* * * * * * *
Drips were running down my forehead. It was still dark out. I reached up to wipe my head and realized it was sweat. My shirt was soaked. I unzipped the sleeping bag and felt around the liner. Thankfully it wasn't very damp. I crawled out, stood up and opened the inside of the bag to the night air.
I couldn't tell if it was a bad dream or a good dream, or whether the sweat had nothing to do with the dream. My stomach felt a bit bloated. I'd had a much heavier meal the day before (a burger at Carl Jr's) than I usually do. I drank some water and pulled out my clean Red Sox t-shirt, hanging the wet brown one on a nearby tree to dry.
The time was about 2:30 am. It didn't take long to get everything dried out. I lay back down and fell asleep again...
* * * * * * *
Under a brilliant pink sky--like the color of the flowers I saw the evening before, that feathered across a blue background, I walked along a highway that looked very similar to Route 21, north of Sonoma.
There were no cars. In fact, there were no houses or vineyards, only soft, grassy rolling hills. The air was cool. I had my old Walmart boots on. I thought I'd gotten rid of them when they fell apart, way back in Livermore, months ago. They were a mess, but the road was smooth and with no cars I could stay right on the pavement.
A mockingbird flew down in front of me, looked up at my face, and as I approached him, jumped up about two feet in the air and then flew another 10 feet forward ahead of me--looking back. In this way, he stuck with me; hopping and flying, landing and looking at me, then rinsing and repeating.
I stopped to look around. It had appeared that the sun was going to rise, yet I could not tell what direction it would come up. If this were a north-leading road, it should be on the right. Way up ahead was a large white form. I didn't have my glasses on and I couldn't quite make it out. So, I started up again, walking a little faster toward it.
The mocking bird jumped up, and this time flew off to the form. It became obvious after short way that the form was a horse. I approached it cautiously. It snorted and raised it's head looking up and over me, unconcerned by my presence. When I turned and looked behind me, there was nothing to see anymore. It was as if I were in a watercolor painting and someone had spilled the brush water out over the places I had been.
When I turned back around again, the horse was running northward away from me, in slow motion. And when it was far away, it simply blended with the clouds. I stood with the mockingbird, while we both looked at each other. I said, "Well?" Then, he shook his tail feathers and started his morning song...
* * * * * * *
Redding Mockingbird
And there he was in the waking world. These birds seemed to follow me around! I was a bit sweaty again when I awoke, but not as much as earlier. The dream - which seemed to be a continuation of the last dream - hadn't been particularly upsetting. Why all the sweat? I chalked it up to something I ate the day before.
I try not to interpret dreams, but rather let them be an archetype for things that had happened the day before and the day after them. I did, however, attempt to remember what the first dream had been about. There were vague feelings and images, but nothing more. I repeated the details of the second dream to myself while I packed up, so that I could at least remember them.
This would be a day of quiet rejuvenation. The day before had served as a buffer between this day and the mental anguish of 2 days ago. As usual, I made my way down Cypress and took a couple shots...
I keep seeing these tiny Morning Glory-like flowers around
Northern California (the leaves around it are from a different kind of ground cover).
Remember that ant covered waffle from a couple days ago? Guess they got their fill.
With the little bit of extra money I had now - and, because I didn't know the Sunday hours at the library - I decided to work at Starbucks, where I had seen AC outlets through the window a couple days earlier. I had 2 posts to make, having fallen behind on that chaotic day.
When I walked in, the place was pretty quiet, as it was still relatively early--about 6:30 am. I ordered a "tall" regular coffee (love the whole new language I needed to learn to try and fit into the Barista lexicon). An overly-friendly girl took my order. Simple, right? A coffee.
I dutifully paid and stepped back to the tight spot where another customer sighed and looked at her watch repeatedly. She got her scone and latte, and rushed out the door. I should have been up next. But, I saw customer after customer order and get their coffees. And, the drive thru window was working at a furious pace. I figured (in all of my finite wisdom) that maybe all the fancy coffees were ready but the vagabond-special, bottom-shelf stuff needed to reluctantly be made. I was glad I'd placed my backpack at the small front table next to an outlet as more people entered and lined up to order. Eventually, I just started to get annoyed.
So, I stepped to the pick up window and told the girl there that I'd been waiting for my coffee for about 10 minutes. She said, somewhat sarcastically, "Oh no!! Let' find out what happened..." She spoke into little microphone, even though every other employee was within arms reach, "Have a customer here who has been waiting for his coffee." A look flashed around the place. One of the guys leisurely went over and checked the large coffee maker. Apparently, it was ready to go, since he poured it right away and handed it off to the girl, who pushed it at me, and said, "Here ya go, sir." I thanked her somewhat unenthusiastically, and she replied with the unthinking and - in this context - disrespectful, "No problem." I guessed that forgetting about me was "no problem"? I held my peace and shrunk away to the small table.
I definitely have felt invisible on numerous occasions and in different places since I left Maine back in October of 2014. Sometimes my imagination would get the better of me when I'd stand in front of an automatic door that let everyone else in but wouldn't open for me. That has actually happened a couple times. Talk about a metaphor!
Then sometimes during this journey, very strangely, I seem to be singled out for one-phrase messages from complete strangers. This has happened three times since walking out of San Francisco. Had I been a more superstitious person, it would have been easy to get caught up in the apparent synchronicity of these meetings. It would be simple - were I a bit more psychologically flighty - to call these three events supernatural.
Perhaps they are? But, I'm too much of a rationalist to instantly jump to conclusions of that kind. I live in a REAL world. I don't only see the things around me, but am fully immersed in them. It is gritty and sometimes beautiful, but it is always fully realistic. I've hesitated to relate these stories since they just seem too "out there" to be believable, but...
The first time I received such an out of the blue comment was in Santa Rosa, after my fruity discharge at a local home supply place. I rested and pulled on my backpack. Slowly starting out toward the road, I passed a Native American woman about my age, a little worse for wear than I. I distinctly heard her say, "Well... You've got a LONG way to go still..." I just kept walking, but it stuck in my mind.
The second time was after I'd left the Amtrak station in Sacramento, heading down I Street. I'd just used Xfinity outside the station on a short piling there to get my bearings. So, directions were swirling around in my mind. I also thought it was cool that my first official transportation had gotten me a step closer to Oregon. It was about to rain, and people seemed intent on watching the clouds gather above. I passed a bunch of folks who checked me out as I checked them out. Then, a very tall black man, also dressed entirely in black, walked toward me, and never looking up, clearly said, "You finally made it!" as he passed me. This time I turned around to see if he'd stopped or was talking to someone else. He just continued to walk with his head down.
The second time was after I'd left the Amtrak station in Sacramento, heading down I Street. I'd just used Xfinity outside the station on a short piling there to get my bearings. So, directions were swirling around in my mind. I also thought it was cool that my first official transportation had gotten me a step closer to Oregon. It was about to rain, and people seemed intent on watching the clouds gather above. I passed a bunch of folks who checked me out as I checked them out. Then, a very tall black man, also dressed entirely in black, walked toward me, and never looking up, clearly said, "You finally made it!" as he passed me. This time I turned around to see if he'd stopped or was talking to someone else. He just continued to walk with his head down.
The third time was right here in Redding. I was just beginning to be frustrated by the series of unfortunate things that would lead to the last three days' posts here at the blog. It was (I think?) the fourth day I was here. I was approaching the Cypress Bridge, when an old, partially limping, white guy was just passing by, then looked up suddenly at me and said, "You better enjoy it all!"
These were probably just shear coincidences. I don't believe in omens. I do however believe that we cooperate in forming the reality around us. Even quantum physics is coming to the realization that there might be non-physical aspects to the universe--that it might all ultimately be various forms of consciousness and not material at all. Whatever that may mean, I see the things that happen to me each day as important parts of the story of my life.
An analogy would be what takes place in a movie. Hardly anything that the camera takes time to focus on is arbitrary. What would be the purpose of wasting the audience's time with things that have nothing to do with the story line? In this same way, all of the components of our daily lives are - to a greater or lesser extent - important to the overall experience. We may only care about certain things and not others when we remember each day. But, ALL things go to making up the entire picture. That we ignore the little details does not mean the details were insignificant. And, sometimes, it is those details that we should have cared about in the first place. Or not? It's just a hypothesis.
Some folks may remember during the Manifest Destiny journey that I mentioned feeling the presence of an "unseen companion," immediately upon walking out the North Station door in Boston. He seemed to exist in my peripheral vision. When I didn't try to look directly at the place where I thought he was, I could easily sense him. Whether a figment of my imagination or a fundamental truth, it certainly was part of that story line. After days of feeling like I was with this unseen companion, I recognized that he was not some kind of guardian angel, nor was he there to protect or guide me in any way. He was only there to BE with me. One night while camping just north of Salem, Missouri, I woke and had the distinct feeling that he was "sitting" on a fallen log next to me--he didn't sleep.
The last time I felt his presence was during the first night at Tucson Mountain Park, while I was camped next to the saguaro cactus I'd named "The Old Man." I had become convinced that other forces were at work, doing other related things on the sidelines of my journey. Being isolated in the desert that night, I made a passionate request to the open air, that if there were indeed invisible beings around, they show themselves or make contact in some way. By that point the Spark I'd written about seemed to be taking over the guidance of my efforts. And, I believe that it provided a liaison-window through which - mentally, not visually - I was able to perceive perhaps 100 or so normally-unseen beings of different orders, scattered about the rocky cliffs and even stationary in the air. all of them, observing me simply out of curiosity.
However, the Spark also made it known that my request for contact had been (perhaps, wisely) denied. It understood my desire to know more and my passion for seeing something right then, but the time was not right. There would be much more to go through before any kind of contact was going to happen--if it would ever happen at all.
Again, this could all be part of my imagination. Frankly, I wouldn't ever have said anything about it, if I'd really believed I was delusional. Making claims such as I have made, and am now making, is crazy talk to most people. The eye-rolling and yawning - since so many people have claimed similar experiences - is understandable and I accept the rejection without question. Nevertheless, these strange things DO happen. And, because *I* have found them useful as an exercise in metaphysical conceptualization, I feel it only right that I make record of them. My mentioning of a "New Advent" during the last journey, might fall into this category as well.
Ultimately, and for the record, I only recognize two non-physical phenomena as being absolutely real: (1) The Spark and (2) The New Advent. Anything else I refer to, including the unseen companion, are simply my hypotheses about what might be related to the numbered things at the end of the last sentence. I use intuition as a means of accessing the 6th sense. The Spark is the doorway through which the perceptions of my 5 normal senses are sent into the higher realms, and through which concepts are sent back to me from the higher realms.
On this new journey I don't feel the presence of the unseen companion (yet?). My intuition tells me that he was there last time as an intermediary between me and the Spark, until I could rely on the presence of the Spark alone. This time, I sense that he is no longer required. The Spark and I can do what is needed on our own, as a team.
With all of the above in mind, I want to state emphatically that I find these things I believe - while being trans-normal - are not "supernatural." The Universe I believe in has infinite levels of reality and means of awareness beyond the human-monkey brain's current capacity to grasp. That there is a bleed over from the higher or more eccentric realms into our realm really shouldn't be a huge surprise. In my mind, these other forces and beings are not hiding from us. They are simply not well-recognized yet by our minds.
I spoke of time a few posts back; how it is not at all what we perceive it to be. It is the NOW--a present, moving moment that contains all past and future within itself. Each morning we wake up in a brand new and updated universe.
Similarly, before we were land dwelling creatures - something more like a fish - the water world was the universe. when we finally crawled out on to the land. We might have had a vague feeling that something existed outside of that water--maybe through the distorted images of what we would later recognize as trees showing through the surface. To US, there were no trees, only images that would turn into trees. The same could be said for our current state of existence. Some of us are now perceiving the distorted presences and activities outside the surface of our collective human water world. It is not an evidence-based world. It is just a world.
In the future, once we have mapped some of the higher levels of reality and indeed made contact with whatever/whomever is in those places (if there is anything at all), we will look back at this time in history and fully understand why the peoples of this planet were so unaware. We just hadn't evolved enough yet.
That is my take. It is likely to change over time as I myself learn more, and accept or reject what I think the true story is. The reader is fully advised - as I often say - to think for her/himself. Nothing is more important than that. Whether science or science fiction, it is all part of the story line. It should be entertaining and not too seriously taken.
I worked my butt off for about 10 hours at Starbucks, until both posts were up, with a rudimentary once-through editing out of the way. By that time, I felt the place had certainly made up for forgetting my coffee in the morning. I packed up and then thanked the staff for letting me work all day there. Ironically, all the morning people were gone anyway, and the confused second shift just nodded and smiled, with - of course - one of them saying, "No problem!"
The late afternoon sun was bright, but the steady breeze kept the air temperature bearable. As a challenge, I decided I would go to the nest before sundown this time, and began my daily pilgrimage there. I got to the field entrance and feigned waiting for a ride, as cars passed in both directions. It was a Sunday night and traffic was light, but steady. When it was finally clear for a good amount of time, I slipped into the trees and down the familiar red path.
I found my nest spot just as I'd left it. I only had two nights left to sleep there, and was feeling a bit proud of having been so comfortable sleeping in Redding for the previous 7-8 nights. I took this video to show why it was so ideal...
Then I snapped a selfie...
These were probably just shear coincidences. I don't believe in omens. I do however believe that we cooperate in forming the reality around us. Even quantum physics is coming to the realization that there might be non-physical aspects to the universe--that it might all ultimately be various forms of consciousness and not material at all. Whatever that may mean, I see the things that happen to me each day as important parts of the story of my life.
An analogy would be what takes place in a movie. Hardly anything that the camera takes time to focus on is arbitrary. What would be the purpose of wasting the audience's time with things that have nothing to do with the story line? In this same way, all of the components of our daily lives are - to a greater or lesser extent - important to the overall experience. We may only care about certain things and not others when we remember each day. But, ALL things go to making up the entire picture. That we ignore the little details does not mean the details were insignificant. And, sometimes, it is those details that we should have cared about in the first place. Or not? It's just a hypothesis.
Some folks may remember during the Manifest Destiny journey that I mentioned feeling the presence of an "unseen companion," immediately upon walking out the North Station door in Boston. He seemed to exist in my peripheral vision. When I didn't try to look directly at the place where I thought he was, I could easily sense him. Whether a figment of my imagination or a fundamental truth, it certainly was part of that story line. After days of feeling like I was with this unseen companion, I recognized that he was not some kind of guardian angel, nor was he there to protect or guide me in any way. He was only there to BE with me. One night while camping just north of Salem, Missouri, I woke and had the distinct feeling that he was "sitting" on a fallen log next to me--he didn't sleep.
The last time I felt his presence was during the first night at Tucson Mountain Park, while I was camped next to the saguaro cactus I'd named "The Old Man." I had become convinced that other forces were at work, doing other related things on the sidelines of my journey. Being isolated in the desert that night, I made a passionate request to the open air, that if there were indeed invisible beings around, they show themselves or make contact in some way. By that point the Spark I'd written about seemed to be taking over the guidance of my efforts. And, I believe that it provided a liaison-window through which - mentally, not visually - I was able to perceive perhaps 100 or so normally-unseen beings of different orders, scattered about the rocky cliffs and even stationary in the air. all of them, observing me simply out of curiosity.
However, the Spark also made it known that my request for contact had been (perhaps, wisely) denied. It understood my desire to know more and my passion for seeing something right then, but the time was not right. There would be much more to go through before any kind of contact was going to happen--if it would ever happen at all.
Again, this could all be part of my imagination. Frankly, I wouldn't ever have said anything about it, if I'd really believed I was delusional. Making claims such as I have made, and am now making, is crazy talk to most people. The eye-rolling and yawning - since so many people have claimed similar experiences - is understandable and I accept the rejection without question. Nevertheless, these strange things DO happen. And, because *I* have found them useful as an exercise in metaphysical conceptualization, I feel it only right that I make record of them. My mentioning of a "New Advent" during the last journey, might fall into this category as well.
Ultimately, and for the record, I only recognize two non-physical phenomena as being absolutely real: (1) The Spark and (2) The New Advent. Anything else I refer to, including the unseen companion, are simply my hypotheses about what might be related to the numbered things at the end of the last sentence. I use intuition as a means of accessing the 6th sense. The Spark is the doorway through which the perceptions of my 5 normal senses are sent into the higher realms, and through which concepts are sent back to me from the higher realms.
On this new journey I don't feel the presence of the unseen companion (yet?). My intuition tells me that he was there last time as an intermediary between me and the Spark, until I could rely on the presence of the Spark alone. This time, I sense that he is no longer required. The Spark and I can do what is needed on our own, as a team.
With all of the above in mind, I want to state emphatically that I find these things I believe - while being trans-normal - are not "supernatural." The Universe I believe in has infinite levels of reality and means of awareness beyond the human-monkey brain's current capacity to grasp. That there is a bleed over from the higher or more eccentric realms into our realm really shouldn't be a huge surprise. In my mind, these other forces and beings are not hiding from us. They are simply not well-recognized yet by our minds.
I spoke of time a few posts back; how it is not at all what we perceive it to be. It is the NOW--a present, moving moment that contains all past and future within itself. Each morning we wake up in a brand new and updated universe.
Similarly, before we were land dwelling creatures - something more like a fish - the water world was the universe. when we finally crawled out on to the land. We might have had a vague feeling that something existed outside of that water--maybe through the distorted images of what we would later recognize as trees showing through the surface. To US, there were no trees, only images that would turn into trees. The same could be said for our current state of existence. Some of us are now perceiving the distorted presences and activities outside the surface of our collective human water world. It is not an evidence-based world. It is just a world.
In the future, once we have mapped some of the higher levels of reality and indeed made contact with whatever/whomever is in those places (if there is anything at all), we will look back at this time in history and fully understand why the peoples of this planet were so unaware. We just hadn't evolved enough yet.
That is my take. It is likely to change over time as I myself learn more, and accept or reject what I think the true story is. The reader is fully advised - as I often say - to think for her/himself. Nothing is more important than that. Whether science or science fiction, it is all part of the story line. It should be entertaining and not too seriously taken.
I worked my butt off for about 10 hours at Starbucks, until both posts were up, with a rudimentary once-through editing out of the way. By that time, I felt the place had certainly made up for forgetting my coffee in the morning. I packed up and then thanked the staff for letting me work all day there. Ironically, all the morning people were gone anyway, and the confused second shift just nodded and smiled, with - of course - one of them saying, "No problem!"
The late afternoon sun was bright, but the steady breeze kept the air temperature bearable. As a challenge, I decided I would go to the nest before sundown this time, and began my daily pilgrimage there. I got to the field entrance and feigned waiting for a ride, as cars passed in both directions. It was a Sunday night and traffic was light, but steady. When it was finally clear for a good amount of time, I slipped into the trees and down the familiar red path.
I found my nest spot just as I'd left it. I only had two nights left to sleep there, and was feeling a bit proud of having been so comfortable sleeping in Redding for the previous 7-8 nights. I took this video to show why it was so ideal...
Then I snapped a selfie...
Looking a Little Too Satisfied
But ,pride doth, indeed, sometimes come before a fall...even if it is just a tiny fall. For the very first time, as I sat there drinking my water, I heard a very-nearby voice. It was at least one man, and sounded like it might be two. The accent was East African, but I have no idea what country.
First, he walked by the front of the field and I saw his gray jacket. That's when I realized it was one guy on a cellphone. He paced and made circuits of all the nearby trails, eventually walking right up and staring at me, from about 10 feet away.
Unbelievably, he didn't even pause his conversation. He did not actually see me! It was that weird time of the evening when the sky is still light, but all things below it (without bright colors) blend in together. I was wearing my brown shirt, grass-colored hat, sat on a dark green tarp, was tanned enough not to look lily white, and my backpack was black.
I held my hiking stick in collapsed form, just in case some intimidation was needed to have him leave alone. But it wasn't needed. I was indeed invisible (to him) and he walked back out toward the street again, gabbing away.
Relaxing a bit, I became curious about what had happened to the popcorn I'd dumped out a couple days before. So I checked out the spot. It was absolutely untouched. That was just complete unexpected. I'd thought that at the very least the birds would grab some of it. Even the ants from that other day were nowhere to be seen. I guessed that this lack of interest by the creatures of the field must be the result of the preservatives, fake butter, high amount of salt in that Dollar Tree snack. Scary, when even the ants won't touch it.
While investigating the popcorn's fate, I heard the dude on the cellphone getting louder again. I went back to the nest and something told me that he might decide to sleep in a nearby spot; one that had been only about 20 feet away.
Since I hadn't taken out the sleeping bag yet, I decided to move and look for another place around the field as a back up. Only about 40 feet down the red path, I saw another, better spot, under a group of trees. Ha I only investigated f-iurth on that first day, I could have been in this new spot the whole.
The sun was down now and I laid out the tarp...
Then I hung up the Red Sox shirt on a tree to dry it out from my sweaty, sleepy morning...
Boston, Someday I will Return!
I fell asleep before the stars even emerged. This had been a good, productive day. I even had a better nest for the next two nights. The cellphone guy never even entered the field again. I fell asleep early-- around 9:30 pm.
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