by Ken Dickson
“That didn’t go very well. I thought that it might cheer him up. He certainly is a… compassionate fellow.”
“I guess you could say that. I’m sure that he appreciates the gift. He’s just dealing with a lot right now. You better go. I’ll take care of him.” I nodded and then left.
A few miles down the 101, I remembered where I’d seen Frank before—in a dream in which he left me stranded in a recliner facing torture in suite 103. I wondered if he really did have reason to apologize and if he had changed somehow. Perhaps I’d ask him some day, but of course, it was just a dream.
There was only one place I could imagine going now—my home. My real home that I didn’t live in anymore. When I finally arrived, I approached the door and rang the doorbell. My dogs barked happily, announcing my arrival, but no one answered. I rang again and the dogs barked in chorus once more, but still no one answered. I desperately wanted to unlock that door as I had for years and welcome licking tongues and wagging tails, but Beth had changed the locks the day after I left. I walked toward the driveway and realized that the van was gone. No one was home. With nowhere else to go, I headed back to my trailer.
As I drove, a deep melancholy overcame me. Oddly, it wasn’t because of the loss of Primera; it was because of the evil I’d experienced over the last weeks. How can people be so intolerant and cruel? I didn’t feel that way anymore and wished that we could erase that kind of ignorant hatred and fear from our psyches. If only it would end, we’d all finally change, be what we were destined to be and stop the senseless suffering and slaughter.
As I crested the hill leading into Primera and turned into my lot behind the big rock, a surprise greeted me. The van was next to the trailer, and Beth and my daughters were sitting on the rock holding each other and crying. When they saw me, my daughters clambered down and raced toward me. As soon as I opened the door and stood, they reached me and hugged me tightly.
“Where were you, Dad? We thought you were dead!”
“No one knew where you were.”
I didn’t reply. I simply hugged them in return and looked with great sorrow at Beth who walked toward me, her bloodshot eyes revealing the depth of her despair. As soon as she was close, I let go of the girls and embraced her, not caring if I offended her or not.
“I… I thought we’d lost you.”
“I’m sorry—for everything,” I replied as I shared the love of the people who despite all that had happened were the most important to me in the world.
After spending some time with Beth and the kids at the charred remains of Primera, I desperately needed sleep. When they finally left, I collapsed fully clothed onto my bed in the trailer. In no time, I was dreaming.
Chapter 46
ON A MOUNTAIN MEADOW
I stood at the upper end of a grassy meadow awash with colorful wildflowers. The view was familiar but somehow less exaggerated than I recollected. It was the view from the meadow near Utopia in my long ago dream at Pinecrest. The lake, with pine-covered peninsulas and islands, was a deep, crystalline blue and much grander than I remembered, and the distant mountains seemed less caricature and more real than the ones of the dream. Stubborn remnants of winter’s snows capped their rugged peaks, highlighting ski runs on the largest of them.
As I savored the awe-inspiring panorama, I noticed a man standing near a bench at the far end of the meadow, waving at me. From my vantage point, I could not identify him, but something drew me to him. I took a step through the tall grass and then another. As the distance shrank, I recognized him: Skip, from that same dream of Utopia.
Skip was a retired man whom I knew in real life, with a machine shop and welding equipment in his garage. In 2011, he helped me finish building a sand-rail that I’d been working on for five years. The Skip of the dream, although more youthful in appearance than the real Skip, apparently existed at some future time in this place. He struck me as all knowing, but whenever I asked him a question, he’d dodge it with replies like: “That’s the million dollar question,” or “That’s all I’m going to say or I’ll spoil the surprise,” or even “You just gotta think it all out, buddy.”
For some reason, seeing him thrust me back into reality, and the full emotions of the past few days struck me like a sucker punch. I stumbled, steadied myself, and then continued, my shoulders slumping increasingly under the snowballing weight of the immense emotional burden that I bore. My feet grew more leaden with each step until I could barely move. It took everything I had to reach him. When I ultimately did, I collapsed in tears at his feet. He reached down, helped me onto the bench, and then sat beside me.
“It’s okay, buddy. A man can only be expected to endure so much.” After a time, the burden eased, and instead of feeling shattered, I felt invigorated, to the point that I wondered if I was once again manic. My memory sharpened, my senses amplified and everything took on a life of its own. Normally, I’d be very concerned to feel that way, but here it felt natural: a logical extension of the splendor surrounding me.
“It looks different than I remember. Is this a dream or is it real?”
“This is the real deal. It does exist, and someday you’ll find it. What you will do then remains a mystery. It’s really up to you. It doesn’t need to be anything but what it is. I expect that you’ll figure it out once you’re faced with it.”
“Are you God?” I asked uncertainly.
“If I am or if I’m not is irrelevant. What really matters is where you are in your life.”
“And where exactly is that?”
“Do you think that you and your people are the first to be given the gift that you have?”
“I’ve wondered about that. It occurred to me that there could have been others.”
“Have you figured it out yet?”
“What?”
“The message.”
“What do you mean?”
Instead of responding, he gazed at me quizzically and then grinned crookedly as it finally hit me like a ton of bricks. The graffiti escalating to vandalism; Carlos’s brutal death; the kids with gas cans; a snowplow in Phoenix; the tanker truck spewing gasoline. There was a message, and each time we ignored it, things worsened. We hunkered down, we fortified, and we never once considered an alternative to our single-mindedness. In the end, when even our 9-1-1 calls went unanswered, it should have been obvious. Why, there was even a mushroom cloud to top it all off, and a second one. The message was so over the top, so exaggerated and out of proportion to anything I—or any of us—had ever experienced, yet we didn’t listen. Now, I heard it—like me yelling at myself through a bullhorn: THERE CAN BE NO AMISTAD.
“Yes,” I replied after a long pause. Just like at Gracewood when life would wallop me on the side of the head when I got off track, the same thing was happening to all of us. One big whack after another and not one of us paid attention. We were going down the wrong path. It was never our destiny to reach Amistad. We missed the message—all of the messages—and apparently, when you do that, life comes back at you in spades.
It was my fault. I should have paid attention. Now, it was up to me to share this revelation, or we would repeat the same mistake again. We must change course and pay better attention to life’s synchronistic messages.
“It’s always been like this. Whenever people were given the opportunity, they always tried to do the same thing: gather the sheep and build an enclave of sameness where they could all enjoy it together.”
That was not at all what I intended, but it was the path I could see clearly now. Amistad would be a fortress against humanity instead of the best hope for it, with all of us barricaded behind its walls. The path we had chosen had only one ending—us fighting to the death against the entire jealous, hateful world in defense of our ideology. Despite our precious gift, we were no different from anyone else—or were we?
“It’s not over, is it,” I stated more than asked.
“That remains to be seen, but it’s a good
start. In the past, everyone died protecting their beliefs. Perhaps this time you’ll realize that it’s more important to stay alive for the sake of all of humanity than to die and take your gift with you. The question is what are you going to do now? I have a hint for you, something to keep in mind as you continue your journey: All you have to do is shine.”
Chapter 47
SHIFTING GEARS
I awoke with Skip’s hint echoing in my mind. I had a dream with a similar message on my last day at Gracewood. The mind certainly works in perplexing ways to drive a point home. Although I’d only rested for only a few hours, I could not fall back asleep. As I lay there, a vehicle drove up. Moments later, someone knocked on the trailer door.
“Who is it?”
“Merry. Can we talk?”
“Sure.” I got up and opened the door.
“Mind if we sit on the rock?”
“Not at all.” We walked up the trail and pulled ourselves onto it.
“First, I wanted to say how sorry I am about all of this. What an incredible shame. I’m so glad that no one was hurt. It could have been a real death trap if you hadn’t evacuated.”
“Yeah, that’s a positive.”
“How are you holding up?”
“As well as can be expected, I guess. I’ll be okay.”
“If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call. I’ll be here as quickly as I can.”
“I appreciate that. So, what’s the real reason you’re here?”
“That obvious, huh? I had a big spiel put together for you about how advertising and consumerism is bringing western society to the brink of a mental meltdown. It's a fascinating pitch detailing our tailspin into brokenness. But I just had a breakthrough of sorts, and I wanted to share that with you instead.”
“I’d love to hear that spiel sometime, but right now I’d rather hear about a breakthrough.”
“Recently, I encountered a man who claimed that he suffered from bipolar disorder, MS, migraines, eczema and more. He said that he took thirteen different medications daily and three more as needed for over nine years to combat his ailments. Although only in his forties, he walked with a cane and had to wear a cooling vest if the temperature rose beyond seventy degrees.”
“He sounds like a wreck.”
“That’s just it. He’s not. He’s completely cured and no longer on medication. I checked into his story, and it’s legit. He’s a walking miracle, but the most interesting thing is that he did it himself.”
“How?”
“Frustrated with his life, he decided to focus on the one thing that he felt he could change: his thoughts. On his own, he set about stopping the spinning thoughts that filled his mind from dawn until dusk.”
“That sounds familiar, like what I did when I was manic.”
“But his was not as risky an approach as yours.”
“As if I had much choice.”
“His plan was ingenious. All he did was force himself to not dwell or ruminate on thoughts for increasingly longer periods. At first, he could only do this for a few seconds, then a few minutes. After months of dedicated effort, he could do it for twenty minutes. Do you know what happened then?”
“He changed?”
“Exactly, but the way he describes it, the brief periods of silence and bliss he achieved during his arduous journey became innate: his natural state.”
“Incredible. I always wondered if you could stop the thoughts some other way.”
“Even more importantly, when that happened, his disabilities vanished.”
“I never told anyone, but I saw the same thing in Primera. Over time, everyone got better. After their minds changed, so did their bodies.”
“I’ve seen it, too, in other resilients.”
“Does this mean that you’ve solved the puzzle? Can anyone become resilient?”
“Perhaps, but so far, nobody’s beating down my door to try this man’s recipe. It’s a huge undertaking, and it’s unlikely that many would succeed. Everyone wants a magic pill, a miracle. They don’t want to work. Even if they did, look at all the overweight people in the world who’ve tried unsuccessfully to lose weight. It’s simple math: eat less and you’ll lose weight. However, the mind doesn’t easily let go of old habits, and it’s very crafty at keeping things status quo. This is immensely important, nevertheless. If it is the key to resiliency, not only could it open doors for humanity, it could cure many ailments and end much suffering. We can’t let what happened here stop us. We have to keep going.”
“I agree, but the path we were on is suicide, and I’m flat out of ideas at the moment.” We both sat quietly for a time and then he spoke again.
“I’m sure it will work itself out. So, would you like to hear my spiel about advertising now?”
“You're incorrigible.”
“I think a more appropriate term would be resilient.”
“Point taken. Okay, lay it on me. I've got nothing better to do.”
Filled with enthusiasm, he related a long and colorful tale that began with snake oil salesmen and ended with bipolar disorder, attention deficit disorder, depression, anxiety, panic attacks and even acne. I loved the quirky way his mind worked to, metaphorically speaking, find and painstakingly assemble the pieces of his latest puzzle. Of course, the key to getting everything back on track was resiliency, and the way he laid it all out left me with no doubt that he was right.
We spoke until the sun dipped below the Estrellas, and despite the stench of burned homes that permeated the air and grounded me in reality, the conversation left me feeling rejuvenated. In any case, it sure beat spending the afternoon crying. After he left, I fixed myself dinner and then went back to bed.
Early the next morning, the unmistakable sound of heavy vehicles driving close by woke me. I peered through the blinds and noticed several flatbed trucks filled with people heading into Primera. What now? Looters? I jumped from bed and quickly dressed, intending to defend Primera, but then it occurred to me that there was nothing to loot. I raced from the trailer and scampered onto the rock. What I saw shook me to the core. I couldn’t make out any familiar faces from the crowd of people below. I had no idea who they were, or where they came from, but they certainly weren’t looters.
My heart filled with joy. I’d begun to wonder after all the things that had happened if there were any decent people left beyond the few I’d come to know in Primera. Here was my answer. People of all sizes, shapes and colors worked together to clean up what was left of Primera. They must have watched the news. The media is good for something, after all!
I ran down the road at full speed, thanking everyone I encountered. As I reached the end of the road, the geyser continued to roar. I was surprised that the city had not cut the water yet, but that sight and the joy of that moment spurred in me a hope to one day build a fountain at that very site to commemorate what happened.
While I looked on, the geyser shrank as somewhere, a city worker turned a valve. With a final gurgle, it disappeared into the mud from which it had come. That day, as I worked alongside perfect strangers in the ruins of Primera, I added a new stain to my already sweat-and blood-stained EWU baseball cap: soot.
Chapter 48
THE CROSS TEST
The message was clear. Instead of gathering in an enclave of sameness, we needed to reach out with our gifts and make the world a better place for all of humanity in our own unique ways. I would communicate that message soon enough, but for now, I relished the goodwill of those around me as we worked together to clean up Primera.
Eventually, word spread and some familiar faces joined in: Conner, as upbeat as ever; Nick, with his fiancée, teen-aged son and daughter; Jessie, arm-in-arm with Frank; and finally, Emma, holding hands with a man I’d only seen in photographs.
“Late bloomer,” she said.
“That’s a perfect analogy coming from you,” I replied. I thought that the change had stalled but welcomed a rare excep
tion, and no one deserved a positive outcome for her devoted efforts more than she did. I hugged her, and then she introduced me to her husband.
Considering how devastated I’d been a day earlier, I couldn’t imagine feeling happier. Nevertheless, things needed to change. The next day, I met with the BRI staff. Although many questions remained unanswered, we did reach consensus on one issue. Afterward, I strategized how to present our decision to the employees of BRI.
***
On the evening of June 28, 2014, I once again found myself in a conference room at the Arizona Grand. By coincidence, only one room was available when I called for a reservation: the same one in which I’d kicked off this venture. This time, however, there was no stage, upbeat music, inspiring video, food or drink. Just me holding a wireless microphone and standing next to the small PA system from the company picnic.
After the last stragglers arrived and the doors closed, I reached into my shirt pocket and pressed the record button on a small digital voice recorder. Then, I raised the microphone to speak. “Good evening, everyone. Thank you for coming. Can you believe where we are? This wasn’t part of my plan, but it does bring back fond memories. That was quite a night, wasn’t it?
Things have changed immensely since then. I can hardly believe how far we came and how hard we fell.” I nearly started to cry, took a deep breath instead, and continued. “Such a catastrophe would scar most people for life, but not you. Many of you are already working to rebuild Primera, and others are preparing more fervently than ever for Amistad. Your resilience astounds me.”
There was a roar of enthusiasm. Everyone wished to put the past behind and continue the adventure.
“Unfortunately, I’m here tonight to put an end to it. All work on Primera and Amistad must cease immediately.”
Cries of disbelief filled the room. “I know that this comes as a shock. Believe me, it’s not a decision that came easily, but our very lives may depend on it. I’d like to share a story with you, one that I’ve never told anyone before. In May 2011, paramedics took me to Pinecrest, a behavioral health facility in central Phoenix. While there, I changed, becoming like all of you. The day afterward, I lay on my back on a bed with my eyes closed, contemplating my miraculous change. By coincidence, with my arms outstretched and my legs together, my body formed the shape of a cross. While I reflected, two PAs entered the room. Assuming that I was asleep, they tried to awaken me.