i could feel pulses of energies emanating from the light … tutoring my being … coercing measure for measure my breath and beat for beat my heart … a corporeal bypass keeping kilter of my anatomy against the siege of my endocrine system … preventing me from going into shock … which was very important … if i went into shock mytelepathic sense would shut down … i knew that … i knew that in the same astonishing way that i knew where i was … who these people were … what the blue lights did and ... what was about to happen next …
Catch me if you can ...
a story of alien abductions and culprit plunder
By continuum thoughtBalboa Press
Copyright © 2014 continuum thought
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4525-9298-5Contents
Introduction, xv,
Part One, 1,
Tipping Point, 3,
Part Two, 29,
Encounter, 31,
Part Three, 79,
Fringe, 81,
Post Script, 117,
Part Four, 119,
Peyote Dream, 121,
Pawn from D2 to D4, 167,
CHAPTER 1
Part One
Tipping Point
the story is alive ...
the dance is intimate.
thought continuum
circa 2012
the big guy they call "chief"
killed mcmurphy... suffocating him
with a pillow, pressing his massive bulk into
the job until mcmurphy's thrashing limbs became still.
lifeless ...
nothing left except
his lobotomized carcass ...
the eyes rolled upward
as though staring at the still-raw
incisions distended from his endgame struggles ...
in a movement
that was as gentle
as a prayer, chief leaned
over and closed mcmurphy's eyes ...
they had been friends ...
the trust between them ... impeccable ...
it was the right thing to do ...
the boy-man they call billy,
whose voice was a stutter ...
killed himself ...
the chasm between what is normal
and what is natural ... between himself
and the man in the mirror ... became sow wide
it broke his mind, his reasoning, and his understanding ...
he used the shards
to cut his own throat ...
it was an insufferable epilogue to a pained life
in a world where conformity is driven by compulsion ...
and ...
it was a sin ...
whose particular sin it was ...
i was uncertain ...
the year was 1976 ...
it was early spring and there
were warm currents of air billowing
into the great basin of utah, bringing with
them restitution from the frigid winter months ...
the parking lot, as we were leaving
the theater, was mostly empty, with a smattering
of cars spread out in a haphazard constellation of headlights ...
taylor and i both stood quietly under the marquee,
inhaling the fresh night air, rinsing the smell of popcorn
from our palates and the taint of tyrannical power from our thoughts ...
meeting mcmurphy and chief and billy
at the late-late-night big-screen premiere
of one flew over the cuckoo's nest was ... disturbing ...
i glanced over toward taylor,
who is usually all dimples and curly hair,
only to find the same dark glimmer of comprehension ...
he was older than i was, although i had
never given that fact much thought before ...
he had served a tour of duty in the military
right out of high school and had probably already
begun indoctrination into these vague, gray-colored worlds ...
where murder and suicide made sense ...
he began scuffing the soles
of his shoes against the pavement
as though scraping some existential muck
he had accidently stepped in off the bottom of his feet ...
i turned my gaze to the parking lot ...
i could hear the engine of the last car grind
a few times before sputtering to life, lurching forward
as the clutch popped and gravel skittered underneath the tread ...
the star had become a comet
fishtailing its departure into the night ...
i was left staring
into the empty blacktop
with its mysterious gravitational pull ...
falling headlong
into my own contemplations ...
i knew whose sin it was ...
it was mine ...
in some strange and insoluble
way, i was as accountable for this world
and her stories as anyone else and everyone else ...
i found myself standing inside
a moment usually much more covert ...
the moment when one moves
from being a child to becoming a participant ...
i seemed to be rushing headlong
into an epiphany i did naught want to grasp
and refusing to molt into a world i did naught want to own ...
i was at a standstill ...
stunned by a momentary lucidity ...
held fast by
the sheer implications ...
questions that had never
occurred to me before were naught
only arising but multiplying at an alarming rate ...
my old viewpoint of a very safe ...
very structured ... very orderly world
where right was right and wrong was wrong
and frontal lobes were made for keeping was mutating ...
in a most uncomfortable way ...
time was becoming an imminent sensation
where belief systems collide, giving rise to new ideas ...
and cold harsh realities.
i am certain, by and large,
that this movement from childhood
to becoming a participant is more long-suffering ...
glimpses that are dealt in increments
buffered with complacency and preintegrated
with indifference. a stoic resilience to a maniacal world ...
where reason is contrived
and god is punitive ...
a sort of built-in
shock absorber for the soul ...
for me.
it was all about tonight ...
even at eighteen—well,
perhaps even especially at eighteen—
the world and her stories were already suspect.
what i had naught realized before
is that these stories are naught sow easily dismissed ...
once donned,
they created a matrix ...
a mold ... a grid ... a model for life ...
a collective frame for the mind, if you will ...
at the moment,
i was off the grid ...
and thinking outside the box ...
oh, i was still around,
falling in step with taylor
as we headed to our car parked
around the side of the theater with its
outdated registration stickers safely hidden from view ...
but i was definitely off the grid ...
i know i was
because i could see
this matrix ... this grid of
consciousness clearly from where i was ...
which was ... stepped back ...
it is a particular
and peculiar habit i have ...
i can step back ... step away ...
step aside ... step back and step away ...
step inside ...
or any variation of the above,
depending on what angle i want to
see from or what depths i desire to explore ...
step ...
and i am naught
talking about footfalls here ...
i am talking more
the blink ... blink ... of an eye ...
more a calisthenics of consciousness
than any literal stomping or treading of the feet ...
the motion and the maneuvering of
each step delivered by varying dilations
of the pupils of my eyes, the darkling bringing
with it a plethora of information both formal and informal ...
both by sight
and by intuition ...
much like the aperture
of a camera can be enlarged
or contracted to admit more light or less ...
bringing into sharper focus whatever
depth in the image its attention is directed ...
i am able to click through the lenses
of my perception, adding depth and songs
and colors to an otherwise homogenous world ...
it is hard naught to do ...
downright tantamount
to my existence—
or at least ...
my understanding of it ...
perhaps i am just
loosely woven together ...
or perhaps it is simply
a proclivity of preponderance ...
either way ...
fueled by an urgency
i could naught quite comprehend ...
i was definitely stepping back ...
the show was naught
the comedy i was expecting ...
in fact, it was sow unexpected
and sow in my face. sow immediate,
and sow intimate, and i was taken sow off
guard by it, that my first reaction was to step back ...
as far back as i could possibly go
and still know what i know ...
i had a bird's-eye view
of something explicit and inexplicable ...
i could see the entire world
bathed in this matrix ... this grid of
consciousness ... this story we tell ourselves ...
from meridian to meridian
and all points between i could see
lights ... layer upon layer ... winking in and out ...
a synaptic symphony
of knowing and experience ...
i could see this matrix being
both the story and the source of the story ...
there appearing to be no
discernable difference between ...
one and the other ...
i could see it was a
consensus reality of some sort ...
a collaborative effort
that had somehow gone awry ...
and this consensus reality
seemed to be the only realty in town ...
recognized ... sanctioned ...
legitimate ...
i could also see that i was as much a part
of this matrix as this matrix was a part of me ...
yet ... its rationalization was sow far from
my soul that i could barely recognize myself within it ...
let alone be willing
to realize myself within it ...
now i know this sounds like a lot
to garner from watching just one movie ...
but ...
as i said before ... the world
and her stories were already suspect ...
the movie simply connected the dots
of my suspicions in a way that was unexpected ...
oh ... i know i could probably tell you,
i had myself a case of the enlightenments ...
however ...
that would naught be true ...
nor would it be appropriate ...
what i was experiencing was
definitely more a stupor than a grace ...
a recognition
without a familiarity ...
a stumbled upon awareness
that lacked legitimacy
simply because
it existed
outside
the
box ...
in fact ...
i was feeling rather huge
and conspicuous at the moment,
walking around outside of a frame of mind ...
no longer an
adolescent child ...
naught quite yet
a full fledged participant ...
somewhere in between and obvious ...
i could naught escape the feeling that
naught only was i stepping back ... i was standing out ...
i was distinguishing myself ...
and ...
naught in a good way ...
i was born a culprit, sow
the sensation was nothing new to me ...
there was subterfuge in the air ...
i could smell the nitty-gritty ozone
of culpability descending like a quiet storm ...
i was stepping somewhere
i was naught supposed to be ...
seeing something
i was naught supposed to see ...
i was censurable and liable.
standing outside the matrix
was trouble times triple ...
taboo ...
which i have discovered
is naught always kryptonite ...
perhaps ...
whatever i was looking at was more
than a mere reflection of my introspection ...
there was an inescapable
totality present, naught common
to my usual meanderings and musings ...
i was becoming more
intrigued by the moment ...
i smiled at taylor as he glanced up
from unlocking the passenger door of the
alpine-green Volkswagen rabbit that was our ride home ...
it was hard naught to smile at him
no matter what one was doing ... or thinking ...
or imagining ...
the twinkle in his eye was contagious ...
obviously he had already thrown off
the damper of the movie and had moved on
to the more happy-go-lucky side of his manic nature ...
or perhaps ...
it was just the lucky part he was after ...
naught likely since
i had to work in the morning ...
but ... worth the
promenade nonetheless ...
for all i knew the greater
mysteries still lay between my legs ...
and ...
that mystery
was here and now ...
naught stepped back ...
stepped aside ...
nor away ...
in the mere flicker of a pheromone
the weight of the world and her insights
gave way to the siren song of the tempest inside ...
the pulsing of the darkling
of my eyes stepping to a new rhythm ...
easily swayed
by its very nature
and chemical outpourings ...
i had yet to learn that to look
at the world too closely for too long
can leave one in a perpetual state of arousal ...
after a small tease ... a small invite ...
and a hardening rsvp ... i loaded my smiling
and huge and conspicuous and obvious and slightly
thrumming self into the front seat of the unregistered rabbit ...
by the time taylor had climbed
into the driver's seat and rearranged
the lewdness in his pants sow he could sit
proper, my arousal was already shifting curiosities ...
i was far and away yet again ...
chasing my own musings
into my earlier gist ...
i could hear the distant sigh
of unrequited lust in an even more
exaggerated breath, as taylor realized that
even the promise of naught sex was losing its viability ...
he knew the movie
had bothered me, and his
attempts at cheering me up were
stop and go and stop and go ... and stop ...
being a musician and a songwriter,
he was respectful and well acquainted
with the tendencies of the absent-minded lot ...
finding it easy to let it be ...
i smiled at his alacrity
as he turned his attention
to starting the car and finding
some music for the journey homeward ...
leaving me one step closer to ...
the matrix ...
and ... something else ...
something i could naught quite
put my finger on ... something important ...
something extraordinary ...
something useful ...
from the far and away
place where i was contemplating,
i could see that this matrix ... that this
story appeared to be comprised entirely of language ...
a vernacular relic of some
long-forgotten lexicon of light ...
though ...
naught a relic in the sense
of something decayed and dusty
and solemn and restrained and dutiful ...
but a relic in the sense
of something ancient and unadulterated ...
an artifact that
was still somehow animated ...
still delicate
and supple and flowing ...
neither compromised or contaminated
by time and space. by mind or by imagination ...
as though all these things existed
inside of it. like a child inside a womb ...
sequestered only
by its unobservable state ...
and ...
it was singing ...
it was singing the song
of every word ever written ...
and ...
it was magnificent ...
the most magnificent idea
ever to find its way inside my pretty head ...
even if it had gone awry
and was slightly out of tune
and i disagreed with most every tenet ...
and ...
the fact ...
that it was the very
story i was running away from ...
i was still irrevocably
drawn by its sheer ingenuity ...
and beauty ...
and intelligence ...
it was dawning on me that
the serenade was indeed sentient ...
and that this matrix was as aware
of me as i was of it ... a symbiotic truce
was underway ... a dual curiosity was being awakened ...
awakened and acknowledged ...
imprinting upon my senses ...
its touch as
soft as a dream ...
in the lapse
of a second split
i knew what i was looking at ...
i was looking at a dream
from the outside in ...
naught only could i see
this matrix ... this grid ... this model
for life ... i could see its inception: the dream
holding it in place ... i could feel it stir and ripple inside me ...
a creatrix ...
a conceptual field
that shimmered and sparkled ...
clear as a bubble,
defined only by its prisms ...
a golden thread, whisper
thin ... gilded the edges ...
it was the size of creation
and as big as any present moment ...
and ...
it was alive ...
the story was alive!
the dream was alive!!
the story dream was alive!!!
i was awed and stunned
beyond my wildest imaginings ...
i was stepping into uncharted
territory here ... stepping somewhere
beyond where i still knew what i knew ... and know ...
i had never even thought
to imagine that the stories were alive ...
i had always suspected
that the stories were naught real ...
especially the creation stories ...
the beginning and the end stories,
because they are the beginning and the
end stories of every other story in existence ...
or at least i had hoped,
prayed, begged, and bartered
for their nonexistence and destruction ...
stupid ... petty gods ...
did you hear the one
where abraham was told to take
his son to a mountaintop and sacrifice him
to prove his love and loyalty to his one and only god?
and then ...
just when abraham
had a knife poised above
his son's heart ... god shows up ...
and says ...
"just kidding!"
"just wanted to see if you would do it!"
are you kidding me?
seriously. are you kidding me!?!
at twelve years old i think
i had a ministroke over that story ...
i also think that was
when i burned my first bible ...
naught that i am an
atheist or an arsonist;
i was just mad ...
Excerpted from Catch me if you can ... by continuum thought. Copyright © 2014 continuum thought. Excerpted by permission of Balboa Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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