The Shasta Gate

by Dick Croy

  “Now let’s shift gears here,” said Roberta. “Enough of the heavy artillery—let’s talk about Mt. Shasta. I am here, and a large number of the people in the community are here...I won’t say ‘for a reason,’ but shall we say: not accidentally or coincidentally. Another way to put it would be to say we were somehow drawn here, but that’s misleading too. We just feel this. We know it.

  “And of course the mind, sensing there is some force at work here, needs to try to explain it. We need reasons for justifying our behavior, even when we’ve acted through intuition. I think this is how many of the legends have sprung up. Yaktayvians and transparent bells, in other words, may symbolize subtle forces and dimensions which our rational minds can’t grasp at the present time. I think intuition—things we know without knowing how we know them—is the source for most of our myths and legends.”

  “I don’t understand,” Eugene interjected. “Why must we create a legend around something just because we have an intuition about it? Why would we need to?”

  Roberta smiled benignly at the newcomer and looked briefly at the ceiling as if collecting her thoughts. “Your mind,” she said, “receives bits and pieces of information—from your cells, from your genes...from what Jung called the ‘collective unconscious’: our species’ biological memory of evolution. You notice I said ‘mind’, not ‘brain’; I can’t presume to give you a neurological description of how the brain functions. What I’m sharing with you is theoretical speculation on how our minds work. Okay—the mind takes these bits and pieces of information and tries to make sense of them. And one way it does this is by putting them together in a story.

  “Now this story, when compared to what we consider the ‘real’ world, may seem to be false, or nonsense. But the bits and pieces of information are real. And if they’re real enough—by that I mean, if they’re important enough to our survival as individuals and as a species—then our minds will eventually find a story that makes sense to enough people that, through our consensual behavior, we’ll begin to make that story come true.”

  Eugene’s face lit up. Catherine was more impressed by his expression than put off by Roberta’s esoteric explanation.

  “So...do I believe in these stories? I think that only time will tell whether the information they are attempting to communicate is important enough for us as a society, that we’ll begin to integrate them into our everyday lives...and make them come true. Maybe first of all by actually finding a secret entrance in the mountain: the gateway to a whole new realm of reality. Or perhaps by acknowledging ‘Mt. Relativity,’ as it emerges from the low-lying clouds that have so long obscured it.”

  Chapter 33

  When the gathering broke up, Catherine and Eugene made their way out to the front porch. The moon was full, held fast in the eastern sky like a balloon on a string entangled in the branches of Roberta’s maple tree. The heavenly body pulled more than their eyes skyward. They were both high: Catherine on the success and daring of her escape and Eugene on Roberta’s provocative remarks, sown like mystic corn (a simile Catherine would have found amusing) in a soil he had been husbanding, it seemed to him, for just such a midwife as Roberta. Under the full moon’s influence the seeds were already stirring in his cultivated earth. While over them, over the house and town, the mountain shone with the sun’s light twice reflected, like a great crystal pyramid lit dimly from within.

  “What did you think?” he asked. “Was it as boring as you thought it would be?”

  “You obviously weren’t bored. Why are you so sure I would be?”

  The question surprised him. “Well we do have different interests after all. I didn’t get the impression from your comments that you were exactly enjoying yourself.”

  “I wasn’t, but I wouldn’t say I was bored either. Dumbfounded would be more like it.”

  He laughed. “I wonder if you take your opposition role a little too seriously sometimes.”

  “Well do you believe the things she was saying? Did they make any sense to you?”

  “A lot of what she said made sense. I’m not sure I understand all of it; I want to ask her a couple of questions.”

  “I’ll admit she’s got charisma,” said Catherine—“and at least she’s no guru-evangelist. But I think she’s spent too much time on the mountain. Or inside of it.”

  “Hey—glad you decided to come!” It was the cashier from the health food store, sporting a black eye and bandaged nose. He walked over to them with his hand out, and Eugene took it in the thumbs-together, palm-to-palm handshake in which it was offered.

  “What happened to you?” asked Catherine.

  “That’s one reason I’m glad to see you,” he said. “Some ‘friends’ of yours who really weren’t too friendly were looking for you, and I told them about Panther Meadows.”

  “Why did you do that?” demanded Catherine indignantly.

  “Well...I’m not a very good liar. And the guy who wanted to know was very persuasive—he’d have broken my arm if I hadn’t told him something. I couldn’t think of anything but the truth. I’m sorry.”

  “Hey, man, it’s all right; they didn’t find us. When was this?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “How many were there?”

  “I just saw one—a great big guy. But he must have had a bunch of people with him. They sounded like a swarm of giant hornets when they took off.”

  Eugene and Catherine exchanged a look. “Did you see anyone else?” Eugene asked her.

  “No—just him. But I don’t think it was the one he’s talking about. I wouldn’t call him that big, would you?”

  “In his own mind maybe.” He turned back to the cashier. “Thanks for tellin’ us. Sorry they picked on you.”

  “That’s all right—I’m just glad I didn’t get you into any trouble. Next time something like that happens I’ll be prepared. I’m going to learn to lie reflexively.”

  “It comes naturally to most people,” Catherine offered. The scathing he’d been about to receive had died on her lips as soon she acknowledged to herself that the cashier was in no way responsible for her getting on that bike.

  “What did you think of Roberta?” the cashier asked, only too glad to change the subject.

  “We had mixed feelings,” said Eugene. “I thought she had some interesting things to say.”

  “...What brings you up here anyway, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  Eugene looked at Catherine and grinned mischievously. “Maybe you could say we’re looking for that Shasta ‘gate’ she was talking about.”

  “Hah!”

  The cashier was undeterred by Catherine’s response from pursuing a subject obviously very dear to him. “You mean a secret entrance to the mountain? You know what I think? I figure if there really is some kind of entrance, it must not be an opening our physical body could enter, but only our energy body.”

  “Did you say ‘energy’ or ‘imaginary’?” asked Catherine.

  “Energy,” he said, ignoring her sarcasm. “See, we have a body of energy surrounding, and governing, our physical body. That’s becoming more accepted all the time. All we need are the tools to measure it somehow, so science can get in on the act and make it all respectable and believable, and we’ll be able to start taking advantage of the greatest natural resource we have.”

  “You said this ‘energy body’ surrounds the physical body?” Catherine asked.

  “Right!”

  “Then how can the energy body go somewhere the physical body can’t?”

  “Good question. I haven’t figured that out yet.”

  Catherine laughed good-naturedly and grinned at Eugene, as if to say, “Your move.”

  Just then Roberta and the last of her guests came out onto the porch. There were exclamations over the moon, a round of good night’s, and then Eugene and Catherine were the only visitors left. She seemed pleased they had stayed.

  “I don’t believe I’ve seen either of you here before,” she said, smiling. />
  “No—we heard about your meetings at the health food store,” said Eugene. “They were strongly recommended. This is Catherine—I’m Eugene.”

  “Hello, Roberta,” Catherine said forthrightly, extending her hand with a gracious smile. He was impressed by Catherine’s manner: you’d have thought she had found the evening fascinating.

  “I’m glad you came.” Roberta’s gaze was direct but gentle and, at this hour, just a little tired. But she was no more hindered by fatigue than an energetic mother is prevented by her active and demanding children from conducting business or a conversation. She was right there.

  “I was really interested in some of the things you had to say,” Eugene continued. “The ‘information’ you mentioned, as being the basis for the stories about Mt. Shasta: what could these stories be trying to tell us?”

  Beaming, she said to Catherine in her hearty voice, “Somebody was listening.” She looked up as he had noticed her do earlier when carefully framing an answer and brought her hand to her chin. “...That of course is the greatest mystery of all. I don’t think, though, that the important thing is whether or not Lemuria actually existed or whether there is another civilization living inside the mountain. This isn’t a story about the distant past or a separate people living apart from us.”

  Roberta had a way of looking beyond her listeners when she was reaching for a particular word or phrase. But now she gave them a searching look, as if asking wordlessly, Do you understand...are you beginning to see your own involvement in this? “The stories are about us,” she said—“our future and our present: what we must do now.”

  “They’re telling us to look inside ourselves for answers.”

  Catherine was as surprised as Eugene was by her spontaneous remark—and mortified. She felt as if she’d spoken out of turn or, worse, that she had revealed something about herself, some part of her subconscious perhaps, before it had been revealed to her—like talking in one’s sleep. But neither Eugene’s expression of intense interest nor Roberta’s approving smile told her she had compromised herself in any way. So what if she was blushing as she seldom did?

  “That’s what I think, Catherine,” Roberta agreed. “I know that the two of you are on a journey. What Shasta has to teach you is between you and the mountain. But I can tell you that the journey we must all make—and very soon—is one of the most difficult and crucial ever demanded of us: the journey from the head...to the heart.”

  ...It was such a beautiful evening and they both had so much to talk about—although who knew where to begin?—that they decided to walk for a while before going back up the mountain. Holding hands, they strolled in silence for a block or two before Catherine said, “What she said about a journey from the head to the heart sure as hell isn’t new. That’s what Romanticism was all about, a century and a half ago.”

  “Well, if you think of evolution as a sort of spiral, maybe we’re back where we were then but at a higher level—different set of circumstances. Something like that.”

  “...Why do you suppose she said we’re both on a journey?”

  “Because we are. It would certainly be as true of you as it would of me.”

  “‘Would be’? Now you’re the one who sounds skeptical.”

  “I always have been. You just saw what was most different about me from what you’re used to seeing and quit looking.”

  “I think that’s unfair. I’ve tried awfully hard to figure you out.”

  “You’re right—maybe it is,” he conceded, smiling and squeezing her hand. “I know you have. But that part of me that I think you see as some kind of terribly naive seeker of truth or something, you tend to view as black or white—with no shading in between. It’s more complex than that.”

  “I never thought of you that way,” said Catherine, realizing as soon as she’d uttered them how false her words were. “Anyway, I can change my mind can’t I?”

  “Nope. Too late. You’ve alienated me for the last time.” He swung her hand and grinned down at her.

  She stopped suddenly. From her look of self-discovery he guessed what she was thinking.

  “Did it ever occur to you that you might have been doing the same thing with me?”

  “I know I have.”

  “And now you’re saying you’ll take the highs and lows and everything in between?”

  “You bet.” A sudden overwhelming love for Catherine, for himself, for the whole human race welled up in Eugene. He laughed for pure joy and swept her into his arms, swaying gently with her from side to side. She looked up into his eyes and he kissed her, with a passion that sprang more from the heart than the loins; while she added to it her own happiness, heightened by a feeling of gratitude: toward Eugene, herself, Ram—with enough left over to dedicate to the night itself and to its maker, whoever or whatever that might be.

  With her eyes closed she imagined she was being rocked like this by the warm night wind. And to Eugene she became less and less distinguishable within his arms from his arms themselves, until it seemed there were not two people standing here but one, neither himself nor Catherine but some fusion of the two of them...not even standing so much as simply being here. Perceiving.

  Eventually they found themselves, somewhat confused but blissfully so, walking aimlessly through a neighborhood neither of them recognized. Then, finally, Catherine remembered something that had been nagging her for some time, just beneath her consciousness.

  “Gene—what about the people the guy from the health food store was talking about? It was them wasn’t it—that biker gang.”

  “I imagine,” he said, reluctant to interrupt the mood with this digression.

  “Why would they be looking for us?”

  “Damned if I know.”

  “Do you think they still are?”

  “If they weren’t, they may be after what happened this afternoon.”

  “Great. What do you think they might do?”

  “It’s a big country up here. If they can’t find us, they’ll probably lose interest.”

  “That doesn’t answer my question.”

  “Don’t get all worked up about it. I’d say you handled yourself pretty well today.”

  “But that was just one guy.”

  “So what? You did what you had to, that’s the important thing.”

  “You mean we did.”

  “Okay, we did. And I’ll still be with you if they cause any more problems.”

  “Aren’t you worried about them at all?”

  He considered this for a moment. He was prepared to say, “Nah,” in as offhand a manner as possible, ostensibly to keep Catherine from becoming too concerned. But that certainly wouldn’t be the only reason: it would be nice to convince her, and himself as well, that the thought of meeting the whole gang on the road didn’t quicken the old fight-or-flight reflexes. The truth of the matter, however, was that ever since that first encounter in Mexico, he’d had a foreboding about them. He’d pushed it aside but that hadn’t made it any less real.

  “Yeah, I’m afraid of people like that, when they’re in bunches,” he said finally. “I don’t care whether they ride motorcycles or convertibles in Fourth of July parades. People so afraid of something different they’ll do anything to erase the difference. Most of the time I do such a good job convincing myself I’m not afraid, I end up foolin’ everyone else too. But to tell you the truth, there are things that scare the hell out of me.”

  “I’d say you were overcoming fear just to be able to admit that to yourself.”

  “Maybe,” he said, smiling and squeezing her hand again.

  Later Catherine told him about the memory of her father that had resurfaced that morning and again on the motorcycle.

  “That seems like a hell of a load to be carryin’ around,” Eugene said when she’d finished. “The trip Roberta was talking about—from the head to the heart...she said it wasn’t easy.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When it comes to knowing h
ow that kind of anger can stand in your way, I’m an expert.”

  “Well thank you, Mr. Enlightenment.” He grinned somewhat sheepishly and she laughed. “I don’t know what you had standing in your way before,” she said, “but I don’t see anything there now.”

  “You’ve experienced it though. It’s certainly come between us at times.”

  They continued to walk. Finally, Catherine said, “there’s always something isn’t there—that keeps people apart. If not at first then later.”

  “There doesn’t have to be. Does there?”

  “Not if you close your eyes maybe.”

  “That’s a cynical attitude. People can change, you know.”

  “Oh sure—people change themselves all the time to try to meet other people’s desires and expectations. I think that’s pathetic.”

  “I agree. That’s not the kind of change I’m talking about. I’m talking about the change involved in growing as a person. You have to accomplish that yourself, but others can help you see the changes that need to be made.”

  “If you believe that,” she said, “why have you spent so much time alone?”

  Damn—he’d seen that coming, even before his words were out of his mouth. “That’s a good question. I guess because even though I am trying to grow, you don’t have to do that through other people, relationships. It’s certainly something you can do on your own—you just don’t have as many mirrors to see yourself in. And the other thing—which has nothing to do with this, or maybe it does: I’m particular...hard t’ get along with. It certainly isn’t just you that’s kept us on edge with each other. I don’t know, maybe I expect too much from people.”

  She laughed. “That sounds like my self-portrait.”

  “...I’ve sure found myself goin’ through some changes with you.” He said this almost shyly, although he certainly hadn’t intended it that way. They both smiled in that special intimacy shared by seasoned veterans of the war between the sexes.