High Steel and Great Whites
A Mystical Adventure
By Michael R Basso
Smashwords eBook Edition
Version 2.0 2010
Copyright © 2010 Michael R Basso
About the author
As a lifelong learner and educator, Michael R Basso, Jr. holds four advanced degrees and a variety of professional certifications. Dr. Basso has a Ph.D. in professional psychology and biomedical systems; an MS in engineering science, an MBA with a focus in executive leadership and an interdisciplinary Professional Development Diploma in pathophysiology, neural systems, and education. He also holds a BS in electrical engineering as part of his undergraduate accomplishments. Michael is also certified in quality systems and in a variety of health related areas.
Dr. Basso has significant experience as a college level educator at Yale University and the University of Connecticut. His experience also includes being a consultant, researcher, newspaper columnist, engineer and organizational leader. Michael is the president of a statewide holistic health organization.
Preface
I procrastinated about writing this book for ages, until one day I got a wake up call that came out of the blue. The ambulance and fire truck arrived early on a Saturday morning at my neighbor’s house. Next came the police. When I didn’t see anybody being put on the stretcher, the situation was becoming clear. Then came a priest, followed by a mini van driven by two gentlemen with black suits. They sat in the driveway for hours. Seeing my relatively young, fit, active and perpetually smiling neighbor being carried out in a body bag was a reminder to all about how fragile life can be and the importance of time. Seeing his elderly mom walk out of the house that day really drove the concept of karma, or cause and effect, home.
While a novel in the truest sense, High Steel and Great Whiles touches on concepts such as life and death and karma from many new and provocative perspectives and possibilities. Relevant ideas from psychology, east / west spirituality, design engineering, the natural and health sciences, and many other areas, are intertwined within the framework of this novel. When viewed from an integrative perspective, the possibilities are endless, as the gap between advanced physics and spirituality approaches the limits of zero.
I was once at a seminar at the Mayo Clinic and had the opportunity to ask some leaders what they thought the medicine of the future might be about. The reply was interesting to say the least. These leaders suggested that it would be more like the medicine on Star Trek: light, sound, electro-magnetic fields, robotics, and other forms of high tech yet to be invented. This experience and others have made it clear that it may not even be necessary to see, touch, or be near a patient. Distance healing is considered a real possibility by many credible scientists today. The relationship between nature’s designs and human ones can boggle the imagination.
When I was small, my mom and dad would read to me for hours on end, every night. It was their devotion and those stories that inspired me to let my imagination run as far as I could. The culmination of my lifelong curiosity and imagination are reflected in the book you are holding, written mostly for the fun of it.
Please note that in this compressed edition lots of information is presented rather quickly, without the typical character development found in most adventure novels. This approach was done with the intent of presenting several important messages in a short period of time. An expanded version, perhaps with several volumes, is planned as a future endeavor.
Please take a contemplation break between each chapter.
I hope you like it!
Prologue
Dell was a college senior, ready to enter medical school at Harvard; or so he thought. Little did he know that the ‘Masters of the Great Silence’ had other plans for him that would make a modern medical education look like child’s play. Through a series of apparent coincidences and disconnected events, he learned of the mystical initiations that he had endured over many lifetimes and their significance as part of a greater whole. He learned of his own trappings as well as those of a very real demonic hierarchy.
It was now time for the higher initiations: to become one with the great white shark, no matter how many times he would have to die trying. Only then could he graduate to the higher planes of Gods many mansions while maintaining mastery over his physical existence.
Contents
Chapter 2 The Tightrope Walker in Spain
Chapter 3 The Swordsman in France
Chapter 4 WWII, The Civil War, and the Distant Past
Chapter 5 The German Monk in the Middle Ages
Chapter 6 The Scottish Highlands and the Little People
Chapter 7 Africa, Incas, Indians, and Trolls
Chapter 11 The Quality of Life
Chapter 12 :Strange Coincidences
Chapter 14 Meeting the Shark and the First Attempt
Chapter 15 Trapped by the Dark Force
Chapter 17 Dell Saves the Lives of Reena and Jared
Chapter 18 Learning to Be a Co-creator Like the Divas
Introduction
As Dell walked down the long driveway of his Atlanta farmhouse, his heart raced with anticipation. His hopes for acceptance into Harvard Medical School had consumed his thoughts ever since he had applied. It was the first week in May and he knew that the final decision would be made this week.
After med school he planned to take care of the men and boys in town, just as old Doc Harris had been doing for the last 50 years. The girls and ladies always went to a woman, Dr. Klaus and her sister, Doc Jones, their mother before them and her grandmother before that. The plan worked well for many generations. After all, it was the right thing to do and this arrangement kept everyone happy.
As he opened the gate in the white picket fence that separated the front yard from the sidewalk, his favorite chicken, Molly, screeched as though she knew that something special was about to happen. Dell’s grip almost froze as he reached for the envelope in the mailbox. He raced into the kitchen and opened the letter.
Yes! He had been accepted to Harvard Medical School. He could hardly believe it, despite his 4.0 GPA from Columbia in biogenetic engineering. His fears were over. Little did he know that his trials were just beginning and that they had nothing to do with his medical studies.
As he reached for the phone to call his childhood sweetheart, Sally, Dell felt like his acceptance wasn’t real, but was only a dream. Sally’s scream of excitement for him made him snap to. This was no dream.
That night his mom cooked his favorite meal, made from eggplant, soy, tomatoes and cheese. Dell had cared little for meat his whole life and eventually convinced his family to follow suit. He other favorite, strawberry shortcake, topped off the meal. After dinner, he and his dad went into town to buy Dell the special dirt bike that he had always wanted.
His friends all had motorcycles and now it was his turn to have one. The next day, Dell got up bright and early and headed to the power line trail with his friends. He didn’t even bother to wait to have his bike registered. He was a natural. Within minutes he had ridden up the steepest trail and showed no fear about going back down the rock strewn, pocketed path, which lay claim to many a broken bone. Within weeks he was jumping over four foot boulders and on the street he could do wheelies for a hundred yards at a time.
The whole town, it seemed, turned out for the barn dance his brother, Cliff, had planned for him. He danced the night away, but also had too much to drink. The next morning, he and Cliff did a great job cleaning the barn. Later that afternoon, Cliff took the new dirt bike for a ride, while Dell found the nearest pile of hay to take a nap on.
As he drifted off to sleep, Dell felt as though he was floating high above the barn while still quite aware of what was going on around him. He sensed that two spheres of light were rapidly approaching him. In a flash, he felt the most incredible feeling of love that he ever experienced in his life. He first saw the outline of what appeared to be Jesus coming towards him. But he wasn’t alone. Another figure with short-cropped black hair and coal-black eyes was with Jesus. The next moment, the three of them were in a valley somewhere in Tibet. Dell and his friends were seated at a long log table which easily seated twenty. To Dells’ utter amazement, the valley became filled with the brightest light imaginable as many others joined the special meeting.
As Dell looked around he was struck by the beauty of a woman sitting across from him. She appeared to be in her early twenties, with blondish-brown hair. Another woman at the table quickly mentioned that this young beauty had learned the secrets of health long ago and that the object of his admiration was over 400 years old, in just her current body! Her real power went well beyond the physical body, the woman said, and she could take any form that she wanted, male or female, to suit her mission or just for fun. She had taken this form for Dell’s benefit.
Sitting beside this beauty was a gentleman with long black hair and a familiar smile. He looked like Lord Krishna, right out of the Hindu Baghavad Gita, which Dell had read in his comparative religion class. Dell noticed many others who appeared like those he had read about in a variety of places.
Just as his attention was drawn to a small Chinese looking man with a small red hat and a long mustache, another speaker announced that he was Lord Buddha. He said that he had come from a place called Shamballa to honor Dell. For what? Dell wondered. Lots of folks go to medical school and many do so for the wrong reasons. He was starting to have second thoughts.
Some doctors do more harm that good and many actually stop people from fixing their own problems, 99 percent of which they create and should easily fix by themselves. Eventually, he thought, everybody will be able to prevent their own problems and fix the few that actually manifest, no matter how complicated the problem. Why was he all of a sudden thinking this way? He had no clue. In the next moment a being that looked like a Native American started to speak.
“Dell,” he said, “you have learned to contemplate well since you were a little boy.” Behind the speaker was a TV playing a clip of Dell sitting on his Dad’s lap and looking far off into space like much was on his mind. He instantly remembered how his dad had read every story Dell could understand; Rumplestiltskin, Jack and the Beanstalk, Greek mythology, Scheherazade and the 1001 Arabian nights, and many more.
The Indian gentleman interrupted. “Your dad was a great master and your teacher for many lifetimes… this time he wanted to teach you how to use your imagination and most importantly how to love. You both had great power and riches in the past, but at times you abused and squandered such things and at other times you used your power for much good. You have mastered many things, but still have much more to understand.”
At once Dell felt that he was in ancient Egypt creating not only great mathematical formulas that helped in the construction of the great architectural designs like the Pyramids, but also much more that had been blocked from his memory for his own good.
“You had much power, but little wisdom,” the Indian said. “We arranged for much of the pain you have suffered in this short lifetime and many other lifetimes--for just that reason--to give you wisdom. Eventually all your power will come back, as it was you who took it away temporarily. You’ll see, and eventually you will have wisdom, love and power in divine balance, just for the fun of it!”
“God has chosen you to be part of the ‘order of silence.’ I cannot go into this with you yet. You are not ready. You will understand more in the coming years.”
“You must be all you can be,” the speaker said with a laughing gesture, “and I don’t mean that I want you to join the Army – again!
What? Dell thought. But the little joke brought a smile to his face and instantly put him at ease.
“You will go through many tests, and based on your many successes in the past, we are confident that you are ready for the challenges that await you. Even though you will not go to the school you intended to in the way you thought, you will do much to help others to help themselves and to depend on only themselves for their health. That school is part of the plan for you, but so are many other schools. You just don’t know it yet.”
“Much more importantly, you will teach others to bring creativity, joy and happiness into this world of pain and illusion. No one need ever be sick, ever. Some who are ready will learn to bring their own bodies back to optimum states and some will even learn to take perfect forms at will; the cream of the crop will learn to how to leave this earthly world and return to it like you go the grocery store today.”
“You have walked this lonely path literally for more centuries than one can count easily; but in fact, you were never alone. I was always with you when you needed me. When you finally learn that power without love is harsh and abrasive and that love without wisdom is foolish…you will be ready for more. These tests will give you the wisdom to use your power and love to help all, but with discretion. So often you have foolishly given pearls to swine, as the bible says.”
“You must never worship anyone or anything in Gods hierarchy; not even the Angels of the higher realms or the experts on the world of form, such as the Elohim, Chohans, Fairies, Divas, and the like.”
“Even the powerful masters of the sun and stars or the masters of the brotherhood of silence are not to be worshiped. Not even the male/female/IT that you call God or the special ‘master of the blue star’ that has helped you for what seems like ‘forever.’ What they do you could call their job, but it is better to call it FUN.”
“When beings do things that are useful for everyone and everything, they usually have fun doing the things they do. It is the way of the higher beings to automatically do such things, so they naturally have fun.”
“You will be tempted by the dark ones and tricked by their cunning ways. But not for long. They are no match for you and they know it. They are actually afraid of your great power, even though it doesn’t seem that way yet. You’ll see; as in some cases their karma unfolds right before your eyes and theirs. They have foolishly messed with one of us and will be punished for their own good and the good of others.”
“When the time is right, you must focus your power and love on the most savage of beasts, the Great White Shark. If you fail at first, you will have to die again and again, perhaps in a special way, until you succeed. There is no turning back.”
“You will remember many past lives of significance to the current one. The lives of greatest importance are those that have to deal with many important themes that you will master before you may graduate the schoolroom called Earth. Focus, concentration, fear, bioenergy, the power of soul and the significance of beauty are just part of the story.”
“These experiences will help you as soul to understand forgiveness with foresight, love in balance and how to control one’s own destiny. You will learn of the many traps the dark force has used against you in the past and how you may learn to overcome the most evil. There are many more themes of significance that will be relevant to your soul’s special journey through time and space as you eventually learn to be a co-creator yourself.”
“Wake up, Dell,” his dad shouted as he shook his lifeless appearing body. “Mr. Sweeney is here to interview you for the Gazette.”
“I had the weirdest dream. Where’s Aunty Em and that tin guy? No, wait, I have a heart already. And those slippers were for girls. Just kidding, Dad. I’ll be right up.”
“Never mind all that. Lets go!” his dad exclaimed.
The Tightrope Walker
The harsh financial reality hit Dell like a ton of bricks. He was going to Harvard, but who was going to pay for all that Ivy League education? His dad was once swindled by an unsavory friend, or someone he thought was a friend. This so-called friend borrowed his family’s life savings. When Dell’s dad went to get the money, the scum of the earth ‘friend’ was nowhere to be found. While his dad was able to track him down, with the aid of the police, the person was a real loser.
His reply to the police was that his trusting and innocent dad, “never taped the conversation.” The ‘low life’ was sentenced to 20 years in prison with no chance of parole for financial and lots of other criminal charges.
Little good that did Dell or his dad. Dell had to work and time was short. He’d apply for a loan too, but during that time of bad financial circumstances, loans were scarce and Dell was getting worried, to say the least. But, he persevered, and by coincidence got a job, and a well paying one at that.
“Are you afraid of heights?” his new foreman asked.
“Nope!” Dell retorted.
“Ok then, let’s see what you can do.”
On the way to the construction site, Dell saw a pretty woman that looked familiar; he was upset when she disappeared into the crowd as soon as he tried to look more closely.
“Are you OK, kid?” asked Buck, his new boss, a Native American high steel welder. “I don’t want any spaced out kid with me on that high steel. A guy could get killed. You’re not on any drugs or a psycho or anything, are you?”
“Not at all. Not to worry. I’ve never been into drugs, I am as sane as a hawk, and I am looking forward to getting high on the high steel. That’s all.”
“Never seen a white boy go higher than 5 stories, and scared shitless at that. Hope that new college boy foreman knows what he’s doing.”
“I’m not the least bit scared.”
“OK, kid; we’ll see.”
As they continued towards the construction site, Dell nodded off. He had the weirdest dream. He was in a cave cut into the side of a mountain, somewhere in the American Northwest. As he entered the cave, a solid stone slab immediately blocked the entrance way, as though this was a secret place of some sort.
He walked down a long hallway beside two beings without regular bodies. They were just ovals of light, one pinkish-white and the other bluish-white. Somehow Dell knew that they were part of the same being, just split into two for his benefit. He also sensed that these beings, whom he called Alpha and Omega, represented the ideal and most perfect manifestation of the male and the female energy.
The walls were made of the most beautiful opal he had ever seen. Inlaid within these walls were mystical symbols of every type, from every culture, and somehow conveying information from the beginning of time on this planet. At least it seemed that way.
“Wake up, kid. You scared me. You looked so peaceful that I thought you were dead. Seems real weird, but did we ever meet? Somehow I feel that I’ve known you a long time.”
“OK, there’s the little boys room over there and the coffee pot over that way. I’ll see you near the elevator in 20 minutes, OK, Samuel, um, I mean Dell. You’re rubbing off on me. See you over there in twenty, OK?”
“OK,” Dell replied.
As they got to the twentieth floor, 200 feet above the ground, the workers below looked like children.
“How cool,” exclaimed Dell, when they got to the 60th floor. The workers below looked like ants or even some smaller kind of bug.
“You’re not scared at all, are you, Kid?”
With that Dell balanced himself on one foot and then hopped 20 feet across a 12-inch wide beam and back, without missing a step, 600 feet in the air!
“OK, Kid. Now you’re really scaring me. I believe you. Cut that out, OK?”
The weeks passed and Memorial Day weekend was rapidly approaching. Dell was not only the best welder’s helper the company ever had; he was learning to weld steel beams 800 feet above the ground and he was getting real good at it.
On the twentieth of May all that changed. It was getting late and Dell wanted to leave early the next day, so he could meet Sally. He knew he wasn’t supposed to be on the high beams when no one was there, but he wanted to get ahead of the game so that Burt, the foreman, would let him leave early the next day.
It had rained that day and the steel was slippery, so the boss had let everyone leave early; thus, things were in Dell’s favor. Or so he thought.
He could feel his feet start to slide across the beam as he reached for his welding equipment. As he slipped off the side of the building, it seemed unreal at first. He fell and he fell hard.
The last thing he remembered was hitting the ground. Both his legs and arms were clearly broken and on his left side the bones were actually cutting through his muscle and skin. Lucky I fell from only 100 feet, he thought, right before he passed out face first in a puddle of bloody vomit. The pain was unbelievable--nature’s way of telling him something was very wrong.
He tried to crawl for help, but to no avail. Screaming was useless, as the site was so far from others that it would do no good. The local rats were licking his bloody face and he couldn’t even move or scream. Jesus Christ, what the fuck did I do to deserve this? Am I dead? he wondered. Nobody survives a fall like this. Am I in hell, paying for the things I did to animals and fish when I was a kid? If I’m not dead, I wish I were. This is hell, or hell on earth. Who the fuck cares, I’m in agony and bleeding to death.
Dell eventually passed out.
“Lagasteeno, get up. I’ve been working hard all day making shoes, and what did you do? Sleep and then sleep some more. I need help. This is a family business and you got your head in the clouds, or in your ass. Who cares which? The tax collector is coming tomorrow and we don’t have the money to pay. What are we going to do?”
“He doesn’t like Italian Jews anyway. This is Spain and your mom and I brought you here so you could make something of yourself. Go to University someday and buy a nice villa in France.”
Lagasteeno worked hard into the night so his dad could fill the huge order by morning and have the money for the tax collector by noon. He wished he had some elves to help, but no such luck.
When his dad came back to the shop that morning, all he found was a note. Lag was off somewhere so he would no longer be a burden to the family.
Just in time. As the Spanish circus was getting ready to leave, Lag offered to feed the elephants for room and board and a little spending money.
“Come on, kid, let’s go,” said the tightrope walker. “This is 1550 Spain. In these modern times, we have to move quicker. Are you ‘stew nod?’” exclaimed Roberto, recognizing Lag’s Italian accent.
The days turned into weeks and the weeks into months. By now Lag had become real close to Roberto and his family. His daughter, Nell, was so beautiful that he’d do anything for her. He even washed the cloths, did the dishes and put up the advertisements for the circus all over town, in addition to doing his job. Nell, like her dad, was a tightrope walker.
So, a tightrope walker Lag was also to be. Week after week went by and little by little he was able to walk the specially made rope. At first 5 feet off the ground, then 10, then eventually after months of practice, he was ready.
The night of his first big show had arrived.
Lag was 100 meters in the air and proud of his new accomplishments. At first, he used a pole and then he didn’t even need that. The audience was amazed. “Watch out,” somebody screamed from way below. Only they weren’t screaming for him.
Lag was so anxious to help Nell that he forgot to finish feeding the lions and even left the door of the cage open.
As Nell went to close the cage for her very special friend, all she could feel was the hot breath of the lion as he bit deeply into her golden haired head. As Lag heard her faint screams, the last sounds he ever heard from Nell, the rope swayed heavily to and fro.
As he fell the 300 meters to his death, he had a faint glimpse of Ancient Greece, or no - some city far older. In a flash, he felt his hands on the chest of someone as he pushed them off a cliff to their death, while he snatched the bag of gold that was attached to their belt. Now, centuries later, he was dead too.
As daylight started to break through the cloudy sky, Dell saw the faint glow of someone coming near the construction site. It looked like the woman he’d passed on the road his first day on the job. In an instant, she passed by at least 100 feet from him, but somehow he knew her and that she was there for him.
“Come on, wake up, sleepy head,” Buck exclaimed. “What did you do, sleep here all night? Where’d all that blood come from? Lots of coyotes in this area. Musta got something last night. Lucky you didn’t get hurt! Get up kid and use the little boy’s room. We have lots of work to do today. I wanna leave early. Got a big Memorial Day celebration happening down at the ranch. Hey, what are those weird symbols on the ground over there? Never mind; let’s go.”
Dell felt like he was in that story in the Bible when someone touched Jesus’ robe and they were healed. By what? God? The Holy Spirit? Who knows? I don’t know what happened to me, he thought.
I know one thing. Every bone that I could think of was broken and with amount of blood I vomited, lots more than bones had been destroyed. For all intents and purposes, not only was I dead, but my body was mangled. Not even the best team of ‘earthly’ surgeons could come close to that much healing; even with days and days of surgery. Not even a small fraction of what was accomplished by the Holy Spirit in an instant.
At that moment he said to himself, I’m not going to medical school. I lost my interest. I have more important I just wish I knew what they were.
“Carry on my wayward, son. There will be peace when you are done,” was on the radio. “Wow! What the hell does that mean?”
The Swordsman in Old France
Dell was relieved when he got the mail. Harvard was willing to help with his loan, if he could hold out another year. This news took some pressure off, at least temporarily.
What was he going to tell his parents? He knew that he wasn’t going to need to go to med school for his work, but he didn’t want to tell anyone yet.
Dell was startled abruptly by the scream of his little sister Kate. Oh God, what did she do? To make things worse, he had given her the keys to the dirt bike since Mom and Dad were away and she had always been responsible in the past. Not this time.
Her face was covered with blood and her right hand was as limp as could be; it was clearly broken at the wrist. As he put a folded towel on her profusely bleeding face, he knew that she needed stitches and fast.
Dell put her in the family pick-up and off they sped to Dr. Jones’ office. He called ahead to let her know that Katie was bleeding badly from her face and that he couldn’t stop it. As he arrived at her office, a strange woman greeted the brother and sister at the door and whisked Katie away.
Dell knew that this might take a while, so he nestled up with a great magazine and swiftly dozed off.
“OK, you two, this is Notre Dame Cathedral and its 1620, not the middle ages. Get a job, for the love of Jesus, and quit hanging around the cemetery hiding from your parents, the gendarme, or whoever was after you,” the old caretaker woman shouted at the teen age boys.
“Let’s get some lunch, Pierre,” his brother François, shouted. “That old bag will be loaded on wine soon and the priests are out of town. We can hang out here, so Momma and Pa can’t find us goofing off again.”
“Got one,” Pierre said. With that François pulled his sword from his belt and with one fell swoop, the little frog had lost both its legs; in a flash another frog met the same destiny.
“Run, let’s get out of here. Those frogs were pets of the priests, who eat no meat, and we killed them. Here comes the old lady with a sword of her own. Yikes,” Pierre shouted. “What’s she gonna do, cut our legs off?”
“You’ll pay for this some day, mark my words, you little……God never forgets those who hurt its children, even the little frogs.”
“You know, François, I had a dream that I was here before as a great swordsman and way before that I was a Viking. You know how they tested the fighter’s swords way back when. They cut off a few arms and legs of slaves or prisoners.”
Then I heard a voice in the dream say that I wasn’t ready to hear the rest that I would someday need to know.
“Come on, let’s go! She might cut our heads off to test her sword. She was supposed to watch the property and the sacred frogs were our lunch.”
Mrs. O’Toole, the regular receptionist, arrived to find Dell sleeping in the waiting room. “Wake up, my boy; Dr. Jones called me to meet you here ASAP. “Where’s Kate?” she asked. “How did you get in here? The door was locked.” Dr. Jones had used the back entrance.
“The other receptionist…,” Dell shouted.
“Never mind that nonsense,” Dr. Jones yelled out. “Young man, you think this is funny; I just saw Kate hangin’ out with her friends. Still up to your practical jokes; ha ha. I’m a busy person. Get out of here before I call your parents and maybe the cops. This time you really did it. Lucky I was on my way anyway. Guess you knew that. Grow up, Dell.”
“But,” said Dell.
“Get lost,” replied Dr. Jones.
As he was leaving, Katie called him on his cell phone. “Are you coming home? I wanna use your bike. This time I’ll be careful. That nice woman at Doc Jones’ office drove me home and said you needed your sleep for some important reason.
“Dell, this is freaky. By the time I walked to the examining room, not only was there no bleeding; the cut had completely healed and my hand was as good as new, so I just left. What the hell was that about?”
“Ya know, last night I had this dream and you were in it; but you were a girl too. I was some kinda healer/priestess in a beautiful white temple with blue windows. You know in those days all healers were women, as I learned in the dream, and they healed with music, light and strange crystals and usually from a distance. There was no need to even tell them you were coming; they just knew. They never needed to see or touch anyone, ever, regardless of how bad the problem was. Their healings were so good that the problems never came back. They used dreams too, in some weird way.”
Several hours had passed.
“Katie, get home ASAP. Come in and check your messages. Mom and Dad called and they are on their way. If they find out you’re on that bike, it’ll be for sale at Smiths hardware store tomorrow. Get home fast.”
“Dell, we gotta talk,” Dad exclaimed.
How did he find out? Dell thought to himself.
“Dell, Mr. Warner got hurt bad the other day and I got a big roofing job to do right away. Can you help me out after that crazy high steel job? I know they won’t let ya work overtime in that line; and I need you on Saturdays too.”
Things were working out well. Dell didn’t mind helping his dad and this would give him a way out when the ‘high steelers’ left the area. He thought, Not many tall buildings will be built real soon, even in the city. At least not for a while. The economy is far too bad for that.
Now that he could be part of the family business, his dad wouldn’t mind his career change and he could be near Sally.
Saturday came and Dell was a natural. He could climb the high roof his dad had contracted to reshingle and was a quick study when it came to learning how to apply the tarpaper and shingles. Not like he had been before when he helped out. This time he was a real help to Dad and Cliff. They used to call him an ‘egghead’ and tell him to go read a book before he hurt himself or somebody else.
The months passed and summer turned into fall and dad was asked, like in every other year, to help with his bucket truck. Apple pickin’ time was upon them and cider makin’ would be happening real soon.
WWII, Civil War, and Distant Past
While Dell was visiting Washington DC regarding his Educational Innovations, he took some time to visit the various monuments around the city.
Coincidentally, an old man was sitting in a wheelchair right alongside the various dedications to WW II. The man had no legs. That night Dell could not get the man out of his mind.
As he went into a deep sleep, he could hear lots of gunfire and planes flying overhead. The air raid sirens were terrifying. Every time he heard one, his stomach would hurt.
In the next scene of the dream, Dell was in a MASH-like unit somewhere in Europe.
As a war surgeon in that life, he was struck by how powerless he was to fix the worst wounds of all, the severed limbs.
Somehow, in some strange way, he knew that it was possible to regenerate limbs and that it had something to do with electricity and magnetism, or perhaps something more powerful and closer to life than either of these forces.
At once, he remembered the electromagnetic device that he invented for a high school science fair. In the dream, it had helped a boy with a severed finger actually grow it back. Dell woke up abruptly.
As he entered the lobby, he saw a man that looked exactly like the one he had seen the day before in the wheelchair. Only this time, the man was walking at a very fast and even pace. Couldn’t be, he thought
The conference was over, and he was real tired, so he went to his room and took a nap.
“Mama,” the old man cried out, “he did it, he really did it! Mr. Lincoln freed the slaves. We is free! We is free! We been lucky, mama, the massa’ been good to us, he gave us this here shack to live in and he left you alone. You know what I mean. Other slaves ain’t been so lucky as we been. But now, says in this here paper that the massa’ don’t own us no more. We be free. Now the boss man, it says here, has to pay us a decent wage if he wants to keep us. And we can leave any times we want.”
“Hank, been down by the bayou the other day, and the old voodoo women been sayin’ the same thing. She says she somehow sensed it and that it would happen any day. It did, Hank. That woman be real powerful; everything she says come true.”
“Come on, Mama, that old voodoo lady ain’t for real. One time when I be down her way, and my stomach weren’t feelin’ so good for a while, she told me that I’d be ok the next day. She don’t know what she be talkin’ ‘bout, Mama. I went down her way the next day and she was in so much pain that she couldn’t know nothing about healing. She couldn’t even help her. She be sick herself.”
“Hank, I heard some stories round the other slave women that that old voodoo lady be real powerful. They be sayin’ that she sometimes takes on a sickness herself when another person is too exhausted to deal wit it theyself. One lady even say that the old woman ain’t old at all, but she makes herself that way as a disguise for some reason. Some lady be telling me that they saw her turn into a beautiful white girl ‘bout 20.”
“Mama, you gonna laugh when you be hearin’ this one. That old fool be telling me that my stomach been lousy me whole life cause I been a British soldier in that other war long ago and that just as I be hearing that drum and fife playin’, that I caught a musket right in my stomach. She be nuts, Mama. I tell ya, she crazy. She also tell me that my stomach be all the worse, cause I shot that same soldier with an arrow in the same place long long ago in ancient Greece. That lady be nuts, I tell ya, she be crazy. Ever hear such a damn fool story?”
“Mama, Pa,” Willie shouted as the old screen door of the shack flung wide open. “The war be over, the war be over.”
That night, Pa and Willie be real happy. They be playing the jug and the washboard all night long.
Old Hank had the weirdest dream of his life that night. He dreamt that he was an Indian brave about to take a sacred initiation of some sort.
The young Indian boy didn’t eat any food for 10 days, like the old man said to do. He rested in the swamp, just like he was told.
As night fell in the swamp, the young boy could hear the owls hootin’ in the trees as the moon lit the whole swamp when the clouds would pass by.
Meanwhile, the young brave could hear the leaves rustling along the riverbank. He knew that the time was coming near that he’d have to meet his deepest fears head on.
As the long black snake slithered his way towards the young boy, his fate was sealed.
The snake bit the young boy just as the old man had told him it would.
The fever was getting worse, as the boy went in and out of consciousness. As the snake returned for his prey it coiled its long body around the young boy and within a few minutes the boy was dead. He failed the initiation.
As he hovered over his lifeless body, he was pissed. In his way of thinking, the old man was a fool and he was a fool for listening to him. The idea of initiation was stupid and he was stupid for going along with the whole thing to begin with. The young Indian had a distorted view of the process and what he failed to do was to follow instructions.
The young boy was told to eat certain leaves and barks for two weeks before he started the fast. He was also told to make his body strong with the sting of the black widow for two months before the initiation was to begin. Once he was bitten, he was to move to the ceremonial hut and keep the door shut at all costs until the initiation was over.
“Mama, Mama, I know now,” Hank started as he woke the next morning.
“What you talking about, you old fool,” Mama exclaimed.
“You be right, Mama, and that old voodoo lady be right. I be the fool for not listening. I can’t explain it, Mama, but I now know that that old vooda woman was right all along. She be wit me in my dreams, Mama, I know she be, and she made me understand what a dumb fool I been for a long time and why. I can’t explain it, Mama, but it be true.”
“Mama, I gotta finish sompin and gonna go away for a while. I be back when I be done.”
The next morning old Hank left for the abandoned Revolutionary War hut deep in the bayou. On his way, he walked into New Orleans to buy some special herbs and barks that he had dreamt about.
As he walked into the bayou, he remembered that long long ago he had been there.
As night fell along the murky waters of the swamp, a large gator appeared and walked by his side. Not the least bit afraid, old Hank reached down to pet the head of the huge beast.
The weeks passed and Hank was getting used to the spider bites that were on his arm. As he fasted, he didn’t get weak at all. In fact, he was gettin' stronger and stronger, so much so that he felt the most alive he had been in years. His thinning hair was getting thick and dark again, just like the voodoo woman said it would.
When the fateful day arrived, he headed for the swamp and lay along its bank as the moonlight replaced that of the sun.
The long black snake approached right on schedule.
Hank shut his eyes, waiting for the snake to bite.
As he opened them, a beautiful young girl was in front of him. There was no snake in sight. “You have passed the test, my son. You have confronted the Snake, the Bear, and even the Lion in the past. Those initiations were difficult and took much bravery, but they were easy for you.”
“Because of your great power, you had become cocky and arrogant. You acted as though you knew everything and had nothing to learn. I had to teach you a lesson or two before you could move on. It would be quite dangerous for anyone to let you go onward on this path, the way you had become. Call it tough love, tough friendship or whatever you want, but you had to be stopped for a while.”
The boy was also politely asked to please keep the old man in the loop about a few things and to never lie to him under any circumstances. He did not do what he had promised the special old man; even after the many things the old man did for him in this life and in many others.
“You were stuck in a place where no one could reach you, my son. I could have spared your life when you were a young Indian brave, but I didn’t so in your later lives you could be all you could be.”
“I saved you many times in the past and each time I did you became more arrogant and foolish, so that time I let you die and learn from the Angels and the Divas and the lower masters of the lower heavens. You learned much that you will one day remember.”
“You had to learn to pay attention to details and to follow instructions carefully before you could take on the initiations that you would someday have to master.”
“When you are ready, Hank, I promise that I will let you be the master of your own destiny. I wish I could have done it sooner, but please trust that I couldn’t do so until now.”
“You have learned in the past to make your body as light as a feather or as heavy as a mountain. You know that you are not that mass of flesh and bones that ordinary folks think of as themselves.”
In an instant, the pair flew without their bodies into the moonlit treetops. In a flash, they flew over the little hut where mama was cookin’ a meal for young Willie.
They next flew into the past and the spirit of old Hank was brought back in time to a place in Ancient Greece where he had killed a Roman soldier with his deadly arrow. At first, he was quite upset over the incident and he had the sense that where his own stomach would have been was quite painful in some odd way, since he had no physical body. At the request of his teacher, he played the scene over and over in his mind until it no longer bothered him.
Old Hank next flew forward in time to a scene during the revolution when he was a British soldier about to take a musket in the stomach.
Once again, at the request of his teacher, he played the scene over and over in his mind until he no longer ‘felt the pain’ or ‘sensed the anger’ at the American Soldier that he somehow knew was his son, Willie, in this life.
He also knew how and why his stomach would hurt when he was stressed and especially when he was stressed around his son.
In a flash, the student and teacher hovered ‘bodiless,’ viewing the Earth from some distant place.
“Do you sense where you are, my son?” His teacher somehow communicated to the spirit of Old Hank.
“No, I do not,” old Hank replied.
“You are on the moon, dear one.”
“Wake up, Dell, you have a poster presentation in two hours,” his roommate screeched. “After that we have a press conference at the Jefferson Monument,”
”Movin’ on up, eh?” Dell replied.
“Ha ha! Thomas Jefferson, not George,” his roommate shouted as he hit him with his pillow. “I’ll see you at breakfast downstairs in 30 minutes.”
This day was very special for Dell. His presentations went well and he was asked to join the White House commission on education as a junior member. His ideas in accelerated learning could save the US billions in funding as well as help with the teacher shortage.
Far in the back of the huge crowd that gathered to hear about the new educational innovations, Dell was drawn to a man that he somehow knew from a time long ago. The man was dressed in casual sports clothes, but wore a violet colored cap, as though he wanted to catch Dell’s attention.
He gave Dell a ‘thumbs up’, making it clear that he approved of what Dell was up to and that he knew that things would work out fine.
Hard as he tried, Dell could not find the strange man again the whole day.And a whole day it was. Poster presentations, speeches, lunch at the White House, dinner at George Washington University and much more.
As he entered the hotel lobby through the turnstile, he felt a strange presence, yet could see no one in the lobby. When he passed the front desk, on his way from the restroom to his suite, the clerk called to him. “Son,” he shouted, “you received a registered letter. I think it’s real important.”
While he stood at the front desk, he felt some pressure on his left foot. “What the Hell,” Dell exclaimed. He looked down to see a strange violet colored crucifix on his foot.
The letter was from the President of the United States. In summary, the president was very impressed with the work Dell had accomplished, as though he was doing the work of three people. He also said that he knew that there would be much peace accomplished when Dell’s work was done and that he should carry on knowing that the president of the United States was backing him up.
Sounds like that song again, Dell thought. “No matter how it’s said, and this time by the President of the United States, it keeps being repeated to me. Why? And why is my life turning out to be beyond my wildest dreams? Why? Why? Why? Hmm, why not?
Dell waited for the taxi in the alley next to the hotel. Where’s that damn roommate of mine? he wondered.
Out of nowhere, the man jumped out from behind the garbage can. In a flash, the young white man was running at full speed, with Dell’s wallet in his hand.
At the same time, Dell lay face down in a puddle of his own blood. The knife had pierced his stomach. The pain was excruciating, but for some unknown reason, Dell knew in his heart of hearts that he deserved what had just happened to him.
As the strange, East Indian taxi driver hunched over Dell’s bloody and hurt body, Dell could hear him say in perfect English, “Breathe deeply, my son, and try to remember.”
In an instant, Dell remembered being in a small fishing boat off the coast of Africa, long long ago. As the large black whale rolled on its side, Ogbe sent a long spear right into its stomach. The next time it rolled, Ogbe could see its almost human-like eyes pleading for mercy in its own way.
Ogbe responded by sending another long spear right into the stomach of the hurt whale.
As the huge fish moaned, Ogbe drove both long spears deeper into the whale’s stomach.
In a flash, the spirit of Dell remembered life after life of being hurt in the stomach, hurting the stomach of others and of witnessing others hurting others’ stomachs or even hurting their own stomach. The reverie of thoughts and feelings only lasted a few seconds.
Dell remembered piercing the stomach of a young rabbit as he hunted in the Australian outback, long ago.
In the next instant, Dell remembered being a young Asian girl taking her own life by piercing her stomach with a sharp dagger.
In the next, he recalled being a fish, and biting the stomach of a crab that was to be its meal.
Next he was a crab biting through the stomach of a small fish, countless eons ago, in a warm ocean far far away.
The taxi driver continued, “You have learned how the past can be brought into the present in two seemingly unconnected ways.”
“From an Eastern perspective, you got a firsthand experience about how karma can be resolved. From another perspective, you learned how the memory of distant injuries can remain with us through both the genetic code and through a spiritual memory of some kind.”
“As you learned from your neuroscience classes in college, the amygdalae are two almond shaped structures deep within the brain. You could say that these structures keep tickin’ and tickin’ when we experience trauma, even if we are unconscious. These same structures help us to respond to scary faces and help us in many other ways.”
“For many reasons that will not be discussed today, what we have done to others, in combination with similar trauma experienced ourselves, can make the past wreak havoc on the present in many ways.”
In a flash, Dell was hovering over his own body. In the next instant, Dell used a special technique that he remembered from his distant past. This time, Dell actually created the energy from within himself that was used to heal his badly injured body while dissolving his spilt blood, all in a split second.
Comparing this powerful type of complete healing with the most extreme forms of modern medicine was like comparing the power from a hydrogen bomb with rubbing two sticks together.
Somehow, even without his body and brain, the spirit of Dell knew that his lifelong stomach problems had been resolved permanently.
When his roommate for the trip arrived, he asked Dell if anything interesting had happened while he was waiting. He also noticed the rip in his shirt.
Dell replied, “Oh, nothing out of the ordinary. Let’s go.”
German Monk in the Middle Ages
“It’s been four weeks since grandma died, yet it still seems like only yesterday when I talked to her,” Dell said to Katie.
“I remember the night we both dreamt of her as a young woman, just over from Austria," Kate replied.
Since the older brother left home to be with his new bride, these two younger siblings were spending more quality time together. It’s like they resumed the kind of mystical connection they had when they were small children and each would know what the other was thinking.
Both kids would share stories and dreams about their recently departed grandmother. In all cases, she appeared to both of them the same way and mostly how she had looked when she was in her twenties, right over from Austria.
One night, Dell saw his grandma sitting lifeless on a sea wall overlooking the ocean. She called to her grandson and told him not to worry. She said that since she had graduated her earthly life that she could take an earthly form if ever and whenever she wished; but there was usually no point in doing so. She was having a ball where she was and never had so much fun on earth. However, she wanted to prove something to her grandchildren and told him that she’d prove that what she said was true.
About 5 minutes later, Barney, the family dog, started barking like mad. The family was up in a flash and footsteps were heard all over the house; later, the front door flew open without any clear cause.
Katie and Dell both heard their grandma say, “Hi, kids, it’s Grandma,” and they both saw what looked like her the night before, walking down the street, looking like the young pretty woman she once was, but in a shimmering glowing ghostlike body. This time, for just an instant, she looked human again, and then disappeared.
“What’s going on, kids?” Dad shouted from his room. “I’ve got a gun,” he shouted loud enough to wake the dead, as if a burglar had broken in.
“Calm down, Dad,” the children shouted in unison. The door flew open. They both winked at each other, knowing that grandma had established a secret connection.
The next day at church, Dell made the mistake of telling the priest what had happened. He got an ear full of things that he wasn’t interested in hearing about; how evil it was to even answer the dead…. And on an on.
Dell felt tightness in his wrists, had trouble writing his ideas down, and oddly had trouble speaking all the next day. This situation bothered him for days. These things had happened often when he was a child and was asked to speak at Sunday school.
Dell had his own views about many biblical things, but he knew it was no use arguing with the priests and nuns that ran his class. All grown up now, he had the same feelings as long ago. This time his wrist really hurt and he was agitated like never before.
Over the next few days, he took vitamin B6, along with other B vitamins, magnesium, vitamin C and zinc; all things that had made his wrist feel better before, but not this time. He even stayed in the sun to make sure he had enough vitamin D to help him absorb all those wonderful nutrients.
Still there was only a slight reduction in wrist pain.
He did feel real relaxed after cutting the grass and taking a shower. He swiftly found the most comfortable lawn chair he could find, before anyone else did, and proceeded to nod right out.
“Stop it,” he shouted to the other monks as they held his arms still in the ‘special room,’ high above the loud sea below. It was the year 721.