Parentood
My Father was eighteen years older than my mother and before they ever met he had survived World War II and Palestine in '46. After that, he went to South Africa where he worked as a civil engineer before returning to Britain in the mid 1950's.
*(As I wrote those lines the smoke alarm I keep in my room beeped three times... maybe it needs a new battery?).
My father left school at 14. He signed up, joining the army before war was declared on Germany. When he came out he could speak German, Italian and French, fluently, and could get by in Polish (and several more that I can't remember). There was no word in the English language (and probably the others too) that he was unable to spell correctly.
Although he was with the Eighth Army in Africa and Sicily, my uncle said that during the war there were periods where no information was available to the family, either of his whereabouts or what he was involved with.
The Long Range Dessert Group was founded in Egypt 1940, a group that never numbered more than 350 men, all of whom were volunteers. The LRDG worked with the SAS, military intelligence, and operated often behind enemy lines. There is no record of his military service, that I have been able to find.
Needless to say my father was not an emotional man. On the few occasions that I challenged him, physical violence was involved, but nothing that I didn't ask for, or deserve at the time.
My mother on the other hand, was artistic, very emotional... and apart from being evacuated during the war to Cornwall, had never been anywhere outside of Richmond Upon Thames, where she remains to this day.
Losing Control
The marriage was doomed from the outset and deteriorated drastically during my childhood and I have seen some things that a child ought not to have seen. I only ever saw my father crack once... he howled like a wolf, like a wild animal caught in a trap, something I will never forget.
Eventually, both my parents turned to drink and my mother suffered severe mental health problems as a result of not being able to receive the emotional security that she desperately required.
She became addicted to the mind altering drugs that men in white coats prescribe, drugs which mask the underlying problem, and rob the mind of all of its power... to heal itself.
Even in my darkest hours, I refused to take the drugs that were offered to me, and to this day rarely drink alcohol. (I have only really been completely drunk once, the day I got married)?
Eventually, my mother became one of those people, confined to her bed in a darkened room '... crying desperate tears, on the inside, that no one can hear'. By then, I had become immune to my parents' problems (as a self-defence mechanism), but one day she called out to me from her room. I found her there, alone, desperate... she asked me for help, saying that she wanted to die.
A year after my Near Death Experience, I took her away from that room, returning her here to Richmond where she found someone else to look out for her, a job which has now fallen once again, to me. However, at 81 she no longer suffers from anything other than the problems of old age.
Having found my mother like that, back in '82, I asked whatever it is that's always been there, in the background; "take it from her and give it to me, I'm stronger than her."
Eight years later, I found my self back in that very same room, alone and in darkness, feeling that I had nothing left to live for. Be very careful, for what you wish.
A Fateful Day
Although no words were spoken to me during my NDE... by that which has always been there, in the background, (usually off to my left-hand side) I can equate it to 'someone'... pressing the 'pause' button.
At the time, back in '81, life was ok? I had a beautiful girlfriend that I'd met back in 1975 after having been sent to the local pub in the middle of the day, to find. I'd just got off my motorbike having returned from buying an album... 'In For The Kill' by Budgie and I was going to go indoors, to play it... like you do?
I never normally would've gone to the pub, on my own, (because I was still a bit insecure then) let alone, in the middle of the day? It was August the second... the same day that the 'Lone Arrow' portrait was painted, by psychic artist Margaret Bevan 25 years before... eight years before I was born.
I kind of just 'knew' I was supposed to go there, so I got back on my bike and drove off to the pub. I parked my bike in the carpark, went in and bought a lager shandy (I was riding!). I went back outside to find her sitting there with her friend (who I knew) on the wall, next to my bike.
Giving Up The Ghost
Six years later, as I lay in my hospital bed, it had never really occurred to me, that I had been using my girlfriend (who later became my wife) as an emotional crutch, one that had supported me since I was seventeen... one that I desperately needed then, because I had lived for a long time, 'switched off' emotionally, from the problems at home.
I also had no reason to consider the fact that the same crutch would one day be kicked from under me, forcing me into a position, that would be very difficult for me, to recover from? (To this day, she remains the only person that I have ever been that close to).
In 1981 I had my own business as a graphic designer and a large advertising account. Things were looking like I was actually going to be right (when in 1974 I had been asked during my interview at Epsom School of Art and Design...) "How do you envisage yourself by the time you're twenty five?"
When I replied that I supposed I'd own my own home and be married by then... they laughed at me, suggesting I should go and get a job at a supermarket? (I was right. Asshole).
At that point, I had no reason to 'give up the ghost' and lay down and die. However, at the very basic level, we are human animals and when an animal is wounded to the point it can no longer fully function... it will crawl off into a corner someplace, having accepted that it is time to die.
NDE
So, I found myself on 'pause'... in a 'nowhere place', pitch black, no noise, nothing. I was completely unafraid, because I'd been here before, when I was very young. But this time I wasn't falling. I was no longer that terrified three-year old child desperately trying to get back to its body. I completely understood what was happening.
I'd previously been shown my body, laying there on the hospital bed, motionless. I could see right through it, almost like a CAT scan... flesh, bone, blood and the rot, poison or whatever it was inside, that had stopped it from functioning properly. It repulsed me and I moved away from it, quickly... "that is, NOT ME!".
I said those words... except I didn't speak them, (because there is no mouth to speak them with, or ears to hear them with). But just as you may well be thinking to yourself right now, "WTF?" you can still hear those words, on the inside can't you? And... they sound exactly the same to you, as they do when you say them out loud, don't they?
There were no bright lights, or visions of doom, or tunnels or angels (or Native American Indians). My brain wasn't pumping itself full of chemicals, desperately trying to cling on to life. Like the wounded animal, it had reached the conclusion... that it was done for.
Likewise, after a week of incredible stomach pain, being misdiagnosed twice, getting up in the middle of the night, not even telling my parents (because I 'knew' they, would call an ambulance and it would be too late) driving my self in agony to the hospital, being cut open, losing over three stone in weight, my girlfriend in tears, having a junior doctor push tubes up my nose and down my throat, vomiting up dark red stuff, splitting my stitches... finally, I really had, had enough of all that!
Not many people in a state of panic or desperately trying to 'cling on' or survive... would pull the tubes out of themselves and tell their doctor to "F*ck off and leave me alone!"... would they?
And there were no other souls, spirits, guides (or whatever you want to call them)... because I didn't need them to be there, in the 'nowhere place' or in-between this one and the next one. I say no one was there which is technically correct, but that which has always been there, was still there, but maybe a bit closer than before?
I don't know what 'It' is... but certainly not 'the great white wizard in the sky'? (I borrowed that from somewhere). There was no exceptional feeling of 'love' all around me (I was a 'grown-up' by now) but there was nothing whatsoever, to be afraid of.
I did feel slightly in awe... kind of like "don't say anything stupid right now... K?" Because, there is, there was, something there that I can only describe as immense, probably beyond my limited ability to fully comprehend... except 'It' knew me and I knew 'It'.
Maybe 'It' is the Universe itself, because after all, that is where we were made, out of stardust? However, that only really applies to the body... the one that had broken down, that was still back there on the bed. I get the feeling that 'It' is a bit more complicated than that... probably?
Consequences
Undoubtedly, some will say, I was dreaming. But in your dreams you still experience the every day symptoms of being in your body. Fear, anger, anxiety, stress, hunger... you even feel horny, in your dreams? There was none of that business going on, because I wasn't in my body and I wasn't dreaming.
As I have said, there was no reason for me to not want to carry on with my life. However, I wasn't in any particular hurry to get out of where I now found myself, either. The world is a pretty uncomfortable place... and to some extent we exist in it like a fish out of water.
Right from when you're born... frustration, hunger, then itchy school trousers, confusion, zits, too hot, too cold, and tired man... exhaustion! You cannot even begin to imagine what it's like to be totally free, of all that... to exist completely in your natural state of being.
And yet here I was 'on hold'. No explanation as to why, other than the fact that either my body had died... or I had gotten the hell out of Dodge, before it did? No explanation as to why I wasn't going on to the next place... or being shown, or guided as to, what I was supposed to do next?
I don't know why I said it, it would have been a lot easier, with hindsight, to have decided for myself... not to go back, and face what was to come, in the years that followed, even now, thirty five years later. But I did say it:
"It's up to you..."
"Either I go on, or go back."
"It's your decision."
Looking back now I have realised, the 'pause' button was probably pressed because it wasn't entirely certain that I could survive what would follow, if I returned. I was kind of being given the option to quit, while I was ahead. I had no idea what awaited me, back here, on the Bridge... only that it was important, had purpose, and was not just for my benefit alone?
I guess those words meant "I know you... and I trust you, completely".
If I had chosen not to return to this place there would have been consequences, not just for my own personal or spiritual development, but for the others. The people you meet in this life, including your parents, your children, even strangers... something that you do, maybe in the briefest of moments, will have consequences; both good and bad ones. Nothing happens purely by accident, of that I am certain.
So, no matter how bad things get, hold on. If you decide you can't carry on with your journey, crossing the Bridge Of Life, no you won't be damned. But there will be consequences for those that you love, and who loved you back and whom you will leave, behind you.
And there will be consequences for you too. Nothing bad, but like school... this place can be a very big pain in the ass, but it is also necessary for you, to learn and to grow.
You have a purpose. You may not know what it is yet, you may never get to know... but the alternative may be that you're put on hold until you're ready to try it all over again?
You got this far... keep going. Hold on tight, to the fact that every day you do make a difference, just by being right here, right now, on a journey that was set out for you alone, to complete.
"The world is a Bridge, pass over it, but build no houses upon it".
"... build no houses upon it." Because the Bridge is not your home, where you truly belong. Only when you cross the Bridge will you get there and know that 'It' is awesome... and that so were you!
Peace be with you. <-
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| 'Lone Arrow' painted by Margaret Bevan (psychic artist) on 2nd August 1950. **(The smoke alarm was quiet, until I got to the last paragraph, why I stopped there. Needs a new battery now). |
