First
Thunder
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the first chapter of
An Adventure of Discovery
by
MSI
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Dedicated to the
Ishayas of the past, present and future
"And I saw another mighty
angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was
upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as
pillars of fire:
"And he had in his hand a little book
open: and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the
earth,
"And cried with a loud voice, as when a
lion roareth: and when he had cried, seven thunders uttered their
voices.
"And when the seven thunders had
uttered their voices, I was about to write; and I heard a voice from
heaven saying unto me, Seal up those things which the seven thunders
uttered, and write them not."
-- The REVELATION of Saint
John the Divine
PART
I – Seattle
SPRING CROCUSES
My old Chevy truck, last
with me as it had been the first, carried me to Seattle, burning only
slightly over a quart of oil every two hundred miles. Mother welcomed me,
but I knew her too well to miss her disappointment. The daughter of a
devout Presbyterian and the sister of a Missionary, she felt violated by
my life. None of her core beliefs about divorce, employment,
responsibility, family or honor were unshaken by my fall.
My plans pleased her even
less. During the long drive home from Missouri, I realized that above all
I needed time to nurture and heal. I wanted to understand why my life had
run aground on the reefs of outrageous fortune, why my business and
marriage had been ripped apart by the hurricane of despair; I desperately
sought a new course for the foundering ship of my being. Why was the
Universe so callous, so hateful? I had only wished to be a good person.
Why was the desire to be an honorable citizen, husband and father not
enough?
I recognized now that even
during the best times in Missouri, I had felt an emptiness inside, a
strange and painful hollowness no amount of prosperity had ever filled. My
new cars, my limestone castle, my family, the honor of friends and
community -- nothing satisfied the undercurrent of discontent moving just
beneath the calm surface. The tragic lie of false peace!
I still hoped there must be
answers somewhere; but I was sure no one I knew had any -- scrape away the
veneer of their belief in God, Science, family or wealth, the same
emptiness was growing in them, a destructive mocking authority that found
joy only in pain. No, everyone on Earth was as lost and confused as I:
everyone believed in struggle, in suffering, in sickness, in death. I did
not feel life should be so, but I had no alternatives to the imperious
demands of my melancholy. The answers from religion, science, philosophy
were incomplete, incapable of offering more than a sugar-coating of belief
over the raging cancer of inevitable ruin.
So began my withdrawal from
the world. I could find nothing of interest to do. I no longer ran, I no
longer read, I called no one, I saw no one except my mother who gradually
lost all hope in me but at least housed me and fed me and talked to me --
from time-to-time.
I don’t know how long this soul
sickness would have lasted as I descended from thoughts of self-violence
to immersion in a dull apathy that left me staring at the walls of my
room, praying for sleep so I could stop regretting the past; nor do I know
how it might have ended in a final cataclysm of despair or rage had
nothing different happened. (I do know this, however: never again will I
harshly judge those who end their own lives or surrender control of
themselves to jailers of the body or the mind.)
But finally something different did
happen -- at last the winter of my life ended with the first buds of
spring. The Universe moved on, God or an angel was moved to compassion,
some good karma returned from a previous existence -- for whatever obscure
reason, a new theme ascended through the frozen wasteland of my heart.
This new movement began simply enough --
a former high school friend called late one Friday evening. His name was
Ollie Swenson, he had just returned from the Greek island of Patmos off
the coast of Turkey, he had something he wanted to share with me, could I
ferry over to Bainbridge to see him?
I remembered Ollie best as the linebacker
on our varsity team who negated my single touchdown interception by
clipping the quarterback, but he had through much of high school been my
best friend. We lost touch when he went to Washington State University in
Pullman to master agriculture; I had gone to the University of Washington
in Seattle to become a research physicist. I didn’t know if he had
changed his desire or not, but mine transmuted drastically by graduation,
due in part to my terminal romance with a Missouri farmer’s daughter.
What would he be like, my old high school
buddy, Ollie? I remembered he married his teenage sweetheart, a pleasant
girl who grew up near his grandparents’ home on Bainbridge Island; I
also vaguely recalled hearing he was divorced. What had carried him to
Greece? And why an island?
Fearing he wanted to sell me insurance or
interest me in some new pyramid scheme, I nevertheless agreed to come to
Bainbridge on Saturday.
When I walked off the ferry and met
Ollie, at first I did not recognize him: he looked about as different as I
could imagine. I remembered him with a crew cut, bulging out T-shirts at
240 pounds. Now he was quite slim, maybe 170 -- trim, not malnourished --
and his hair had grown long and was flowing in dark waves all around his
tan silk collar. He was beardless, but something about his brown eyes
reminded me of a feral animal -- free, wild, unpredictable.
There was more to him than this, a
feeling I couldn’t pinpoint or readily describe. He was calm beneath the
wildness; there was an aura of wisdom about him. This did not come from
his appearance, nor from his greeting (he hugged me warmly, then kept his
hand lightly on my arm as he escorted me to his Honda), nor even from his
words; this deep serenity and knowingness radiated from his presence
itself. I did not understand it, yet it resonated with something
deep inside me. I did not know it, and yet I also felt I knew it well, as
if it were speaking to an integral part of me, a part with which I was
hardly familiar and yet was my fundamental reality.
His peace resonated within me; at the
time I did not have the words nor even the thoughts to understand this,
but I did recognize I felt extremely comfortable in my old friend Ollie
Swenson’s presence. Why?
Someone was waiting for us in his Civic.
Someone wearing a bright red blouse and gorgeous golden curls. Ollie
opened her door; she stepped out gracefully. The curls flowed in glorious
profusion around a flawless face. Her azure eyes were deep yet warm. I
felt myself blushing. Stunning beauty always makes me feel like a school
child standing before the principal.
"I’d like you to meet Sharon Alice
Stone," introduced Ollie. "She is the most exceptional woman I’ve
ever known."
"Sharon Stone? The movie star?"
I asked, attempting weak humor, entirely missing Ollie’s point.
Sharon smiled at me genuinely, oblivious
to Ollie’s praise, unoffended by my poor joke (doubtless far beyond
stale to her, I realized with growing chagrin), and embraced me warmly. I
hugged her awkwardly as Ollie finished his introduction of me,
"...The best defensive end Shoreline ever had," which did
nothing to lessen my embarrassment.
"Come on," said Ollie, "we
can talk back at the house. Sharon’s made us some lunch." I
squeezed into the back of his Civic, Sharon settled like a feather into
the front passenger seat, then turned to talk to us. Neither of them
fastened their seat belts. I reached for mine but soon gave up, realizing
it had been swallowed by the seat. When in Rome, I thought, mostly
listening to Sharon chatting about her childhood in Oklahoma.
Why did you leave the Midwest?" I
asked, briefly reliving the horror of my past few months there.
"Tired of the cold?"
"Following my heart," she
laughed gaily. "Seeking larger meaning than I was finding in
Tulsa."
"But why Seattle?" I persisted,
her easy manner causing me to feel more relaxed. "Three hundred days
of rain a year makes all Seattle-ites gloomy and introspective, didn’t
you know?" My past month of an Eeyore-like existence was not easy to
drop on instant demand -- even in the presence of Ollie’s transcendent
peace and Sharon’s joyful beauty. Even Pooh and Piglet can’t reach
me, eh? I thought, judging myself again.
But they both laughed generously and
brightly as Ollie replied, "That’s three hundred days of clouds,
old friend; it doesn’t rain so much, only forty inches or so a year --
hardly ever on Bainbridge, as a matter of fact. Part of the rain shadow,
you know. A real banana belt. Plus these days, espresso grows on every
street corner. Starbuck’s coffee capital of the world, that’s our
Emerald City. People are much too hyper to be depressed here."
Sharon added earnestly, "For the
first six weeks, I had no idea why I was here. I had begun to think maybe
I was insane, as my former boyfriend tried to convince me. But then I met
Ollie three days ago; now I know why I came to Seattle." She
looked at him and smiled with radiant warmth.
Will anyone with such gorgeous lips
ever look at me like that again? I thought. My heart longed to ask her
what she meant -- Why had she come to Seattle? What had she found? -- but
something inside me was afraid of what she might say. I didn’t want my
life to become more complicated. Even though it was killing me, it was all
I had of security in a painful world.
So instead, I asked the vastly easier,
"How did you two meet?" What were they? An instant romance? They
didn’t seem to be affectionately touching. Certainly not like I would
be if she were my girlfriend, I thought, then felt embarrassed again.
This time my feeling was embellished by contempt for my arrogance and
self-loathing for my stupidity. What could I offer any female these days?
Poverty and failure? May life was ashes; I was the original fool. Ollie
was staring at me in the rear view mirror. His brown eyes were dancing
with mirth! It was not a judgmental laughter mocking me; it was a pure and
simple happiness singing there. It felt as if he were looking right
through me. How much had he intuited of my thoughts?
He smiled warmly at me and said, "I
had a feeling I should walk over on the ferry last Thursday. Sharon was
sitting alone on the Observation deck, crying as if her heart were
breaking. That was just too sad: it was a gorgeous Seattle day -- the
Olympics and Cascades were out; Mt. Rainier was floating like a
vision of dream heaven over the city; even Mt. Baker was visible in the
distant North. When the sun shines in Seattle, it’s like nowhere else on
Earth. The sky was a fabulous royal blue, the Sound a deep, royal
aquamarine, the forests a dark, fathomless green, the sunlight glittering
over the water a royal pathway to the gods. I felt as if I were in the
Wizard of Oz, Seattle truly deserved its nickname of the Emerald City --
and there was poor Dorothy, completely missing this glorious Pacific
Northwest moment, crying her eyes out on the Observation deck, oblivious
to all the wonder and joy. I realized I had to talk to her, to offer her
an alternative to life as she knew it... Here we are."
He pulled into his driveway, lined with
old Douglas fir -- not first growth (there are precious few left of those
primeval trees anywhere -- a logging tragedy inherited from our careless
ancestors and continued by our own thoughtless generation) but some
ancient second growth. Bainbridge was probably logged fairly early in
Washington State history, I thought, impressed by the size of the
hundred year old trees. I remembered suddenly I had been here before --
this was once his grandparents’ farmhouse. It dated from the turn of the
century, by its appearance; apparently several acres still went with it:
no new homes were encroaching.
The yard was unkempt, but someone not too
many years before had sculpted it to perfection. The weeping cherries and
flowering crabs and plums had already strewn the ground with their
blossoms and were fading, but the azaleas were bursting in glorious
crimson, violet and gold profusion and the rhododendrons were counting
down to their annual explosion with thousands of mature buds. It all
appeared a little slice of paradise.
Ollie took us around his grounds before
we entered the house. In the back, he had built a huge Japanese garden
complete with weeping cedar and hemlock and an enormous koi pond with
waterfalls and stream beds. "Take me a while to get it back in
shape," he said, a touch of melancholy kissing his tones. "I
hated to leave this for Patmos. But it turned out to be the smartest thing
I ever did."
"How long were you in Greece?"
I asked, mostly to be polite -- my attention was captivated by the size of
some of his bonsai's -- I had never seen larger or more beautiful
specimens. Even in neglect, Ollie’s garden was magnificent.
He noticed my true interest; instead of
answering me, he said, "That one is nearly three hundred years old.
Mo Takata gave it to me when I graduated from Pullman. His great
grandfather brought it over from Japan. Interesting it should be so
attracted to you. It doesn’t often respond to many. Too old, I suppose.
See how it sparkles, Sharon?"
She smiled at him and said uncertainly,
"I think I’m beginning to, a little."
"What are you two talking
about?" I asked, impatient with what seemed mystical nonsense.
"It doesn’t matter," Ollie
chuckled good-naturedly. "Come on in, let’s have lunch. I told you
Sharon made a great fruit salad, didn’t I?"
Something about his manner soothed me
instantly. We entered the kitchen and sat on wooden chairs that looked as
old as the house. There was a bright blue plastic cover on the table; the
walls were a pretty yellow; a skylight above let in ample light;
all-in-all, Ollie’s kitchen was airy, very pleasant and well equipped.
Sharon dished up three enormous plates of her fruit salad. The porcelain
serving bowl was so full it looked as if they were expecting about half a
dozen others.
"Your mom about?" I asked past
a bite of fresh strawberries and watermelon. I remembered her warmly.
Ollie’s father had been a full-blooded Norwegian, a builder by trade; he
was killed when Ollie was young; she’d raised their five children alone.
Her name was Gladys, but we always called her, "Happy Bottom" --
which she always took in the best of humor.
"She died two weeks ago," Ollie
said without any discernible sadness. "That’s why I’m here and
not still on Patmos with Lance and the others."
"Oh! I’m sorry," I said
sincerely. I’d liked her a lot. She’d always seemed an ideal mom.
"There’s no need," he replied
warmly. "She lived a full life and died peacefully. I don’t think
she’d have accomplished much more, even if she’d lived another twenty
years. My only regret is I didn’t have the chance to share what I
learned in Greece with her. She’d have loved it."
"Tell me why you were there," I
said, putting down my fork. I liked the fruit, but would have been happier
with something a little denser. A Big Mac, in fact, would have suited me
just fine.
Ollie, perhaps simply desiring to be a
good host, followed my lead, put down his fork and pushed back from the
table. He studied my face intently for a moment, then said, "Do you
remember Alan Lance?"
"No -- oh, you mean the All-State
fullback over at West Seattle? Vaguely. We partied together after games a
few times. A really nice guy. Why?"
"We became good friends at W. S. U.,
but I lost sight of him after we graduated -- I went into the landscaping
business, you know, with Mo Takata and his sons; he moved out to Sedro
Wooley to work his uncle’s dairy farm. I pretty much forgot about him,
but three years ago, he called me up; I went to see him. He looked
completely transformed; I liked what he said and decided to return to
Greece with him. He’s still there, on the little island of Patmos, with
a dozen or so others."
"What are they doing?" I asked,
wondering if that was the very question that would begin what I was afraid
was going to be a sales pitch.
"Studying, mostly," he replied
with a far-away look in his eyes, "but not in the sense you are
likely to think. Most of their work is done in Silence, seeking to
understand the inner Self."
"They meditate many hours every
day?" asked Sharon, looking up at him as she popped an enormous
cantaloupe ball into her mouth. She was obviously enjoying the sweet fruit
very much -- she had already made a big dent in the large bowl.
Meditating, I thought. I have
entered the Land of the Weird. I wondered how long before I could
gracefully leave. Did I even care if it was graceful? I had no fondness
for cults or anti-Christian practices, no desire to get involved.
Ollie seemed aware of my discomfort. He
smiled at me, then answered Sharon, "Well, they Ascend eight
to twelve hours every day, normally. But it’s not exactly meditation, it’s
not some strange Eastern or ‘New Age’ kind of thing. It’s more like
prayer -- but even that word doesn’t convey what Ascension is."
He looked affectionately at me. He didn’t seem to be frothing at the
mouth, just sincere. And earnest. "Both words lead to
misunderstandings, based on previous and common uses of them. Most people
think of concentration or mysticism when they hear of meditation;
Ascension is effortless and systematic. Or they think of religion when
they hear of prayer; Ascension requires no beliefs of any kind. That’s
why we call it something new, we call it Ascension. They -- and I --
practice Ascension, which comes from an ancient Teaching, never before
widely available in the world. It is a type of silent inner prayer or
meditation that everyone there believes came from the Apostle John."
"Patmos!" I exclaimed as an old
college memory collided with the present. "Isn’t that where St.
John wrote his Apocalypse, the Book of Revelation?" I had once
thought of visiting there -- when I was in the midst of a short-lived
burst of "Born-againism." My fundamentalism lasted until I
realized I couldn’t resolve my root belief in a loving, caring God with
a God who could condemn 99.99% of humanity to eternal damnation.
"Exactly," answered Sharon,
smiling approvingly at me. "Ollie has been studying and Ascending
with a group of monks who believe they are following the true but hidden
teachings of John -- and of Christ."
"Oh now, come on," I said, my
temporary enthusiasm transmuting to a repulsion born of fear. "Every
sect of Christianity, every cult on the Earth from Waco to Guyana says,
‘Our way only! All else are doomed to hell. Why, we won’t even be
buried with those miserable sinners -- we’ll have our own private
graveyard so we’ll be easy to find during the Second Coming.’ I don’t
need this." I pushed my chair back and stood to leave.
Ollie did not stand, but looked at me
with eyes filled with fire. It was not anger, I sensed -- it was intensity
of commitment.
"Patience, number 70. Let me explain
before you storm out."
Hearing my old football number triggered
a flood of past memories of my friend. I had been very close to him. Could
it be so bad, just to listen for a little while? After all, he hadn’t
asked me to do anything, nor even to believe anything -- at
least, not yet. And I had asked him what he was doing in Greece --
and, to be fully honest, who could say? Maybe if I could cut through all
the silliness, he might know something which would help me -- my
life wasn’t working as it was going, that much was certain.
"Well, all right," I said
gruffly, sitting down again. I was still flushed and not sure that I was
making the correct choice, but perhaps I owed my friend this much.
"Just keep it short, OK? I’ve got a lot to do today." A bald
lie which fell flat even to my ears.
Ollie didn’t say anything, instead slid
his chair up and leisurely ate his fruit. Meanwhile Sharon, to all
appearances oblivious to my rage and discomfort, emptied the rest of the
bowl onto her plate and set herself the task of finishing it. Fruit
must be all she eats, I thought, observing that the quantities she was
consuming would give terminal gas to many others -- myself included. I
poked at my mostly full plate but ate little more.
Ollie finished his lunch, sat back again
and said to me, "You remember my true love was baseball?"
"Sure, you bet!" I exclaimed,
grateful the subject had turned to something less threatening. "In
fact, weren’t you scouted during the playoffs, our senior year?"
"I was. Two agents came. I knew they
were there, so before the game, I went up to the umpire as they were
talking with him and said, ‘Hey, if I hit the ball over that fence, is
it an automatic home run?’ He kind of sneered at me and replied, ‘Sure,
kid, but don’t worry, it’s never been done, by much better hitters
than you.’ I could tell he was thinking I was some kind of case. But
when I saw that pitch coming in the seventh, I knew I would hit it
over the fence; after I did, both the Cubs and the Red Sox said they
wanted me in their training camp."
"But you didn’t go," said
Sharon simply, wistfully eyeing the empty bowl and my nearly full plate.
I pushed it over to her; she gave a
little gasp of surprise or joy and leapt at it as Ollie answered,
"No, I wanted to be educated. And I wanted to master agriculture. So
I chose what I really wanted."
"Riches and fame or happiness?"
I asked sarcastically.
Ollie ignored the tone and answered
earnestly, "I chose what I thought would bring me the most happiness,
yes. The most growth. And the choice worked well for me; I was successful
materially and enjoyed my job. I love working the earth, sculpting beauty
in three dimensions. But when I saw Alan Lance again after all those
years, I realized he had something more than I, something for which I
longed but thought I would never find. I couldn’t quite identify it, but
he was radiating a kind of peace or understanding I did not know."
"Born again?" I said, but the
sarcastic tone was gone -- his description exactly matched what I’d been
feeling in him -- a serenity and wisdom I longed to share.
"Not at all. Or not in the sense
that you mean it. But that is exactly what I asked him three years ago.
Lance laughed and explained he had learned a series of techniques called
‘Ascension Attitudes’ that were transforming him. He told me his life
was changing on the basis of new experience, not new belief, and said I
would discover the same thing if I could be bold enough to try it. He said
there were twenty-seven techniques in all, divided into seven
"Spheres" of Attitudes, each Sphere consisting of about four
techniques, each Sphere more subtle and more powerful than the one before.
He said that humanity as a whole was going to learn to Ascend, and
commented this was all prophesied by St. John nearly two thousand years
ago and also by every other great culture on the Earth at one time or
another, including the Egyptians, Mayans, Hopi, Chinese and West and East
Indians; but most if not all of these prophecies had been distorted or
misinterpreted or lost."
"How could Alan have discovered
those techniques?" I asked with little interest, believing nothing.
"He met a monk in an orchard on
Samos, one of the Greek Islands. This monk said he was one of a hidden
order that had retained the full Teachings of Christ through John; for the
first time in history, they were desiring to share these with the world.
Think of it! The original Teachings! Unadulterated by centuries of
distortion, poor translation and selfish revision." He stopped and
looked at me as though he expected me to comment.
"This all sounds too fantastic,
Ollie. Alan Lance, star fullback turned dairy farmer, stumbles across the
authentic teachings of Christ? Come on, you can’t believe this, you’re
sounding like a psycho." I had never stopped wondering how I might
leave without violating the bond of friendship; the desire was at times
intense, at others subdued, but always there, gnawing at me. This whole
escapade was ludicrous. I wanted to get out of there, to go back home to
my room.
"You may go back home to your room
anytime you wish," said Ollie with perfect sincerity.
My jaw dropped slightly -- was my thought
so transparent? "I -- I don’t care to leave," I stammered.
"At least, not yet."
"I have no desire to convince
you," Ollie continued, again smiling at me. "I don’t want to
browbeat you or convert you or anything like that. I’m only telling you
that Ascension is available. Either you will resonate with this
opportunity -- or not. I don’t care if you believe it came from Christ
or from Joe the Hot Dog man down on Pier 59. Nor does it matter in the
practice of Ascension if you believe in it or not. Belief is not required,
it is absolutely not required.
"I called you because I heard you
lost your business and family and were in Seattle at your mother’s,
seeing no one, withdrawing from the world. I know what I have can
help you, but you are not expected to know this. All I ask is for you to
suspend your disbelief just long enough to give the First Attitude a fair
chance. If you can do this, it will transform your life. The
self-destructive internal programs you’ve picked up from childhood will
melt away as you experience the Silence within; your constantly running
habits of judgment will be replaced by a constant appreciation of the
wonder and beauty of the world. No stress, however large or small, can
withstand the power of this Teaching. Ascension has cured me of my
childhood traumas; it has led me to an understanding of the world I often
dreamed about but never thought possible to live.
"Every word I have told you today is
true. This is not my belief, it is my experience. Each of the
twelve Ascension Attitudes I have been given -- each of the three Spheres
I have been fortunate enough to learn -- is magical, transforming,
unequaled in my personal history. I do believe this Teaching came from the
Christ -- it is that good. But again, don’t take my word for it! If you
wish to learn even the First Ascension Attitude, if you can be that bold,
come back here tomorrow again at noon.
"This much more I can tell you --
you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. You only have to be
willing to take a stand for Life -- you need only to be willing to say to
the hurt and crying self inside that the guidance of your ego has led you
nowhere but to destruction. Your ego wishes to kill you; it is making you
very uncomfortable right now, because deep in your heart you know
what I’m telling you makes perfect sense and is consistent with what the
best part of you knows to be true. That part longs to be innocent again,
to be free, to believe it is possible to find meaning in this harsh world,
to remember that life is filled with magic, with wonder, with joy, with
Love, with Truth, with Beauty -- and another part of you wants to keep you
locked in your mother’s house, staring at the walls, waiting for death
to free you. Part of you feels you deserve to suffer, that anything that
happens to you that is bad is not only warranted, it is probably not even
enough. You have to decide which voice you wish to hear!
"The fact is, I’m here now; you’re
here now; something inside you must be ready to learn the highest Teaching
or you wouldn’t be here. Your time and your world is ripe. The simple
truth is: no one can even read about Ascension without being ready to read
about it. Your challenge is to recognize the part of you that is
responding to my words and realize that it stands for your lost dreams and
true hopes. You need to acknowledge the way you’ve been living your life
is not only pointless, it is leading you nowhere you want to go. Partly
you need to see that you are worthy of miracles in your life. You
are a child of God, a creation of omnipresent Love and Power, therefore
worthy of all success and happiness. Truly now, truly! Do you think you deserve
to suffer?"
Ollie ended his monologue and sat back
further, watching me, waiting for my reply, wondering, perhaps, about the
effect of his words. I glanced at Sharon; she had stopped eating to stare
at him, my unfinished fruit still before her, a watermelon ball stuck on
her fork, her hand part way to her mouth, her arm frozen in space. Had she
never heard him talk this way? Did he have a different approach for
everyone he felt drawn to contact?
Finally I swallowed hard then confessed
softly, "Sometimes I think I must. I don’t understand why God let
my life get so messed up. I don’t know if you can help me; I guess I
would like it if you could." What did I have to lose, after all?
Sitting in this bright kitchen with Ollie and Sharon was like a vision of
paradise. With a shudder I remembered my dark room in my mother’s gloomy
forest. Even as my mind had rebelled at the thought of trying anything
new, my heart had been opening to the presence of peace I felt in Ollie.
"What do I have to do?" I asked, with almost complete sincerity.
Was I really ready to move ahead?
"Not much. Come back tomorrow at
noon -- I want you to think about it overnight, see if you’re really
ready to move ahead, if you’re willing to try anything new." A
thrill shot up my spine as I realized he again used the words I was
thinking. Ollie grinned at me, apparently noticing and understanding my
surprise. This did nothing to lessen my confusion. Who was this guy? An
empath? A walk-in from the Pleiades, replacing the Ollie I had once known?
"So, if you’re willing, come
tomorrow; I’ll teach you the First Attitude. If you take to it (as I’m
sure you will!) I’m qualified to share the first twelve with you over
the next few months -- I can teach each of the first three Spheres. Try it
and see. As Lance’s Teacher told him, ‘If you want a different fruit,
plant a different tree.’ Plant the tree of Ascension in your garden,
water it well, tend it and see if it matures into the Tree of Life for you
-- see if its fruits of Peace and Joy and Health don’t suit you better
than the painful fruits of fearful ups and sorrowful downs you’re
harvesting now."
The phone rang from the living room,
Ollie said, "Excuse me a moment," and went to answer it. It was
perched high atop a mountain of sheet music on the Baldwin Grand that
filled most of that room -- I remembered Gladys had once been a concert
pianist; it was her music lessons alone that enabled her to support her
children after her husband died.
"Hello?" he said. "Yes,
oh, it’s you! Nice of you to call again. Yes, tomorrow will be all
right. No. No..."
I glanced at Sharon; she had resumed
eating, was just now stabbing the last of the strawberries. Apparently she
felt my eyes, for she looked up at me and smiled.
"Never heard him talk that
way?" I asked.
She shook her head and answered, "I
guess you needed him to be that forceful. If you have mountains of stress,
it might take dynamite to remove them."
I replied it was probable I had mountain ranges
of stress, but suddenly Ollie was shouting into the phone, "No! That
is completely wrong! The world needs this Teaching! It has to be released!
John never intended this to remain a secret tradition for monks only! No
one has the right to keep it from the world! I tell you, this has to come
out, and it has to be now... No, I don’t care what you do... No... No, I
don’t believe what he says. I tell you, you have it completely wrong...
Fine. Tomorrow then." He slammed down the phone and leaned into the
piano, breathing deeply to regain calmness. Finally he shuddered,
straightened slowly, turned back toward us with a forced smile and came
back into the kitchen. He looked grim and pale.
If you'd
like to know the rest of the story, you can order First Thunder here.
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