Hrim turned back to see Amelia’s eyes were drooping as she fell into her next dream. “Zeke?” she called softly. The shadow of a dachshund came through the wall and curled up on the cover at the end of the cushion. “Good boy.” She cooed sleepily.
Hrim relaxed and perched on the windowsill glancing up and down the alley. There was a long way to go and he wasn’t going to let anyone cut the story short if he could help it.
Pause, pause, pause…
The darkness was deeper than any Amelia had ever seen. Nothing was visible. She opened her eyes wider trying to see. With her arms stretched overhead she was clinging to something like a wall while fierce winds buffeted her back. She twisted her neck to squint out from under her arm. The wind stung at her eyes but she was able to see the stars as she had never seen them before. They were closer, and brighter.
Other side. A woman’s voice spoke inside Amelia’s mind.
“What?” Amelia shouted. She was having a hard time hearing over the roaring wind.
I’m on the other side. Amelia heard clearly inside her head. According to the movie I just watched, so am I, Amelia replied in thought.
Very good. Lucidity already! Amelia thrashed her body around as she tried to find a way to stop hanging on to whatever suspended her.
Don’t try to find a way, just wish to be here. The voice replied. Amelia wished to join the voice and found herself sitting in front of Guru Tetta.
“Where are we?” Amelia asked, looking out at the black, star filled sky. The guru smiled. Amelia looked around. The terrain all around her was filled with craters. Amelia’s jaw dropped. She tapped her teeth together and looked at the Guru. “We’re on the moon?” she asked.
Yes. The Guru continued to think her words.
Amelia eyed the Guru. “Listen, I’m not used to talking to people who don’t move their mouths. Could we both talk out loud?” she requested.
“As you wish,” the Guru replied. “Where would you like to begin?”
“Why are we here?” Amelia motioned to the moon. She guessed she had much larger issues she would like to discuss with the Guru, but right now the question taking priority was why the audience had been granted on the edge of a mountain on the moon.
“It’s not a mountain,” Guru Tetta answered Amelia’s thoughts. Amelia looked behind her and saw that the slope was just as deep and a little too close for comfort behind her as it was in front of her. Amelia’s body gave a short, sudden wiggle as if to catch its balance.
“Crater,” Amelia corrected herself. “Why are we meeting on the edge of a crater to talk?”
“This is not a crater,” Tetta corrected again. “It is a precipice. The crater is waaaaay down there.” Tetta pointed into the dark hole with her finger.
“I’m on an edge?” Amelia said aloud.
“Yes.” The guru nodded and motioned as if Amelia should continue.
“This is a metaphor, a symbol?”
“Exactly!” The guru jutted her small fist into the air like a fan cheering at a baseball game.
“You brought me here to show me I’m on the edge?” Amelia felt her body position as if readying for a fight. “I could have told you that. I feel like I’m losing my mind!”
“No, dear,” Tetta replied, “Your unconscious mind brought you here for several reasons.” She laughed lightly.
“Such as?” Amelia simultaneously felt impatient and disrespectful but the guru didn’t seem to mind.
“Partly because you thought you needed to climb a mountain in order to have an audience with a guru. Partly because, yes, the edge has meaning for you. And partly because of Jackie Gleason.” Tetta looked intently into Amelia’s eyes.
“Jackie Gleason?” Amelia repeated incredulously. “God, I wish that just one thing would make a little sense right now.”
Tetta acknowledged the frustration mounting in Amelia. “You were thinking of him as you fell asleep remember? The man at your bedside, he looked like Jackie Gleason to you.”
“Yes?” Amelia felt more and more confused.
“What was one of his best known expressions?” Tetta asked.
Amelia thought for a moment then her face relaxed. “To the moon, Alice?” she asked.
“As you wished.” Tetta motioned to their surroundings.
“But I wasn’t wishing for this,” Amelia argued.
“That’s just what we are here to discuss.” Tetta sat down and arranged herself in easy pose in front of Amelia who suddenly realized there was nothing but air beneath the guru. “You humans have a lot to learn about the power of the word and you, my dear, must learn especially fast under the present conditions.”
“So I’m on the edge,” Amelia acknowledged. “The edge of what?”
“I cannot tell you this.” Tetta shrugged her shoulders.
Amelia’s red hair belied the flaring nature of her temper. As she felt the heat of anger and frustration rise she wondered if the guru would be aware of this as she was her thoughts.
“It’s okay,” Tetta acknowledged, “I could be angry if I were you. But I’m not and I am not keeping information from you child,” the guru went on. “The things you are searching for are already in your grasp. You are simply not yet seeing them.”
“More Wizard of Oz,” Amelia mumbled, remembering her earlier attempt at clicking her heels together. “My ruby slippers are gold lamé, Guru,” she commented.
The guru laughed aloud. “That was a nice try.”
Amelia bristled. “You were watching me in my room?” Amelia shot an angry look at the Guru.
“No,” the Guru answered. “Actually, I am not anywhere at least not in your usual sense. It is not necessary for you to think everything through. One word can convey a lifetime of experience.”
Amelia felt herself grow regretful for the accusing outburst. “So what can you tell me if not what I’m doing here or how to get out alive?” Amelia asked.
“I can acquaint you with where you are.” The guru advanced, “It could be very helpful for you to know how things work in this realm.”
“Realm,” Amelia repeated. “You say that as if this dream was a real place.”
“It is.” Guru Tetta stood on the edge of the crater and looked down at Amelia who felt uneasy inside just by watching the old woman walk on thin air. “Where we are and how it works may not seem the same as your typical dimension, but it is just as real.”
“When I pinch myself it doesn’t hurt,” Amelia asserted as if feeling pain was some sort of a litmus test for reality.
“This is because you have moved beyond the boundaries of your physical body. You are actually beyond the bounds of space and time.”
“So what’s real about it then?” Amelia asked. The guru laughed and then caught herself as she picked up on Amelia’s growing level of irritation.
“What you think you experience in your so-called three-dimensional world is no more real than all of this.” Tetta explained. “It’s just different. Everything you experience here or there comes about as the result of your own thoughts, words, and actions. You have limited yourself to 3-D measures of awareness such as pain. That doesn’t mean that it isn’t real if it doesn’t hurt in this dimension.”
“So we’re in a dream world?” Amelia decided.
“You are in another area of consciousness. In your three-dimensional body you think all of this is happening outside you. Here there is no such standardized duality as inside and outside. Everything you conceive becomes your experience as you wrap your consciousness through it. When you experience your oneness with it you may experience your oneness as separate, but that is a choice. Can you see that?” The guru paused.
Amelia considered her words. They seemed to tear down as fast as they built up an example. In her heart Amelia became aware that she rarely remembered her dreams in 3-D life and didn’t have much interest in other realms or planes of existence.
“Well it’s time to give it a try.” Tetta addressed Amelia’s thoughts.
“Do you mean that my experience of you happens inside me?” Amelia responded.
“Take out the you and me and you get it.”
“Experience…happens?” she asked.
“According to your beliefs which are thoughts that act like silent words to create your experience. See?” The guru Tetta smiled.
“Then I should be able to change my thoughts and change my experience, correct?” Amelia eyed the Guru.
“Yes.”
“Then what am I still doing here? I have wished myself out of this place, home with my dog and yet I remain. What’s the deal, Guru?” Amelia felt strangely confrontational and extremely uncomfortable about it but held her position forgetting Tetta was privy to her every thought and feeling.
“There is a system of checks and balances my dear.” Tetta explained, “Apparently there are many more thoughts and wishes that have brought you to this point which outweigh your recently manufactured desire to retreat.”
“Retreat? You make it sound like I’m giving up.” Amelia noticed how her ego bristled at the idea of quitting. I must be a fighter, she thought.
You are. The guru thought back in the calmest most reassuring thought form she could send out. That is why you are still here. Amelia silently gazed into the guru’s eyes as she realized just how slight the difference between going home and fully crossing over must be.
“I’m just trying to figure out how I can fight if I don’t know what’s going on. How can I know what’s safe?”
“There you go with duality again!” The guru pointed at Amelia. “You wouldn’t be here if you needed to be safe. This is a whole-hearted, winner take all event you have entered into. The key is to give up the need to be safe.”
“Why should I?”
“Because the amount of energy you need to expend on the illusion of being safe is also what you need for a break-through.” Tetta let the side of her fist land in the palm of her outstretched hand for effect. “All attempts to protect yourself eventually produce only the illusion that you are safe.” Tetta underlined her words with the tips of her fingers as she spoke. “That’s what got you here and it is now time to stop for your own sake and the sake of everyone involved!”
“We’re never safe?” Amelia ventured.
“Never.” Tetta replied. “But we’re never truly in danger either,” she reassured.
“But people are physically hurt all the time.”
“Yes, but that is not your limit.”
“Well, I guess that depends on my beliefs.”
“Correct. If you believe you are limited to your body for existence then you will attempt to stay safe, which is to avoid and cut yourself off from the Truth.”
“And the truth is?”
“That everything is one, everything is connected. If everything lived from that truth then everyone would be able to hear everything all the time.”
“That could get very confusing.” Amelia shook her head.
“It can seem overwhelming,” Tetta nodded, “which feels unsafe to many, so they shut themselves off.”
“So I still don’t get how I can benefit from not being safe.”
“Because then you’ll be able to have awareness of your reasons for being here.” The guru moved her face closer to Amelia’s and pressed her eyes to meet with hers. “If you maintain the need to be safe then you must remain ignorant of the agreements and arrangements you made for this journey; and the likelihood of accomplishing your goals will remain diminished, even improbable.”
“So what do I do instead?”
“Give up the need to be safe, stop relying upon your limited thoughts and beliefs, and let yourself be in the flow.”
“How?” Amelia could not consider the possibility of not thinking. Her thoughts were constantly active. A benefit, she believed.
“Think about the boy and the tiger.” Guru Tetta looked deep into Amelia’s eyes. In the pupils of the guru’s eyes, the entire scene of Darius as the tiger showing up on the mountain path replayed as if it were a movie. “Very good,” the guru concluded, “then you see.”
“See what?” Amelia asked urgently, afraid the Guru might be ending their conversation.
“See that no harm came to anyone on the mountain,” the guru proclaimed. "See that the elephant did not need a railing.” Tetta held up one finger as if keeping count. “The boy entered into the flow. He was not afraid.” The second finger sprang into place. “He took care of the tiger with ease.” Another finger went up. “On his suddenly large and flying snail.” She continued to raise fingers in a counting motion. “Even when the man fell over the side he landed safely on a net.” Tetta held up four fingers. “Four things that could have gone wrong because the boy was in the flow.” She dropped her hands to her hips and gave a little jump for emphasis.
“So no one can really be harmed in a dream?” Amelia asked.
The guru slapped her hand to her forehead in frustration. “Real is a dream,” the guru replied. “Every time you dream in your sleep you leave your body. You are dead to your body. Free of it.” Tetta searched for the right words to connect with Amelia on the subject. “Dying is dangerous in 3-D only because humans perceive the loss of their bodies as the end of their existence. But that is not the end of you, sure as you are here talking with me now.”
Amelia was more confused than when they began. She remembered that in the fog before her experiences in the jungle Zeke had told her she was having surgery. “Can my physical body die while I’m here?” she asked.
“Yes,” the guru replied, “There are two ways. You leave your body for good or you believe you can’t get back.”
“Why would I believe that?” Amelia asked.
“Have you been able to return so far?” the guru pointed out.
“But I want to get back.”
“Wanting leaves you wanting. When you have cleared what you have put in place to keep you safe then your wanting will be over and you will be wherever you are,” the guru admonished.
“Then I could just wake up?” Amelia asked.
“When you have your yellow bricks in a row,” the guru borrowed the metaphor. “You have reasons for being here now which only you can tell. To understand these reasons will be easier when you know more about how this realm works. Can we get on with it?”
Amelia was exhausted. She felt challenged and a little beaten up. She couldn’t conceive how the information the guru had so far given her might help her remember who she was or what she was doing here, but she felt limited to the present circumstances. Slowly she realized it was her acceptance of this limit that could leave her hanging short of a solution yet again.
“Teach me more.” Amelia looked at the guru with refreshed determination.
Pause, pause, pause…
3 Don’t Let the Parade Pass You By
“Wake up!” Amelia felt her shoulder being pulled back and forth, rocking her whole body. “Wake up!” Jojo kept pulling.
“No, Jojo, NO!” Amelia pulled her head down toward her chest trying to hold on to her sleep. That’s silly, she thought, what sleep? Her dream began to fade.
“The parade is coming!” Jojo exclaimed, “And there’s a whole bunch of Dumbos!”
Amelia felt her silky nightgown turn into flannel pajamas out of modesty in front of Jojo. She rolled over onto her back. “When, where?” Amelia asked.
“Right now!” Jojo jumped to his feet and scrambled to the window next to Hrim whom he didn’t see.
Amelia looked at the ceiling and tried to remember her dream. With a sense of futility it slipped past her recollection and all she was left with was the image of the guru standing off the edge of a large crater in mid air. She heard Tetta’s last words: “Zen says: Leap and the net will appear, but this is more true: Leap and the need for the net will disappear.”
“Come on, come on! Before it’s all over!” Jojo’s feet danced on the floor as he frantically tried to get Amelia to join him before the parade passed by. Amelia smiled at Joj
o, her eyes also overlooking the sketchy presence of Hrim’s consciousness as it receded to his cot in the respite area.
“Come and look!” Amelia’s eyes moved up to Jojo’s face and she saw that something was different. She looked around the room. Everything was different.
Amelia pushed herself into a sitting position. She was in the middle of a double size bed with a down comforter. The room was decorated with curtains that reminded Amelia of a country cottage. She sprang from the bed still clad in the flannel pajamas and looked past Jojo out the window.
A wooden framed porch stretched beyond sight outside the window. Beyond that a small green lawn was neatly trimmed and edged with red geraniums. Small groups of people cheered along the edges of a normal looking Midwest America street as a parade did indeed pass by.
Amelia listened to the playing of a small brass band. The music was celebrational and the instrumentalists strutted with their knees high in the air. They wore red uniforms with long tails in back and big brass buttons hitched with yellow straps in front.
Following the musicians a wagon was being towed by a huge elephant and followed by many more elephants. Amelia looked at the side of the wagon and blinked her eyes for clarity. In yellow letters on the red paint were the words Drury Brothers Circus Extravaganza.
Amelia pulled her head back inside the window. Once more, even more than the night before, she didn’t know where she was or what she was doing there. Is it possible? she wondered. Amelia looked for the gold lamé shoes. They were still on her feet. Guess I’m still in the shoe realm. I must be getting used to these, she thought as she considered the ease with which she sprinted to the window.
Amelia stepped back. “Isn’t it cool?” Jojo looked up at her. “A circus! I’ve never been to a circus before!”
Amelia looked into the boy’s beaming face and relaxed enough to smell the coffee and bacon that was being cooked somewhere inside the house. She looked down and instantly found herself clothed in a white blouse and blue slacks. Jojo didn’t seem to notice her fancy dressing skills. Amelia heard a dog bark and turned once more to look out the window. Zeke stood wagging his tail in the yard. “Guess what Dorothy?” Zeke teased. “It looks like we made it to Kansas.
Gold Lame' (That's le-mayy) (Gold Lame' Series) Page 5