It was about three o'clock. I was soaking up a book about out of the body experiences when I heard the floor creak outside my bedroom door.
"You're still up!" The door cracked opened; Mom's sleepy face emerged from the darkness.
"I'm reading."
"Heavens, you've got to get some sleep. This has got to stop, Sim," Mom was pleading.
I marked my place and cleared my collection of occult books from the bed. I turned off the light. This was the best time to silence my brain, or at least, attempt it. That was the first step, along with controlling my breathing. Relaxation was critical to travel outside one's body.
Laying on my back, I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate on easing the tension in all my muscles. Before I had begun, I entertained a slow pace of images that occurred to me as I read. Now, a deluge of images rushed at me, viciously circling the pinpoint of my resolve to eliminate them.
I saw myself at my job lifting huge panels of concrete roofing, the sun squeezing my sweat from every pore. Two workers were helping me fit a panel. Their eyes peered out at me from the shadows of their hats. It sounded like they were talking about the Second Coming of Christ, as I gathered from what I could hear.
"He's coming soon...the Hand's on Him...the One..."
"It'll be hard...these last days."
Their faces jumped out at me like a zoom-lens moving in on a close-up. Tobacco juice dribbled down their crusted lips over their stubbled chins. They were ancient in this vision. Even though I knew them as fellow workers, they appeared as phantoms.
"Sim's working like a ape", one of the men laughed.
"It's all vanity," the other said. "From the roof here, see the fields, white...ready for harvest. Why, one of us could be taken up in the clouds, and here we'd be left holding more weight; I'd have to let go of my end...'less I was taken."
I struggled to shake these images of the day's work. I didn't know such a simple concept as not having any thoughts could be so monumental. If these images were building materials I'd have a condo erected before I'd ever leave my body. I just needed to focus on my breathing. My breathing would take me on this excursion. That's how the Out of Body Highway put it. Breathe...counting to thirty seconds....Exhale. Focus the mind on the toes. Work your mind up your legs relaxing every fiber. With each inhale and exhale you've massaged that area of your body with awareness. All tension is taken away. I forgot about work and continued to focus on relaxing and breathing slowly.
It could have been fifteen minutes since I began my experiment. Maybe an hour had passed. I couldn't feel my arms or legs. It was as if my body had gradually dematerialized. This was difficult to hold my mind in this place of no thoughts. I must have been in this state for a minute. Time stood still just like my mind. I was aware of lying on the bed and at the same moment not having any sensations of my body.
Inhale...counting to thirty...Exhale...counting to thirty...Inhale...
>Then it happened. A blast of electricity erupted from the base of my spine and shot up my spinal column. Instantaneously, a sheet of white light engulfed my mind. I felt myself rising from the bed. I was aware of hovering, looking down at myself asleep on the bed. A fine silver thread of light connected my ghost-like luminescence to my physical self like an umbilical cord. The shock of leaving my body and seeing myself below frightened me. In that instant I jumped up out of bed. I was back in my body. I was breathing heavily. Though I had only been outside for a second it was as if the moment hung there for eternity, and in that timelessness I felt a fear I had never known.
As I began to collect my thoughts, the realization hit me. I had made it. Success, finally, so many attempts: reading and re-reading: Out and About; Put Your Body Where Your Mind Is; Leave Home Without It. My mind was spinning. I had experienced a new dimension of myself, yet I had a peculiar feeling. With this achievement I expected some kind of tangible connection with a Higher Being or consciousness. But instead there was this nagging apprehension tugging from the recesses of my memory. Something was missing. I went over the last few days trying to figure out what could be the cause of this uncertain feeling settling over me. I wondered...what was wrong?
Last night at supper Mom set a plate in front of me. I sipped my juice and slid the plate back, clinking against a bowl of vegetables. She looked like she had just been to a funeral. Her eyes were red from crying; her expression depressed me.
I made a comment about the idea of having a connection with the dead.
"An article of clothing, a necklace...any possession of a loved one could bring you in contact." Dad sliced his steak and jabbed it with his fork.
"Sim, it's impossible! Communication with the dead...Malarkey. Those publishers are capitalizing on people's gullibility--and you're supporting them! All those books you've read..."
"But Dad, I mean a connection through dreams or psychic impressions." I realized I chose the wrong dinner topic. Why did they have to be so critical? Couldn't they open their minds to this? What were they afraid of?
"Sim, you're not eating?" Mom wanted to change the subject. "We're concerned about you...Working in the heat...Keeping late hours, up all night reading, God knows what...We love you and..."
"I'm OK! If we can't have a decent conversation, I'll keep my mouth shut."
Mom was in tears. I could take Dad's pulse watching a vein throb on his temple. He had stopped eating and looked at me; his penetrating stare could've burned a hole through steel.
"Ever since you started reading those books, it's all you ever talk about! I feel like I don't know my son anymore." A few tears ran down his cheeks. He didn't try to hide them. I got up from the table and went to my room.
It seemed I had slept the whole night, I got out of bed thinking of my success a few hours before. The sheets were soaked with sweat; I needed a bath. The sun's light reflected through the running water acting as a prism. Rainbows splashed the walls of the bathroom to the rhythm of the bath water filling the tub.
An indescribable feeling crept over me as I turned off the faucet. It felt like I had been asleep all my life until this exact moment. Sitting in the tub, hearing the early morning rustling of birds...their singing...seeing the colors on the walls--I was transfixed. My body felt light, without density.
When I floated out of the bathtub and reached for a towel, I had an odd impression. I sensed that a large gathering of people had congregated outside, thronging the neighborhood. They were waiting for me. I had to go outside, now. I felt them and knew they wanted me to join them--no time to dry off. I hurried to my room, grabbed a blanket, and bolted through the house, diving out the front door. I didn't see a crowd, but they were all around me, I could feel their presence. I pulled the blanket over my shoulders and bounded to the street and headed east. I didn't feel self-conscious tooling down Oak Avenue wearing only a blanket on this Sunday morning.
Two blocks--then I crossed Fairview Drive, a main thoroughfare. The thought of where I was going or what I was doing didn't occur to me. An irresistible force had jerked me from my ordinary consciousness and hurled me into this ecstatic reality. I barreled through a yard, rounded some box woods, and halted at a fence. A rose bush twined in the chain-links. I felt the fragrance fill me; the red blossoms were pouring into my being. I stepped backward and hurdled the fence. My blanket snagged on a link as I whizzed over the thorns. I didn't look back.
Through swing-sets, and yard tools; I crashed, veered, and dodged my way east. I exited the landscaping onto Long Street. My paced picked up. The force radiating within glided me across the asphalt.
This was a neighborhood where some of my childhood friends had lived. We played tag football here, in the middle of Long Street. Now, I was running for the end-zone, beyond--an invisible crowd of fans were cheering me on.
The yellow pines carpeted the edge of the pavement. My feet kicked up a stream of needles like a motorboat's wake. I was at the end of Long Street. The presence of the crowd intensified. My strides pushed me forward with such fire--the passionate gait of a groom dashing for the honeymoon suite. I thrashed through woods and wove around briars. There was an encompassing sensation of oneness within my being. The grass, the blossoms, the trees, the sky, the sun--all were unified in me. I was blended and enmeshed with it all.
On the outskirts of town, next to a creek, my trek ended. Settling down in the vines, I listened to a robin perched in a sycamore above me. My heart was beating in unison with her chirping. The running water murmured my sigh of contentment. Gazing up at the sky, I watched clouds form an inverted pyramid pointing directly at me.
"Sim!.....Sim!.....Sim!"
I wasn't expecting a voice, I knew that voice. Standing up, I saw John and coming up behind him was Jack. They found me. I wasn't going to speak, words coming out of my mouth could make this feeling go away, just like fear made me get back into my body. I could let them know where I was without talking. I picked up a stick and slung it into the water. The stick's impact rocketed thousands of gleaming crystals of light, arcing upward. They faded, falling back into the shimmering candescence.
"The cops are looking for you. Your folks called me, said you ran out of the house, naked. We've been trying to find you for the last hour." John was solemn.
There was no way I could remain silent. I had to speak, now. I waded to the other side.
"I did have a blanket when I left."
The tension lifted. We were all laughing.
"Why'd you do it?" Jack was puzzled, and so was John. In fact they would all be puzzled, my folks, the cops, and who knows who else; they all would want to know why I ran across town naked. How would I begin to explain? What about the gathering of people whose presence had been so strong? I didn't feel them now. Where were they?
"You'll see." I said.
I followed them through the woods to Jack's car parked on the side of the road.
II
"That suck-ass Jim's in the goddamn corner, sulking again." Robert whispered.
It was after we shot a game of eight-ball a dark cloud descended over Jim.
"What's eating him?" I questioned Robert.
"Don't know. Could be the meat loaf," Robert offered as he cut the deck.
The day-room was bathed in golden-orange hues as the sun cast long shadows on the linoleum through the wire-reinforced windows. Jim was balled up, hiding his head under his arms between his knees, chin tucked tight against his chest. Some of the men in the room were dozing in rockers as the TV's glow flickered on their faces. Jo-Jo was at his usual watch in the doorway to the day-room, making sure no one closed the double doors. I could hear the smacking of Gary's bare-feet treading his accustomed path in the hall.
"My deal." Robert grabbed the deck out of my hand, "Crazy Eights or Go Fishing?"
I was about to say Crazy Eights when Jo-Jo let out a shriek.
"Intruder! Warning! Warning!" Robert grated in a mechanical voice. An attendant walked through the doorway. "It's Mr. Rump! Time for desert!" Robert was ecstatic.
Robert had a habit of having a nickname for anyone on the spot when the moment inspired him. Usually that name stuck among all the men that were friends with him. It was uncanny how Robert's nickname would travel back to our building sometimes within a week after he'd do his magic. And when that happened Robert would transform into another personality. I knew of only three personality types he'd go into. But that was just the third day since I'd met him.
"Medicine! Time for medicine!" Mr. Rump roused the men. "Come on Jo-Jo."
Jo-Jo stood his guard, his round face looking up at Mr. Rump, a four year old in a 46 year-old man's body. The men in the rocking chairs rose as if they were attached to wires controlled by a puppeteer from above. Mr. Rump scanned the room. Jo-Jo cowered behind him.
"In the corner...Get with it, Jim!" Mr. Rump blared across the room.
Jim's head emerged from safety. Slowly he unraveled himself and pushed his body up off the tile. He stared at me as he stood up, his eyes piercing like lasers zeroing in on a target. His jaw quivered and sweat beaded on his forehead. Mr. Rump herded us out of the day-room.
We were bunched up standing in the hall, waiting in line at the dispensary window. The green paint peeling on the walls formed shapes resembling continents. Usually, I would imagine cartoon characters' silhouettes in place of land masses when the geography became too familiar. Standing in close quarters, I noticed the putrid aroma of excrement and sweat whiffing from the older men. The geezer in front of me was hunched over. I had exhausted my obsession with the paint, so I focused on the bobbing head before me. The man's skin was stretched taut over his skull. I couldn't imagine any land masses or planets to align with his head. I'd have to make a huge stretch for that venture. Maybe instead of a telescope I'd look at him through a microscope. That was it. Now with my microscopic vision what was once a man's head, I could see a protozoan. Yes, that's it, adjust the focus...of course, volvox. His head's a volvox organism...
"Ellis. Ellis...Ellis!" Mr. Rump alerted me that it was my turn at the dispensary window. He selected my dosage from the tray and handed me the pills in a paper cup.
Robert walked up and asked if I wanted to play another hand. I was about to answer him, but as I was turning around I saw Jim from the corner of my eye. He was lurking behind the men still waiting in line. In an instant, Jim leaped in front of me with his arm cocked and loaded. A hair-trigger, Jim's arm uncoiled, his fist bashed me square in the face. My knees gave out from under me as I began to topple backwards in slow motion. My head broke my fall when it spatted on the tile.
***
A mockingbird outside my window was chattering--a restive alarm clock for a throbbing brain.
"Sim? ... Sim?"
I heard a voice as I felt someone move my hand away from my head. Opening my eyes, I saw a fuzzy blur, someone's face--angelic, radiant.
"How do you feel?"
My vision partially focused. Her face moved closer.
"You had a rough night."
Her voice seemed to be right in my ear. With every heartbeat my head surged.
"Quiet...Be still my heart." I mumbled.
I could see her now, her eyes, her lips. She seemed to be floating motionlessly above.
"Glad you're awake. The blow knocked you out. Your medication kept you asleep too long. I was concerned you might have a concussion.
Her words were tom-toms in my ears.
"I was on the night shift. I had to check on you every half hour."
I had a vision of this nurse by my bedside holding a lamp, the flame flickering throughout the night. She was playing Florence Nightingale in my mind's eye. Was this from some old silent movie I may have seen or was this impression from a past life.
I was treading on unfamiliar territory, the continental land drift had moved away from that peeling paint in the hall. She was standing at my bed. Where was I?
"Why did that guy slug you?"
Now I remember. Jim got pissed and balled up in the day-room. He wanted to play Crazy Eights but it was Robert's deal.
"Go fishing."
"What?"
"Oh, ...This psycho Jim... couldn't handle the card game we were playing. I wish they'd give him more thorzine...."
to be continued........