One cannot help but be in awe when one contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality.

Albert Einstein

Chapter Four

The Mystics

      I sat quietly that night in the blue casting of a full moon, gazing vacantly at the reflection of plants off the glass tabletop in my kitchen. The time I spent with the nun reminded me of an experience I had years before with another nun from St. Agatha’s parochial school, which was adjoined to the church of my upbringing.

       I recalled one morning in 1962 when I bolted from the sidewalk and into the street with that nun in pursuit. I froze at the sound of screeching rubber until my palms stung on the hood of a hysterical woman’s Chevrolet. Then a claw-like hand emerged from the black and white cloth I fled and snared me by the scruff of my shirt.

“Where were you at nine-o’clock mass Sunday?” Shouted Sister Clementus as she shook me unmercifully.

“I was there, Sister,” I replied, still stunned from my first near-death experience.

“You could have given that woman a heart attack,” screamed the irate nun.

I thought, St. Agatha’s isn’t even my school and I have to put up with this?

 She chased me regularly as I made my way to the public school I attended two blocks away. Her talk about the devil, sin, and hell, assured me of my due punishment for blasphemy—the only unpardonable sin. “BLASPHEMY” flashed in my mind’s eye nightly before sleep as I envisioned hellish lakes of fire. But that was only one of many disturbing experiences laying the groundwork for me to explore and ask why?

Fourteen years later, I could see how the nun at St. Mary’s had a heart, but Sister Clementus was cold, and the memory of her left no wonder why I preferred to be alone in churches. I went to sleep that night with the comfort of knowing someone was praying for me.

When I reached the age of twenty-two, my quest led me to the teachings of universal law by the masters of an ancient mystery school. I was introduced to metaphysics as a pathway leading to what they called Christ Consciousness.

Through their instruction, I could see I still served a habit of viewing almost everything through the beliefs and opinions of others—making for a displaced sense of self. The teachings explained the dynamics of belief, and how what is believed reflects from the screen of life as the believer’s reality. For example, if I changed my attitude about any given situation, my perception responded like the turn of a kaleidoscope.

 They taught that human beings are electromagnetic and spiritual in nature, rather than becoming so, with minds having the ability to either project superficial thinking, or extend from a deeper truth.  

My mystical teachers told me I was privileged to have a powerful spirit guide who shone every color of the rainbow—symbolic of great wisdom. They said he was a Native American Chief in a recent incarnation, whose tribe roamed the plains. I wondered why this guide chose me, but despite my intrigue, apprehension grew shortly before the arrival of each successive lesson. I would eventually discover how this uneasiness was directly related to long-forgotten events in my past, which through the lessons were being slowly uprooted. I wasn't aware of it then, but time would show the truth so often left uncultivated is a foundational one having to do with core-identity.

I arrived home from work and joked with the postman as he placed the familiar envelope from the mystery school into my mailbox. I stood there thinking for a moment about the lessons and knew they were transformative, but why were they lifelong? I believed transforming one’s life was what the teachers meant by metamorphosis, but the notion the terms had different meanings began to arise.

 The more I processed and eliminated negative belief patterns, the more I felt like the walls around my thinking were crumbling into starting lines of newness—or the horizon of a beyond I couldn’t see. My intertwined mental, emotional, and physical states fluctuated between a sense of freedom, and feelings of dread brought on by letting go of the familiar and looking toward the unknown. I sometimes wanted to go back to my old self and pull the covers over my head, which was another paradox since through the process of the teachings, much of what I had identified with as that self—was gone.

I pondered over just how much of a change I was looking at here while exhaling through pursed lips. Then I whisked the envelope from my mailbox and climbed the stairs of the Victorian I called home up to the third floor hallway leading to my room.

 After tossing the unusually thick envelope onto my desk, I glanced at it curiously before sitting to open it. Supplemental to my biweekly lesson was a sealed blue scroll encircled by a golden ribbon. Information in an attached fold described its contents as an offering, and that to read the solemn truth inside was optional.

Like Pandora with her box, I removed the ribbon and broke the seal. After sipping water poured from my carafe, I unrolled the fine paper of the scroll and read these words:

You are about to embark on an inter-dimensional journey where you will receive solvency to what has caused you great tribulation. Remember to focus on the seed of truth growing within you when in the face of opposition; for when you know truth, you will see there is nothing to fear.

The implications of that statement crossed the limits of my sensibility, and I thought before long my closet will be filled with unopened envelopes.

Chapter Five

There are No Accidents

Many teachers will tell you to believe; then they put out your eyes of reason and instruct you to follow only their logic. But I want you to keep your eyes of reason open; in addition, I will open in you another eye, the eye of wisdom.

Sri Yukteswar

’ve often heard that it’s best to live each day to the fullest and discovered why the following day at work. My buddy, Jack, told me I was knocked unconscious when a storage bin collapsed. A concrete wall broke its descent, but not short of the top of my head. I knew nothing of this accident except what I was told. My only recollection was of our morning break, a flood of colors, and then finding myself in a church full of people.

Feeling disoriented as though emerging from the residue of a daydream I couldn’t recall, I stood in a pew. There was no reason for me to think I had been knocked unconscious in some other life. I was in the church, and the life I was living there was the only life I knew.

“Feeling okay, brother?” Ray asked, the man sitting next to me.

“I’m fine, thanks, just a little dizzy from the heat—I guess,” I replied woozily.

I watched Suzanne, an elder of the Gospel Searchlight Church, stride purposefully to her place adjacent to the pulpit in her gray, ankle-length dress, as though assigning herself guardian of all things sacred.

 Listening intently as the pastor rose to speak, nothing he said reached inside of me to revitalize my life. I needed relativity—something to ring true on Sundays, but all I got were contradictions and proclamations pointing to the possibility of eternal separation from God, and people wanting to hold my hand.

I questioned whether I had a reprobate mind—a term used to describe the spiritually incorrigible as parishioners whispered, “Blasphemer” and “Plucked right from the flock!”

They thought I lacked faith because I asked too many questions.

 Suzanne told me that the Holy Spirit would shut the door of reformation in my face for becoming amused when a woman in the church spun her head wildly, her hair whipping around in a two-foot radius as she spoke in tongues.

 I was rejected and denied the promise of the unconditional love I’d so often heard about, but never felt from these haughty-eyed people—especially from the women with their beehive hairdos.

During the Sunday service, a church acquaintance by the name of Sandy sat nervously at a 90-degree angle across from me. She appeared shaken, as though she’d just drunk a pot of strong coffee. Sandy looked like she was having an anxiety attack.

When I had symptoms, I tried to hide them in the hope no one would notice, so approaching the subject with Sandy would be done in a diplomatic way at another time. Anxiety and panic disorder was frustrating, and I thought that if she had it maybe we could develop a supportive relationship. Just having someone to talk with might have helped to lighten her burden, and maybe a dose of humor would go a long way. At least I knew joking about it helped me between episodes.

I expected the compassion I felt for Sandy to bear fruit in some way; but through a turn of events, I discovered the universe sets a time and place for everything. I wouldn’t be talking with Sandy anytime soon. Further into the sermon I looked to where she was sitting, but she wasn't there. When I asked where she had gone, some of the male members of the church laughingly told me, “Sandy flipped out,” and pointed toward the window. I saw Sandy standing outside. She was crying while talking with Suzanne. A van pulled up with two men inside who got out to help Sandy in, apparently against Suzanne’s wishes—and they drove away. Suzanne came back inside, brittle and stone-faced as ever, and sat in her place near the podium. Whatever happened in the last twenty minutes concerning Sandy was yet to come to light. But there was nothing I could do. She was gone.

I turned to watch an elderly black woman visiting from the south light the platform at the front of the church with her elegance as she prepared to sing, adorned in a pristine, yellow gown. Her facial expression radiated such warmth that I wanted to stay, but as the target of Suzanne’s scowl, I felt uneasy and like an unwanted guest. Unable to withstand her unrelenting assaults on my psyche, my footsteps reverberated to dissociating stares as I left the church feeling defeated for the last time.

Making my way to a quiet patch of grass amongst the tall pines across the street, I sat to the angelic tones of Amazing Grace echoing from the walls of the church as the lovely old woman sang. I reached into my pocket for the picture of Jesus my mother had given me, which grew noticeably warm in my hand—and while seeking forgiveness for wrongs I didn’t even know, I held to what faith remained in the promise of asking.

A tingling sensation ran through my body and I caught the scent of lilac as a vaguely familiar woman wearing a white shawl appeared sitting next to me. Her skin was startlingly translucent and she smiled softly, comforting me.

After repositioning me gently by my shoulders to face her, she held my hands and with indigo eyes, looked through to the depths of me. Her lips didn’t move, yet she conveyed to me distinctly, emphatically, “Life is about being”.

A softness of every color of the rainbow surrounded us when she pressed something solid against my palm. As I sat motionless in the aura of her kindness, I saw moving across upper space in front of me, Holy Symbols of Truth shining more silver than silver. The Symbols dispelled all illusions of separation from the Omnipresence of God. A final display in verse read:

“Forgiveness is the recognition of everything you already have inherent in your creation. You do not lack forgiveness from God. You only need remember, and to forgive one another. This is the narrow gate to truth and the pathway of absolution”.

In that timeless moment, I knew the peace that passeth understanding and the unity of everything. A voice began calling to me from a distance, becoming louder to the point of urgency.

“Sal, are you all right under there? Wake up—Sal!”

“Who are you?” I asked as a hum faded from my ears and tingling warmth radiated from the palm of my right hand to the crown of my head. Then it dawned on me that I was back at my workplace laying on the concrete floor, apparently where my accident had taken place. The fallen storage bin lay suspended one foot above, keeping me out of full view.

“What do you mean who am I, Salvatore? It’s Jack. Are you alright under there?”

“I’m okay,” I answered; still unaware of exactly what had happened.

There was increasing heat in my right hand, and when visually inspecting what I thought to be a wound, I saw what appeared to be an exquisite, crystalline object glistening in an array of colors. I jostled to get into a position enabling me to move my hand toward my face for a closer look. Holding the strangely transparent object to my eyes, I gazed into it when what unfolded both fascinated and baffled me.

 I’d heard that colors have an effect on people, but these colors were permeated with a certain lusciousness, activating sensations new to me. I was swimming in a rainbow of awe until the creaking of the metallic storage bin I lay under distracted me. Heavy footwear scurried near as I peered out from under the bin. Despite the danger looming above, my thoughts gravitated to the magnificence of my find, which cooled as I tucked it into my pocket.

 Two paramedics snaked their way under the bin and slid me out of danger. Following a quick examination, they fastened me to a flat-board and carried me to an awaiting ambulance. I was rushed to the local hospital emergency room and admitted for 24 hours of observation.

Bewilderment and joyfulness were what I would have considered strange bedfellows, but that was the emotional tone blanketing me as I lay in my hospital bed. Images of people in a church flooded my mind, leaving me confused as to why. More confounding was the certainty that I knew them. I was just talking with someone there, but couldn’t remember whom. I had been there in that place or why was it so real, just like life before and after my accident?

 Even if there was truth to the idea of bilocation, I still couldn’t wrap my mind around how I could be in two places at once. Could a ding to the head be medical grounds for strange ideations of a separate reality? Wherever I’d been, I knew the people and didn’t think of here from there. Some say the answers we seek are in our questions, but I got none.

 Exhaustion rolled over me like an opiate fog bank, but before I reached the shores of slumber, I felt the incessant nagging of some unfinished task. Sandy! Wait a minute. Who was Sa—? 

A nurse woke me to take my blood pressure after an unusually long sleep brought me to the next day. Afterwards, while lying on the hospital bed, I understood why I had always heard that in dream studies it was important to log your dreams immediately upon waking. But on this occasion, it was events of the previous day that were becoming foggy at best.

 I struggled to piece fragments of memory together in some type of order. Thoughts of a church associated with a sense of displacement, a picture of Jesus, and images of a loving mother figure along with an incredible sense of exaltation, were all passing away quickly—like strands in the wind.

Excitement rose in my chest as though I awaited the final scene of a melodramatic opera. But the fleeting pictures on my mental screen faded to black and I forgot everything with a final, receding wave.

 Despite failed efforts to remember, it was the afterglow I basked in that left a sense of something too real to be misconstrued as a dream or an injury-induced hallucination. Whatever the case, my absence of memory digressed to the dismal feeling of losing the love of my life at sixteen. The first love that slipped so easily right through the palm of my—“THE GEMSTONE!”

The nurse was still in the room and jumped when I bellowed, “Nurse, where are my clothes? Bring me my pants!”

“Your clothes are right there in the closet, Mr. DeSanti,” murmured the discombobulated nurse. “I’ll get them for you.”

I couldn’t restrain myself when the nurse, distracted by a crash outside the room, changed her course. Barely dressed, I rose from the bed and raced to look behind the door to where my clothing hung. While probing my pants pocket, my fingers found the annoying hole loose change had poured through twice the previous day. Fumbling to find the other pocket, my knuckle bumped something hard as I slid my hand inside. I felt the smooth solidity of tangibility—at last.

 My breathing and movements slowed as I retrieved my trembling hand from this pocket of serendipity. In my palm rested the crystalline proof that what we think to be dreams may very well be actualities.

Learning often happens indirectly, and in a relapse of what would become known as inter-dimensional experiences the difference between remembering and reliving would grow apparent in the succession of my imminent thoughts.