouth. It wasn't a great sensation to have something like pure water repellent dust bunnies getting all over your mouth and between your teeth. Swallowing it seemed to be pretty chancy to, since even a little bit carried the risk of severely choking on it. Needless to say, I was taking this final step a little slowly and thoughtfully as I concentrated on not choking.

I only managed to swallow a minute amount of the dusty root powder. The futility of this whole exercise was setting in and so I gave up trying to take anymore. I poured out the water with the bulk of the root fiber still floating on top. But I did get a little bit in me. I wondered if I'd feel anything! So I waited. After several hours it was obvious I must have done something wrong, I never felt a thing! Well maybe it's more mystical, than it is an actual drug trip. Maybe the ritual of using it with that intent, will allow me to have altered perceptions.

So I stored the rest of pill bottle's root fiber away and basically forgot about the stuff. But I would later be reminded of it. A person gives account of his words and actions.

"Opium's Secrets"

Gradually my nose healed up with the septum twisted just enough to inhibit breathing on my right nostril a little bit. Other than that, life was really good having my first springtime free from the bondages of school. My old car was running well and was still very fast. I spent my time running around the lake and visiting friends. I had access to marijuana and regularly enjoyed it.

In my conversation with Ike, I had managed to reinforce my idea that people were like the embodiment of animal archetypes. Ike probably didn't intend that, but his unusual enjoyment of the idea, spoke to me. I began experimenting with the idea, and thought about each person that I met or knew and tried to ascribe what animal type they were. Rex was a dog of course. Vashti was also a dog. Janice was a cat, Ike was a dragon. I did this with everyone. In conversing or being involved with somebody, I didn't direct my words and actions to them at simple face value. I directed my expressions to the animal archetypes I saw in that person. It was a wonderful delusion which set up some very interesting dynamics. In a strange way it seemed profound to see them as personality archetypes, because they became somewhat predictable and their responses were no longer a surprise to me. I didn't let people know how I was thinking about them, and how I was experimenting with how they related. I just carried on with observing and experimenting.

I was also watching for "occultist", to challenge myself and see if I could spot them. I used the buzzwords "see" or "seen" since Ike seemed to have understood me. If somebody seemed to respond to those words in an unusual manner, they might think I'm one of them and open up to me. The funny thing is that the buzzwords actually worked on several people. But most people never had any notice of my use of the terms.

One example of it provoking an unusual response was when I was at a market that all my friends stopped in at. There came driving up another mysterious old country boy named William Hinton. I had known William since elementary school days. He was a carl of a boy, robust and strong, quiet and gentle. His skin was white, but his hair was black. The thing that was really impressive to me was that William had always had unusual strength, even as a boy. There was something mysterious about all his strength. As boys, three of us could all climb on William and he would walk around bearing all our weight. We were amazed since none of us could even piggy back more than one of our pals. William had grown into a big stocky young man and was still quiet and deep behind his black eyes.

On this day, William got out of his car at the market and I hailed him as I walked toward him. I said "William! I ain't seen you, in a long time!" He immediately paused with a twitch. He noticeable went deep into thinking about something for a second or two and he was really quiet and serious. Then he faced me with a very serious look on his face. I was the kind of look that says, "I'm not playing". He purposefully fixed my gaze and looked me sternly and searchingly right into my eyes. Those dark eyes of his were telling me this was serious. I stood there smiling back at him and he slowly spoke these words: "It's called opium". I had absolutely no idea what William meant by that. But I didn't want him to see that I was an ignoramus, so I responded, "Sure William".

I knew that my buzzwords got some kind of reaction out of William. But his response was kind of strange. What did he mean by, "It's called Opium"? Was he saying he had opium? Or was this a secret euphemism used by some occult group? Maybe William was completely aware of my façade and knew I was messing in things I knew nothing about. Maybe he was meaning something like religion being the "opium of the people", and he was warning me that I was in danger of the opium effects of some strange spiritual natures. William was too deep for me, so I just left it alone. I figured William's animal type was a wise old gorilla; strong, gentle and knowing.

I was becoming convinced that a lot of people knew about something I wasn't hip to. My imagination was beginning to work overtime. Another wonderful thing about this very early spring time was how much it made me feel natural. I mean, I felt like I was bonded to the earth and part of it. I was an earth being in my mind, completely at home in this paradise. I felt wonderful.

"Scrying Shame"

There is some technical term for the act of crystal gazing, looking into gems, pools of water, mirrors and crystal balls. But I can't recall it just now. These types of things are condemnable and open doors to deceptions and delusions.

Nevertheless, I wasn't a young man of faith or consideration of those types of things. I was just playing around. One dark evening I decided to try to "see". I was sitting in my room on the side of my bed thinking about how to "see". I decided to just look and see if anything broke through to my perceptions. I wanted something to steady my gaze upon, and the first thing I spotted was my own face in the mirror. So I began to stare at myself, and decided the reflection of my right eye was a good point to focus on.

I sat there staring at my right eye intently trying to see beyond this realm, when something did begin to happen. As I watched, there began to emerge another face right beside mine and overlapping mine. The place where I was watching my own right eye reflection became the opposite eye for the face forming in the mirror. I was intrigued and my focus on the figure became clearer and clearer. As I looked, the black face that formed seemed to be that of a rather gorilla looking thing. Immediately I thought of the animal archetypes and the gorilla like image made some sense to me as my own archetype. But I really don't think any longer it was a gorilla that I saw. I now think it was just an evil spirit with deception in its ways.

The body has its own natural actions which are not really conscious things we decide to do. Some of them are just automatic or instinctive. In some way, I theorize, this gives us an advantage over spiritual beings which cannot predict or perceive certain actions we do, which we don't consciously think of for them to hear. I could be wrong about that, but my experiences suggest instinctive things we do, take spirits off guard. Such is how the case seemed in the next few moments between me and this dark spirit.

As I was staring into the mirror, my eyes instinctively and involuntarily averted away and I instantly glanced to the window of my room, which was beside the mirror. I was instantly fixed upon the appearance of a huge ink black figure standing in my window looking in at me. It seemed remotely human like as a figure silhouetted there. But it was ink black and huge! As I fixed my gaze instantly upon it, the figure jumped visibly as if startled that I was seeing it. Then as I watched, it seemed to have a resignation to the fact that I was seeing it, and moved shyly and silently aside out of my window.

What was that thing, I wondered? Was it some kind of big ape spirit or was it some kind of malevolent entity as the ink blackness of it suggest to me? Why was it spying on me? I figured it was that being, whatever thing it was, which was projecting the image of its face into the mirror for me to see. All of it seemed like some kind of spiritual prank. I trusted none of it. But the suggestion of a gorilla archetype did stick with me for awhile. It led to more strange experiences.

Stay away from anything but God. All this spirit stuff is open season on your soul for spiritual predators. Turn to God, not liars. But through this event the animal archetypes paradigm was being further reinforced to me, and I was falling for it. The gorilla, I thought, was my own archetype.

"Animal Archetypes"

One early spring day I decided to drop in on Janice McKay and her sister Daisy. They were pretty good friends who always enjoyed me dropping in. It was early in the day, probably around noon when I showed up. Janice as usual was itching to do something instead of just sitting around being "bored". Janice was the driving force between these two, and Daisy just kind of went with the flow of things. So after we thought about it for awhile, we figured that a pretty day that wasn't chilly should be spent at Cooks Recreation area on the lake. So we drove up there and generally clowned around, acted silly and laughed a lot.

But leave it to me to bring up the subject of my latest curiosities. I asked them what kind of animals they would be. Of course Janice piped right up with an enthusiastic, "I'm a cat!" To which we all agreed she was definitely a cat. Daisy was a bit tougher and I think we decided she was some kind of dog. A lot of laughing and poking fun ensued and then I told them to guess my type. Janice suggested a bear and Daisy sort of agreed. But I led them to the gorilla archetype and they got a big laugh out of that. Janice exclaimed, "Yeh Bryson, You sure are a monkey!" Such laughing was going on since girls just love to tease me. Janice challenged me to be a gorilla, "Act like a gorilla!" So I did.

I began to subvert my humanity and take on a gorilla. Calmly, placidly I moved and I could feel that I was a gorilla. The feeling became stronger and I was losing myself in the transformation as I moved easily and observed. Suddenly both of Janice and Daisy were squealing and exclaiming remarks. They started begging me to stop! "He's really turning into a gorilla!" They both became scared and they were calling earnestly for me to stop. Realizing I was a convincing actor to them, I certainly didn't want to frighten them. I stopped and just laughed at them. But they were still in shock and both were saying to each other and to me, "You really turned into a gorilla!" "He became a gorilla!" They weren't funning anymore; they had actually been frightened.

Of course after this event, my transformation into a gorilla was the topic of choice for Janice to all my other friends, with Daisy attesting to the truth of it all. I soon realized that the mindsets among certain of my friends, was to take this seriously enough to act upon it, which they did.

A friend of mine named Van, heard all the details from Janice and Daisy, and he came looking for me within a couple of days. Of course I was easy to find and Van met me at the market where we all liked to pit stop. He was in a good mood and seemed to have some plans of some kind. He suggested I jump in his car and we could go for a ride. Van was being sort of insistent with me in a way that suggested he had some expectations of excitement. He told me that he had somebody he wanted me to meet. I asked who, but all he would say is that it's a girl. Did I know her? Why do you want me to meet her? He was just reassuring but gave no reasons and told me that I had never met her. Well an adventure waited for my curiosity, so away we rode!

Surprisingly, Van drove us into a neighborhood that I knew of, but it certainly wasn't a place I went to. It was a place called Tulip Grove. Van drove to a house and pulled in the driveway. Now I was mystified about what was going on. Van told me to come on, and led the way to the front door and knocked. The door opened and there was a young dark haired girl greeting us with quiet placid expectation. She immediately invited us inside in a quiet way, and led us to the den. She and Van talked like comfortable old friends, though I had never ever seen her with Van. We were introduced, and she looked at me freely without self-consciousness. I sensed both approval and a question in her eyes. Not just any question, but the "Are you my man?" question. I realized I was being looked at as a potential boyfriend by this young girl who had obviously been expecting us. But why was she interested in me? Why were we being matched up like this?

As I watched her easy relaxed body language, her thin extra feminine frame, I had to admit this quiet girl was very attractive. She had the fair skin, the long dark hair, pretty eyes and something about her that was a little strange. There was an aura about her that was subtly apparent, but undeniably there. She had the subtleties of a gorilla like aura in her features. Far from grotesque, she was actually very fine boned and pretty. Yet the aura was like a subtle spice. When she looked at me it was soulful. This young girl wanted to know if I was interested in her.

The whole situation took me completely off guard. I simply was not ready to be paired off according to being a gorilla type. I didn't like this set up. She may have been a wonderful girl, but I never took the time to find out and refused to be interested. After a bit Van excused us and we left. On the ride back, Van was enthusiastically prodding me about what I thought of her. Did I like her? Do you think she's pretty? She's interested in you! I had little to comment about her. I was actually kind of surprised that people could take this archetype thing this far.

I also began to wonder just who all was in on this stuff? Did everyone know about this, including pretty young girls who want to be like animal mates? Am I the last person to catch onto this stuff? I was beginning to have a shift in how I perceived people. I perceived them as either knowing, or not knowing. So far a lot of subtle people seem to be in the knowing group. It seemed that Van was in. Or if he wasn't, he just seemed to be able to play along well with a game like situation of animal archetypes.

But when Van said "I have somebody I want you to meet", the phrase stood out to me.

It became a catch phrase that I soon heard over and over from many strangers, always said in exactly the same way.

"Lilith"

Johnny Prescott came over to my house and we went for a ride in my old Buick at about dusk. While we rode along, Johnny decided he wanted to go visit a girl he was interested in named Amy. We arrived at the Amy's house which was in Madison TN, and she was there with her friend. I met her friend, Tina, and invited her to go for a drive. We rode around aimlessly and talked. The only thing I can really recall about our conversation is the strange thing Tina told me about herself.

As I was driving slowly along, Tina seemed to have something on her mind. She acted like she wanted to say something, but was hesitating like she was a bit uptight about saying what was on her mind. I gently encouraged her to just go ahead and tell me what she was hesitating to say. Tina said softly, "I'm a vampire". This struck me as very odd and I asked her what she meant. I wondered if Tina meant she was saying she was a prostitute, or if she meant she was a vampire in the monster sense. Or was she part of some other strange occult subculture, or was she deluded? After I asked her what she meant, Tina hesitated and then replied, "Never mind. I don't know why I even said it."

Tina certainly was an ordinary looking girl with no outstanding features such as the silly Gothic styles that have become popular for adult children who fancy themselves as dark death loving types. Tina was just a regular girl. She certainly had no aura of prostitution about her and she was young. I couldn't believe this about her. She didn't seem insane or deluded and mostly seemed to talk in the ordinary manner of any young girl. I wondered sincerely if Tina was a vampire of some type. At this point of events, I was ready to believe anything was possible. But she seemed so ordinary and wasn't outlandish in any manner. It was just her strange claim which she refused to elaborate on. It was like Tina had felt compelled to warn me about something. It was a bit unnerving.

Before I had a chance to take Tina back to the house where Johnny and Amy were, this girl managed to scratch me just enough to make me bleed a tiny bit. I'm not even sure Tina had been aware of it and it seemed accidental. Yet in my mind it could have been some crazy predation for blood that was carried out in a most nonchalant manner. I didn't even bother to mention the scratch since it was so minor it didn't rationally seem to matter.

I dropped Tina back off at Amy's house and Johnny and I left. I had no interest in going back there ever again. But the thought of this young girl's claim bothered me, and I simply couldn't understand why a girl would say that about herself. The seed was planted in my mind and the idea of a vampire culture's existence would be no more outlandish than the occult group I was encountering. Though confusing, I resorted to my mode of surmising a vampire subculture could be true, and waited for it to manifest itself if this were the case. Otherwise I simply wouldn't know if it existed or not.

Another possibility in my mind is that Tina had the impulse to say something like that, because something else unseen was making her say it. This seemed plausible to me and would explain why she didn't elaborate. Tina couldn't elaborate, because she didn't know why she said she was a vampire. But that would mean that some telepathic entity existed and was making claims of vampires' existence, by implanting the thought into Tina's mind. Or maybe Tina was being forced to say it under duress. On the other hand, Tina did seem to have the attitude that she was confessing something as if to forewarn me. I just don't know what was going on inside her mind. But it was strange.

Could there be such a thing as vampires? The claim was certainly outside the boundaries of the animal archetypes or the subculture of the occult. If this were the case, it was repulsive, and seemed to be just another prong of some profane and repulsive spiritual agency.

I suppose I really wasn't the only person confused about the nature of my humanity. A lot of people seemed to believe their humanity reflected the spirits of weird things like animals, dragons and vampires. Nobody seemed to think about being created in the image of God.

"Summon the Wind"

A few days had gone by since the last time I had dropped in to see Janice and Daisy, so I figured I would drop in again this weekend. It was early in the day again when I showed up. Everything was just as before except that this morning was a bit chilly. But it was a brilliant day and it made the early springtime hard to ignore.

When I had gone into Janice and Daisy's house, we started lamenting that it was a chilly day, but that it was so pretty it made you want to go outside. I suggested we all go sit outside on the southeast side of the house and it might be comfortable. So we gave it a try, and outside we went. We sat around in the grass, and it was nice out there, despite the chill in the air. But when a gust of wind came up it was uncomfortable.

Janice stated that when the wind wasn't blowing it was nice, but when the wind kicked up it was cold. She said she wished she could make the wind stop blowing. I decided to have a little fun with them since Janice and Daisy were so easy to tease. I told them that we can make the wind stop blowing. All we have to do is think about the nice still air and it will happen. It was a joke of course, because I had noticed the wind would gust followed in a few moments with a short period of still air. So I told them to just think about it just as the gust started blowing. I ceremoniously went into a meditative thinking state while they watched me. Sure enough the gust died down like it had been doing all along, and the air became nice and still. Then I smiled and said, "There you go. The wind is stopped", as if I had just accomplished something.

Janice and Daisy were wide eyed with complete belief in my theatrics. They carried on with many exclamations of marvel that, "Bryson made the wind stop!" and so on as that. They were so gullible, and I was really enjoying my prank on these two girls. As the conversation revolved around, Janice like always, wanted to zero in on me in some teasing manner. This time she was a bit serious though. She was freaked out about my prank and gave some opinion about me not having real feelings and emotions. All the while she was looking all big eyed into my face as she talked animatedly. Then she proclaimed, "Look at ole' Bryson! He's gone crazy! Oh my! Just look at his eyes! He's crazy!" and on and on she went for a minute or so. I looked at her as she talked and realized that Janice was really spooked by me again. Again I was irritated by her being afraid of me. I think Janice saw the hurt in my eyes even though I tried not to show it, and she dropped the talk about me being crazy.

I thought her imagination was getting the best of her. I was a bit offended, even though I wouldn't normally have minded the mystique of being thought of as a little crazy for ego's sake. But Janice wasn't joking. She was really spooked, and this irritated me. I didn't like being a spooky guy one bit. I'm all about love, peace and harmony. But here now two visits in a row, and these girls have been seriously spooked by me just being playful.

I should have known by now that anything I did around Janice and Daisy would be heralded far and wide among all my peers. So now I was gaining a reputation, via Janice and Daisy, of being able to control the wind; though I was unaware until later that the news about me was being spread rapidly by them. But the news fell on the ears of certain persons who again were interested enough in what they heard about me, to take the matter seriously. But the interested party wasn't Van this time. This time it was Michael.

A few days after my wind prank on Janice and Daisy, I stopped in at the market, and who drove up shortly but Michael? He was a friendly acquaintance I had known for years. But he and I had never gotten any closer than that. But today Michael had a mission, and I was involved. He was driving his "Dream Weaver" custom van with its unmistakable markings, so I knew immediately who was arriving. He parked near the street out in an open area by the pay phone, got out and came around the front of his van toward where I was across the parking lot. The next thing I heard was Michael calling out to me, "Hey Bryson come over here". Well I wondered what Michael wanted. He and I usually just passed with "Hi" and friendly eye contact.

I walk over to where Michael wanted me to come to, which was away from the others out of hearing distance for normal conversation. Michael was a bit serious acting but still in a friendly tone of mood. I had never seen Michael have a serious tone before, but I kind of liked the manliness of his manners.

Michael in a sort of commanding entreaty said to me, "Let's step across the road". He started that direction like he just expected me to come along. Well I did follow his lead, because now he had me flat out curious as to what was on his mind, why he called me away from the others, and why he wanted to step across the road with me. So I followed him.

We got across the road and he said, "This is fine".

Then he directed me to look across the open field to the tree line on the other side. Michael asked me, "You want to see the wind?"

"Sure!" I said.

Michael instructed me, "Look at the tree tops. Look for the whirlwind. You'll see it."

So I looked in that direction but wasn't sure of what to be spotting for.

Then Michael pointed to an area toward the right in the trees and said, "There it is right there".

I looked and a wind was twisting the leaves in the top of one of the trees.

Michael said, "It's going to move."

Then as Michael pointed, he talked about the location of the whirlwind. "See it moving through the tree line? It's moving to those trees over there."

I followed what he was telling me and saw the whipping of the leaves move from this location to that location.

Michael said, "Now it's moving up that way".

I followed his pointed finger and saw the slow migration of the whirlwind by watching the different tree leaves being whipped and twisted.

Then Michael said, "It's seen us! It's going to come this way! It'll be here in a few seconds! Here it comes!"

As his anticipation grew, he said with quiet enthusiasm, "Now!"

Sure enough the whirlwind had seemed to leave the tree line and migrated directly across the open field, though I couldn't really follow it as well as Michael. Just when he said "Now!" a strong gust of wind blew around us and lingered for a few seconds, and then left.

Michael faced me and said, "Now you've seen the wind".

He looked at me in a sort of appraisal of what I was thinking. I was thinking this was a pretty good prank and I looked back at him trying not to show any reaction. We walked back across the road and I didn't even have any question for Michael at all. I figured it was just a prank trick that Michael must have gotten from the occult circles we obviously both knew people in. So I let the demonstration pass, with me acting unimpressed for Michael.

Michael had spoken of the wind as if it were a living entity which would interact with people who got its attention. I had heard of this kind of thing before. But what was more interesting to me was the fact that here was this young man from the sticks, drawing upon this type of idea and making a demonstration out of it. Obviously Janice had told everyone about my prank, which she still believed I had really done. And now Michael had made it a special point to show me this "seeing the wind" scenario. I was thinking that Michael must also be a part of the occult circle. Why else would he have gotten so serious about something like this, to search for me, and then have something in mind to show me concerning the wind? I think from Michael's perspective though, he just wanted to let me know I wasn't the only one who knew something was living in the wind. I never thought there really was anything alive in the wind. But obviously Michael sure talked like he thought so. Maybe that talk was just part of the gag.

By now, I was thinking a lot of people I had known were stranger and deeper than I had realized. All this seemed like confirmation of a group of subtle people. I surmised this thing was generational, and those involved had inherited it from their own people. I could be wrong though. But it seemed so because there was none of the contemporary "Hocus Pocus" nonsense going on. There were no ridiculous spells and silly crystals; none of that kind of thing. Just strange connections and quick responses to the news of the things I had been doing around Janice and Daisy. The responses and demonstrations the underground group made with me, must have had some motivation. I was just playing around with my acting and pranks, but the occult responses showed they were taking me serious. I think they may have considered me to be the proverbial "loose cannon", and they were seeing themselves as coaching me into their ranks, rather than doing the things I was doing independently of them. Imagine that: An orthodoxy establishment of the occult! Shee Whiz!

"His Arm is Revealed"

I had been pondering the mystery of how a spaceman could be invisible. Ever since I had seen the sign of the key over Tammy, and realized the manifestation was a statement from some invisible being, I was really curious about how the being could manage to keep itself hidden and invisible. I came up with all kinds of ideas on creating invisibility, but none of them seemed plausible to me. But I kept on trying to think of some method the spaceman might be using. I thought of things like the spaceman bending light around himself. To bend light around himself could be done in several ways, and I considered several possible methods. But surely that would leave edge refractions. I thought of somehow managing to monitor and track the places people were observing, and then managing to occupy only the places people weren't looking. This wouldn't really be invisible, and would seem even more difficult than camouflaged invisibility. I came up with all kinds of ideas as I continued to think about it. But the thing I didn't believe was that the very nature of the spaceman was an actual invisible being. I figured that if he didn't use his technology of some sort, that he would be just as apparent as any ordinary person.

One midmorning I decided to walk up to the Site 2 recreation area on the lake. I got my towel and put on my cutoffs in preparation for swimming. Before long I have arrived at Site 2, thoughtfully engrossed and pondering on the question of invisibility. People were everywhere and it was a beautiful sunny day. But I decided not to go swimming because the water was still a bit too cold. It was still too early in the spring for the weather to have warmed the lake enough.

So there I'm sitting on top of a concrete picnic table top, with my feet on the bench. I'm facing toward the west and I'm just thinking and thinking about invisibility. A few yards in front of me there's a man sitting on a towel in the grass, with his feet toward me. I'm casually looking toward him as he raises his left hand and takes a big drink of beer. Just as the man starts to lower his can from his mouth there appears a disembodied hand in the midair that is reaching toward the man. The hand is moving toward the man's beer and proceeding as if reaching out from behind an invisible curtain or slit in the air just to the man's right, my left. The full reach of it reveals a hand which appears to be mitted instead of fingered, but with a thumb, and a strong, long and thick masculine arm. It was a man form for certain. The whole appearance of the arm was lucid light, the color of lavender in the main part, with a yellowish aura around its perimeter on all sides except where the slit in the air was from which the arm was extended. From the slit in the air, the arm was cleanly cut off with no aura. Both the lavender and the yellow aura were cleanly cut off. In the place where the body of the manlike being might have been, there was nothing to see except the scenery of the park and the lake in the background. The effect suggested the arm was reaching from behind a curtain in the material dimension of reality.

The mitt hand acted as if it took hold of the hand of the man who was drinking the beer, and then guided the man's hand to set the beer down on his left side. Once the can was set down, the hand and arm of light withdrew itself back into the virtual slit in the air and no trace of anything being there was observable.

Now I was very impressed with this demonstration! My first thought was, "Now that's invisible!" It was a great demonstration! The being was obviously right in front of me and even facing me. Yet I could see nothing of him until he reached out his hand and arm from behind the veil of invisibility, and acted as a controlling agent in another man's activities. Very impressive invisibility demonstration! Suddenly another thought occurred to me: "Hey, that thing is showing off!" I liked that! The being had enough ego that it was willing to be a show off. It was comforting to think the being and I could relate and understand each other with our egos. It made him friendly and mutual to me.

Then I wondered what prompted the being to show off it at all. Then I realized: Obviously he was listening to my thoughts! He knew I was thinking about invisibility and decided to demonstrate his capabilities for me. That thing can hear thinking! It's telepathic! The being had made a clear voluntary choice to respond to my thoughts about invisibility. I decided that if he can hear my thoughts, I would address him in my thoughts, and see if the being will talk with me.

"Hello Spaceman!" I thought. "Nice demonstration. I liked it. It was nice of you to show it to me". Impressions started coming to me as if to guide my thoughts about what I saw, as a teacher would guide. The thing seemed very friendly and enjoyed company.

So I thought to the being, "What else can you do? Where is your spaceship?" Suddenly a streak of lightning crawled across the brilliant clear blue sky directly overhead, and made a noisy cracking thunder. How curious that lightning would be in the blue sky! So I figured quickly that the lightning simply must have come from a cloud somewhere that I hadn't seen. To figure it out, I looked in the direction of the source of the lightning, and saw in the west there was a small brownish cloud from which the lighting had come. That little cloud must be five miles away! How could that little cloud send out such a long mighty lightning bolt? "Oh I get it!" I thought to the spaceman. "Your spaceship just shot out some lightning and the spaceship is camouflaged in the cloud!"

Suddenly wind started blowing from the direction of the little cloud in the west. Coming over the horizon very swiftly was another huge bank of dark lavender clouds. Swiftly they came and soon the clouds passed over head with a brisk breeze filling the park. I half wondered if the spaceman was controlling the weather. I noticed people started gathering themselves up and leaving. The impression was coming to me that the people leaving were the ones the spaceman didn't want to be there. But other people were staying, which I assumed meant they were alright to stay. As the bank of clouds moved over us, there even sprinkled a few drops of rain, but nothing very hard. The lavender clouds gave the whole park a shaded calm with no shadows, and the greenery seemed very bright and lush. Such a pleasant setting the park became with absolutely comfortable air and no heat of the sun. It was idyllic like a garden setting by the lake.

Then another demonstration began. There came a strong whirlwind and it moved slowly around the recreation area just whipping the tree tops making it easy for me to see where it was. I thought to the spaceman, "I see! Your ship is invisible, but you can see where it's moving by the effect of the wind it's stirring up." As I followed the path of the whirlwind, which I took to be the wake the ship must be leaving behind, I thought to the spaceman, "It sure does put out some horsepower!"

It also impressed me how the being used the normal things, such as clouds and wind, lightning and such, as a plausible cover for his activities. In other words, it could all easily be denied, which would itself help the spaceman to remain hidden. Deniability is the facilitation of that which desires to be occult. But the whole demonstration was very overt, purposeful, and intelligently orchestrated just for me.

I was glad I had a truly fantastic friend. I hoped he would turn me on to all kinds of knowledge and insights. I even imagined riding in the spaceship! Oh man that would be awesome!

The people remaining in the park, despite the threat of rain, I took to be people that the spaceman didn't mind being around. Obviously they were distinct as a group in some way I didn't recognize or know about.

"The Bird Nest of Eden"

As things calmed down, I returned my thoughts to the spaceman with some appreciation for the demonstrations. "You've been hanging around me listening to my thoughts. Are you a friend? Are you always hanging around?"

Impressions came to me that the being was indeed hanging around. I thought to the spaceman, "Are you wanting to hang around me?" The impression came to me that he indeed wanted to hang around me. So I thought to him, "You're keeping yourself invisible, so how will I know when you're hanging around?" As soon as I asked the question of him, the sound of a bird pierced the stillness. It was striking on my ears and the impression was that like the Indians, he would imitate the birds to signal himself to me. I thought the sound was distinctive enough to easily recognize; just a long single note of a bird sound. A simple dialogue followed with calls meaning "yes", and no calls meaning "no".

During this dialogue it was expressed to me that "Love" is the key to everything, to which I resonated a great agreement. I believed in love and loving motives were good ones. This spaceman sure knew how to push all my keys and harmonize.

I thought to the spaceman, "Why are you hanging around?" The impression came to me which answered my question, "There is more significance to things than you had understood". I looked around at all the things that could be observed, the park, the trees the colors and the people. Could all of these ordinary things have some hidden significance imparted to them by virtue of with them the spaceman is actually interacting? Like the spaceman did when guiding of the man's hand to set down the beer: The act of setting down a beer is so ordinary as to think nothing about it at all. Yet with the normally invisible hand guiding the man to set down his beer, the act itself is now full of meaning as imparted by act of that guiding hand.

I looked for an example of something of subtle significance. Just then, a young juvenile dog came bounding onto the park parking lot. It was a lean brown thing. Just as I was looking at the pup, it stopped and defecated right on the parking lot! It picked the worst spot of all to leave a mess! I laughed out loud and thought to the spaceman, "What's the significance of that?" I seriously doubted there could be real significance to such a trivial matter as a defecating pup leaving his mess where it didn't belong. But then on the other hand, the spaceman is impressive and sublime. For all I knew he might very well have orchestrated the event. Maybe the spaceman was comparing me and my life, to the existence of this young pup that made an inconvenient mess in the beautiful park.

The being wasn't finished demonstrating his abilities to me yet. He was about to show me how he controls human perceptions, both in the perceived and the perceiver.

"The Meshiach Effect"

Presently, I began to be tired of being in the recreation area with all the clouds and stuff. So the clouds began breaking up and shafts of sunlight began to break through here and there. I figured the spaceman was accommodating me by breaking up his clouds so that I would stay for a while. But I wanted to go.

I gathered my towel and started walking out of the park. I figure the spaceman was probably through showing off anyhow. But as I walked a few feet, a girl in the edge of the woods at a picnic table called out to me and waved at me. So I waved back and kept walking, registering only a little bit that she had wanted my attention for some reason. Then as I walked on some more, some other girls said "Hi" and "Hello" to me as I passed by them. So I replied "Hello" to them and kept walking and got on the road leading out of the park. As a car load of girls were driving into the park, they honked their car horn at me and they all started waving really friendly to me. I realized at this point something strange was going on. I reflected, and realized girls were trying to get my attention and acting like I was something special to them. And it didn't stop! The longer I walked, the more girls and women seemed attracted to me and wanted to greet me.

I had never ever been very noticeable to girls and women, though I would have liked to have been. The suddenness of this change made me reason, "The spaceman!" "He's controlling all the girl's perceptions to make them see me as attractive. Maybe he's put some kind of aura over me that actually makes me look attractive to women." Now I was truly impressed to the point of marveling. Even human perceptions were mere clay in the hands of the spaceman.

But for the first time I felt a moment of a little fear. Not of the spaceman per se', but of the ramifications of this action he took upon me concerning girls. It seemed dangerous to my soul. It all struck me as like the stories of selling ones soul to the devil for some earthy thing. So in such fear of losing my soul, I resolved in my heart not to take advantage of women. It was like, now I could exploit women if I so desired. I didn't desire to exploit anyone and resolved I would not take advantage of this strange artificial beauty perceived in me. I would respect women as human beings. If it had been an offer for my soul, which I certainly do not believe it was, I refused it. If this demonstration of perceived beauty in me by the spaceman's mass mind altering was to continue as it seemed to be doing, I would never take advantage of it to exploit others. I never took advantage of my physical strength over others; I would not exploit others by this artificial effect of beauty. Real love, real peace, and real harmony, is what really matters.

"The One Eyed Union"

I suppose I had managed to get a little bit too much attention from the occult circles in my neighborhood. Ike and company were about to play an elaborate prank on me.

Ike and I both had arrived at Rex's house and the three of us decided to take a good long drive for no good reason. We seemed to navigate aimlessly with Ike suggesting routes to take. Things were pleasant and I was in the back seat just riding along while Rex and Ike held up the bulk of conversation up front. Rex suddenly held up a cigar and said in a buoyant tone, "Hey Bryson! Have a cigar!" as if it was all in great fun. Ike just laughed about it. I decided I may as well have a cigar just for kicks, though I really had no affinity for tobacco in any form. I took the offer and lit that cigar and puffed it lightly and slowly now and then. Honestly I doubt I got much more than a bad taste in my mouth from that thing. I didn't realize at the time, that cigar was a device provided most likely by Ike. But maybe Rex actually got the cigar. I don't know.

Every once in a while Ike would nonchalantly point out something to me, some feature of the land, some object or some reason for me to look in some direction. But what I was actually intended to see were certain individuals prominently positioned in proximity of the area I was to be looking. Above that, the actual thing I was intended to notice was how the people were looking my way with a big one eyed stare. The people had their other eye squinted shut, covered by a patch, or covered with a hand or what ever. But the idea was that time and again there would be some person looking strangely at us, me, or at the car as we drove by, with this one eyed gaze. It started near our usual haunts and concluded far out into the next county, which was Wilson County.

Then Ike pointed out this farm area to me. I looked into this area just in time to see this old man standing close to the road as we passed. This old man was giving me the all time googleyest one pop eyed glare of them all! It was ugly! Then just as we had passed the googley eyed old man, we drove by the purest white goat just standing right by the road as if begging to be seen. This goat was a classic! This completely white, fat goat had two long horns and its clean bright whiteness stood out sharply against the lush green background of the countryside. The creature actually looked comical in its extreme goatishness.

I contemplated all this, and figured some pranksters had purposefully placed the goat there so conspicuously, to suggest some kind of goat devil occult thing. All the one eyed stares I had gotten that day certainly didn't strike me as just coincidence either. But I was cool and was just riding it out. But right after seeing the old man and then the goat, I happened to notice a little twinge in my stomach. It was very small and nothing at all. I figured it was just one of those little stomach things that anyone gets once in a while. It lasted about two seconds.

But for the fun of it I decided to correlate my small stomach twitch to all those one pop eyed looks I was getting from so many strangers. So for amusement I said, "All those one eyed looks are about to kill me." Ike jerked his head toward Rex and looked at Rex with growing mirth until he burst out laughing! As far as he was concerned I had fallen for the prank completely. He believed I actually thought I was being killed by the one eyed looks of his confederates. The cigar was the device to induce feelings of discomfort in the tummy, like tobacco does for many. I was supposed to believe getting ill from the cigar, was the beginning of my own death throes from the curse spell of those one eyed stares.

Of course I didn't believe any such a thing. But the correlation was handy and amusing, until I realized this is exactly what Ike wanted me to believe. I kept quiet about what I really thought, and my opinion of the whole scheme. But the most mind bending thing to me was how many people were actually involved. It reinforced strongly the idea that a lot people were involved in this occult underground. I was beginning to think at that point, the occultist were a little sick minded as a group. My interest was in having a firm grasp of who they were and what they were about; never in being one of them.

Shortly, fooling occultist into thinking I was among them became a mode of interaction so that I could learn more about what was going on. The one eyed thing did a lot to turn me off concerning them, and I smelled manipulation and exploitation. That was a crime against the cause of love, peace and harmony.

Later on, Rex mentioned to me, that the crux of the prank was that the cigar was supposed to make the person feel a bit ill and cause him to think he was dying. So now for Rex it was just a silly prank and he seemed to see nothing deeper about it. I extended the benefit of a doubt in my mind concerning Rex. But in Ike, I sensed the prank was purposeful and directed. It had made a larger statement about the group as a whole. Was I supposed to conclude they were lethal spell binders? Was I supposed to fear them, or lust for a position of mutual ability to induce fear in the naive?

What could be the motive for wanting to induce fear in others? I could only come up with one answer: Servitude and exploitation. This motive did a lot to explain a strange companion who often spent time with Ike, named Kerry Legion. This strange little man was a social misfit who spoke in almost inaudible tones, and who seemed to have an unlimited amount of time, money and transportation to spend kicking around with Ike. I had often thought he seemed a lot like a slave to Ike. The more I discovered or was shown concerning this occult subculture, the more I was repulsed, yet intrigued. I was enjoying the hunt at least, even if I was becoming the bait.

"Whisperings"

It was still early springtime. Early in the evening I was sitting at the dining room table in Dad's house, doing something which I can't recall. I may have been folding an origami frog, but I'm not sure. I do recall I was engrossed in whatever it was and had been sitting there for a good while. The house was very quiet.

Suddenly I heard people whispering in the hallway. They were quite distinct whisperings, even though the words were indistinguishable. The voices whispered back and forth for a few moments and then stopped. This grabbed my attention with my first thoughts being some phantoms or entities resembling people were in the hall. I arose from my seat and went into the hall to investigate.

In the hall I found nothing, which is what I expected to find. Yet it was curious and so I investigated some more. Music was playing softly from my bedroom and so I walked into it and went to the radio. I turned up the volume to see what was playing. It was a "Pink Floyd" song. When I realized it was "Pink Floyd", I concluded that I was a victim of a prank. I figured that while the music was playing too softly to be heard in the dining room, that the muffled sounds of whisperings had been under dubbed into the music at a more powerful volume and carried with sonic projection as if to sound displaced from its actual source. I also figured the reason I had never noticed the whisperings before when I listened to the same music, was that even loud whispering sounds would be indistinct subtle white noise against the background of the clear music.

Was this the case? I can't say for certain. However the mystique of "Pink Floyd" led me to believe this was that case. I had kind of suspected this group was part of the hidden underground of the occult, although I could be wrong about thinking this, because I now have heard the leader of this group is schizophrenic. But this was my explanation to myself about the whisperings in the hallway.

"Dogs"

Rex had moved out of his father's place and had even decided not to move back to his old house. He relocated all the way up in East Nashville on a quiet little street called McAlpine, into a house a few blocks off of Gallatin Road. Going to see him out there took longer and more money for gas for the Buick, but being young means that fun with friends is more to be considered than money and convenience. So I managed to motivate myself all the way out there just to hang out with my friend Rex.

Rex's new place was actually a strange little house of a bland gray rubble stone masonry exterior. It wasn't very attractive in any manner. The house was smaller by a fair amount than all the other modest houses along this street. It was also set substantially further back from the road than the rest of the houses, on a well treed narrow lot, bordered on three sides by overgrown hedges. The whole effect was to make the house sort of unnoticeable. I think this perfectly suited Rex and Vashti's preference for keeping a low profile.

The house itself was kind of strange in construction as well. From the front you saw what looked like a little rectangle house. But there seemed to be multiple additions added to the back of the house, which made it deeper than it gave the impression of being from the street view. The really strange thing was how the additions were laid out. It was as if the builder of them was unable to align the walls, and so only brought the additions' walls out to a point, just short of aligning with the main structure. Likewise, the ceiling was not raised as high as the main house. Then, there were a couple of more additions; each one also being narrower and lower than the one preceding it. When you walked from the front to the back of the house on the inside, the effect was to funnel you dimensionally into progressively smaller rooms. It was funny to us, but still a strange effect as the last room's ceiling was close to your head. The house had a small front porch only large enough to stand on to go in the front door. The front door itself was plain wood with no design, and a single diamond pane glass window in it. Once inside the front door, directly across the room, was Rex's red couch. The rest of the room had the basic chairs and tables of the usual manner.

I was a big fan of "Pink Floyd" music and just couldn't seem to get enough of their new album, "Animals". I no longer approve of the lyrics on that album, but at the time, in those days, I hardly noticed lyrics. For me music was a sensual, not intellectual, pleasure. The main thing is that I had heard a lot of their music and was familiar with most of their biggest songs. All my friends seemed to be big fans of them as well, and purchased a lot of "Pink Floyd" music which we played at our gatherings, especially when we were getting high. Well maybe Janice wasn't such a fan of this kind of music. She liked hard driving rock music all the time like Foghat.

One evening I was over at Rex's house on McAlpine Avenue. We were doing our usual routine and it was probably after midnight by this time. I was sitting on the red couch as usual and watched as Rex and Ike talked by the front door for a few moments. Then they stepped outside and closed the door behind them. I was content and just stayed where I was at on the couch. After a few minutes Rex and Ike came back in. Ike said to me, "Bryson, go outside for a minute", as if he wanted me to see something. Curiosity prevailed and I got up and stepped out onto the porch in the night. I was looking for something, but saw nothing interesting. Then I noticed it was the sounds of the night. All the dogs in the neighborhood were howling and barking. As I listened to the dog's ruckus coming from near and far, it occurred to me that they sounded exactly like one of the sound episodes on a "Pink Floyd" song. The similarity was really amazing to me.

I noted the howling barking ruckus without making any conclusions, and went back into the house thinking about what was causing all the dogs to bark, and what it was I was supposed to think about this. Ike had wanted me to hear this stuff I realized. I imagined that he and Rex had gone out and loudly blew one of the inaudible dog whistles and started the dogs up. Or maybe they had set off some kind of firework that I didn't hear from inside. I didn't know. What I did reason though, was that Ike wanted me to make the association between this neighborhood's dog howling fest, and the mysterious "Pink Floyd' music. He obviously knew the mystique of the band was for all of us a "Hocus Pocus" thing, and wanted to impress me with the nearness of the same kind of event as I had heard recorded.

Nice trick, but I'm not buying it.

"A Cool Black Dog"

I came back inside the house from listening to the dogs, and sat back down on the red couch. Rex and Ike continued talking for awhile, when suddenly Rex arose, and in a ceremonious manner, picked up his cheap guitar and plugged it into the amplifier. He turned everything on, yet never played a note. Rex was so cool about making the trivial seem ceremonious. Then he walked over to me where I was seated on the couch and made a grand presentation of the guitar to me. I took hold of it from his hands and as I took it, Rex was looking at me with a knowing and amused look. Then as I lowered it to playing position, Rex said in the ceremonious tone, as if speaking entreatingly to a maestro, "Play".

Well that sounded fine to me. I had my own theories about guitar style and had the idea that real playing involved miming things, such as trains, creatures, or even states of mind. I refused to make the guitar into an intellectual exercise in technique, even though I did regularly hone my chops. Instead, the purpose in playing was to evoke things in the listener which they could feel or relate to in some sensual way. The style or the technique of playing was less relevant than the soundscapes created in the artistry performed by the musician.

Inspired as I was by improvisation jazz guitarist, the soaring sounds of "Pink Floyd", the masculine fisted mind expansion music of Robin Trower, the soundscapes of Jeff Beck playing with the Jan Hammer Band, the blueness of Savoy Brown, the guttural drive of all the contemporary hard rockers, the virtuosity of Progressive Rock, the country charm of rockabilly purist; for me playing wasn't about being in tune. Playing guitar was about being in vibe with the rhythms and soul of our humanity.

Rex's little challenge was all I needed to be completely motivated to "Play". He was challenging me to go beyond myself and reach new levels of artistic mastery. I took the challenge completely and began to noodle, looking for responses from my own nervous system. Soon I felt the sounds affecting me, forcing moods and dreams to become conscious. I began to actually "play", progressing through many mimes, soundscapes and emotional projections. It occurred to me that I suddenly could do no wrong. I dared myself to play wrong notes and I played them, and they were transformed into mastery as if they were intended all along. I cut up the rhythms and yet it seemed as natural as if voices were interjected into the music. I realized every note had a little extra tone, an emphasis, and a degree of sass to it that was becoming like magic. I began to realize, as I was engrossed in my free wandering upon the strings, that I simply couldn't manage to play anything "wrong". Then as I played, I began to wonder if somehow I wasn't getting some assistance from some unseen hand. It was as if some spiritual being was making the music transform by overriding my physicality and making my fingers give the extra mood bending emphasis to every note. Was I possessed in this event? I decided to wind down the music, which obviously Rex and Ike were enjoying, and let it settle on a slow vibe of atmospheric ambiance.

As I played in the softer mode, Rex and Ike accepted the invitation and began to chat between themselves. I punctuated the chatter and stroked the rhythms of a calm evening in a paradise. Then I decided to reach to the nerves and smooth them out into calm strands with a stroke after stroke down the frets. The guitar crooned the natural comforting tones of a mother to her child.

After a bit of this Rex interrupted his chat with Ike and looked over at me smiling and said, "You don't realizing it, but you're having an effect". Oh I realized it alright. It was by design.

Then when the atmosphere was just right, I stopped playing, and let the silence have its sensual, situating and orienting effect. In the silence, it was like the room itself invited us all to life! Well being was with us and calling us to enjoy it. Rex, who was riding freely upon the effect of the music as he chatted with Ike, looked over at me and said in a knowing tone, "Bryson! Be a cool black dog!" I was shocked.

You to, Rex? You to?

"Worm Medicine"

A few nights later I was again at Rex's house with Ike and Vashti. A knock came at the door. Rex opened the door and exclaimed happy greetings. A couple of strange visitors had arrived. Rex invited them in with familiar pleasure, and the atmosphere became instantly festive. The two guests were a young man, about a year younger than me, named Oliver, and his older sister Patricia. I had seen them around and they seemed familiar, but I just couldn't place where or when I had encountered them before. They both greeted me like familiar old friends, while I was in the discomfort of not knowing where I knew them from, but acting like I was glad to see them again.

When Oliver and Patricia appeared, my impression of them was that they had come from some place back in the woods to the big city to have a big ole time at Rex's place like honored guest. Patricia was an ordinary attractive young woman who was just slightly overweight. But Oliver was a work that just demands description:

Oliver had lean muscularity and the extreme masculinity of mesomorphic character. Though he wasn't a large guy, he was large in bone and sinew. His face was full of strong bone as if he were only a few generations removed from cave dwellers. He had fair skin and large blue upward slanted eyes that were full of an expectation of a great time and a gleeful mischievousness. Growing from Oliver's scalp was a long mane of reddish blond hair that was rough and wild. His clothes were rough utilitarian fair, intended more to function than style. Those wild eyes full of mischievous glee revealed inside him a raw soul. Oliver was manifestly an unrefined, but exuberantly friendly rube. Oliver was too energetic to be mellow. Moving constantly about while he socialized with happy enthusiasm, I had the impression this guy needed a large animal to pounce on and kill for breakfast. As calm as he could get was when he was focusing directly on the person he was talking with. As primitive as Oliver already appeared, he also had a set of teeth that looked like his molars had migrated forward to replace his front teeth. His smile was the essence of a happy caveman. Yes, Oliver was a statement of radical style all his own.

I really didn't have much to relate too with Oliver and Patricia. But they seemed happy enough to gab animatedly with Rex, Vashti and Ike. So I just kind of let them all carry on while I hung out with my Coca Cola. Beer and marijuana were served and everyone was feeling great as the music grew louder along with the happy gabbing and joking around going on.

I seated myself on Rex's red couch and just observed the festivities and the interactions going on with these two strange guests. After a little while it came my turn for some of Oliver's attentions. As I sat quietly, Oliver focused on me and crossed the room looking me dead in the eyes with a really mischievous smile. He started chatting with me in a happy way, but was looking me right in the eyes with gleeful expectation, as if he were searching for some reaction from me. I can't remember what he started as the topic, but he certainly demanded my focus on him as his molar toothed smile was right in my face.

But this part I remember very clearly when he made the comment, "Oh by the way, I put some worm medicine in your Coke!" and he stood there with the most pleased grin on his face. I thought to myself, "What kind of standards of social acceptability can you expect from this type?" While I didn't think this was an especially cool topic for good company, in fact it irritated me, I decided consciously to keep my cool as I looked back at Oliver who was grinning wildly. I figured he was playing a prank on me to just have fun messing with me. So I defiantly took another drink of cola and then asked him slowly, "Now Oliver. Why would you put worm medicine in my Coke?" as I looked back at those happy prankster eyes of his. With that question Oliver looked like he was suppressing an outburst of laughter. His eyes squinted with exertion as he looked me dead in the face and said, "TO WORM YOU!" Then Oliver helplessly started snickering. It was shockingly absurd and tingling my nerves funny! Despite being uncertain about this being messed with, I helplessly started snickering too. Then Oliver blew up and burst his seams laughing! Oliver had yanked my chain, but it was crazy funny! I couldn't help myself and laughed with Oliver. Afterwards I wondered if I could taste worm medicine in my Coke, which I thought of every time I took a sip. Durned Oliver!

I was suspicious of Oliver and Patricia being a part of the occult circles, but I didn't know. To me his prank was in the same genre as the one eyed looks and cigar prank of the occultist. Oh well, getting wormed wouldn't be so terrible even if he might have actually done it, which I doubted. Still, I drank my Coke a little more thoughtfully than usual. The rest of my gang seemed to thoroughly enjoy having Oliver and Patricia joining the festivities. But for me, they were a curiosity that left me feeling nervously in danger of a worming.

"Magic Walks"

Springtime beckoned and it was another great day to go for a walk up to the Site 2 recreation area. After a little breakfast, I grabbed my towel and headed out the door walking south toward the lake. I had barely gotten started and had only crossed Central Pike, when this coral colored Toyota economy car passed by me and then stopped ahead of me a few yards. As I walked up to the car, a beautiful blond haired girl wanted to ask me where I was going. I told her I was walking up to Site 2 just to hang out at the lake for awhile. She asked me if I needed a lift. Well sure, okay! I got in the car with her and looked at her closely. She seemed happy about me looking at her, and she smiled sheepishly while she drove up the road. She really was beautiful and was extremely cute about it. In fact she was so cute and pretty that it was maddening! I tried to be immune from her, but she was making my heart pound. I asked her name and she replied with all the cuteness of a happy young girl, "Cindy!" Whoa! Even the way she talks drives me crazy. This girl was blowing my mind with her incredible cuteness and femininity.

I decided that there was some agency of temptation going on here. Obviously girls were still seeing me as irresistibly beautiful because of the spaceman's mind control. Why else would a mind bendingly beautiful girl pull off on the road to pick me up, a young stranger? I became afraid because I recalled the idea of selling one's soul for earthly rewards, and I was not going to have my soul snatched! Cindy drove me to Site 2 and stopped in the middle of the parking lot. As I got out, I thanked her for the lift, but consciously neglected to invite her to hang out with me, nor did I allow myself to outwardly show any interest in her. Cindy seemed a bit perplexed at my coolness, and finally said, "Well? Bye" to me. She slowly put the car in gear, slowly released the brake and started inching along. As Cindy drove slowly away, I was questioning my sanity for just letting her go like this. I thought several times about calling out to her before she got out of range. It was painful to let her drive away, but at least I felt safe and secure finally.

Cindy had gotten the attention of other people than just me. People in the recreation park had spotted this maddeningly pretty blond who was kind of a sensation all by herself. They noticed that I had gotten out of her car and a few strangers asked me who she was and if she was a friend of mine. I explained to them, that she had just offered me a ride and that I didn't know who she was.

But getting rides from strangers was becoming kind of a ritual with me. Each time I left the house on foot; somebody quickly stopped and gave me a ride. It was interesting to see what kind of people they were, and what the news was with them. I began to call this effect of attracting rides from people and going with the flow of events, the "magic walk".

I just felt something cosmic, specifically the spaceman, was orchestrating things for me in order for me to meet certain people, hear certain ideas, or see certain things. But the Magic Walks all really began with the unusual offer of a ride from this extremely and exceptionally beautiful girl. Then the pattern repeated time and again. Something cosmic had people for me to meet.

"Someone I Want You to Meet"

On another day I had driven myself to the lake at the Site 2 area again. It was time to begin experimenting again since it seemed many people wanted to chat with me. Each time I got into a conversation with somebody, I tried to figure out what animal archetype they could be. So in all my guessing about them, I molded my words and responses to them in consideration of their deepest type. It set up a very strange dynamic where a person would be somewhat fascinated and amused by me, and then say to me, "I have somebody I want you to meet". Then they would leave and after awhile another stranger would arrive to talk with me. The meeting was quite arranged, and I would do the same guessing about their animal archetype and let the dynamic of the conversation follow along with my crude psychological musings of their animal archetype. Time after time a conversation would begin with an expected stranger whom I was supposed to meet. Each time it ended with, "I have somebody I want you to meet", stated to me.

As the day progressed into the afternoon, a lot of the strangers I had talked to all seemed to congregate in a general area. After awhile the group as a whole invited me to go somewhere with them. Sure! Why not? They all seemed to have "somebody they wanted me to meet". One native Indian fellow rode with me in my old Buick, while we followed several carloads of people toward the airport. We came to a neighborhood near the airport and then to a certain house and stopped. What filled my mind as we arrived was that this neighborhood was where Rita had lived the last time I saw her. It was painful to think of Rita and our last meeting. I suppressed my flames of loving desire for her, and the compulsion to mention her to the guy riding with me.

Everyone got out of their cars and started going into the house. It was a simple house; a little red brick box with no other description. I joined the group and went inside. They all seemed like a pretty nicely dressed and intelligent crowd, and I felt comfortable with these strangers.

We lit up some marijuana and then somebody said we were low on beer. Everyone wanted beer! I didn't care much for beer myself, but a pool of money was collected and I offered to go purchase a few cases. Me and the Indian guy who was riding with me, went to the store and I purchased the cases of beer. When I returned, the crowd seemed to agree that it had taken me awhile to run the errand. Well it was true, I did take my time. One girl said, "Bryson, we only doubted you three times". Out came the beer and everyone was happy.

I looked around the living room area of the house and saw the owner of the place. He was there when we all arrived. This man was rounded in all his form and features. He was dressed in a dark blue jumpsuit and was rather serious looking, despite his obvious hospitality to these people. To look at him, I thought the animal he resembled and reminded me of was a pig. Yes, I was still tossing those archetype ideas around in my head!

I looked at the decor of the house and it was plain casual fare, nothing showy or expensive. But there was one article which I couldn't help but notice. It was a skull of some horned animal, but it wasn't a cow. It was something smaller, yet it had huge jaws. It was also decorated with art, and I looked at the paintings that were done on it.

On each side of the skull were yellow lines bordered on both sides by red lines forming triple stripes. The stripes zigzagged back and forth in curved arcs, that ended after about five or six repetitions. The zigzagged art forms were depicted on both sides of the skull. I interpreted the art to be the abstract depictions of coiled snakes on both sides of the skull. What is more is the snakes were depicted as snakes of yellow light with red auras surrounding their form. The whole skull and snakes thing was just grotesque and ugly to me. It suggested to me this group was somehow different from the occult group of my own circles. I had taken them to be some kind of underground group of course, but their form and expression was different from those people I already knew.

I spoke to the owner of the house and asked him about the skull thing. He seemed shocked that I mentioned it at all. I asked him what kind of animal it was. He replied that it was a goat skull sitting on pig jaws. I didn't mention to him how creepy I thought it was. Why do these underground groups seem to have such fixations on dark themes and death and such? I finally left this group and headed home. Why this group in particular, all "Had somebody they wanted me to meet", I'll never know. But it was a strange day.

"In My Face"

I went over to Rex's house in the mid-morning and Ike was also there. I had brought a Frisbee with me that was a really good one. I suggested we go over to Cooks Recreation area and fling the Frisbee for awhile. They thought this was a decent idea and off we went.

Well we certainly were no professionals with a Frisbee, and spent more time retrieving errant throws than making cool catches. We had smoked a joint on the way of course and were probably not up to much physical running around at that point anyhow.

The morning was growing quite warm and Ike made an errant toss of the Frisbee that came sort of between Rex and me. When I went over to pick up the Frisbee, I was only a few yards from Rex. I picked up the Frisbee and as I stood erect, suddenly there was a very strange manifestation.

Moving right up to my face, there manifested the smelly repulsive stench of hot wet feces that was so strong it was as if a wet hot pile of excrement was being shoved under my nose. But nothing was really there to be seen. Then I heard the buzzing of all the flies flying around the feces, as they were disturbed by my close proximity to them. The flies were so close to my face that as they flew they brushed against my face. I felt several of them actually touch me. What I saw instead of flies, were translucent bubbles shaped like ovals, as if the flies were clear and the refraction of light defined their edges. The bubbles flew and moved like flies disturbed from the feces pile, that I smelled so strongly.

I immediately thought some invisible entity was shoving some kind of parallel universe excrement under my nose. But why would any entity do such a thing except to express contempt? Was the entity punishing me or something?

I stood there for a seconds wondering what had just happened. I looked over at Rex who was a few yards from me. Rex looked at me and then went "Phew!" It seemed to me at that instant, that Rex knew what had just happened, and his timely and appropriate "Phew!" became to me an expression of response to contemptible things. I was certain in that moment, that "Phew" must be part of the language of the occult group.

Then I quickly rethought the situation and decided that maybe Rex knew what had happened, and maybe he didn't. After all, Rex just didn't seem to be part of the occult. I just couldn't reconcile Rex, the rational friend I knew, with something that would seem like nonsense to him.

It was intrigue created for me by some other entity. Maybe this unseen entity holding some kind of cosmic feces pile under my nose, himself prompted Rex's "Phew!" Maybe Rex was actually unaware of anything which was acting in our proximity upon either of us. Or maybe Rex knew everything and was consciously involved with some invisible confederate. No, I doubt that Rex would be aware of something like that or a part of it. More likely, Rex's "Phew!" was just from being a bit high and lazy from the joint we had smoked. The morning was also getting a bit warm and sunny, and was obviously just wearing Rex down. Surely it was just coincidence that Rex said "Phew!" just at that moment. At any rate we decided to end the game of Frisbee just then.

Later on, Rex made some remark that I didn't understand, on a subject I don't recall. However, I remember responding to Rex's statement in a tone of playfulness, saying to Rex, "You're crazy!" Uncharacteristically of Rex, he seemed irritated by me saying this. Rex never got irritated about anything, much less a funning jab. Rex looked narrowly at me through his glasses, and said in a tone as if he were loathing the mentioning of it, almost choking on the words, "No. You're crazy Bryson."

I was very surprised at Rex being even a tiny bit upset. The moment passed. But what in the world could make Rex have an uncool moment? This just wasn't Rex. Was he really worried about me being crazy and he just didn't want to say it to me?

"Invisible Men and Demons from Hell"

Ike wasn't finished with me yet. Over the next few days, Ike seemed more engaging toward me than usual. I think that in the years past, Ike hadn't really paid me that much attention because I was just a friendly immature kid next to him. But now that I was showing an awareness and grasp of things that Ike related too, I think Ike felt less restrained, and was willing to be a bit more open with me. I remained on friendly terms with Ike, and his interest in me had increased. It seemed now that Ike would initiate conversations and activities with me, and in the course of them Ike would seize on certain words I said as if they were somehow contractual agreements. Usually he would either nod with affirmation, or softly repeat statements with emphasis, or maybe agree a little more affirmatively than usual, or give an interpreted meaning to some remark. But the idea of an agreement having just been made was there. The vibe to me was as if I was being bargained with by the emissary of the hellish world of the occult. I wasn't making any agreements though, and thought the whole routine was rather silly.

There was one time when Ike showed up at my house, which was more than unusual because that just never happened. Yet here he was. We talked a bit, and then Ike suggested we walk around the place outside. We went walking around in the back yard behind the hedge row toward the garden plot. There laid the blackened remains of one of my overly ambitious mechanical projects. It was the chopped and reshaped floor pan and transaxle of an old Volkswagen Beetle, which I had wanted to make into a three wheeled cycle, like my friend Larry Fudge had done. But the project was too much for me and there the hulk laid in the weather. As Ike and I were talking, I stood upon the hulk, and Ike asked me a question which I can't recall. Yet the question evoked an indignant response in me and my only answer was, "Hell!" Ike started nodding in pleased affirmation, as I stood there on the hulk of ruin. Ike was acting as if I had just signed a contract through the implication that this was all ritual. He was implying that I just had made an agreement with Hell. I took it as silly.

About this time I began to really explore the scope of speaking in metaphors and double meaning, as part of trying to get feedback from those who were occultist and those who weren't. Those who weren't would simply take my words at face value unsuspecting they were spoken with a little emphasis, questioning tones, inviting a look for double meanings. Those who were occult would catch the tilt of terms and play on the mutuality of speaking behind the words. It was subtle and imprecise, and required a little degree of faith in the possibility. I became quite adept at having second meanings. Yet I sensed there was also some spiritual catalyst that seemed to work between parties to cause the metaphoric vibes to really take hold, because using double meanings was suddenly, very much, excessively opportune! But it was hard to imagine this could really possibly be true. The spiritual catalyst thing didn't really seem all that plausible to me. But the feeling was still very distinct.

Ike liked the opportunity to occasionally make an open interpretation of my double meanings or symbolic emphasis, with a mere word or two of his own. His interpretations were always defined by his perspective and didn't often jibe with the way I was speaking. To Ike it was a handy and convenient thing in order to imply a ritual contract was made according to his specific emphasis. I was taking stock of Ike, that his bend on matters seemed distinctly evil. Still, he believed that I wanted to be a part of his strange subculture. That worked to my ends to bring some light on this mystery. In my heart of hearts though, I was becoming quite repulsed by what was increasingly evil, exploitative, and sinisterly implied a personal sacrifice of my being. I was regarding the occult scene as toxic groups of sick minded people by this time.

One afternoon Rex, Ike, and I were riding up Briley Parkway on the way to Rex's house on McAlpine. I was in the back seat and contemplating that I was turned off by what was appearing evil. I thought of myself as a good guy. But then as I really thought about it, I knew I had done things that wouldn't be considered good. But my mind definitely wanted to be good rather than part of this culture that seemed black and evil. Black for evil I thought. Hmmm, then white is for purity. Well I made a symbolism of this idea that I was maybe blackened by my past deeds, my mind was definitely wanting to be pure in motive. So I stated, "My body is black, but my head is white"; meaning I was bad in deeds done in the past, but I was seeking purity in my mind. In a fashion I had come to expect from Ike, he offered his own take on my words. "Black is male, white is female". "Maybe in his mind," I thought, "But that's not what I mean."

Shortly we arrived at Rex's house and went inside. It was then that something very repulsive and perverse began to take place. There began to be appearing lights in the room that first announced their arrival by making clicking spark sounds as they flashed. As I began to notice them here and there, they began to interact with me with touches and stings. Sometimes they would move across my skin either seen or unseen. They had a particular affinity for moving through my hair across my scalp. I heard Ike say in humorous tones, "Something is getting in my hair!" as he stood with a pleased grin on his face looking at Rex, and suddenly the phrase had new and deeper meanings to me. I immediately realized these noisy sparks were some kind of exotic life forms with the intelligence to relate to me as a human being. But these beings were far from anything I wanted to be involved with.

The sparks acted as if Ike's interpretation of my symbolism was some kind of contract they were obliged and anxious to enforce. They began to touch me in lewd ways. They created light depictions of lewd and vulgar things. These spark beings were acting like a bunch of crazed homosexual men in their lewdness. They truly could make the impression that an invisible and very lewd group of homosexual men were present. They affronted the physical senses, though they were mostly invisible. I put up with their vulgarity because I was intrigued at how they could be invisible entities, and I studied on this. I studied how they could interact with the senses of the physical man, even though the sparking entities were mostly invisible and without physical form.

Then the spark entities started playing tricks with other people in the room, without making those people aware of it. They would sting a person and cause them to jerk. Obviously the person would think he just had a strange pain and think nothing of it. Yet they would do something to me at the same time, even if I was across the room. The message implied by them in this, was that there was some strange ethereal connection between me and the other person, as if we were interacting from a distance apart. The problem was they chose to make the statement with the lewdness of homosexual suggestion. This was not acceptable to me, nor did I believe there was any true connection between me and other people. I saw the whole thing as a trick in which these lewd incorporeal entities were the sole agency.

I tried to be as tolerant as I could for the sake of trying to understand these beings. But their persistent lewdness gradually wore me down and I was becoming fed up with them. I wanted them to just leave, but they wouldn't. It was about this time that I realized there seemed to be only one other person in the room who was aware of the sparking incorporeal beings. It was obvious to me that this person was beginning to play along with the sparks in their games. This person wasn't being so obvious as to be outlandish appearing to others. Yet in subtle words and actions that have context to the situation occurring, I understood this person was involved in a direct and open way with these beings. It was Ike. I believed then with realization, that Ike seemingly kept very strange company and seemed to enjoy the perverted behaviors of these revolting incorporeal beings. I knew then that Ike and I had polarized completely. Ike and his astral friends had done all the explaining I wanted with this lewd demonstration. But still they persisted. How could I make them go away?

It was all very magical and the thought of magic power occurred to me. But where is this power found? Then it occurred to me that God is the most power that exists, if he really does exists. So I surmised that God might exist and decided to try praying to him. I had nothing to lose and everything to gain by just giving a prayer to God a try, so I went with it. In my mind I thought about God having a reputation for holiness and thought of my unworthiness to approach such a being, if He actually existed. Yet God also had a reputation for being there for those in need, worthy or not, so I decided such a God might listen to me. So without drawing attention to myself, I quietly lowered my face toward the floor and prayed within my thoughts, knowing telepathy was real.

I spoke to God: "God, if you are there, you are the most powerful thing that exists. I need your help. You can see these invisible beings are making me sick and bothering me. It isn't right what they are doing. I want to ask you that you would come and drive these evil things away from here. I ask you in Jesus' name. Amen"

I raised my eyes and instantly the air was clear. The beings were gone and I knew God had driven them away. I didn't even care what happened to them. I was just grateful that God answered me and came to my rescue.

Suddenly there was a profound realization: GOD REALLY EXISTS! Then another realization came to me: I had no more excuses concerning God's existence, and all this living right stuff. That was a bit heavy, so I put off thinking about it very much.

I felt enriched and secure about God existing since he was willing to help me. I was polarized to God's side. I just knew it! That means Ike and his starry pals are the bad guys!

On another day at Rex's house, I felt sorry for Ike and appealed to him to adopt love and goodness and to get on "God's side". I was so tender that Ike felt my sincerity and was touched by the turn of events. Yet Ike seemed unable to change sides. He seemed to desire something, and a huge struggle seemed to be boiling up inside him, though he tried to appear calm. Silently, Ike listened in uncharacteristic great tolerance of my intrusions into his personhood. The lamb was approaching the lion. Ike gripped deeply at times, into the arms of the chair he was sitting in, yet he remained silent. Still yet, something was holding him back. I figured something was really gripping Ike and had its oppressive influences upon him in some coercive manner.

I was sitting on Rex's couch and the time was early in the afternoon. Ike was in a chair next to the front door. As I was appealing to Ike to turn to the good side, he listened attentively. I read in Ike's expression that something inside him desired to make that turn, but he just couldn't! Then a bright yellowish diamond of light flashed on the far side of the room and raced across the room and shined brightly into my face! This startled Ike who was badly frightened by the sudden light, and he nearly jumped out of his chair! I realized he thought some spiritual being was upon us. But it was only the sunlight reflecting in the front storm door glass through the main front door's window pane. The storm door had been opened outward and the breeze had made it swing shut some, sending the flash of light into the room to race onto my face and stop there. I must have momentarily seemed gloriously transcended to Ike. But the light just happened to stop on my face. Or did it just happen? Or was it some agency making the event happen? Who knows?

I quickly told Ike it was just the sunlight. But Ike had been so frightened by the event, that for the only time, I saw his emotions come to the surface. A mixture of stress, desire, and fear boiled up in his eyes as they filled with tears. Ike could feel, that much I knew! Between Ike and me, it was understood which side I was on. I left Ike alone at that point to let him recompose himself.

"Getting in My Hair"

During and shortly after this strange event with the vulgar invisible things had ended, I overheard Ike laughing with Rex and say things about something getting in his hair. Normally, I would have never taken a second notice of this statement. But the invisible things had really messed with my hair a lot. It was as if they had this strange affinity for hair, on top of their evil lewdness. Now with Ike saying this phrase, and his apparent awareness of the invisible things, the phrase now had a meaning beyond the surface meaning to me. Now it meant that incorporeal beings were up to their no good antics. Over the next few months these invasions of my hair would be frequent. Sometimes I thought it was a bug maybe, but mostly I knew right away that some being was messing with me. Over time I learned to mostly ignore it and it gradually ended. But the buzz phrase was now a megaphone announcement, and I began hearing people use it pretty often.

When I did hear people say this phrase, it always raised a question for me. Did they really know the association to incorporeals beings and their affinity for hair? Or was a person just saying it because they were passively resonating the prompting of those beings who suggested the phrase to them telepathically? Or maybe people were just innocently using the phrase for no other reason than anyone would normally use the phrase. It was all very much a matter of intrigue and deceptions, and I was a keen and curious observer.

"Grinning Goat"

There was a certain night which began to really fire my imagination up. The recent events prompted me to earnestly question what I had understood to be conventional reality. Had I just been ignorant and blind to the real things that are going on?

Such questioning deserved investigation and I decided that I would follow and see where things lead. My curiosity being willing to behave serendipitously. I would surmise about things as if they might be true, and then proceed to the surprise ending, if there was one to be found. My recent experiences with hunting occultist had shown me that a plausible explanation on why not to believe something was a method used as a disguising device for the things wanting to be hidden from us. "Surmising", is how you got past the inhibitions of doubt and proceeded on with the hunt, despite all the obvious deniability. It's sort of like seeking God for a person who is skeptical and unsure. But in this case it was hunting mysteries and occult groups.

On the night in mention, all was peaceful and quiet in my bedroom. I had gone to bed and was laying there just looking up at the ceiling in the dim room. It wasn't completely dark in my room because of an outside light at the house next door. It made the room quite pleasant in the dim light. Not a sound was coming from anywhere. I was just thinking, and ready to fall asleep.

Suddenly a vivid image flashed large above me, almost as high as the ceiling. It was at least two feet tall. There, above me, appeared the face of a goat with prominently erect horns, a nutty gaze, with an even nuttier wide toothy grin. The grin was excessively large for the goat's face, and I immediately thought of the "Cheshire Cat" in "Alice in Wonderland". On the sides of the goat's head, hung those floppy goat ears giving the whole thing a really creepy look. What flashed through my mind immediately was the legend of the devil being like a goat. The image above me certainly offered no reassurance that it was harmless. It was creepy and discomforting. Then it vanished.

The next thing that happened was that I started hearing far away voices. At first I couldn't understand the voices, so I concentrate on them. They are beckoning me. The voices are whistling, yelling and calling me to "Get up out of bed!" They seem so far away! Where are they coming from? I sat up in my bed trying to understand the sources of these beckoning voices. I try following the sound, which at first is hard to do. But as I concentrate, I slowly realize the beckoning is coming from my left. I reach to my bedside cabinet and find the radio. Aha! I pull it to close to me and sure enough, people are calling to me from out of it. The volume had been so low that I didn't realize the radio was even on. But this beckoning, whistling, and calling was loud enough to barely come through the speakers.

Once I had established all this, I turned up the volume on the radio a little bit and the radio says: "Now that we have your attention! We want to invite you to come to 'Writers' Night' at the Exit Inn on Elliston Place on the night of......."

It was a commercial! But the timing of the goat's face appearing, and the sudden beckoning as if calling me personally, seemed meaningful and mystical. I decided that some cosmic thing was expressing himself through this method and use of the timing of the events. Who knows, this cosmic thing may have been controlling those who created and played the commercial, without them even realizing it. What would be even stranger is if they did realize it, and were in league with the Goat faced being, and mutually agreed to play the commercial when prompted by the goat being!

It was a strange way of communicating by first appearing, just to create significance to what happens next. But if I was some cosmic thing, I might do it the same way. It's not exactly a concise message, but it serves at least to create a breadcrumb trail. Imagine that: A personal message to me from the radio sent from some unknown cosmic thing. Maybe this is what the Spaceman entity had meant when telling me there was more significance to things than I had realized. Well an invitation is an invitation, so I decided I would join the "Writers' Night" event at the Exit Inn the following evening. Who knows what awaits me!? I anticipated finding more mystical people like I had been running into already. It's funny how what we anticipate turns out to be true, but still nothing like we expected.

"Pasech"

Following the evening after I had seen the grinning "Cheshire Goat" thing, I had decided this Exit Inn scene had to be checked out. After all, the circumstances of getting the word and invitation to go there were very impressive and strange. The potential for getting involved in some far out mysterious stuff was beckoning. I was also a fan of music, and the party atmosphere I envisioned seemed like a good time.

The next day I decided that before I go to Exit Inn, that I should swing by Rex's place, just in case he and Vashti might like to join me in my excursion. I also figured they would know the way to there, which would be helpful.

On this remarkable night, I had arrived at Rex's house late in the afternoon. Ike was already there and we just hung out gabbing and listening to music as the daylight faded to evening. They asked me what I was up to, and I told them I was planning on going to the Exit Inn later. I asked them if they wanted to come along. They said no. But it was going to be a while before I needed to be on my way, so I might as well hang around.

By the time it was good and dark, we had already made a beer run and had come back. We smoked a joint and all was feeling peaceful and content. I was happy sitting quietly while Rex and Ike were talking steadily, joking, and sharing some interesting things between them. I couldn't stand the taste of beer after smoking marijuana, so I tended to use alcohol very little. The feeling of alcohol intoxication was unpleasant to me as well, reminding me of a severe fever that I got several times as a child, which left me dizzy and burning hot. Tonight was no exception to my usual pattern: Smoke some weed and drink colas.

I was feeling quite content while sitting on the red couch directly across from the front door. Rex and Ike were still laughing quietly and chatting intently. I wasn't even paying them any attention. Vashti was busy cooking and occasionally interjected her comments into their conversations. I was just enjoying the pleasant buzz and the peace, sitting quietly on the couch with music playing in the background.

As I sat there, I noticed something above the door, directly in front of me. I drew my eyes up to see what it was. When I looked up, I saw a bright starlight above the door a few inches above the lintel. I thought I was seeing a star in the sky! Yet, the bright star shone amidst the wood paneling on the wall. I thought to myself, "How can I be seeing a star in the sky from inside the room?" This was curious and I was fixated sight and soul on this puzzle. As I looked at it, after a few moments, the star began to shake and shimmer in such a way that my eyes dazzled briefly trying to look at it. Then I realized, it was descending as if from the sky and coming towards me. Then I made myself watch as if looking through the wall into the sky, and I was able to refocus my eyes and follow the star's approach.

The star descended and came into the room through the wall. As it came nearer, it grew larger, so that I now saw it as a shining silhouette of some kind of standing figure about three inches tall. Perfectly white and shining, the figure's shape was clearly not a star at all. It was a little, manlike figure standing in the air a few inches inside the room above the door. I say manlike, because something wasn't right about it. Something was out of proportion. It was the figure's back; something about it was too large.

The figure paused a few seconds after it descended and entered the room above the center of the doorway. I stared at it; white and brightly lucid, three inches tall, above the door, turned profile to me, facing my left. Then, the figure began to walk slowly. I watched it take slow, gliding, labored steps in the air, going a few steps to my left, only a few inches. As I watched it walking, things began to flash through my mind. I wasn't religious, but what went through my mind was that the figure's walk was like it was gliding over desert sands; slow, easy, and deliberate. Then another association came to me: The figure's actions suggested the event of the Israelites leaving Egypt, walking over the sandy places. The figure is like it's leading the Exodus!

This shining figure was doing the Exodus above the doorway of the house! Then the outlandishness of the situation, the strangeness of it, came crashing into my realization. Suddenly, I was amazed and shook my head, yelling at the same time, "What is that!"

I had gotten some attention with my outburst. I heard Rex ask me, "What is what?" I looked over at Rex who was looking at me puzzlingly. Vashti and Ike were also looking at me. I was immediately embarrassed at being the source of a scene and refused to bring anymore attention upon myself. I looked back up at the place above the door, and the figure had vanished. There was nothing to show them. So I said to them, "Nothing". They turned away and resumed their talking and pleasantries. But I sat there on the couch looking above the door from time to time, wondering. What was it? It's gone! But I saw it!

As I wondered about the star man over the doorway, the world seemed to change for me in an instant. Suddenly, I felt everything was mystical. Every object, color, sound, and comment had many levels of meaning. My mind was leaving this world as the reference to reality, and entering the idea that reality is defined by unseen things. I was not sure of what it was or how it worked. But the unseen agencies were in control of everything and everything could be used as means of expressing itself, and I was becoming able to perceive those expressions. This marked the point in which my behavior truly changed in bizarre ways.

In trying to describe the shape of the figure; my first description was that it was either a humpback gorilla, or an angel in the shape of a man with wings. Yes, I was still kind of hung on the gorilla thing, so I decided the figure was a humped back gorilla. Obviously, it was actually an angel with wings. But I never settled that in my mind for a long time. It began as appearing to be starlight in the distance, and coming closer I could see its actual form was like a man.

At first, I described this event as a hallucination. But for me, a hallucination wasn't as most people think: seeing things that aren't there. For me, hallucinating was seeing something that actually exists, but is beyond our perceptions most of the time. But the truth is, I hadn't had a hallucination. There was another term for such events that is religious. But I didn't know those terms.

How can you explain it? I know it's vulnerable and can all be explained away. Well I didn't know myself at the time, and it took years before I ever actually understood this visitation. The thing that came over the doorway that night was the "Passover Angel". Before my witnessing eyes, the angel was looking for something above the doorway. It found what it needed to find, and it invited me to join the Exodus. I had to leave one thing to enter another: Leave Egypt to enter the Promised Land. I had been invited to the Exodus to Exit-In.

"Wilderness Journey"

A little while after seeing the star like figure above the door at Rex's house, a voice came over the radio and proclaimed that I should follow the lights. There was commentary and joking around by the show's host, but for me it was a personalized message from some invisible cosmic agency. I had after all, just seen a fantastic light over the doorway. Maybe I should follow the lights to wherever they lead. I decided it was getting late and that I should be off for the Exit Inn, even if I was going by myself. I didn't know how to get there, but decided that if the lights were trustworthy, I would follow them and see if they lead me to Exit Inn.

I went out to the old Buick in the cool dark and fired it up. I headed out of the drive and onto the road and proceeded toward Gallatin Road. Soon I noticed there were lights everywhere and they were many colors. If lights were to lead me, there must be a way for them to have a meaning. It was obvious red meant stop, green meant go, yellow was caution. What about blue lights and white ones? I ascribed blue lights to mean "correct" and white as "all is well". I know it's silly and lights are just everywhere. But this navigation system was worth a try just to experiment and determine if the unseen reality is indeed working so covertly through the seemingly ordinary.

If things really had more significance than I had ever thought before, then maybe even the placement of colors and lights were part of an expression being orchestrated by the unseen hand of something intelligent. Maybe it was a hidden system that was set up by the unseen. On top of that, I still wasn't really sure what that unseen thing was that I was dealing with; God maybe, a secret underground organization of men, spirits of some kind maybe, or those spark things, or maybe the spaceman. I really had no idea where the boundary line of sublime orchestration and ordinary reality was. It all had to be investigated and tried out. The results would speak for themselves.

There was also another personalized message that came to me, though I can't remember how it came or from what source. The massage was that I was the heir of everything and everything was to be mine. What a thought! But then I reasoned to myself and asked how could I own everything anyway? People would never buy into that idea, even if I believed it. I wondered if maybe it was true in a sense of destiny or something. Practically speaking I understood that everything wasn't really mine, and that other people owned their own things. However it was as if there was some cosmic promise coming to me, and I sort of believed it and entertained the idea.

I drove around in the night using my ridiculous navigation system and things went pretty aimlessly for a couple of hours. I was getting lost in parts of town I had never been too. Or if I had been to them before, the disorientation of being lost made everything unfamiliar. I ended up on the south side of town in an area known as Tusculum. I decided I wasn't getting anywhere close to where ever Exit Inn was, and it was now after midnight. If I was going to get there at all, I had better ask for some directions. By now the lights had seemed to become coercive to me and the delusion came upon me that the lights were somehow demanding that I follow them or else I was defying God. That was a scary thought and I pondered that it couldn't really be true. But the fear got a grip on me anyhow and it took some courage to be defiant enough to throw aside the wonderful dynamic that had set up between me, the unseen and the sign post of lights.

Purposefully, I decided to pull into a Kroger store that was closed. Who can I get directions from here? I was getting tired of the lights thing anyhow, and they simply couldn't all have meaning. Getting directions seemed like the simplest, most reasonable and best idea. So I shucked off the lights experiment altogether. I saw there were cars in the back of the store so I went there. Obviously people were inside so I decided to ask them. I went to the back door of the store and knocked on it loudly so they would hear me. After a couple of knocks the door came open a bit and out came a black pistol that startled me. I just stood still and the weapon was followed by a young man who saw me and asked what I wanted. I told him I wanted directions for the Exit Inn, and asked him if he knew how to get there. The fellow holding the pistol with irritation in his voice and manners, told me he had no idea where or what the Exit Inn was. So I told him thanks anyhow and left him and his gun.

I went out to my car to think about what to do next. Should I try to go on to the "Writers Night", or just go home? While I was thinking about it, a car came up behind me in an aggressive manner with its bright lights shining into my mirrors. Uh Oh! Somebody is looking for a fight or some kind of trouble! Then the blue strobe lights came on and it was just the police. Oh is that all! Man I hate the way cops act all dramatic. Why can't they just drive normal instead of always charging at me or my car? But after I saw it was just the cops, I wasn't really bothered by the idea the police were there. An officer came up to my car and I greeted him. He asked what I was doing. I told him I was thinking about going to the Exit Inn. He told me the people in the store called them about me. I said to him, "Yeh that guy came out the door with a gun when I knocked on it! Crazy! I don't know what he was so paranoid about."

The officer explained that the people in the store thought they might be getting robbed. Oh that's what they're worried about! Well going around worried about being mistook for a robber, was something I had never thought of in my life. Being mistaken for a robber was not even in my whole universe of thinking. To my surprise the officer asked me to get into his car with another officer. They went through all the procedures checking me out and talking with me. They wanted to know my intentions. Well I was either going home or to the Exit Inn.

An officer pointed to a car that looked really tough that was just sitting there. The officer asked me if I should take that car. In some strange way I felt he was offering it to me. Well if all things were mine and it was appointed to me, then I should take it. But I didn't have any intentions of doing so or being out of order. So I figured he somehow was hip to the idea of being heir to everything, and so I answered him in that context. After all, the occultists were aware of things, so why wouldn't the cops be also? I replied that if it's mine, I should take it. Then he said, "You just failed the test." I realized obviously that he and I weren't on the same page. He didn't really seem to know what I meant. So he said, "We need to call somebody to come get you. Who can we call?" Oh BROTHER! Now this is getting ridiculous! He obviously wasn't going to leave me alone, so I finally and regretfully told him to call my parents. At least if they came out in this strange hour, the cop would be out of the picture. I sure hated to bother my folks.

The officer contacted my mother and told her that she and Dad should come get me. Something was wrong with me and I shouldn't be left alone. Hey now that's insulting! Danged cops always have to talk about you in a way to just to make you look bad! He's talking about me like I'm crazy or something. Good grief! He said to Mom that he didn't know if I was on some bad drugs or if I was deranged or what. Talk about a lack of sensitivity! Now he's scaring my poor mother to death! What is wrong with that cop being all overdramatic and saying stuff like that? This is all absurd!

In a little while my deeply concerned parents showed up and the cop let me go with them. I tried to reassure Mom and Dad that nothing was wrong. I was thinking everyone's imaginations were running wild and they were over reacting to paranoid ideas. I was wondering if the whole world had gone nuts, and I was the last sane person left that night. First a guy with a gun and now cops calling my folks out of bed to come get me. How embarrassing! Anyhow, I guess I'm going home even if it is my folks taking me there. I'll check out the Exit Inn some other time.

I was so embarrassed! My parents walked over to my mother's car with me and wanted me to get in first. Hold on! I'm not so sure I want to get in. This car is green, the color of envy! I'm not so sure about this. With this kind of balking, my exasperated mother was getting a bit upset with me. She noticed that for some strange reason I was really hung up on colors. I finally relented for my parents sakes to spare them excessive concern, and got on into the car. What I was reflecting upon was the contractual nature of ascribing meanings to colors, and what Ike's ascribing of meaning to black and white had resulted in for me: The lewd assault by incorporeal beings. So where is the line drawn if there is a line?

We just left the old Buick at the store and would come back later for it. On the ride home I was careful with my parents and didn't want to alarm them any at all. They kept asking questions and I kept reassuring them. Their greatest concern was that I was on some drug and had fried my brain. They just knew this was the case, which I assured them it wasn't. But what could I tell them that they could grasp about all the strange recent events? It would be impossible since I knew my parents, and that they would never relate too or understand anything I could tell them about. Finally as the talk died down, I was just riding along thinking about things. Then an impression came whispering into my consciousness that said, "I'm the Holy Spirit". Well I had never thought that before in my life, and was surprised that I had thought it just now. At least I believed I had thought it. Where ever it came from, I took it as a personal realization that I'm the Holy Spirit!

I thought in myself "Hey, that's religious stuff. Could I be the Holy Spirit and live like I've been living?" That didn't make any sense. "If I'm the Holy Spirit, then I better clean up my act because I might make God look bad if I don't. I better start living perfectly." Being the Holy Spirit was going to be a big responsibility. But I figured I could handle it, if that's the being that I am.

Then from nowhere the impressions of a question came to me, "What about Jesus Christ?" Hey now that's going a bit far. I now had the impression some cosmic inquisitor wanted my opinion on me personally being Jesus Christ. I thought about Jesus and I felt humble and unworthy. Jesus was a perfect man who never ever did any wrong. I couldn't be him because I'm just not good enough to be him. Only Jesus himself could ever be Jesus.

Then the impression came to me that I should serve Jesus. But I replied to this cosmic inquisitor with my thoughts, "Hey, I'm the Holy Spirit. I can clean up my act and all, but Jesus is Jesus and I'm me. Jesus and I are in two different worlds. We don't have any connection. Jesus can be Jesus and I'll just be the little ole' Holy Ghost.". But maybe, just maybe, the cosmic inquisitor was meaning I should imitate Jesus methods. That sounded reasonable to me. So this is how the ride back home in the dark of the morning hours went. I was having the grand epiphany of thinking I was the "Holy Spirit".

As I was telling you about my response to the Jesus question, that He and I had no religious connection, I was struck by how much I sounded like a Jewish person responding to the question of Jesus. They might say, "Jesus is about a religion that I don't follow, and I have my own religion", or "Jesus and I are worlds apart".

Sometimes the things we think or say sound so reasonable and rational to ourselves. We think others are just losing their grip. But really, who is it that is unbalancing the scales of reason? Can we be so sure?

"Mothers' and God's Love"

When my parents got me home from my night of searching for the Exit Inn, it was still pitch dark. Dad went back to bed, but Mom stayed up to keep an eye on me. She was asking me so many prying questions. How could I tell her all the things that were going on? Would she understand? There would be so much explaining. I really didn't think I had that much time or the patience to bring her up to speed. I was confident I was onto some neat stuff and the excitement of the hunt was keeping me very interested. Oh but Mom was worried. She told me I had been acting really strange lately. She asked if I could I explain this or explain that? Can I tell her what is going on? Questions and more questions from a worried mother; how was I going to take so much time to explain or reassure her? But I was being good, because I was "The Holy Spirit"!

As Mom and I talked on through the night, the morning sky brightened to dawn. As reassuring as I tried to be, Mom was still very worried. As the sun arose, golden and brilliant in the east, its golden yellow rays filled the kitchen where Mom and I were. The kitchen became a lovely scene and it felt good to be in such pleasant light. Mom was facing me as I stood near the kitchen door. Finally she said, "I'm so worried about you." as she stepped up to me and took me into a big loving motherly hug with her arms all around me, and she rested her sweet head on my shoulder. Her hug was full of all the enormous love a mother can feel. There we stood in the golden sunlight in the kitchen.

As Mom hugged me, these thoughts occurred to me. I first knew Mom loved me deeply and was afraid. Then as her embrace was tight, I felt a little uncomfortable because of my mother's femininity. Before this morning, such a thing would have been no concern to me. But upon the golden dawning of this new day, I had to live perfect from now on. I had a role to live out as the Holy Spirit. Even a love filled hug from my mother, somehow was questionable for its modesty. I stood there looking over Mom's shoulder in her tight embrace. Then I sincerely asked myself from the deepest places of my heart that intended to be good from now on, "I wonder if it's right for my mother to hug me?" Suddenly, I had the profound realization that I didn't know much about defining right and wrong!

But God was watching this scene and listening to my thoughts. He took notice of my sincerity to live perfect for His name's sake. God noticed that I was at that moment trying to decide about right and wrong with absolute resolve. Then God spoke. With poetic timing while in the unfailingly loving arms of my mother, God answered the sincerity in my heart.

"Witnessing the Crucifixion"

While I stood there in the golden light with Mom holding me tightly, God struck me instantly blind. There was no fading away of my sight, no noise, nothing but lights out coldly in an instant. All was black, though I knew exactly where I was. I was aware of everything else around me. I was just instantly blind. I stood there trying to see and wondering what was going on. My mother was completely unaware of what was happening to me, because I didn't react to the swift event.

As I peered into the blackness and the darkness, I noticed a small point of yellow light. Yellow was my color for compassion and tenderness. So I focused on the light and it began to grow larger. I had seen this kind of thing with the star above the door at Rex's house, so I knew right away the light was coming toward me. As it rushed silently up to me it became large enough for me to see what it was.

The source of the yellow light was revealed as a scene of three crosses. One cross was nearer and higher and two others farther back and on each side of the near one. They were positioned in perfect perspective as if they were up on the rise of a gentle hill. There this scene stood and I beheld these yellow crosses, silhouetted in sharp contrast against the dark black blindness I was in.

I recognized this scene: The crucifixion of Jesus Christ and the two others with him. I was looking at it and understood the scene I was witnessing. The instant I comprehended, God responded by rushing the scene back into the distance until it became a pinpoint of light again, and then was gone. Then coldly, instantly, silently, my sight came back. It was then that my Mom started loosening her embrace on me and let me go. In the length of time for a loving mothers hug, God had made me a witness of the scene of Jesus being crucified.

I'll tell you what I thought at first: I said to myself "God saw me trying to be perfect. Those crosses are in the Bible. God wants me to read in the Bible about Jesus to see how Jesus was able to be perfect, and then copy it". I thought the reason was to imitate Jesus' methods in order to be a respectable Holy Spirit. I had to learn about right and wrong in all its subtleties. What I now think is that if there is anything God wants a disoriented and blind person to see and understand, is that Jesus was crucified and a light to follow as a sign in the darkness.

Later, I did go get a Bible and turned to Matthew and started reading from the beginning. I read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, trying to learn Jesus' methods of living perfectly. In the process, I discovered things that were life changing for me.

"Abstract"

As you see, I never thought of myself as being anything other than a completely rational investigator of the mysterious and the hidden. My concept of reality had expanded to include intelligences and life forms that are prime movers and influencers of humanity, but in ways sublime to those who are not aware of such beings.

What are the rules and boundaries? How did these beings affect us and what is their actual degree of influence and expression? I had no idea about the answer to those questions, yet nothing was beyond the imagination any longer. What I had always thought of as reality had only been an illusion. An illusion based on a lack of perception that so many of us are prone to.

Yet, being born into this larger reality was beginning to make me abandon the terms of conventional reality to the point that it was becoming noticeable and disturbing to people. But I didn't have time to worry about that kind of thing! My investigations were too important. My experimentation with concepts and ideas concerning larger significances, had to progress. The game was afoot. The hunt was on.

Who and what are these invisible beings, these formless intelligences? Was the one being a spacemen? Was Ike's company a bunch of whacked out disembodied souls of perverted men? Were some of them vampires?

There were some things I had learned and understood, and was certain of:

•Invisibility exist,

•Mental telepathy exist,

•Material reality is just a plastic medium to some intelligences.

•Human perception is easily altered by unseen influences.

•Some intelligences express themselves in the language of human events.

•Some intelligences exert profound and sublime control over human beings and human events.

•Some intelligences are willing to be open and overt about themselves and their natures.

•Some intelligences seemed to relate well with me and were friendly and other ones were repugnant to me.

•Some beings seemed caring and some seemed predatory.

•At least one being is a lot like a man in form and ego, though vastly superior in ability and intelligence.

•Many of them appear star like and are capable of morphing in form to our human perception.

•Something invisible was concerned with religious stuff.

•God Exist!

•I had learned that some people are aware of, and interactive with, a super reality or a parallel reality.

•Some of the aware people seem to love the evil in this super reality, or are enslaved to it somehow.

Where I was going wrong was in my tenacity and focus being so single minded that I forgot to behave in terms of convention, though I knew perfectly well how to. I was under the incorrect impression that many people knew about what I was discovering. I figured if people knew, why be pretentious and behave so conventionally as if nothing is understood or realized. I was wrong though. Most people didn't, and don't, know about these kinds of things. Just a small minority of people do. But I couldn't accurately distinguish this fact, because I was among so many individuals who did know.

I was also going wrong in being concerned about a contagion of vampire entities. But the cultural fiction about vampires was influencing my thinking. At that time I had no basis to rule out the possibility of such things existing, and a lot of basis to think anything is possible. Had I somehow been infected by that one strange girl? At the time I could discount nothing! This concern was profound upon me and led to some troubles for me later on.

Although I had seen entities make certain things significant and meaningful, I was mightily confused about what exactly is meaningful and what is not. The change in perceptions that can be induced purposefully over the human mind by some beings, such as the spaceman's ability to cause people to see me as beautiful, had left me with the belief that every minute detail of the material world was orchestrated to be an expression of some cosmic being(s). It was up to me to recognized such events and interpret the meaning in them. So stupid things like a feather dropping, or a fly buzzing around, the shape of a cloud or even the colors of things, became meaningful in ways to which I was becoming compelled to respond too. Literally everything was becoming synchronicity to me, and I was uninhibited enough to let my responses to it show. Imagine thinking that the radio and television had personal significance to me as I watched or listened. It's not impossible, but generally, such thinking is a bad mistake. But mine was a mistake made in a good faith effort to explore all the new possibilities of this super reality or "parallel universe" that interacted so subliminally with the material world we all know.

Was I crazy? I never thought so even for an instant. Yet I realized others were beginning to think this about me. Functionally I suppose I acted that way. Yet crazy is a departure from reality. I was not departing from reality, but embracing the true reality revealing itself to me. Under the circumstances, even if I became confused, I had good basis to explore further. I felt those who thought I was crazy were just unknowing and afraid of things they didn't understand. To me, their versions of reality were just limited narrow views. They were like children in a crib to me who didn't know anything past their sheltered existences and limited perceptions.

I was in a cast of strange actors and the stage was set for far more drama. Up to this point it was all a curiosity and adventure, and I had felt very little fear. I had felt both comforts and revulsions by the polarization between the virtues of good beings on one hand, and the predation of the incorporeals and those people they relate to, on the other hand. I had began to realize there was some kind of cosmic tug of war going on between grotesque, malevolent and death preoccupied things, and the other rescuing, love based things. I was in the middle of it.

Section 2 "Conflict"

"Over Speed"

After the visitation of the star over the doorway, my imagination raced into overdrive and rationality was an obsolete mode of operation. I had accurately perceived the existence of otherworldly entities. I became fully accepting of the idea that this material world is just plastic putty to the whims of a super reality that is generally unseen. The problem was in the boundaries of things. I had no idea where they were, how to decide on those boundaries or understand them. Everything was up for grabs, and my old ideas of reality had suffered having the rug completely yanked out from under them. While many of the expressions from the sublime beings were religious in theme, I wasn't religious nor had understanding about God. The messages and symbolisms were beyond my scope of understanding at that time.

This much is certain that I did perceive well enough: There is a conflict of something good with things evil, exploitative and revolting. Whatever the super reality was, it was both good and evil and in conflict. It was certain that many acquaintances of mine were themselves aware of, and apparently attracted to, the ugly side of the super reality.

Sometimes we wish for something so badly and don't really know where to find it. I had been wishing to be able to "see", and had even tried to use my batch of root fiber to be able to have the altered perceptions required to "see". But my wish was coming to me from other sources: strange revolting incorporeals and an apparently friendly spaceman of some kind. Little did I realize at the time, who or what the true source was, that was actually granting my wish. I should have understood from the overt demonstration by the spaceman, when he caused girls to start seeing me as attractive in an instant, that altered perceptions are the domain of something much higher, and of a will stronger than humanity. Yes I had noticed the change concerning me, in the perceptions of those girls around me. But the identity of the being able to cause mass changes in human perceptions, I simply didn't know. To me he was a spaceman, and the mass change in girl's perceptions, was just a neat demonstration that was very curious to me.

Not only were the perceptions of unwitting girls and women being altered, I was being granted new capacities of perception, though I didn't really realize it was being granted to me. I was simply following a breadcrumb trail to a curious conclusion. Things had been warming up for certain, and I had weathered it with amusement. But the night of the visitation of the angel over the door is where I mark a radical change in all that I was, to become an atomic explosion of imagination. From my own perceptions of myself, everything about my reason seemed to have changed from that point.

I was now behaving out of character of myself. For instance, one night at Rex's, we had smoked some grass and were listening to recordings of Woodstock. I was intently listening to Jimmy Hendrix who went into a dialogue in which he seemed to start at the end of the story, and kept filling in the details that preceded the last things he had said. I was so struck by this reverse telling of a scenario that I became excited out of measure and out of character for myself. Rex, Vashti and Ike were all asking me to calm down a little as I ranted on about the "Flip Flop" of the story telling. They tolerated me with a good degree of grace for which I'm thankful. But obviously I was just not myself.

After I had spent an evening following lights and making the colors of them be the determination of some mystical guidance, and then to have had the police call my parents, my Mom and Dad were convinced I had taken some kind of drug that had just fried my brain. That wasn't the case at all. But it was an explanation they could grasp.

With my answered prayer to God to remove the revolting invisible beings from my presence, I had decided that God and I must be real pals. God was talking to his right hand man, and that was me. I figured God had some important things for me to do. It didn't help that I started telling my parents that I think God is talking to me. The truth is that God was indeed talking to me, but I had barely begun to understand and grasp this. I wasn't really prepared for it either. So it sounded like more irrational insane talk to my poor parents. I was confused about things and that was making me really look crazy as well; though I didn't realize how crazy I was looking.

Also, encountering a being which could not only alter human perceptions, but had the ability to whisper thoughts into your conscious mind, was something I wasn't accustomed to. I simply hadn't realized the approach of the Holy Spirit was an outside agency and mistook it as my own thoughts. I grasped the telepathic communication as if they were my own thoughts forming a realization about my own self. After all, in all times prior to this in my life, I had thought of the things going through my mind as private domain, in which there were no intruders. By the time I realized this was an outside entity dialoging telepathically with me, we had moved on to the subject of Jesus. I suppose I'm fortunate he didn't start off with the statement, "I'm Jesus" or "I'm God". Then I would have been really messed up even worse! Telepathy takes some getting used to, is all I can say in my defense.

"Reading the Gospels"

With the new responsibilities to be on God's side, I did go start reading the gospels in the King James Bible. The literary style was atrocious to me. It was so dry, lacking the warmth and human feel of the various authors I had read. I figured at that time that if it was God's word, He just didn't relate well with what reads well to human beings. But I plodded through it with the objective of determining how to live perfect by seeing how Jesus did it.

In the process, I was aloof from the words in the Bible: "It doesn't apply to me because I'm the Holy Spirit. It applies to those Jesus was talking to, and other regular people". I noticed that not only was the reading dry, but a lot of it made little or no sense. But some things did grab my attention. There seemed to be a language of symbolisms that I should be able to grasp. However I wasn't grasping the symbolisms because I wasn't familiar with this religious culture. The symbols meant the things God or the people in the Bible defined them as. I thought, "A covert language: The language of, "God Culture"! How interesting! It shouldn't take me long to grasp all this", confidently assuming I had such a deeply penetrating mind. But I soon found the progress at the second meanings of the words to be slow. Especially since the Bible is so poorly written, arranged in a discursive manner and written in dialogue of an appalling style, and compiled like a train wreck.

These were my typical thoughts while reading the Bible: "That Jesus! What a great guy he is! I sure would like to meet him. I'll have to study his methods very closely to see how he lives perfectly." I thought, "The things he tells those people in Judea, that he is the one and only way: That applies to them of course, but not me." "What is dying supposed to accomplish? This story has some grotesqueness about it. The dying thing seems like a big waste to me. But at least he came back to life; which is probably not as good as the option of not dying at all." "Why does Jesus keep saying he is the only way to God? Doesn't he realize that I would show up? I'm the Holy Spirit!"

I decided to read some of the Revelations. "Good grief! Talk about a mixed up batch of writing! This is impossible! I think I'll stick to reading about Jesus."

This was the mode of my reading the gospels, and I did enjoy some of the points Jesus made. It was during one of these reading sessions that a spark of yellow light began appearing on the pages. The spark's focus was on pointing me to things in the Bible. I had a tutor! It was a living intelligent thing that exists as a star like spark pointing to scriptures. I asked the spark a questions and it responded by various means. Once I asked the spark a personal question about itself. I asked the starry spark who he was. The spark responded and appeared on the page of my Bible. I looked at the place where the spark was appearing, and read the words it brought my eyes to as I remember them: "I am John". I asked the spark if it was John the Apostle, and various sorts of identity clarifying questions. Never did get a real clear answer to any of that.

I didn't know it at the time, but the name John is the Anglicized form of the Hebrew name, YaHannah, which means: "God's gift". I have to admit the starry tutor did help me tremendously with grasping the words in the Bible and overcoming my confused existential resistance to applying them in the most important way; to my own self.

"Media Speaks"

After having had the experience of the grinning goat's appearance, in which also, the radio had seemed to have been given significance, I thought it was worth noticing if the media such as radio and television were used by some cosmic being to communicate. In my present way of thinking, it did seem to me that things were rather magical and that even the television correlated well with my thoughts. It kind of terrified my poor parents for them to watch the interaction between myself and the shows and newscasters on television. They saw me staring and nodding at the television, while I was having quite an interesting time watching things correlate as if they manifested personal messages to me.

The funny thing is that I did notice that there seemed to be numerous hidden references to spiritual things in a lot of programs. How much of it I was seeing that was real verses imagined, I can't really say after all this time. But there did seem to be something about the shows on television that to this day I can't dismiss. The classic stories seemed especially rich with such references. Disney classics seemed to describe the very things I was experiencing. It was if the old writers new about such things and left their own clues to those of us hip enough to understand it. Covertly, the old writers and old directors of movies could insert deep things that would be over the heads of those who didn't know, and poetically apparent to those of us who did.

My imagination was so fired up that I was completely and fully absorbed in my observations. Typical of me, when I focus on anything, I completely zone everything else out in order to study what has my attention. I retain this trait to this day. Does the media actually speak to us at some deeper level? Yes it does. But defining this deeper level of meaning can become the treacherous part. If you go to my extremes, you might be seeing something that's not even there. If you take it to the extreme that I did you would be behaving functionally insane. But it isn't beyond God to use something such as a voice over the radio, a sight on television, the ringing of the phone or any number of things at certain times for the benefit of some individuals. There are also the deeper meanings of the authors of such things as, the Bible, poetry, stories, art and testimonies such as mine. Whether deeper by human intent, God's intent, or by the very nature of the things being testified of, there are deeper meanings. What I'm telling you about now, is a perfect case in point. I'm inviting you to see deeper meanings and significances.

"More Stars"

After having seen a star beginning to appear in the Bible that was teaching me, I had some comfort in the idea of an appearing star. One evening I went over to Rex's house and was just hanging out. I began to notice that other stars were appearing in the room. They seemed to be in the air and others of them seemed to parade or march around the edges and corners of the room. The multitude of stars didn't seem to be doing anything much, other than just being around. I observed them with a little curiosity. After a while I didn't pay them as much attention and Rex's and I began to have a conversation. I certainly don't recall the subject of our talk, but I remember that it was in my heart to be earnest with Rex and to reason with him. Rex was sitting directly across the table from me as I talked with him. I was focusing on his right eye. I had a thing about looking at people's right eye, because of the image in the mirror that appeared to me and the fact that the one eyed union had generally closed their left eye when they were messing with my mind.

As Rex and I were talking, Rex made some point which left me silent as I looked at his eye intently. Suddenly as I was sitting there, something stung me in the center of my left eye. I was trying to focus on Rex and my left eye involuntarily closed because of the stinging pain. But I tried to keep looking at Rex and only my right eye was open. Rex's said, "Open your eye! Closing one eye doesn't do anything but ruin your depth perception!"

Rex thought I was making some gesture imitating the one eyed union's behavior, and being aggressive. But I truly wasn't. Something had stung my left eye! I figured it was one of those pestering incorporeal stars that had done it, but how could I explain that to Rex? I felt embarrassed because Rex called me out on what he felt was a hokey stunt on my part. I wasn't being aggressive with Rex and was never inclined to be such. But with all the circumstances of recent, I had little room to make a defense or protest. I felt that if I had bothered to try to explain my eye closing, Rex wouldn't have believed me, and would think the simpler explanation was the truth: that I was copying a stunt I had learned from others.

It kind of hurt to think Rex would think I was behaving aggressively. I felt some shame on account of him thinking this. I feared a breach of trust in our friendship was perceived by Rex and that really bothered me. A breach of trust just wasn't the case at all. Yet I couldn't bring myself to attempt explaining anything. If Rex was going to think I was being stupid and childish, I would just let it be. Rex no doubt would seek, perceive and trust the simplest explanation, which came to him instantly. But the simplest explanation just happened to be wrong.

The conversation had gone sour, which was something that never happened between Rex and me. I looked around the room and those stars were still marching around. I held one of them responsible for what had just happened between Rex and me. I considered to myself how much such beings might be interfering with humanity and human relations, and I doubted if I could trust those beings. Yet the stars didn't seem to be harming me or anything else, so I decided to simply observe them and keep my eye on them concerning how they might involve themselves in my affairs and friendships.

"Magic Walk: Apollo"

I headed out for a Magic Walk and got a little ways up Dodson Chapel Road, heading toward the lake, when an old Chevy eases up beside me. The car is really old from some year in the early sixties. But it's as sharp as a brand new car. Its gold body and white top are bright in the sunlight. I look over into the Chevy to see who's driving, and its Apollo Oldham, sitting there grinning at me. Apollo is a cousin of Rex's by adoption. He's really kind of a character, who is fun to be around. I get into the odd old car, and Apollo wants to know if I'm going to Rex's house. I let him know I'm just hanging loose and enjoying the day. Apollo starts driving along and in an aimless way navigates more or less toward Cooks and Alvin Sperry recreation areas, where our familiar crowds were apt to cruise.

Apollo is a handsome manly fellow. He has a brownish gold beard in a classic full style, well trimmed with a handsome mustache. His bristly hair is golden and well groomed in a nice brushed back style that is a bit longish and friendly looking. His hairstyle brings out his face and beard. His face tends to flush red a lot and he smiles like a movie star almost constantly. Apollo likes to catch the eyes of the girls, and plays to their eyes habitually.

On this sunny day I begin to tell Apollo about some of my recent decisions, the gist of which is that I have decided to be on God's side. Apollo looks at me smiling and beaming and then at the road. For some reason this just really entertains Apollo and he takes off on the topic of God with relish and beaming happiness. His manly blue eyes are full of happiness as he takes over the conversation and starts talking about all the stuff he thinks about God, religion, right and wrong. Now I never thought of Apollo as a guy on God's side, but it became obvious that he thinks of himself this way. As Apollo talks incessantly with many stories about himself and God, he covers all the details and with decided self satisfaction in his face and voice, usually ends up seeing himself as a just right fellow in the process. All the while his eyes are smiling just as much as his mouth. I think Apollo is fooling himself to think his sinful hide is alright with God. But I kept that thought to myself, since I like Apollo pretty well.

It was something Apollo said every once in a while, to punctuate the authenticity of his views, that struck me. Every once in a while after he made a point, Apollo would say, "That's what God says!" with the smile never leaving his face. I begin to think about his liberal use of the phrase and the question came to my mind: "Is it proper to go around saying this and that is, "What God said"? Hmmm, I have heard about guys in the Bible saying things like that, but can that happen today?"

I reflected on my witnessing of the crucifixion when I was struck blind, and realized it was a statement from God, but I can't really put words to it and say, "This is what God says". It was a picture that was speaking the proverbial "thousand words", but I couldn't put the exact words to it to say it is what God says. Then I wondered if being the Holy Spirit would someday mean I would have to quote what God is saying.

To me, Apollo seemed to be a bit nervy and presumptuous to be saying God says this and God says that. But he clearly seemed to be enjoying his chat with me and was comfortable with declaring what God says. I wondered if maybe he had some religious background in which it was part of their culture to use that phrase.

Then for some reason it occurred to me that Apollo needs to do something. I gently tell Apollo he needs to marry the young woman he's been seeing. She obviously loves him, and marrying her would be the right thing to do. Apollo listens and understands where I'm coming from. Within a few minutes he makes his decision and tells me he is going to marry her. The moral imperative is shouldered decisively and he says that he will need a little time, and then he'll marry her. It wasn't long after that, I got the news that Apollo the young woman had their wedding and became husband and wife.

As for me, I was left pondering this concept of speaking for God and stating "God says". That seemed a bit over the top, but if God was saying something, a person should at least state it as such. Those old Bible guys did it. I figured it could happen.

"Magic Walk: Clouds"

God and I are on such good terms! Everything seems possible and nothing seems impossible. One morning I decided to go on another one of my Magic Walks to see what God would do with me. On this morning I only made it as far as the corner of Central Pike and Dodson Chapel Road, when a car stopped and a young man motioned for me to come over. He asked me where I was going and if I needed a ride. Obviously this was the person God wanted me to meet. I informed him I was just enjoying the day and had nothing planned much. I accepted his offer for a ride even though I had no certain destination.

Once I was in the car and we were rolling along, the young man broke the silence by a reference to the weather: "Sure is a cloudy day". He was right, it was a cloudy day. A day filled with a smooth layer of lavender clouds and absolutely no rays of the sun shining in any place. The clouds let the daylight through in a muted and pleasing way, making all green things seem more intensely green, and all the colors of flowers were nicely contrasting the greenery. It was like a canopy of shade over paradise. I had noticed the clouds and how they had persisted for days. But it was just weather to me. That is until the young man, my appointment from God, had mentioned the clouds. This made the clouds significant to me in another way, and made me think, "Obviously God was providing this cloud to shade me". But that made me wonder why I would have shade provided for me during the day? If God were sending me clouds in the daytime, it must be for an important reason. Was the sun dangerous to me? I didn't think so unless, uh oh, I was infected with the vampire contagion! That girl has dragged me into her clutches after all, and God is just protecting me! Hmmm, that doesn't seem very plausible. I'll just wait for the clouds to clear away and I'll laugh this off.

I can't recall anything else about this ride with the young man, or where I ended up. I do recall that these smooth lavender clouds persisted and persisted for days, and I began to get creeped out thinking the vampire contagion was now a plausible and believable explanation about why God would be shading me with clouds in the day. I was beginning to long for the sun, just to get into it and prove to myself there was nothing to this stupid idea! But the sun wasn't coming out, and it didn't come out for days.

"Calling the Sun"

With the persistence of the always pleasant lavender clouds, I was beginning to want to call on God for another favor. This time I didn't want to believe in some stupid vampire thing, but my experiences with underground groups had me convinced anything is possible concerning the weird and perverted mindsets of people; or what seem to be people. I imagined a life being lived in dim twilight, and what a high maintenance friend of God I would end up being. Just going out in the day meant I would have to have clouds, and God would spend a lot of time shading me. The rest of the time would be night! Man! I like the sun. It's beautiful and I like it.

Finally I had enough doubting and called on God to do me a favor: "God would you make the sun shine through for me?" The strangest thing happened: In a very short little while, the clouds began to break up and the rays of the sun did come shining through here and there. "God let the sun shine on me if I'm not going to be hurt by it." I was thinking that if I was vampired out, at least the issue of sunlight would be settled. Then the clouds obeyed and the sun jumped through them as if startled into action to shine on me. That was neat!

I recall going on a car ride with my Mom, and as we rode the clouds kept blocking the sun. Each time I would call for the sun in my mind, and the sun would instantly shine through the clouds onto me. Over and over and over it would happen without fail. Instantly and obediently the sun shone through at my beckoning. "This can't be mere coincidence" I thought. "Some intelligence is obliging me when I call. It must be God since he's powerful enough to do things like this. The funny thing is, God could be doing all this and showing off for me, and nobody else would even notice."

"The Squeaking Gate"

It was about this time that I started hearing a creepy sound that responded to the cadence of my thoughts and seemed to be in every place where I went. The sound was like the squeaking of a gate moving on rusty hinges. Or the sound might be described as the sound a toy recorder flute that is being blown too hard. Either description was creepy since one suggested the decrepit gates of hell, and the other suggested a devilish piper.

I was thinking: "Ah the master of the vampires is beckoning. Some unseen spirit is just as interested in me as all the rest of the incorporeal beings are. Everyone wants a piece of my soul and wants me to be a part of them. Or maybe it's just the Devil. Who knows? At any rate I don't like that sour sound and I don't want to be a part of anything it's about".

At least the sound didn't seem to be used like a dialogue. It was more like a goad or a pique being used to taunt me. Creepy as it was, I refused to let it fully sway me since if evil was behind it, evil lies anyhow.

"Colors of Duress"

I decided to experiment with the idea of following colors again. I would be discreet and not arouse any attention from my parents or anyone else. I would simply play with the idea and act as if nothing were going on. This time I did so by taking another walk. I tried the experiment by following the meanings I found in any random colors in any particular place my eye fell, on the premise that some greater intelligence was so in control, that it could give meaning to all things in every instance with premeditated intent. Even things like mere colors would have been placed where they were by the design of the unseen intelligence to have a deeper mystical expression. It was therefore to be discovered by me the dialogue of such expression, because it was my intelligence listening for the whispers of the unseen and the evidence of its existence.

So on this walk I followed colors and generally punished myself in a convoluted rambling through streets, weeds, stores, brush, bluffs and too much sunshine.

I mention a store for a particular reason. While following the colors experiment, I ended up at a convenience market and was challenged in some manner to convert my belief that I was heir of all things, and all was mine, into some action. I think it was the telepathic voice that was doing the challenging. But I can't recall for certain. At any rate the challenge was that I should take what I want, if it's all mine anyhow.

Now I had a problem. The convention of things I still respected. And in conventional terms this was stealing, and I wasn't a thief. This was just plain wrong. If all was to be mine, let it happen as it should, in order. But stealing is striking right at the order of things. Yet the challenge persisted. I felt something was amiss and evil was behind it. But I wasn't certain. It could be God. I asked the challenger, what if they don't understand that all is mine. I would get in big trouble. The challenger insisted that nothing would happen and that I would be invisible to them anyhow. Now I didn't have any faith in that concept whatsoever since I seemed fully visible to me.

It was at this point the challenges became more insistent and spiritual duress was being heaped on me. Things like, "Are you daring to disobey God? Do what is instructed or face the consequences of judgment". Now this was repulsive to my very nature to have a strong willed something or other handing me ultimatums. However I was afraid that if it was God, I would be in real trouble.

So with a dead heart of resignation I walked into the store and looked for something to take, in order to satisfy the demands of this thing challenging me. I went over to the drink case and picked up a chocolate flavored soda and went toward the front of the store where all the people were and the clerks on the cash registers. I walked past them casually, and even held up the drink in plain sight of anyone who was looking. The problem was that as I looked around waiting for somebody to see me holding the drink, absolutely nobody was looking at me. It was crowded and anyone could have seen me parading that cold drink around. I noticed and felt it was very strange that nobody would even glance at me. I didn't want to take this drink but nobody would stop me and grant me the excuse for disobeying the challenger. I walked out of the store with the drink.

I had to admit that I did indeed seem to be invisible to others, though I could clearly see myself. The people's eyes just wouldn't fall on me. It was like their eyes were being controlled.

"Graceless Severity"

Okay you being! Are you satisfied? Now I feel dirty like a thief! Yes you did manage to keep me from being seen. But I don't like this and I'm not doing it again!

The suggestion came to follow the colors yet again and so I did. Rough terrain, down a tall bank, across fences, across the interstate, into another open field, across another fence, and up toward a house. As I came somewhat in the vicinity of the house there was another fence with the tall grasses growing up around it. I stopped to see the colors hanging in the fence and was horrified to see two chickens hanging in the fence. One was black and dead, the other was red and just as dead. It was a strange sight in any case, made worse by my mind conjuring the significance of this scene: Black death, and red wrath, for the chickens sitting on the fence. I was very disturbed by this scene, because I immediately applied the idea of the chickens as a representation of myself, and the existence of the scene as a statement from a higher being. I was now being condemned as a chicken fence sitter facing wrath and death. I was feeling even worse with the duress now than when I was at the store. My experiment with colors was done for the day. This is where it leads and I'm feeling nuts! I quit!

I walked toward the road and passed by the house that was on the property. Then an old man confronted me and asked what I was doing there. He was agitated at seeing me cross his property near his house. I told him I was going up to the road and heading home. He declared slowly in an angry tone, "You have cancer!" With that I resumed my plodding up to the road and left the old guy standing there. However, this old man had strange words as if he either knew something, or something that knew prompted him to speak them. Now on top of a slight concern about being diseased by a vampire contagion, I was dealing with cancer. Is that the manner of wrath and death I get for being a fence sitting chicken? I have cancer? I don't like this scene and it's repulsive to me. Today there seemed to be no end to horrible things for me. If this was God making these things happen, I was beginning to feel some apprehension about Him. Things just didn't seem to be right! The use of will and coercion was not friendly, but tyrannical. I was beginning to have my doubts about this thing being God, or if it were God, I was having doubts about God himself. I personally was becoming afraid.

I finally made it home and felt really distressed, which concerned my Mom a great degree. It wasn't like me to be distressed and it worried her. I was very tired and fell asleep as it became dusk. I just wanted to escape into the bliss of dreams.

"All Things Mine"

In my continuing contemplations about this strange existence I was discovering, it was still such a big question about how would it happen that promised things might actually manifest to me in my life. One of the things I had wondered about was the question of "all things being mine". Could it possibly be that the perceptions of other people would be that I was somehow entitled to things? Everything else about reality was up for grabs at this point, so why not try to define the boundaries on this question, if there even were boundaries to be defined?

One day I was walking and found myself on Lebanon Road at the big Baptist Church across from the McDonalds. As I walked up the parking lot of the church, a car pulled briskly into the drive and parked a few yards away from me. Man the way that car pulled in seemed like it was trying to summon me. Could this be the first offering of all things being mine? So I walked up to the nice little blue car and looked inside. The driver was a young man from the area who I barely knew. His name was Bill. He wondered what I wanted and spoke to me in that effect. I came right to the point: "How 'bout I take this car?" Bill about blew a fuse and went into a fairly good fit of anger as he got out of his car. Well this test wasn't going so good. Even though Bill was really venting some serious anger at me, I was cool and unperturbed. I calmly leaned down on the driver's door and looked into his car. Sitting there in the passenger seat was an old sweetheart of mine. It was Jenny Jones! She was looking at me in a lost kind of way, and I said, "Hi Jenny." She said "Hi" back to me, but didn't have much else to say in this situation. She just sat there with a look of uncertainty on her face. Jenny looked just fine and still had her wonderful long chestnut hair. I saw that Jenny was pretty uncomfortable about me, so I left her alone.

Now Bill was still giving me a tongue lashing and I just stood there listening to him. It simply wasn't relevant or interesting to me what Bill was thinking or saying. I prodded him a couple of more times about if he wanted to hand me the keys, which brought out another round of anger each time. My cool disposition in the face of his anger was confusing him and making him feel off balanced. Then he said to me, "Your mouth is bleeding." Hmmm, that's curious. So I put my hand to my mouth and sure enough, there was a little blood on my lips. I wondered why that was. At any rate I finally saw it was deeply disturbing to Bill for him to think of losing his car to me. I felt sorry for him and decided to leave him alone. My presence was a crucible of testing for Bill and I realized it. I left the scene.

Later I was miles away near Central Pike and Old Hickory Blvd. I noticed some activity around a basement house and just decided to go investigate who it was. As I walked around to the backside, I heard talking coming through the open sliding glass door. I walked up to the door and looked in at the surprised faces seeing me appear there. It was a couple of guys I had known for years, though we never were more than acquaintances. One was Thomas and the other was Earl. They both greeted me in a nervously friendly way, asking me what's going on. I didn't have much to tell them about what was going on, so I looked around. Earl had a suped up six cylinder Honda motorcycle that sounded like a fighter airplane when it was running down the road. I said to Earl, "How about I take that motorcycle?" Just like Bill previously, Earl had a severe bout of anger at the threat of having his motorcycle taken to his face. But I wasn't really worried about that. I saw fear and confusion on those guys faces. Even though I was coming to raid their place, something about the situation was restraining them even though the gauntlet was thrown down. Being the tender hearted guy that I am, I realized that like Bill, Earl was grieved and angered at the mere prospect of letting go of his bad boy bike. So feeling the whole idea wasn't worth upsetting people over, I dropped the matter and walked out and left those two guys wondering.

After this couple of experiments along this line of thought, I realized this matter of all things being mine, was just a ridiculous idea and goes against the grain of human nature. Obviously people didn't understand it. I dropped the whole matter out of my heart, realizing the world didn't think for a second that all things were mine, any more than I did.

"Revelations and Confusion"

It seemed to me that since I was the Holy Spirit, that I should easily understand the Bible. But I wasn't finding this to be the case at all. Its euphemisms such as the "right hand" were lost to me. I realized this book was written with a code I wasn't hip too, by a God and a culture which defined its own symbolic significances. I should be able to grasp second meanings though. To test myself I read passages in the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ. It was crazy with a style of hyper symbolism that I couldn't make any sense of. Yet my pride compelled me to try to figure it out, and I thought at times I was getting some insight. I was wrong though. But imagine my parents concerns when I start telling them Dad is the "pale horse" and other such nonsense.

My parents concluded that the one thing that seemed to be on my mind consistently was something spiritual. Yet they still figured that my brain was drug fried, and the main reason for all my confusion. But considering the true things I had discovered, and the bizarre nature of them, it shouldn't be surprising that I did eventually get confused. Wouldn't anyone in such a situation be expected to go over the edge on some if not many things? I wasn't brain fried on drugs, but I was a bit freaked out and confused at this point. Soon I was going to realize a hard lesson: Though everything is actually possible, not everything is actually as imagined. I was going to have to find the means to distinguish fact from misconceptions, or lies. I didn't realize this yet. I soon would.

"Herald"

On this sunny day I decided to go for yet another magic walk just to see what else could happen. I left my parents house and went down Central Pike toward Lebanon Road. I can't recall what form the dialogue was that came to me was. But as I reached Lebanon Road and turned towards the town of Donelson, it was at this point the dialogue was getting kind of stressful, because I was now being instructed to become a preacher. To me there was nothing more embarrassing than the idea of being a preacher, and I was quite agitated at the whole idea. Also I was informed that I should be a writer as well.

This just tore it for me! I had so many great capabilities, but writing was mere clerical work to me, which was the least of my strengths. I was convinced that I should be a scientific genius. So now with this double whammy of bad career recommendations, I was feeling like the imperious hand of some oppressor with a bad sense of humor was pressing down on me. Preachers are about the most useless things around! What would my friends think of me? Churches are such a drag! I was about as disheartened as a young guy could get at this point.

Whatever combination of things coming into my senses that formed the dialogue was, it was strong. I walked onto the grounds of the Donelson Hospital. I spotted some people going in a side entrance and figured there was something there I needed to go inside for. Again I can't recall what I was after, but I went in the side entrance and there were people waiting around sitting in chairs.

I decided to take a seat myself and sat beside this black man who was a sociable fellow himself. I spoke with him and the conversation immediately became convoluted, probably because I mistook anything he was saying as part of the covert talk that everyone apparently used, but didn't talk about. I was still upset about being told to be a preacher and a writer so my mood was lees than great. As we tried to talk, I went into some spiel about, "everything being forgiven", directing it to this poor fellow who listened to me with absolutely no idea what I was talking about. He was a bit stunned and looked at a nurse who had stopped momentarily to observe us. All that the black fellow said to the nurse was, "Crazy", in a resigned and sad way that told me he really meant it.

Now this made me mad. I didn't show it outwardly, though I might have appeared a bit shocked. At any rate I concluded the guy was just as ignorant as I had been just a few months ago, about the second meanings behind words. I got up and walked outside and started heading back toward the road. The idea of all things being mine came into the theme of things and I saw a nurse walking along and so went up to her and asked if she had a dime. If people were supposed to give me things, I figured a dime would be a small enough burden. Just a tenth of a buck wouldn't make me feel like an exploitist. After all people worked hard for their money and goods and it wouldn't be right to deny them anything they had strove for. Now this nurse was confused by my request, and then I sensed she was either afraid or worried. I can imagine her position. This beautiful young man was coming up to her for no reason and asking for a dime. Was he setting her up, was he crazy, was he going to rob her, was he insane or did he really need a dime? Nevertheless the nurse furrowed her brow and silently opened her purse and produced a dime and handed it to me. I received the dime and told her "Thank you" ever so politely and then walked on toward the road. I looked back to see her and she was getting in her car. I thought about her life and wondered if it was a good life. I wished her well in my heart and went on to the road. I was getting a bit worn and started heading back home.

Then the impression came to me that I should begin right this instant to start saying these God things. I questioned whatever the source of the impressions was, "Right now? Out here on the road?" I was afraid to be defiant of the impressions coming to me. I balked a while and finally the duress and pressure was too much and I caved. I muttered out something to the effect of, "God is real. Jesus is alive and he's coming back." Something wasn't satisfied with this effort. I was made to recall the idea of shouting from the roof tops. Was I being challenged to start shouting it in public? The last thing I wanted was to be a public exhibition. But again I was under pressure and afraid to be defiant. So I raised my voice louder to a shouting level and started shouting it much to my distress and humiliation, as the traffic went driving by. I began to jog along as I shouted, really wanting to get home fast and be done with this exercise in humiliation. I was just not cut out for this kind of thing. As I jogged and shouted the message, a car drove by in which a girl shouted out the window to me as they passed, "Baby brother!" I watched the car drive off into the distance as I continued shouting, "God is real, Jesus is alive and he's coming back." I felt like an utter fool, but the pressure from something was prevailing upon me to continue. Finally my voice got dry and cracked and I couldn't shout anymore. I was glad my voice gave out so I stopped shouting and began to walk along.

Just about that time my dad came driving up and asked me what was going on. I wasn't about to tell him what I had just been doing. That would have been too embarrassing. I told Dad I was just heading to the house. Well he had me get in the car and told me that one of the neighbors had called him and said I was on some kind of drugs or something out there on the highway. I told him I wasn't on any drugs. Inside I thought to myself that it just figures that when you do the kinds of things God says to do, you end up being taken for crazy! I wondered if God had any concept of social suitability, or if he was always ready to have people on his side just act like nuts in front of everybody. I was tired of this pressure and not a very happy guy, with the prospect of being demanded to become a stupid useless preacher! Or a writer either! And now I was being expected to act stupid. I couldn't stand it, this, what ever it is!

"Vampire I"

About this time I was starting to take the idea of a vampire thing seriously, and was becoming convinced I had caught the contagion. The reason was that somehow the impression of a question had come to me. The question came to me in the form of, "What could be dead, but come back to life?" Of course the only thing I could think of was the myth of the vampire. I didn't think of anything religious, like Jesus, to answer this question.

It was worrying me to be around sunlight. Nothing seemed to happen when I did get in the sun, yet this was the myth, and the suggestion of it was getting to me. I informed my parents that I think I've been infected with a vampire thing by a girl I had met. Of course this exasperated them when I wouldn't listen to reason. I knew it sounded silly, but a lot of things I had experienced would sound silly to them, so I was not really inclined to try to explain anything to my parents which I thought they wouldn't understand. It was risky to even say this much to them, but I was beginning to need help sorting through all the strange things happening to me.

So now my parents were watching their little "Holy Spirit" behave like I'm allergic to sunlight, nodding at the television like it was having a conversation with me, and coming home stressed out about weird things happening while I was out and about. It wasn't going too far for them to be convinced that I had utterly lost my mind. They were observing my behavior traits pretty well and noting them for future reference.

"Intercession Impression"

I recalled enjoying the intrigue of my magic walks and the events occurring around them. On this day I decided to go walking toward Earhart Road which is quite a way to walk. But I did finally get to Earhart Road and was walking up it when I heard the Bird. Now the voice of the Bird has been the one friendly voice I trusted. The spaceman was whistling like a bird and he seemed to be my type of individual. He was listening to my thoughts and started responding to me. I had liked this guy and his optimistic view of things, his "significance" themes, his powers and ability of controlling human perceptions, were really neat technologies. I even hoped he might let me ride in his hotrod spaceship. Today though, the Spaceman's contact with me seemed darker and creepier. It didn't help that as a counter call to the voice of the bird, the squeaking gate sound seemed to making a goad of itself. It was like some kind of dual was going on. Some point of conflict was in the air. This day, the whole feeling of this song of the bird combined with the squeaking gate sound, was toxic and really creeping me out. It was almost like a good guy, bad guy interrogation of some kind. As I walked, the topic of the conversation became about my belief that I thought I was something religiously significant: that I'm the Holy Spirit. There seemed to be contention in the very air. Was this a day a spiritual testing for me? Why am I being challenged on this? Why are the squeaking gates goading me as if anxious to see me fail the test of this question? Why is the shrill flute even in the same conversation as the bird with me?

I had just topped the hill which was at the end of the big S-curve, when the antagonist posed a frightening question to me; a question that was terribly challenging.

"If you are the Holy Spirit, can you take the punishment of everyone so that they can go to Heaven? Can you go to hell for their sakes?"

I was shocked, repulsed, and stunned by such a scenario! How had this idea come to the table? Was God expecting me to take the punishment for others? I didn't think being the Holy Spirit involved anything as drastic as that! I thought this was going to be fun! Now I'm being asked if I can do something like that for other people that I don't even know! Was God really expecting such a thing? I felt revulsion at such a concept. Yet even so, I felt deference to higher authority, since we are talking God here, and I'm the Holy Spirit!

At this point I felt fear and was under extreme psychological pressure, and a kind of existential spiritual agony. It was coming to me as some kind of spiritual ultimatum and it all felt like duress. I wanted to be on the good side with God, but sacrificing myself for others, which would leave me in the misery of final judgment, was asking a bit much. I took the question so seriously that I had to think about whether I could accept this mission. I was beginning to feel the pains of terror. I love people and I want the best for them, but what about me? As I walked I became more and more terrified and yet more serious about what I should say to God. This bird had really fowled me up on this question. It didn't help that the goading sour sound of the squeaking gate was following me. It was like a glee of evil to me that was happy at my misfortune. The question along with this pessimistic ambience of a sour sound following me added to the dread and terror I was beginning to feel.

After a bit I decided that I had to do what God wanted, but I didn't like it. I loved my existence and it was precious to me. It was a hard thing! I went into some woods off the road a bit and a great light started appearing in the sky with burning brilliance. I was terrified and just knew some big fire of God was about to take me. As I watched it, I realized it was just the landing lights of a jet plane that had turned my direction. I realized that I was losing it, just to have been frightened by a plane's light! I sat at the base of a tree and began to mourn my fate of being the one to intercede for the rest of humanity. At the base of the tree I was in agony and wept until my energy was depleted. It began to grow dark.

As the dark descended, I felt no comfort being in the woods and so walked out to the road as the dark set fully in around me. I walked onward to John Hagar Road and turned right, which was another route toward home. I was emotionally strung out, feeling bitter and now exhausted. As I walked some headlights came up behind me and a white van slowed down beside me. A man was concerned about me and asked if I needed a ride. I was too tired to refuse the ride, and so I got in the van. I doubted the man could see how wretched I was in the dark. But I felt miserable and had hardly the energy or emotional state to converse. The greatest impression I got of the man was that he was a kind and loving person who was really concerned about me as he drove me toward the house. He took a little longer route, but I didn't care. It was nice of him to give me a ride at all. At least this magic walk had finally got a ride at all, even if it was on the road home. I think this man understood that I was hurting, and he showed real concern for me. At least there's some kindness left in this world!

Finally the man dropped me off at the intersection of Central Pike and Dodson Chapel Road and I walked over to the house and went in. Mom immediately saw that I was in some state of agony, which I dared not even mention to her. But who can hide themselves from their mother? She knew! I went on to my room to continue in agony. Mom's love was so deep and so concerned. She said to Dad, "We have to get Bryson some help". They were resolved and did faithfully intervene to try to get me some help.

Was all this from God or was it just some insane delusion? If it was from God, this is what is accomplished: The concept of interceding to take other people's punishment for them was introduced to me. I found that I couldn't say no to God. Yet I let God know my bitterness. I felt agony of soul, weeping and having a terrified and broken heart. If there was ever anyone who might have felt this kind of thing, I certainly could begin to grasp the agony they felt. Maybe that's what God wanted. If there was any way out of this thing, I was hoping God would find another way. But I knew that God would do what God needed to. It was a horrible price to pay, but if God wanted it, how could it be any other way? I sure didn't want to be the "Holy Spirit" anymore. Was there any hope of relief from such a thing? I hoped so, and hope was all that kept me from utterly falling into the pit of despairing resignation in which our souls fall over the edge and we die in our mind.

There is somebody who understands:

Then came Yeshua with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and Yeshua said to his disciples, "Sit here while I go and pray yonder." Then Yeshua took with him Peter and also Yames and YaHannah, who are the two sons of Zebedee. As they went, Yeshua began to be in agony of great sorrow, amazed with grief and full of heaviness. He said to them, "My soul is in great agony and sorrow of death. Stay here with me and keep watch" Yeshua then proceeded a little further from them and went to his knees to pray, then collapsed on his face. He prayed to God, "Father, anything is possible for you; if you are willing, let this cup be taken away from me: Nevertheless, not what I want, but what you want be done." Then an angel of heaven appeared to him and gave him strength. Then Yeshua, in all his agony, prayed with all his heart.

"Christian Group Counseling"

Unknown to me, my parents had started making phone calls and contacting various experts for advice and describing my behavior to them. Though I was very bizarre acting and upset, they had noticed a strong spiritual theme to the bulk of what I had told them. They contacted a man who was a minister, Christian psychologist, and counselor, that was recommended to them, and arranged for me to attend one of their group meetings. My parents told me what they had arranged and entreated me to visit the man. I agreed with some hope the man might actually have some insight to the things going on, since his background was in spiritual evangelical charismatic types of churches. This was a very big departure on the part of my parents to even consider resorting to this form of Christian expression for advice. But they were desperately seeking anything that could sort me out, and hoped against hope this man might be able to calm my spirit as well as guide me through the things I was experiencing. I did indeed need somebody who could relate to me. I wanted somebody to talk to me on a level that revealed to me that I could trust they actually knew something.

On the day of the meeting, my parents drove me to a church facility in the tourist section of Nashville. We arrived and I was escorted to the meeting room while my parents waited in another area. I was miserable from thinking about the idea of interceding for others at my own life's expense, and it was really eating at me. The concept was so foreign to anything I could or would think of, and suicidally grotesque to me. Yet the concept was deeply impressed upon me and I was barely able to hide or contain my deep fear and foreboding of my fate. Upon entering the meeting room, there were jovial folks in the group, which clashed with my own mood in taxing disharmony. I didn't need levity from these people. I needed answers and the establishment of trust in them.

I took a seat and observed the gathering people and their manners. Frankly, they made me ill. I couldn't bear what seemed to me as childish enthusiasm over a bunch of nothing. The stylization of this religious group culture was like the pretend acting of children to me. I felt worse than ever just being around them, feeling like I was being taxed to even be in their presences. But there was one redeeming person among them; a girl, who was quiet and dignified. I assumed she must have issues of her own to be involved with this meeting. She was ever so attractive even though she tried to not face my direction. It was as if she was ashamed or put out by me noticing her. She had fine wispy blond hair and slenderness about her. I couldn't keep my eyes off of her for a few seconds because I was trying to convince myself that she wasn't Rita. She kept turning her face away from me and it was driving me mad. As badly as I felt, I still felt the pain of love for Rita to the point that I could have been distracted from the thoughts of my dire fate, to express love for Rita with some joy. The girl didn't want me to notice her so I finally was able to leave her alone and give her the space she wanted, free from the intrusions of my eyes to see if she was the girl I truly loved. I reasoned she simply couldn't be Rita.

Well the group went into a "testimony" session with each person recounting some manner in which God is working in their lives. Naturally it was a thing where turns were being taken and it was coming around to me. I listened as they described insipid life events and made their tenuous connections of those events to God. The most mundane minor event was interpreted as a blessing from God fulfilling their desires which were yet to be realized. It all seemed like baby talk to me and I was loath to spill my guts in this company. I had my dignity and it was not easily defiled by being open to childish people who obviously didn't have a clue about the likes of anything I had experienced. This group was making me sick. I didn't like them, they repulsed me, and I certainly didn't trust them, their judgment, or respect their understanding.

My turn came and the group intently waited on me to say something and testify. They didn't realize that I was already fed up with them and didn't want to be there. However I decided to reflect on the idea of intercession and the purpose of it. The part that interceding for them seemed to be my burden to bear, I wasn't about to share with them. While thinking about interceding for these people with my own soul, I stated to the group, "All of you are going to heaven". Yet at that, I felt miserable thinking I had to pay the price for them. I was really about to get sick. There were a few "Amens" shared and such stuff as that in response to my statement.

It was then that the directing counselor spoke to me; the man my parents had wanted me to see. His name was Donald Poulet. Almost the instant he spoke, my hopes were dashed at the very sound of his voice. This "minister" spoke with the vilest and most indiscrete affected inflections of a flaming homosexual. For him to speak at all was like a rasp being placed on my nerves. How cute of a stunt it was for a man to speak like that while playing coy and posing as a minister, as if daring people under God to even notice he sounded like a faggot. Meanwhile, he seemed to revel in the sound of his own voice. Donald asked me, "Why do you seem angry when you say we are going to heaven?" I wasn't particularly angry; just tormented and afraid. But this man was about to get me angry by the sound of his voice. I wasn't about to answer a man who spoke to me in such undignified tones. Why should I be open to this group and expose my thoughts to their childish scrutiny? How much less would I humble myself in the company of a man who talked in these perverted and affected tones of speech.

Suppressing the outward show of my disgust and disappointment, I was loath to dignify this group with another utterance. Feeling actual anger now at the intrusiveness of a faggot into spiritual matters by this distasteful Poulet character, I motioned to the next person and firmly suggested they move on to his turn. I refused to be goaded and firmly frustrated any further prying into my thoughts by this poseur of flagrant contradiction; the homosexual sounding preacher. I was through with him and planned on never being in his company again. Not soon enough did this sickening meeting end.

Afterwards I saw Poulet talking to my concerned parents. His head was downward and his face was grave as he spoke to them. What an actor. He knew absolutely nothing about me, yet there he was being the voice of concern and leading my parents onward. What an ignorant poseur! A man like this could never know the things I experience. He's so pseudo. The sissy preacher and his childish Holy Roly wannabees, they all made me ill!

"Tricked"

Shortly after having gone to the Christian counseling meeting, my parents suggested I go see a doctor for an examination. On the day of the appointment, my parents and I drove into Nashville. I thought this was rather out of the way for an exam, but I didn't care about that. I was watching the scenery and felt calm especially since they had waited for dusk for us to get underway. I thought about trying to live avoiding the sun. What a drag that was going to be. In retrospect staying out of the sun might not have been such a bad idea, if I had only had the right reasons for doing so. But being concerned about becoming a vampire isn't really a good reason.

After awhile we arrived at a huge facility and went inside a really modern and nice hospital called Parthenon Pavilion. We went to the appropriate floor and my parents told the receptionist I was there. They invited us into an open lounge room that was furnished with couches, tables and chairs. I sat down at the table with my parents to await my turn to see the doctor for an exam. Soon they started setting forms down in front of me and told me to fill them out. So I filled them out and signed on all the places where I was supposed to sign. I thought to myself, "This sure is a lot of paperwork to fill out, just to get an exam!" When I finished all the papers, they were taken away and my parents started chatting with me. While we talked I began to notice the people mulling around looked weird. Visibly, they all looked like they had some kind of problem like they were creepy or crazy. Sort of like people from nightmares. They all creeped me out and I thought, "I sure am glad I won't be around here long. These folks are a bunch of weirdoes!"

About this time I heard my mother say in reassuring tones, like she was talking to a baby, "We'll come back in the morning to see you". I was puzzled by this comment and asked, "Do you think an exam takes that long? You don't think I'm staying here do you?" She replied something to the effect, "Yes you have to". There is one thing sure to get me upset and that is the imposition of an imperious will. The very idea of telling me I "have to"! I then realized Mom and Dad were thinking seriously that I was staying, even though I had never even considered it. I looked around at the people milling about in their afflicted looking manners and the realization hit me with a flash of rage: This is a crazy house! This isn't a physical exam! I've been tricked into coming to a place with nutcases all around me!

I arose from my seat with fierce anger and told my parents, "I'll never forgive you for this. I'm leaving!" I turned toward the door and went out to the elevator and pushed the button for the ground floor. Suddenly there was a lot of commotion and shouting and I figured that one of the nut cases must be acting up. Then they started calling my name which was very insulting. Four big guys in white coats arrived and decided to rush me as a group. Now I was really mad, because force as well as will was being imposed on me. Two of them grabbed my arms and two grabbed my legs. I realized this was the treatment crazy people were given, that was normal procedure for the guys in the white coats. They completely dehumanize the dignity of the insane and treat them forcefully like animals are treated. Now such treatment was being directed toward me! I was indignant and madder than a wasp. But my mind was sharp and clear in the moments when these guys in the white coats assaulted me.

They wanted to get me off my feet to attempt to wrestle me into submission. Even though I was angry, I knew I could easily defeat them. But I didn't want to use that level of violence on anyone. I would feel guilty. I picked up on the two guys holding my arms just enough to make me so heavy on the floor the guys trying to yank my feet out from under me, might have well been yanking on a tree. My parents watched and my Dad was weeping. I was just mad! But I was in control of myself.

While the big guys were struggling to budge me, a fifth guy joined in and grabbed me around my waist and started trying to move me. He was a skinny guy and I looked down at him pulling on me. I thought to myself that if I really wanted to end all this, I could shake them all loose in an instant. I could feel my strength was more than all of them together and I would be able to subdue them with the pure punishment from my blows. But again I realized and felt, I would never want to hurt anyone. I looked down at the skinny guy again and thought about how he doesn't realize what danger he's in. I thought about how easily I could free my arms and twist his head off his shoulders. But even in anger, I felt compassion and identification with this skinny guy. I knew violence could free me, but I couldn't do it. I just couldn't do it. As I stood there like a stone with five guys struggling to budge me, I made a decision that I respect to this day: I either have to beat up these guys or go along with them. I can't bring myself to hurt them so I'll find another way to deal with this by my wits.

Once I had made my decision, I said to all these guys, "Alright! Carry me away!" And I relaxed and leaned back so they could lift me off the floor by my arms and legs. I didn't bother kicking or anything since this was a conscious decision to play along rather than hurt them. They carried me past my parents, back into the lobby area and then to a small concrete room that was completely empty. I thought about how dramatically they were acting, as if they had a tiger by the tail. They then started pulling at my clothes. Of course they couldn't get them off if I didn't allow it. I thought to myself that this indignity is how they abusively treat and dehumanize the insane. I noted this trespass against human dignity and found them guilty of abuse. But the decision was still the same on my part: play along instead of beat them to bloody pulp. So I let them have my clothes and I was naked.

Then they handed me a little stupid gown that ties up in the back. They really expected me to play my part like I was crazy, and now I had to wear this little monkey jumper that shows my buttocks. Why would they take off some clothes and then put on others? It's not an issue of safety for a patient, or an issue of sanitation. This is simply a frontal assault on dignity. But my plan was formed already and so I played along again. I put on the cloth of humiliation and submission, dehumanization and theft of dignity. I was beginning to cry from the injury to my feelings, but not to weep. I was angry but not to the point of violence. I was just hurt.

Then they came with a syringe full of some kind of tranquilizer. Oh boy, they want to give me a shot! Well how bad could a drug trip be? I have friends who would probably pay money to have that shot. What the heck! Sock it to me! So I let them give me the shot right in the cheek of my buttock. Now they were satisfied they had subdued an animal! They left the room and shut the steel door. I was still mad and a little hurt. But this shot was kind of comfortable! I noticed this room would never be safe for a truly deranged person because of all the hard surfaces. I was feeling very comfortable all over and things were sounding far off. I thought of the plight of the insane and the indignities they suffered by the same example that was being imposed upon me in this manner. I passed out.

"The Creepiest Singing in the Universe"

Something awful was penetrating my consciousness. It was horrendous and foreboding. I was instinctively repulsed and felt a sense of danger. Through my dreamlike stupor, I became aware of my surroundings, and began to realize the thing so irritating to me was some kind of sick music. Slowly I realized and remembered where I was, and that I was still lying on the floor. The music was somebody strumming some weak minor chords on a terminally ill guitar and a woman was warbling in nauseating waves of crescendos on the minor notes. She sounded like a witch or some other demented form of subhuman mindset whose specialty was driving humanity nuts with her sickly warbling. She sounded insane! It was instantly recognizable as soon as she made a sound!

I couldn't take another note of this noise. I jumped up and pounded on the steel door loudly in indignation. In a few moments a nurse opened a peep through and looked at me directly in the face. "Are you OK now?" she asked me. I was irritated with the singing and for being awakened by such abuse. I replied to the nurse coolly with a bit of irritation and impatience, "Yeh I'm OK. Somebody get that woman to stop singing!" Surprisingly the nurse asked me, "Are you ready to come out now?" Hmmm, an option has appeared. I may as well take advantage of it, so I replied gruffly, "Yeh, I'm ready. I need some clothes." She told me she would take care of it. In a few minutes the door opened and a man put some of my clothes inside the door and left it ajar. I got dressed and stepped out of the concrete cage into the room to see the woman strumming on the guitar and still singing in her sick tones. I studied her. She was a woman with blonde hair in an unfeminine blocky short cut. It was the kind of hair style you see on the institutionalized mentally retarded women at Clover Bottom. She was middle aged and struck me as a person who was quite comfortable with herself being dysfunctional. I mentioned to the nurse in a discreet but very serious way, "I can't take that singing." The nurse nonchalantly distracted the singing siren and caused her to stop her insane spell. Oh, I was glad!

I looked around at the room which was an open foyer with individual rooms for each patient lining two sides. In the wide end was a glassed in room with tables and at the narrow end was the entrance and the glassed in nurses station. My exit was that entrance.

"These Afflicted People"

For now though, I was actually a bit interested in observing what goes on in this place; to see what insane people are like. There was a woman who was obviously in deep inner pain and she was walking around sack faced. She must have been fifty years old. I had the impression she was a wife and a mother. She was so drugged.

There was this tall slim blond headed man who was obviously a social misfit. He was gabby and outgoing with everyone, which was his obvious flaw. He seemed to think the sound of his voice was a major asset and was apparently pleased with himself the more he chatted up people. He just wasn't cool, and it would be tiring and tedious to be around him very long. I doubted he realized it.

Then there was the slightly built, dark haired and swarthy fellow, who might have been an executive or white collar type, except that he was so mentally ill. He had short hair meant to be neatly combed with an old fashioned part on the side. At least that was the intent of his hairstyle. Apparently it was often messed out of place and was oily looking due to his being mental and his hair had taken a low priority. I felt especially bad for him because he apparently got into trouble for something, and the staff locked him in the concrete room. Later they let him out and he was standing in front of all of the people there, crying like a little hurt child wearing the little immodest monkey jumper they insist on imposing on humanity.

There was that witchy woman who sang like a refugee from hell, who seemed really adapted to this crazy environment. I have the opinion that she liked being mental and milked the benefits of it like a true professional.

Another younger fellow was there as a patient, who to me, seemed like a normal cool fellow. I couldn't detect anything really odd about him. There were other patients that I can't really recall, and of course myself.

As I observed these people I could see the turmoil and pain they felt from their various mental illnesses. While I found them at first revolting, that was replaced with a sense of compassion as well as identification, since I had received some of the same abuses they had. I truly hurt for them when they suffered. I felt they were treated beneath dignity, drugged into weird states, and subjected to handling as if they were animals to be trained.

In my mind, I wondered how in the world I could have been mistaken as in the same group with these suffering people. I was not hurting like these people. They were unable to function normally, but I could conduct myself as conventionally as the next person. Those skills were not forgotten, just set aside carelessly during the hunt, not realizing the need for appearances.

It's funny, that while I thought these things, about how obviously I differ from these afflicted people, I had somehow forgotten the terror of just days previous, when I believed my soul was to be sacrificed so that others could be saved. I had also forgotten how following the colors had led to a very stressful and strange day.

Maybe it was the shock of the conflict that made me focus on the new objective and decide that the new battle field required new tactics. Dealing with the most pressing situation, made me set aside the curiosities of the past few months, weeks and days.

"Realization"

I didn't belong here in this nuthouse. I wasn't like these people in any form. I concluded that I had already made a mistake in being too open. One valuable answer had been gained by the events of this turmoil: Obviously there were people who didn't understand mystical things, underground cultures, and intelligences expressing themselves in events. They were ignorant of this side of reality. In fact, I concluded once and for all from this experience, that the majority of people don't understand things mystical at all. I had obviously just been exposed on my own to beings unearthly, and to a small concentration of people who did know. This was comforting to realize: That a person could return to the setting of just ordinary simple people, having an ordinary simple and conventional reality.

On the other hand, among those who didn't understand this side of reality, were the hospital staff in charge of this dominion of hell, and who exercised that authority upon the patients. It seemed inherently dangerous to me that those who administered overpoweringly potent brain altering psychotropic drugs would be my perceptual inferiors. Who knows what legal forces they might resort to in order to maintain an attempt to control? How could the uninformed be allowed control and to do so in an imperious manner? The prospect of it all was intolerable to me! I would not play along with the inferior attempting control over me. The blind were not my guides. I know reality in ways they can't even entertain in their professionally conditioned perceptions. I may be looking for answers, but these guys can't even deal with the questions, except to deny the basis in reality such questions would have!

Being absolutely convinced of their ignorance, by virtue of receiving the disrespectful treatment of being thrown into the nuthouse by them, I saw them as my inferiors and as dangerous. This required a plan to be carefully carried out, or they would succeed in ruining my existence with imprisonment, a loss of rights, and possibly driving my intelligence out of me with psychotropic drugs or other weird treatments. I would need to be very cool about this.

"A New Modus Operandi"

By now I was realizing that being too open already, had gotten me utterly in a fix. I now understood the value of the term "occult", used by those who want to remain hidden. The reason is for self preservation, while among the fearing ignorant. Well my mistake! From now on I would be hidden while among the ignorant, so as not to cause them alarm or fear. I would consciously project normality as a show, until I had opportunity to be shed of their scrutiny. They were like a monkey on my back.

My next decision was to be very co-operative with the psychiatrics, in order to establish my own harmlessness in their minds. This would induce them to drop their guards concerning me, in case I needed to take advantage of an opportunity their lax attentions might present.

I considered also that I would need my physical strength and endurance. There really was no place to do conditioning, but they did have plenty of hearty food and I planned on saturating my system with the strength of it. I ate well and purposefully to bring my strength to the ready with an abundance of reserve.

My next consideration was the acquaintance of the routines of this prison. I would spy out the times that things occurred, like the changes of shifts, the hours when people were present and the hours they were absent, and their locations. I would monitor their attentiveness to me and their demeanors concerning me, to the end of finding the weaker links in this chain of bondage.

I also surveyed the routes of possible exit. I checked the windows and adjacent doorways for stairways or halls. I checked for fire exits. How strange that this place didn't have fire exits. I supposed the insane would just have to burn up. I checked for balconies and roof accesses outside the windows. I even considered a climb out the window. But this place was a dead end and alternate routs were far too risky since it was four stories above the ground. The best route out was the same route I came in.

"Medicine"

Now that I had a bigger situation to deal with, having been tricked into signing myself into a nuthouse, other matters could wait until later. Right now I had to focus on delivering myself from these perceptually blinded professionals before they harm me. I cannot understate the utter disdain and contempt I felt for all their credentials and expertise. To me, the psychiatrics were blind children delving into things they didn't understand and couldn't even think about without reacting to it as if it were a malady for them to cure.

I wasn't about to open up to them even a fraction of an inch. To tell them about the visitations from other intelligent beings would be fodder to feed their ignorant misperceptions. To extricate myself from their grasp was indeed a matter of survival. But I certainly wouldn't let them know I thought this way about them. No, I would be very co-operative, low key, and as cheerful as possible in this toxic setting of pained minds, and the pernicious arrogations of the "educated".

The first test of my cooperation and facade of docile demeanor occurred when one of the nurses came to me with pills to take. I had to think fast and weigh the risk involved. "What is this?" I asked. The nurse informed me the pills were sedatives. Ok, maybe I needed to be even more docile. But a sedative probably wouldn't harm me. I had never taken pills and considered it absurdly dangerous. On the other hand I reasoned that this must be a fairly routine thing and not really that risky. I thought about how some pill popping friends of mine would be anxious to take this stuff. So with a bit of abandon and a willingness to test myself under the influence of the little pills, I took them like an obedient lamb for the nurse.

Now of the pills themselves, I certainly recall little blue ones. I think there may have been a small pail yellow one also, but I'm just not sure. But I have to admit they were potent little things. The next thing I knew I was feeling as sluggish as molasses. But high is high, and that wasn't so bad. But soon I was tired of trying to enjoy a free high. These little buggers were completely lacking in some character, quality and content, like you get from a good joint. Instead, what they gave was an utterly depressing one dimensional burnout feeling of no energy. There were no euphoric properties, no sensually redeeming qualities, no anything but blah. If I had ever been a pill user, these blue thingies wouldn't be worth a dime.

Every now and then the nurses would come around with another dose, which I would take. But the effect of them was so utterly tiring and boring, that I got completely fed up with being high on them, and really wanted to come down for the first time in my life. Day after day, hour after hour, I was high and burned out feeling on the boring little blue things. But I put up with it for the sake of my plan to pacify and placate them concerning my disposition, and get them to drop their guard.

Then on a certain occasion, the nurse came with a new prescription for me. A little tiny paper pleated cup with a measure of some clear liquid in it. I was concerned about this. I was informed it was just a medicine to promote clear thinking. A redeeming quality at least! I felt such a drug could only enhance my already profound intelligence, so why not? Not much risk in a "clear thinking" drug! Yeh, right!

I drank the stuff right up, thinking they were falling for my act and eventually my chance would come. I anticipated an epiphany or enlightenment or some other breakthrough to come streaming into my mind like inspiration, on this drug. But the next thing I knew I was feeling a bit stiff. In fact it was getting hard to open my mouth. It was beginning to bug me. I played with opening my mouth until the effort was so strained, that I just let my mouth stay closed. Then things got really ugly from there. My jaws began to clamp tight and I was bearing down on my teeth involuntarily. My jaw muscles were about to explode with the exertion, and I was afraid my teeth were going to shatter. It was enough to make a person get a bit panicky. But I controlled this impulse to panic, with the resolution they would never see me anything but cool and in control.

But here is the problem: While my intent was to be calm and collected, it seemed their intent was to conform my appearance into the zombie state with a side dish of contorted facial expressions, busted teeth and pain enough to make one panic like a caged and cornered animal. Oh these guys are good at self necessitation! If they can get me to look nuts, they will no doubt see a need for their contributions to my "benefit".

I couldn't bear much longer the painful effect of this liquid torture. So as coolly as my stiff and sluggish gait would allow, I eased over to one of the nurses, a blond haired youngish woman with an air of importance about herself, and I gestured to my jaws for her. I simply couldn't speak because I was completely locked shut and about to break my teeth. She calmly asked me, "What's the matter, are you having some side effects from the medicine?" There was no time for sarcastic thoughts or contempt, I needed help. I did a nod "yes". The nurse then asked if I needed a shot to counteract the side effects. I nodded "yes" again, and she agreed to get me a shot. At this point I would have drunk arsenic for relief. But I hadn't lost my cool! They came with a syringe and gave me a shot. Relief was almost instant and I came loose. What a test! They almost had me acting nuts for them on that one.

I began to think about all the drugs available to people in the world, and the charming qualities of many of them. But these psychiatric types only seemed to use drugs that are about as bad as they can get. How convenient that giving people such bad highs and unpleasant drugs would make them look like face contorted derelicts in agony. Self necessitation is a wicked thing! I must escape from these psychopaths before they manage to trip my brain fuses and they have a lifetime customer to line their pockets!

Hey, it's only paranoia, if it isn't true. But the truth is I have the psychiatric communities' number. They are ignorant and incomplete concerning reality. They have the credentials to justify their arrogations upon others. The psychiatrics have a toxic reliance upon their own conditioned perceptions, which are so utterly limited that they are the ones who can't grasp reality for fear that it might be outside their safe professional boundaries. One in a thousand of them may be wise. I can only hope the psychiatric community has a more sophisticated generation now, than in 1978. I may admit that one in a thousand of them can grasp reality. But if the psychiatrics can't allow that I was encountering and interacting with incorporeal beings, then I have no use for them. Such a reality is too much for them, and they would try to cure it. My sense of self preservation is kicking in. I intuitively know that if I breathe a word about anything I experience, I will be trapped by the profession of my words and the psychiatrist will use some force to make me a permanent patient.

"A Wicked Hand"

A night came and I went to sleep in my bed in my hospital room. As I slept, a strange and disturbing dream began. I became conscious that I was lying in my bed in the room, and had awareness of where I was. Then from my right side I observed a vivid apparition of a man's arm and hand descending toward me. The arm was thin and the hand was aged and gnarly in its thin bony form. It was a wicked arm with wicked intent and I didn't trust it in an instant. As it descended toward me, I instinctively knew that it belonged to somebody who had something to do with the hospital. It belonged to either a patient, or somebody who worked here; I couldn't know. Then as the hand came upon me, it had reached for my private stones, and grasped me in this manner torturing me as I lay helpless. Then it began pulling on me and I was hurting so badly that I was sick with intense pain. As it pulled more and harder I could feel my body beginning to tear, and I knew I was about to be castrated in a violent act. As my body was beginning to break apart, the pained transformed to a feeling of nausea and I resigned in my spirit to this fate, which I was powerless to stop. Just at the moment I resigned, the hand stopped and let go of me. I seemed to go back to sleep.

Once I awoke in the morning, the dream had been so real that I checked myself for injury. But I was fine. I wondered if there had been some kind of procedure performed on me in the night, such as a chemical castration or something. I was paranoid enough about the dangers of being in the clutches of these psychiatric people, that I wouldn't have been surprised if they had decided to prevent my type, "the insane" they called me, from bearing children. Such eugenic motives are, after all, a part of the American medical scene. All we have to do is look at the holocaust of Planned Parenthood and its mass murdering founder, advocate of eugenics, and racist heroine of Hitler, Margaret Sanger.

There was nothing I could do. If the thing hadn't just been a dream, the risk of inquiring about it would play into the psychiatrist hands to condemn me. I decided time would tell if I could father children or not. But for now, my circumstances compelled me not to dwell on the matter, despite a seething indignation inside me that I may have been trespassed upon.

What could be the meaning of this dream? Was it, that with resignation to the evil that had me in its clutches, it would stop hurting me. Was the evil just wanting my will to break to its will? I thought to myself this could definitely apply to the psychiatrics who would be more than willing for my will to submit to their game of their own self necessitation.

Or could the meaning be that I was rescued by another agency? That the dream was a metaphor of my will breaking in the face of overpowering adversity, to realize I was helpless, and then to receive a rescue or a deliverance from the clutches of evil when I was powerless?

Maybe the dream was literal and I had actually been attacked in my sleep. I doubted this; but I doubted the dream for meanings as well. As far as I was concerned, if it had been some unseen agency expressing itself in my dreams, it might well just be deception and intrigue being expressed. Maybe it was just a bad dream and nothing more. Whatever it was, the dream did describe my present circumstances. I was definitely in the clutches of some kind of mad scientist doctors that I considered to be an unwitting and ignorant evil. They are trying to confine and conform my mind to their narrow vision of reality, despite themselves being the blind ones.

"Occupying Time"

After scoping out the surroundings, and deciding the entrance was the exit escape route, I had to have some street clothes to make my exit. Naturally they had me wear some pajamas that my parents had brought to me. I loathe pajamas! I regard them as almost as nonsensical of an article of clothing as a necktie: Useless and uncomfortable in any situation! So I inquired about my clothes and they were brought to me and I hung them up in my private room. I would need them for the escape.

I also asked about a guitar and was allowed to use the same guitar as everyone or anyone could use; it belonged to the hospital. It was a horrid classical guitar. I tuned on it and tried to play it. Its neck was wide and its frets were flat. The huge nylon strings rolled under my fingers rather than bending smoothly like a soul preaching guitar should. The very sound of it was depressing. The tones were weak and the sustain was short. It was a sick little instrument and its sound reflected the atmosphere of this mental ward well. Playing on it was utterly frustrating and the result was to feel irritated rather than to have experienced the psychoactive effects of soaring and inspired music.

I observed the milling around of the mental patients and caught some of their trite chatter about a lot of nothing. They bored me. Once I was just sitting in a chair and felt a loving stroke of a hand upon the crown of my head and stroke down the back of it. I turned to see who was loving on me, and it was the lady that I figured was a wife and mother. She had just wondered up behind me and stroked my head. When I looked directly at her, she was startled and looked horrified as if she had just seen a monster transform for her. With wide eyes and frightened sounds coming from her throat, she backed away from me and then went away. Poor thing I thought. She probably thought I was one of her kids.

The witchy singing woman tried to be sociable with me. But her croppy unfeminine hair and her wrinkled weathered look so repulsed me that I couldn't stand the atmosphere of her presence. When she spoke to me, I mostly didn't have a clue about what she was talking about because I couldn't relate to her pre-occupation of mincing about the ropes of bureaucratic stuff that was on her mind. Yeah she must be a professional at working the system, but we were definitely not on the same page conversationally. I didn't encourage conversation from her, and she eventually gave up trying to converse with me. I wanted space between her and me. I didn't want to see her, hear her, or even think about her. Unfeminine women affect me that way, all the more if they look, sound and behave neurotically, like she had mastered the art of. I shudder in response to her.

Conversation was not something I wanted to attempt among these repulsively ill people. The one guy who seemed like an ordinary person, I may have spoken with some. But I didn't plan on staying long enough to make friends.

I checked the entrance door fairly often to see if it was locked. It always was. The young blonde authoritative nurse noticed me checking the door, and chided me for trying to leave. I wouldn't have left at that point because I was in pajamas. I was simply learning the times when it might be unlocked and locked.

I was fast becoming very bored. My mind needs something to think about and focus on all the time! I must put my mind on something or I become agitated. I watched out the window of my room as people played tennis below. Boring!

I finally asked for a radio. The request was approved and my parents brought my beloved bedside radio to me. At last I had some stimulus to counteract the boredom and the effects of the drugs of sluggishness. I turned it on nice and low and let it ooze out its vibes into my room. Ah! Mellow, hip alternative rock vibes on 103 FM. Yes, the radio was speaking to me in relevance to my own existence. But I wouldn't let on. In fact if they had asked such a question, I would have replied in shocked tones, "That's crazy! You don't think that could happen do you?" Just having something to prompt my thoughts was a great relief to me. I really needed to hear the outside world and escape the toxic feeling of this nuthouse.

"Medical Testing"

Shortly after settling in a bit, the doctors started wanting samples of body fluids and such to be sent to labs. What all they were looking for I wouldn't know. But I do know they at least were looking for drugs in my system that might account for my bizarre behavior. They should have at least found I had smoked pot, but according to what my mother told me, they declared my system was free of any of the drugs they were looking for. This news reassured my parents that my brain wasn't drug fried, but no doubt left them puzzled about what had happened to me. The psychiatrist of course was telling them my problem was schizophrenia. They didn't have to tell me that's what they thought. I knew absolutely for certain that's what they would think. I had complete faith in the limits of their professionally conditioned perceptions, and knew this was a certain conclusion they would arrive at. This was all the more basis for my sense of self preservation to be on red alert.

Then came the day they wanted to hook me up to a machine to monitor my brain. The radio host exhorting to be co-operative, reminded me of the mode of my plan, which was to be cool and normal until the medical types lost their attentiveness toward me. So I played along with them as they interacted with me. I responded to their instructions, questions and other words with conventional plain spoken directness while displaying indifference to the whole procedure. I showed neither enthusiasm nor reluctance to being pasted with all the connections all over my head. I simply went along with the whole procedure for their sakes to convince them I wasn't nuts.

You're probably wondering what the results of the brain test was. Well as far as those Doctors could tell, I had a normal brain pattern. Yes they looked for brain waves and drugs to explain my behavior; anything to explain things as an alternative explanation to what I had already told my parents, which they in turn revealed to the doctor. No, the doctor had no inclination to accept those ideas or even consider them. This is why the doctor is in the dark, and I'm the enlightened, even at this confused point in my experiences. But the stakes were now my self preservation and I had to escape from the doctor's grasp upon my life.

I have often wondered how many gifted people have simply been committed to nuthouses and drugged for the rest of their lives to cure them of the wonderful gifts they have, which no-one understood.

"Occultation Prose"

While most of my time was spent being bored in the nuthouse, there was a morning when the blonde nurse came to my room and asked me to write what I was thinking about. I figured I had best play along to keep them from being on my back. I was given some note paper and a pen, and I sat down to write. I could have written about some topic as if it was the thing I was thinking about. However, insincerity and making stuff up is not my strong suit. Naturally I wrote, as they requested, about what was on my mind.

But this required some considerations. If I speak directly about my thoughts or experiences, they will interpret this as insane. The best thing to do is be vague in such a way that the doctors won't understand it and use it against me. But being loath to speak for no reason, I contrived a plan to make the writing have substance. My plan was to use allusions veiled in various ways that have the catch phrases and buzzwords that will serve as clues about what I'm talking about. I don't know why, but I had the deepest intuition that what I was going to write would be published. So I figured that in some future time after it was published, that some very hip and knowing person out there would read it. They would see the clues and realize I was being vague, and put it together with a little thought, and understand what the allusions were meaning. But the ignorant would have no idea about what I was referring to, because they have no basis to understand the reference points of my experiences.

There I sat in my hospital room with the bright morning shining in. My radio was softly playing in the background on 103 KDF of course. What to write? I wanted to express that I have been seeing star entities which appear in different colors in order to convey meaning by association with what color they choose. I need a vehicle to express this. I reasoned that since a lot of the classic media seemed to reference such events, I would resort to a line from the classics. I recalled the Disney character, a singing cricket, singing the line "When you wish upon a star". I figured this was as good of an allusion to dialoguing with star like entities as any, so I wrote that line down. The next thing I did was hint about the form of dialogue with the stars beings by referencing the colors they appeared in and meanings one could find in the association to the color they chose: "Red stop, green go, yellow, be on the lookout."

The next thing that happened is that a great Kansas song came on my radio. I paused to consider it as they sang uplifting lyrics: "Carry on my wayward son! There'll be peace when you are done! Lay your weary head to rest! Don't you cry no more!" Here I was locked up in the nut section of a hospital, feeling considerable stress about my plight, and this wonderful song speaks to me as if it was meant for my ears. I felt encouraged and so wrote, "How the music grew braver and...". At this point I meant to write "peaceful", but instead I wrote "pey.." by accident, and I paused to look at my "write-o". I guess you could call it a "write-o", like a typing error is a "typo". But I decided the error had a sort of rhyme with braver, so I finished the word with a flair of whimsy and wrote "peyser" just for the fun of it. I even laughed when I wrote the nonsense word.

Then I considered my situation again. I was in a hospital mental ward with doctors I felt no trust or respect for, and I figured it was up to me to find the answers to my quest. So I wrote in defiance to the doctors, my own name as my designated physician: "At last doctor Hughes, I have decided what to do". I am having difficulty recalling all I wrote, but the gist of the remainder of the prose was a kind of prayer to God to give me patience in dealing with a world that is so ignorant about the kinds of things I have known.

In summery the context is a kid in the crazy house, dealing with real events, describing it in hints and allusions instead of directly stating it, in order to avoid feeding the imaginations of the imperious doctors: A kid deciding to be self reliant in the issues and asking for the hope of patience from God in dealing with a world that can't deal with his knowledge. Once I finished writing I was convinced the psychiatrics couldn't pin anything on my code of buzzwords and allusions. I had carefully stated nothing directly for self preservation sake, yet knew there was enough information there for an enlightened and hip person to realize what I was alluding too.

After a while, the blond nurse came around and collected my prose. I figured she would take it and it would shortly be published. I just knew it somehow. I was pleased to imagine one day in the future a really insightful, cool and hip person would read it, understand it, and then realized a young man with spiritual knowledge had gotten himself in a mess and had to speak in code. But for now, what could the doctors say about it? I knew they couldn't understand it and that was exactly my intent. Yet it is all there for those who know about these things.
In case you're asking: Did the hidden prose ever get published as I expected? Yes in fact it did; at least twice. I don't know if it was the blond nurse who submitted it or some other psychiatric type. But it was submitted first to a publication called, "The Inner World of Mental Illness" by a big time psychotherapist type named Bert Kaplan. The antinomy of this is that his example of my writing is in a book published in 1964, fourteen years previous to my writing it. Some conspiracy types also suggest Bert Kaplan is a CIA operative. Then another publication used it in a book called, "Schizophrenia: A Medical Encyclopedia of Symptoms". I hope I'm remembering this stuff closely enough.

At any rate I found it in the second publication about ten years afterwards. Having been pegged as insane, the topic was curious enough to me to read about it. So as I read through the various sections, there was a chapter about "Chaotic Speech" or "word salad". There it spoke of a young man who was a High School graduate that was of above average intelligence, who wrote this extreme example of "chaotic speech" which is a symptom of schizophrenia.

I began to read this extreme example and it started out with, "When you wish upon a star. Red stop, green go, etc. etc." I immediately started thinking the writer was very cool. He obviously knew things and I could understand where he was coming from. Yes the colors are right and he understands. He's writing like this to keep from being open about such misunderstood knowledge. I was immediately impressed and knew I understood him even though the authors of the book didn't have a clue about this "extreme example" of "chaotic speech". I could see the conflict so clearly this young guy was in; kind of like I had been. Then as I read further, there came a line which stopped me in my tracks. "At last doctor Hughes, I have decided what to do." I was utterly stunned by my name appearing in the text. Some poor guy from the past is trying to reach out and speak to me today! He KNEW! What is going on here? I read further and saw the young author had a primitive piety in his heart. He was asking for patience to deal with this world full of fearful ignoramuses!

Who was this young man? How could he have used my name? Was it just coincidence that he had the same name as me? Slowly a vague recollection began to surface. I had the sudden realization that the young man who was impressing my masterful insightfulness was ME! I had wrote this? But when did I write this? Slowly the memories gently came to me: I was in the hospital and I remembered the blond nurse. I remembered knowing it would get published and that in the future a really hip cool guy with insight would understand me. That hip guy of the future was ME today! I understood it perfectly in the future time that I had imagined when I was the writer. As I scrutinized it further I saw they had published it with a mistake of their own. They had mistaken the word "braver" and published it as "brauer" thinking my "v" was a "u". I had miswrote the word "peaceful" as "peyser" and decided it was just fun. Their line read "how the music grew brauer and peyser". They had one mistake which made us even score on mistakes.

By now I considered the sublime providential hand of God and his ability to orchestrate events in defiance of all statistical odds. That something I had written years previously, and sent into the wind of the worlds activities, had now found itself in my hands again in published form, was against every statistical odd that you could imagine. This was clearly the hand of God just making yet another one of his showy demonstrations for me. The thing is, that after all I've experienced, this event didn't actually surprise me, knowing God like I do. Yet the experience of it was like a surprise gift that I enjoyed receiving.

Another oddity concerning time and my prose, is that in 1953, there was a book titled "How Music Grew: From Prehistoric Times to the Present", by Bauer and Peyser, two lady authors. Hmmm, Coincidence? There seems to be a lot of time and wording issues and themes, past, present and future concerning what I "write, writing, written, wrote". Maybe we should realize this about the Bible as well.

Those blind academics. They are utterly victims of their own conditioned perceptions. They think this is incomprehensible chaotic speech, yet it's completely understandable to those who know! The psychiatric guys don't know "chaotic" from "occultation". I shared this with several people in my inner circles explaining the context that I had written it while in the hospital. When I read it to them and told them when it had been written, they knew enough about me and my experiences to know what I was talking about in the text, and it was clear to them as well. But not to the unenlightened psychiatrics who in their dim understanding were only so baffled by it, they called it "extreme chaotic speech" and a symptom of schizophrenia. Such are the arrogances of the uninitiated with too many empty credentials, who think those of us who are their gifted superiors in the understanding of reality, should be their patients!

"The Day We Die"

One morning the authoritative young blonde nurse came to my room where I was sitting being bored. She told me that she wanted me to draw a picture of my grave stone and place the dates of my birth and death on it. This struck me as humorous since this was the ward for the death obsessed. I personally wasn't the least bit concerned about dying, but the vampire concerns had made them peg me as a death obsessed kid. Nothing like a picture of my grave to reinforce the idea that I think about death! Well I decided to play along anyhow. She said she would come back later and get my picture and then we would have a "group therapy".

I took the paper she offered, took pen in hand and drew a grave stone with a winged angel standing on top of it in a fighting pose. I liked this bit of whimsy and then put the date of my birth on it. For the date of my death I wrote beside "Died" the word "Never". It was just my way of proclaiming I wasn't interested in death and didn't care to think about it. On top of that, I figured with God on my side, I may just never die; or at least I might live forever after being raised from the dead. It was just my optimism coming out, but I kind of liked the idea. Its funny how I wasn't recalling how I'm supposed to be sacrificed for the sake of others salvation. But it wasn't in my mind and I was dealing with the situational context at hand.

After awhile the blond nurse came and collected my picture. Then in a little while she came and told me the group session was beginning. It was in the glass room at the end of the lounge room. I looked, and almost every person was filing in. So I went in and sat down. The nurse held up the pictures everyone had drawn of the grave stones and talked to each person in the group about their dates and such. I noticed that several people chose the same year to die, which was 2040. The pattern made me curious about what they were thinking, but I refrained myself from delving into another mystery. Nobody really had much explanation for the dates of their death. I got a bit of unwanted attention from the group about choosing "Never" as the date of my death. Explanations were asked for, and I made it a point to see it as humorous and to make the point that I don't really plan on dying or even think about it. Maybe I might never die! Who knows about stuff like that? Such was my mild protest that the topic was something I didn't think about. My fighting angel was death defying and I liked that idea much better.

Then the nurse started directing us to think about each other and make comments on who in the group we might like to spend time with and what would we do together. I thought this was rude and didn't want to say what I thought about anyone. But co-operation was the plan so when it came my turn I declared I might like to spend time with the fellow who seemed normal to me. I was asked what we would do, and I responded, "We would smoke a joint". I felt some humor at this, but the fellow I was talking about lowered his eyes and said, "I don't know man. It's kind of a has been for me". See what you get for being open with stupid things to think about concerning strangers. I was feeling humorous and he got all serious and dumped on the levity. Good grief! Let me out of here!

The group session plodded along to my great disinterest in this toxic wallow. After awhile we were dismissed and everyone started filing out of the glass room. I let them all go out ahead of me. As I was exiting the room, the blond nurse followed me out and stopped me. She had something to say to me. I looked at her eyes as she began to say to me, "Bryson, you know just enough to be dangerous". Oh I could imagine she had ideas alright! But I wasn't about to ask her to explain or elaborate on that statement, lest I feed her imagined fears. So in the most conventional sense I feigned that she had lost me with that statement and I had no reply. She continued on and said, "You know there have been problems with cult figures like Charles Manson?" I indicated that I was aware of such things, but indicated nothing else. She looked at me and said, "Don't start teaching people." and then she waited for my response. She was asking for a commitment from me, and so in feigned confusion as if I was really lost about this topic, I agreed not to teach people saying, "Okay". She gave me a seriously stern look and then decided to let it go.

So now they've resized me up. What happened to being brain fried on drugs? What happened to being schizophrenic? What happened to my obsessions? My cool act was having some effect. It was backfiring. Now their imaginations were telling them I was aware of some true things, that I was intelligent and subtle and a danger to society as a latent cult figure. I reminded them of Charles Manson! Good grief! You just can't win with these "learned" shrinks. Everything they perceive is interpreted as a problem.

I couldn't really think of a way to project an image that I wasn't a dangerous latent cult figure. That was a problem the nut doctors would have to just get past by themselves. What I did see was their conditioned perception and it further reinforced to me that the doctors were very dangerous. Show confusion openly and you get tossed in the nuthouse by them. Show no confusion and they take notes on a dangerous cult figure, which of course leads to the same place by their recommendation: the nuthouse. No matter what way I turn, I am being unfavorably reflected upon. I'm in a no win situation by virtue of the imperious control of the doctors over my fate. I knew all the more that I must break their control and influence over my life, lest I end up with a lobotomy, a drugged induced state of incapacitation, and caged in a psycho ward for the rest of my life.

I checked the exit door all the more often to see if it was unlocked. I was observed checking it and chided for it. I didn't care at this point anymore. They had shown their hand and it was all about their perception of me having some kind of problem requiring their intercession into my life, no matter how I behaved. I was between the hammer and the anvil.

I did ponder on what the nurse thought I "know just enough" about. Surely she couldn't really realize what I actually know concerning incorporeal beings and a parallel reality that is mostly unseen? If she could by some remote chance, possibly grasp that reality, this might explain her comparison to Charles Manson and her condescending remarks that I "know just enough to be dangerous". The stakes were too high to bother picking her brain for clarification to satisfy my curious nature. I needed most of all to render her irrelevant to my life. Anyhow, I figured she was probably so ignorant about spiritual things that it frightened her into framing it in the worst possible light by warning me not to become a dangerous cult figure. Such hysteria was her problem, not mine! I did sense peril though, in being the subject of another person's catastrophizing when they were arrogating control over my situation and life.

In retrospect, I have come to wonder if the nurse herself was aware of, or part of the occult. But at the time, I was not ready to play around with that idea, since my assumption concerning all the psychiatric community was that they had no conception of that kind of thing. I assumed the nurse would only make statements within the boundaries of her professional culture. But would a nurse actually resort to themes concerning the occult? I think its plausible now. Her remark about what I "knew" certainly didn't invalidate me. Her connection of my knowledge to a man known for practicing mad acts of magic is awfully full of allusion. Her admonishment to me not to teach, showed the same theme of an aversion to teaching, as Ike seemed to have shown when he confided in me about the occult's existence. The nurse's very manner of communication, speaking non-specifically, yet relying on the double meaning of the allusions, which themselves could be denied even exist, is very much like the vibe style of communication of the occultist. She said little in specific, but I sensed a vibe in her words at that time, but refused to accept it as plausible or to even deal with the allusions. My mode was to revert to the conventional act, full force. But now, I think the nurse may have known more than is professionally allowed or accepted.

Another thing to ponder is the plausibility of some people's claims that Charles Manson was himself a victim of a government mind control experiment. I have no idea if that is true or not, but the topic is easily found researching on the internet. It all creates questions, such as, could I be that easily correlated along this theme to what happened with Charles Manson by the nurse? When might I have become the interest of government scrutiny, if that is what the nurse was thinking about? Could it have been the paranoid guys from the Navy? Could it be they wanted to find out who I got my marching orders from? Could it be that some method was used upon me to find out this matter through mind control, only to find that I actually get my orders and controls from somebody that isn't a Red Communist, but a guiding hand of a God from a higher reality?

Of course this whole line of thinking is pretty fanciful. But it's great entertainment.

"Get My Walking Papers"

Everything was adding up to me that these people in charge of this nuthouse were only trying to validate themselves and promote their own self necessitation. The problem is that demanded a patient, and it wasn't about to be me! These people are dangerous!

What had they accomplished since I had been there in the ward? The only thing they had accomplished was to convince me they thought treating mental patients like unruly animals instead of human beings was acceptable. They had convinced me they were willing to keep mental patients stoned on unpleasant drugs; and I was really getting tired of the burnout of those stupid little blue pills. I thought it funny that they had accomplished making me want to not be high anymore. But enough is enough! They had convinced me they were very willing to take control over others based upon their own justifications for doing so. I figured if I played their patsy, I would end up committed by them while they would have their greedy pockets lined with lucre at the expense of my life. I utterly loath the imperious and consider them in a class with tyrants. They had convinced me they were completely ignorant of anything metaphysical. Spiritual realities were beyond their own experiences, and they thought such things required their treatment. All the things they had convinced me of, were things about themselves; things they hadn't intended to convey, but which I understood about them nonetheless.

The only thing they benefited me in any way, was in a way they hadn't intended to: I had learned to not frighten the ignorant with things they can't understand; like these "doctors". Other than that, my patience was getting low and my concern was rising since I was now being compared to a psychopathic killer. This frame up to get me committed had to be stopped. Had they given me one word of advice? No! Had they conveyed any insight into my situation? No! They had offered absolutely NOTHING which would help me sort through the mysteries I had found.

Two weeks and counting and the doctors had absolutely nothing to say to me other than to compare me to an insane killer! I got the message alright! They had overactive imaginations and issues of their own to deal with! If they are so smart, where is the wise counsel and advice? They had none to offer! All this was a game and a sham and I was, to put it mildly, "out of their league". Where is the trust building that would allow me to see it was not dangerous if I did share my experiences with them? There was none: Only pills and imprisonment. The term "Doctor patient relationship" was an abstraction to these Lords of the Nuthouse. They had their control and their incomes secured. In all their ignorance and foolish good intentions, I realized they were effectively the unwitting psychopaths by virtue of their methods and their results. The patient had correctly diagnosed the doctors. But isn't that to be expected when fools try to control the wise? The fools become dangerous to the wise, imprison them and then kill them? There is a lot of history that bears out this truth.

But I on the other hand, was good in my heart, harmless even to my adversaries, and wise despite my youth. So what if I had a bunch of confusing mysteries present themselves to me? It was mostly fun and a great privilege. One could be expected to get confused in the face of mind bending events, realizations and inspirations! Is that so wrong? No, the error is in frightening and alarming the simple minded. One must not let it be shown to them or reveal ones confusion, lest you spread hysteria to those who would bind you in chains. History is full of this situation as well.

I had a full grasp by now of the truth of the situation with the doctors. But since they were in a defacto sense the enemy, despite any good intentions they may have had, I needed to get some advice from somebody who was not dangerous. I looked around at the mental patients and most of them were either out of it or just too ignorant to deal with. I had a question and who could I get to answer it among this group?

I came to the repulsive blond haired witchy woman. Yes, she was articulate and sophisticated about this hospital mental patient scene that she seemed to thrive in. She often talked a bit over all our heads with the particulars of hospital speak and procedure. In fact she seemed very comfortable with anything bureaucratic in nature and spoke the language often enough. It made her happy to talk about such dull stuff, and she conveyed it in a matter of fact manner as if it was just normal stuff to talk about. She would know the answer to my questions and spit them out instantly with directness to the point. She wouldn't be able to help herself! She knows what I need to find out!

I figured I had better try an easy route out of this insanity ward before I resorted to my plan which I had all along. So I went to the witchy woman one morning and initiated a discussion. She was a bit surprised that I came to talk with her. She knew I didn't enjoy her company and she had allowed me the space without having hurt feelings about it. She also noticed, as I saw her look quickly in all directions around the ward and gather the situation, that I had chosen a time and setting when it would be just her and I, without prying eyes or ears. She immediately understood this was a private exchange in confidence. I came to the point quickly and told her I had a question and that I think she could answer it. She was gamey, spunky, and matter of fact manners invited my question like a seasoned old hand would. So I asked her, "How do you go about getting out of this place?"

This question was much too simple for her. While she instantly produced the answer, she was a bit visibly let down and had the impatient directness of an old hand being asked dumb questions. "You just ask for your sign out papers, sign them, and leave!"

I didn't know sign out papers existed. I asked her, "It's that simple?" Now she was convinced I was an idiot and asked me, "What else could it be, but that simple?" with a bit of impatience in her tone that was more inflection than actual impatience. It was just her style. I thanked her for her answer and she assured me I could ask her anything, anytime I had a question.

Later on in the morning as nurses and other personnel were around, I went to the imperious blond nurse who compared me to a psychopath, and told her I was ready for my sign out papers, and would she see about getting them to me. But she looked at me directly and informed me, "I think you need to be with us for a while longer". I expected that and let it pass without getting angry. I wasn't going to loose my cool among these psychiatrics, lest I fuel their imaginations. Later on I saw the skinny guy who had been the one who grabbed my waist when I was imprisoned; the one I had decided not to twist his head off. He was a good guy and I sensed a kind heart in him. So I came to him and told him I wanted to sign out and asked him to get me the papers. He resisted the idea as well, and told me to be patient and maybe in a few days that could be done. Brushed off again!

Over the next few days I repeated the request a couple of times a day with the intent that everyone who was in charge understood clearly that I was ready to go. They all knew I intended to leave, but they didn't know I was going to do so with or without their co-operation. All they were accomplishing by brushing me off repeatedly was to justify me when I initiated my plan which I had from the beginning. But they all refused to get me the sign out papers and so I resolved to initiate my plan at the first opportunity.

"Me Cat and Mouse Star"

On another night I had another dream that seemed significant to me. In this dream, I dreamed that I had awakened, or at least became conscious, and I knew that I was inside my room in the hospital. In a strange way I could see clearly, yet it was somehow not quite normal, but dreamlike. As I looked around, there appeared to me this starlight in the room that beckoned with playful behavior like a playful puppy wanting to play chase. So for the fun of it I began to chase the star around the room and it dodged me over and over. Sometimes when I would have it nearly cornered, it would move to the left, and I would block it, it would move back to the right and I would block it. Then as if to just be defiant it would charge straight at me and just go through me and end up behind me. To me this was a dirty cheating trick. But I was having fun so the chase would continue around and around the hospital bedroom. Once I had it cornered near the floor and it was going back and forth, looking for an opening. I tried lying down on the floor to use my whole body to block its escape. It suddenly charged toward me and just passed right through my torso, as it scooted swiftly along the floor. This frustrated me finally, and I lost interest in the game and began talking to the star.

I can't remember the dialogue, and the dream ended shortly. Later I awoke in my darkened room and realized it had been a dream. But it wasn't merely a dream, but a visitation in the consciousness of sleep, in which a starry visitor had come and played a bit of cat and mouse with me. It had been real as much as the realms of the spiritual encounters between incorporeal intelligences speaking directly to the innate spirit of a living person are real. Yes the exchange of pleasantries and the dialogue and the inferences behind the cat and mouse game had all been expressions from something very real; which even had the ability to bring me to some form of conscious awareness, even while I slept peacefully in my bed.

What was the starry being trying to express to me with this cat and mouse game? The whole episode also acquainted me with the reality that these starry beings had no boundaries by the flesh of our humanity. They could transcend our human frailty and still speak and appear to our spirits. But a cat and mouse game; what could that mean? I had no solid conclusions for the vagueness of this being's expressions of a playful game of escape. What was it trying to tell me?

"Escape from Bedlam"

One morning it was "visitor's day" and various people were arriving to visit their respective family and friends who were patients. As I observed, I noticed the visitors would just walk up to the door and press the buzzer. The nurse behind the glass at the reception desk would unlock the door and out they would go. Relying on the nurse's preconditioning I decided now was the time to leave. I went to my room and changed into my regular clothes and got out of those contemptuous pajamas. It felt good to put on real clothes and shoes. I reasoned that, at first glance I would be taken for a visitor.

I left my room and nonchalantly walked directly toward the exit without wasting time. I stepped up and pressed the buzzer. The nurse glanced up and saw my clothes and unlocked the door which I immediately pulled open, stepped through, walked directly to the elevator, got in and pressed the ground floor button. I rode down alone and the door opened into the hospital entrance. I stepped out and walked directly out the front doors and proceeded to walk acros the parking lot. I got about a hundred fifty feet away and passed by a doctor who was going toward the hospital. I nodded at him courteously and he nodded back at me as we were about to pass each other, when suddenly I heard my name being shouted! "BRYSON!!" The doctor also noticed the shouting and turned back to me, and said "Hey." I turned and looked at the doctor and he asked me if the guy in the white coat was calling out for me. I looked back in the direction of the hospital as if to see what he was talking about. One of the big guys in the white coat was shouting my name, "Bryson!" I looked at the doctor and said, "Not calling me". He asked me if I was sure. I looked at him as if he was crazy and said, "Yeh, I'm sure", as if puzzled by his further questions. Then I proceeded on as if I had now decided he was irrelevant to my day. I glanced back at the doctor who was now standing paralyzed with indecision and his brow deeply furrowed considering the situation. More big guys were showing up to join the first one and I saw them start running as a group toward me. I lit it up on my two feet and flew along as effortlessly as the wind, heading for the first major road I saw directly ahead. I could orient later! Right now it was a chase! I glanced back and they were chasing me with the one skinny guy now chasing and passing the three big guys because he was lighter on his feet. There I was running through the city with four guys in the white coats chasing me!

I hit the main road, turned right and glanced back to see my pursuers, just in time to see the three big guys giving up. I knew they wouldn't last, but the skinny guy was calling me and still coming. So I continued to run lightly along down the city street with the intent of keeping a little cushion between me and the skinny guy. Every once in a while I would glance back at him as he chased me and called my name. He was now getting tired and his voice was weakening. On my last look back at him, his running was now labored and he was just about out of steam. I realized he was absolutely unable to physically go on and was no threat to me. I also trusted his spirit and sensed he was a good guy. So I stopped and turned toward him. I was still full strength because I had been saturating myself with calories and good food while I bided my time. My athletics had paid off and my heart wasn't even beating hard, nor was I winded or breathing hard in the least. I stood cool and calm while the skinny guy came running up with a great slow labored gimping stride. I felt sorry for him. As he approached I saw his red face was covered with sweat especially noticeable on his forehead. He was calling my name in weak hoarse tones now only loud enough to be just heard.

When he stepped up to me close enough for me to speak in soft tones to him, I asked him, "What do you want?" with a tone of patronization.

"You've got to come back!" he replied hoarsely but with urgency.

"Why?" I asked him. He replied, "This isn't the way to leave. It'll cause a lot of problems! The insurance may not cover you if this isn't done right".

Finally! I had gotten an intelligent response from the psychiatric clan! But it had to be outside their walls, out here in the open streets where the playing field was even before I got an intelligent response.

I reminded him, "I've been asking for the sign out papers for days! You guys have been dragging your feet. Isn't that right?"

He conceded I had been asking for the papers.

"You guys wouldn't bring them, so it was time to go with or without them."

"Look", he said entreatingly, "If you come back and stay overnight, I'll bring you the sign out papers".

I liked this guy and I knew he wasn't lying. I knew I could escape at will even if this plan wouldn't work again. Now they knew I was serious and I now had some currency of respect from them. Something was at stake for them if I didn't come back, and now they weren't brushing me off, but talking man to man with reason and intelligence. This skinny guy was facing some ramifications if I didn't come back. I thought momentarily about brushing him off as a payback, but for some stupid reason, for the second time I felt sorry for him. In any other situation I knew he and I would be friends.

"Oh Fine! I'll come back. But you get those papers for me!" I said as I looked at him man to man, friend to friend, the trusting to the trusted. Between us it was understood I was giving him a break.

He stated again as if it was certain, "I'll get you the papers", and the deal was done.

We walked back to the hospital together talking casually. He was relieved and I was comfortable with myself, my conscience clean, and reassured I had some respect now and that I was still able to bust out if I was deceived. Somehow the issue of being crazy had vanished. When I went back into the crazy ward, I didn't put on the pajamas, no pills were offered. I simply decided to pass the day and the night quietly and wait for the papers to arrive before me the next day.

"The Deal is Honored"

The next day while it was still morning, the sign out papers were brought to me and I signed myself out. I needed a ride and called my parents to come down and get me. I packed my bags including my radio and waited to be picked up. I wasn't surprised at the co-operation. I had broken the psychiatrics' sense of control over me for one thing, and for another thing I knew the skinny guy was trustworthy.

Naturally the main doctor who was in charge of me, whom I never saw or met, wanted to see my parents before they picked me up. They stopped by to talk with him and he informed them that my leaving was a terrible idea because I was so sick with schizophrenia, according to him. He told my parents I was going to get a lot worse before I ever got better. Nevertheless my parents arrived to retrieve me from this toxic environment.

When they arrived, the mood was matter of fact about my leaving. No celebrations of a cured patient, no joy, no fears expressed either. It was just the way it was: I was leaving this place. I got my things and we went out that prison door that I loathed; we left out the front door of bedlam. I left much less trusting and a whole lot wiser.

So now I had encountered several insane sub-cultures whose specialty was messing with your head. The first was the masonry company, with their brutish antics. The second was the underground occultist, whose take on spiritual realities was that it was a device to be exploited for some perverted reason or motive. Then there was the mind bending "Christian" group counseling with its sissy preacher and childishly demonstrative wannabee charismaniacs. The other head messing group was the psychiatrics, who were just as toxic in their brutishness and whose naivety about the actual nature of reality caused them to attempt curing the perception of it. What they had in common was that they were all dangerous and controlling. All those sub –culture groups were filled with their respective forms of wrong thinking, and laid it naked before me, an eighteen year old kid. At least the doctors could be forgiven for their mistakes by virtue of their ignorance, pre-conditioning and good intentions. But the occult groups were overtly evil and perverted, having sunken themselves to the lowest degradations. It was demented to me that they could know about spiritual reality and yet face certain punishments from God.

My impressions of the Police and the Navy weren't creating much respect for their judgment either. To me, they were just another couple of irrational groups, not to be trusted.

Yet there were other parties which were messing with my head: The actual beings of the super reality. Both the being I had thought of as a spaceman, and God when I prayed, seemed to have love. Both of them somehow resonated with who I was and I liked them. But they are so confusing! I will definitely have to be cool while I investigate this apparently less toxic side of spiritual reality. My plan is to make no-one afraid and end up back in this nuthouse. Can I, being the Holy Spirit, be so crafty, cool and sublime as to never get unwanted attention? Well with my brilliant mind I was confident I would never arouse negative attention again. It makes me laugh now to think about how many times I blew that plan!

"Humiliation or Humor"

On the ride home, Mom said to me, "Johnny called and I told him you were in the psychiatric hospital. He said just as soon as you get out, to give him a call."

"You told Johnny I was in the nuthouse!" I protested. "Now everyone will know about it and think something is wrong with my brains!"

In her defense, Mom replied, "Well I didn't think you would mind me telling your friends. They care about you".

This news was really souring my day.

"My friends are exactly who I wouldn't want you to tell!"

I didn't want to have to deal with any more people thinking I was nuts, or the stigma and disrespect such notoriety gets you. More words were spoken and I was really getting down in the dumps now. This trespass had officially shredded every aspect of my whole world and there was now no hope of returning to my normal life!

Dad spoke up and said, "There are a lot of people who don't know anything about you and the only thing they have to know is what you tell them. Those who do know about it will start to forget about it and it won't be an issue. You'll live it down".

As depressed as I was now, Dads' reasoning did seem to have the ring of truth in it and I felt a teeny tiny bit better. Sure people don't focus their whole lives on me all the time. Other things will come up and this will just fade into history even among my friends. I knew it was true.

I said, "Yeh, but right now, when I get home, I don't even want to see any of my friends. I'm too humiliated and I'm tired of people thinking of me as crazy".

Dad was being really understanding of my feelings and he had a great suggestion for me: "Bryson, have you ever tried a sense of humor?"

"I hadn't thought of it" I replied.

Dad said, "Try a sense of humor. It'll make things smooth right over. You'll see".

Besides being a bit mad at the moment, I realized that Dad's idea was absolutely right. I did realize that people couldn't restrain themselves from laughing anytime I was in any kind of emotional or physical discomfort. When I hurt, people bust up with the end result that I'm endeared to them as they try to stop laughing and start apologizing. There's just something funny about me being in pain. I think I may have smiled a bit imagining the possibilities.

I said, "Okay, I'll try a sense of humor and maybe people will let the whole thing just blow over".

Dad said, "Of course they will Bryson. There's nothing to get torn up about".

You know, it really helps when somebody points the way to the truth of things once in awhile. When I got back among my friends, there were a few laughs and some story telling about my great bust out. The best funny parts were usually my exaggerated accounts of being chased through the city streets by four guys in the white coats hot on my heels! Yeh, it left me a bit of hero status and everything really was okay thanks to a sense of humor. There were lots of details about how they kept me so high I was sick of being stoned! Folks wanted to know what kind of drugs and stuff they gave me, and I really had no idea what it was; blue pills and yellow ones? My friends often tried to guess which pills it was. Oh I told them all the details with a sense of freaked out amazement at the doctors, the patients, my agony and the whole durned situation! My esteem wasn't the least bit diminished among my friends as far as I could tell.

Rex was a bit more skeptical since he was a lot deeper than most of my friends. I went to see Rex and when I arrived he greeted me and asked coyly, "Where have you been?"

I told Rex I had been in the crazy ward for a couple of weeks. Rex asked why, and I explained to him that I had been hallucinating and everyone got freaked out by the whole situation. Rex wasn't about to believe this bit of information.

In those days anything you see that you normally don't see, I referred to as a hallucination. All my encounters with the beings, I considered them hallucinations. But calling something a hallucination didn't mean it wasn't real. I thought of there being two kinds of hallucinations: Those caused by some mental process that wasn't real, and those which are really real and you just have the unusual ability or altered perceptions to see them. If a being came and appeared or "manifested", this is a "real" hallucination to my way of thinking. But if you saw something that wasn't a being and thought you did, this is a hallucination maybe the psychiatrist could deal with.

How do you tell the difference? For me it was the expressions of intelligence in the beings, the themes and scenes shown to me, the aliveness of the entities and the meaning of the scenes. I think, therefore I relate to thinking beings. Such events aren't usually called hallucinations. But this was the way I was conditioned to refer to such experiences, and the word carried no implication to me that the events were not totally real.

I don't think Rex related to my use of the word "hallucination" the way I meant it. I think he believed I was implying I had gotten some great trips off some stoner drug and was bragging about my hallucinations. After a few days Rex had thoughtfully considered the possibilities and then flatly told me, "I don't think you've been hallucinating". "Well I have to." I replied, puzzled why Rex would think I would lie about it. Rex and I were not on the same page. This was a spiritual thing in my page and on Rex's page it was a head's brag about a drug trip. Rex knew I didn't take hard drugs and so he replied, "I've smoked pot since I was a kid and it doesn't make you hallucinate. I don't believe you". I realized Rex didn't understand I was talking about parallel realities and I had never implied pot was what was causing my "hallucinations". But Rex was a thinker and leaned to the logical common sense side of things. His doubt in me wounded me to some degree since Rex was my best friend. I could have explained the distinctions, but I realized Rex wouldn't relate to it or take it serious. I let it go. This time humor didn't cover things and I was a bit humiliated by Rex. But it wasn't so bad as I had imagined.

"Hallucinations"

Speaking of hallucinations, things were getting more intense. I was beginning to see a lot more things from the other side and it was getting to be like a zoo. It was if I was being shown all the various possibilities in that dimension. However in a lot of cases it was just that, a show, without some concise expression being imparted.

There were plenty of stars still hanging around. If I decided to, I could speak to them by addressing them with my thoughts. Dark figures sort of like men, only larger and bulky, rounded in form as if visually blurred, were occasionally appearing directly before me. One of them had what appeared to be a star light in the place where you would envision a forehead on the figure. I have no idea what those beings really are. But being dark, I naturally associated them with evil. Is this a true association? I could be wrong for all I know.

Then there were the forms of animals, some familiar and some curious, that appeared with bodies of light. Some of them were translucent luminous and others were brighter and opaque, often with auras around their form which might be the same color or different.

One morning as I walked through the front yard at my parents' house, the area was filled with many forms of incorporeal things. As I walked toward a maple tree, there I saw a lucid little brown and white puppy dog happily facing me with an attentive expectation. I immediately recognized the little dog. It was Tess. I couldn't even recall what ever had happened to Tess, but it was like something was showing me her spirit lives on and is happy.

Another morning I was looking through the front glass storm door, over the front yard. Something appeared on the road and my eyes cut over to it. From out of nowhere a figure instantly appeared from behind a slit in the veil of reality. It was black as infinity with sharp edges clearly outlining its form. As soon as it appeared it was running up the road from my right to left. It was the figure of a short stout little humanlike thing, about three feet tall. It was rounded and suggested a carlish adolescent in form, but in presence it seemed ancient and evil. As it sprinted up the road, with its arms and legs flailing about its dark silhouette, the first thing I compared it to was the storybook "Tar Baby". It ran about fifteen yards and then slipped behind another slit in the curtain of reality while still in stride. It was like it had run from a slit in the material reality, to another nearby slit in which to hide itself again. The being had behaved almost like a child playing a dare to let itself be seen by me.

Then there were times when intelligent agencies would cause manifestations which seemed to be expressing something which I didn't understand. For instance there were the times such as when I was upstairs in my parent's bedroom. On the sloping white tiles of the ceiling there would appear above me a blotch of darkness that was brownish like an old dried blood stain. It wasn't actually on the ceiling tiles, but like a lucid vapor being purposefully placed there as if to convey the idea of a blood stain. What is that supposed to mean? By now I had learned the price of yielding to an over active imagination, had landed me in the nuthouse. It also seemed sensible to me to resort to the discipline of scientific thinking in which things were observed, but if there wasn't enough information, there was no basis to form a conclusion. I was resolved to simply remember these expression and if more information came with time, I might understand it in the future. But for now I realized I didn't get the meaning and just observed with the intent to recall it later if it was justified.

While none of this stuff was surprising to me, I had also resolved to be calm and not let people know what I was observing so that they wouldn't be alarmed by me. So as I observed a great variety of things not of this world, a person standing beside me would probably not even notice anything unusual about me. However I did sometimes get absorbed in my observations and people might notice I was watching something very intently. Several times people asked me what I was staring or looking at. But for the most part people didn't know what was going on with me. I was pretty good at hiding it by remaining placid appearing.

This type of thing was easy to handle. But it was the intelligent beings, which came specifically to address me personally, that was difficult on me for the most part. However they often were helpful and their prodding moved me to new levels of personal growth, despite the fact that it was often terrifying. As much as I tried to hide it, sometimes you just can't hide the fact that you are utterly terrified. God was so wise to provide us mothers, who immediately sense the trouble of their children. Mothers, who with their offerings of tenderness and love, move God to offer His compassion.

My conflicts with the occultist experiences had been rather mild in my estimation. Though being strange and repulsive, with strange incorporeal friends, with a single prayer to God, all the conflict with them was defeated. My conflicts with the psychiatric culture had been a lot more trying and intense. Yet with wit and patience, they were overcome and thrown off. But this was mild compared to what I was about to face from the beings I was about to have to deal with. I was about to face a great trial from which I received great painful inner scars, which would leave my soul and spirit injured and limping. It would even take a huge toll on my physical body and leave me diminished for many years.

"Shotgun Wedding"

Before I had a chance to face my usual friends, I took Mom's advice and returned Johnny's call after I got out of the crazy hospital. Johnny told me that he was taking a trip to Lafollette Tennessee to visit with his grandmother. He wanted to know if I would go with him for the company. This sounded like a good idea to me and would keep me away from my other friends for a little while. I was struck by the fact that Johnny didn't seem to mind or care that I was in the nuthouse. So I agreed to go with him and the arrangements were made. I packed a few things for the excursion and waited for the Johnny at the appointed time. Johnny pulled into the drive in his chariot Electra 225, and I went out and got in the car with him. We eased out of the drive and got out on the highway. I was really loving his car and played with the positions on the electric seats as we headed east toward the mountains. Johnny put on the eight tracks and we jammed as we rode. I was glad Johnny was keeping his word not to break out any marijuana as we rode since I was deciding to stop smoking it.

We drove on until the dusk came as we headed north from Knoxville. By the time we got to his Grandmother's place in Lafollette, it was good and dark. We parked on the side of the road, since his Grandmother's house was perched on the mountainside above the road. We got out, and his Grandmother's voice greeted us from above. Johnny was all filled with love as he called back, "Hi Gran' Mamma! I Love you!" Johnny set the tone for the visit right away and festive love was shared all around with much smiling and joy.

To call Johnny's Grandmother's place a house is a stretch. Actually it was a shack perched on the steep mountain side with unseen supports. As we walked up the steep path, we reached a long set of steps that went up to the front porch. As Johnny and I climbed the wooden steps, I noticed how dangerously in disrepair the steps were. I wondered if we would get all the way to the porch before a step broke and one of us got injured.

We reached the porch where Johnny's Grandmother was waiting for us, and Johnny fell on her old shoulders with a big loving hug. Johnny smothered her with kisses and repeated over and over his love for her. She was overcome with all this affection and just reveled in Johnny's loving attention with joy. Despite Johnny's tough voice, which came from being hard of hearing, and his powerful muscular build, Johnny's innocence allowed him to be childishly affectionate and you just had to smile with appreciation of his unabashed way of loving up his grandmother.

As for me, I was polite and fairly quiet, since I was kind of strung out from being in the nuthouse. Not only did I have little energy for conversation, nor much to say, I was resolved to hide all the issues facing me of late. The old lady invited us to come inside. I went in the door but it was too dark for me to see inside. I was afraid to move forward for fear of tripping. Granny asked me what was wrong, and I told her I couldn't see. She offered to turn on a light and then started messing with something slightly over her head. Just then a light came on. It put out the weakest glow that you ever saw. Obviously the bulb was not getting full power, which made me think she didn't actually have electricity, but was just getting some wasted power off of a ground wire or something that was ran to the shack from the road.

In the dim glow of the light, I made out an Elvis Presley calendar hanging on the wall. The year on it was 1958. The whole setting was kind of freaky. As we walked through her kitchen, the floor was uneven and I walked carefully. Grandmother called a man's name and a man answered and came out of a black room off to the left and ahead of us. He was a tiny old man who came out to greet us and introductions went all around. This guy was Grandmother's boyfriend. She wasn't married to the old guy.

Johnny and his Grandmother and I, sat at the kitchen table and they went to talking and visiting. They talked about all the family and old friends they both knew. Johnny asked about various people and she filled him in on all the news. I sat quietly and let them talk, since I couldn't relate to any of this. Grandmother started wanting to know about me, and Johnny told her all she wanted to know. She asked me a few questions and I answered her politely as she sized me up. I could tell she didn't seem too comfortable with me and I wondered what was bothering her. She seemed to have a problem with my name as well, and she stated she was going to give me a nickname she could say. I told her that was fine with me. Then she decided to give me the nickname of Gaylord. Gaylord! Does this old woman suspect that I'm a fag? What in the world is she thinking? Just because I'm beautiful and I'm being quiet, doesn't mean I'm a fag. Well I was too worn to worry about it and I just let her do what she wanted. I was a guest and I wasn't about to put a damper on Johnny's visit. Johnny for his part didn't understand or catch on to this kind of interpersonal dynamic, since his being hard of hearing left him naïve about a lot of things going on around him.

Johnny's Grandmother got up and went to her counter to get something. She came back to the table and sat down and put a glass on the table. Then she opened a previously unnoticed bottle of whiskey and poured herself a generous serving of liquor. I understood by this she was a partying old girl; a real fun times drinking girl from the mountains. As she and Johnny visited, I tried to estimate her age. I figured Johnny's own mother's age and added at least 17 years to that. By my guess this old woman was well in her seventies. But her mischievousness was still youthful as she often addressed me as Gaylord and seemed to enjoy picking on me. Like all girls, she just seemed to enjoy poking fun at me in particular.

Johnny and she began to make plans for the next day. Johnny wanted to see old acquaintances and she promised to take him there. She also had some places she wanted to go. She asked Johnny if they could stop by a certain friend's place, and explained that she needed to get some opium. I think Johnny missed that part of the topic because of his hearing. But Johnny assured her he would take her anywhere she wanted to go, and she was satisfied in his outpouring of love for her. But I caught that detail about the opium and asked Grandmother, "Opium? What do you want opium for?" in my surprise. She looked at me mischievously and replied with a sing song in her voice, "I been havin' trouble sleepin'. Gives ya sweeeet dreams!" Her eyes sparkled in the dim light as she smiled at me sheepishly. I had no further comment about it. I just figured this old mountain woman must have used it all her life and it was just normal stuff to her. We were after all, in the hills of Tennessee where Washington and the law didn't come.

Grandma wasn't finished with me yet. She told me she had something she wanted to sell to me. She went out of the room and returned with an object in her hands. She presented it to me, and it was a brand new fish filleting knife in a leather holder. I took it out and noticed how long and slender the blade was and that it was razor sharp. I felt like I was getting messed with yet again by yet another insane culture, mountain style. But I played along and asked her how much she wanted for the knife. She insisted I give her two dollars and refuse to let me decline. Finally I gave her the money and she was satisfied with this ritual, for what it was worth and meant to her. Personally I was feeling a bit persecuted by her. But I let it go since girls like teasing me.

Well everyone was tired and wanted to get to bed. A lot of plans had been made by Grandmother and Johnny for the next day. She escorted Johnny and me to a room with a spare bed. It was big enough for both of us to sleep on comfortably. Johnny was still gushing love for Grandmother and she had fallen into the routine of pampering and loving on him. Johnny and I sat on the bed as they exchanged love filled goodnights. Well Johnny wanted to give her a hug and kiss goodnight, and she bent down to him as his strong arms hugged her shoulders and he gave her a big old kiss on her cheek with the loving enthusiasm of a child.

She arose up from Johnny's goodnight kiss with some merriness and then she looked at me sheepishly and asked, "Do you want a goodnight kiss too Gaylord?" Well I knew she was taunting me again, but I played dumb and decided to just play along with her. So I said "Sure." She came over to me and bent down for a kiss. As she came near a set of confusions set in for both of us. Did she want to kiss me, or did she expect me to kiss her? Was she going to my right cheek or my left? She was having the same indecisions as she came closer to me. With all the head nodding that happened between her and I, that by the time the kissing came we ending up missing all our targets and gave each other a big old smooch on each others lips! I had a moment of profoundly mixed emotions as I realized I was lip locked with Johnny's old grandmother! I think she had the same feelings too. She backed up a foot or so and looked at me with marvelously vacant wonder! I was pondering the ramifications of having such a flirtatious moment with a seventy something year old girl! I decided not to tell anyone I kissed her. It was an accident. Johnny didn't seem to notice. I went to sleep.

The next morning Johnny, his grandmother and I, all descended from the shack down to the Electra parked on the road. I looked back up at the shack in the daylight, and wondered what was holding it to the side of the mountain. I sat in back and Johnny drove while his grandmother navigated and asked Johnny to take her to various places as detours to their previous plans. Johnny was so full of love for her that he instantly agreed to her every request with loving enthusiasm. We made a few uneventful stops until finally it was time to go to see somebody they had talked about the night before. I assumed we were about to go see the opium dealer.

Well Grandmother had us taking small roads and navigated us over tiny bridges until finally she had us all, and the beautiful Electra, on some dirt path in the middle of nowhere. Johnny navigated the big car so carefully and smoothly that no damage was taking place. Just when I thought things had gotten to the limit, we drove up to a stone bottomed creek, and Grandmother urged Johnny to proceed on in with the car. I was getting worried now. Johnny obeyed and eased the car down into the creek which was mostly stone and only a little water. The question was where on the other side do we drive out again? Grandmother told Johnny to make a right turn right in the middle of the creek. Johnny did as instructed, and the next thing I know, we are in a surreal situation of driving a beautiful Buick Electra 225 downstream in a creek bed! But Johnny seemed unfazed by everything and simply eased the car slowly over the ridges and drops of the creek with careful braking to ease the descent. After a few dozen yards of this, there appeared a pullout on the left bank of the creek, and Grandmother navigated Johnny to pull out there. I was relieved that we made it out of the creek and the car wasn't hurt. There were more dirt roads and finally we hit pavement again. On we proceeded until we had climbed to the top of some mountain ridge and finally stopped at a house a couple of hundred yards off the road near the very top of the ridge.

We all got out of the car and went to the house. The house was a well built white box, set on a strong foundation. Since it sat on a slope, the back of the house was considerably higher off the ground than the front. It had a large covered back porch that was about ten feet above the ground, with a long set of steps going even further down to a lower point on the ground.

The man who answered the door seemed to be in his mid forties. He was a serious looking mid sized slim man, a Scott Irish, with long thin blond hair. He invited us in after greetings with a noticeable seriousness about him. Inside, the house was clean, elegantly simple and open, well lit by all the windows. I can't recall any of the discussion until the man's daughters were called into the living room to meet us. Obediently two young girls walked enthusiastically into the room with us, and with some enjoyment made greetings with us all. What nice little girls they were. They were full of life and innocence. But the funny thing was that the older girl, who was twelve, had very light tow blonde hair like Rita's, and the younger girl who was eleven, had raven black hair. I wondered how these two girls could be sisters, and be so starkly opposite! It must be the bloodlines in these parts of the country.

After a little bit, I noticed the two girls talking happily together as they cast their glances toward me and Johnny. I figured they must be sweet on us. Then the little black haired girl, Mary, came up to me and said something with a bouncy cadence of sing song, that was so distracting that my ears and mind weren't tuned to deal with it immediately. I said to her, "What?" I focused my attention and she repeated to me, "Do you wanna' go down to the cow pon'?" I was struck by the slow rhythmic cadence of her question more than the question itself. Da da Dada da Dada da Da Da? I was amused by her sing song southerness, and replied in the same cadence back to her, "Sure! Let's go Down to the Cow Pon'!" I noticed, with a feeling of relief, that Mary was oblivious to my mockery and enthusiastically said, "Okay, C'mon!"

She took my arm and pulled as I got up out of the chair. I followed little Mary as she led me out the back door and down the long set of steps to the ground. Johnny and Mary's sister were right behind us. We started walking down the steep mountain and I noticed it was tiring to try to go easily down such a steep slope. But I followed her as we went among trees beyond the grassy slope, and then arrived at the well trodden banks of the cow pond. "There it is!" Mary said. I looked over the cow pond as if I was really interested in it and said to Mary, "That sure is a good cow pond!" Mary was quite pleased and decided that I should see more stuff if I liked this. "Do you Want to go See the Hole in the Ground?" I replied to her in mock cadence, "Sure! Let's go See the Hole in the Ground!" Mary was delighted and enthusiastically led me to another place on the mountain until she announced, "There it Is!" I looked and there it was indeed. A regular hole in the ground! I acted as if this was fascinating and asked how deep it was. Mary didn't know, so I dropped a rock in it as if to hear it falling in the hole. Mary listened too. I declared that it must be a really deep hole alright! Mary just had to agree.

Walking on the slopes had drained my energy, so I suggested we go back to the house. Johnny and the little blonde haired girl had been with us all along and they chatted between themselves the whole time. There sure was something endearing about how these young ones sweetened on me and Johnny. I was willing to be kind, but I couldn't possibly be the least bit interested. I figured once we left, it would just be a nice event for the little girls.

Walking down the slope had been tiring, but walking back up to the house was positively a workout. Curiously, the little girls seemed to run circles around me with no notice of the terrain or the effect from it. As I looked up toward the house, Johnny's grandmother walked out the back door on to the high porch to the post at the top of the steps. She just stood there watching as we all move up toward the house. As I got closer, I noticed Grandmother was smiling sheepishly at me. No doubt she was going to tease me about something again. She sure knew how to zero in on an easy target to mess with. I suppose that just getting out of the nuthouse and being drained emotionally made me a little more placid than usual. But as I climbed the steps with Mary, Grandmother eased up to ask me something discreetly with a silly grin on her face. "Did you get any sugar?" "What!" I asked with some shock. She repeated with a smile, "Did you get any sugar!" I felt my face wrinkling up in a complete scowl and I said in utter disgust and shock, "Nooooo!" Grandmother was really amused and said to me with a winking eye, "Easy sugar!" How could she possibly think I would be interested in some cute little eleven year old girl? I was both shocked and disgusted and it showed. Grandmother was really having fun picking on me. I thought to myself, "I don't go around kissing every girl in sight Granny! Good grief!"

We all went back into the house and I sat down where I had been before. The man of the house came back into the room and sat across from me with a serious quietness. His words were few and his speech clipped and almost mumbled. But I sure noticed he was looking at me and sizing me up. Then I heard him say to me, "You're alright". I've heard that buzz phrase before. It was usually associated with the sex culture, but sometimes with drug traders or other crime activity. But this time I was thinking he was sizing me up for something else. Then he said to me, "You'll do." as he sat staring at me. I thought to myself, "I'll do for what?" I was beginning to feel alarm and paranoia with this strangeness going on. I did a quick inventory of possibilities when I thought of Grandmother's question to me about getting a kiss from the young girl. Suddenly I reasoned I was in a setup and was about to get me an eleven year old wife! Could this guy really expect me to pack his girl into Johnny's Electra and take her back to Nashville?

Then Mary and her sister came back into the room with note paper and pencils. Mary asked me to write my mailing address down for her so she could write me. Johnny gave his address to her sister. I wrote mine down for Mary. I was starting to want to leave fast. "Let's go! Let's go, let's go!" I thought. "Let's get out of here!" Mary was so happy to have my address. I was afraid a shotgun was about to come out and I was about to be hitched.

Finally goodbyes were being exchanged by everyone and I preceded the relaxed group a little as we went toward the Electra. Man I was being messed with bad. We all got in the car and to my relief, made it back to the pavement without the sound of gunfire!

Mary did eventually write me a letter. In it she expressed how much she loved me and wanted to see me again. She asked me to check one of the "Yes" and "No" boxes she had made, to answer the question if I loved her. "Do you love me? "Yes" box and "No" box." Then she added the little poem, "Wrote with love, sealed with a kiss. If you love me, you'll answer this." Then it had X's and O's followed by her name, Mary Chalmers.

Despite the fact that I was facing a lot of stars and dealing with my own matters, I did find this letter to be sweetly moving and I felt sad for her that I couldn't possibly reciprocate any affection for such a young girl. Yes I felt a bit sorry for her that I could never even venture a reply in any form. She was indeed a very pretty girl, but a very young girl to me. I sadly crumpled the letter up and tossed all connections with her into the waste basket. But I never forgot Mary Chalmers, or the fear that we almost had a shotgun wedding.

"Mountain Folks"

In less than twenty four hours in the mountains with Johnny, these mountain folks were succeeding in totally freaking me out! As I rode in Johnny's car trying to recover from the alarm I felt concerning Mary and a shotgun wedding, Johnny's ancient old grandmother decided to make another request of Johnny to take her some place. I heard her ask Johnny if he would take her to see her mother! I was amazed! How could this ancient old woman have a mother who's still alive? But Johnny gushed out love and concern and agreed immediately to take her right then to go see her mother.

I started figuring on the age of Grandmother's mother. Adding about 17 year to my guess of Grandmother's age, I figure her mother had to be at least in her early nineties! Wow! I tried to picture a girl who looked older than Johnny's grandmother, and imagined a white haired and frail woman without any weight or strength, probably barely able to sit in a chair. I imagined we would see an even older and more run down shack that she lived in, or in the best case, a nursing home.

Grandmother navigated us until we came to the drive of her mother's home. As we turned in, I beheld a beautiful farm with a charming white house perfectly situated among flowering trees. That scene was against a backdrop of large trees and blue sky filling the mountain valley, and mountains rising to our right and left. Fences were white and painted in picture pristine form and the grassy fields before the house were emerald green and luscious. It was a picture of paradise. It was unbelievable for the care and beauty reflected in this farm.

Driving up toward the house, Grandmother spotted her mother and said, "There she is".

I looked and inside the fenced area around the house. I saw a small figure of a woman in a white dress, who appeared to be working in the yard while occasionally looking up at us as we approached. I instantly noticed that as soon as I was able to see her face, she didn't look very happy about our approaching.

We got out of the car and greetings were made. I couldn't have guessed more wrongly about what such an old woman would be like. This little woman was maybe five feet tall and maybe a bit less than a hundred pounds. But she was barely inclined to stop working her yard tool as we all stood near her. This little woman was strong and full of serious strength and energy. She was stern and brusque, and impatient with us. This was a real Scottish woman if I had ever seen one. It was her labor that produced this post card picture farm. She was intent on not being too interrupted by our intrusions, and she let us know by her demeanor that she didn't have a lot of time to deal with us. Stern and curt, she addressed her daughter with disapproval.

"What brings you here?" she asked Grandmother.

Grandmother took on sweet entreating tones as if to soften her own mother's disapproval. "We've come to see you Mama."

"Who is this with you?" the Great mother asked.

Grandmother replied sweetly, "This is Johnny, Pearl's boy!"

The elder woman graced her tone a bit as she spoke to Johnny and asked him caring things appropriate for a proper great grandmother. She was comfortable with Johnny and I figured with him there, she wouldn't draw out a firearm or chastise us with a yard tool.

She then asked about me, "And who is this?" with a tone of irritation and a suspicious scowl. I said nothing for fear of her. I was completely intimidated.

Grandmother spoke up as said, "This is a friend of Johnny's, Mama! His name is Gaylord."

I just could not believe this indignity or handle the embarrassment by being introduced as Gaylord. How much more of this could I take from this old grandmother who liked teasing me?

The older woman looked me up and down with suspicious expressions and disapproval. She replied, "Gaylord huh? I don't like you!"

I was amazed at the gracelessness and said nothing. Then the conversation that followed was the most bizarre thing. Two very old women started talking between themselves and this was the manner of it.

The oldest said to her daughter with a great degree of disgust and disapproval, "Are you still shacking up with that man?"

Grandmother lowered her head in shame, and answered in sweet submissive tones her confession, "Yes Mama."

I was stunned! I could barely believe I was hearing such a mother and daughter conversation in two ancient old women.

"Are you still drinking and smoking?" the mother between them demanded to know.

"Yes Mama" the daughter confessed in sweet tones.

I cant' recall the last confessions extracted from Johnny's grandmother, but there were three "Yes Mama" admissions in all. I was absolutely amazed and stunned by this demonstration of mindsets.

All the tension in the air, the hostility of being intruded upon, and the weirdness was making me nervous. Inside I was thinking, "Let's go, let's go, let's get out of here folks, let's go!" We never got another step closer to the house than where we first met the great grandmother in her yard. Good byes were exchanged, and I preceded our group a little as we went back to the Electra.

Once we got back on the road I felt a big relief and tried to relax a little. I just wasn't up to all the high strangeness of these mountain people. Johnny on the other hand, didn't seem to notice anything strange, and was as full of love and happiness as when he first greeted his grandmother when we arrived. At least Johnny was happy. I was stressed out. Though I never complained, and made it a point to allow Johnny full enjoyment of his visit, I was really glad when dusk started coming and Johnny mentioned to his grandmother, that he had to head home. Sadness and love was expressed in all the good byes and sentimental caring and bidding of love was lavishly exchanged between Johnny and his grandmother. Finally as the light waned, Johnny and I were riding slowly out of these mountains back toward the highway, and hopefully civilization. We progressed to the highway and then to the interstate. I was beginning to relax now that I was leaving these crazy Scott Irish. On the interstate I noticed there was a Pizza Hut and I told Johnny I was starving, and we pulled in to the restaurant for some food. I felt like I was back in civilization and those mountain people were now behind us.

Johnny and I went inside and placed an order. We got our food shortly. I was glad the mountain scene was over and I could relax now. Just about that time, in walked a strange looking group of characters who were acting like they were whooping it up for a night in town! Loud and boisterous, these rough looking mountains guys were acting out gleefully their pleasure at being in the Pizza Hut like it was a celebration! Their lack of social grace and their nutty demeanors started making me really wind up again. But I figured I could last long enough to finish my food. About that time I heard those Scott Irish burst out in gleeful laughter. I looked around toward them and they had made a large fire of burning napkins right on the bare surface of their table! I started thinking, "Let's go, let's go, Johnny let's get out of here, let's go!"

I suggested to Johnny we needed to make some time back home, and he agreed with me. We gathered up the rest of our food and took it with us. I preceded Johnny slightly as we went out to the Electra to leave. This time as I rode along, I didn't actually feel safe that I had left those Tennessee mountain folks behind me until we dropped out of the mountains into Wilson County. Then I began to relax and in a short while Johnny dropped me off back home.

"Secondary Benefit or Dignity"

My pride was really smarting from having been in the psychiatric ward. What was making it worse for my smarting dignity now, was that in the mind of my parents, I was pigeon holed with this perception of me, and they treated me in a childish manner. While things were plenty confusing, I was determined to use my intelligence to get to the truth of things. However when I did or said things my parents wouldn't understand, they would act as if it was their duty to not hold me accountable to reason. While they were mystified by a lot of my antics, instead of addressing what was on my mind or the situation at hand, they would remind each other in my presence, as they talked about how to respond, that I was mentally ill and to just let it slide. This patronizing made me quite angry. Did they think I was a baby? With their attitude, I could do no wrong! I could get away with anything and they would just spoil me in response. I am NOT a baby! I'm smarter and more capable than they can imagine! I will re-earn my dignity and respect from my parents and everyone else! They will see what kind of man I am!

Another issue I faced was that people responded to me with fear still. Just because they had heard or knew that I was in the nuthouse, didn't mean I was dangerous! My personal sense of dignity required that people realized that I am harmless and benevolent, wise and loving. I will prove it to them. I resolved that I would not do any of the stupid things the incorporeal beings had pressed me under spiritual duress to do. I didn't even care if I thought it was God prodding me, I would refuse to do anything which people would think was nuts, wrong, irrational or evil, and which they would have absolutely no chance of understanding.

Another result of all the events was that people would give me things as if I was a charity case. It was all part of being seen as a nut. I realized that under this condition, I could conceivable live very easily. All my needs were being supplied by others. I figured I could even sign up for some government program and get money for nothing every month. But this is no way for a man to live! A man earns his own way and takes care of himself without being a burden to others or being a charity case! Each act of charity and giving ate at my soul and agitated me. Even if circumstances forced me to accept an offer with outward gratitude and grace, inwardly I was angry and humiliated. I would turn this around! I would first carry my own load and then if I ever was able, I would help others who actually needed help! I am not a baby. I am a man!

The hope of dignity prodded me to get on top of the many issues, situations and mysteries. I had managed to use a bit of humor to smooth over some situations, but other issues were all in my face like a stinking reminder that I was a wasted life. I have a destiny and God would be on my side because I have a wonderful purpose in this material world. I will be respected! I will be appreciated! I will have dignity by applying myself to those actions and words which earn it.

I pondered the cost of yielding to the secondary benefit of being taken for a basket case. Not only would I never have dignity, but what about a sweet loving wife with which to bestow my romantic adoration upon? What self respecting woman would want a basket case? I cannot live my life without love. My experiences with Rita still intoxicated my mind and I was always in love with love from my early childhood. Being a hero like Elvis Presley, winning the car race, taking care of the bad guy, and getting the adoring and adorable girl, was what I wanted most in life from the earliest memories. All my experiences with all my girl friends which I had from even childhood, had been wonderful for me. All my girls had been sweet and harmless to me and made me drunken with love. Though I didn't have many girlfriends, or have girls attracted to me like some young guys, I did have a love interest for a large portion of my youth. All of it was sweet and wonderful to me with no bad memories at all, except for one heartbreaking over Rita! Even a heartbreaking wasn't toxic and a risk worth paying the price of, for the potential of those intoxicating moments of shared love between true lovers. I cannot give this up and I will not be a lonesome basket case! I will have the love of my life and she will love me, or life is just a desert of pain and purposelessness.

So I began the quest for dignity. As much as people pulled on me to be the role of a basket case, I resisted by taking them to higher thoughts and purposes, making these matters the relevant things to deal with. Such things not only healed me, but healed other's perceptions of me. But it was not easy since the real situation was that I had some formidable things to deal with, which tore at my spirit like a lion attacking me.

"More Bible Reading"

I was still thinking, though now reticent to say it, that I was the Holy Spirit. So I felt I still needed to study about Jesus and learn his methods. I was also intrigued by the code language of the Bible. Loving mysteries and puzzles, and having a lot of pride and confidence in my penetrating mental abilities, I tore into the Bible all the more. It was all the more confusing, and all the more I resisted thinking Jesus' role was relevant to me.

The Bible was a bit worrisome to me as well. A lot of the things it stated were literal sounding, but it just couldn't be literal! Jesus said things like cut off your right hand and pluck out your right eye! This is crazy! Surely he's not as literal as he's sounding here! I touched my eye and tugged on it trying to get a grasp on how horrible it would feel to blind oneself like that. Just a little messing with my eye really began to hurt. Does Jesus have such a hard spirit that he would want somebody to endure this torture and horror? I'm missing something here. I realized that I was obviously missing a lot. The book of "Revelations" reminded me of the sheer lack of answers I had. But I knew I would soon figure this stuff out. I had such confidence that I would have it all within a couple of months. What a laugh, looking back on such proud confidence. It only took me twenty years to understand the big picture of the Bible, forget about the minutia.

Even so, Bible terms were starting to enter my vocabulary. I was beginning to sound a bit King Jamesish to myself at times and it annoyed me. I didn't want to be a nerd or come off like a Bible freak. How socially dysfunctional is that? It's a good way to turn a lot of people off, and make you live without the dignity one seeks. But this stuff is a great puzzle just ready for me to come and solve for the rest of the world.

I had an unfair advantage as well over the rest of the world. My starry tutor was returning each time I read the Bible and pointing out things and expressing a lot in the process. All around me the star would appear and make simple dialogue through the suggestion of its proximity relevance, its colors, its place on the text, and even the form it would morph into besides a star. I realized God had sent me a special teacher and that makes me very special! Yes being the Holy Spirit has its benefits! The world will extol me in amazement!

What ever happened to those fears about being sacrificed for others salvation? Well for some reason I figured I must have misunderstood the question. Besides it looked like the Apostles were pretty adamant that Jesus had already been there and taken care of that. Evidence was mounting that I really didn't need to worry about that. At least I was optimistic enough to surmise that it wasn't my fate, and move onward with that hope.

One thing that was really impressing on me was the need to "repent". Was this some kind of act of contrition or what? Was it just deciding to be sorry? John the Baptist and Jesus both just kept hammering on this point. The context of people who repented, defined it as people who decided something they were doing was wrong, and they stopped doing it. Well I must be repented then. I'm trying to live perfectly! God and I are going along great!

"The Red Vial"

I came home in the early evening and after a little while my mother happened to mention to me that Dad had a strange experience while I was gone. I asked her what had happened. She told me that as Dad was going up the stairs to his room, at the top of the stairs against the slatted closet door, Dad saw an apparition. She went on to describe that what he saw was like a small bottle, like a medicine bottle of some kind, and that it was glowing red. I went and asked Dad about this, and he confirmed that he had seen exactly that. He said that it somehow alarmed him, as if to say that something wasn't right about this small bottle. It had been glowing red and it alarmed him. Then it disappeared. Dad then told Mom what had just happened to him.

I looked at Dad and he looked a bit grave and serious. The idea that he had seen what looked like a small medicine bottle, reminded me of my pill bottle that had the root fiber in it. I had stashed it away and not really thought about it since. In this case, the color red definitely was implying the meaning of either anger or danger. In either case the meaning wasn't so good. I took it that some intelligent being was expressing its disapproval of my batch of root fiber and was either offended or warning of danger. I didn't tell Dad about the connections I was making. After we talked, I simply went and got the pill bottle of root fiber, and privately disposed of it. I wasn't the least bit interested in the stuff and it had been an exercise in futility. But the idea that something was upset with me even trying the root fiber was enough to settle the issue for me.

Another thing that gave me some comfort was that this time, it was Dad who was having the hallucination. Well since he had one, I hoped he would be a little more open minded to my experiences. However this didn't usher in an era of sharing between Dad and me. He wasn't comfortable with such matters and I realized it was still risky. So I generally tried to keep my experiences to myself, even though Dad himself had an experience of his own.

"The Purple Messenger"

By now it was getting near summer and the urge to get out was in me. I arrived at Rex's house early in the afternoon and Rex's wasn't home. But Ike was there, so I went in and sat down in one of the living room chairs. Ike was sitting in the recliner a couple of feet to my left and was watching the television in the corner. I watched it a little, when all at once Ike said enthusiastically, "Bryson! Let's smoke a joint!" He pulled out some stash and immediately started rolling one up.

Now I should have expected this, but I felt a moment of internal questioning? If I'm the Holy Spirit, and trying to be perfect, is smoking a joint what I should do? But as I watched Ike rolling one up, I sure did want to smoke one. Thoughts of justifying it went rapidly through my mind like: God made marijuana! I was also strongly disinterested in creating waves or drawing negative attention to myself. Besides, Ike was a personality type that intimidated me to some degree, which made me not want to go against the flow of things either. Ike fired that baby up and took a long draw and held it in, with his dragon eyes squinting as his face wore a slight smile of satisfaction. He handed the joint my way. By now I was thinking that thing was caviar, cheese and wine. I took it and hit it pretty good. Back and forth we passed it until it was ashes. The first thing I noticed was this grass was some really good stuff; nice and strong but not as harsh as some stuff. The slightly sour taste had me guessing its origin was probably some homegrown Tennessee stuff, grown from redbud seeds or something, since it was a darker weed. But it was a very pleasant batch and I acknowledged the quality to Ike, who nodded to agree with a grin on his face.

Something caught Ike's attention that was playing on the television, and he got absorbed in it while sipping on a beer. Not to be rude, I let Ike watch the show and I just sat back to relax and enjoy the good strong buzz with a feeling of the world lifting off my shoulders. It was good as I sat there facing the television, but not really paying attention to it. That is, good until somebody came knocking on my door.

As I sat there, I noticed a round purple light, about the size of a softball, was appearing in various places around me. Obviously it was trying to get my attention. So I addressed my thoughts to it with a greeting and a question of who it was. What are you? The purple light made me understand it was a messenger. What is the message? The light informed me that I wasn't living perfect. Well I'm working on it I replied. I'm repenting of evil things. But the purple messenger, hovering right in front of me, made a clicking sound and out from it flew a tiny bright yellow spark that arced over and then fell toward the floor right into the middle of an oval red shag rug that Rex had on the floor. I looked at the spark as it fell and the red shag rug suddenly symbolized the lake of fire. The yellow spark was obviously supposed to be me! The royal light had just thrown me into the lake of fire! It's telling me if I don't straighten up, I'm cooked!

Out came issue after issue the purple light had with my conduct. I was on trial here all of the sudden. I tried bargaining with it and tried to stretch the boundaries, asking it hypothetical situations over and over. Over and over when the purple messenger disapproved of my thoughts, out went the tiny yellow spark of my soul down to the red shag lake of fire! Here I was being called out by some royal thing from God on my mistakes, and I was high! For the first time ever, I felt paranoia while high. The Purple messenger was ruining my high! My fate was being decided and it didn't look so cool according to this messenger of light. In fact my fate looked really hot! If God took the trouble to send this purple light messenger thing to call me out, he must be really serious! I don't want to be condemned, and yet here I am as good as cooked according to this being! My buzz was utterly ruined now and I felt sick with fear. But I refused to let it show. No matter what I was experiencing, I wouldn't let people see it happening to me.

I sat there in that chair paralyzed with fear, but coolly pretending to be absorbed in the television. Ike noticed that I was really quiet and so he spoke up and asked me if I was alright. I told him I was fine, and I went back to pretending I was focusing on the television. But the truth was I was begging God for another chance! "Just don't punish me before I come down from being high! I'll never smoke pot again! I won't be hypocritical! I'm sorry for all the other things too! I didn't realize they were wrong or that bad! Don't strike me dead and burn me up!"

I was craving to come down from the effect of the joint we had smoked. I was feeling so guilty before God while still under the effects of it, that I felt I couldn't be properly remorseful until it had worn off and I was in a non-hypocritical position to say I was sorry about it. But while still high, I just knew I would be a cooked goose if God judged me right in the act of getting a buzz. Can you say: PARANOID?

I was in no condition to be good company about this time, so I coolly told Ike I appreciated the buzz, but I think I'll be going. I needed to take my mind off all this and even try to stop noticing the high until it wore off. I went out to my old Buick and calmly drove out of there and drove around trying to distract my mind from being high and being afraid of being condemned.

Gradually as I came down, I began to realize God wasn't dropping the gavel on me right this instant. I realized I was being given another chance and I was more resolved than ever not to blow it. But now the idea of condemnation had entered the picture. I was trying to be perfect, but apparently not perfect enough. Now God was pouring the heat on me. But if I'm the Holy Spirit, why would God be so tough about the issues of sin with me? Why would the idea of condemnation even be discussed? That wasn't such a good way to handle somebody on his team. But the one good thing about it was, that the idea that I could be sent to the red shag lake of fire based upon my own sins, certainly contradicted the earlier concept of my being sacrificed in the place of others. I felt better about that old issue now. I also asked myself and concluded, "Why be warned of something bad unless the option of escaping it was indeed a valid option?" Yes the two scenarios the beings had brought me, one of being sacrificed to take the punishments of others, and the second of being condemned as punishment for my own wrongs, struck me as irreconcilable if expressed in me alone as just one person. I had to be in either one situation or the other; but not both. I latched on to being the sinner facing my own punishments idea, because at least if I reformed, I had a chance. But the concept of being a chosen sacrifice for others, offered little hope of escaping the punishments, which I didn't like one bit.

With a great relief I laid the idea of being sacrificed for others to be saved, to rest once and for all. But the new situation was that I didn't have a free pass to heaven either. If I was going to avoid the red shag lake of fire, I had to be more perfect than ever, and save my own soul! This is getting hard to do!

One thing I did notice was that God was more than willing to give me encounters when I was high; like when I saw the star over the door or now with this purple messenger of light. People, who might hear me tell about it someday, would never give me any credibility because it happened while I was high. Why didn't God wait until I wasn't high to give such strong expressions, so that people might believe me? Maybe God is doing this on purpose like the occultist: Giving people a served on the platter reason to not believe something in order to remain hidden from those he wants to be hidden from. Well for whatever reason, surprisingly enough, it didn't seem to be an issue to God that I had been high when he sent messengers to me? Whatever people would think, was not the primary consideration to God, or controlled his decisions or timing.

Now I was facing two issues concerning my love of marijuana: With God around, I wasn't enjoying it because of the self conscious paranoia and the strange messenger sent to let me know I was being held accountable even to the punishments of eternal doom. The second was the credibility issue that came as excess baggage with smoking marijuana. I was already dealing with people thinking I had become mentally ill eating at my credibility, and surely the pot thing would do the same. The one person who would be the exception of pot creating a credibility issue concerning hallucinations, was my close friend Rex. He simply didn't believe a word I said since he figured pot couldn't make you hallucinate, which is what he thought I was claiming. That was the exact opposite logic most people would have for not believing me.

Primarily, I didn't want to go to the red shag lake of fire. But I really liked marijuana! The purple messenger just let me know I could be punished for a lot of the issues it brought up, which I can't recall what they were. But did it say something about marijuana? Well it certainly ruined it with paranoia, and now I doubted I would ever enjoy marijuana again without being unbearably paranoid that God is watching me.

"Keep of the Stars"

Now the companies of the stars were staying with me virtually constantly. Much of the time they could be seen in multitude as I went about in my doings. When I went to Rex's house they really showed themselves. When I lay down in my room, they swam in the air and marched along the edges of the room as if they were soldiers guarding me. I could look into an empty place in the mid air, such as a few feet in front of me, and the stars would appear exactly where I looked. They would appear in various colors. They responded to my thoughts by appearing in colors and with appropriate timing to be relevant to my thoughts, creating a dialogue in this way. They also telepathically whispered complete thoughts into my head. Those stars remain with me to this very moment.

Once when I decided I was going to do something sinful about this time, I noticed all the stars vanished away and were nowhere in sight. It was a clear message they were present only on condition of my attempt to live perfectly. In spite of this, I kind of liked the fact that they would leave me and everything would be normal again, except that I was being sinful on purpose. When I repented of my behavior and fairly loathed myself, the stars returned as I resumed the quest for perfect conduct. Such comings and goings meant, to me, that these star beings had something to do with being on God's side. I could address them and they would begin responding to me all the more. But it was all so weird and a lot of the things they would convey to me stressed me out; sort of like the purple messenger had stressed me out.

It seemed also the stars would put me up to things I didn't want to do. If I decided to play along, they left me in inconvenient and foolish situations. Having trust in the stars was very difficult because of the situations they sometimes compelled me by force of duress into. But defying them seemed almost like defying God or something, since the stars seemed to be concerned with such spiritual matters and responded to thoughts concerning God.

I believed it was also the star beings that were running through my hair a lot and tickling my scalp which was a constant reminded of the phrase, "Something's getting in my hair", which was now a buzz phrase for me.

Being obsessively compelled with curiosity, I would dialogue with the stars often as in almost constantly. I would ask the stars what and who they were, and I would get answers like "God". They seemed to have a lot of ego about them.

Gradually, I began to notice more and more the hassle of the stars effect upon my state of being, and it wasn't good. As I directly addressed the star beings, I would become stressed out by them until it got to the point they made me ill. Whatever and whoever they were, they weren't fun and games. One of the things that most stressed me was they were constantly wanting me to take off my clothes. They would coerce me by suggesting God wanted me to do this and I had to obey. But I not only didn't want to take off my clothes and be a shameful spectacle. I could just see myself going back to the nuthouse. I complained to the stars concerning such demands, but they had no sympathy for my situation. They suggested to me that I would be invisible. I had been in the presence now of several beings which could be invisible. But I had absolutely no faith in the idea that I could walk around naked and these stars would somehow hide me from peoples' perceptions. They also suggested that if I killed myself, I would be a free entity without the body, yet just as conscious. Not only was that idea horrifying to me, it sounded perverse. Besides I would be too chicken to do something like that even if I had believed these star things, which I didn't.

Though it was oppressively stressful thinking I might be defying God by defying these star things, I had made a strong commitment to myself I would not do anything that would appear crazy to people, with my realization that people couldn't possibly understand. Because of all the stress, I felt bad vibes from the largest portion of my interactions with the star beings. They were getting to the point of bothering me for the most part, and I was beginning to be depressed from the stress of dealing with their many coercive proddings.

Were they good or were they evil? They seemed a bit of both to me, though I was afraid to call them evil. There was enough connection to holy things like God, living right, and having one of them tutor me in the Bible, that I was afraid to denounce them over the things they stressed me out about, lest I be denouncing God. I realized there were many individual entities among them, and one of them even claimed to be God. But they all look the same to me, like stars or sparks that appear at times or just stayed present as if just hanging around. Maybe some of them are good and some of them are just yanking my chain! I can't tell by just looking at them which ones are good and which ones are not. All I can do is talk to them and try to decide; even if it's my place to decide. Maybe they are all good or maybe they are all evil. How would I even know since everything is so mystical and religiously centered, and "rational conventions" of morality could expect to be challenged by things which are still spiritually good by God's economy?

Not only were these starry beings telepathic, something about their presences made me ill at times. It could be accounted to just the stress they gave me I suppose. But to me it seemed to be more than that. It was if the very act of interacting with some of them telepathically somehow clashed with my brain and made me start feeling ill. I theorized that maybe their vibes or whatever it was that they used to speak or to appear, was discordant with my natural healthy brain patterns. Maybe they were just malicious and could reach into my head with their incorporeal wills and just mess with my head like a lemon on a juicer. What ever it was about them, the pattern that they often made me feel ill, even head swimmingly ill at times, was obvious to me. I later coined the phrase, "the psychodynamic effect of spirit", to suggest spirit beings have a direct effect on the mentality and physiology of humanity, for the better or worse it. But not all of them affected me this way. The one which came in my Bible for instance: This star seemed particularly helpful and very interested in showing me things and in clarifying things I didn't understand.

Now you can picture that around this point in the unfolding of the events, I was walking about with a number of stars in proximity to me at any given time. Other people didn't see them, but I saw the stars always, and they were there.

I mentioned that I still have them around me, and this is true. But these days I pretty much refrain from addressing them and starting any dialogue. There is the occasional exception to that though. It would be a brief exception though, because I'm so wary of them. I observe them often and have some comfort in their presences, but they are not who I seek.

"Sunshine Says it's Wrong"

Life is really changing a lot and I'm changing with it. I was so proud to be on God's side, now that a new purpose in life was really inspiring to me. I was pretty much living down the stigma I perceived, from being in the nuthouse. On top of that I had found the courage to consider myself a force of good, to make a stand and proclaim to those I knew, "I'm on God's side."

Once Johnny showed up at Rex's house and a friend was with him. She was a petite teenage girl with short blonde hair and a rather organic overall presence. It was like she was a country girl, who had just happened to not live in the country. But with her casual cotton clothes, her bare feet and short un-styled blond hair, she certainly had a humble persona. She was a friendly thing and soon she and I were talking on about things that teens usually carry on about. As she wanted to know more about me, I told her that I was on God's side. She approved of that by saying, "Nothing wrong with that." I was struck by this response because it hadn't occurred to me that a person would have a value consideration about it that would even weigh out if there was something wrong with it or not. It was just another realization for me, that God is polarizing in the minds of people.

Johnny and his friend visited for awhile, and as the afternoon wore on they decided they had other places to be. The young girl was polite and humble and told us she was glad to meet us, and she went with Johnny out to his Buick Electra. They got in and glided out to the road and silently eased away. I was thinking as they left, that she was a sweet girl and a warm friendly soul. It had been a pleasure to meet her. She was like sunshine.

It must have been at least a few days later, that I decided to stop by Johnny's place, which was a second story one bedroom apartment, in a U-shaped building in which the balcony, going all around the inside of the U, made it easy for all the residents to see each other and socialize. It was afternoon and a sunny comfortable day. Everyone was feeling festive when I arrived and a lot of people were outside, just hanging around, bantering, playing music and visiting each other. Johnny was out on the balcony himself with several friends, offering beer to acquaintances who passed by in his overtly festive and inclusive manner.

While I was hanging around with Johnny on the balcony and gabbing with people, who came wondering up but Little Sunshine and a friend of hers. She was as friendly as usual and glad to see me again. Before a half hour had passed, somebody broke out a joint and it was time to relax and really enjoy the good vibes. The joint was fired up and passed around. I considered it for a second, and I just couldn't resist. I took it and toked a nice indulgent pull and handed it off to somebody. I guess I hit it a couple of more times and I noticed Little Sunshine was obviously watching me with a peering look of scrutiny.

Out of the blue, Sunshine said to me, "I thought you said you were becoming a Christian." I hadn't exactly called myself a Christian, but it was close enough I suppose to what I am. So I answered her, "Well yeah I am." Then Sunshine asked me with real seriousness, "Then what are you doing smoking that joint?" Sunshine was really hitting me at my weak point. I was trying to find a way to justify it, but the truth was, I wasn't so sure if I should be indulging in this or not. Well if my buzz was going to be ruined, at least it was a harmless sweet girl instead of a Purple Light casting my yellow spark of life into the red shag lake of fire over and over. But Sunshine had actually gotten my attention. I saw her courage and proudly admired her. I wanted to know what this earnest young lady really thought, so I asked her very seriously, "Do you really think Marijuana is wrong?"

I'll never forget that cloud of stress that came over that little ones face. She didn't want to be on the spot. Her eyebrows furrowed with humiliation, stress and a bit of genuine embarrassment. I felt her discomfort with a bit of compassion in my heart, but there was nothing to say or do until she answered. She lowered her head as she stood there with me, looking down in humility; she nodded a bit and said, "Yes."

I have to tell you, I was filled with admiration for this humble little lady. I was called out, and now it was my turn to feel a bit humiliated, which I did. I've been corrected by a gentle young girl, who ever so much didn't want to correct me, but stumbled into it. I wasn't convinced her opinion was right. She did make it obvious though, that people perceive smoking dope as a contradiction to being on God's side. The issue was getting so complex, and now I wasn't enjoying the buzz again. This God issue was ruining my highs. The prospect of giving up marijuana was really bothering me. I just didn't want to, but the possibility loomed upon me.

"The Last High"

I looked all through the Bible, and even used some reference tools to find out what it said about marijuana. The problem with the Bible, I realized, is that it simply doesn't cover all the issues of life. I guessed they didn't think about things like marijuana back in those days. It was a funny thing though, that a complete book supposedly from God would leave out such a significant part of our human experiences. Well maybe there's some principle or something I needed to find out about. I felt guilty when I got high, but I really didn't want it to be wrong.

When I went to visit Rex I would end up high even if I said I was trying to quit. If I was with Johnny, I got high. Everyone I hung out with seemed to think I was a big joker and was quite amused whenever I told them I was quitting. I guess my reputation was larger than my intentions with people, and it came off as a joke when I told them, "I'm quitting." Everyone would instantly laugh at the idea and look at me slyly. Well my heart just wasn't into quitting and I crumbled to temptation easily in the presence of my friends, who all seemed very happy to offer me some since I didn't have any of my own lately. They were loving friends.

On one of my walks, Apollo Oldham spotted me and came driving up in his funky sharp old Chevy. He was a cool dude, and his sunny shining face was all smiles as usual. His face was all full of the expectations of having a great time. He asked me what I was doing. I told him I was just goofing off and had nothing planned. He told me to jump in the car and off we went. We drove out of the usual stomping grounds around the lake, and headed toward urban Madison Tennessee, which is north of Nashville. We ended up at his grandmother's house and went on in.

What was on my mind when we showed up there, was that this house was the place were Sandy Oldham, who was a step brother of Apollo's, had committed suicide. I went into the living room where the event had occurred, and I looked for signs of the event. There seemed to be no visible evidence of the tragedy, which made me feel a bit less uncomfortable. It was a strange feeling though, knowing what had occurred in this house's living room, as I imagined the events taking place.

I thought about my memories of Sandy. Once I had gone up to the A-Frame bar in my old Buick. It had been over a year previous. I was too young to go inside at the time. But a lot of the patrons and my friends were hanging around outside with stereo speakers placed on the tops of the cars, and Eric Clapton eight tracks playing. Sandy was there and with him I noticed his very beautiful girl friend. She was a sweet looking girl with very long and full chestnut hair. She was adorable.

While hanging out in the parking lot, another girl came up to me to get acquainted and just gab. She was a sweet girl who was overweight. But she was a happy person and we talked friendly. She stated something to the effect that she would like to go somewhere and do something. I was feeling generous and asked her where she would like to go. She named some place around the Vanderbilt campus; a club of some sort. Well I suggested that we just do that and away we went. Yes she was a chubby girl, but I just liked her outgoing personality and wanted her to have a blast.

I used my fake I.D. to get into the club with her and we had a good time listening to the band and drank a couple of drinks together. I later took her back to our neighborhood and the evening with her ended. It had been fun.

A week or so later I stopped back at the A-Frame again and folks were outside as usual. As soon as I got out, Sandy started shouting to me in front of everyone. "Hey Bryson, I heard you went out with that o' sweat hog Betty! Man what are you doing? I wouldn't touch her with a ten foot pole!"

I stood there looking at this drunken redneck fool and didn't say anything. But I thought to myself that he certainly had a big mouth. I also wondered why he thought anything I did was any of his business. Then I was amazed at his high mindedness, since he had a very beautiful girlfriend who was very sweet, and yet he would talk about another girl in such insensitive ways: To call her a sweat hog and act like he was too good to be around a pariah like her. I decided that Sandy having a pretty girlfriend had gone to his head in the extreme. He disgusted me.

It was a few weeks later that I got the news that Sandy killed himself. Apparently his very beautiful girlfriend had broken up with him. I'm sure she had her reasons. But Sandy was distraught and went to his grandmother's house and shot himself in the head. And to think, this guy was the same guy who put me down for being sweet to a girl who just wanted to have fun; then he goes and kills himself over a girl. Sandy's ex-girlfriend apparently had a lot a trouble dealing with Sandy killing himself over her. I heard it messed her up pretty bad.

The next thing I know, Apollo was breaking out a joint and said, "Let's burn one." I felt a sinking feeling and I said to Apollo, "I've quit." Apollo looked at me with the most amused expression, and his eyes were full of the message that he just knew I was joking around. Smiling, Apollo lit that joint right up, took a big toke with a bit of a grimace, and handed it to me. I looked at that thing for a second, and I just couldn't resist. I wanted to get high. I also felt cheap and weak about myself giving in because of the peer pressure. None of my friends believed me when I said I was stopping.

I got good and high. Apollo seemed right contented and I appeared to be. It was a good stout joint. The problem was that on the inside I was in turmoil. I started feeling so guilty, the next thing I knew I was apologizing to God again. I figured at this rate, I was bound to be running out of second chances, and God was going to finally get tired of my games and send me straight to the red shag lake of fire.

Apollo and I went driving around afterwards, and passed by a big huge church building called, Madison Church of Christ. I looked at it and thought of God. By now I really wanted another chance from God. There was now a realization that made me feel ashamed: I realized that I just was too weak to stand the peer pressures of my friends. As we drove back toward my neighborhood, the decision was made: I'm too weak around my friends and I'm going to drop all of them until I get my own personal strength and can handle these situations. I knew this was going to take a long time. But I just had to quit getting high and feeling like the world of guilt was on my shoulders. One consolation was that I knew not getting high, would give my words more credibility among those who concern themselves with God.

"Seeking New Friends"

The admission to myself that I was too weak to not smoke pot when I got around my friends, had been made. With time and distance from my friends, I hoped for my personal fortitude to grow stronger so that some future time would find me able to deal with such issues without such an internal struggle.

In the meantime, I couldn't see myself being isolated without any friends. I noticed some people I knew from school days who happened to be at the Waffle House, so I stopped in and socialized. There was Gary Seaborn, who was a big tall obese fellow with a heart of gold, an intelligent mind, and a playful spirit that was like an eleven year old boy inside him. Also there was Gary's beautiful younger sister, Darlene, who was a waitress there at the Waffle House, and who always wore a flower style hairpiece. Darlene was quite lovely and her presence gave the room a sense of joyfulness. Also among the school friends I knew, there was Amy and Burt Grey, who are brother and sister. I met other people in my age group such as the character, Tony Haynes, who smoked incessantly, drank coffee by the pot, and drew on napkins. Tony's imagination was far from practical. He had many of his great inventions all diagramed out on a stack of napkins that became so precious to him, that he carried them with him all the time. As friendly as Tony was, he spoke too softly and was hard to hear. When I did hear him, the topic was usually his plans for the next great project. I found this very tedious and couldn't listen for too long because Tony made it a laborious effort to hear him.

I had discovered the Waffle House in all its redeeming nature. It was a place to go hang out; to make and be with friends. Inside those diner walls there was not a sign of marijuana, though out in the parking lot you could never tell what young people might be up to. But I felt safe from my former friends by being there, and I was distracted from boredom, having an enjoyable time, and most importantly, was away from the pot scene.

There were a couple of problems with this though. It cost money to buy colas and I simply didn't have much money. Things like seeing talking stars, having hallucinations, and getting thrown in the nuthouse, had interrupted my occupational activities. I bummed pocket money off my mother to buy drinks, who I suppose would have rather given me a dollar or two to hang at the Waffle House, than to be gone all over the country side with my old friends. However, the issue of money was somewhat abated when I discovered that you could buy coffee just once, and they would just give you refills over and over and not charge again. I ordered coffee.

Waffle House coffee was part of a solution to the next problem I was having. I really wanted something, anything, to get a buzz off of. I was craving a nice fat joint, but there was none of that here at the Waffle. It occurred to me that people drink coffee and use it like a drug. I figured I would try it and see if it can substitute in some way for the high I was craving. I took a cup of coffee with the intent to experiment with it and try to get a buzz. It was inconveniently hot and I had to let it cool off. I put sugar in it and tried it. It was awful! I grabbed some creamers and dumped them in. Well at least that made it tolerable and I can get the coffee down now. One cup didn't have much of an effect. I thought to myself, "This is lame!" I tried another cup and the slow ritual of cooling, sweetening and creaming was repeated. I drank it, and noticed that coffee made you need to go to the bathroom pretty often. It was harder to hold than beer. After a couple of cups, I took assessment of any sign of a buzz. I sat there trying to feel anything. It was very subtle, but I think I did notice a kind of gentle feeling of lightness. But there was no dizziness or euphoria! Well I do kind of feel a bit like smiling. This stuff is lame! Stems and seeds! Maybe another cup will do the trick. I drank coffee until I did notice I was undeniably jittery and wanting to jump out of my seat. I thought to myself, "Hmmm, not exactly in the same league as a good joint, but it has some subtle charm to it. I'll never make it! If coffee is all I have, I just ain't going to make it!" But at least by this time I didn't feel like I just had to have a joint.

Another problem with the Waffle House is that the side effect of drinking coffee, made me unable to refrain from spilling the beans about myself. As much as I wanted to not let it show, before long every detail of my recent embarrassments was out. People were amused with this young nut. Guys teased me and as usual, my pain is very amusing to people. They all liked me, patrons and employs alike, especially the young girls, despite the fact that I was so confused; as made so overtly evident under the influence of the powerful truth serum they call Dine More Coffee!

Naturally all my confusion was attributed by the crowd, to my having too many hard drug trips. Big Gary was only too willing to broadcast that I was the biggest stoner around this area. Every psychedelic substance known to mankind, Gary made sure everyone there knew, I had burned out all my brain fuses on one too many of each kind. Well there is a perverse pride of being thought of as a head with the knowing authority of experience about fantastic drug tripping. But I protested out of obligation to sincerity. I was not such a mystical figure of drug altered perception as I was being billed as. I smoked pot a lot, and was willing to admit it. But this just convinced the crowd I was being coy! My brain fuses were obviously popped and it all added up for them. Nevertheless, nobody offered me any marijuana and I was so glad about that.

There was another side effect of coffee that was a bit disconcerting. I would stand up, pay my bill, go out to my car and drive a block up to the first traffic signal, and then realize I had left the Waffle House. "Why did I leave? Why am I driving? What is happening to me? I think I'm safe to drive. I'm going to have to watch out for this!"

"Son of God Test"

By now my Bible investigations were moving along and I had read the four Gospels, and then even branched out into other passages just to see what might be there. I had a method of just opening the Bible and reading the first thing I saw. I was thinking that if some cosmic control was being exercised, that God would cause me to read a verse that pertained to me right then and there. I've heard jokes about people who read the Bible like this and what it leads too. But at that time it seemed like it was absolutely meant for me to read the words my eyes fell upon.

One passage that I latched onto that did seem appropriate, was a passage about testing the spirits. It read, "Every spirit which confessed the Son of God has come in the flesh, is of God." Maybe this would give me some clue about the beings I was encountering. You've probably noticed I'm quoting the verse wrong here. But this is the way I had it in my mind and this is how I used it at the time.

At this point I began to interject this question into the dialogue I was having with the star beings, or the bird voice, or any other thing which happened to talk to me. The problem was that I would ask them who they were, and get vagueness. So I would ask them if they were God. To this question, most of the time, the entities would readily claim to be God. But I wasn't convinced. I would pull out my test question and ask in a manner typical of this: "If you're really God, do you confess that the Son of God has come in the flesh?"

You would think it would be comforting to have the ability to distinguish between good and bad spirits with a simple question. But in my case, over and over I would pose this question to the entities, and none of them would affirm Jesus! Only silence came from this question. Not the bird voice, not the starry ones, none of them, would agree that the son of God had come in the flesh. Well there is one exception: The starry one that appeared all over the pages of my Bible, who seemed to identify himself to John the Apostle; this one seemed to be a big advocate of Jesus. This one was always pointing out things about Jesus and trying to make me apply it to myself, even though I'm the Holy Spirit. But all the other ones would be quiet on the question of the Son of God. This was not comforting in the least. The reason was that I felt I was surrounded by evil beings who would not talk about Jesus being the Son of God. Why would God let a lot of evil beings come around me? I was getting kind of worried that maybe God was mad at me and was putting me in the company of beings I was already condemned to spend eternity with.

I wasn't sure of course, but the idea was a worry to me. Fear of the spiritual beings and the ramifications of having evil ones around me, was beginning to erode my certainty that God and I were alright with each other. It ate at me. With time it became a debilitating fear.

"Duress of the Bird"

One afternoon I was relaxing on the couch at my Dad's house. I heard the familiar voice of the bird outside calling from a large oak tree just outside the house. I addressed the bird voice in my thoughts, trusting it was quite telepathic. I asked it who it was. It didn't answer. So I asked it in a yes and no context in which a response was yes, and no response was no, "Are you God?" It answered yes. "Do you confess that Jesus is the Son of God?" It didn't answer. "But you say you're God?" It answered yes. This was creepy since it claimed to be God, but wouldn't confirm Jesus. I was getting suspicious that this being was evil, but I wasn't sure. Just being suspicious of it though, was enough to make dreadful thoughts about what the ramifications of having evil around me, meant to my eternal soul. It made me feel condemned already. I wanted to tell the being to go away. But how could I insult God if it did happen to be him? What had happened to the friendly spaceman behind the voice of the bird? Had something else decided to take his place?

Then in the round about of the dialogue, there came up another issue that just paralyzed me with apprehension. The voice of the bird was wanting me to take off my clothes and go around naked. If this is God, I was afraid to disobey. Yet I had enough doubt that it was God, that I wasn't ready to obey either. Above all else I resented how I was being asked to do something crazy. I had a commitment to myself that I wasn't about to do something that people wouldn't understand, and end up getting myself committed into the nuthouse. I told the bird being that I didn't want to do that. I don't want to be a disobedient servant of God, but I don't want to take off my clothes either.

The pressure was enormous to me. Was I disobeying God and the ultimatum was the condemnation of my soul? I shook with fear, yet clung to the shred of doubt that this thing was actually God. I prayed to God and told him I didn't want to go about naked. But there was no relief from the issue. I didn't take off my clothes, but chose to suffer with the duress, with the thread of my suspicion that I was being tricked by an evil being. But even having evil around was no comfort to the issue. Am I condemned? I was in a no win situation. On one hand I was condemned if I was disobeying God, on the other I was already consigned to the company of demons. or if I humiliated myself and got naked, I would end up in the nuthouse again. My sprit was dying under these no win conditions of spiritual duress. I was feeling hopeless and terrified. Some tyranny was bringing me within its clutches to torment me.

One afternoon my Dad found me behind the garage out behind the house. He sat down on a stack of firewood beside me and asked me, "What's going on?" I told Dad that a bird was talking to me. He asked me what I thought it wanted. I told Dad that the bird wanted me to take off my clothes. Dad assessed the situation sensitively, and then offered me the suggestion to just ignore the bird. I told him I was afraid to ignore the bird's voice. I was thinking the bird may just be God. I told Dad that I didn't want to take off my clothes and didn't intend too. I realized this was crazy sounding to Dad, and I felt some assurances were in order and due him. After I reassured him, Dad got up and left me alone. Dad simply didn't know what to say to me or do for me. I was on my own.

"They Talk to Me"

The stress of fearing for my soul was making me sick. Was I disobeying God, or was I already consigned to spend my existence in the company of demons? Whatever it was, I was beginning to dread God. Feelings of anger and resentment would cause me to lash out at God in my thoughts that weren't even framed as prayer. I told God all kinds of awful things about how I felt about his existence at this point. I was under the grip of tyranny and I was sick with anxiety. Even the stars now had joined the feast of duress upon me, with all of them wanting me to take off my clothes.

In the afternoon I was on my bed, filled with amazed dread, when Dad came into the room and sat on the bed beside me. He asked me what was bothering me. I told Dad that I was seeing stars. He didn't know that they appeared in various colors to suggest meanings, that they were telepathic. He didn't know what fearful dreadful things they were confronting me with. When I expressed my desire to be saved, they informed me that I was condemned already and to just give it up. The prospect of facing that lake of fire was terrifying me. I couldn't live knowing I was destined to eternal punishment. I wanted to die and end all the suffering right now, except that dying would only hasten me to more suffering all the more immediately.

Again my poor Dad made the suggestion to just ignore the stars I was seeing. I told Dad that I couldn't ignore them. He asked me why. I answered him, "Because they talk to me!" Dad just sat there on my bed for a minute or two, feeling helpless. He finally got up and silently left the room.

I lay there with all the stars hovering around me. "Give up!" That was what they delighted to express to me to my torment.

"The Serpent Watchers"

Shortly after Dad had left the room, a crescendo of duress seemed to be being applied to me. I was now most obsessed with not wanting to go to hell, more than any other concern. As I trembled and dreaded under the duress, I was looking at the green ceiling as I lay on my bed. Just when I thought I was a doomed individual, there appeared above me a figure in lavender light, a few inches below the ceiling. What appeared was about six or seven inches wide and tall. The image was a series of zigzagging arced lines that connected alternately on the right and then the left. The top arc only went half way across, as well as the bottom arc only going half way across. The lines were about as thick as a pencil and were of opaque light. Around all the lines and the figure as a whole, was a lavender aura. It all contrasted weirdly against the green ceiling.

The figure was immediately understandable for what it was. It was an abstraction of a serpent that is coiled, as if it was upon a rock. The top arc was the head and the bottom arc was the tail. All the other zigzags were the body of the serpent wrapping around. I had seen this shape before. Not in lavender, but in vivid yellow outlined in red. But the shape was the same. When I had been at that house with the occultist group that was outside my normal circles, I had seen this figure painted upon the goat skull that rested on the pig jaws. I had loathed the occultist and their creepy preoccupations with perversities of attitude. I had rejected all they were about. Now the symbol was being placed by some entity right before my eyes as if to proclaim a stake of claim was being made over me. Yet as I saw it, I rejected it with all my heart and averted my eyes away in rejection of it and all it stood for.

A second after I averted my eyes, another figure appeared right before them. This time is was the figure of an eye, also in lavender light. The character of it was that it was like a negative photo, in which the light areas are dark, and the dark areas are light. In this way, light defined the eyelids as light patch areas, and the pupil was a void. The iris was lavender light. It was a single eye and I assumed it was good, as opposed to the snake figure, which would be bad. It was like the being behind the eye was giving me the ever so gentle encouragement, to let me know that it had noticed I rejected the serpent apparition, as well as all it stood for. Somehow I sensed the eye was from God, and it was letting me know, not to give up.

The impression was just enough to help me past this day. I knew nothing for certain. I was still terrified and the same doubts obsessively turned over and over in my mind. But the little nudge of encouragement affected me to at least hope. Hope was all I was clinging too.

"Following a Star"

Maybe I was doing something wrong. Maybe I had the wrong idea. I was beginning to detest all the starry beings, God, the voice of the bird, and all the other apparitions that paraded before my eyes. Maybe I am thinking wrong. It had seemed to me from everything these beings suggested, that if I went along with it, it left me in a bad situation. I was filled with mistrust. But I decided to reason. I thought to myself that if these things are from God, then maybe I should trust them. Maybe I had been misunderstanding them and it was somehow my mistake that was making me end up in the stupid absurd situations. Maybe it wasn't them designing mishaps and falls for me. I decided to open up to the stars for an experiment. I would follow them again and hopefully they would make an outcome that would lead to their vindication for me.

So I addressed the starry ones, and one responded more prominently than the others. I spoke with it and asked it if it wanted me to follow it. I seemed anxious that I should. I decided to give the star another chance and before long the star had directed me to go outside. Now I was in the living room and it was night outside. In fact it was quite a dark night. But I went along with the star trusting its direction. As it appeared in this place and that, I would follow it into the darkness of the night.

The general direction the star took was to lead me through the dark to go up Dodson Chapel Road to the south. South was uphill from Dad's house. I followed it along and before long I was approaching the "T" intersection of Bell Road where Dodson Chapel ended. Across Bell Road the star beckoned me. It was going into the woody brush! This didn't look so good, but I decided to tough it out and followed it off the road, right into the dense bramble. Soon I was busting spider webs with my face, dragging thorns across my light clothing, breaking through brush and bramble with a lot of loud breaking of sticks. On top of that I was going downhill, straight toward the small cove of the lake that the brush hid from sight from the road above. It was so dark in the brush that I couldn't see anything and thrashed through like a blind man. I thought about being snake bitten here in the dark, and what I would do if that happened. I figured with all the noise I was making in this pitch dark, a snake would have a lot of warning to get out of the way. But the star beckoned me on.

Before long I broke through the brush and was standing on the bank of the lake. The water was high and the bank was a short drop off to the water below. At least there were dim light sources from the Marina just around the bend. I was wondering what the star brought me here for. I was a bit miserable at this point, having had all kinds of brush get against me. I wondered how many thorns and cockle burrs I had accumulated. I figured I had a fair amount of scratches too. I hoped I didn't have any poison ivy on me and felt lucky to have avoided being snake bitten.

The star appeared below me toward the water. I looked down at the black water and stared. I didn't see anything. I looked out over the lake and saw only faint shimmers on the water from the dim lights. I was tired from my struggle through the bramble. I paused to rest. It was such a black night. Then again the star began appearing below me on the water. I stared down wondering if the star wanted me to jump in the water. The prospect of this gave me some hesitation. I stared down at the water and in the dim light I began to make out a huge flat rock that appeared to be sticking up just out of the water. I realized the star wanted me to jump down onto the rock. It was only a small hop so I went with it. I jumped and all of the sudden I splashed into the lake and found myself knee deep in water with my feet in the mud below. What had happened? I realized I had jumped onto a floating mass of pond scum, and had mistaken it for a rock in the dimness. I climbed out of the water, and tried to decide on an easier route back up to the road. I sure didn't want to battle the bramble again.

I'd had enough of following strange stars. It seemed to me their deception was consummated in this final experiment. It was like their response to my willingness to follow them was a proverbial, "Go jump in the lake" and "Your rock is an illusion in your darkness and you will sink anyway". I walked back home the couple of miles, with soggy shoes and a good deal of indignation for rogue stars. From now on, I'm not trusting them!

"Flying Away"

There was a morning in which I had been thinking about going somewhere just for a change of scenery. I had pretty much gotten stressed staying at home to much, and felt a distraction and some challenges would change the context of my life. I was standing outside on the south side of the house in the sunny morning. Mom came out and I tried to tell her I was thinking I need to go someplace. Mom responded with some direct indignation at the whole idea and reasoned with me in a confrontational manner. While I was surprised at her attitude, I did try to discuss it with her. But she became angrier and frustrated with me and finally in tones of resignation she just dared me to go on and do something so stupid. I certainly felt Mom wasn't being helpful and she was telling me to go ahead with a tone of anger. It made me feel like I was obliged to just go ahead and take off in some kind of blind journey to who knows where.

I was wearing a pair of cut off gold corduroy shorts, a T-shirt and a new pair of nice sneaker shoes. So without any further hesitation I embarked on the spot for a long magic walk to destinations unknown.

I thumbed rides to the west side of Nashville and ended up thumbing the westbound side of interstate 40. I can't recall what form of dialogue or delusion or whatever the impetus was, but the message was to remove my shoes. I hated to do that since they were really nice and new, but I took them off and left them on the roadside. I had traveled barefoot before and only ended up with very sore and raw soles. I didn't want a repeat of that mistake, but something was compelling me to remove my shoes. Soon I got a ride and I was heading for Memphis. A black man had offered me a ride, and as we talked he told me that he was a minister. He gave me a card and invited me to attend his church. He seemed so anxious to help me and was tremendously friendly. I actually kept his card for several years. When it came time for him to take a road off the interstate and I had to get out, he asked me if there was anything I needed. I am the kind of person who hates to be a bother or burden to anyone, so I assured him I was fine and needed nothing. Yet this man insisted that he help me out in some way. He began offering me money to get by on, to which I adamantly refused. He became very insistent and his kindness made me just as ashamed to refuse as to accept. I reluctantly accepted about twelve dollars, and thanked the preacher for his offer and help. He was so glad to do it and he drove off with an obvious sense of joy.

The next ride I got was from a lady. As we rode along she informed me that she was a minister of a Methodist church. I thought it was kind of coincidental that I had gotten another ride from a minister. She was such a nice lady and I enjoyed her company. She gave me her card, which I kept for several years. She invited me to her church as well.

I got another ride shortly with a gentleman, and I unfortunately convinced him in short order that I was a nutcase. He dropped me off after about an hour and I found myself thumbing in Memphis.

I was standing on an entrance ramp that was a clover leaf, thumbing at cars coming around the bend heading toward Arkansas. Many cars passed me by when for some reason I just pointed my finger at this one big baby blue Cadillac that was easing around the bend. The driver was a large black man who kind of jumped when he noticed my pointing at him. With a good deal of abandonment, he stood on the brakes looking for a spot to pull over. He got stopped and I went up to his passenger side and he gave me a big welcome to hop in. He told me he wasn't going far, but he could at least get me through this section of town. We exchanged introductions and he wanted to know where I was going. I didn't really know, but the idea of heading for Abilene Texas was seeming to form. It was the place of my birth and I had lots of family who lived there.

The next thing I knew, this big friendly black man was telling me he was a minister at some local church, and that he was so glad to give me a ride. He also invited me to come visit his church, gave me a card, and inquired about my spiritual welfare. It was all so nice and I felt the kindnesses being extended toward me. As usual I had no intention of being a bother to anyone, but he began to ask how he could help me. I pleaded to him not to worry about me, I was just fine. He wouldn't hear of it. After he had to take his exit off the interstate, he stopped to let me out. I was now in Arkansas and headed the right direction. The preacher stated that he just had to help me out in some way. The idea hit him to give me some money and he asked me to give me some money. I couldn't bear it, but like the other preacher, he was so insistent and kept asking to bless me in some way. He finally produced about eight dollars in quarters and shoved them toward me. I refused and his insistence made me ashamed again. I caved in and accepted the money with humble gratitude. The man was overtly happy now and he finally drove on. I put his card in my pocket and I kept that card for several years as well.

I noticed I was accumulating money from these people of God, despite that I wasn't wanting or asking for it. I felt some peace that these coincidences weren't coincidences at all, but somehow God was showing off for me again. I felt a lot better. But soon things were going to turn sour for me.

"The Trucker and the Nutcase"

The next ride I got came from a guy driving a heavy duty dually pickup truck pulling a goose necked car hauling trailer. He was a jolly scruffy fellow who had an abundance of friendly energy. He talked about all kinds of things as we headed west through Arkansas, and I realized he was just really wanting some company. But by this time I was getting really exhausted and needed to rest, and wasn't so sure I was up to the friendly obligation of being good company in my state of fatigue. I could hardly find the energy to respond to all his energetic commentary. I realized he didn't know how tired I had become, and I felt the situation wasn't good, because I felt like I was a burden to him if I just rested and rode.

As we rode along, for some stupid reason I can't imagine, I reverted to a concern for colors as a red car and then a black car eased ahead of us on the right side. I felt it was bad for the colors of wrath and death to get ahead of us, so I suggested to the trucker that we pass those cars. He was openly puzzled and asked me why. I realized immediately I had said something stupid and wished I hadn't. He became quiet and then started expressing concern about his rig being stolen from him. I realized he was afraid I was setting him up. By now I wanted to get out and by now he wanted me out. He drove along quietly and then he spotted a rest area ahead. He said, "I'm going to pull in this rest area. I never have stopped at a rest area before." He got out once we pulled in and stopped, and stated that he was going to use the restroom. I sat still in the truck as he headed for the facilities. After he went inside, I slowly got out of the truck and ambled up to the restrooms. My plan was to give him plenty of time to leave me behind. I entered the restroom just as the jolly trucker was coming out. I told him I would be along in a minute, and he told me that was fine. I took a little more than a minute, which was enough time for him to be back in his rig and start heading out if he wanted too. I hoped he took the opportunity because I was too tired to be around him, and he was too worried about me to feel good in my company. When I went out of the restroom, I looked down the parking lot just in time to see the trucker and his rig hitting the entrance ramp back onto the interstate, with his pipes sounding off under a good measure of throttle.

This was best I thought; best for him and me since there was discomfort between us. This settles down everything for both of us. I figured it would be awhile before he picked up another hitchhiker.

I walked down to the entrance ramp that left the rest area and started thumbing rides. But now something was different and I wasn't getting any ride at all. I stood there patiently waiting, but it became obvious that night was going to fall soon and I would have to camp here for the evening.

"Destination Slammer"

As the sky began to grow dusky, there came into the rest area, an Arkansas State Police cruiser. I immediately knew they were going to come to me. Sure enough they spotted me and I resigned myself to deal with whatever hassle was coming up, and refused to let stress rule me. I was going to handle this calmly, no matter what happens. I knew I wasn't a criminal and so there wasn't much they should be able to say to me.

The cruiser started toward me with swiftness inappropriate to benevolence, and drove aggressively up to me. This driving english spoke volumes to me; that these guys were looking for action. I wasn't action and I wasn't looking for any attention. Why is it that cops always seem to be threatening me with the aggressiveness of how they drive at me with their cruisers? Two officers got out and started questioning me. I answered the questions and concerns they had directly to the point. I expected soon they would get back in their cruiser and leave me alone. But their questioning took an unexpected turn. They asked me if I was a runaway. I told them I was eighteen years old and wasn't a runaway. Now they wanted to see identification. The hassle was going bad now. I didn't have a bit of identification on me and these officers were looking at this beautiful youth with a lot of skepticism that I was actually eighteen. The truth is I really looked young, and my manliness was just not declaring any age or maturity at this point.

After a bit the officers decided that they needed to make sure I wasn't a runaway and put me in the cruiser to take me someplace to make a phone call. On the ride to the station, I briefly chided the officers for bothering me and asked them about the rightness of it. I framed it as a spiritual issue and that they needed to save their souls instead of bothering innocent people like me. They got really kind of mad at me for this attitude. One of them angrily informed me that he would worry about his soul and that I needed back off. He was pretty darned serious about it too.

Once we got into town, a judge briefly saw me and I was ordered to be held until this matter could be cleared up. I was told that I would be released to my parents when I called them to come get me. MAN! Why do cops keep making me call my parents? It was bad enough getting them out the last time early in the morning. But now they want me to call them all the way to Arkansas! I was loath to bother my parents again and I stubborned right up. I was a legal adult and this time I was going to make them recognize my rights! It didn't matter. They drove me to the slammer and inducted me into a nice cell with another inmate doing time for his crimes.

"Pokey Life"

Once in the cell, I met my cellmate. I can't remember his name, but I'll call him Leon. In fact that may have been his name, because it seems to ring a bell. The first impression of Leon was that he was a friendly black man, who didn't seem like your stereotypical jailbird with some kind of dangerous attitude and a toxic outlook on life. Leon was actually a pretty humble fellow who admitted his mistakes and was accepting of his punishment. He readily admitted that he had messed up and was looking forward to restarting his life once he got out of jail. His attitude was the same kind of cool Rex had. Leon was easy going and his spirit was calm and warm hearted. I have to be grateful that Leon was this kind of innately good person who wasn't uptight about a lot of stuff. He treated me in a brotherly manner and helped me familiarize myself with the jail house routine. If I were to guess, I would think Leon was in his mid twenties.

The jail cell was about what you would expect: Two thin mattresses on metal frames mounted to the wall. There was a toilet that came with no privacy at all. A light was on in the day time, and it was turned off at night. Other than that, there really wasn't any way to tell night from day.

I was feeling a bit defiant and sure didn't want to be run over by the law. I was an adult and I figured that the department would have some obligation to figure that out. However they decided to just hold me until I decided to call somebody. It was a contest of wills about who would make a move to get the matter resolved. For me, it was an odious thing to bother my parents. I really didn't want to have to do that.

After spending a day or two in jail, my bravery in facing the situation was yielding to frustration. I inquired from the jailers if they had found the information they needed to verify who I was. It became obvious, they weren't even trying. They made it clear my only way out was to make a phone call and that was that. After another day I felt some self pity and decided to have a small cry. It helped.

Leon and I chatted some and became friends. I did my best to hide my inner conflicts, so that I wouldn't make Leon uncomfortable with my presence, or end up with negative attention from the authorities. Several days on in the slammer, there came this occasion when Leon stood by the jail door and called out a name, and somebody answered him back.

"Whatcha' need?"

Leon answered the lady's voice and said, "How 'bout some chew!"

A lady called back, "Alright."

I didn't exactly understand what Leon had asked for and was puzzled. In a few moments, the little door opened and the young black lady handed Leon a pouch of chewing tobacco. Leon thanked her, and took the pouch with a pleased look of anticipation, and began to unfold the top of the mud yellow foil bag. He looked over at me and happily commented that it would give you a buzz. Hmmm, that didn't sound like such a bad idea! I suppose he saw my interest at that point as he stuffed some of the brown tobacco into his mouth.

"What is that?" I asked Leon.

He told me the brand name, which fell indistinctly on my ears. He held it out to me and asked, "You want some?"

Now chewing tobacco was an idea I hadn't considered to take the edge off my craving for a good joint. But the possibilities of a little buzz, gave me some happy anticipation myself! I took the bag and read the brand label: "Levi Garret". That's what Leon had said to me. Now I understood. I thought to myself, "I hope it has a good kick." As I looked into the bag at the brown leaf, it sensuously sent an enticing aroma of sweet licorice and hay to my nose. It was a wonderful smell! I pinched out of the bag a just right helping of "Levi Garret"! Not generous, but not immoderate either, not enough to get sick on, but enough to challenge me and hopefully get a really good kick. As I stuffed it into my mouth, I was thinking that it was good to have something to get a buzz on that isn't illegal. The possibilities of being able to legally get a buzz sounded like a promise and hope to me! Leon told me to hand it back to the black lady, who was the trustee of the jail. She was waiting at the door. I folded up the top of the bag and handed it to her and she left. I chewed and spit and generally relished the good flavor of this ambrosia. I wasn't disappointed either. I was getting a really good kick and was as dizzy as all get out! I felt good and contented and the edge had been taken off of pokey life.

"Naked In Jail"

With all the time I had to kill in utter boredom, there was a distraction that seemed to begin to preoccupy my thoughts all the more. Those durned stars just hadn't stayed back in Tennessee, but decided to hang out with me in jail. By now I was suspicious enough of their motives and their intrigue that I actively tried to ignore them. But when you're in the pokey and all you have to watch are stars, you kind of begin to pay them more attention. And it wasn't just the stars now. That small shadowy blob was hovering around the jail cell, responding to my thoughts, just trying to get me to talk to it. That blob sure looked like a living bloodstain to me, and it seemed more ominous than even the stars.

All I can say is that it's a good thing I realized these beings are telepathic. Can you imagine what Leon would think if I spoke to them out loud? Even worse, what would the jailers think? But at any rate I gave into the temptation to talk to these entities and soon the arguments came. The issue was the same as before: They wanted me to take off my clothes. The duress of disobeying God was the strongest persuasion and pressure applied to me by them. I wasn't convinced this was from God, but I wasn't sure it wasn't either.

With time I began to realize I was going to be harassed by these entities until I either gave in or was dead. So I began to toy with the idea of, what if I did it? Imagining scenarios of getting naked, it occurred to me that jail was about as private of a place to make an utter fool of myself as anywhere. At least in jail the only person who would see would be Leon. I sure didn't want to create a hassle, but it would be better to get it over with in jail than it would be in Central Park. My resolve to resist was crumbling as the realization that jail is better than out in the public, giving me an alternative that was minimal in consequences, by which to get it over with.

One evening I had been arguing with the stars and the blob, and I was really getting fed up with the harassment. I decided to summon my courage and face the music if I had too, and get these things off my back about going naked! After many hesitant moments, I finally decided the time had come to make a fool of myself. I hated it, but the duress of being defiant toward God was strongly filling me with apprehensions. I couldn't imagine what kind of reason God would have for wanting me to do something as stupid as become an exhibitionist fool, but who knows anything for certain about the why of things? I more strongly suspected the entities were playing yet another dirty trick on me and I would end up humiliated and in bad circumstances again. But the time had come to either obey God, or appease these starry tyrants. I walked over to the jail cell door and then with utter loathing in my heart, tried to prepare Leon for the shock surely to occur at my imminent behavior. Without a shred of remaining dignity I spoke up in a heartless spirit and declared, "In the name of God, I'm going to take off my clothes."

Leon was relaxing on his bunk when I stated my intentions. Of course this sounded alarming to him and he protested, "Hey man! You don't have to get crazy!"

Well the most damage was done already, so the rest was just the act itself. Even if I stopped now, Leon would still think he had a nutcase for a cell mate. Even worse, he might think I was a faggot or something. Well I might as well get on with it. I took off what few clothes I was wearing and there I was, locked up and naked in a concrete room for the second time in the past few weeks. Being a legal adult has been a major hassle so far. Twice in jail and once in the nuthouse! Well what now? There isn't much you can do naked that you can't do clothed in jail, so I just stood around for a little bit.

The idea came to me that Leon was just one witness of this stupidity, and I needed at least two witnesses. Leon was being awful quiet. So I shouted out the small door for somebody and wouldn't you know it, the lady trustee answered me. Oh great! A lady! Needing to get this over with, I figured she wouldn't be overly distressed anyhow. I figured the sight of a naked fellow wouldn't be the first time for her. She's a grown up lady.

So I answered her, "Can you come here for a minute?"

She told me she would be there in a minute, so I had a chance to get back into my clothes. But I decided this was going to get over with here and now. I got bored waiting for the second witness to arrive, so I went to my bunk and sat down. In a minute or two, she opened the access panel and looked in saying, "What do you want?"

I looked up at her as she realized what she was seeing. She shut the door and left. I was thinking she would recover. But at least this episode can come to an end now. So I got my clothes and put them back on. Leon was speechless.

In a few minutes I was forgetting about the whole thing. I did look at the stars, and they had ceased asking me to get naked. In fact they never asked me such a thing again. I had the argument that I had done it, and that was enough once and for all, that I was going to throw back at them if they persisted anymore. I was sitting on my bunk and the thoughts of the past few minutes were fading fast, being displaced by other things.

After about a half hour had passed, the locks on the jail door clicked and the door opened. I wondered if they had finally decided to let me out. Instead, a man stepped in. It was one of the sheriff lawmen, a strongly capable looking tough with a short aggressive looking burr haircut. He was mad! He shut the door and it locked behind him. He pulled off his belt and started wrapping it around his hand. A fight was about to begin. The first thing I thought about when he started doing this was the pity I felt for his widow and orphaned children. But this was a clear case of a bad cop. I figured the ramification for this entrapment would be hard for me to deal with. But I wasn't about to give an inch to a bad cop or take a beating from such a scumbag. I felt absolutely no fear, just some alarm and regret for what I was being forced to do. I knew in my heart I would surprise this fool with my power and he was about to die for his mistake of being a bad cop.

He snarled at me, "You took off your clothes and called the trustee!" as he stood there in battle form with a belt around his fist.

Now I had remained seated and never so much as showed any bit of fear or retreat. I sat there thinking to myself, "What in the world is he talking about? I didn't call the trustee. She just came to the window on her own." The fact is that I had absolute belief that I hadn't called the trustee. The memory of it had vanished completely, and now I was thinking this bad cop was a liar as well. This frame up was going to lead to a dead cop.

So I answered him in a steady undisturbed matter of fact way, "I didn't do that."

Leon was on his bunk and was absolutely silent. I sat waiting for the man to make his move. I was more than ready and willing to get this over with.

The cop suddenly had a look of shock and confusion come over his face as his face went slack and his eyes widened and looked off in the distance above me. I figured he had just seen the flash of some entity in front of his face, or that something was telling him his life was in danger. Maybe it was just the dynamics of the whole situation that confused him: A rational steady voiced denial from an un-intimidated young fellow with an angels face. Who knows for sure what happened to that cop. But what I saw was the realization in his face that he wasn't ready for this situation. He then snarled at me, "We don't tolerate trouble making around here." I didn't have a reply, and didn't care to make one. I was waiting for him to make a move. His move came in the form of stepping back toward the door and opening it, and then leaving as he locked it behind him. I was filled with loathing contempt for this bad cop. I was thinking something must have made him realize the danger he was in as he was facing his judgment at my hands. I was relieved that I didn't have to kill him. I glanced over at Leon and he was not saying a word. I think Leon realized something profound in this event. As for me, I wanted to play by the rules, but dealing with a bad cop was going to force my hand. I was glad for the reprieve.

"Exodus"

It began to weigh on my mind that I was in severe danger here in this jail in nowhere Arkansas. The realization this place was infested with the vermin of bad cops gave me plenty of motive to end this contest of wills. On top of that, I was pretty tired of being in jail. I didn't really have any idea how many days I had been there already, but it had been too many now.

With a regretful resignation in my heart, I went to the jail door and called out for somebody. The lady trustee answered me and came to the door in a couple of minutes. She asked me what I wanted. I told her I wanted to make a phone call. She asked me if I was ready to leave. I told her I was. She told me she would tell them and then she left. After about a half hour, a lawman opened the door and invited me out of the cell. He escorted me to a phone and I dialed my parents. Mom answered and was relieved to hear my voice. They had been really worried about me and I told them where I was and asked them to come get me out. I explained that I hadn't done any crimes, but that the cops thought I was a minor runaway. She talked to the people and got the information on how to get me and that was that. I went back to the cell, and waited.

The next morning, my parents arrived, and promptly retrieved me from this corrupted place. We walked out to the car and we all got in. As Dad drove us back on the highway, he finally boiled over with anger and chewed me out one way and then another, laying down the law! Well I didn't have anything to say and understood his feelings completely. I took his tongue lashing in silence.

After a few hours we had made it back home. My trip to unknown destinations had been a big hassle for everyone. I decided hitchhiking was about a stupid way to get around, and from then on I would travel with identification and preparation. One good thing was those stars weren't pressuring me to get naked anymore. I hoped for life to get back to normal, even though I was seeing more critters and stars than ever before.

"Changes"

One thing that was beginning to change was that certain forms of the visitations were now leaving, and new ones arriving. The voice of the bird was beginning to leave me. I had begun to ignore it because of my suspicion and sense of betrayed trust in it. As far as I know it may have been from God, but now it was fading away. Also the sound of the squeaking gate or the high pitched pipe had completely gone away. But now I was beginning to see a large smoke in the air; a presence that came around parading itself above me in the air. Entities now appeared as invisible bodies of form, in which they were discernable by the refraction of light around their edges. Once I was in the back yard at Dad's house and noticed the presence of one of these as the light bent around it. It seemed to notice me noticing it, and it started coming toward me. As it approached, I watched the grass on the ground being mashed down as if it were human steps upon it, only the walker was invisible. As I observed, it walked up to within just a few feet of me and stopped. I just stood there wondering what this being was. After a bit it left. I may have walked away from it first. If things didn't have some conclusion to be made about them, I didn't tend to dwell on them long. Some of my fascination with them was wearing off by now.

"Called to Work"

I could feel myself changing as a result of not smoking marijuana. I was sitting at the dining room table one morning and restlessness was gripping me in a physical way. I could feel my energy and thought to myself that I needed something to do. I figured out that as the marijuana was leaving my system, that vigor was replacing the lazy happiness that marijuana gave me. I felt edgy and my shoulders were tingling with energy. I stretched my arms and tightened all the muscles across my shoulders. It felt good to feel the strength in me. I couldn't think of anything to do and suddenly the idea came to me, "I need to go to work!" It was a pleasant idea at the time and the thought of money sounded appealing to me.

But in the following days the stresses of my experiences began taking a toll on me. With nothing to take the edge off, like a good joint, I began to feel my vigor vanishing and it was being replaced by a stressed out weakness. Sleep began to take me over and I felt tired a lot, so it seemed too easy to retreat to frequent naps. I began to feel a burning feeling in the back of my head much of the time. If I paid much attention to it, it seemed to intensify. The pain of it seemed to go down the back of my neck and into my shoulders. It was uncomfortable, but not intolerable, if I didn't focus on it much.

One morning my mother awakened me with the news that I had a phone call. I felt miserably groggy and fuzzy headed. But I took the call, and it was James Oldham, who was one of Pharaoh's brothers, an uncle of Rex's. Even though James wasn't part of the company, he had been plenty involved in masonry for years. James told me on the phone that he had picked up some work and needed me to work with him as a tender. I knew all about masonry and accepted his offer and the wage.

James picked me up at home the next morning and we went into rural Wilson County to a house being built in which we began construction of a fireplace and chimney. Even though I only had to tend one person, the work itself in the heat was plenty taxing. My body was wearing down with the steady exertion. But it wasn't intolerable.

In moments when I could stop and take a breather, my eyes would return to watching those shining entities that were constantly beckoning for my attention. I would direct my thought to them asking what they were. I thought maybe they were like the spaceman or maybe like the foul friends of Ike's. But I wasn't getting clear answers and I spent my free moments in a constantly renewed amazement. I was watching one entity appearing as a bright star form manifesting against the gray trunk of a tall tree, when I heard Jim ask me, "What are you staring at!?" I looked up at James on the scaffold and he was looking at me kind of amused. He was so much friendlier and kinder than most of the masons I had worked with. I told James, "Nothing", and reminded myself that I shouldn't have let myself show even this much. I quickly took a look at what James needed and went back to work, resolving to hide my situation better.

By about the third day, James had come to pick me up, and we were riding to work. It was a bright sunny morning already. As I rode quietly, the sun was shining on the back of my neck through the truck window. I noticed that burning feeling was especially strong. I felt tired and stressed. As I rode there, I couldn't help but notice I was utterly uncomfortable. The burning in my neck was so strong that it was getting intolerable. The sun shining on my neck seemed to amplify the pain like it was pressing it into me. It was getting unbearable and my stomach started getting nauseated from the pain. But I sat quietly just longing to get out of the truck and get the sun off of my neck. My head hurt, I was weak, my shoulders hurt. Yet it was time for hard labor in the sun. I worked with James until the job was finished.

I was glad when the work was over. I figured the sun, or the stress of the entities was making my head sick. I didn't know about such things as stress induced clinical depression. All I knew was that my head was on fire and I struggled just to work. What had happened to my vigor? Why did I feel tired and need so much sleep?

The masonry had been a cruel taskmaster and I felt the job had been beating on me. I needed a break from the hard labor and felt like this was my solution to the burning fire that came in my head.

"Signs of Smoke and Fire"

Dad decided to take a trip to see his parents in a little town in West Virginia, called Craigsville. He invited me to come with him. To me, this sounded like a pretty good idea. I hoped that these entities wouldn't be in West Virginia, and I could have a break from them.

We left really early in the morning. We were riding in Dad's turquoise Dodge pickup that had a light off white interior. Before long as the day got brighter, we were already riding north on interstate 65 through a beautiful hilly area of Kentucky

The problem was that the entities were tagging right along. Yes there were plenty of stars to be seen. I was beginning to realize I wasn't going to escape them. Dad asked me if I wanted to drive. I told him I would. I got behind the wheel and took off driving. But I was so uptight now about trying to be perfect, that I was afraid to do a mile an hour over the speed limit, which at that time was 55 miles per hour nationwide on the interstates. I may have bumped 56, but now I felt I was making God upset. It felt awful because this was a ridiculous crawl. It didn't take long for Dad to lose his patience with this turtle pace himself. He didn't complain to me, but simply told me he wanted to take back over. I happily agreed and we changed drivers again. Now we were cruising along above the speed limit, but at least we were getting somewhere. I looked forward to seeing my grandparents, and we had several hours of riding to do. But it was going to be a strange trip.

While we cruised northward through the beautiful hills of Kentucky, that strange smoke cloud began to hover around our truck. I knew Dad couldn't see it, and I wasn't about to mention it to him. Yet there it was, following us, pacing us. Sometimes it would move ahead of us and cross our path. This went on for a long time. At the same time I began to see lights rising from behind the hills to the west of us. The lights seemed like bright auras that followed the contours of the hills, flashing and disappearing, in such a way that I wondered if fires were burning on the other sides of the hills. But since they flashed I also wondered if bright explosions were taking place over on the other side of the hills.

As we covered the miles though, I began to realize that fires or explosions couldn't be the answer, since they went on for miles and miles. Dad never mentioned seeing anything and I realized the events were for my eyes only. Some cosmic something was making demonstrations for me, but I couldn't figure out what it meant. As I observed the smoke cloud moving about us, and the ethereal fires rising from behind the ridges of the Kentucky hills, the idea of something that was dead, but came back to life, impressed into my mind again. The only thing I could think of, that had that undead capacity, was the concept of vampires. It never occurred to me to think of the Resurrection of Jesus, God's Son. I was still worried about the inane idea of some kind of vampire subculture.

I looked at the smoke cloud and earnestly felt that it might be the form of the spirit of a vampire which was showing off for me. This idea was reinforced for me because there was this bad smell of something that was like something burned, that seemed to be lingering in the truck. Was it the scent of the foul nature of the vampire? Smoke and fire, what else would I see?

Then there were the flocks of ethereal black birds that would appear flying as a dark cloud. They would fly along for a few moments and then vanish in the air. Blackbirds seemed to be ominous to me, and fit neatly into the dark theme of a vampire spirit realm being who was showing off to me.

Another demonstration being made for me also involved birds. Only this would involve birds that I understood to be real birds. I would see a bird flying along, something like a robin, starling, or a dove or other common bird. As I would watch these solitary birds flying along, they would blink out of existence. I thought of the unseen line in the air from which the glowing manly arm had extended itself. I wondered if these birds had simply been made to fly into this portal of the alternative reality and they were now in that realm. Then sometimes a bird would suddenly blink into existence in the air. It would flap it wings furiously, catch itself in the air and begin to fly away. I assumed these birds were emerging from the same portals of an alternate reality as the other birds were being trapped in as they flew. It never occurred to me this was actually a demonstration of creation and annihilation from existence.

"Missing Rita"

I suppose Dad noticed my silence as we rode along. Why would I be commenting on things he could neither see nor relate to? The overt demonstrations were enough to keep me fascinated, yet by appearances I was just sitting quietly. Dad noticed how quietly I was sitting. He asked me what was on my mind. His timing just happened to coincide with me remembering another time, another place, another person. His inquiries prompted me to share something close to my heart that lingered there smoldering. I suppose I had not only been quiet, but maybe I was looking a bit sad and Dad happened to notice it.

It was very rare for me to open up like this, but I began to tell Dad that I was missing Rita. How different that time was from the present. The time with Rita was a time of intoxicating love and happiness. I had just been sitting there missing Rita, and thinking how crazy life had gone since those wonderful times. The contrast of that time, to the present was enormous to me. How I longed to return to Rita and be in love with her, with the magic of romance about us, instead of these dark nasty experiences I was traveling through now.

I talked to Dad about Rita. I told him I was just thinking about her. As I spoke and recalled, I lapsed into describing Rita's long wispy blonde hair. How light it was in every way; how the wind would lift it like baby hair. I told dad that Rita's hair was like the wispy cirrus clouds way up in the sky. Each time I saw those clouds, Rita flooded my thoughts. I told Dad about Rita's blue eyes and how they flirted, but somehow reminded me of a baby. Oh but the mischievousness those amused eyes revealed coming from Rita's prankster heart. I went on to describe the relaxed and sheepish smile she had. Always her smile looked as if she was just not letting you know an anvil was about to fall on your head, so she could laugh at your slapstick suffering. Sheepish, mischievous, and childlike was that dangerous smile. Yet I loved that smile. I told Dad how she stumbled to express herself. Eloquence was not her strong suit. Just making small talk left her trying to make her words come out right. It was almost as if she was from Sweden, and was uncomfortable trying to communicate in English. But through those ultra light pink lipstick tinted lips poured whispery southern accented babies breathe words of flattery that sent my head spinning in both directions at once. She had the mastery over me and I was a willing slave of love. I couldn't bear her pranks and couldn't bear being without her flattery. I told Dad how Rita offered me some candy she made, and I tried to be so nice even though it was mighty lame for candy. I tried to be easy on her as I explained it wasn't so sweet, kind of crunchy, yet trying my best not to hurt her feelings. She sat and smiled sheepishly as I chewed on the candy she made. After I sampled it, Rita asked me how I liked it. I professed it to be fine candy! Shortly it came out, only because Rita couldn't hold it in, the candy was a chunk of Purina Dog Food.

I told Dad about the fact that even though so much of Rita reminded me of a tow headed child, that she was the most feminine girl there was. Just being near her made my head swim. My heart beat hard. It was difficult to talk to her and I seemed to mirror her discomfort with trying to just have a normal talk. Her flattery made her take full mastery over me. I always found myself having to calm down for a few minutes whenever we first got together. She was the ultimate in femininity, though she had only been a teenager.

While I explained these things to Dad, I was acutely aware of the present descent into the turmoil of these days. I told Dad that I missed Rita and wished more than anything to just be back with her again. The flame was burning hot for her, and the wounds of my broken heart expressed themselves by rising up in my chest to a moan. I lowered my head a wept for a few seconds, feeling that pain anew of a love I could never live or have.

"Why didn't you tell me you loved her, Bryson?" Dad was asking me. He was being so sincere and sympathetic.

He then said to me, "Bryson, I know you were young, but I would have helped you if you had wanted to marry her."

Dad's love and understanding comforted me greatly, and I was able to recompose in a minute or two. I looked over to the Kentucky hills in the west and those fiery auras shot up from behind them. I looked ahead to the road north, and the smoke paced our truck. I had lost both the Garden of Eden and the Eve of my life, and now I wondered through this perverse hell and confusion.

"Grandpa's Protest"

It was very dark when Dad and I finally arrived at my grandparents' house in West Virginia. Love and hugs went all around and we went into the light of the kitchen at the back of the house. Grandma insisted on feeding us a good meal. I sat at the end of the kitchen table to just talk while we waited on some dinner.

Presently, Grandpa sat at the side of the table to my left. He turned his chair a bit sideways to face directly at me. It was obvious to me that he wanted to check me out. He was shocked by my presence and I knew it. As he starred directly into my face and fixed my eyes with his steel blue gaze, he spoke carefully to me.

"You have long hair", he said.

But the real thing he was observing was my overt beauty. I was aware that some kind of spell was on me since the afternoon I had met the spaceman, and everyone saw me as beautiful. There was a look of shock on Grandpa's face as he spoke carefully to me. The hair statement was actually a protest of the lack of masculinity in my face. It was painful to be so aware of my own androgynous condition. Grandpa's remark was a rebuke made ever so gently.

I looked directly into Grandpa's eyes and said in my mind expecting him to be able to hear my thoughts, "Now Grandpa, don't be a snob."

I sat silently and just looked back into Grandpa's blue eyes. He seemed even more stunned by my presence, and leaned back as if to relax a bit.

Grandpa said, "I can take you out to the garden and you can run my Gravely. That's a real man's machine! It's a man killer!"

Then he threw down and slapped his leg and burst out laughing from the spirit of his prankishness. Obviously Grandpa was picturing the fun of getting me into some slapstick situation with a hard to control machine. Grandpa was a notorious prankster. But the real spirit of the remark was to get me into some macho man activity. By now this was all tedious to me. I had no interest in trying to prove myself as a man. I wasn't insecure or weak in ego enough to worry about demonstrating myself to Grandpa. I certainly didn't want to do garden work, nor did I want to hear any more of these goading comments. I said nothing to Grandpa. I looked at him easy. I made certain there was no anger, attitude or malice in my expression; only calmness. While I looked at him, Grandpa conspicuously searched my face. He realized that he was on a bad line of conversation, or that it was at least useless. He stopped focusing on me and joined the conversation with Dad and Grandma.

"The Dream Joint"
After a couple of days in West Virginia, boredom was already setting in. I read the fishing magazines Grandpa kept around the house. I warily watched the stars, but tried to ignore them as much as I could. I looked for some activity to keep myself occupied. This house was a desert for activity, and passing the hours themselves was tiring.

Dad was happy though. He spent time talking about old friends, visiting people he knew, rummaging through old footlockers and trunks that he had there. Those trunks were full of his keepsakes. Objects of memory seemed so important to Dad. I considered it a binding attachment. But to Dad, such keepsakes evoked precious memories, as if the objects themselves were the title deed to the events, to be treasured forever.

I suppose the tedium and boredom did tire me out. It was mid afternoon and I was really sleepy. I went upstairs into the large bedroom. The room was finished with dark solid wood paneling, and was quite comfortable in its rustic aesthetics. The window was open and I could hear traffic passing on the road outside. The large bed I was using was comfortable and I decided to rest on it until the drowsiness passed. I lay down on top of it and before I knew it, I was in a dream.

I saw a large humongous joint appear in the air before me. It was the size of two cigars. It was magnified in size and so close! The joint began to rotate end to end like a slow motion compass needle. As it spun around slowly, suddenly one end of it began to light up! I watched the end start to glow, and superlative sparkles jumped off the end like a banner of fireworks to entice my eyes. This was a good joint! As the burning joint slowly spun in the air, a graceful trail of smoke began to flow and spiral from it. The smoke began to move sinuously around through the air and temptingly the trail of it began to waft and flow right toward me. My deepest indulgent impulse was to lean forward a bit and get a big ole' snort of that long sinuous trail of flowing smoke, just passing right in front of my face! As I leaned forward to snort it in my happy dream, I suddenly awoke to find my head was raised half a foot off the pillow trying to snort that dream joint in the air.

I was shocked to find myself awakening in mid motion. I lowered myself back down into the pillow. My first thought was that I must be really eaten up with it, if I was trying to get a buzz in my sleep. Talk about a psychological need! Then it occurred to me that going without a joint for the past few weeks was really making me crazy. I didn't want to go back to it, but something in me was getting kind of desperate!

I thought about whether I should be feeling guilty about wanting a snort of the dream joint. But I decided God didn't get uptight about dreams, and would probably see the humor it as much as I did. I walked back down the stairs feeling a bit amused and silly, just realizing how much I was missing marijuana.

"Androgyny"

As the days dragged by at my grand parents' house, Sunday rolled around. I decided to keep God happy and go to church. As much as I disliked church, it seemed to be part of my new obligations since God exists. I needed a ride and asked for volunteers. To my surprise Grandpa offered to give me a ride. Then Grandpa decided to just go with me to church. I'm suspicious now, that he was just going in order to keep an eye on me. But at the time, I didn't know what to make of it. Grandpa wasn't exactly a church going kind of guy. But I supposed it was just fine that I was having a good influence on him.

Before long, Grandpa and I pulled into a little chapel that was a Church of Christ congregation. I had told him this kind of church would be fine for me, and of course he knew where it was. We walked in and had a seat.

I certainly don't remember the message the preacher gave, but I do remember the impression that this guy was a true hillbilly with a really hillbilly level of preaching style and content. It was painful for me to get through the sermon. Then it came time for singing. I usually enjoyed singing and had a great appreciation for choral music since I had chorus class in every year of high school. You have to admit, that Church of Christ music would be awfully bland without instrumental accompaniment, except that the people knew the various voice parts and could really carry the alto, tenor, baritone and bass parts with a surprising degree of skill and enthusiasm. To me the singing at most Churches of Christ kind of rocked. But not in this case!

When the director of music made our selection, he happened to pick a very nice song with a flowing and soaring melody. He waved his arms to direct us in time and away we went singing to the tone he gave us. But instantly I heard a bouncing and loping rendition of a favorite hymn, in which all these shaky old folks were clipping every word as if they had a great fear of being too generous with the pronunciation. I was stunned and repulsed by this sad pathetic exhibition of musical destruction and their horrid weak old voices bouncing and loping in a rhythm like they were singing, "Boing! Boing! Boing!" I couldn't bring myself to even attempt joining this exercise in musical assassination.

As much as I didn't enjoy the services so far, the old folks made sure I enjoyed the whole visit even less after the service was all over. The formal obligation to make a visitor welcome was dutifully carried out toward me as each member pretended to let me know how very welcome I was. Personally, I certainly never felt such an obligation to make sure a visitor left thinking we all thought he was the high point of our day. It was all so pretentious to me. And I hated being the object of such dutiful insincerity. It got worse for me after that.

Some of the folks in this church were acquainted with Grandpa and actually had something to relate about with him. They talked comfortably with him and he enjoyed the familiar small talk about this person and that person, whom they mutually knew. But the question came up of how Grandpa related to me, the stranger. Grandpa told them I was his grandson. I'll never forget the several comments made in my presence, as if I wasn't there, now that they felt comfortable with Grandpa. The attempt to make me feel so welcomed was forgotten with utter abandonment as two or three times, the comment to Grandpa, upon hearing I was his grandson, was, "He looks like a girl." The looks I got had also changed from forced smiling and faux sincere welcome greetings, to raised eyebrows and rude faced scoffs. I thought to myself these people are rude. I now suppose that gracelessness must be part of the culture in those parts. But whatever these people were, they were not refined. Naturally I had no desire to ever be a part of that scene anymore. Grandpa ignored the rudeness, but he noticed it for certain. Who would blame him for not feeling any differently than I felt about this church thing? It was enough.

I just wanted to get out of West Virginia. Everyone here seems to have issues with my appearance and longish hair. I was tired of dealing with excessive and insecure issues of gender defining. I couldn't help it that I was gorgeous in a way that threatened these people. I knew I was a man. I simply had no time for their problems, nor a willingness to make them my problems. Ultimately though, whether I was willing or not, it really was my problem to deal with. I was the one with the youthful appearance of profound androgyny. I really just hadn't grasped the reality of that fact yet.

"Tammy Returns"

Dad and I had made it back home from West Virginia. I was settling back into the routine of life with telepathic stars, spiritual manifestations and general amazement and torment. It was all starting to feel like a curse from God rather than some privileged gift. I was really beginning to feel God was mad at me. If not mad at me, God was certainly putting me through a brutal spiritual boot camp.

I was avoiding all my old friends, and felt a bit isolated on top of every recent humiliation. One night though, Tammy arrived in a surprise visit! I suppressed my humiliation, since she had heard about all the awful things happening to me, through the interpretation of other peoples' perspectives, such as my mother or sister. I loved Tammy, cherished her, and enjoyed her warm, loving and buoyant company. I say loved, but not in the sense of a consuming desire of insatiable love and romance between lovers. With Tammy, it was love like a faithful friend loves, an earnest love that will not betray or harm. A love that makes you regard that person as if they were your own self. I loved Tammy because she's Tammy. I always saw myself in her, and never meant to hurt her.

But she was long over that by now. She had been away for months and I had heard she had another romantic interest. I had wavered between sad and relieved about Tammy moving on from me. But I never felt happy about it. When you love somebody, you never want to hurt them or have change forced upon them through painful events. But this is how I felt I had affected Tammy, this harmless dove.

Oh the love that everyone in the house felt for Tammy. She was like a bright light of joy shining to the whole family. All of us adored her. After awhile I was able to drag Tammy away from everyone so that I could talk with her alone for awhile. She was happy to see me, which was a sign of her forgiveness toward me. She didn't know how much I needed her forgiveness.

She and I went to my room and she sat on the edge of my bed and I sat in a chair right in front of her. As we discussed little things, I had the humiliation of feeling like her great hero, who had fallen from grace and into ruin before her. While we talked, the impression came into me; that now was the opportunity in which I should ask Tammy to marry me. It was a big leap to even think about such things. Maybe it was the stars filling the room or some other spiritual agency prodding me. But I had the deepest apprehension that formed words in my thoughts in this manner:

"I think God is upset with me over Tammy. If Tammy can forgive me and reconcile with me; if she can even be my wife; then for her sake, God will relent from being so hard on me, and return things to normal for me; even make things wonderful. I will be faithful and devoted to her forever, and God will be gentler to me from now on."

Tammy and I talked some more, but in the midst of this I was thinking, "She's my redemption. I have to ask her. My fate is in her hands. If only she can forgive me."

I realized the fallen hero was now suffering the humiliation of needing to be saved himself, by the very one before whom he suffered his shame. I finally decided to just ask her and summoned the last shreds of my dignity and courage

."Tammy, I have something I want to ask you."

Tammy said, "Okay, what do you want to ask me?"

I sat there trying to find the courage and find my tongue. I looked up at Tammy's face and she waited patiently for me as her dove eyes looked kindly into mine.

"Tammy." I was beginning to struggle.

I was afraid. I was so very afraid I was leading her wrong. I was afraid of her being upset with me. I was afraid I was going to hurt her yet again. I vowed to myself to be the best man I can be for her, and gave myself permission to say the words to her. After my hesitation I think Tammy sensed the gravity of my thoughts. Surely she was beginning to know what was coming.

I looked at her and she gazed back at me with eyes captivated and kind. I looked back into those eyes and suddenly a Crowned Radiance jumped out of Tammy's face. The Crowned Radiance was a rushing expanding horizontal oval of light that became so large before my eyes that it completely obscured Tammy's face from my sight! Her face was close enough to me that I could have reached my hand to the back of her neck. The radiance appeared like it was made of white pearl in which a very intense light was shining from inside it. It was a three dimensional form, as the receding all around its edges showed a slightly darkening hue of pearl. And all around its perimeter were the spikes of white light forming a complete crown of glory.

The radiance retreated back into Tammy as I looked at her in wonder. I thought to myself, "God just showed me that Tammy is my crowning glory!" I treasured her all the more with this confirmation. Will she forgive me? It was all or nothing for me now. My life is in her hands.

With trembling courage I barely managed to say, "Tammy, I want to ask you, if you will marry me."

As those words escaped from me, I looked at Tammy, searching for hope. She was a little flustered and surprised. Her love was not so dead for me that she would be unkind. She smiled in her surprise, yet she didn't exactly abandon herself to me. Tammy had been hurt by me, and I understood she was wary. I also understood this sorry excuse for a proposal, was coming from out of nowhere from her perspective. I understood all that, and knew her hesitations were completely justified.

There was something Tammy needed to know and I didn't blame her. She needed to know that she was the absolute focused desire of love for me; the person of my adoration. She needed to know that she was loved in that special way; that she Tammy, was indeed the light in the apple of my eye. I knew what she needed. I needed it as well. But I simply didn't have that kind of pining love to offer her. I hoped that with time our love would become its own kind of special. I hoped for her to throw away caution and just come with me for the potential of the future. My inner soul cries out, "My Crowning Glory! I need you more than you can know. Help me?"

I took stock of the situation and Tammy's reluctance. She needed to hear the words that I love her; and for me to mean it in the way I should mean it when a man loves a woman. I realized that I simply could not deceive her, because I loved her in a faithfulness that would never allow me to hurt her again in any way. I thought about pouring out words of love, but I simply could not be insincere about my romantic feelings. This was a case of needing somebody more than life, yet not feeling possessive romantic love above the love of closest faithfulness and caring.

I tried to tell her that I love her, and to mean it in a way acceptable to her need for a lover. But all I managed was, "I think I love you"

It wasn't really a true "I think", but it spoke the truth of the situation for her loudly and clearly. I was incapable of insincerity and deception. She understood I didn't have the special passion, and I knew it. I went on to reassure her in complete honesty that I would be devoted to her and try to make her happy. I am not unfaithful. She was informed enough to make her decision now. Would she recall the love she felt for me, or would she consider it hopeless and give up ever having that feeling for me again, because I didn't have it to offer in return.

" _Tammy! Tammy! Take my hand and lift me up! Please!_

You know the truth, but help me anyway

.But I will instead face my ongoing burden of God's correction, rather than deceive you ever my true friend and beloved dove.

I fear God may never relent on me!

But I will not harm you with a pretense and deception. I just beg you to be my Crowning Glory in any case, and grant me God's relenting as my wife, my dearest one.

I was so sorry before; but now I am ground into dust!

But I cannot burden you with this. Because of my caring love for you, I cannot place this burden on you. I'll just keep it a secret from you, that I believe you are my grace."

Tammy listened to me and understood. She didn't let herself be carried away and didn't give me an answer at all. After a bit, Tammy left the room and I knew I was on my own to face what may come. I was a basket case and she could see it in my eyes and in every word I spoke. I was unfit for her and I knew she could tell it. I overheard her and Mom talking from the kitchen. Though I couldn't understand the words, I knew that Mom and she would discuss the matter, and Mom would tell her I was unstable and discourage the whole thing. I was resigned. I stayed in my room in the lowest state of utter humiliation. Before long, the dove was gone to the nest she had made for love in other places.

I declared to myself that God saw my conscientiousness. Maybe he will honor the fact that I refused to deceive my precious Tammy. Maybe God will ease up just a little on me; though he was just and right to take up for Tammy. I should have never feared her Jewishness. It was just not good for Tammy that I make aliyah with her. My love for Tammy has never faded. I loved her so much that I let her go, rather than mislead her. I put Tammy above my own desperation and concerns. Over the years, I've realized that Tammy truly was a love expressed as a gift from heaven to me; even as a Crowning Glory meant for the day of my wedding. I lost a gift from heaven: I lost Tammy.

"Star Gnat Humiliator"

By now I was starting to despair of the state of things. Everything was full of darkness for me. Having come to distrust all the beings presently interacting with me, I felt surrounded by a cosmic adversity. God seemed to me by this time, to be interested in making me pay for sinfulness. The whole feeling of being in good with God had seemed to have vanished ever since the purple light had made me realize the danger of sin and brought up the possibility of condemnation. But still I was clinging to the idea that I was the Holy Spirit and this must all be some kind of spiritual boot camp. Why else would God be so intense on me? Around and around my thoughts went, swinging wildly between being on God's team and being just fine, to feelings of condemnation brought on my all the adversities of late.

It got worse from here. I picked up my King James and sat in my reading chair in my room. I read in the gospels yet again where Jesus claimed his exclusivity. Again and again I dismissed that claim as something I was outside of, because I'm the Holy Spirit. Yet there was some appeal to Jesus. My starry tutor arrived to coach me in the Bible. The star would point out scriptures and I would read them. More often than not it had to do with a claim of Jesus, that all men needed him, that he was the doorway, and other themes like this that made Jesus the exclusive means to God. A pattern had formed between my reading of these things, and the response of the starry one to my thoughts. I would read the passages about Jesus being needed by men to find God, and I would dismiss it as being irrelevant for me, the Holy Ghost.

In response to my obstinance concerning Jesus, the starry one began turning himself into a little dark speck instead of a light. Once in this form, he would move around in front of my face as if to imitate a gnat flying around me.

This was clearly an insult to me, since the association of gnats to their localities, was formed in a derogatory and vulgar saying I had heard and recalled. It was like the starry one, by taking the form of a gnat, was calling me the very name of the place where gnats hang out, which kind of made me mad. He was calling me unconsciously stupid. The star understood my response and thus it became a simple, handy rebuking insult that he began using often as I read the Bible. Each time I thought I was above Jesus' words, that star would fly around in my face in gnat mode.

Time and time again the star became a gnat. It began to crack my impenetrable ignorance until there was this time I read a passage by Jesus in which he included all men together and their need for him. Just as I was thinking I was above needing this, the gnat flew in my face and for some reason I considered the consistent response in context to the words, and my rejection of them for myself personally. I finally realized the gnat was insulting me for thinking Jesus words didn't apply to me.

"Wait a minute. Are you saying the words of Jesus apply to me just the same as everyone else?" The star flashed in affirmation. "But I'm the Holy Spirit!" I protested. Once again the star turned into a dark speck and flew around in my face. Feeling flustered I saw the star flash upon the Bible as if to look in another place near where it was flashing on the gilded edges. So I turned the pages to approximately the place where the star flashed. The star flashed on a place on the new page, and I read the place where it flashed. It was a random passage saying something to the effect, "The pride of your heart has deceived you". I realized finally exactly what the star was saying to me and why he kept insulting me when I thought Jesus didn't apply to me. I addressed my tutor and asked, "Are you saying I'm no exception to Jesus words?" The star flashed in affirmation. "I need Jesus just like anyone else would need Jesus?" Now at the mere thought of saying I was the Holy Spirit, the star became a gnat. I realized the star was telling me I'm not the Holy Spirit, and that I needed Jesus. "I need Jesus?" The Star flashed in yellow light. "I'm not the Holy Spirit?" The star flashed again letting me know my words were correct.

Suddenly the realization of my own need for Jesus came crashing in on me. I had been in some kind of state of utterly deluded foolishness. I understood the truth in a flash of starlight twinkling before my eyes, that I was a sinner that needed Jesus just like any man. I wasn't the Holy Spirit! It had become actualized and real in the past few moments! I had been a deluded fool for several weeks!

Then the reality of the whole situation came into me like a thunder of clarity and a deep profound sense of embarrassment, then humiliation, and then utter shame washed over me until my face and body crumbled up in agony. I began to weep with humiliation and anger, and shouted in my mind, "I have been such a fool! I need Jesus! I'm just a sinner! I'm no exalted Holy Spirit! I'm a sinner and every word Jesus said applies to me!" The star had brought me to this realization, and I realized and accepted that the star was helping me. But how could I have gotten so mixed up? I was thinking too highly of myself and it lead to latching onto the idea that came into my consciousness that I personally, was the Holy Spirit.

I was so humiliated before God that it was unbearable. I confessed to God, that I was such a fool and begged his pardon with many tears of shame. I was a broken young man and all my spirit was gone. Yet I knew that this time, I owed gratitude to the starry tutor for his helping me break my delusions. Where is this old friend now? I simply don't know. For me, all the starry ones are indistinguishable one from each other, except by the things they express.

How could I turn to Jesus with such shame? How can I even face him to ask him to help me? But then I realized that Jesus, by virtue of his impeccable character, wouldn't hold a grudge or hate me for being embarrassed. I began to seek him, with the birth pains of shame and humiliation.

Now I read Jesus' words with a new kind of relevance. I was a sinner needing salvation, not a Holy Spirit taking lessons on perfection. Now when I prayed to God, whom I had become so aware of lately, my prayers were changed to include Jesus, in relevant respect of God. I wanted Jesus to somehow have his effect of bringing me before God.

"Be Not Amazed"

Now I was re-reading the Bible in a completely whole new light. With me and my starry tutor, the truth was pouring into my mind with clarity. But now I was truly confounded by the stars. What are they? Why do some of them lead me wrong and this one is leading me right? Sometimes I would be practically paralyzed with confusion by the mystery of these starry beings. How did they relate to God? What is their role?

I was sitting with my Bible open, but not reading it. I was thinking about the stars and in my utter humiliation, I wasn't about to pretend I had any answer. My tutor listened to my confusion and decided to give me an answer. He flashed on the edges of the pages and so I turned the pages to about that place in my Bible. My starry tutor flashed in yellow at a scripture. My eyes were drawn to that spot and I read it curiously to see what my tutor was pointing out. It read: "Be not amazed; even the devil is transformed into an angel of light." The light bulb came on and the realization that this was my answer came to me: "They're ANGELS! All these stars are angels!" I laughed with the joy of understanding and the new reference of bearing! I was getting somewhere now and I knew it!

With my new bearing on the stars, and my acceptance of the Bible, issues such as vampires became irrelevant. Reality now has a context and a defining source: God is in control. He decides everything and I have to trust him. God is the primary force of the ultimate reality. Issues of an alternate reality were settled. That is the realm of God and all the spirits and angels. It is God who plays with the material reality like clay, instead of some strange cosmic force. I wasn't hallucinating per se'. I was having my eyes opened to see into realms few can see. That was a gift that was being granted to me from God, for which I could take no credit. All the bad experiences with entities, the ugly repulsive ones, the lies that left me hurting, those were demons. Demons lie and their suggestions to me had all been designed to hide the truth; to direct me to false ideas that simply didn't include God at all. Things were becoming clear now. It had all been very intriguing.

But still, trials awaited me which would terrify more many times more than all the fear I had ever felt. Maybe I had gone too far already and God had let me experience these things as a punishment. Could I be saved? What if God was too angry at me to save me and I was already condemned? Maybe that's why I'm already encountering demons. It was my fate and final judgment upon me while I am still alive!

Fear was finding a place to fester in me and I just wasn't sure. I just wasn't sure! Gone was the levity of my foolish delusion that I was the Holy Spirit. I am a sinner in deep peril. "I want to be saved! I don't want to face judgment! Why am I with all these angels?!"

"The Roaring Star"

I was now driven to my knees by the realization of God. Humiliated, confused, I was afraid I had offended God so badly, I might never be forgiven. Why else would so many hurtful stars be about me? And the stars were continually all about me. On the other hand I realized I had a tutor who loved getting into my Bible when I read. This gave me a thread of hope. Reading the Bible was now a last grasp for sanity, because I simply couldn't bear the prospect of being condemned. I had to read it! I had to find hope. Now the words of Jesus, though confusing and unclear at times, were a lifeline for me. I read the words on an emotional roller coaster, searching for hope. Everything didn't just suddenly become clear to me; far from it. I was a complete ignoramus. But I realized that nothing was more precious for me now than the facts. Deceptions and lies were of absolutely no use to me in any situation.

Now the stars were around me more than ever. Their tone of communication with me had become more aggressive now than ever. They filled my room, followed me outdoors and in every other place. I knew they were angels now. Yet even that offered no comfort from the pressures they would put on me. I was willing now to at least listen to them, since I hoped that they were good angels. But what if they were bad angels? How could I tell the difference? One star looked like another to me, with appearances not making any distinction for me about their nature of being either good or evil.

One evening a star came into my room which simply demanded my attention. Out of respect I gave my attention to the angel just in case he was important. I asked the angel, "Who are you?" The angel gave no reply to my inquiry and left me wondering. So I adopted the tactic of the twenty questions game and started naming possibilities to the angel, to which he could simply flash in some color to imply yes or no, perhaps with a suggested meaning in his color. I finally asked the star if he was God. To this the star gave me a strong affirmation. I was kind of confused by this, because I had figured God wouldn't be like a star himself. Maybe the light was like the fingertip of God or something he was making happen, even though I couldn't see God directly. So I decided to accept the idea for now.

I asked "God" what he wanted with me. Again I was getting no reply. So once again I adopted the question mode and inquired with possible suggestions concerning what he wanted with me. As confusing as all this was, I finally thought about God wanting people to worship him, and inquired with the suggestion, "Do you want me to worship you?" The star flashed a powerful affirmation. I wondered how you go about worshiping God. I recalled that people in the Bible had bowed on their knees sometimes. So I asked the star if he wanted me to bow to him. The star flashed very affirmatively. Now this started making me feel awkward and silly. I was already humiliated enough, and now I was being asked to do something that made me feel like a trained dog being commanded to jump through hoops. I had never bowed in worship and it felt unnatural. I didn't want to do it. Yet something inside me felt that I shouldn't disobey God. So with a sheepish sense of absurdity, I decided to get on my knees and bow down.

Upon my knees now, I leaned forward before the star hovering above me. Nothing happened, so I thought I must need to really bow down and not be so dignified. So I lowered myself closer to the floor, and nothing happened. Following the same reasoning again, I lowered myself until my head was on the floor and this was as far down as I could go. I felt stupid and humiliated. But I was doing what I thought God wanted. It was then that the star responded to me; but not in any manner I expected.

As I was still bowed with my head touching the floor, there came a great roaring like a lion or a dragon from above me. The roaring wasn't the kind of audible you hear through your ears. It was coming as if from the ethereal dimension behind which certain beings could be present, but invisible. The roaring repeated several times, sounding proud and gloating above me.

The proud gloating immediately offended me. I realized this had all been a trick on a fellow who hadn't known better, and now I was being humiliated by this gloating star. Instantly I realized this wasn't the nature of God to act like this over a humble person. I raised my head and got up immediately. I addressed the star in my thought, "I didn't worship you! You just tricked me into thinking you were God. You are a liar and you don't matter. Tricks mean nothing! You roar like a lion or a dragon! You're the devil! Get lost!" Then I turned my back on this imposter star and ignored it. So it became certain in my mind that I saw my adversary as like a star fallen from heaven.

I decided God wasn't likely to be a star like manifestation. In fact I seemed to recall there was some insistence that God was invisible to mankind. It was like as usual: I had gone along with these beings' ideas, and ended up shamed and humiliated by the starry ones. But I addressed God in my thoughts, and let him know I understood that He realized I would never worship an evil being. I knew that He knew I had just been tricked and that it meant nothing at all.

"From Thin Air"

By now I had seen and experienced thousands of things manifesting to me from the thin air. I had even seen living birds pop into existence and fly away. There was the spaceman's arm, the devils that were like homosexual men, the spirits that were as animals, the tar baby entity, the millions of stars, the angel over the doorway and the dark figures like overgrown men. All these had manifested to me, yet there was one thing which came to me from the thin air which meant more to me than all the previous things combined.

In my Bible reading, I had seen over and over how Jesus repeated that he was our salvation. I saw how he proclaimed that it was exclusively himself who brought us before God as saved people. I accepted this completely of course. There was also the connection of being crucified to our being saved. This is where things began to not make sense to me. How in the world does being crucified make us saved? What is the whole idea of that? I was mystified. I tried to imagine how being crucified could connect to me, but was at a loss for any theory to even get started with.

It was about noon one sunny day, and I had walked into the living room after reading the in the Bible. But I was still mystified about the question of how Jesus death connected to my life as a means of salvation. I was thinking about this question as I sat in Dad's big easy chair continuing in my thoughts. I still remember the words clearly that rolled through my mind.

"I know Jesus is saying he is the only means of being saved. I know he is making some connection to being crucified to my being saved. But Jesus lived two thousand years ago in a place halfway around the world! How does Jesus connect with me today here in this place?" It was at this moment that something instantly whispered into my mind a phrase, and implanted complete total understanding along with that phrase. Something listening to my thoughts, decided to answer my question, and said directly into my mind the clear statement, "He took your punishment for you." Then instantly without figuring anything out, I understood that Jesus had satisfied the requirements of the penalties of my sins, by legally taking my place for me on the cross. Jesus had taken my punishment for me even thousands of years before I was even born. The space of time and distance was irrelevant. To believers, this concept is just common knowledge. But for me it was a new and profound insight that simply had not entered my heart until just now.

Just then a strange and impressive sign was performed as I comprehended everything in that moment and the twinkling of an eye. Without any volition on my part, something took complete control of my right arm and raised it from the arm of the easy chair to a place above me. I watched passively intrigued as my hand arose upward above my head of its own power, and then my hand made a very deliberate turning grasping motion around some unseen object in the air, and my fingers closed around it. I had not done this! Something took control of me! Once the thing was grasped from the thin air, my arm stopped moving and my own control of it came back. While still looking up amazed at my own hand, I felt my control of it and slowly lowered it back down and moved my closed hand in front of my eyes in amazement. I realized the meaning of it all: Something was showing me I had just grasped the most profound imparting of understanding as a gift from above me, right out of the thin air! Then another realization came to me as I began to feel joyfully relieved, filling up with life breathing hope. The being telling me these things, is the REAL HOLY SPIRIT!

I arose from the chair feeling stronger and confident I was saved. Nothing up to this time, which came from the spiritual realm, had filled me with the hope and joy like the understanding and graciousness I had received in this instant of time. The Real Holy Spirit was teaching me about Jesus saving me! I just knew it! I just knew!

Later I thought about how Bibles had been around our house all my life. I recalled even reading them, yet it never impacted me with understanding. I thought about all the times I had been taken to church through my childhood and yet it had not made me know anything. I thought about all the preaching and sermons I had encountered and still I hadn't learned. The things actually teaching me about Jesus were angelic beings instructing me in the Bible, and the Real Holy Spirit teaching me directly. I was now learning about Jesus and understanding it from God, not men. All of these things had been coming from God and moving me into a rebirth of my existence and who I was. I was being guided all along.

As I moved into the dining room, I asked the question from the unseen teacher bestowing hope, "Why would Jesus count for me and not somebody else?" Then as if I should know the answer, the answer came to me from my past. It's because I had been baptized into Jesus. I sort of knew that, but now I understood that it was a contract that had consummated the deal between me and the Lord. But I was so young at that time. I had lived very sinfully during the years! Could it actually count for me now that I had been so unfaithful since childhood? Obviously it meant something to God despite my unfaithfulness. God was still being faithful and doing something to get me back on track. I didn't deserve it I knew. Obviously God was giving me back to Jesus, who wanted me for some logic defying reason. Maybe it's just love.

You would think that after these things, my spirit would be completely calmed and reassured from now on. This is the farthest thing from what happened though. The angels were quite persuasive over me. My fears of being condemned were re-inflamed as a result of the angels. Some of them were helping me by making me face issues that needed to be dealt with. Others simply seemed intent on breaking my hope in Jesus' help for me. Under the stress of either situation, I felt condemned. The angels would also mess with my mind just to frighten me. I'll continue telling you about these accounts so that you will see what kind of horror a young man can face.

"Ha Mikvah"

Guilt: fear. Guilt: shame. Guilt: humiliation. I wavered wildly between courage and despair. Yes I had been baptized at eleven years old. But the effect of years of living sinfully was making me feel filthy before God so much, that I doubted that baptism as an adolescent could really wash all this filthiness of guilt off me now. Legally speaking, could it count for me as an adult? It seemed that I had an endless supply of things to be afraid about. The weight of concerns were heavy to me, and I decided that, "Just in case", I would go get baptized again.

But what day of the week was it anyhow, Thursday? I couldn't take a chance on dying as a sinner while waiting for Sunday. I my situation, one of those starry angels might decide that it's my time and anything might happen! There was only one thing to do. Take action and get my sins washed off of me right then.

There was nobody around the house to take me anywhere. I thought of who might be willing to help me get to the church to get baptized. I thought of Carol Vallent, a dear friend of my Mother's, who is the finest form of a true Mississippi lady. So I called Carol's house and she answered the phone. Trying not to sound like a fool, I sort of explained to her that I wanted to get baptized and wondered if she could help me arrange it. She was very kind and encouraging to me, and agreed to make the arrangements immediately. After we hung up the phones, Carol contacted a gentle kindly assistant minister at her church and made the arrangements. She called me back and said she would be right over to get me. In a little while Carol pulled into the drive in her little beige rounded bodied, old timey Volvo station wagon. Her young son Scott was with her. I went out and got into the car with them and away we went. The sturdy little car felt strong and stable. Its little engine running effortlessly, imparted a sense of reliability and faithfulness in the world to me as we rode to the Church of Christ where Carol's minister friend was waiting for us. I tried not to be to open about my concerns because I didn't want to make a bigger fool of myself than I already felt like. But Carol was so gracious and Scott is a nice kid. They are just those kind people.

We got to the church and went inside with the Minister. He was a tall rotund minister with blond hair trimmed in respectable standards. His face was full of kindness and he was so gracious and reassuring. I was still concerned about being baptized twice, and started explaining my dilemma to him. "I've been baptized before, but I was only eleven. I was worried that it might not count for me." With this, the minister looked at me and his demeanor was quite respectful as if I hadn't said anything stupid at all. He was treating me with dignity, as an equal to himself, and I really appreciated it. He replied with calm reassurance, "We'll just make sure of it this time."

We made the preparations and put on the clothes to get baptized. We entered the baptismal in the main auditorium. The room was so quiet and so large. It must be able to hold a thousand people, but only the four of us were there. We went into the water and the Minister asked me, as Carol and Scott observed, if I believed Jesus is the Son of God. I replied, "I do". The minister then raised his right hand to heaven, lifted his voice a little, and proclaimed for all witnesses in heaven and earth concerning me. "Because you have confessed that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, I now baptize you in the name of the Father, and the Son, and of the Holy Spirit! Amen!" Then I was baptized and arose from the water with a contract between God and myself, that my past was gone, and I was pure with a second chance. I'd already been trying to be perfect and not sin, but I knew it wasn't enough. The past was haunting me and I had needed to be shed of it. I felt so much better.

"The Broken Cross"

I was sitting in my room in the evening, doing whatever activity I can't recall. Maybe I was reading or maybe I was watching the stars. But something caught my awareness as I sat there. There seemed to be something wanting me to see it that wasn't like the other things. I looked over to the corner of the room and watched carefully. Every so little bit, something seemed to be moving. Something right in front of me, that was invisible, yet somehow a movement was there. Light refractions! I'm seeing a lens effect in the air in the corner area of the room. The effect is in the air itself, away from the wall a little bit. I watch, and slowly I saw enough lens effect to vaguely discern a perimeter area of some form of bubble shaped thing in the air. Only the edges of it are able to be seen since this is the area refracting light just a little tiny bit. I stared into the heart of this bubble, and realize it was some kind of entity. The entity itself seems interested in me as well and it began a little demonstration.

As I stared at the being, I can discern that it was oval with the height of it being maybe two feet if the form extends all the way to the floor, which I couldn't be sure of. The width of it was maybe a little over a foot. The being is slowly, slowly, starting to make more light refractions. At first it starts as gentle undulations in the air, in the main part of it that was at first completely indistinguishable. Gentle and slow, almost like the being is experimenting trying to figure out how I'm seeing it. While I watch it, I think the being is realizing it's the light refractions that I perceive, as the form of its invisible body moves. Maybe the being is watching my thoughts and understanding my perception level of it by trial and error. That would explain why its undulations began so slowly. After a little bit, the pace of the undulations gets faster and light is being refracted more obviously. At one point the being is beginning to resemble the strong effect of a heat wave shimmering above the hot asphalt on roads. One thing that makes the effect more obvious is that on my hunter green walls, I have a cross painted directly on the wall just behind the entity. The lines of the cross make an easy reference for the effects of light bending as it passes through the entity. The undulations increase in speed and magnitude as if the being seems to be understanding the effect now. Then its shimmering becomes so strong and fast that it begins to take on the effect of a shimmering membrane in the air. As it gets stronger and stronger I notice the cross on the wall is starting to appear to shake as the light of it passes through the being. The vibrating is very fast now, very strong; the cross behind the oval entity is positively being distorted. I notice this and the entity seems to understand my perception. It develops a violent chaotic shimmer and suddenly the top of the cross on the wall is being refracted as if to appear it is being sharply bent over. First a sharp flicker of a bend, then another flickering bend and finally the top of the cross bends over violently and sharply and stays that way for a few jerky, static like moments, and then returns straight again. The entity stops! I can still perceive it, but it has stopped its shimmering. The cross on the wall is still and normal.

I think to the entity that this wasn't really an impressive demonstration. All you did was bend light with your body. I lost interest and began to ignore the apparition.

I had the suspicion the entity itself was having a learning experience with its own abilities. But on the other hand, the entity may have known exactly what it was doing all along. That's the nature of the intrigue of spirits. You can't ever really draw a solid conclusion based on what little you know. All you can really understand is that you have encountered it. The intrigue is so bad, that even if you talk with the being, you don't know if it's knowledgeable or truthful. One thing is for certain, jumping to conclusions on my part, or on anyone's part, will have you bouncing of the walls; this much I'm learning.

There was one thing I did think at the time of the entity's bending of the cross. It seemed plausible to me this entity may be intending to express that he was planning to make an assault upon the cross to me. In fact, this is much of the content of the pattern of the life's events following this episode. It was like he, the spirit in the air, wanted to break off the top of the cross in indignation. What could be so significant about the top of the cross? When Jesus was crucified, there was a proclamation placed above him in three languages, "This is Yeshua, Messiah of the Jews".

There is also the idea of reducing the whole event to the simplest words: The cross within the oval is being distorted. If we change the context a bit, the event might be an expression of complaint that the cross is being distorted in the eyes of people today,

"Dragon Eyes"

With the realization that the star beings are actually angelic, the natural conclusion was to confirm the divide between the good and evil that I had perceived all along. It was the classic Biblical battle between God and the devil, angels and demons. Now my experiences had a context around which to reference them. In my experiences, I had perceived that I was being actively hunted, even though the sources had not always been clearly defined. Now it was clear that it was God, and the devil. In retrospect, it is clear to me now that the battle of good and evil, redemption and damnation, was being waged over me personally. Why me? I haven't a clue. But the battle was now in full and the combatants were openly doing their parts.

All this seems like a bizarre and mind bending thing and, I admit, it was cripplingly frightening. Yet to realize I was being sought by God against the realm of wickedness is a great treasure. I say you should be so blessed.

So far the demonic had caused me to bow to a star, and were openly expressing contempt with my growth in Biblical themes and my grasp of the faith. They were constantly undermining my hope for a second chance from God. One of the open expressions of contempt was the timely appearances of the shadowy silhouettes of a pair of eyes. When I would be thinking of God and generally making progress, these eyes would appear above me in the shape of angry or aggressive slanted almond shapes that were just shadows and shades, appearing at times in colors, but mostly just appearing dark. They had the starkness of the eagle's gaze, and were slanted sharply. Their contempt and dissatisfaction with me was obvious. I pictured behind these eyes the form of a dragon staring contemptuously at me. It was threatening, yet I was actually glad to myself to have the chaos of evil annoyed. Yet it was a threat.

In those days there was a funny evangelist on television named Ernest Angley that we all used to laugh at. Ernest Angley was so strangely stylized and demonstrative with his overt healing services, that it was comical and odd. We all found his act to be hilariously entertaining! However, I now think that beneath this odd man's frankly weird persona, was a truly spiritual mind. Years later, I happened to see Ernest Angley on television, and he began to talk about the presence of the devil that he had perceived. He spoke about how the devils eyes would look at him at times. He went on to describe how they appeared above him as a pair of eyes like two big horse eyes. You can imagine what I felt when I heard him say that. Ernest Angley was essentially describing the exact same thing that I had perceived in the previous years. "Horse eyes", was an excellently good description. I understood this oddball little man had actually known and experienced things like I had. I decided I wouldn't focus so much on his oddities anymore, but from now on, try to respect him in my heart. I know little about him, but I did find that in his insane sounding descriptions of visions, that we had a mutuality of the absolute certain knowledge of the spiritual realm and conflict. Who but a person experiencing the same thing would find room to respect a man simply for a description of the devils eyes? It was a description, I understood, the rest of society would find ridiculous. It was notable to me that this man, Ernest Angley, had found the courage to be spiritually eccentric in defiance of society, and was able to be open with his experiences in the face of scorn. I admired him despite his strangeness, and decided to somehow emulate his openness about his experiences without getting myself tossed into the nuthouse. If Ernest Angley could stay out of the nuthouse, I suppose I could manage to stay out of it as well, and not be so bound to hiding my new faith and experiences.

"Do Cats See"

Mutuality itself became a sign and a beckoning voice of encouragement. Despite the absolute weirdness of my situation, I found mutuality in the strangest of places. I had experienced a degree of mutuality in perception of the spiritual realms in the occult circles that I had encountered. But they revolted me and I found no other mutuality in them. They certainly couldn't help me define me own situation. I found mutuality in the strange man, Ernest Angley. But the next instance I'll describe, I found mutuality in a way that stretches the boundaries altogether.

One bright sunny summer morning, I was sitting on the front porch of Dad's house, which faced west. The dew was on the grass and it was a pleasant morning. One of the family cats came strolling up to me. This cat was a full grown healthy tom cat that was ink black. As he sauntered up, I invited him to me. He meowed back to me and jumped up on my lap. I petted on him as he purred and just stared over the front yard like the predator seeking the sight of prey that is in his nature. He started digging his claws in and out of my pants leg and it was a bit prickly painful. But it was okay.

As we sat there quietly, an angel flashed his starry presence before me in close proximity. Because the cat was on my lap, I was able to observe his behavior closely as well. When the angel flashed, not only did I notice it, but the cat suddenly turned to look at the exact place where the angel had flashed. I realized the cat had seen the angel, and I wasn't alone in this thing after all. Had the cat actually seen the angel like I had? I was convinced the cat had seen it.

Then my imagination allowed me to consider the role of angels in the care of all the creatures. I pictured how the birds may not know where the food they need is, and maybe they see the angels and go to them and find food. I pictured the cats being led toward the place where they would find a mouse. The idea that God cares for the animals formed to me and became real. Another thing that became real to me was that the creatures also see angels, and that I am not alone. Maybe it could be, that in the Garden of Eden, it was just man who seemed to lose this connection to the spiritual Eden, yet the other creatures retained it. I didn't know. At least now I felt some mutuality again to the creatures of the earth and their experiences. I abandoned the idea that nature is a closed set of values in this material realm, with everything controlled by the instincts born into them. Nature is also a participant in the spiritual. Could this actually be true? I think it is. Yet I wouldn't swear to it. I just have some faith in the idea, based upon a simple event of petting a cat when angels flashed around us.

"Dazzled"

I was in my room one night. The room was brightly lit with the pleasant combination of a large fluorescent lamp with two four foot tubes, and a couple of incandescent lamps. I had my shades raised and the windows appeared as black areas on my walls. Nothing was outside in the dark that I wanted privacy from. Just nature is all that was out there. Yet I did have a visitor who was attracted to all the light shining out of my windows into the night.

As I was sitting in my room facing the north window, suddenly there jumped up onto my window ledge another one of the black tom cats. With a little start on my part, I looked to see what was on my window. I immediately recognized it was the cat. The big tom looked through the window into the room at me, and fixed his gaze directly into my eyes. The bright lighting of my room lit up his shiny black coat. But more noticeably, the bright light lit up the tomcat's large green feline eyes very brightly! I looked back at the tom's huge cat eyes.

I suppose the events and stresses of the past months had made me somewhat susceptible to what happened next. As I looked at the cat's eyes a strange sensation of a slight vertigo come over me. I felt those huge cat eyes hypnotizing me. My sight began to fade into the sparkly blackness of faintness from the periphery closing in until all that I was able to see were the two large brightly shining green eyes of the tom cat. I was dazzled and hypnotized instantly by the cat's fixed gaze. But in a few moments I shook it off with some alarmed effort, and regained my senses. I avoided the cat's eyes so that I wouldn't fall into this state again, since I felt in myself I was weakened and susceptible.

I got up and went to the window. As I approached, the cat became frightened of me and turned to leap down. As the tom leapt off the window ledge, he was suddenly snagged and was hanging off the window screaming in agony and desperation. I opened the window to help the cat, and reached down to lift him back up. I could see that one of the toes on his hind foot, had went into the crevice of the storm window frame and snagged there when he turned to leap. It was kind of a panicky moment, in which I felt unsure about lifting him to the right or left in order to untwist his toe, or would I twist it further. It turned out not to matter anyhow, because when I reached down for the cat, he immediately grabbed my arm with his sharp front claws and began climbing up my arm painfully. I could see the desperation in his eyes and his frantic actions. As the tom cried out in agony, I felt sympathy for the old tom even though he was ripping my arms pretty good. Between the efforts of the two of us, the cat's toe dislodged and the creature dropped to the ground and fled into the dark.

I looked at the storm window framing and didn't see any dismembered cat parts stuck in it. I figured that at the least, the poor thing received a broken toe out of the event. I wondered if this was somehow just punishment placed immediately upon the beast for fixing me with his hypnotic gaze. Punishment from God: What a frightening concept, since God was obviously able to do anything, including planting thoughts into our minds without us even knowing where they came from. Would God hold the creatures accountable? Was there even God's justice for animals? I didn't know. Anything was possible with God was all I could consider.

"Oblivion"

"I didn't ask for all this! The world and creation was doing just fine before I ever came on the scene! Why did I enter the picture to become the whipping boy of spiritual realms? Am I condemned already? What is the point of existing only to be a damned creature?"

These were the kinds of thoughts and questions going through my mind under the stresses of encountering strange entities and the questions of judgment and redemption of God. I was so afraid, I was at the point my existence was becoming a burden to me. I had been harassed by angels over so many issues by now, that my hope of life in this world was fading. There comes a point in which you get so stressed, that you truly wish you had never been born. Instead, you long for the oblivion that you imagine before your perceptions of life here on earth began to emerge.

On this night I was sitting in a chair by the north window of my bedroom. I was just loathing my existence and generally feeling angry over my mind bending plight. It was then that a starry angel paid me a visit and began to converse with me telepathically. The angel didn't offer any comfort at all. In fact it seemed his intent was to slap me around some more. "Just stop existing." the angel said to me. I replied, "How do I do that?" The angel replied and said, "Be still." The idea of not existing had some appeal to me at this point, and I decided to play along with the imperious command of the angel. Questions of whether the angel was speaking for God came into my mind as well, and I sort of became afraid to be defiant as well.

So I began to sit very still, trying not to move. It's surprising how much you will actually move when you are trying to be still. This was requiring some concentration. I don't know if the angel's commands were inflicted upon me as sarcastic mockery, malevolence, or instruction from God. But the angel did seem to have a way of twisting the blade to add to my pain. The angel wasn't satisfied with my stillness and critiqued my efforts until I was virtually statuesque. I asked the angel if breathing was included in this stillness, and it was. I tried to not breathe, but I couldn't do that. Then the angel brought it to my attention that my eyes were moving around. So I tried to fix my eyes and not move them either. I decided I needed a focal point to fix my eyes on, and the first thing I looked at was a large green glass bottle sitting on my bedside cabinet directly in front of me. I had filled this bottle with water and the fluorescent lamp was lighting it very well. It was clear and its green tones were warm and comfortable against the red cedar and the background of my lamp and the one chartreuse wall. Inside the bottle, there had formed bubbles clinging all over to the inside of the bottle. The bottle was rounded like a light bulb inverted and had a long graceful neck extending upward. It had once held wine, but now it was just a nice decoration. I finally decided to fix my eyes on one of the tiny bubbles clinging to the inside of it. I stared at the bubble and tried not to blink. I sat there too intimidated by the angel to move a hair. I tried to not even move with breathing, but this was impossible. But I tried to slow my breathing until movement would be hard to notice.

As I sat there, the thought came to me that I was in an insanely absurd situation. I was trying to not exist, sitting here like a statue, afraid to move because of an angel's commanding harassment. I thought about how my parents would react when they entered the room to find me frozen, fully aware, but unresponsive. Naturally there would be panic and soon the ambulances would arrive to carry me to the hospital and then the nuthouse. I sat there statuesque, yet thinking, of the ramifications of this futile attempt to be still and not exist. I realized this wasn't going to work and if anything, was going to bring a lot of pain upon me. Yet the angel was hovering about me intimidating me. I wanted to give up, but what if I did? Would God be upset with my disobedience? So I kept sitting still staring at that tiny bubble in the green bottle.

Time went by and slowly I had the realization that I was becoming horrified: Horrified by the prospect of throwing my conscious existence away by sitting still doing nothing, staring at a little bubble contained in the bottle of its own little universe. "I can't do this!" I thought. "I'm aware, and this is not ceasing to exist; but existing in a state of insanity!" Horror started overwhelming me in this insanity. Outwardly I was as placid as a pool of water, but inside I was terrorized out of my wits to be sitting here forever in such a perverse manner trying to not exist. Finally I felt anger rising in me on top of the horror and I declared to the angel, "I don't care who you are! If I'm going to be condemned, at least it won't be in this state! I'll just move and exist in my sorrow, rather than have both sorrow and this premature torture!" With this courage of my outrage, I moved all my members in an act of defiance and arose from the chair. I waited briefly for a response from the angel, or maybe a stroke of wrath from God. But nothing happened to me at all. In fact, whatever God thought about it, at the moment it didn't seem to be my time for punishment.

If a soul is backed into a trap of helplessness and paralysis, a state of living death, a state of paralyzed torture, a destiny of oblivion, then what more threat of punishment would even matter? The worst is already. From that point there is nothing left to lose. From that point, defiance of oppression gives one everything to gain, and nothing left to suffer. "Defiance", at that moment is not an evil thing, but a good and remedial thing.

As for existing, what I got out of this was that acting as if one doesn't exist, was a very perverse alternative to living a vibrant involved existence. Sometimes I have forgotten this lesson, yet somehow I feel this is the answer from God. Maybe it's how God thinks about himself. Maybe God wants to express his existence as living and involved. If that is true, one has to wonder why God is so restrained about revealing himself to most people. Maybe God restrains himself for our sakes, because humanity is so freaked out by encounters with and the presence of God. I don't know. I don't know.

"On Trial"

The heat of the conflict was becoming more intense. The battle lines of the starry warfare going on all around me, was changing positions and evolving in themes. At this point, despite my attempts to ignore the angels, I was still engaged in conversation with them more than ever before.

The scenarios that were emerging were forming a pattern: An angel would come to me and start accusing me. Over and over the accusing angel would declare to me, "You're sinning." Typically, I would have no idea what the angel was referring to. I would ask for an explanation, and the angel would remind me of some forgotten deed or some forgotten word. A lot of the times I would have thought of these events as trivial, yet somehow they seemed significant to the angels. I protested to the angels, that these idle words and offhand events meant nothing in the scheme of things. Yet over and over the thing being examined and questioned was not the ramifications of the events or the words themselves; but the matter of the state of my heart and attitude at the time the events in question took place. Overt actions and words were easy to repent of, and obvious to me or anyone else. But this line of examination by the angels was subtle, and things I would have never thought about or identified. Over and over I would finally understand the point of the angels' questioning, and try to explain to them, the things in my heart at the time of the deed. But the only real answer was to admit to the error of that situation or mindset, and agree to repent. I hadn't realized that so often there was a toxic seed in me. The angels were attentive to the bad seeds of the heart, and they were it bringing out in the open for examination. I would repent of this thought, word or action and resolve to not make that mistake again. I would have pure thoughts from now on.

With all the admissions and contrition on my part, I would instinctively feel this should gain God's forgiveness. But it seemed the response from my starry accusers was not interested in reassuring me of my salvation. Far from being satisfied with my repentance, the angels seemed to insist over and over that I give up the idea of being saved as if my wrongs and toxic thoughts had sealed my fate.

Eventually, I perceived this whole set of events with the accusing angels and their examinations, as being like a trial. That's it! Suddenly it all made sense. I was on trial for my soul, and the prosecution was tearing me to shreds! I was terrified with this realization. This wasn't supposed to happen while still alive! My only hope was in forgiveness, which also demanded the courage to face the issues and repent of them with clear understanding. My guts were being spilled daily and it was sickening to deal with issues I wasn't prepared to face. Yet the alternative was to allow the prosecution to win the case and claim my soul for punishments! I had to go on! I had to have some hope! I couldn't live with knowing the reality of punishments to face for my sins. Life without hope was an intolerable prospect that I simply couldn't face with this absolute certainty of the reality of things. The angels were telling me to give up my hope of being saved. I was terrified and clung to the tiny seed of hope in my heart.

I missed my days of blissful ignorance of the things of God. I never felt fear of judgment in those times of ignorance. I was a free spirit living in bliss. Now I was in such a state of ongoing terror, that at one point I felt the certainty of doom and in absolute terror, my soul succumbed to resignation of my fate. I layed my head back into my pillow and I closed my eyes with sad resignation, expecting to literally fall into the precipice of doom. I felt my life leaving me in my terror. It was over.

But in that moment a little tiny, very tiny, seed of encouragement manifested from nowhere. I think maybe it was that I heard a word come over the radio speaker to the effect that something is not over. Who knows for sure what the agent of encouragement was. But for me, it was timely and far from coincidental. When I was falling over the edge of the brink of doom, when I was about to perish forever, when my life was leaving me in terror, an unseen hand would prevent my utter fall with a tiny, tiny seed of hope. I heard the word of hope from some unrecalled source, and the hope of destiny and life returned to me. I opened my eyes with a small and tenuous connection to salvation. My humanity needs but even just the tiniest hope!

It was also in this moment that I noticed a pattern: When I am my weakest and most helpless, when I face what I think is the end, it was then in those moments that from somewhere there would come a tiny nudge of life. Over and over this pattern repeated. I recognized this pattern finally after this event. It was a realization in my perception of God, that God sees us in great enormous events, and uses the tiniest amount of intervention to utterly overcome all those great storms assaulting us.

"Hair Issues"

Inside my room, the angel came to me in the afternoon. I asked the angel, "What do you want?" The angel replied, "You're sinning." I asked the angel how I was sinning. The angel directed me to go into the bathroom and look into the mirror. So I did, and stood there looking into the mirror at myself. I saw my youth and the beauty of my face. I thought about the androgyny of my appearance and hoped I would gain more manly features with the maturity progressing upon me. "Okay, I'm here. Now what?" The angel drew my attention to my long hair. I can't recall if he appeared in his starry form on my hair, or if he did the usual stroke of the angels through my hair. Maybe he even stated it telepathically. I just don't recall. But I do recall that if this was like the other situations of accusation from the angels, this time the angel was accusing me over my hair. I became alarmed. My hair was part of my rock star music ambitions. I needed it for the role of guitar virtuoso and stage presence! I asked the angel, "You want me to cut my hair?" The angel affirmed this was the issue I was being taken to task for.

I really didn't want to part with my hair, and I was frustrated now. Is this really something God would be uptight about? Is the hair the real issue? As I thought about the accuser's issue, I realized quickly that the only hope for me was to give in. Now I felt this state of utter helplessness and un-empowerment. I was trapped like a child and felt the humiliations, injustice and the affliction of a child in the face of things to great for him. How can I express my frustration without offending God? It occurred to me the only thing left to do was cry like the child I felt like. It was going to be easy because my heart was grieving over my hair and the dreams of stardom that required it. So I dropped my strong shoulders in resignation and my face went to the floor. In the frustration of a child I cried in my sense of helplessness in the face of loss before an overwhelming foe.

The mockery of angels began! It was like the previous time of the roaring of the lion star, there manifested a sound that was obvious to my spirit, yet obviously from a dimension beyond the material. I heard the sound of a vigorously crying infant baby coming from above me, as if there was an invisible room in the air that the baby was in. I listened to the sound of it for a few seconds, and then I got as mad as mad could get. The angels were calling me a crybaby! Now I was embarrassed at the humiliation of this macho attitude I was getting from the angel. I didn't think they would even relate to the culture of manliness or the concept of a crybaby. But it was as obvious as the day to me now, these angel things sure did relate to manliness and crybabies, and weren't above mocking a guy with it. Boy I got mad.

I immediately straightened my spine in sobriety. I had nothing left to do but begin a haircut. Out came the scissors and off went the hair. I decided that short enough was good enough. I didn't go into the stupid self afflicting mode trying to demonstrate the pains of a martyr back at the angel. I simply gave myself a neat short haircut and hoped it looked good. Maybe at least with this shorter hair, it would make me a little more distinctly masculine in the face. I thought more masculinity would be a decent consolation for the loss of my hair.

I wished I could have been more like the Prescott boys and young men, who were all the epitome of masculinity despite how long they wore their hair. But this is not my lot. I needed the help of short hair in order to be manlier. I was embarrassed before the angel and before God. But at least this time I didn't despise the angel and the outcome. Somehow I realized this was for my own good. I was not made to feel hopeless in condemnation this time. In all these things, the rest of the angels had been saying to me to give up, just give up on the hope of being saved. But the angel didn't convey that idea to me this time. This time of facing an issue felt like a remedy to me, and it was allowed to be left as such by the angel.

"Guitar Issues"

It was in the afternoon on another day when the trial continued. This time the issue was my guitar. The angels were apparently expressing dissatisfaction with it. I was confused by this. Again I protested to the angels that I needed my guitar for my career in rock music. That was my goal in life. As I was expressing these things to the angel, the radio blurted out a timely statement: "Why don't you do something worthwhile?" This thing with the radio just wasn't coincidence to me. It was as if God was using it to express himself. I got the message that my rock music ambitions just weren't something God was interested in or in favor of. In a way I could understand this. Rock music was after all a culture of things contrary to God for the most part. Sexual licentiousness, cursing, drugs and a fascination with debauchery were all part of the rock scene. Yeah, I could understand God having an issue with my guitar. It was hard to let go of the last shreds of my only ambition in life. In frustration, and a willingness to just be shed of the reminder of my ambitions, to show God I would be rid of them, I decided to just destroy my guitar and get it out of sight and out of mind with finality.

I'll describe this axe for you in case you appreciate them. This guitar's most outstanding feature was that it was teardrop shaped. It was a Vox Starstream V269 that was made in Italy. Its color was a beautiful transparent cherry red over a hollow mahogany body, with an arched top and a flat back. It had an ebony fret board with mother of pearl rectangular inlays, that themselves were stripped with black and white stone inlays in a slightly diagonal pattern. The headstock was almost black as if it were dark mother of pearl. Along the corners of the body it had edging that was white on the sides, a tan center with some kind of dark Egyptian looking pattern within that. Its metal work was all bright chromed with a large spring loaded bridge and tremolo bar. It had a large "f" hole above the strings that was outlined with white, yellow and tan. The pick guard was black with beveled white edges. Along the bottom of the front was a chrome strip in which controls for "wah wah", distortion and repeater, were mounted with a switch and knob for each one. On the body were mounted in a diamond pattern, the four knobs for the volumes and tones and a selector switch for the three chromed pickups. All the knobs were like mother of pearl. This guitar was gaudy and beautiful to look at, but light, lean and clean to play. Hang a few ribbons and tassels from the head stock and guitar strap on the body side, and you had a wonderfully true expression of a gypsy guitar. This guitar screamed, growled and preached with soul. Its hollow design allowed it to feed back with the amplifier at about 100 decibels, creating a magic voice from nowhere, which was controlled by muffing on the strings.

In perverse frustration, I took this beautiful guitar I so loved, and went out into the back yard. I walked up to a hack berry tree and swung my axe by the neck with a lot of force against the tree. The guitar bashed the tree noisily, but just rebounded and didn't break apart into a million splinters like I had expected. In my surprised at the strength of the instrument, I examined it to see the effect of the abuse. There wasn't even a scratch!

This struck me as nothing short of a miracle and a sign that the guitar wasn't the real issue. It was my ambition to be a Rock and Roll god that was the real issue. I felt sorry for abusing my axe and took it in to see if it still played. It played just as perfectly and wonderfully as ever. I was relieved, and set the beautiful Vox aside. I shut off my overpowering Ampeg G4-12 amp. With no proclamation to anyone, I silently gave up my only ambition, forever.

I didn't even bother to consider other types of music. I couldn't stand them. Classical is boring, Country is stupid, and the religious music is so poor in form and quality that it's actually depressing. Even if I did like country, which I didn't, it was twice as nasty as rock music. It was redneck and stupidly singing all about adultery, drunkenness, and had a prurient form of expression of the fascination with women. Country made rock seem decent by comparison. They also sang with a fake accent that made them sound like a bunch of stupid posers from imaginary Hicksville. I certainly didn't like old people who thought sounding like morons was cool.

I supposed God had seen I was willing to sacrifice the cherished thing in order to consummate repentance. Yet even in all these things, the rest of the angels were repeating to me to just, "give up, give up on being saved"!

"Covenant with Hell"

It was around noon on another sunny summer day, when the prosecutor angel arrived in my room to afflict me some more. I realized the angel was forcing me to face issues that might come between me and God, but I strongly felt that he wanted me to fail. I no longer think this is true. I now believe I owe this angel gratitude just as a fiery preacher should be appreciated by his chastised followers. I didn't have the courage to face issues, but I had sheer terror motivating me to face them.

The angel began with me with the usual assertion, "You're sinning." On this day the angel directed me to go outside to the back yard. I went out to the area behind the hedges in front of the garden area. The angel pointed out my failed three wheeled chopper project; the carcass of the Volkswagen floor pan. There it lay as black and forgotten as always. I walked over to it curious about what the angel had in mind. The angel always had something in mind; always some sideways angle on looking at some matter. The last time I had even noticed this junk was when Ike had pretended I was making some agreement with Hell, when I had responded to him with the indignant word "Hell", while I stood on this junk. Then I recalled that event and realized the angel was questioning me about this matter. I explained to the angel the idea of a contract with Hell was simply Ike's contrivance. To me it meant nothing at all. It wasn't in my heart to make a pact with Hell. I told the angel that it was surprising to me how he could actually think my idle words were such an issue. It was nothing then and it was nothing now. I chided the angel a bit for being so uptight about idle words and turned and walked back into the house. I had declared my innocence and felt no need to repent. The angel left me alone about this matter. Yet I did take note that even insignificant words were big deals to angels. I figured they just didn't understand us humans and how we talk. But do they understand us?

This play by the angel, to me was just more angelic insistence they constantly give, that I give up my hope. I took it as an assertion by the angel that there was a legal claim upon my soul, to be consigned to Hell. This time I wasn't going along with this whole premise. I no longer think this was the angel's motive of course. But at the time I was so paranoid about angels that this reinforced to me, the message of giving up on salvation.

"Driving Issues"

Around noon on this sunny day, the angels were talking to me. I was informed that I was going to have to deal with a sin. I asked the angel that I was specifically talking to, what the issue was. I was directed to go outside and the angel would show me. I left my room and went out the back door of the kitchen. I proceeded to the driveway when the angel appeared on the green Volare' coup, that was my mother's car. The angel informed me that driving was my sin. Was it my driving or just driving in general? I had no way to grasp what the angel was driving at. The angel informed me by starry induction that driving was the issue and I was going to have to deal with it. I tried to reason with the angel and went through arguments with the angel of maybe driving real carefully or driving slowly. But the angel was insistent. I tried making deals to be sure my driving was perfect and thus it wouldn't be a sin. But the angel was all the more insistent there was some sin. I thought to myself that the reality of driving is that it's humanly impossible to never commit an infraction of the traffic laws. Even if I never got a ticket, heaven would know I just broke a rule. I thought about how easy it is to nudge a mile an hour over the speed limit, to forget to use a blinker, to pull to far forward at an intersection. All these were technically infractions which I would never succeed in avoiding. I was resigned to this truth. I was condemned if I was held to task by heaven on even these very minor human errors. The angel insisted that I obey and stop driving.

The issue I had and felt, was this imperious being making demands that seemed unreasonable to me, yet who held all the cards. Was this angel really telling me God's will and would I be guilty of disobeying God if I stood my ground against such unreasonable demands? But I was afraid to go against the angel, because God was obviously going to the trouble to subject me to these visitations. I mourned inside myself at the ramifications of immobility in my life. I would be a dependant! I loathed this indignity more than anything. Yet what was I to do?

It was then that I recalled the nature of the magic walks and how I did seem to get places I needed to be; or at least where something magical and unseen needed me to be. I comforted myself figuring that if I was to be someplace, God would use his magic power to make it happen. Small comfort it was though, considering the effect of magic walks was just recently discovered and quite out of the ordinary. What if there was some place I personally wanted to go? Would God make me somehow get moved to that place? I wouldn't have control! How would I get anywhere?

This demand grieved me, and I mourned with the realization that I wasn't going to go against God. The connection between driving and sin was not clear to me, nor was I convince completely that I wasn't being messed with by an angel. Yet I couldn't take chances with my soul and eternal fate! I was afraid of God, and saw only one alleviation of my fears at this point. I reached into my right hip pocket and pulled out my wallet, then from it, my drivers license. I stood there in the drive and took my frustration and oppression out on my license as I mournfully ripped it to shreds. I threw the pieces into the grass and turned around toward the house to go back in, feeling a deep sense of the prevailing irrationality imposed upon me by the angel. This angel was as unreasonable as the most nitpicky cop and heartless judge. I walked back into the house feeling defeated, oppressed and helpless.

"Dream Raider"

The stresses of all the things I was going through had been taking a huge toll on me. I was a wreck. As a consequence of this exhaustion, I spent a lot of time sleeping. My parents had noticed how much I slept, and had commented on it. But they didn't mind since to them I was apparently a basket case who wouldn't ever amount to anything anyhow. They pretty much left me alone as long as I wasn't creating some problem. But for me, sleep was also an escape from the incessant torment of angels upon my conscious being.

On this day, it was late in the afternoon. The day had been filled with starry visitations and many hallucinations of various kinds. I was exhausted emotionally and weariness came over me very heavily. Even though it was still daylight, I layed down on my bed and soon was asleep to the bliss of dreams. Only this time was to be different; terrifyingly different.

While I slept, there appeared to me the light of an angel like a round aura. I watched it and knew it was another visitation. The angel declared to me, "You're sinning and you can't go to Heaven." I reasoned that if I couldn't go to Heaven, the only alternative was Hell. I asked the angel, "Are you sure I have no hope of going to Heaven?" The angel replied, "You cannot go there." I asked the angel, "Are you telling me I'm going to Hell?" The angel flashed his round aura in affirmation that I was destined for Hell. I panicked in my dream, and shouted, "I want to go to Heaven! I don't want to burn forever in Hell! What can I do!?" The angel flashed his round aura in yellow this time as a reply. The yellow was the message, "Forgive." I replied, "Forgive? You want me to forgive you for condemning me to HELL?" Again the angel flashed his round aura in yellow, "Forgive." I was in utter terror at this perversity and plight. Suddenly I was wide awake.

I realized I was awake and that the dialogue had been in a dream. I asked myself if it was real or just a dream. Yet the angel had shown a mind and intelligence of his own. I was asleep, but the maybe the dream had been real! I had been condemned by an angel who was invading my only refuge of sleep. I couldn't escape from the angels in any place! I would even be tormented in dreams. Was I really consigned to Hell? I was unsure, but I still had the tiny seed of hope in me. I was now awake and terrified. I couldn't lie here any longer. I had to get up and try to distract my mind from the terror inside me.

By now I noticed it had become dark and I heard my parents in the living room watching television. I got out of the bed and walked through the well lit house toward the kitchen. Mom saw me as I passed by the living room, and she saw a deep disturbance in me. She thought to herself, "Uh Oh, Something's wrong with Bryson." She immediately got up and followed me as I went out the back door of the kitchen and walked onto the little walkway down from the porch in the cool black evening. Mom spoke my name behind me in a beckoning soft tone, "Bryson?"

"The City Four Square"

I stopped walking at the end of the small walkway when I heard my mother say my name. I stood looking into the darkness as Mom walked up to me. I was trembling from a combination of fear and the cool evening. Mom stepped in front of me and reached her loving arms up and took me in her embrace, holding me close to her. Softly she spoke to me and asked, "Bryson, what's wrong?" I didn't bother telling her about the horrifying encounter with an angel in my sleep. What I was really afraid of was being condemned. But I didn't dare say it. The thought came to me that I needed to answer something to her. But what could I tell her? I thought to myself just in case there was any hope at all, I had better not blow it with how I answered her. Then I decided what to say and replied, "Mom, I'm trying to have faith in my God." Mom just squeezed me tightly in her arms and didn't say anything, as I stood looking over her shoulder into the night.

Above the driveway where I was already looking, a blue light began to manifest. I looked at it as it took on a more distinct form and sharp edges became apparent. What I saw was the solid form of a geometric polygon with four sides. It seemed at first to be standing on edge, with the bottom and top edges parallel to the ground and the right and left edges slanted to the right at about a forty five degree angle. When I looked at it in this form, the first thought that came to my mind about it was to think, "A parallelogram?" It looked like a sky blue parallelogram standing on edge to me.

Immediately after I thought this about the manifestation, somehow without it even moving in any manner, my perspective about it changed. Suddenly my eyes saw it not as a parallelogram standing on edge, but instead it was now a blue square floating flat, about two feet above the ground. The width and depth of the square appeared to be about eighteen inches. It floated there with one corner toward me which caused the slanted lines to suddenly make sense due to my perspective being slightly from the side of the square. I thought, "No, it's a square floating flat in the air." I wondered what it could signify and immediately the correlation came to me as I thought, "The City Four Square; the Kingdom of Heaven; It's not far from me!"

Just then my mother spoke to me, "There you go. It's Okay. Now you've stopped shaking." Then she released her embrace and held me back from her as I broke my gaze upon the city so near to me. I hadn't even really noticed that I had been shaking, but Mom had. I suppose it was very apparent to her as she held me. When she said I had stopped, I realized that I actually had been trembling. I was intrigued by her saying I had stopped trembling in the very instant I saw the City of Blue so close to me. I held my right hand up and looked at it in the dim light coming from the porch. It was as steady as a rock! I thought to myself, "God just reached inside my head, pushed a button, and turned off the trembling!" I was fascinated and feeling very comforted compared to my pathetic state only seconds earlier. I thought to myself, "I'm still afraid, but not so much now. God is helping me!" I noticed the timing of God's help was again while in the loving arms of my mother. The timing was a message to me that is found in the pattern of things. Something was telling me that God's comfort and direction is expressed in unison with the love of my mother. As surely as my mother gives her love to me, God loves me.

Mom suggested we go back into the house, and she and I calmly went in together. I was beginning to understand now that I had hope, and God was still being kind to me. He was putting me through a lot I knew. But God was just refusing to let me utterly crumble or allow the tiny seed of hope to vanish from my heart. He let me know again, that it was right to cling to a hope and faith and was encouraging me to do so. I knew I had a reason to feel grateful; with God being kind to me like this.

"The Birth of Faith"

As the days passed, there were many more episodes in which I had visitations of the starry prosecutor, sights of strange things, and the ever present thousands of stars. The angels were still running their touch through my hair and other touches. Often the prosecutor came to me in the mornings and had even taken to waking me up a few times by inducing a gentle stinging on some part of my body, such as the bottom of my big toe, which would awaken me with a start.

One mid morning the starry prosecutor came into my room and said to me, "You're sinning" I replied to the angel, "I can't believe you're saying that, I've repented for everything I ever did. I've even repented of things I'm not even sure I've ever done." Then I thought about the sideways reasoning the angels consistently came at me from. With this in mind, I directed my thought to the angel, "Alright, you always have some angle on things, so you must have something in mind. So tell me how I'm sinning." The angel replied, "You're calling Jesus a liar." With this accusation, I was confounded and protested to the angel, "I don't know what you mean! I can't recall ever calling Jesus a liar. Alright, you tell me what your angle is, and if I can see it, I'll repent. So how am I calling Jesus a liar?" Then the prosecutor flashed and said to me, "Because you're saying Jesus can't save you." At this I began reflecting on all my hopeless feelings of being condemned already. Feelings of being beyond hope and doubting I could ever be saved. I had to admit to myself the prosecutor was right again. So I said to the angel, "Alright, I have been saying Jesus can't save me. If this is calling Jesus a lair, then from now on I won't say Jesus can't save me. Instead I'll say Jesus CAN save me." Immediately I took a moment to reflect on this new behavior I had proposed, and what it meant: "IF it's calling Jesus a LIAR to say he CAN'T save me, THEN it's TRUE to say he CAN save me."

My light bulb came on! All of the sudden I was profoundly struck by the hopeful tones of saying the right words about Jesus, and the pleasant ramifications it held for me. My light bulb of profound realization came on so brightly, I was filling with enlightenment and understanding! "Jesus CAN save me! JESUS CAN save me!" I believed it! Finally that little seed of hope was watered and had sprouted up leaves of life in me! Two little leaves of salvation hope reaching up to heaven! All my fears were unjustified by the truth of things, which is: JESUS is to be COMPLETELY TRUSTED!

I felt all my fears, from the greatest to the least, flood out of me like the feeling of relief from a burning boil that had just been lanced. A feeling of joy filled me. I felt a sheepish smile come over my face. I looked back up at the angel hovering as a star above me. Almost always the prosecutor had left me emotionally wrung out and feeling condemned. But this time the one appearing to me had filled me with a fantastic understanding and hope! In the face of any more accusations from angels and the undermining of my hope, I knew from now on I would say, "Jesus CAN save me!" Smiling, I projected my thoughts to this benevolent accuser and said to him, "You're not the same angel, are you?!" The angel flashed in white like the morning star and was gone.

I have a weapon! I have a weapon! A weapon NOW that the prosecutor cannot beat! I can't wait till he returns! I can't wait for him to come back! I am going to surprise him and I'm going to WIN! The angels didn't harass me the rest of this day. Intuitively I knew the rematch would be the next day in the morning. But I was anxious for battle and I knew the outcome. Peace had finally filled my heart and I was so very strong!

"Starry Warfare"

Suddenly I'm awake. I feel the burden of being conscious again, but it lasted for only a few seconds. It was quickly replaced with the memory that things are going to be different now. I look out the north window and see that it is quite early for me to be awake. I think to myself that God is inviting me to experience this day. God is anxious for me to have this wonderful day. This is why I'm awake so early. Soon the battle will begin. I'm full of happiness as I wait on my foe to arrive.

Before very long, the star flashes above me in my room. I think, "There you are! I've been waiting for you." I'm filled with peace and I even feel buoyant facing my prosecutor. I address the star and ask him in thought, "What do you want?" Immediately the star flashed and declares to me: "You're sinning. You can't be saved." I feel merriment in my heart at the starry imparting of these lies. I don't even bother to ask what my sin is this time. No this time things are different! I smile as I observe this angel and I slowly raise my hand up and point my finger at his starry face and I shout to him in the voices of my thoughts and say, "You're Lying! JESUS CAN save me!"

I sensed the prosecutor was stunned by my sword. He flashed again and yet I refuse to hear him. My blows had the knowledge of certainty and the keen edge had found its mark. He flashed some more and yet I refused to address him. He had nothing to say that interested me. The conversation was over! A few more times the starry one tried to initiate some discourse with me. But my sword had made him irrelevant. All that mattered to me, I had. Jesus is my Savior! I sensed the star's frustration with me ignoring him. But I would not relent nor pay attention to lies. Before long the star left me alone.

As the days went by, this confidence in Jesus never departed me. Oh the angels would mess my mind up, make me feel sick sometimes, and have me so paranoid about sin that I was dysfunctional a lot of the time. But I had the victory and the rest was just learning to live again. I realized that the old me could never exist again. I could never go back. Whoever I had been before all these things began, that person was dead and gone. I was a different being now, and the reinvention of my life was irrevocably underway.

Section 3 "Climax"

"Identifying With Israel"

By now my perspective had changed enough that I was reading the Bible with a much better relevance. However at times I did get a little off here and there. One thing I did read was about Moses and how he had been a prince in Egypt. Even though he had it made, he saw the suffering of his own people, the Hebrews. There was a place in one of the Epistles that commented on Moses, that he chose to identify himself with the suffering of his own people, rather than with the riches and power of Egypt as a prince. This really struck me in such a way that I consciously decided to adopt the same attitude. It would be better not to ignore the suffering of people, especially the suffering of the Jewish people, than to live with every opportunity while having indifference. In a way, I somehow planned on sharing in the suffering of the Hebrew people, even if it was just living my life under God in such a way that the courses of things brought mutual experiences with the Jewish people.

One day I was reading in the prophets and came across a passage where God was expressing his concern for the Hebrews and how they had drifted away from him. He directed the prophet to face the north and declare, "Get you back you backsliding Israel." In a way the same situation existed in this day and I read the scripture in such a way that I thought God was wanting me to do the same act myself right now. Well it didn't seem like such a risky thing to me and with little hesitation, I went out into the back yard and faced the north and said loudly, "Get you back you backsliding Israel!" Yes I was feeling it in my heart and calling Israel back to God. Just when I said this, the blue sky had a white flash cross it. It was like God had agreed. I looked around and saw one the neighbor's adolescent kids playing in their yard next to ours. I knew the oldest boy had heard me and I looked over at him. He looked away from my direction and resumed his playing. On this day, something was drawing my heart to the Jewish people.

In a way I was really identifying with Moses. I had given up my ambition of being a crowned prince of rock music and was now preparing to do God's work. Even though I had been humiliated about thinking I was the Holy Ghost, I wasn't above having a bit of grandeur about my being. I reasoned that since God was going to all the trouble to have angels and manifestations all around me to teach me to follow Jesus, to understand what faith in Jesus is all about, and to have done so in such an extraordinary way, God must obviously have big plans for me. Yeh, I must be a regular Moses figure! Could Israel possibly understand that? I figured it would be a tough call, but I would figure out something, to reach out and bring Israel to God. My experiences though, had taught me that people don't understand things, and I wasn't counting on Israel to suddenly have a great realization and just follow me. But this call was in my heart for the time being. With time it faded as if it became irrelevant to me. My predisposition to think of faith in Jesus as something other than being Jewish, however wrong it was, caused me to isolate my thoughts in a culturally "Christian" centric expression of faith in Jesus.

"Baggy Clothes"

There's an old saying, "Even a blind hog finds an acorn now and then." I suppose this was applicable to me considering my state of utter confusion. There was one issue that I can't recall the angels bringing up to me, but which I somehow faced and resolved out of the principles in my heart. It was the issue of modesty in apparel.

Hey, it was the seventies and we all had fashions designed for one thing: Looking sexy. Yes, we had all the skin tight clothes and open shirts. We were obsessed with it! You know what? It just came to me that this is something I need to be honest about and not pretend. Everything was about sexiness; at least until you spoke openly about the idea. That's when you get a bunch of denial from people. Girls would say that nobody notices them in their tight jeans, tube tops, and spike heels. Guys just think it's a ridiculous idea and brush it off. On top of that people tended to turn the issue around on you and try to tell you that you're being dirty minded, which isn't after all, very "spiritual" of you. But for me, this issue was something to be honest about and face. I had my own share of tight jeans. I couldn't just replace them because clothes cost money. I decided to start wearing my shirts untucked to cover myself, and gradually picked up baggy pants as I went along. I was intent on not being part of the socially acceptable message of sexiness. I was baggy before baggy was ever cool. It's funny now in this time to see all the baggy styles people now wear. Imagine a beautiful young man who looks like a hobo and you would have a pretty good picture of me, the baggy oddball in the tight fitting seventies society.

I suppose this is the one kudos I'll give myself for having the sincerity to face the truth and deal with it on my own. It had been a year of radical changes already. At least I was joining the process on my own at this point.

"Flight of the Dove"

I'm still going to Churches out of the feeling of obligation to God that this is what I'm supposed to do. I ride with my mother, who is more than happy that I'm going to church. She protests about my baggy clothes though. You can imagine my conflict with going to a Church of Christ, when I've experienced all these fantastic manifestations of spiritual things, and they as a group don't even believe in such things.

One Sunday morning I had arrived at the Madison Church of Christ, and there was some kind of issue with my Mom shaming me about my baggy attire, that was inhibiting me from going on inside. I was standing on the upper side of the parking lot, which was probably fifty yards from the church building. The church building itself was several stories tall and mostly brick. On this side of the building there was a lot of square footage of red brick walls.

As I was thinking about whether to go on inside or not, the thought came to me that I was definitely obligated to God, to just go on in. I distinctly remember repeating these words in my mind about the idea of not going in: "I cannot forsake my God." I was facing toward the building when I had this thought. Just then a white manifestation appeared against the large area of the red brick wall of the church building. It was the form of a white dove of light, many times larger than real life. It was to the left side of the church wall and it began to fly to my right going parallel to the building. The dove flew gracefully along flapping its wings for a distance of about seventy five feet. Then it vanished from existence again just as it had appeared. I took the sight of this dove as a sign of affirmation from God, that I indeed could not and should not forsake Him. I thought it was also good to finally see a glimpse of the real Holy Spirit.

I went on into the church and attended the services. I've never really been one to enjoy churches. But you know, the culture we live in has us think we must attend. I did approve of the benevolent programs this particular church is known for. I later felt proud to be a contributor of financial support for those purposes. The choral style singing at this congregation is pretty good stuff too. Man, did I ever feel isolated in my experiences within this setting though. I didn't breathe a word to these folks about them.

"The Watchman"

Does it sound like I'm getting on the right track now? I laugh to think about that idea. I tell you I was far from being on the right track. I may have been going the general direction of the right track, but I was doing convoluted corkscrews all around it rather than being right on it. All the confusion didn't just vanish away all of the sudden. I was still an emotionally strung out wreck. Everything had been too much for me and the feeling of the spiritual coercions, ultimatums and blackmail the angels had afflicted me with, was still eating away all inside me. The prosecuting angel had made me so afraid to sin with all the threat of penalty, the wrenching process of facing the issue and making the resolution to never do such things, the constant wariness and vigilance to prevent sinning; it was killing me. In fact it is still killing me. This is a rough world just full of sin in every place. Trying to live holy is enough to make anyone dysfunctional in this society that's so unsympathetic to the needs of the spiritual minded individual. This was enough of a problem for me, on top of the fact that I was still isolated from meaningful spiritual relationships among humanity. I couldn't find anyone who could relate to or understand what was going on with me. Nobody had answers! The few answers that I had, came from angelic tutors or the act of divine impartation of a concept directly by the Holy Spirit. Living perfectly was becoming an exercise in eccentric behavior in a cold world of sin. Then I stumbled upon Bible passages that made things worse.

I remember reading about this guy in the Bible who was spoken to pretty roughly by God. The guy was told that he was being chosen to be a spiritual watchman, whose job it was to sound the alarm when sin issues were present. God told him that if he didn't speak the warning about the sin to the sinner, that God would hold the guy personally responsible for the loss of the soul of the sinner who wasn't warned!

Well there is the ultimatum to make a youthful spiritual sprout get completely tied up in knots. Was this some kind of principle God was expecting me to live by? Well the way I read the Bible, I suspected each passage was hand picked, and specifically being directed to me by this formerly unknown cosmic hand that, as it turns out, happens to be God. Oh man! I was sick with apprehension. I was having a really tough time just dealing with my own issues. Was God expecting me to go around calling people out all the time for sinning? Not only did that sound like a way to create some hassles, but people would think I was crazy. On top of that there is so much sin in the world that I would end up spending all my waking moments finding fault with things and peoples' behaviors. It would consume my life, assuming I survived the irate responses of strangers. If I had any hope of life easing up for me, with all my insights into the strange nature of reality, this concept was about to make life a gut wrencher. Feelings of impending doom fell all over me. I didn't want to lose my soul, but I didn't want to spend my life in conflict with sinners either!

Speaking of conflict, it sure did come honestly. There was one case in which I would have been the watchman even if I had never read that passage. It was my parents. After the reality of God and of Jesus had been fully understood by me, I naturally wanted to extend the benefit of escaping condemnation to those I loved. I wanted both my parents to understand that they needed to turn completely to Jesus for help, and to stop living with sin and face some issues. For instance, like watching those shows on primetime television which didn't reflect the things of God; shows which had the bad vibes of sin in them. No Dad! No Mom! This stuff is wrong! Turn away from it and turn to Jesus! Get rid of those "Woman's Day", "Redbook" and "Readers Digest"! Turn off the television shows where they make off color innuendoes and double entendre! The country music has filthy lyrics! You can imagine all this went over like a lead balloon when I actually expressed things like this to my parents. My parents didn't take graciously to having their insane son tell them what was appropriate for them. There was conflict to say the least. Anyone who has dealt with a fanatic or new believer understands what I'm saying here.

It really struck me how I had pushed the boundaries of what I could get away with for years with my parents. They had been kind of philosophic about things and figured I would pass through stages. They didn't tend to get uptight with me. But have a kid become religious, and suddenly the parents find their nerve to directly admonish their offspring for being a disruption and out of order. And the parents do so with wrath and ire! So why didn't parents have this attitude when I was clearly in the errors of my youth all along? My theory is that as a wild youth, the parents didn't want to exacerbate the problem by putting the kid directly into the role of rebellion. After all he is a bit of a bad boy, but not that bad. Why push it?

But a religious youth is not about rebellion. When a kid turns religious, I think the parents realize that they have nothing to fear about pushing the youth to rebellion when confronting them with indignation and anger. I've seen it over and over again with youths and parents. Parents are afraid to object when the kid is living wrong. But let the youth become religious, and suddenly the parents are responding hostilely to religiously disordered behavior, like they should have been when their child was actually doing wrong! You explain it to me! What the situation should be is that parents raise cane and punish their youths for doing wrong, and then encourage them and be patient when the youths find God! I get mad just thinking about it.

"Spitting Fire"

There was another incident, in which being the watchman felt like the only thing to do. I doubt I could have been refrained from calling out a friend of mine on this one. This particular friend was a guy I had grown up with in the neighborhood. His name was Loyd Westmeyer. Now Loyd was a small wiry character who had been nothing but trouble all his life. But his kind of trouble was tempered by the fact that he was so outgoing and extroverted, that he was completely amusing to all of my peers and myself. But on this incident, I wasn't in the least bit amused.

Loyd had taken to running around with another friend of mine who was a bit weak minded and naïve about life in general. That would be Edwin Gentry, who had some problems. Loyd thought it would be amusing to introduce Edwin to the world of prostitutes and send Edwin into their beds. Edwin didn't have enough value judgment about himself to realize this is something he shouldn't be involved in. In the process of things, Edwin had his wallet stolen by a third party under the bed of the prostitute. After all that, later on Edwin was having trouble urinating and was in pain. Some of the fellows, who had heard about all this, started teasing Edwin and told him that he had the clap. Edwin wanted to know what to do, so they told him the doctor had to burn the clap out with a burning red hot steel rod. Edwin believed them of course, and they didn't correct the teasing, which left Edwin terrified to get some treatment.

Edwin suffered until it became unbearable to him and he finally went to the doctor. As terrified as Edwin was, his pain was too great to bear anymore. The doctor treated Edwin and he was cured of the clap. To Edwin's great relief, no red hot steel was used of course. But the whole episode had impressed me as purely evil, and an exploitation of the weak minded.

I was walking down the road one sunny day around noon, when a car pulled up beside me. It was Loyd. He told me to hop in so I did. Then as we rode along I recalled the episode with Edwin, and began telling Loyd to stop messing with Edwin. Loyd got pretty mad about it and stubborned up. He acted like he couldn't see the wrong in how he had misguided Edwin, and thought it was all in fun. I felt protective of Edwin because he's weak minded. As Loyd stubborned up, I felt my anger growing. But now as a Christian, I felt I had to be as cool as possible. But I sure did feel my blood pressure rising with utter anger at Loyd. As I was reasoning with Loyd, I felt something coming up from inside my throat. It was a funny tickling sensation that happened while I was still speaking. Something rising up in my neck, seemed as if it rebounded off the back of my throat, jumped forward in my mouth and leaped off the tip of my tongue as I was speaking. Out from my mouth leapt a small ball of fire that looked like a miniature sun with a corona around it. It flew through the air making a sizzling sound as it went right toward Loyd who was driving. When I saw it, to me it arced over and seemed to drop down toward the seat next to Loyd. But Loyd, who had been looking directly at me, shouted out in pain and covered his right eye. "What was that!?" Loyd shouted. I told Loyd I didn't know what it was. Loyd exclaimed, "It flew from your mouth and hit me in the eye!" I couldn't account for that, since I saw the fireball drop toward the seat next to Loyd, and I told him that's what I saw. I told him that the thing didn't even come close to his eye. Loyd was adamant. His eye was all watered up and he was in pain. From his vantage, the ball of fire had hit his right eye.

To me it was obviously some spiritual expression from God, which accounted for how we perceived it in two different ways. I thought of it as anger from God. Loyd thought of it as something strange and painful. In the course of conversation, Loyd went on to proclaim to me that he was saved, and that he had been a song leader in a church. Was this supposed to be some kind of spiritual currency that nullified his taking the weak minded to visit prostitutes? His attitude made me ill.

"The Cursing Beauty"

I was still hanging around the Waffle House as my new refuge of social life, avoiding almost all my old friends. I talked about God and found that nobody had any inclination to accept my ideas or agree about anything I said. On top of that, my friends proclaimed that the things I was experiencing were just flashbacks from some imagined LSD abuse. But I kept their minds on the subject of God even though they never saw my point of view. The funny thing about it though, was many of my newer friends there started going back to church and trying to get themselves on the right track. They didn't believe me. But just thinking about God so much of the time when I was around, got their minds on the subject. I composed another proverb to describe this effect:

Bryson 1: 3 "You may not agree with a fanatic; but having one around keeps your mind on the subject."

I tried to be as gentle as I knew how with my friends. But the idea of the "Watchman" role was putting me under stress. One example of this is when I walked up the cash register to pay my tab. I had to wait my turn behind this attractive young woman who seemed to be in her early mid twenties. As she bantered with the Waffle staff, she used some language that ladies really shouldn't use. Just then the "watchman" role came to my mind. I hate this! I don't want to go around telling people they shouldn't do things! But the duress of spiritual coercion that was in the passage concerning the watchman, I felt was something that applied to me. I was afraid I would lose my soul if I chickened out about saying something.

I decided I had to say something to the young woman about her language. I was afraid and the whole thing just wasn't natural for me. But I summoned up some nerve and with fear inside, I spoke to her with trepidation. "Ma'am, don't you think God would be upset about talking like that? Don't you care about your soul?" I got the words out and utterly hated how oddball and fanatical I sounded to myself. I sounded like a nut even to myself. I was standing there beside her and doubtlessly when she looked at me, she could see the troubled spirit in the eyes and face of the beautiful youth who was speaking to her. To my surprise she responded to me very gently and earnestly. She spoke of how she knew talking like that wasn't really right. She wanted to let me know that she believed in God and that she didn't think God would be upset with her if she tried to watch her language. She said that she was a good person and loved people. She even went to church sometimes. Her expression was gentle and kind toward me. I really appreciated her graciousness! I expected anger, but got kindness instead. I didn't have any more comment to make and was just silent. She sweetly told me bye, and left. I paid my tab and left as well.

I have to tell you, this "watchman" thing was something I wish I hadn't read. It was making a difficult transition all the more stressful.

"Back to Abilene"

Well the time of the summer vacation has arrived and my parents decided to visit my mother's parents in Abilene Texas. As much apprehension as they may have felt about taking me along, I think they probably felt they needed to keep an eye on me. I was looking forward to returning to my birth place. I had good memories of Abilene from the other times I had visited there. The last time I had visited had been six years earlier when I was only twelve. We drove to Abilene and soon we were happily reunited with my grandparents, uncles and cousins. It was a nice time. I had kind of hoped the angels wouldn't follow me there, but the starry cloud of witnesses was with me the whole way. Of course everyone was aware that I had gone off my rocker.

One evening the subject of my experiences came up, and I felt courageous enough to disclose myself to them a little. I described my hallucinations to those present. My Uncle Clint and Aunt Debbie were there listening and contributing their thoughts to my situation. Aunt Debbie confided that she had suffered hallucinations herself. I wondered hopefully, if I had found somebody who I could relate to. Debbie described seeing a giant black bird appear in front of her and how it took off flying. She shuddered at the thought of it and didn't seem to have any sense of a spiritual significance about it. Her perspective seemed unfortunate for my sake to me, once I realized she simply saw her hallucination as some kind of mental illness she had suffered. I knew I couldn't relate to that, so I didn't even try. I certainly didn't want to be perceived as thinking of myself as a hallucinating schizophrenic. I knew I wasn't that, and wasn't about to misrepresent myself. Nevertheless, this was the accepted prognosis of those present in the room concerning me. It was frustrating, but I held my peace.

"Bubbles"

One day while in Abilene, my Uncle Clint asked me if I would like to tag along while he worked installing glass in buildings. He had to travel around a bit doing this job, so I figured it would be a good chance to see some of the countryside. I accepted his invitation.

On the days I rode around with him, it was generally enjoyable. But the roads in that part of the country are long and have plenty of sky ahead of them. The ride would often be longer than an hour at a time. As Clint drove along, I would get pre-occupied watching the stars, and a new thing that had recently begun responding to my thoughts. As much as I was intent on ignoring the stars and other hallucinations from now on, with so many of them so present all the time, I would lapse into a state of fascinated observation.

One day I was riding down the straight back roads in that part of the country with Clint. It was a sunny day with blue sky ahead. I had started noticing against the sky, entities that were like tall translucent ovals. I had seen translucent bubbles before, when they buzzed around my face like flies in the incident in which it had smelled like feces was being shoved under my nose. The last time I had seen a bubble like entity was when I had been sitting in my room and perceived the shimmering waves of the small entity which caused the light refractions and bent the cross that was painted on my wall.

Now bubble like entities were appearing directly in front of me with the light refraction from around their edges defining their shape. Over and over they would appear against the blue sky near the horizon. They appeared in response to my thoughts and my thoughts were on them. Were they some kind of new order of angels I wondered? It seemed possible to me that star like angels could be just one kind of being from among many kinds of angels. I sat there in the truck, riding along transfixed by my observations. I had been sitting quietly for a long time looking dead ahead, when Clint broke into my thoughts with the question, "What are you staring at!?" I replied, "Nothing."

The reason I refrained from informing Clint about what I was seeing, was that I realized my description would sound a lot like eye floaters to him. He would have probably explained the phenomenon of eye floaters to me, trying to be helpful. How could he relate to telepathic entities that could take whatever form they wanted, including translucent bubbles standing upright in the sky? I realized that my mother's people already thought of me as childishly lost and naïve. I just didn't want to hear some of their explanations, for the sake of my dignity and patience.

"Flash Spiders"

On one of my rides with Uncle Clint, I suppose his curiosity about my situation became irrepressible. He worked his way up to the question of, "Just what are you seeing Bryson?"

I figured the risk to me was minimal, so I ventured to open up a little to Clint and just explained to him that I was seeing things that have the appearance of stars. I told him how they appear to me all the time in all kinds of places. Clint asked me what I thought they were. I informed him they are angels. Skepticism was the response.

It was then that Uncle Clint began describing a spider that lives in the area that they call "Flash Spiders". He said these spiders carry drops of water on their backs and at night when the spiders are near the roadside, the headlights will reflect in the drops of water on these spider's backs, and show up as a flash. Well his explanation was a nice attempt to help me out, but of course I didn't buy the idea that I was seeing "flash spiders".

I decided to turn the tables around on Clint, and asked him if he had ever seen something that people don't ordinarily see. He confided that he wasn't sure. He described an account in which he had been intoxicated in revelry with some friends when he was young. The story goes that his friends informed him later on that he had thrown a fit in his state of intoxication and was fighting something they couldn't see and screaming, "They ain't gonna' get me! I won't let them get me!" I asked him what he thought was trying to get him. He said he had no idea. He couldn't remember anything about it.

For my part, I just wasn't finding anyone to relate with or who had any answers. After a couple of weeks we left Abilene and returned back home to Hermitage Tennessee. I did manage not to be any trouble whatsoever for my parents while on vacation. Keeping my turmoil locked up inside myself was at least reaping me the benefit of not having or inviting outside turmoil from other well intentioned people.

"Old Guys"

The Waffle House was turning out to be a good refuge for me. With time, the old guys who were regulars there became familiar with my face and started opening up to me. They knew I was different from most of the youth. Granted I was a little wacky, but I think they saw that I was good in heart, harmless and respectful. I noticed they sort of had mentors attitudes toward me, and I absorbed their practical thoughts and experiences as they told me their stories. I would ask the old guys about things, and they appreciated the respectfulness with which I conversed with them. They told my all kinds of things about how to work, do business, dealing with legal matters, experiences in the Big War, and amusing accounts from their own lives. These old guys were full of good practical ideas. It was surprising to me that the old guys liked me, a young mixed up fanatic. But I liked them as well, and they had a maturing influence on me. They had years of living as soldiers, businessmen, teachers, builders, fathers and husbands, believers in God, and many other life experiences which offered a centering perspective to me. Most of them told a pretty good and engaging story. I became a welcome joiner among them when I came into the Waffle for a coffee break. I fairly picked the old guys' minds for all the useful things they could come out with.

I soon realized that I was growing up with these old fellows, more than my peers were maturing just hanging out among themselves. I was becoming wiser from the new friends I was finding; the old guys.

"A Job"

I have this great friend named Boyd Fudge. Boyd has always had a kind of angel role in my life and empowered me in ways I couldn't empower myself. When I was an adolescent, it was young Boyd who made it possible for me to gain a collection of "Hotwheels" toy cars. Boyd made it possible for me to drive hotrods, ride motorcycles and other things a young teen would love to do. Boyd was a kind of quiet fellow who took some time to open up to people he didn't know well. He possessed a very sensible personality that saw things in a clear and practical way. In a way he was a leader among the young guys, because of the power his sober nature evoked.

While I was all freaked out by my religious experiences, Boyd started dating my sister Jalana. She admired Boyd and his manly attitudes. She found him easy to love. Boyd was also handsome, which I'm sure made him all the more lovable for her. I was pleased that my sister would hit it off with such a fine guy, a faithful friend like Boyd.

One evening, my sister returned from a date with Boyd. They pulled in the drive and Boyd was in his custom Ford pickup truck with its fancy paint job. When Jalana came in, she informed me that Boyd had told her that there was a job that he thought I might be able to get in a small electronics firm. Boyd was at it again: taking care of old Bryson. I called Boyd later on and he told me about the job and encouraged me to apply for it. He offered to come by the house each morning so I could ride to work with him. I gladly agreed to that and made sure that we agreed that I would pay for part of the gasoline cost for the week. I took Boyd's advice and applied, and quickly found myself assembling electronics. I liked the idea of electronics, since I understood it was the Navy's second choice for me if I declined the nuclear power option. I figured I would be adept at this line of work.

While at work, I didn't mind people knowing that I was religious. But I hid the fact that I was dealing with manifestations of angels and such for the most part. However some of my conversations did get a bit heady and existential with some of the people that I felt comfortable talking with. But it was a funny thing to be having angels run their touch through my hair while I worked. I would have to brush my hand through my hair to alleviate the sensations. But mostly I kept my act together and didn't have any problems working there. It was also great riding back and forth to work with my friend Boyd.

"Prayers"

While I wasn't really purposefully communicating with the angels much anymore, they were still around in abundance. It was too hard for me to deal with them and try to decide if I was dealing with a good angel or a bad one. It just wasn't worth the risk. But I did communicate with God often enough. I wanted to be on God's good side more than anything. I spent lots of time reading the Bible, avoiding sin with all my might, and generally learning that many of life's activities have a subtlety to them which demands that we think of the sin behind them which isn't always so obvious at the face. Most those subtleties would be the things in our hearts motivating our actions.

God was listening to my prayers, I could just tell it. When I had a question for God, an answer would come to me in some event, some scripture or any number of magical coincidental ways. It was comforting to know that God was pulling strings in the events of life to provide me with ways to see things clearly. But not all the answers came so quickly. I was still mystified by a good number of the things being shown to me and didn't have any conclusions on many aspects of them for years to come. But I finally had what my sanity depended on: A good relationship with God in which I felt I wasn't going to end up burning in the red shag lake of fire.

There came a time though, that some of my prayers would seem to be answered in such great magnitude, that it frightened me. I eventually came to the conclusion that I needed to be careful what I pray for, because God is willing to do things I wouldn't have in mind when I prayed. God took things much further than I was ready to go. Another aspect of my prayers was that in a way, I think I was resonating thoughts in God's heart, things he was planning. The thought of them would come to me and I would pray thinking I was speaking from my own heart, but I may have just been repeating back to God things he had sublimely imparted to me. In this way my prayers had both the effect of becoming predictive, and of making me see God is listening to me and showing off for me.

"Suffering a Witch"

Man the power of spiritual coercion! You come to this idea that you start thinking that if you go against it, your offending God! I felt this conflict like a fire inside me. One pitfall in this respect comes from reading the Bible from a Christian centric perspective, which makes you confuse the context the scriptures are actually written in. People do this all the time, and end up with the most absurd conclusions that they will defend as if to question it is going against God or calling God a liar. What they need to question is their mixed up mindset leading to bad conclusions. One typical example is when people are reading the words of Jesus, the have a preconception that Jesus is talking about "Christians" and "Churches" when the actual context is that Jesus is speaking about Jewish issues to Jewish people in context of their Chosen nation. I was no exception. I thought Jesus words were all about creating a new religion called "Christianity", that was meant to make all Jewish things obsolete.

I got really fouled up emotionally by a very bad translation of a Jewish law, compounded by the problems that I was thinking it applied to the present time in our society. It was a passage in the law that is translated as "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." To me this wasn't a law of the Hebrew nation. To me this was a crisis, while I asked myself if God wants us to prosecute occultist. On top of that, there were all these vigilante' hero figures in the Old Testament, who just did what God wanted, even if nobody else would. Guys like Shamgar and Sampson, who got on God's side as individual one man armies. The question was for me: Was God expecting me to be like one of these enforcers and go vigilante' about occultist? Is it going against God, by not wanting to do something so radical? I certainly had no desire to become something like this. On the other hand, I didn't want to defy God either. Spiritual coercion was gripping me. I was afraid.

What I finally did was just become a little defiant against the idea, no matter where it came from. I reasoned that this may not be what God is expecting and if it was, it was going to take a lot of profound persuasion in the face of my best, most earnest, skepticism! I wasn't about to go hunting down people, short of being held by the hand of God directly over the lake of fire and getting my feet burned.

I also reasoned that this world got along for a long time before I was ever born. If God had wanted something like this to be done, he had plenty of opportunity long before I ever arrived on the scene. It didn't seem right to me that a strange burden like this should fall upon me within a society that not only doubted the existence of the occult, but more so doubted the validity of guys like me whom, "God talked too". Not only would it look crazy, it would be crazy, and certainly not impress anyone that God is worth following if this behavior was the result of it.

So I set the whole idea aside and simply waited to see if God would punish me for being obstinate. God had already put me through the wringer, so I had no doubt God would deal with me on this matter if it bothered him. But you know, God didn't make an issue of it and continued being gracious to me. I soon realized I was still being blessed and let the whole insane idea go as a matter of concern.

Looking back on that painful situation I reflect on how tragic it is, to not have a correct context of how the Bibles passages apply. That passage is about Hebrew law which applies to only the Chosen nation. It's their laws! Nor did I realize "Witch" is a mistranslation. Back in those days of the Hebrew law's writing, things like a "witch" didn't exist. That term came into existence millennia later in a culture far away in Europe. It is tragic that this more contemporary word is used as an acceptable translation, which leads to confusion about what, where, when, why and who the scripture is about, and how it applies. Very poor translations and out of context interpretations created the bulk of my confusions and mental blocks. I was also somewhat brainwashed by my culture of "Christian centric" perspectives. I'll stop complaining now.

"Prayer for Diseases"

There are passages in the Bible where God talks about various nations that existed in those days, in which he states that he directly imparted diseases among the citizens of them for their sins of all kinds of sexual crime, perversions and exploitations. I got to thinking about my own present society, and we were just as bad. We had taken it to the point of the mass communication of sexual deviance, exploitation, and even the sexualization of children was common on television.

I had personally known of a girl who was molested by a group of guys and treated like she wasn't even a human being. Guys commonly wanted to take advantage of girls just for sex. To make it even worse, homosexuals overtly wanted to take advantage of males in the same manner! Exploitation and using people was rampant. Girls used people as well. A girl, who was treated badly and used, becomes pregnant by a guy who refuses to have anything to do with her. She in turn seduces another guy and tells him he's the father of her baby, using him as a means of support.

Everyone was prissy and all our clothes were sexual messages. It was everywhere all the time. I realized our society was just the very thing God was saying he was angry with. I considered myself a victim of the social brainwashing in failing to see all this behavior as sexual exploitations and personal irresponsibility. A few months previous, I would have liked the opportunity to be a sexual exploitist. I realized I had been brainwashed by society and had been blind. The same effect was happening to almost everyone and we were being dragged down to our lowest common denominators by the purveyors of our sex culture.

I decided to pray to God to enforce the punishment of diseases upon the sexual culture. I figured that many people were brainwashed and simply needed to be woken up by some examples of what mindless sex would get you. I didn't want God to punish everyone. I wanted as many people to see the wrong and repent as possible. I was myself grateful for the opportunity to repent, and wanted to extend the same mercies to others. But they weren't taking the issue seriously. People needed a shock like I had gotten. Maybe they would gain clarity. So I decided to temper my prayer and ask for punishments on what I considered the worst of the worst and a minority number to be afflicted. That would be the predation of homosexuality. I imagined what I would now call, a designer disease.

So I prayed in this manner: "O God. It is time for you to enforce your words and bring diseases upon them to make an example of them and cause people to see the wrong and repent. Lord God, I don't want you to punish everyone, but just save as many as possible instead. God, bring a disease upon the worst of them first. A disease which afflicts homosexuals first and doesn't get to other people so much unless they are completely obstinate. God don't make it a disease which strikes sudden death. But make it a disease which consumes them slowly so that while they live, they might have a long time to consider their actions and repent of their behaviors before they die, and even be saved. Then others will see their suffering and begin to be afraid of committing fornications. Then maybe our culture will change and begin to see that using each other as sex objects is wrong. I ask in the name of Jesus your Son and my Savior. Amen"

"A New Disease"

About this time I began hearing news of a new disease that was striking homosexuals, especially in San Francisco. The disease was still being identified and they hoped to find a cure for it. It was the disease we now know as HIV/AIDS, which is still resisting a cure.

At the time of my first hearing of the disease, it was very shortly after I had prayed my prayer against sexual exploitist. I immediately recalled the prayer and thought to myself that God works very fast. Well obviously the disease existed before I ever made the prayer, yet the disease met every criterion that I prayed for.

What is the answer to this fantastic correlation of my prayer, to the actual manifestation of the disease? I have come to believe that the mind of God was being expressed in a sublime manner directly into my mind as if it were my own thoughts. In my thinking with the mind of God, I simply expressed the desire for this remedial action as a prayer, in which I gave the explanation for the diseases' existence. The whole matter was being made into a concrete set of ideas that could be expressed easily. The expression came in the form of a prayer in which I parroted the imparted concepts and ideas, right back to God. Would I swear this is the absolute explanation? No I wouldn't. But I think this is what happened. God was explaining His actions to me as He does to those close to Him; revealing His secrets to His servant.

If the world has the will to do it, the disease can be eradicated in less than a generation. Nobody will ever have to suffer it or fear it again. Simply stop supplying it with new host by engaging in the behaviors which spread it. The stubbornness of those with the behaviors subjecting them to exposure to the disease is the problem preventing us from wiping out the disease from the face of the earth. Many would rather die wishing for a cure, than abstain from the risky behavior that spreads it. How many would suffer before we have the spine to face the behavior issue at the heart of the diseases' existence, and then we deal with it? Would we be angry with GOD for the innocent who suffer? Why not blame those who keep spreading AIDS while exploiting each other, when we know the innocent suffer because the incorrigible keep the disease alive! Maybe God will ask us why WE let the innocent suffer instead of remedying the situation! Who is condemnable more than those directly involved, and who then decide to fail to deal constructively and practically with the issue? Repentance saves lives.

"A False Teacher Falls"

Another thing that really bothered me, was how some people would head cop others about spiritual things. The whole of my experiences with the occultist had been especially revolting to me. I considered such things as a form of spiritual predation. I felt compelled to ask God to intervene in such situations, to alleviate the spiritual predation of exploitative people upon the unsuspecting. So I prayed to God to make an example out of misleading spiritual teachers, so that others would see what occurs and be afraid of being spiritually misled by those false teachers who are evil predators among us.

I had read in the Bible that there would be a misleading teacher who would enter the house of God and make himself out to be God. I suppose I was longing for Christ to return, and saw that this was one of the things that had to happen before Jesus could come. Whether something this dramatic was of our present time or not, I didn't know. But I did feel that it was warranted to somehow curtail evil teachers and cause people to not to be so susceptible.

On the news on television, there was a big mess taking place. Some guys from the United States Government had gone to investigate some religious group in a place called Jonestown. As the U.S. officials were leaving, they were assassinated by the religious cult. It was all over the news. Then later it came on the news that all the members of this religious cult had committed suicide along with their leader. It was all being blamed on the leader, who was named Jim Jones. Apparently the guy had been teaching his followers that he was God, and the followers called him "Dad". As a whole group, over a hundred of them drank poisoned refreshments and died of cyanide. The news showed their corpses lying all around and there were men, women and children, all dead.

I recalled my prayer from a few days earlier and felt completely shocked that God would answer it so dramatically and swiftly in such a short period of time. I didn't want people to die, yet that decision was up to God. But the event had the sobering effect on people, I had asked for from God. People became wary of predatory spiritual teachers and the name Jim Jones became synonymous for insane and predatory religious teachers. This response of people, contrasts sharply with how stubborn people were about predatory sexuality in the face of deadly diseases. Wariness of religion was fine by them! Wariness of sexual exploitation though, was unthinkable!

For me, the events exactly correlated with my prayers and I couldn't help but feel a degree of responsibility, even though it was up to God how He answers prayers. I was shocked and felt with absolute conviction that God was not only hearing my prayers, but still making demonstrations for me that would make very profound impressions upon me. It was like God was teaching me directly, that he was willing to be powerfully dramatic even if I hadn't had that degree of response in my own mind. I excused myself from too much personal responsibility. The reason being, I had no idea God would take things so far and to such extremes; even to the point that it became world wide news of insane death and destruction.

Feeling connected to the Jonestown events by the power of prayer, I became apprehensive and decided to be more careful what I prayed for, since God was more severe than I had imagined. It was at this point that I purposefully curtailed my prayers in both frequency and request, making my prayers more personal and modest. Was I wrong to fear to wield the power of prayer, or to presume to project my own moderation upon God? I was young, only eighteen years old! I knew nothing of the principles of praying and how to conduct myself according to the sensibilities of a powerful God who sublimely works his hand in the events of mankind! I just feared the power and the ramifications! This was a ride I was jumping off of. If I was wrong, God seems to have forgiven me, by evidence of His continued kindnesses toward me. Nevertheless, even to this day, God has continued to challenge my own sensibilities and has shocked me many times.

"The Eagle Above the Stars"

I wish I could recall the exact date of this next event. It was around late October or early November, I think. Early in a cloudy gray day, Boyd and I were riding around in his custom pickup. For not much reason at all, we drove up to the boat launching site on Percy Priest Lake that's called Vivrett Creek. I was seeing many angelic stars of course. But the intensity of their numbers was about to change.

Boyd and I got out of his truck and began to walk around the recreation area, just kind of enjoying the place. But as we walked, I saw the numbers of the stars increasing so much that it seemed Boyd and I were walking through a cloud of them. It was like we were in very snowy weather, for the sheer number of the millions of angelic spirits that we walked among.

I looked above us, and there flew a great eagle, like a great shadow of a giant raptor that soared above us. The spread of the wings could have been a half a mile as it coursed about in the air above us, just beneath the clouds. This great spiritual being would glide above us and then off in the distance maybe a couple of miles away, and then circle gracefully and glide directly above us again. The great eagle seemed to be overseeing the cloud of the stars being gathered around Boyd and me. I thought of the passage in the Bible that reads, "I carried you out of Egypt on eagle's wings", and imagined this great eagle was a sign of God calling these millions of starry beings in a kind of exodus. I asked myself, "Is this the resurrection of the dead? Is the Spirit of God above calling the dead from the graves and they appear like the starry angels in form? Why are Boyd and I standing in the midst of them?"

I looked at the water along the shoreline of the lake. Within the water, flashes of light were moving about. I thought of the people who had lost their lives in these waters. I thought of the souls of Tangie and her mother who both drowned one day in the lake. I looked in the water and yellow flashes were moving about. Was God calling from the water the souls of those who perished here? On and on this event continued and the intensity never decreased.

I looked at Boyd, and considered that he and I were both a part of this event. Yet I realized he knew absolutely nothing about what was occurring. Yet I watched him walking among the clouds of the starry souls. I was loath to mention anything about it to him. I would not endure being thought of as insane. My dignity compelled my silence, as I watched with my eyes some wonderful event that God was showing me. I looked again at the great eagle flying above us as it silently glided through the lower clouds. Boyd and I got back into his truck and we left this place and this wonderful event, while I behaved as if nothing at all was happening and all things were just conventionally normal. I wondered if I was being shown the resurrection. Somehow this resonated inside me. I would not be surprised if this is what it was, wherein the souls were like the starry angels.

"A Gift of Robes"

I was at work one morning. I had assumed a job in which I made printed circuit boards. I would take sheets of copper laminated to fiberglass, and cut them to size for printed boards. Then I would silkscreen the pattern of the electric circuits onto these blanks. After the paint dried, I would put the printed circuit boards in a rack and dipped them into ferric chloride, which dissolved the exposed copper leaving only the paint protected pattern of the printed circuit. Then I would wash off the paint with triclorethylene and would have raw printed circuit boards. I made the various boards by the hundreds and kept myself pretty well occupied as I worked alone.

One morning one of the engineers, who's name was Eric, came to my area and informed me that he had lost a lot of weight. He told me that he had a lot of very nice dress shirts that were now too large for him, and he asked me if I would be interested in them if he gave them to me. I told him I would like to have them.

A couple of days later as I worked, Eric brought me about a half dozen very nice shirts that were appropriate dress shirts for a suit. The only thing was they were extra large and I was only about a hundred and seventy five pounds and maybe five feet, nine inches tall at the time. I took the shirts home and tried them on. They hung off of me like billowy robes. Yet I liked them for their high quality, elegance, and baggy comfort. I figured they would make good work shirts.

I picked out a soft blue one for work and wore it. As I was making circuit boards, I somehow got ferric chloride on the front of it leaving a big stain. But work shirts are just for such things so I felt no remorse. After awhile, Eric came walking back to my area and greeted me. He noticed I was wearing one of the fine shirts he gave me and saw the big stain on it. I looked at him and he was quite displeased. I said nothing about it, but Eric had little to say as well. When he left I continued my work and hoped he wouldn't be too upset.

This was of part of a new pattern in which people were gifting me. Before, people seemed to want to take care of the insane charity case. But now peoples' giving had seemed to change, as if they were giving to somebody with some worth and dignity. Somebody they liked and joyfully offered gifts too out of loving support. Although I was not one to take advantage of people, it seemed that people were often offering me gifts. I considered it a call of God being put into their minds to help provide for me.

Nevertheless, all this giving to me kind of harmed my dignity and I resisted charity. Was I wrong for resisting this? Was I resisting the call God was placing on people? Maybe I was wrong. All I wanted was to have my dignity back and to take care of myself. It was a modest goal: If only I could take care of myself! I hope I wasn't wrong minded. Gifts from strangers hurt my dignity, though they seemed joyful to give them and I was graciously appreciative to those who gave. And the thing is, now that I'm old, I reflect on all the years of my life experiences, and I've never really succeeded in being fully independent. I've needed people and God in many situations that tried my metal.

"Confronted by Sampson"

I enjoyed working alone in my department. There was nothing wrong with making printed circuits, and having no controversies with people kept my mind free of the fear of sinning. I was at peace as I worked. There was this older man named Dwight, who was a salty mouthed and incorrigible fellow. He seemed to delight in his foul mouthed dramatics, and the attention he got by misbehaving this way. He came into my department to chat with me, and it was one curse word after another, one vulgarity and then another. I felt pressured by the spiritual coercion of the watchman passage in the Bible, so much so that I felt that I was obliged to protest to Dwight about his language.

I said to Dwight, "I wish you wouldn't use all this cursing around me."

Dwight got angry and asked me, "Are you a preacher?"

He continued in defiance and stated, "I'll use any kind of language I want around anyone!"

I replied, "I just wish you would stop it."

Dwight's anger had provoked a stern intolerance in me. He was now invading my space with his trash and I was not the least bit concerned about his feelings at this point. Delicacy had departed from my tone.

Dwight's face flashed sheer anger and he turned and walked off saying, "We'll see about this!"

After a short while Dwight returned with the supervisor engineer named Sampson, who was a big muscle bound guy. They came back to my area with both of them cussing and cursing like two children parading their naughty defiance. They stood a few feet from me as I worked, and just gave themselves completely to prurient vulgarity. I thought to myself, "These guys are looking for trouble. I'm not taking the bait and I ignored them and kept working. I glanced up at them as they looked at me. I went back to work and kept silent. Eventually they got tired of themselves and left. These were grown men acting like children, before one harmless youth! Intelligence isn't necessarily a product of age, nor wisdom the domain of the elderly.

"Clouds on the Horizon"

It was late afternoon at work and a clear day. The delivery dock door had been raised at the back of the building which was right beside my work area. I took a break and stood in the doorway looking out to the eastern view and sky. As I stood there, I was thinking about the manifestations, and of being able to see things other people can't see. I had realized that if I looked, I was more apt to see, than if I simply ignored them; although in either case, things still manifested to me. But in observing intently, the intensity and distinctions became stronger. It was as if the spiritual beings were taking advantage of the opportunity of my attentions. I decided to look into the eastern sky just above the horizon and see what I could observe.

As I looked, there began to emerge in the distant sky, clouds that were low and spread out near the horizon. I focused on the sky and they began to fade. I refocused on the manifestation and it regained its intensity and became a clear appearance of a bank of clouds spreading near the eastern horizon, and they were very clear. Yet I knew these weren't real clouds, but a manifestation being shown to me by some intelligent will. I asked myself if those might be the clouds Jesus was riding in. I didn't know and had no way to know. But if those clouds were the clouds of Jesus, they weren't far off; just a little ways away on the horizon of the eastern sky. Maybe Jesus is letting me know that he's quite near.

"A Jamming Trumpet"

I was in my room. I think it was daytime. I had stood up and was about to leave the room. Suddenly from the realms of the ethereal there sounded a cadence of a trumpet signaling. Very clearly it sounded out, crisp and vibrantly. It played a cadence that was hot and rapid in such a way that I described it as jamming. It moved me and I liked the sound of it. Inside, my thoughts said "AHA!" After a few seconds it stopped and I wanted to hear it again. It had played so well! I tried to remember the notes but the recall was fading before I could gather the melody of it. I felt regret at only being able to hear it once.

What was this about? Was this the famous trumpet of the Lord announcing he was arriving? I waited to see if the Lord was coming. But nothing was happening, the Lord wasn't appearing and the world wasn't catching on fire like I imagined. What could this trumpet mean? I had no way to know, and so I stopped trying to have an answer. I simply kept it in mind for whatever realization might come to me in the future. My pause was over and I left the room. The sound of this hot trumpet playing so vibrantly had moved me! I truly liked it.

"His Sign in the Sky"

It was now December 13, 1978 on a Wednesday. Boyd and I had left work and were riding home in his pretty black Ford truck with the bright yellow graphics painted all over it. It was growing dusky as we got off the interstate. We crossed Percy Priest Dam and turned left off of Bell Road onto Dodson Chapel Road, heading north toward Dad's house. I was almost home. As we passed by the Nelson's mansion, I was thinking about Boyd going to the Baptist church. I thought to myself that he really should learn the doctrines of the Churches of Christ. It was Wednesday and there were church meetings that night.

I turned toward Boyd and asked him, "Boyd, would you like to go to church with me tonight?"

Boyd appeared thoughtful for a few seconds and then replied, "No, I guess not."

I left it at that and turned back forward in the truck. Just then I noticed something bright up in the dusky sky that was beckoning my eyes. It was ahead and slightly to the left of our direction of travel. I looked up to see what it was. When I set my eyes upon it, this is what I saw: In the sky before us was a bright white upright oval of lucid light. Around its perimeter there appeared several rings of light like the effect of a rainbow; auras that I seem to recall were the colors of lavender and yellow and maybe rose. But I can't recall the third color for certain or if there was actually a third color for certain. But the lavender and yellow were there. Within the oval of white light, there stood a cross of heavy wood. The grain of the wood was very clear and the cross was gray. The cross itself was glowing as if it were a hollow plastic imitation wooden cross with fluorescent lighting inside it. The scene was very clear and distinct as we rode along.

I immediately realized I was seeing another manifestation, and my habit had become to avert my eyes away from such things. This was no exception and I averted my eyes and moved my gazing toward the eastern sky. Before the cross left my peripheral vision, it jumped as if reacting in surprise to my averted eyes, and then chased my line of gaze across the sky, following my eyes only a few degrees behind my direct line of sight. I stopped my eyes on the north eastern sky, and immediately the light with the cross moved directly in front of my eyes. I again averted my eyes all the way toward the north western sky, and the cross and light again chased my line of sight just as quickly and moved in front of my eyes again as I looked at the north western sky. I averted my eyes again, but this time I looked down into the truck at the floor in front of my feet. I noticed the light with the cross in it, remained in the sky this time. As I sat there I reasoned: "A cross is a good thing that's about Jesus. I shouldn't be suspicious of this or refuse to look". Reassured, I decided to just look at the cross in the light. I raised my eyes to see the light of the cross again, and this time to intently observe it. But it was gone! It was replaced by something else even more wonderful.

"He Lifts Up His Countenance Upon Me"

I looked back into the sky to see the cross and the light. But this time I saw the color of amber in the sky. It was a broad field of amber directly in front of us. Then I noticed a conspicuous patch of blue within the amber field in the sky. I focused on the blue area and my eyes struggled for a few moments to resolve the blue patch into sharp focus. I studied the blue area and realized as I resolved it, that I was seeing the silhouette of the figure of a man there within the amber. At first I had trouble understanding the situation of the man's figure, until I realized the man was seated waist deep in the amber. The amber itself was now to me apparently a kind of mist like a cloud. The man was a silhouette of blue, and the word "sapphire" came into my mind concerning the nature of the blueness of his silhouette.

As I looked at the man I was meeting the sky, I was in quick cognition that I had just seen the sign of a cross in the sky as a kind of an annunciation, and the man being announced was Jesus Christ! I realized I was looking at Jesus sitting on his throne in the amber cloud. As I realized this, the Lord was listening to my thoughts, and knew when I realized it was him.

With my realization, the Lord responded in those moments, and he started arising from his seated position, standing up from his throne. As he arose up in a very natural motion, he lowered his arms down to his sides and stood there before me. I noticed that he was robed within the context of his silhouette, and his robe was gathered at the waist. When he lowered his arms to his sides, the motion revealed that the sleeves of his robe were belled and they loosely swayed at his sides. His form was apparently average slim as if he were a man of about a hundred and seventy pounds. His shoulders and stature reminded me of Rex. I saw no details of his face because it was the same blueness as the rest of his silhouette. The shape of his head was smooth and round as if he had no hair, or maybe his hair was oiled down against his scalp. The whole shape of his ears showed clearly on each side of his head and the view of them was clear and unobstructed. The whole shape of his silhouette was sharply defined against the amber cloud, except for where his waist entered the mist, and there it was misty.

As I beheld the appearing of the Lord, meeting him in the air on this amber cloud, and as I watched the Lord arise and stand before me, and as I was looking directly at him, I thought about the rude awkwardness of my silence. It occurred to me that I was in the presence of the ultimate person that anyone could ever meet. I felt like a child before a hero. I thought to myself, "There's Jesus and I can't think of anything to say!" Then I gathered the situation in my mind again and thought, "Jesus is so perfect and never sinned and I'm just a sinner!" I suddenly felt some shame and humiliation as I looked at him and quickly I was too ashamed to look at him anymore. In utter self consciousness I lowered my eyes down from him and lowered my head in the truck.

I struggled to think of something to say to the Lord. The only thing that came to mind, I offered to him in a silent prayerful thought, "Lord, forgive me of my sins." Immediately I was embarrassed at how redundant this was to say to him, because I had already prayed about sin and asked his forgiveness a thousand emotionally crushed times already. I knew with all my heart I was forgiven. I thought to myself, "Good grief! All I can think of to say is the same thing I've said already." But with that thought, a gracious impression came upon me. Not in audible words, not even a clear word from the ethereal, but like a whispered statement into my spirit which was, "I already have." I took it as a gracious encouragement from the Lord and I felt better, less ashamed. So feeling acceptance from the Lord, I ventured to look back up at him. But when I raised my eyes, he was gone!

I was shocked at his disappearance and wished he hadn't left. Where did he go? Why did he leave? Was he upset? Then I realized he surely wasn't upset with me. He just has his way of doing things is all that his disappearance means. I thought to myself, "Though I can't see Jesus now, I still know he's present and still watching me." With this confidence, I directed my thoughts of gratitude toward Jesus.

Everything had happened in a few seconds. I knew I was good at hiding the fact that I was seeing spiritual manifestations. I looked over at Boyd as he drove along, and realized he had noticed nothing at all. I looked down the road and immediately I wondered if the world was going to start burning up. "Was this the Second Coming?" I asked myself. I couldn't understand the event from anything I had read. I was wondering why I wasn't arising into the sky. The Lord had arisen to stand, but I didn't arise at all. I had met the Lord face to face and He was in the air in a great amber cloud, but I stayed on earth. I was confused and silent. What did it all mean?

Within a couple of minutes, Boyd let me out at Dad's house. I hadn't uttered a word of anything about seeing Jesus to him. I walked across the yard and went into the house. I saw Mom, but held back from telling her about what I had just now seen. It was very dusky now.

Somehow it all made sense that all the terror, all the manifestations, all the conflicts and trials, and all the harsh teachings of the angels that I had gone through, was leading up to this event: the Appearance of the Glory of the Lord. I was happy the journey had found a destination. I had been brought along to be ready to meet the Lord. I had a lot to be grateful for. I was still an emotional wreck, but I knew I was blessed beyond all imagination. I offered thanks to God, for Jesus my close companion!

The starry angels were still all about me. Among them I knew was the one that accused me. But I knew I had a constant companion. My faith in Him had caused my fear of the angels to subside to a great degree. They could still mess with my head, but I largely ignored them and tried not to converse with them. Life was now going to move along under these encouraging circumstances.

Section 4 "Epilogue **"**

"Where are the Babies?"

After having seen the Lord Jesus, I was worried that everything might be over for the spiritual hope of the world. I was unable to reconcile the way he had appeared with my preconceptions of the Second Coming. Yet enough of what I had seen suggested to me this anti-climactic event had indeed been what was prophesied. So I was worried about the idea that all final judgment was decided now at this time about who was saved and who wasn't. I thought to myself, it may now be an act of futility to talk about Jesus if the person I was sharing Jesus with had already missed the Lord's appearing. I was left in silence and didn't want to talk about the Lord unless I knew there was a hope and reason.

An idea came to me. I reasoned that if children were still being born, then surely these sinless children were not born to be too late for the salvation of the Lord. I decided to wait and observe if children were still being born. For a few weeks I heard of no children being born or of any pregnancies. It was strange. Then one day I heard of an expectant mother and felt a great relief. There were still going to be people who would need the Lord. Everything was not decided once and for all. Others still needed salvation. With time I heard of many children being born and I began to resume sharing the message of salvation with anyone who would tolerate my fanaticism. My purpose in life was restored: The next generation was coming.

This kind of reasoning may sound a bit silly to you. But you have to understand that I was doing the best that I could. Hope was such a precious commodity all through these events, that it was the only thing that kept me going on many occasions. Just a tiny glimmer of hope, I needed it so badly. So often the tiniest hope was ultimately rewarded and substantiated into reality for me by the Lord. Thus the Lord imparted a basis for faith into me over and over. Isn't it true after all that "faith is the substance of things hoped for"? The Lord has let me know many times over that He is still in the business of saving people. However erroneous it may have been, watching for new souls being brought into the world, was just my way of seeking hope for the rest of humanity, as I imagined God would not prejudge those born after I had seen Jesus.

"Anti-Climactic Jesus"

Everything is not over. The Lord may have returned, seen only by me as far as I know, but obviously something was completely different from what we had all expected. This didn't surprise me at all. When Jesus came to the Jewish people, he had been very different from what they expected at that time. Yet his purposes were carried out and it was all God's plan. Why shouldn't this time be like back then? Why shouldn't Jesus second appearing have been different from what we expected? I didn't know what it meant and couldn't make sense of any of it. But I did share Jesus with a sense of hope for people.

The Lord had been anti-climactic at his first coming. He had not been a warrior King to the Jewish people. Instead he had ended up crucified. It was anti-climactic of the Lord. I thought to myself, that if I had seen the Second Coming, the Lord was definitely in the pattern of being anti-climactic. I expected fire and an earth of cinders. I expected to rise up in the air. Instead all I got was a sapphire man in an amber cloud. The only arising going on was what the Lord did himself, when he stood up from his throne as I met him there standing in the air. I was far from certain.

"Careful Witness"

I rejoined my Waffle House mission field, speaking like a wild eyed fanatic about the Lord to my very patient friends and strangers. However I was afraid to mention having seen the Lord in the Cloud to them. I was concerned, however unlikely it would have been, that they would believe me and then be stricken with fear that they had missed the Second Coming, and were lost. I now simply didn't believe that everyone was lost at all. But I understood how they might think so. Having felt this terror of being lost, at the instigation of the angels, I had no desire to inflict such pains on any person. I had to offer hope. Hope is so precious, and faith so delicate, that I nurtured it in others. Harming faith was a crime to my thinking.

One day though, I was in the Waffle House walking past a table where a man and woman sat reading their Bible together. I asked them about themselves, and they informed me they were "Seventh Day Adventist". I hoped they might be able to offer me some insights, so I ventured to tell them about seeing the Lord. As I described how the Lord arose to stand, the young woman gasped, and immediately started flipping though her Bible and came to a passage. There she read a passage to me and her companion, "In that day shall Michael stand up for the.........." She was reading from the prophet Daniel. This was new information for me. She informed me that many people believe that Michael is an ancient name for Jesus, and that this prophecy is referring to Jesus. Michael is also called, "The Great Prince" in that passage. That certainly sounds like Jesus to me, the Prince of God and King of the Jews. But something didn't fit for me. Michael is standing up for Daniel's people. I thought they were Jewish. Well maybe it's some cosmic idea of some kind; I don't know. It was something to think about. I thanked the young woman for the information and moved on. Still I carefully avoided referring to seeing Jesus as the Second Coming, lest I sow fear.

What is this thing about standing up that's in the Bible, as well as my observation of the Lord? At least I was having some hope that I might find some correlations in the Bible that I hadn't known about before. The phrase "standing up" had been a buzzword, and it did prompt a response from the young woman.

"Work Sheep"

For a while I continued working for the electronics firm and made printed circuits by the thousands as I worked alone. In the course of time, the folks at work knew me as a spiritual young man. Some of them had interesting discussions with me. I felt a sense of worth and purpose representing the Lord with them.

I continued riding to work and back home with Boyd, doing the forty hours per week routine. But I had been there for a while and I was making very little money. Though I thought the potential in electronics was good, I was no longer happy making as little as I did. After taxes, my pay was about one hundred dollars. I kept eighty dollars for myself, out of which I gave Boyd ten dollars to help on gasoline cost. Seventy dollars was all I netted for the hours and production. I began to feel exploited. I made it a point to speak with the owner about getting higher pay. I was doing a lot of work. However, after the third talk with the owner, his indifference offended me along with his minimizing of my contributions. I quit.

I went and got a laborers job with Farley Masonry where I could potentially make two hundred bucks in a week. But I read a scripture about shepherds that leave their sheep, and felt guilty about leaving my old job where I did have some spiritual rapport with the people there. But what was done was done. I hoped God wasn't upset with me. Now I was back into masonry yet again. I resolved to lay brick, since bricklayers made what seemed like a lot of money to me. Besides that, I could think of nothing that was sinful about laying bricks as long as it wasn't building some kind of disreputable establishment.

I was nineteen now and the first year of being an adult had been turmoil. Gradually the winter passed and the next spring came. I had gotten my driver license again and was driving. Somehow, even with the angels all around me and the constant manifestations, it didn't present a safety problem of distraction from driving. Angels and manifestations had all just become normal stuff and wasn't relevant when operating a vehicle.

There I was, a strong beautiful youth, doing hard labor with the thousands of stars all around me, and an unseen companion watching over me called Jesus Christ. The building I was laboring on, conveying the bricks to be set in place by the masons, was a large addition onto a Baptist Church on Antioch Pike, with it's cross upon it. "Mud!" they called; "Brick!" And so life progressed.

End

I humbly thank you from the depths of my heart, for reading and sharing in the experience of this account. I hope this account has been meaningful and moving for you. If there is anything I can help clarify for you, comments that you would like to make, something you want to share, to point out a mistake in editing, suggest an improvement, or simply to say "hello", **please feel free** to contact me, Bryson, at:

mailto:brysonhughes@hotmail.com

Now as we depart I want to leave you with this blessing:

### The LORD bless thee, and keep thee:

### The LORD make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee:

The LORD lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace.
