The Time Sleeve

INTIMACY, The Final Frontier

                   As a friend and a person, I need to apologize for revealing feelings that may not be helpful. Since I've closed the book on "Zenophile" and my serial novella I've had to confront an uncomfortable feeling of letting people down in my personal life.

                   I've been arguing rather defensively that I can't possibly feel what other people feel because I'm philosophically opposed to the pretense of mind reading. I refuse the need to presume on something as subjective, personal and inconsistent as my empathic sensitivities. And yet so much of my happiness and joy comes from awareness of others feelings. I want so much to make sense to others, that I've taken on mutually destructive opinions. This blog is proving to be the most substantial expression of religious observance and dedication I could have ever hoped for. I shouldn't have cause to believe that these excursions into the Anatomy of Intimacy are going to be worthwhile to read, but here goes anyways. As we get closer to intimacy, boundaries change.

                   If I'm going to map out the anatomy of an intimacy, "LOVE," I'm going to start with the individual. For this emergence of an initial separateness, a single unit entity, I would want to start with the symbol of an upward pointing arrow, just one, to symbolize the presence of a singular positive assertion. A totality. As the secondary symbol I will use an "Infinity Sign" to signify the perpetual entanglement of existence with no beginning or end. And I will close out the equation with the letter Theta to represent the Physio-Emotive-Field, which is that receptive awareness of existence that supports, provides and defines. But it is like a Holy Ghost, for which we have no proof other than anecdotal evidence. If you have any background in meta physics or esoteric philosophies you will recognize the overwhelming symmetries between my construction and ancient religions.

                   From the singularity of oneness; we stumble through into a life of infinite multiplicities, infinitudes and the infinitesimal. Such is the love that for some of us finally leads to a last final phase that most will never know about until the last moment. As if those first two previous states of being aren't strange enough, in this last one we get to see the walls melt and all that has gone before is here now, again. I know I sound like a dribbling idiot. But I swore I would bring you a quality product and here we have it. Voila! We have an answer. It may not be the kind of answer that flatters or glamorizes, but it is consensual.

                   Nobody has ever said that the mystical experience would be easy to explain, but here we have it. In it's finality, whether it's true our not, there is an overwhelming concordance of description about how the world is experienced by love. Of those of us who witness to this profound nectar of bliss, we are all viewed as a little strange. Are we not all a little strange when we are in love? As I've said many times before, "Thank God not everyone is like me." I doubt we could get much of anything done. Please forgive my horrible sense of humor, I find trying to map out the meta physics of love to be a potentially very dry subject. And I think, that if there is a God, she must have a sense of humor.  

That Normal Rift Between Image and Truth

                   As much as I'm not a big fan of the popular myth of scarcity, I do find that generally I try to please people with the full awareness that most people will never really know me until it is too late. As a medium I live in a world of rarefied perceptions and unfamiliar pleasures. I've already mentioned how people rarely ever seek to look at themselves with what Spinoza called a "Self Complacency." This excommunicated Sephardic Jewish philosopher said that there is much evil in the world and so complacency in the world is a bad thing. But when it comes to examining and knowing your self, a dispassionate detachment is the only way we can be ruthlessly honest with ourselves. I find that on occasion, I'm reminded to check myself. People who are blind to themselves are still right to confront and challenge me, even if it is for the wrong reasons. You have read my feelings about the popular proverbial attitude of, "I don't care what others think about me." (Possible subtext; "I don't think anyone likes me?") But I will say that even if and when it is true, as a self defining boundary definition, it doesn't have to mean that that person is oblivious, I hope.

                  Such absolute proclamations of supposed indifference may simply reflect inexperience at understanding the place of shared opinions and community. (I believe that if someone actually doesn't care what others think about them, it would never be said. What would be the point of announcing it?) These self designated people do care when I contradict them, so I'm not sure where the line is anyways. A little self complacency might go a long way to help these people understand the limits of a personal self limiting definition. But maybe I'm just self righteously trying to defend the indefensible. (A little of the misanthrope in me?)

                 The beautiful person may think they are ugly, the glutton often thinks they are perfect. The greedy man thinks he is generous, the squanderer thinks there is no tomorrow. The coward thinks they are brave, the hero only wants to be loved. A wise man can be cruel, and the fool is often giving, having nothing left to gain. Such is the beauty of the human soul, and when I speak in terms of a language of radiance, I am told that I am that fool for believing in something so pure and intangible.

                 If you work intimately with people you discover even good people can harbor illusions. Were I to pretend I can get others to see as I see, or feel as I feel, I experience that strange awareness of futility. As a natural "Philophile," I never try to tell people what to think. Even if I am strangely able to "Read someone," I don't know what it means. I just do my job and let other people take away whatever it is that they can without interference from me. I'm acutely aware of the fact that my faith and intrinsic trust in people is nothing more than a quirk of temperament, and that I still have much to gain from learning and emulating contrasting qualities that conflict with my own self contradictory self image. Thank goodness not everyone is like me. We would have all starved to death.

Why Mind Reading Is Verboten

                  My teacher had said that, "Telepathy is one of the most inconvenient things that can ever happen." I also had a Croatian Sociology professor who would say, "Make predictions, but never assume." (1st Axiomatic Rule of a Para Psychological Method, "A persons guess is always better than odds would allow.) I'm wondering, how do I approach this subject. I use myself as an example of why we should be minding our own business, but I promised this book was not going to be about me. This is a blog however and although I know I'm going to keep this pleasant, I suspect self disclosure is the only way I'm going to stay on point.

                  As a 57 year old recovering opium addict I've found physical education has been good for me and my return to a social life. If you've seen my work on "Circular Maturation," (reposted under, "TRANSITIONAL RELATIONS" / Wed. Oct. 23rd / from the earlier "Growing Into A New History, NEXT CORE DOCUMENTATION" / July 4th 2013,) you will have seen my proposition that "Emotional affairs are inevitable and generally non sexual." As I have seen, most people are not happy to forgo love just because they have moved past a pair bond relationship that has run it's course. That need for love is the thing that motivates us to want things to, "Work Out." When you get to my age, and you are single, almost everyone has been in a rebound relationship and therefore realistically is not likely to have affairs that "Just Workout." Add that most people fantasize about idealized relationships, and everyones first deeply meaningful emotional affair can be very stressful. Most people need to be more forgiving. All most everyone knows a friend, who has totally flipped out at someone for disappointing them. (2nd Axiomatic Rule for the Para Psychological Methods, Everyone has blind spots and everyones blind spots are different.")

                 On point now. I've discovered that "Friend Love" can be very unemotional, but for some, emotional attachments can also be very jealous and even antagonistic. The term "Bromance" has been thrown around like the latest trending insult. I was delighted to discover, that after separation from my common law spouse and 15 years of celibacy, I am loved. As I don't toy with peoples emotions, I found these type of connections with people made my recovery much more fun. The kinds of athletes I am surrounded by, (Male and Female) aren't just beautiful, they have been looked at like objects most of their lives. The popular prejudices about the culture of the body tries to sexualize everyone. I believe this is one of the unintended causes behind obesity, people feel resigned to misjudge themselves as unattractive and try to escape behind negative and distorted self images. I myself am overjoyed that my gym is not a pickup joint, as many tend to be. I believe there is a curse of beauty, and modesty is the only defense. (3rd Axiomatic Rule for the Para Psychological Methods, "Some people are very different, very differently.")

                 Conscious non verbal communications are usually the result of cultivated rapport skills, not mind reading. Any presumptive behaviors can be very alienating. Pandering is for idiots. As I would hope the point of what I'm trying to illustrate is not lost, I'll say, in the same way I wouldn't want to assume my writing is always clear, we especially need to be sensitive with others, when considering the consequences of our approach to other people's feelings. (4th Axiomatic Rule for the Para Psychological Methods / "Everybody Needs Love.")

"May God grant me the gift to know how others see me?"

                   I believe this is the point I must reveal a mystery of truth hidden in plain sight. I'm talking about shared vision. Inter Sensory Perception. In this bittersweet melancholy of living joy we find each other. We seek to bond, to recognize and be recognized. It is as much of a mystery to me that I don't feel that separation and loneliness that most claim to suffer. I suspect my work is to blame. I myself need to have both the contact of others and the interpersonal space. When I speak of my own personal loneliness I just mean isolation. As a misunderstood medium, I am never actually really alone. Much as touch therapy has greatly improved my life and given me a shared reality, I live in a world with the constant awareness of other peoples pains and difficulties. One of my professional massage buddies has taken on the gift of working with the terminally ill. This has been most challenging for him, (and I must confess I am so proud,) as the burden on his heart has required his willing acceptance.

                   There is a Chinese touch therapy called "SHEN." Using my body's natural polarities, I place my hands on both sides of an effected emotional center, thus closing the circuits broken by traumatic physical and emotional pain. This opens the capillaries and releases chronic tensions. When we help each other to release pain, there are often healing tears. My sanity emerged from an otherwise incurable disability. Through shedding pain I am transformed into the man I have had the privilege to become. This is my new anchor in this storm of worlds in conflict and chaos. How strange is this wounded healer that we may be able to become.

                   I personally believe that when most people go to the mirror, they see the same person looking back at them day after day, (Sometimes I wonder if it is harder to forget pain than it is to remember peace or happiness.) Most are not aware of becoming better people or at least people do not see themselves changing as time performs it's miracles of transformation. Even those of us who have taken on the mantle of "Guide" are sometimes blind to ourselves when it comes to the differences between the way we see ourselves and the truth of what others can see. I'm not suggesting we should willingly turn over control of what we see of ourselves to others. I'm just pointing out that the first casualty of egotism and defensiveness is our receptivity and openness to others. And if and when we are so inclined to take on that responsibility for communicating, would we not do best to understand that field of influence generated by our unique and distinctive voice, as it is perceived by others? "We have two ears, but only one mouth," as my massage pal says. Listen twice, speak once?

                  As faith and necessity demands, selfishness is a self limiting proposition. No where in human relations is the issue of cooperation more central than in the case of intimacy. As professional sensitives and intuitive's, we require a level of honesty and trustworthiness of ourselves that is required because of our advanced intimacy skills. Teachers, trainers, therapists, readers, all of us have this ethical responsibility for understanding and respecting the human limitations of ourselves and others. Otherwise the faith that others have in us would be based on falsehoods and lies. I want to be deserving of the trust others bestow on me.

                 Again I'm not saying that we allow ourselves to be bullied by awareness of other peoples criticism, I'm just pointing out that the way into this new frontier of shared "Inter Sensory Perceptions" is through a "Void of Uncertainty." Even if when I know what someone may be feeling, (Physio Emotional Field) it is wrong for me to assume that I know why. We are that mystery, in ourselves and with each other.

I Must Thank My Lucky Circles

                   I Must Thank My Lucky Circles. A joyous shout out to my new links to this wonderful world of Social Networking. Although I still make no apologies for refusing direct feedback I'm so happy that Byron Medicine Wheel: New South Wales, Australia & now Vida Spas have included me in their Google+ circles. I'm so impressed that people working in the Intuitive and Speculative Arts would prove so brave in supporting my intention of advocating a "COMPLEMENTARITY," of neutral opinion bias. I strongly anticipate that as sensitives, we must be able to protect ourselves, and thus we embrace these ever shifting dynamics of transformation in a personal as well as professional life.

                  Although this is still only the beginning, You have brought me an unexpected boon. I hope I will be able to provide much more considerable resources in this burgeoning science of Alternative Medicine and Psychic Diagnostics. Bless you, Bless you, Bless you.   {+,  +,  + = ( the Unity of "1.")}

The Experience of Survival is the Gravity of Love

                  I think one of the things that made fiction so unacceptable to my readers is that I have made considerable progress documenting believable explanations about the super normal. The core concepts, models and primary assertions do stand on their own. But without "Authoritation by Proxy, I felt no one would ever read my work. Add my flair for the fantastic (I'm judged by many to be a bullshit artist), I was being greedy and impatient expecting audiences to indulge in fantasy. I felt stories could illustrate the synthesis of transforming cultural influences. Even though the narrative showed some promise as a story, I was having too much fun. I'm not a novelist. A mild schizophrenic impasse was called for.

                  On with the work at hand. If we define projections as fiber bundles, we are able to follow lines of reason and conjecture. As with my escape into recreational writing, it is often most difficult to recognize others peoples perspectives on what we may not see about ourselves. I myself get so tired of hearing friends say, that they "Don't care what others think about them." (Sounds like just another excuse, or maybe even a pathetic plea for attention.)

                  "May God grant me the gift to know how others see me." There is almost always illusions that we each entertain about ourselves. Favorable and unrealistic or self defeating and hypercritical. Most people have a very predictably outworn personality and then we don't intentionally choose to contradict ourselves. The identified persona for most people is usually static and then the defenses of the ego is also going to be consistent and easily anticipated. Under no circumstances do I recommend outing each others ego defenses, unless you are prepared to deal with other peoples evasions which, if I am correct, are completely unintentional and therefore outside of each individuals ability to own without serious thought. No one is immune to the force of clarity, least of all you or me. The only reason I can say that each persons style of evasion is as distinctive as a fingerprint is because, just like the stuff we keep hidden in our shadows, our persona's are deeply ingrained.  Therefore, personality is no longer subject to voluntary self control. Fortunately, for most of us, the outworn personality as well as any submerged inner shadow dynamics are not that disgraceful and so direct confrontations are usually not necessary, even when we do not understood what we are really like. Most of us do have enough internal conflict that in fact, can be both very painful and occasionally constructive.

                 But the irony of how little people really do understand about themselves and each other is accounted for in the way that we all have distorted self images. As a person with extreme internal dynamics and friction, I have a very broad range to my personality. I'm unaccustomed to self doubt. As well I have that rare floating point Identity that makes it possible for me to abandon myself and take flight into the fantastic and unbelievable. Hence the last week and a half of "Spiritual Fiction." I see I have much work cut out for me and I would hope that in the long run my work on personality inventory proves to be worth the time that people have given to my readings. I am blessed amongst men to care what others think and I hope to be worthy of your faith. Back to the task at hand. I will be documenting that "Normal' rift between the way we see our selves, and the people that we try to appear to be, myself included.

A Zeal of Purpose, A Theatre of One

                   As I sit in front of my Computer I slip in and Out. I see myself being abducted from the steps of Oraca, Brussels. I wanted to go for a walk. I can tell through their gloves and mask, I'm being read,....., again. This group I suspect is from InterSpace. They would not have been told about my voluntary detour into Oraca hands. Bag over head and tossed into a van. From my keyboard, I see the identifying husk of my presence remain behind, a shed skin of  my consciousness if you like.

                  I remove the bag, but just like before none of my abductors is talking. I'm tired and still full so comfortable I don't care and let my abductors know, I know who they are and that they know I wont fight them. They too remove masks and silently, timidly apologize with quiet eyes of misplaced concern and regret. I'm saturated and jet leaped. It's going on midnight here but the sun has just set where I came from.

                 I realize the faces I'm seeing are just shadows of an unformed dream. This is not a vision of the future that I want to share. So as the readers peel off from the pages of my blog, I feel the strain of loss. The traffic source likes teasing me with the promise of readers, only to shut down feed to international markets for my spirituals arts documentaries. I find this more embarrassing than the awkwardness of being shuttled like a hot potato from the oven to the plate. As the future flakes off like old paint, so does this facade of self consciousness. I may have missed the mark terribly as I wrote so many years ago.

                 I start hearing that flushing, whirling sound, when the world is about to change. Where will I wake this time? Will I be the Liberian mother of six with the orphan free school for abandoned children of AIDS parentage? Will I become the Russian research physicist with the tiny glasses and the taste for exotic music? Will I end up back in my own body, at my own desk, only to discover that I took an inescapable wrong turn that lost me almost all of the followers that were driving this blog on to literary acceptability. I can see you all leaving.

                 First to leave were the hundreds of readers from Russia, and the Ukraine. You had all accessed me through the porn brokers of what I suspect may have been Russian mafia. Then I lost the readers from Serbia, the Netherlands, Canada and France. Now even those interested readers of Indonesia and Malaysia, with their sophisticated translation software have peeled off like relatives who picked over the dishes from my spiritual buffet. Now Brunei, Puerto Rico and Viet Nam have now un followed me. I'ld take it personally but this is what I get for using a blog in an unprescribed way. And besides, Maybe Vera will be right to tell me, "Go back to your own time and stop writing about us."

                I'll go back to writing my future without "Spiritual Fiction." I may have to see if I can't regenerate interests in new readers. I'm not sure I can keep writing to an imaginary audience. So many will never come back. Remember folks this is an experiment, and I still may fail at writing a best seller in the reverse biographical blog form.

               I will return you now to your regular reading practices and will avoid lengthy narratives in the future unless absolutely necessary. Please forgive me if this has interfered with your desire for cohesive information. I will re evaluate my manuscripts and see if I can't upload much more interesting material. But even if I do, It'll be a very long time before this is read by more than just a hand full of loyal U. S. readers. And as for a public address, I may have to just start over.

              And the InterSpace workers and their van, vanish. I may go back to see them in the future, but I'll just use one of my other blogs. I'm back at my keyboard and market research is shutting down. Don't that beat all.

Test Post # 5. A Seamless Syncretism {Exploring the Void}

                         In the first hundred posts, we have documented many of the ancient soft technologies. With the emphasis on the ordering and structure of these various meta formally logical, enumerate partitioned and symmetrically collated traditions, we map for uncertainties. I will never ask you to believe or not, I simply want you to adapt to seeing data mapping as models. These models are just like the ones we use in math and physics, their just older and although seemingly arbitrary, often elegant. The utility of these "esoteric?" diagnostics is why although they evolved into our modern sciences, they are still being used today.

                         As a professional psychic trained and educated, I am eternally reminded of the wealth that comes from knowledge. As the sensitive I've lived with horrifying pain. Temporal lobe seizures, migraines, type 2 hypo manic Bi-Polar depression, perceptual hyper focus, ghosts. Now as I've turned the fifty plus milestone, I lived to finish my work.

                         The greatest void I experience is not uncertainty, I find that pure joy. The greatest void is the emptiness between people. Opening my perfumed little vat of sorrows, an agony so sweet I cannot bare to live without. Remove the stopper, release the spirit, we have been together a million times before. (I would want that nothing I do will ever cause you pain or make you suffer.) In this eye of the beholders, this shared vision of beauty was built for us by those who loved us. These wonderful humans saw to it that mercy allowing, we might never have to feel alone. But man does not see it.

                         Clumsy segue. Thank you to all of you readers who have put my blog on your auto access service in your browsers. I still get the occasional random searchers who tap onto my posts. But as I can see from my blog stats I have some very curious and intelligent followers. (Tears of Joy.)

                         Back to that gaping void of content between us humans, ouch. The ancient seers had an eye for order and structure. Were we to arrogantly presume to be smarter than our ancestors we would be wrong. Similarly when we look at personal blind spots, often people think they are alone. It is most ironic, that that which we have most in common, we use against each other. I'm talking to pain. Self indulgent egotistical pain. Suffering, I renounce thee. No more will you keep us apart.

                         What I have found most delightful is as I analyze data for uncertainties, I've seen a host of resources. All of these riches are hidden in clear sight. And the most amazing of these mysteries is the seamless syncretism that spans the ages, bringing us this symmetrical coalescence of our shared culture of understanding. I know my words must sound strange when waxing poetic about data. This is the great hoard of data.

                         So this past, present and future has been stitched seamlessly into this inescapable moment. As I have proposed, "Truth is the only eventuality." Truth is the inevitable result of love. This is what was  meant when it was said, "You are made in the likeness of pure love." Who would have thought that love and beauty could be so dangerous. The indomitability of non violence may be no guaranty of success, but love can obliterate lies of selfishness. No black hole is as cold or dark as is the heart of denial. We live in a hostile universe, and yet we persist in trying to thrive. This is that shared timeless vision of the light of love. Rock on beautiful. I wish I could do more.

Out of the Bottle

                   "Oh bull shit," I blurted as I sat up on the foot rest of the permanent recliner.

                   Terry is laughing quite vigorously, "Quite rightly, this isn't fair and I'm sorry that we tricked you." "Vera's office is fitted with an ambient holographic projector." "And all of this stuff is my art and I couldn't resist either. Your the most fun we've had with a new guest ever." "For the worlds best psychic you really are suggestible when you project." "I suppose that's what makes you the best, your imagination is notorious." "No wonder you shun the lime light" "What I don't understand," says Terry with conviction, "How do you stay on the top of your game? I mean, really?"

                   "I want to know what's happening, NOW!" "How did you manage to retrieve my dreams?" I ask.

                   "We didn't." "You've written so much on that time when you never spoke to anyone, that it's been easy to reconstruct the hallucinations from your forgotten manuscripts." "You just filled in all the blanks for us, as we expected." "But most of what you've heard from us is true, and we do want to know if you can help us."

                   I feel a little cheated, I'm still not sure what is real or whether this is just another one of my lucid subjunctives. "Can't you just go somewhere on your own, Gretchen seems to be the only one with family ties?"

                   "There's nothing stopping us other than the fact that we are freaks." "Once we go, "Out of the Bottle," Where can we go?" "You don't necessarily see it, but we all stick out like sore thumbs." "We all want to continue to make a contribution to society still, But time stopped for us." "We make others look and feel terrible." "We're not any fun any more." "The only other place we can go is where people share our sense of immediacy, and that's in the third world." "Even there, problems are finding solutions solved, peoples lives are improving without our help." "The only eventuality is the truth." "We would just get in the way." "You changed the game, by sharing "your" views, you changed us and we're not alone anymore." "We mustn't interfere, ever." "Most people can't handle knowing what the future is going to be, and we all will just screw everything up if we try to help." "We may have already gone to far with our latest issue of the "Confidence Game." "There's just too much joy, too much mirth, too much whimsy." "Can you see what you've done to us?" "Tomorrow when you leave, we'll all be bored again." "What kind of a life is this?" "Is this all we have to look forward to?" "Is this all we have to offer others?" "Really?" "You know what I'm saying," says Terry.

                   I'm startled by his grim assessment of life in the era of enlightened selfishness. Who in their right mind would want to date someone who knows exactly what is going to happen, Honestly?

                    I'm afraid Terry is right. I too went through realizing the utter futility of control. I rationally fought the inevitable downhill slope of deterministic prognostication, only to discover that the people around me wanted certainty. A kind of certainty that, even when I do know, I do not share, not ever. Loneliness leads to boredom, boredom leads to finality. Why would I wish that on anyone?

A Secret Cold Call

                   Facing the edge of the balcony I struggle to my feet. Getting out of Vera's deep chair is only happening because of panic. I can't feel my body except for a numb tingle. I'm seeing stars. I stumble to the railing too low for safety. I hear gentle wind rustle through tall trees below me. I fumble to grasp a support I don't know how I find. But I seem to be safe for now.

                   This isn't Brussels I'm seeing. I recognize the view across a deep gorge from past dreaming. Pale luminous fog crawls across the city coming to the lower edge of the chasm gapping beneath me. Multi colored lights surface through the rolling mists before disappearing over the opposite brim of the moon lit chasm. Flowing water sounds I recognize cut at the deep river gorge below. I lean to see that bank of fog climb the canyon wall beneath me. Normally heights give me horrible suspense. I'm intrigued by these emerging vapors. My interest rises with the bubbling sounds of the soft winds caressing up the trees underneath me, they engage, absorb and distract. My sense of reality is even more rarified than ever.

                   "Mr. Johnson, sir,...., If you can...., can you please step back?" Said a soothing familiar voice. There's mumbling behind me. Two quarrel in whispered tones.

                   I hear Vera complain, "I didn't want to talk to this pill."

                   I don't recognize hearing my name, but I know something is wrong as I still have a little toxic panic. I try to straighten up but I've leaned so far over the low railing. I get into this scene which is so entrancing, at least it seems that way to me now. That feeling of free fall kicks in and I'm caught by my elbows before loosing balance completely. As touch has always been my private medium I feel the total body awareness of Terry. I stand up, turn to my left saying, "Terry, how good to feel you again." "How are you young man?" Terry is in fact in his early fifties, but the educated stopped aging back in the early twenties when advanced diagnostics and physiological medicine became the standard of treatment modality for informed consumers.

                   "Let me get you out of this death trap." Terry seems justifiably concerned. "We had to make sure you are on the level about this whole extraction process." "Actually we all want to get out of Oraca. But there really is no other place for us to go any more" "There have been some unanticipated consequences with all of us using the same reprogramming." Terry put his left arm around my shoulders while holding on to my right arm. I wonder if I'm going to be finding bruises tomorrow from all the firm handling. But his touch remains sincere. As he pulls open the door to walk me back into the building, he says, "Gunter and Gretchen have been making secret plans to dismiss the boards of both InterSpace and Oraca." "A merger seems the best recourse for protecting everyone, and saving precious intellectual property." But now days all upper level Management everywhere are learning "Confidence Gaming," and it makes everyone kinda stupid, especially in groups. It's great for detaching but I knew that this was going to be a problem when they first re-released this mislabeled spiritual technology. Before I know it we turn right into an office decked out like an artifacts archive. "Welcome to my lair. By the way, Where did you end up?" "We always ran into each other at the rollouts for new conversions." He drops me into another low comfy chair. Looking around I realize most of the artifacts are not familiar.

                      As a lover of art history, "I'm curious, This isn't earth art, is it?

                     "God it's good to see you again old man," laughing and smiling. "Technically you are correct, we are not on earth any more, at least not your earth." "The earth you knew was doomed to fail." "But remember all those visions you had during your dreadful recovery?" "It turns out you were releasing alternative realities that had separate "New Histories" that had far more ancient civilizations that have survived into our today." "The ancients were master tera formers and they gave us this amazingly nuanced new world." " That's why the city looks so unfamiliar to you." "Vera really meant no harm but she has always been bitter about her ugly reversal." "She didn't need the rapid conversion, actually none of us did, but we couldn't justify releasing an untried technology on an unsuspecting populace." Waves of guilt pour over my shredded sense of proportion. WHAT HAVE I DONE?

What Did You Do With Mr. Nice Guy?

       

                   Before we look back in on Vera to see what she does with my body, let me give you a little of the future "New History."

                   This is one of those horrible opportunities to heal that painful rift inside of me. I've always kept my inner business man chained up in my inner basement. Vera wants me to change the past by not writing it in the first place. All I have to do is fail. It's said you can't change the past, I don't want to change it anyways. Because I had arranged for this alternate timeline, all I had to do is step over this new event horizon and leave my friends behind. I'm my own best friend anyways. Much to the objections of my shadow self, I forced the inner me out of the cozy basement where he was happy all alone causing harm to no one. When I released my manuscripts into the world, that brilliant wedge of "Complementarity" was a bombshell that exploded the popular myth of "IRRECONCILABLE DIFFERENCES." People now days in the future can't say they don't understand. The vehicle of "Social Recursion" makes it impossible to lie about mutually assured differences. Cults now days are honored concessioneers of the practical fix. Here in the future we don't need to waste time on attachments anymore, no matter what we're doing. Love is love, and if things work out great. Soft spiritual technologies have finally caught up with the rest of modern life.

                    But the first casualty of my radical "Reversal" of temperament  was my outworn better nature. I still have great empathy but I haven't been any fun for a long time. This is why my personal inner business man wanted to stay submerged in secure solitude. I was very happy hiding behind the designation of being seriously mentally ill. As long as our society devalued the place of hidden disabilities in shaping and informing the publics shared views, I was a pleasant nobody. Now my face is recognized the world over. I've become just another popular schmuck. Very few people understand my research even today. But it reveals and provides for a better shared existence for everybody. But had I been more normal, there was too great of a chance that the mass proliferation of practical spiritual technologies would have never been accessible to the popular culture. My work, as I had expected, proved to be most needed by intelligent and elite people in positions of power and influence. There was too great a chance that the world would have finally come to an end, had I not published my work. Boy, this book looked really stupid when I first wrote it.

                    It doesn't seem that crazy now here in the future, as it has become one of many useful practical manuals for thought mapping in neuro physics. Society had to catch up, and it has, and it started with popular media. I felt so bad for my friends. They knew me as just being pleasantly insane. But just like my own inner businessman, my friends too had to get out of their own way if they wanted to succeed. The irony is, by taking this most trivial, but most heavily prejudiced subject of psychic reading, and turning it into a lifeline for the 21st century, I won.

                   I'm beginning to think maybe Vera and the other coverts are trying to get me to jump so as to make me look crazy. It would be much easier for them to blame me for the corrupted social programming, from the very beginning. It has always been much easier to market the mystique of rapid conversion, than it is to help everyone to be knowledgeably proactive about everyones own personal responsibility. The "Vision Quest" has always been fraught with self indulgent disincentives.

                   I refocus and notice Vera's still growling. I think she recognizes that I'm not impressed by the spiritual abuse and meta speak. I'm sheepishly smiling. It's breaking the tension. She says, "What?" "You're not convinced?" "Your useless, I'm going to let you talk to Terry now." "I think you need to be taught a lesson." She taps a panel on her desk. "Mr. Johnson is ready for his closeup." Then she says, "Don't try to move, you've been compromised." "If you try to get up now, you'll fall, and I don't want to have to clean up your  mess." " I have to leave because you stink." I didn't think she cared.

Waiting on the Big One

                   The only reason I had developed the Psychic Personality Inventory, was because I observed the "Styles of Evasion" cycle, which became one of my signature analytic models. It mirrors so perfectly the most practical elements of everyones pet cult. I was doomed to success. I tried so hard to remain anonymous. By revealing the functional necessities for cults and religion, I have become the darling of the recovery movement.

                    Here I sit paralyzed in Vera's lounge of torture somewhere in the future, or is it the past. With the moon setting, the city sings a dirge. She has my at her mercy. The truth has always been my weakness. I was such a phony, and now I'm looking back at myself, sitting in that chair, remembering back to those stories that I wrote, that ended up coming true. And, and ......, I don't know. Have I done more harm than good?

                    "What are you doing here, seriously, Why are you here? Vera asks.

                    I am numb. I have always doubted myself even when I am most precise. Why should I pretend to be objective now? "You have me at a disadvantage Vera." "I thought I'm here on a routine extraction, but you could throw me off of this balcony right now and I don't think I can resist the temptation to help." "I don't know you." "What do you want from me?"

                   "I want you to go back to your own time and stop writing about us." "I want you to stop helping." "Once you got us all to lower our expectations our lives turn out so much better." "But at what cost?" "None of us are married, we don't have children." "We work without expectation of reward or approval." "And for what? So you can tear down the barriers to understanding, that keep separating people?" "God I hate you." By this time Vera is hovering over me like an angry disciplinarian.

Reversible Time

                   Home again I realize I'm in Split view. At my keyboard the letters seem to move around and change places while I fight the characters trying to escape from my page. Every word is a battle with the person I am becoming. There is a knock at my apartment door. I step from my desk, "Who is it?"

                   "It's George,  Mr. Johnson, those documents have arrived."

                   I say, "Thanks George, you're here late tonight." As I open the door and no one is there, I discover I'm asleep still and this is one of my other apartments that I occupied in a dream. Everything is familiar, but just like friends that have changed and escaped from my life, I know this isn't mine.

                    I hear a pair of unmatched footsteps as I notice the feel of a mans hand on my arm holding my up as he opens the glass door in front of us. We step outside into the night and he is addressed by a stoic Asian woman who takes instant control. "Thank you Benjamin." "So this is the trouble maker." "Make him comfortable. Has he been scanned?" Benjamin sets me down in a very low but comfortable chair that leans back like a torture device in satin. The night air is bracing and a little cool. I hear humming from the city. But it is a charmed and musical chorus of delicious sputtering that sticks in my throat.

                    Benjamin says to be nice to me and that I am having a rough evening. And that yes, I've been checked out and that I am fine. I'm almost relieved to hear Ben's voice, as that it seems familiar. I wonder if this has become my hell for letting so many slip through my life without attachment. I don't want him to leave, but I know this is why I'm here. And I am learning. I look up to see Ben's smile as he walks toward the door and disappears.

                    "My name is Vera." She steps around the front of her desk and sits down straddling the corner. Once she turned off the equipment on the desk I could see we are looking down on the sparking city. It shimmers in harmony with the stars and the music of the city. That feeling of dread gives me shivers. I want to die. I began to sob. Vera scolds, "Stop that, nobody hurt you." This is the characteristic behavior of a "Confidence Gamer." I take a deep breath of relief. At least now I can get on with why I'm here, I think. "You are supposed to be a great psychic, but as you know we have machines that can that now, thanks to you." She scathes, "Are you proud of yourself?"

                     "Look if you have some criticism to offer, let me have it and spare me the attitude." "I'm here to help." "I'm back, at least for now, whenever this is."

                     Vera laughs, "Good, I just wanted to make sure I have your attention." "I don't like you Mr. Johnson and I have always resented the tone of your writing, you are too pure." "I hate that, but in spite of everything your work has redeemed cults like ours here in the 21st Century." "We now have your work in the psychic profiling inventory to protect us from the "Normal Blind Spots" that deluded and alienated our predecessors." "Without your work we would still be seen as threats to the stagnant order of our post modern society."

                    "You don't expect me to buy this whole dragon lady routine, do you?" "It's so canned, and I'm not feeling it."

                    "You are right Phillip." "I am just acting, but sometimes it's hard to remember the detail of what you achieved." "You made it fashionable to detach." "Once your books went viral, dispassion became the rage." "Under achievement became the new black." "When people decided that they don't need to be attached to opinions, to each other, to even life itself, it's like the world came together to have a purging cry." "How can you be such a joke?"

                    Wow, she's right. I never deserved any of this.

Other Directed Communication

                   "Well doc, will I live?"

                   "I'm not sure at all what just happened, but that petite mall seizure you just had wasn't that serious by itself, but you are also putting out trans-hemispheric microbursts that seem to piggyback on the seizure." "You tried to say something, were you dreaming?"

                   I tell Ben that I have the mixed blessings of dreaming with my eyes open. I deliberately distance myself from the behavior. I never did get used to it.

                   "Look, for all your weird brain activity, you are very healthy and there is little evidence of brain damage." "But the R E M state was sharp and it looked like you were having scores of dreams all happening at once." He was describing my secret agony perfectly. I was there to help them and yet I the one who needs help. My nausea lingers. 

                    Benjamin persists, "I'm going to guess you were sending." "Are you conscious of transmitting data outwardly to others psychically or are you just supposed to be science fiction?" For someone who is supposed to be a cult member, Benjamin is very rational. But I never published any of my research on telepathy. Was he fishing? 

                    "Ben, I have been working with what I call "Other Directed Communication," for most of the last twenty years." Oh well, I might as well just tell him. "I've noticed that most conversation is based on shared language." "If we can understand each other, do we really need to converse?" "I find it is much easier to let people come to their own conclusions." "Resultantly, people read my mind, but I don't have to tell them." "You are the first person I've shared this with, you asked." "Most of the time I feel like I'm telling people what to do by silent suggestion. Cueing if you like."

                    "That's great." Ben says. "Your profile makes you look like some crazy Napoleon, but I kinda knew you would be pleasant and receptive." " Now it makes sense, Maybe these micro blasts in your brain are echos of all your silent will." "I've noticed the way that you've gotten all of us dancing since you got here and I'm loving it." "This place has never been this much fun, Dude!" "Your not able to control this though, are you?"

                    "I feel like I have to focus on everyone else so as I wont be obliviously distracting people." "I've always been a little jealous of the way most people have realistic expectations of what they are going to do, instead of  this scary "Flying Sickness." "I tend to believe that if it will get done, then I will be the one to get to do it." "And I really don't deserve all this attention." "The constant supervision can be a drag."

                     Ben Laughs. "Your alright. Seriously." "I can't find much of anything wrong with you and if I had to compare you with these medical records of yours, I'ld have to say you are going to cheat death." "I've taken up too much of your time already." "So let me take you over to Vera's office, and don't have any more seizures." "I'm going to start telling that you're doing it on purpose." He takes my hand again after removing all the wires, pulling me up out of the chair. I'm emotionally drained. I need to be led.

Split Image

                  Without releasing me, Ben leads me out of the dining hall and into what seems another dream. I don't think I can wake up. I don't think the seizure is over, I'm going under again. I find my self back here with you in 2013. I'm typing this down for the first time and a wave of re-entry dread crushes the breath from my lungs. As I struggle to breathe I'm in two places at once. This is why I stopped taking drugs. I need a nap.

                   I realize I'm having a narcoleptic seizure on this side too. Before I get to close my eyes the world disappears and I find myself in an examination chair and Benjamin's voice is calling me to look at the monitor to see if I can follow the cursor as it cycles through it series of pulses and juxtapositions.

                   Generally during a seizure I hallucinate. Slipping above and below the level of waking, I dream. I dream of here. I dream of over here. And I dream I dream. Here at home, (I know you) and here in the future I know you too but you are someone else I never met. But we are good friends. I'm walking past George the night watch, at the front desk of my condo. "Good evening Mr. Johnson. How are you tonight?"

                   "Thanks George, a little out of it. Did anyone leave me a package, I'm expecting some documentation?"

                   "What? Did you say something?" It was Benjamin. I have lapsed out again and I'm making the equipment buzz and beep and I'm ringing the bells like one of those old time pinball machines that I loved so much back in the fifties. This is not a gaming arcade. Benjamin is hooking me up to all the available monitoring devices he has and I'm starting to look like a switch board. He wants to make sure I don't die. I haven't been this sick in a very long time.

                    In diffused light of the exam room, strobe lights tease my brain. As the room slowly spins I feel I'm twirling in the opposite direction. Benjamin seems amused. I glance over to the screens glowing in his eyes and face. He's in a luminous glow with waves of iridescent rainbow hues as he turns and says, "You don't have to look at the monitor any more." I was getting nauseous and my heart was starting to stop beating in rhythm. My head was pounding again but at least I was starting to wake up.

                    "Dude, has anyone ever told you what a pretty brain you have?" Ben turns on the large screen in front of me and there is my brain scan doing a dance. I can see that the right temporal lobe is putting out irregular pulses that branch and merge with almost every other part of my brain, even those parts of mind that aren't supposed to be able to communicate back and forth. "Do you chant?" is his next question.

                     "I've been voice training most of my life, and I use music to stir deep emotions." "But that's not what you're asking is it?" I was amazed I could talk much less form thoughts. The pains fade.

                      "You are a freak." "How do you function?" "This is what happens to people on Angel Dust." "Your brain is sparking like a sparkler, but the cycles are still in sync with each other." "I read your dossier and I guess this is what your profile described as your "Ecstasies." "How do you function?"

                       "Could you speak a little softer?" "I'm still a little nauseous." I don't tell Benjamin how turned on I am. I learned to keep my private business to myself. Being a living ecstatic does have it's perks. But I wonder if it's worth the inter dimensional jet lag.

                 

The Full House

                   I sneeze. I explode. Decades of every dream and every Deja vu I ever had or will have, flash through every cell in my being in this world and the next. Tears stream down my twitching face. I can not see the room. I am crushed by depressive weight and I want to die. This is why I abandoned prophesy. I can't wait for this life to be over.

                   I loose consciousness much to my relief, as would happen when I would have these cataleptic seizures. I used to get migraines before I cleansed myself of this wretched gift. Alternative Medicine may have made my life endurable but it came at a horrible price. I chose to loose the gift. I have too much work in this world to be obsessing about the next. But as is normal for a psychic, it takes much more than this to cause me to loose awareness of self. My first notice is of my eyes looking at the stars. I left my body. But Maria's face comes into view. She is screaming something at me but I can not hear. She is crying again, and I wonder how can a Forth Degree Oraca Master be so emotional. I start to surface realizing that she had pulled me out my chair, put me on the ground and was beating on my chest to get me to start breathing again. As well as C.P.R. she had been giving mouth to mouth. My eyes focus and I must have looked horrible. The stars were visible through the dome framed by the indoor tropical canopy. At that moment I thought I was in heaven.

                   An expression of relief came slowly to Maria's face as I started to giggle. I regained consciousness quickly. We were surrounded by a full house of Oraca. Never had a cult that I worked seemed so friendly and I feel like I know everyone.

                   "My name is Benjamin." Said a compact younger man as he started taking my pulse. He also was one of the new converts I met at the airport. "I will be your doctor for the evening." "Do you know where you are?" For a second I know that I must be at heaven's wonderful spa, and Ben was to escort me to my table. I think out loud, "Gee, I didn't think heaven came with a buffet." There is an audible gentle laughter from the house. The crowd starts to disperse, but I feel lingering affection from the room as if these people whom I theoretically should not know were all my dearest friends, and that I had arrived. I became accustomed to strange afterglows from the seizures but this time the warmth I'm feeling seems to be true.

                    "God damn, Phillip!" "What are you trying to do?" Said Maria through a twisted smile, "We just want your help." She looks to Benjamin and looks puzzled. I suspect everyone may have already said too much. Ben shakes his head.

                      Benjamin gestures to Bettina who was standing close, to take Maria aside. "We have a clinic here on the compound." "I will have to examine you." "As long as you are here you will be given the best of care."

                     "How long was I out?" I asked.

                     "I don't know for sure." "We all  came running when we heard Maria screaming, so it probably wasn't long at all." "Let me help you up." With my right hand and his left on my arm he effortlessly lifted me. I could feel his hands downloading sensory data into me. Did these Spiritual Grad Students all learn how to send? And were they just playing me?  Did they really have that much depth of sensitive feeling? As if I hadn't already been dangerously scanned, I am about to undergo state of the art medical examination. My barriers are down.

                     Without releasing me, Ben leads me out of the dining hall and into what seems another dream. I don't think I can wake up. I don't think the seizure is over, I'm going under again. I find my self back here with you in 2013. I'm typing this down for the first time and a wave of re-entry dread crushes the breath from my lungs. As I struggle to breathe I'm in two places at once. This is why I stopped taking drugs. I need a nap.

Loneliness and Virtue

                   "Maria?" "Are you alright?" "Do you need some time to yourself?"

                   She said she would get it together, and that she didn't expect to unload like that. Maria had traded in her coding skills to work personal at InterSpace. "Don't you remember me?" "I took all your classes." She asks as if I had ignored her at the airport.

                   And what about those tears? I look into hers sad eyes and realize that I'm feeling something I had tried to ignore and forgot decades ago. I could actually feel her body. I feel what she feels inside her own tiny beautiful body. Her curvy grace and physical sensuality. I'm more than distracted. I feel that embarrassment I used to feel when I still felt an attraction to someone. My head hurts and my ears starts to ring. It was looking through her eyes back at me, I have to pull back.

                  "Of course I remember you Maria." "What are we, I mean,... what are you feeling?" I'm truly baffled. This is that little fitness model that got men to jump through hoops for her and now I feel like I treat her badly.

                 "Didn't you know? I've always had a crush on you."  And then she said, "It seemed like you just wanted me to go away" "When I first read your "ZENOPHILE" I new I wanted to do profiling and learn the Spiritual Technologies that ultimately made you famous." "I knew I might be one of those few readers that understood what you were saying." "I ultimately helped prove your Propositional Assertions to be correct." "Then when I got to participate in the trial Mutual Support Systems Workshop, I felt a kind of peace I never known before." "Being able to touch, to explore and experience my body and express that knowledge through touching and feeling the same sensitivity you shared with all of us was almost more than I could take." Maria looks at her hands as if what she wants to say is written in the lines in her palms. Then looking straight into my eyes she says, "You were always so pure, so inaccessible." "You never gave anybody a chance!" "I ended up thinking that you hated me and yet I studied everything I could get my hands on that would make me as talented as you." "I felt like there must be something horribly wrong with me."

                  "Maria, I'm going to ask you to cut yourself some slack here," "I have always tried to admit to having my own issues and I just wanted each reader to exercise healthy Diplomatic Immunity." "I'm old enough to be your father and fifteen years ago that meant all of my students, including you, were off limits."

                  "Forgive me," she said. "I know why you are here." "You're reading us so as you can help Gretchen sever business ties with the new board here at Oraca." "This place has turned into such a cash cow that the board is trying to blame anyone for the unplanned and unpredicted reactions of the new converts." "There seems to be something wrong with the Programs."

                  "Who else knows why I'm here?"

                  "All of us that came from InterSpace." "We are here as plants to check out the latest issue of the Confidence Game." "We're not even sure if Gretchen even knows why we're here yet." "No one even talks to each other around here, and it's starting to get to all of us.""Gunter was terrified something bad would end up happening to Gretchen, he staged this whole court case and everything." "We all think Gunter still has feelings for our new boss."

                   My Belgian fishing excursion was turning into a real bug hunt.

Approach and Contemplation

                   Carl evaporated from his chair and is replaced by a tall elegant slightly awkward blond woman with irregularly cropped hair which has come into style again. She carries a small black lacquer tray with two bone porcelain cups. To my surprise I recognize the fragrance of green jasmine tea. After the sun went down I can see the crescent moon through the canopy and the dome. I again detected a fragrance and I realized it's the night fragrant moth orchid behind me. Sweet strains of Mozart filter into the misty atmosphere. I get a chill and discover I'm not cold. It's the harmoniously orchestrated environment that's making shivers run up my skin.

                  "Hello, My name is Bettina," she said as she sets down the tray and places before me the cup and saucer. I'm grateful for the prop as I need to re-enter the space before I leave again for the next reading of this new person. "I'm told that you would be reading for me tonight." She speaks well through a slight but distinctive Dutch accent that is so common for her nationality, education and pay grade. I sip my tea only to discover that Bettina touches me first on my left hand where she silently sat down before I even notice. I flinch, which makes Bettina giggle and she removes here hand. "You are a funny little man." she says with a mischievous smile. She looks into my eyes like we have been friends for life. By now, the hair on my head is standing on end.

                   "Hello," I said trying to clear my throat. "I'm a friend of Gretchen's and,"

                   "We know," she interjected. "We all wanted to meet you during your dinner." "But I think we all felt a little threatened when we saw you scanning "Gretchen." I sense a kind of power from Bettina that is making my head spin. I could barely think, and I like it. Again I detect a sweet essence, not a product, not the tea, not the orchid over head which is now draining it's full bouquet down on me. It's coming from her, and for all her subtlety I doubt she even cares that I am beginning to palpably shake.

                    "Would you excuse me for a moment I need to stretch my legs?" In reality I need to compose myself. Bettina stood up with me and immediately starts doing some gentle stretches like she's a teacher prompting class to follow in kind. Her movements are utterly infectious. I take delight in following her lead. As the movement takes effect my mind starts to fill with impressions of this woman's hard life as a child of misfortune. Soon the images of a boarding school with cruel children mocking this giant of a skinny girl for her quiet genius, floods my senses. I fight my way back, up into that dining hall that I haven't left. I feel like crying, but I have to surface back and I look, up, into her eyes. She is smiling down on me. We are still. I hadn't noticed how tall she is until now. Just like Carl, she telescopes down to look like any other short person, as tall people tend to do when they meet me. After a quiet pause we sit down again and she repeats that I am a funny little man. I have so much I want to ask her but I have by this time completely lost my train of thought and she gets up just in time to be replaced by a very petite woman with shocking straight black hair cut in a bob with a yellow head band behind her ears. I can already understand why they have stopped talking to each other, much less do they talk to anyone else very often either, ever. Their inner quiet is deafening.

                     "My name is Maria." And no sooner than when she sits down, again to my left, she shows me both of her hands. I'm afraid there isn't enough light, but that isn't a problem yet and my eyes are strangely clear. Maybe I not going to need my eyes anyway. I take my hands and place them prone on her supine palms and feel waves of warmth emanating from her. She spontaneously starts to cry. I started to feel a weight in my chest. This is going to be a weird night indeed.

Coding a Social Linguistic

                   What I know today I will have forgotten by the time this actually happens in 2031. Gretchen and I will be able to leave of our own freewill and the new converts turn out totally innocent in the matter of the reprogramming scandal. By the time I get inside the Oraca compound, I will not remember having written about this and I'll be quite devoid of objectivity, which is the norm for me anyways. I almost never remember what I remember until I remember. I chose to forget those decades of deja vu.

                   As I finished my sumptuous dinner of steamed vegetables with sesame oil, jewel sea weed barley miso, wooden ear garnish and sticky green mochi, I again see Carl approach me. He seems little less formal and reports that he was instructed to attend to my lodging and answer any of my questions. I asked if he would mind letting me read for him. He said that his own preferences would not interfere with the results of any assay, he knew about the basic reading technology and was able to detach.

                  He went on to assert that he had never seen someone so casual with Gretchen before and that he meant no disrespect. I was starting to like this man a lot. "Please, sit, Let me look at your hands if I may." As I touch him I felt this unusual rush of dense pleasure receptors in his brain. I knew of only one other person that I got this feeling from. So I asked, "You are a recovering addict?" Carl sighs and nods. This is the part of my job I've always felt strange, I know I don't actually read minds but it sure seems that way. I take his right hand in mine an I start getting detailed impressions of a beautiful but painful life of love and loss, heart ache and deep romantic pain. I asked Carl my million dollar question, "What are you doing here?" "Don't tell me." "You are a Physical Genius and you have survived the passing of your most significant love relation." "You started taking narcotics when you shattered your neck vertebra playing college soccer." "You continued your education even under the strain of addiction." "Even though you have been sober for over ten years you have never fallen in love again after college." "And you knew that you were never going to renegotiate your bad contract with InterSpace." Again another nod and a sigh.

                  I had to ask, "Not to change the subject too abruptly but, why do you Oraca types get such a reputation for being cold?"

                  Carl shifted his considerable mass like he was thinking what to say, "I can only speak for myself," he said. "It was such a relief for me to find that I no longer had to explain myself that it just became second nature to mind my own business." "Even though I still care about others, I really like the fact that no body around here makes excuses." Carl went on, "I'm a very passionate person but because of my looks and education people look at me like a thing to be envied and admired. I couldn't find anyone to replace Jennifer, my fiance, so I just stopped looking." It seemed like my team at InterSpace were the only real friends I ever had and now that we all joined Oraca, we all changed into this, you know, Corporate." I barely recognize any of them any more, but I think it's just because there's nothing left to say." "The Confidence Game kind of made that even more inevitable, once you go through your reversal, nothing really matters any more." "That is what you are asking about, isn't it?"

                  I was so floored by his candor and sincerity that I not only forgot where we were, I forgot myself. I felt such an affection for that lovesick man I wanted to find some way to relieve his insatiable hunger for love and life. Not only is that kind of intervention not in my means, but he also answered perfectly why he was there, why he had completely lost all of his personal desires and why he was content to stay. This was not the confession of a malcontent, much less a deluded cult member. I immediately wondered if all the other new converts would be so lucid and interesting. If I was trying to find the bad guy I felt like it was going to end up being me.

Silence Under Glass

                  I almost shouted, "What the heck is going on?" No sooner than I had spoke, I look up to see one of the new bees standing at our table, Telling me that I am not authorized to audit the "Chair, " and any chance for my acceptance into Oraca will be revoked if I presume again.

                  "Excuse me," said Gretchen. "Carl, this is Phillip Johnson, the designer of the Personality Profiling Inventory." We would not have even known if you could survive the "Confidence Game," had he not provided all of us with the necessary diagnostics to determine your robustness." "Back Off." That rather big attractive younger man floated away. Gretchen again apologized. Weird. "Carl's a good guy, or at least he was before the reversal." "Look we are going to have a hard time finding privacy." "There is no inorganic surveillance here in the compound, no need." "Damn if we didn't train these kids too well. They can smell an incongruence a mile away." "They have been trying to scan me for weeks."

                  "Let me guess," I say, "Gunter isn't trying to sue you, and in fact you two have one of those "Secret Bonds," don't you?"

                  "Right," she says, "But we don't have a lot of time, I want you to profile this new batch of converts from InterSpace. Discreetly!" "There seems to be some bad bugs in the updated social linguistics code and our new bees our coming out arrogant and paranoid."

                  "You mean more so than usual?" Gretchen never liked my sarcasm. She scowled.

                 My two daughters and my wife have been confirmed 3rd level confidants and I feel like I don't even know them any more." "I've grieved the lose of my life's desire for two years now in silence." "No one knows except Gunter and now you." "Gunter has been corresponding by mail through the pseudonym of my Aunt Simone." "When the real Simone passed on last Oct. we had already set up my exit strategy." "We had taken a page from your playbook, and just planned for an inevitable truth." "And the truth is I'm sick of this place, everybody knows what happens to the bad child." "All in all, we knew the defectors would need a place to go and so we made it look like I wanted their malcontented disfunction." "I did make my fortune capitalizing on peoples need for a controlled rapid conversion experience." "It kept the code in friendly control and no one has to know I was the person who persuaded the holy master, JOHN MILLER to hand off the power of attorney for Oraca to me."

                I look up again and before I have even tasted my soup, the original six converts from the airport float out of a mist. Light is turned up and we are informed that Gretchen is required to put out a proverbial fire in Malaysia. Turned out another ashram was bombed and it is suspected to have been done by another convert. Gretchen leaves me to ponder my dinner alone. Wow.

The Edge of the World

                   Again my apologies to those of you readers who had not anticipated the blogs sudden turn into a serial novella.

                   None of the converts are willing to talk to me but I am directed into a lavish dining room decked out with an interior of a mountain cloud forest. As much as I've always loved orchids and humidity the lush environs reminded of the horrible wars that plagued the third world. As I looked up into the interior dome I sensed the fading glimmers of the dying sun, peaking through the domed ceiling.
 
                   Gretchen is already seated at an intimate corner table. As I approach her I again start to sense that raw genius that had drawn me to her in the previous century. She wore her trademark sweater and I felt strangely at ease. I think I am hearing her thoughts. I will have gone through decades of therapy to eliminate that private insanity of "Kriyas." The popularization of the alternative medicines had made such suffering treatable. But I realize it's not me. Gretchen is telepathically pinging me. I chose to keep those skills unpublished with the hope of protecting the general populace safe from the dangers of mind abuse. It had been years since I had used this form of communication as generally for all the so called psychics, none of them were any good at it. Only my teacher and his secretary seemed to get the subtle humor that comes with real intimate understanding.

                   But now Gretchen was here with all my favorite macro biotic dishes. I felt her warmth for the first time since we had finished the "Mutual Profiling" app that was to be the cornerstone of both of our web industries. I had been a real pig to demand a level of un hackable security that made it necessary to take it ultimately to hard copy which won me awards for writing. But she had been left with only the unfinished web design. She did get to keep the advancements in secure fire walling, but that was all her's anyway. Coding on the computer wasn't my thing. But now I was hearing her voice, in MY head.

                  So I thought "I'm game," and as I sat down and was drinking in the fragrance of the meal, I imagined saying, "Que Pasa?"

                  "GET ME OUT OF HERE!" as loud as if she were using words. I paused to pull my chair in and looked back at her to my left, and thanked her for the hospitality. Her eyes twinkled but there is still the hint of stress behind her notorious self control. We knew each other very well. We not only supported each other through our friendship but had also been the first two humans to beta test the mutual profiling assays. The success of the programs were in their usability.

                   "Gretchen, you know Gunter is probably having the whole of Interpol scouring the globe for me right now, don't you know?" She assured me that Gunter was informed that I would be spending the night with her, and that I was a guest. She also clarified that there would be much I had not been told.