Might As Well Be Here Now

My friend, John Freeman and I have been friends for sixty-one years. He recently visited Chapel Hill and stayed with Carol and me for a few days. John travels in a large, solar-equipped, self-contained van in which he can drive, sleep, eat, camp, stay warm, and entertain himself as he travels across the country. I don’t know how many cross-country trips John has taken in his van but I think he has stopped by Chapel Hill in the van three times over the years. John and I met in Cub Scouts when we were eight years old. We lived on the same street and our houses were only a few doors away from each other.  We were close friends in those days and spent a lot of time just hanging out at his house. John’s mother was a single parent. I called her Aunt Mildred. She was a profoundly good person but being a single parent in the fifties was no easier than it is today - just more unusual. Perhaps out of necessity, Mildred was a good deal more flexible in her supervision than my pa...

My friend, Lloyd, and I graduated from the same high school. We often talk and laugh about that period in our lives. Our high school days occurred over fifty years ago but those days continue to produce interesting echoes. Our high school served predominately white, blue collar, working class neighborhoods in Louisville. Our school did not have all of the resources or the perceived advantages of high schools in wealthier neighborhoods in the East End. I used to think that whatever I learned in those teenage years was in spite of my high school, not because of it. Like high school kids everywhere we learned to entertain ourselves during school hours by pranking teachers or inventing other ways to creatively misbehave. Sometimes after school we entertained ourselves by watching tough guys fight each other behind the Texaco station next door. The tough guy fights drew large crowds and provided valuable learning opportunities for those of us in the audience. For example, I lea...

“A lucid dream is a dream during which the dreamer is aware of dreaming. During lucid dreaming, the dreamer may be able to exert some degree of control over the dream characters, narrative, and environment.” __________________________________________________ Look at your hands. This is such a simple sentence. Its simplicity might be why it works as a way to intentionally shift an ordinary dream into a lucid dream. A few days ago, I started re-reading a book by Carlos Castaneda called “The Art of Dreaming.” My good friend, Lloyd, gave me the book for Christmas. It was published in 1993 and I remember first reading it around that time. In the book the author describes a number of techniques to alter awareness through intentional dreaming. One of the techniques is to give yourself a simple instruction while awake to carry out in a dream. The recommended instruction is as simple as it gets. Look at your hands.  Since I first read this instruction in 19...

Carol and I spent the last week helping our son, Patrick, his fiancé, Lisa, and their dog, Bramble, move to Denver, Colorado from Raleigh, NC. We helped them drive their two cars and a 15-foot panel truck 1700 miles in three days. We stopped overnight in Louisville and then in Kansas City and then… just kept driving. The outside temperature was near zero for about half of the trip. The wind gusts in Kansas made it difficult to keep the panel truck upright and in the correct lane. Lisa had a bad cold and needed rest. By the end of the second day, Patrick was exhausted and feeling the stress of being the group leader and primary truck driver. Bramble and I were both disoriented and constipated. By Day Three Carol was absorbing some of the stress, too. Yet, if Patrick asked me to take the entire trip again, I would do it in a heartbeat. It actually was a privilege to witness Patrick and Lisa as they took a big risk and moved West. ________________________________________________...

Have you ever daydreamed through a Christian Christmas church service? I have daydreamed through many. Sometimes I daydream the sermon that I would like to be hearing instead of the one that is going on. The following fictional Christmas sermon is the result of one of those daydreams. This does not necessarily reflect what I believe. It is, however, a fictional perspective on Christmas that I would understand and respect. ________________________________________________________________________ Good morning and Merry Christmas brothers and sisters. Here we are again. Right now... on this beautiful morning where we have gathered to celebrate together the birth of Jesus Christ. Let’s begin today by taking a deep breath… and then releasing it very slowly. Let’s pause and notice the space we are sharing with each other right now…in this sacred moment. Before our Christmas celebration begins I want to share with you some unusual questions I am asking myself this year. Thi...

I recently watched a movie on Netflix called, Dying to Know . It is a documentary film narrated by Robert Redford about the lives of Timothy Leary and Ram Dass, aka, Richard Alpert. Much of the film is footage of a conversation between the two men that occurred a few months prior to Timothy Leary’s death. I think the movie does a great job of telling the story of how these two men influenced the culture in obvious and in subtle ways. I cannot describe how I felt watching the film. I first heard the story of Timothy Leary and Ram Dass, in 1971. Someone gave me a reel-to-reel audiotape and just said, “You will want to listen to this.” I listened to it and then listened to it again…and again. It was a three hour talk by Ram Dass describing his experience with Timothy Leary and psychedelic drugs that lead to his eventual pilgrimage to India. The audiotape preceded the soon-to-be released book, Be Here Now . While watching the movie, Dying to Know, I was swept with my...