That's how the day began and when the day gets off to a start like that, it usually means the Universe is planning a big practical joke and it's on you, my friend. Sorry, I really can only speak for myself, so let me re-phrase that and say, the jokes on me.
Later that day--it was in the early afternoon to be exact--I was returning from Southport and just outside Winnabow, I saw the full moon, plain as a picture postcard, hanging in the sky at just about the spot a window would be if the sky had windows.
You're probably thinking there's nothing unusual about seeing the moon in the open day but what if I told you that it wasn't one of those pale shades of the moon but a solid, detailed moon. I could make out the Sea of Tranquility and I'm not certain but those dark spots on the lower, right edge may have been Neil Armstrong's footprints.
This is not an ordinary occurrence but I'd been expecting something like this since Wonder made that remark at the breakfast table. After all, with the auspicious convergence, if that's the term I want, something like this had to happen. Consider that in a period of only a few days we're to experience the winter Olympics, Chinese New Year, Mardi Gras, and the half-off sale at the Southport CIS thrift store.
Something had to give. The fabric of the Universe will develop a hernia when this kind of pressure builds and I knew that I was in for it now. I just hoped I'd get home before it started.
Nope!
Follow me closely on this next part because this is where you'll find the in vino veritas. Is that the term? Getting someone drunk enough to tell the truth?
Driving along Highway 87, I entered a stretch of highway where the sun was just at the perfect angle behind the trees lining the road, to create zebra streaks of sunlight and shadow.
But wait, before I go into that, I want to say something about driving from Wilmington to Southport and if I don't tell you now, I'll forget. Most people drive down Ocean Highway to Highway 211, where they make a left turn and follow that road right smack into High Street in Southport. Bad choice. The long way to go.
What you want to do is follow Ocean Highway for only a short distance to Highway 87 and turn there. You have to look closely. Watch for the Kangaroo service station and turn just before you get to it. Southport is much closer following this route and it's a nicer drive.
Now, back to the zebra stripes on the road. Be sure you have that clear in your head; the story depends on it. As I drove into those striations (striations?), My vision alternated from light to shadow to light, in rapid succession. It was hypnotic. In a matter of seconds, my consciousness moved from the conceptional light and dark motif to a more focused awareness of on, off, on, off, on, off. Finally, I moved to an even deeper level of discrete 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 1.
I tried to fight it, of course. Who wouldn't? But my best efforts only moved my awareness up 1 or 2 levels at a time and I couldn't completely shake it. At the dark/light level, I was Keith Richards, not completely dead as the joke goes. At the on / off level, I was the Soul Merchant (not actually a Soul Merchant but that's what some of us use as a sort of shorthand way of identifying ourselves.)
At the deepest of zeros and ones, I ceased to exist. What I mean is that the personality known as Genome ceased to exist and I was pure consciousness. I believe this is what the Buddhists refer to as Enlightenment.
How long I continued to jump back and forth through alternate dimensions, I can't say. It seemed an eternity but probably lasted less than a minute.
Now, I'm sure that a lesser man would have been shaken to the foundations but yours truly has been through the ringer not a few times in his solar revolutions and he's developed a thick outer crust. I simply put it in the basket with all the other things that one doesn't see every day.
So what's the point, you're probably asking yourself. I know how you feel. I ask myself that every day. But here's the point. You never know what Life has in store for you from one day to the next. What you expect Life to serve up is probably something bad but it's never as bad as you think. And what Life was like a few years ago wasn't really as good as you remember. Billy Joel taught me that.
We're all just moving through the world through a series of light and dark patches. We don't move as fast as I drove but still, it works the same way. You're not really Kieth Richards and you're not a Soul Merchant. Still, you're in that personality-free state of consciousness even though you seldom realize it.
Life will never get any better than it is right now, my friend, so the best way to deal with each day is to live it with all your might. Fierce Qigong!
