Out of Gas

by Randy Dyess

  RJ laughed, “He is trying. Wilma is eighty-two and she is a tiger. Last summer a group of young punks came up to her and her friend and tried to grab their purses. They pushed her friend to the ground and broke her hip while doing so, but Wilma fought back and broke several of the punk’s fingers and arms. They ended up dropping Wilma’s friend’s purse and running away. We now have twenty people from Wilma’s senior home training here. It is amazing what you can do if you understand body mechanics and energy control. The little girl I just told you about, Suzy. I’ve been doing this for three decades and have been in some rough places when I worked for the government. She put a move on me the other day and got her finger in one of my pressure points on my arm and I liked to have cried. Even with all my training and experience, I was on the ground begging her to let go.”

  That broke the ice and everyone had a good laugh at RJ’s expense. The rest of the tour went well and by the end both Mark and Kelly were sold on RJ’s techniques. “What do we do from here?” Mark asked once they made it back to RJ’s office.

  “Normally, it would take someone like you two at least two years of prep work before we started the actual martial arts portion of the training. We spend the first two years working on your body and mind. You need the physical ability to handle the martial arts and the mental ability to overcome the stress of what you are learning. We all know we don’t have much time, so I’m going to put you on an accelerated training schedule if you agree. This will involve coming here at least twice a week and putting in at least two, if not three hours, a day by the end of the year. We need to get you up to speed on quite a bit of stuff before January so we can start defensive moves at the beginning of the year.“

  “We don’t come every day?” Kelly asked.

  “No. Most of our students only come once or twice a week for each class they are enrolled in. What we do here is introduce a topic and then guide you until you understand enough to learn on your own. We don’t expect you to learn everything here. We expect you to learn at home after being introduced to the topic here. Coming here only allows us to guide and correct your learning. You will need to watch DVDs, read books, and practice your craft every day. Your time at the dojo is spent to quiz over what you should have learned during the week and then introduce what you need to learn during the new week.”

  RJ went over to a cabinet and pulled out four large binders. “Here are you guide books,” he said as he handed them to Mark and Kelly.

  “They have our name on them,” Kelly looked up.

  “Yeah. I knew you two would make this decision, so I went ahead and made this up for you. What you’ll find in there is a training schedule for the next two years. The manual will show you what you are going to learn each week. You will learn what to read to find out more about the exercises and which videos to watch to enforce your training. You will find the exercises and concepts are progressive. You should not continue on to the next exercise until you have learned the current one well enough to be given the go ahead by your Sensei. Don’t go ahead and learn on your own. In the beginning, come here and let one of our teachers show you what to do. Use the book during the week to keep the training in your head. If you don’t learn the basic pieces correctly for the first few months, it makes the rest of it harder.”

  Ok. When do we need to show up?” Kelly asked.

  “Wednesday evening at seven. You will be working with Donna as your Sensei. Use the time before then to gather your supplies and work on the few prep items I have listed.”

  “Owen’s Donna?” Kelly asked with a smile.

  “Yes. She asked to train you. She’s quite good at everything we do here. Plus, she will be a good teacher for the other things you two have to learn before the meltdown we know is coming.”

  “What about that?” Mark asked. “We are so busy trying to build up with the farm to get ready for the meltdown. How are we going to find two or more hours a day to learn this?”

  “Easy. Once you get your internal energy under control, you will be able to wake up earlier and do a round of training before starting your day. You also probably spend at least an hour, if not two, each night on the web reading news sites and web pages about the upcoming meltdown. You know it’s coming and you know you only have a few years before the meltdown occurs. Stop wasting time reinforcing your beliefs each night and use the time to prepare. Owen told me, you and he are unemployed. Use what time you can each morning to do this training. Work on your farm and other preps during the day when you can. Finish up each night with another round of training. I need you two to be ready by January to start the actual martial arts part of the training. You need to get physically and mentally ready for it over the next five or six months.”

  “I can do that,” Mark replied, “but Kelly still works all day. I guess I will have to take over some more of the household chores so she has time to complete her training.”

  Kelly just laughed and said, “I knew something positive would come out of this.”

  “I also take it you want to join our community as well?” RJ continued.

  “Yes, if you will have us. Kelly’s mom and dad are moving to the farm with us and if I can talk them into it, so will my parents. Please include them as well if you can.”

  Mark, Kelly, and RJ talked for an hour about the community and what RJ wanted from Mark and Kelly. They all agreed Kelly would start trying to organize the community from an HR perspective. Mark would start making the rounds with RJ to meet everyone before he dived into his new job. They had completed their talk just as Cheyenne and Dakota were let into the office by Lisa.

  “That was fun,” both of them said at the same time.

  “Can we come back?” Dakota asked.

  “We are coming back on Wednesday,” Kelly said.

  “Yea,” both girls yelled.

  “Until we come back, you two have homework to do.”

  Cheyenne looked at Kelly and said, “But’s it’s summer and schools out. How can I have homework?”

  “There are a few things you have to do each day while you are training here. You need to practice everything every day so you learn it.”

  “Ok,” Cheyenne said.

  “Do I have homework?” Dakota asked.

  “Yes,” replied RJ. “You need to practice being cute.”

  “I can do that,” she replied to the laughter of all the adults in the room.

  “Wow, there’s a lot of stuff in here,” Kelly exclaimed while looking at her folder on the drive back home. “We are going to have to go to the store today and get all the stuff we need. It’s like going to school and having a supply list.”

  “He did say the place was like a university,” Mark replied.

  “We’ll if your folder is like mine, you are going to have to start jogging in the morning,” she teased him knowing he always hated jogging.

  “What?” he said as he corrected his driving to stay in his own lane. “I hate to jog.”

  Cheyenne piped up in the back and said, “I’ll jog with you in the morning, Daddy. I can take it slow so I don’t embarrass you.”

  “Thank you, Pumpkin,” Mark chuckled knowing it would not be hard for her or anyone to run him into the ground.

  Once they got home, the girls took a little nap while Mark and Kelly went over everyone’s folder. The training schedule was extensive, but put together so well they figured the schedule would be easy to follow. Mark was impressed how progressive the schedule was and took them a little deeper every week. He didn’t read anything in the schedule that would cause them to ‘over do’ their training, although he knew they would be sore the first few weeks. Kelly wondered how she was going to fit everything into her current schedule. She had to tell herself it was for the family and one day what she learned here would be useful. Besides, she needed to get back into shape if she was going to live on a farm. Better have the soreness now than when everyone depended on her more than they did today.

  Both Mark and Kelly decided to start o
n their ‘prep’ work today and were surprised when the first thing they had to learn was how to meditate. “Does your folder say you need to go into a quiet room and stare at a spot on the wall for thirty minutes?” Mark asked.

  “Yea, but the goal is not to stare at a spot on the wall for thirty minutes. It is to focus only on the spot for thirty minutes without having anything else enter your mind. We are supposed to learn how to block out everything and not think of nothing but our breathing.”

  “That shouldn’t be too hard. I block you out all the time,” Mark chuckled.

  “I can’t wait to learn to put you on your ass when you smart off,” Kelly laughed as she went into her office to learn to meditate.

  Mark and Kelly created a comfortable spot on the floor with a pillow. Each one of them taped a piece of paper with a large dot in the center of the paper to the wall at eye level. They sat down and started to concentrate on their breathing while looking at the spot and trying to block any other thought out of their mind. They both made it for thirty seconds before the first thoughts invaded their minds and they lost their focus. They started over again and again and could only make it about thirty seconds at a time before losing focus. The entire thirty minute session seemed to drag on for hours. Once their time was up, they walked into the living room with their heads held down and just looked at each other before bursting out in laughter.

  “I take it, it’s as bad for you as it was for me?” Kelly asked.

  “Sure wasn’t easy. I only made it about thirty seconds at a time before I started thinking about something else. I mean, I couldn’t concentrate on my breathing at all after about thirty seconds.”

  “Me, too. It seemed like I was in there for a whole day and not just thirty minutes,” she said while laughing. “I wonder how much of this stuff looks easy on paper, but is actually going to be as hard?”

  They both got quiet and picked up their folders to go over them again. This time, they took nothing for granted and read each word and took notes. They both didn’t know it at the time, but they both had just started a life long journey into the discovery of the mysteries of mental and physical abilities. Abilities they had buried deep in them, RJ and Donna was going to teach them to release over the next few years. Abilities they never knew existed, but would be used to save their and many other people’s lives in the near future.

  Chapter 20

  Over the next few months, Mark and Kelly were extremely busy. Mark was able to work into his schedule at least three hours of training RJ had given him each day. He went to the farm three days a week and still managed to work for Plains Airlines enough they didn’t think he dropped off the face of the earth. Kelly was even busier as she had to spend more time at work dealing with the massive layoff starting in a few months. Her days were a blur, but she did manage to train with Donna on Wednesdays and Saturdays and practice her skills for at least two hours each day. She admitted she would not have been able to do this if Mark hadn’t taken up most of the household chores. Kelly still wanted to be in charge of making dinner each day. She would plan the meal and Mark would do the prep work and get everything ready for her so she could cook it once she got home. He also agreed to do the dishes so she could go upstairs with the kids for at least an hour before working on her meditation. Mark and Kelly agreed they knew the world was going to meltdown in the next year or two. There was no reason to spend more than a few minutes on the web each night confirming it. They agreed to take a quick look at Mark’s economic indicators and a few news sources. They wanted to try to figure out if there was still time to work on everything before the crash. They knew they wouldn’t get an exact time the meltdown would occur, but looking over the indicators would let them know if it was happening sooner rather than later.

  It came as a pleasant surprise and source of worry when Mark and Kelly and Kelly’s parents received offers on their houses. It turned out a lot of people were trying to move closer to their jobs. Outlying housing divisions and small towns were losing people who could pick up and leave. Everyone was now faced with the chore of moving and finding new places to live. Kelly solved the problem of a new home for her parents when she took her mom, Mark’s mom, and the girls to visit her grandmother in Madill. On the way back, they passed a mobile home lot that had a big sign saying, “Everything Must Go! No Reasonable Offer Refused.”

  Kelly said “What the hell,” while turning around and driving into the lot.

  The quality of mobile homes impressed everyone. Kelly had made a deal with the lot owner to sell her two 1,200 square foot homes for $38,000 a piece and a 2,200 square foot home for $68,000. She could pay cash for one of the 1,200 square foot homes today even though it would drain their bank account until the house closed in two more weeks. Her mom would need to talk to her dad, but they would also pay cash when their house closed at the end of the week. Kelly also worked out an agreement that if the larger home was still available in two weeks, she would come back and give him a $30,000 down payment. He would finance the remaining $38,000 for ten years at the current finance rate. He agreed and they drew up papers for the smaller home. She said she would be back first thing in the morning with Mark to finish the sale. The owner promised he had crews standing by and could set up any home he sold in a manner of days if their lot was ready. Kelly got a listing of stuff that needed to be done to the farm before the mobile could be set up and promised it would be ready before next week.

  Mark was skeptical about the mobile home until he saw it and learned the ongoing mortgage payment would be less than $400. He loved the look of both the smaller and larger mobile homes. When he learned they could have them ready in a matter of days, he agreed to let Kelly spend the rest of their savings. The owner of the lot was pleased with the sale. He agreed with a $2,000 down payment he would move and set up the larger house before their house sold. Kelly’s dad took a little longer to convince to buy a mobile home. By the end of the day, three new houses were scheduled to be set up on the farm within two weeks. They still needed to add a new septic system for Ted’s and Helen’s new house. Mark also needed to convince his parents to put their house up for sale and move to the second smaller mobile home. Mark and Kelly still needed to rent a small apartment to live in until they did not need to go into work anymore.

  Mark and Kelly had some additional luck during the month. They had managed to secure a new apartment in Denton a few weeks before gas jumped up another $1.50 a gallon. After the gas increased, a mass of people walked away from their home mortgages and rentals in areas deemed too far to drive into work. This mass of people quickly soaked up all the available rental units close to the downtown areas of the cities. Every apartment complex within twenty miles of downtown areas found themselves faced with month-long waiting lists. Rental rates skyrocketed which caused a mass of long-time renters being forced out because they could not afford the new rates. Middle-class working Americans moved into the cities, poorer working class Americans left their jobs and left the cities with anyone who was unemployed or on fixed incomes. This event caused Mark’s dad to finally see the writing on the wall and he sold their house and moved out to the farm with Kelly’s parents.

  Over the course of the summer, Mark continued to work on the farm and was able to add a small garden Kelly, her mom, and his mom tended. Because his parents and Kelly’s parents both would be living on the farm by the end of August, Mark started adding small animals into the mix. He built up a small flock of chickens, ducks, and turkeys. Added rabbits and pigs for meat and because his mom loved raising goats when she was young, they added a small herd of milk goats. The efforts they had made were already paying off in the form of a small number of vegetables, eggs, meat from the chickens and rabbits and milk from the goats. It was not enough to supply them with all their needs. The food they grew did help to supplement their diets with fresh, healthy food when food prices across America were starting to skyrocket upwards.

  The rise in fuel prices brought another crisis to Texas duri
ng the summer. Across the state many school districts decided they could not afford to hold any extracurricular activities in the upcoming school year. Many people didn’t understand this until it was time for the traditional summer football and band practices. Schools decided they could not afford to have teams anymore and went as far as to lay off all coaches of any sport in their districts. Band directors, basketball coaches, track coaches, choir directors, theatre teachers, and the venerable head football coach saw their lives shattered by this decision. They lined up at the unemployment office like a huge number of other Americans to see what the government could do to help them to support their families.

  Getting rid of all teams and extracurricular activities was not the only decision made by desperate school boards. Many urban and suburban schools dropped their school bus services. Parents would have to find ways to drop their kids off at school in the morning and pick them up from school each afternoon. Some schools went as far as stripped the curriculum of all but the basic classes they felt were needed by today’s youth. The high price of fuel was making it much more expensive to keep schools open. Districts decided to reduce the school day to only four hours a day and all schools would close by 2pm each day and not open on Friday. Parents were left scrambling to figure out how they were going to drop their kids off and pick them up from school during the middle of a work day. They scrambled to figure out how to take care of their younger kids before the regular work day ended and on Fridays when they didn’t have school at all. School no longer became the babysitter everyone counted on it to be. As a result of these school districts actions, thousands of unlicensed daycare and transportation companies sprouted up overnight as both the unemployed and the unscrupulous sought to fill a need. Mark and Kelly solved their problems by dis-enrolling Cheyenne from her school. They moved both Cheyenne and Dakota up to the farm to live with their parents. Cheyenne would be home-schooled by Mark’s mother, who was a former school teacher. Mark was not happy with the arrangement, but at least he got to see them almost every day since he went to the farm three days a week. Kelly was extremely depressed about the situation and her inability to see the kids until her employer solved the problem for her.