The Little Thread Which Grew - the Apollo '73 to Everything But

[FoTi]

Beautiful, EP.

 

[FoTi]

Over Monterey Bay tonight was a nearly full moon. It was a balmy night. Starship was playing Jefferson Airplane / Starship from the 60s-80s at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. The group has a young female singer who does Gracie's songs pretty well. Mickey Thomas does the male leads. Nobody does Kaukonen, Kantner, and Casady, but this performance band is solid and good. We sat in the sand. The smell of burning hemp cigarettes, the music of days gone by, people of all ages dancing, the light show all took me back.

45 years ago, we used to go to the Boardwalk, smoke dope on the beach, see a band, dance till late at night, go off to someone's house and continue almost till dawn.

I don't have that much life in me still, but I've got to say, it's never been bad.

The original Airplane with Signe and Skip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mr_KnscgBZc

with Gracie and Spencer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZc-kPWWQvc&feature=related

Ah, yes....the wonderful 60's.....I loved the aesthetics of the hippy days.

 

[Mark A. Baker]

Over Monterey Bay tonight was a nearly full moon. It was a balmy night. Starship was playing Jefferson Airplane / Starship from the 60s-80s at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. The group has a young female singer who does Gracie's songs pretty well. Mickey Thomas does the male leads. Nobody does Kaukonen, Kantner, and Casady, but this performance band is solid and good. We sat in the sand. The smell of burning hemp cigarettes, the music of days gone by, people of all ages dancing, the light show all took me back.

45 years ago, we used to go to the Boardwalk, smoke dope on the beach, see a band, dance till late at night, go off to someone's house and continue almost till dawn.

I don't have that much life in me still, but I've got to say, it's never been bad.

The original Airplane with Signe and Skip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mr_KnscgBZc

with Gracie and Spencer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZc-kPWWQvc&feature=related

very cool!


Mark A. Baker

 

[This is NOT OK !!!!]

Invite me!!

 

[CarmeloOrchards]

A line in the sand for those wrecked by the Scientology Greed Machine

6 Signs That You've Made It To Middle Class

James E. McWhinney, On Friday August 27, 2010, 3:49 pm EDT

Not so long ago, most people viewed the hallmarks of success as something along the lines of a house, a white picket fence, two weeks vacation, two children and the ability to send those kids to college. Today, the middle class is a vanishing breed according to nearly every survey and statistic on the topic. Its disappearance is of such grave concern to the fabric of American society that the U.S. government launched a task force to explore the issue. Despite all of the attention to the subject, defining "middle class" remains a challenge, as everyone wants to be in the middle regardless of their income. Instead of focusing on the dollars, let's take a look at the lifestyle benchmarks that define middle class status.

Have You Made it to the Middle?
A wide variety of numbers have been thrown around in an effort to define the middle. People earning 20% of the average income and people earning 80% all claim to be part of the middle class. More than a few millionaires make the claim too. While there is no official financial standard, the middle class as defined by the government task force is characterized in terms of six financial aspirations, which we can view as benchmarks.

Home Ownership
Home ownership remains the American dream. The step up from renting to owning signifies prosperity and achievement. With median home prices ranges differing by so much in different cities across the United States, the ability to achieve this goal varies significantly by geographical location. Someone earning an income in the 50% range in Detroit may not be able to afford even a small house in Los Angeles.

Automobile Ownership
Owning an automobile provides freedom of movement and the luxury of avoiding the limited schedules and cramped quarters offered by mass transportation options such as buses and subways. Here again, the cost of cars varying widely, as does the kind of automobile required. For one driver, a used Hyundai will do the trick. For another, a new BMW signifies the achievement of this goal.

A College Education for the Kids
Helping children get ahead in life is a primary goal for middle class families. Paying for a college education for children can cost anywhere from the low tens of thousands of dollars to hundreds of thousands. Decisions about which university of college to attend can have a significant impact on the price tag.

Retirement Security
Retirement is a goal nearly everyone wants to achieve. It demonstrates success and provides a reward for decades of hard work. Once again, definitions make a difference. The amount of gold required to support your golden years will vary significantly depending on whether you want a staff of 10 at your villa in the South of France or a townhouse in Peoria, Illinois.

Health Care Coverage
The ability to obtain healthcare is an important goal for middle class wager earners and their families. The high and rising cost of medical care and prescription drugs make healthcare coverage an ever-increasing need, as going without it can have serious negative financial implications in the event of a severe illness or injury.

Family Vacation
The family vacation is a middle class staple. Vacations demonstrate that a family has disposable income and has been successful enough to take time away from work to focus on leisure.

What Happened on the Way to the Dream?
Globalization and technological advances began to reverse the growth of the middle class. The manufacturing base in the United States changed, as good-paying jobs in factories and heavy industries went overseas to lower-paying markets and labor unions lost much of their ability to bargain for high wages and good benefits. Later, white-collar jobs from accounting and data entry to reading medical images and answering telephones in call centers were also sent offshore. Many jobs that remained in the U.S. were eliminated by computers and other technological advancements that increased productivity.

To achieve or maintain a middle-class lifestyle, many households became two-income families. Achieving middle class goals became more difficult as employers eliminated their pension plans and defined-benefit plans, the cost of a college education continued to rise and the cost of healthcare jumped. For most of the 20-year period following 1990, the Commerce Department reports that real median income grew at a rate of about 20%, while the cost of a college education grew between 43% and 60%, the cost of housing rose 56% and healthcare costs jumped by 155%.

How to Get There
Although there are significant challenges to obtaining middle class status, there are some proactive steps that can help make the dream a reality. Budgeting is one of the most obvious. Understanding where your money goes each month can help you determine the exact makeup of the benchmarks you are trying to match. Are you looking for a Hyundai or a BMW?

Planning is another crucial step. Are the kids going to a state university or a private college? Are scholarships an option? Some savvy families find money for college by participating in programs which can aide families with the costs related to sending a child to university.

Working is another one of the requirements. A second job or a side business might be just what you need to boost your income and achieve some of your goals. Putting your money to work is also an important consideration. Investing has helped build wealth for generations. In fact, income earners ranked in the top 1% enjoyed significant increases in wealth even as the middle class fell into decline. Most of that wealth came from investments. Even if you don't have the means to invest for current income, you can take a few dollars from each paycheck and save for your retirement.

The Bottom Line
Don't underestimate the role of hard work and luck. Sometimes being in the right place at the right time or taking one particular course of action over another can make all the difference. So keep watching for opportunities and make the most of them when you find them. As motion-picture mogul Samuel Goldwyn said, "The harder I work, the luckier I get."

 

[This is NOT OK !!!!]

As motion-picture mogul Samuel Goldwyn said, "The harder I work, the luckier I get."

That's what I said!

 

[CarmeloOrchards]

That's what I said!

7 Millionaire Myths
Posted: August 11, 2010 11:34AM by Claire Bradley

We all have our preconceptions about millionaires: they're tax evaders who just inherited their money from rich aunt, and they hang around the golf course all day with their snobby, elitist friends. So what's the average millionaire really like? Here are seven millionaire myths, and the real facts about the ones who seem to have it all.


Millionaires Don't Pay Their Taxes
Fact: It is estimated that millionaires, those in the top 1% of earners, pay about 40% of all taxes. Current tax regulation shifts may change these numbers to make this even larger than that - so think twice before accusing the millionaires in America of not paying taxes.

Millionaires Just Inherited Their Money
According to Thomas J. Stanley's book, "The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America's Wealthy," only 20% of millionaires inherited their riches. The other 80% are what you'd call nouveau riche: first generation millionaires who earned their cash on their own. Many millionaires simply worked, saved and lived within their means to generate their wealth - think accountants and managers: regular people going to work every day. Most millionaires didn't get their riches overnight when a rich relative died - they worked for the money.

Millionaires Feel Rich
From the outside looking in, you would think that millionaires feel rich and secure, but that's not so. Most millionaires worry about retirement, their kids' college fund and the mortgage just like the rest of us. Those worries are greatest among new millionaires, the people who just recently acquired their wealth. (For more, see Don't Forget The Kids: Save For Their Education And Retirement.)

Millionaires Have High-Paying Jobs
It certainly doesn't hurt to be gainfully employed, but half of all millionaires are self-employed or own a business. It does help to have a college degree, as about 80% are college graduates, though only 18% have master's degrees.

Millionaires All Drive Fancy Cars
You can get that idea of the rich guy in a fancy German car out of your head when you think of a millionaire: they actually drive a Ford, with the carmaker topping the millionaire preferred car list at 9.4%. Cadillacs run second on the millionaires' favorite car list, and Lincolns third according to onmoneymaking.com.

Car payments are an investment with little return, which is why someone looking to grow wealth avoids high-priced vehicles in favor of a more economical set of wheels. (For more, see 10 Steps To Retire A Millionaire.)

Millionaires Hang Around the Golf Course All Day
Those millionaires are all retired, with nothing else to do but hang around the golf course, right? Wrong: only 20% of millionaires are retirees, with a full 80% still going to work. It's not as glamorous or fun, but millionaires go to work just like you do; it's how the money gets in the bank.

Millionaires Are Elitists
We've already established that most millionaires earned their money not inherited it, still go to work, drive a Ford and worry about their kids' college expenses. Sounds a lot like the rest of America, right? Millionaires come in all shapes and sizes - some may be elitists, but most are just regular Joes who successfully managed their money.

The Bottom Line
Maybe you see a pattern here: today's millionaires are people who live within their means, budget and spend wisely, and focus on financial independence first. These are habits that take discipline, but ones we can all adopt to begin growing wealth. If these facts prove anything, it's that every one of us can strive to become a millionaire - you can start by driving your old car with pride. (For tips from the rich, check out 6 Millionaire Traits That You Can Adopt.)

 

[Jachs]

Twinning with muliple bodies?

Wow this is way out , is this possible FoTi, what did your twin say to you exactly about tesla ?

I twinned with one of his multiple bodies ex wife on the KTL. Apparently one of his bodies was in the SO for a while.

 

[CarmeloOrchards]

6 Millionaire Traits That You Can Adopt

6 Millionaire Traits That You Can Adopt
Posted: June 17, 2009 1:55PM by Stephanie Powers


Millionaires have more in common with each other than just their bank accounts - for some millionaires, striking it rich took courage, salesmanship, vision and passion. Find out which traits are most common to the seven-figure bank account set, and what you can do to hone some of these skills in your own life.

Independent Thinking
Millionaires think differently. Not just about money, about everything. The time and energy everybody else spends attempting to conform, millionaires spend creating their own path. Since thoughts impact actions, people who want to be wealthy should think in a way that will get them to that goal. Independent thinking doesn't mean doing the opposite of what the rest of the world is doing; it means having the courage to follow what is important to you. So, the lesson here is to forge your own way, and let your success drive you to financial spoils - rather than doing it the other way around and trying to chase the money. (To learn more, read Getting A Millionaire's Mindset.)

Just look at David Geffen. A self-made millionaire with $4.5 billion to his name in 2009, this American record executive and film producer was college dropout, but made millions founding record agencies and signed some of the most prominent musicians of the 1970s and '80s. Although he didn't take what many assume to be the usual path to success, his tireless work ethic and sense of personal conviction about artists' potential allowed him to rack up a sizable fortune.

Vision
Millionaires are creative visionaries with a positive attitude. In other words, wealthy people not only have big dreams, they also believe they will come true. As such, wealth seekers should set lofty goals and not be afraid of uncharted territories.

Bill Gates, the world's richest person in 2009, did just that. The American chairman of Microsoft (NYSE:MSFT) is one of the founding entrepreneurs who brought personal computers to the masses. Gates jumped into the personal computers business in 1975 and held on tight, creating Microsoft Windows in 1985. When consumers began to bring computers into their homes, Gates was ready to profit from this new age.

Skills
Writer Dennis Kimbro interviewed successful people to determine the traits they had in common for his book, "Think and Grow Rich" (1992). He found that they concentrated on their area of excellence. Millionaires also tend to partner with others to supplement their weaker skills. If you don't know what you are good at, poll friends and family. Use training and mentors to refine your strong skills. (Want advice from some of the most successful investors of all time? Check out our reading list in Ten Books Every Investor Should Read.)

Passion
Billionaire investing guru Warren Buffett says "Money is a by-product of something I like to do very much." Enjoying your work allows you to have the discipline to work hard at it every day. People who interact with money for a living, bankers for example, often love creating new deals and persuading others to complete a transaction. But finding your dream job may take time. The average millionaire doesn't find it until age 45, and tends to be 54 (on average) before becoming a millionaire. Kimbro found that millionaires tried an average of 17 ventures before they were successful. So, if you want to be rich, stop doing things you don't enjoy and do what you love. If you don't know what you love, try a few things and keep trying until you hit on the right thing. (Find out how Warren Buffett's passion for investing led him to a billion-dollar fortune in Warren Buffett: The Road To Riches.)

Investment
Millionaires are willing to sacrifice time and money to achieve their goals. They are willing to take a risk now for the opportunity of achieving something greater in the future. Investing may include securities or starting a business - either way, it is a step toward achieving great financial rewards. Start investing now. (Want to get started but don't have much capital? Read Invest On A Shoestring Budget.)

Salesmanship
Millionaires are constantly presenting their ideas and persuading others to buy into them. Good salesmen are oblivious to critics and naysayers. In other words, they don't take "no" for an answer. Millionaires also have good social skills. In fact, when writer T. Harv Eker analyzed the results of a survey of 753 millionaires for his book, "Secrets of the Millionaire Mind" (2005), he found social skills were more important than IQ. Just look at Donald Trump. His fortune has fluctuated over the years, but his ability to sell himself - whether as a TV personality or as the force behind a line of neckties - has always brought him back among the ranks of celebrity millionaires.

The ability to communicate with people is essential to selling your idea. Contrary to the traditional view of salesmen, millionaires cite honesty as an important factor in their success. If you want to be a millionaire, be an honest salesman and polish your social skills.
Becoming a millionaire is not a goal that can be achieved overnight for most people. In fact, many of the world's richest people built their wealth over many years (sometimes even generations) by making smart but often bold decisions, putting their skills to the best use possible and doggedly pursuing their vision. If you can learn anything about millionaires, it's that for many of them, their riches are not necessarily what most sets them apart from the rest of the world - it's what they did to earn those millions that really stands out.

 

[The Great Zorg]

7th

6 Millionaire Traits That You Can Adopt
Posted: June 17, 2009 1:55PM by Stephanie Powers
<snip>

7th Trait: Turn into a ruthless, mentally disturbed, paranoid schizophrenic hypnotist and enslave tens of thousands spewing out a drug and alcohol created crock of shit and just take everything they have, including their lives and family and dreams. :confused2:

Gee wilackers, that sounds so familiar.

 

[The Magic Thetan]

A Visit for an OT ET - The Magic Thetan's Anneversary

Something big is coming to ESMB and it will make its debut on our thread!!!

Sometime in the next couple of hours, we are co-hosting an exclusive release of one of the biggest and most dynamic Scientology based stories ever told on the internet. William Tell Overture fanfare.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7O91GDWGPU

Return with us now to the thrilling days of yesteryear when out of the past come the thundering hoofbeats of the MAGIC THETAN and his faithful companion BLUE SPIRIT!

First a message from our producer, Lakey. A momentous event will shortly occur! One of the biggest Thetans on Planet Earth, known as the MAGIC THETAN, accompanied by our own BLUE SPIRIT will post the first installment of his story in two places on ESMB at about the same time.

The story will appear as its own thread under the category, MY STORY FROM INSIDE SCIENTOLOGY. Nearly simultaneously it will appear here on the Apollo '73 thread. The first installment is appearing here because we have the big readership and we want to give MAGIC THETAN'S story the biggest launch possible. Once that new thread is successfully launched, succeeding installments of this unique story will appear exclusively on that new thread. That is the current plan although it could change as things develop.

So stay tuned and hopefully within an hour or two, this magnificent launch will be done and all of our lives may change a bit as a result of what we read.

This is the one month anniversary of my first post on ESMB. I remember being so delighted with lkwdblds introduction of me that I thought i would include it in the post.

I have learned many things, and made many wonderful friends, new and old. However, as you can see, I still post REALLY LONG POSTS, and this one is a REALLY REALLY LONG POST. It is about my beloved wife. I have again divided it into parts. Hope you enjoy it, and thanks for all your love and support. John

A Visit From a New OT ET
7th Submission and 7th Chapter of
The Johnny Raff Chronicles - The Scientology Years
​

Shortly after I began to write this chapter something very dramatic occurred - something that had a profound effect upon me personally, but something that was also a lot of fun, So to highlight the occurrence, I decided, just for fun, to identify the precise time and location when the happening occurred.

10:34 AM Mean Solar Time (Adjusted to Los Angles, California latitude and longitude from the base calculations of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, London, England, British Empire. 21st century)

Monday the 21st of June 2010

Planet Earth.

Solar System number 1- 406 - TG7 (Per artificial intelligence base number 23, Observations platform 9, and Association Mother Ship number 23 - 7)

Galaxy 13

Third Density Reality number 41 61 82 - 2T DB AG - MultiVerse

Just a few moments ago as of this writing, I reread some of the sections I had just written in an effort to correct my chronic tendency to write run-on sentences. Working to break the lines into smaller units, I suddenly felt the presence of my beloved wife Carolyn, who had showed up to assist me, as she had done so many times in the past.

Together we successfully cleaned up my latest set of run-on sentences, at which point she tuned herself to a different Signature Vibration and vanished from my consciousness.

Suddenly I realized that she was a new OT ET. She was now an extra-terrestrial consciousness and a fully Operational Thetan (a spiritual Being who consciously and deliberately does what ever the hell they want to whenever they want to do it.) Of course being an OT, an individualized spiritual consciousness, was only an infinitesimally small portion of what she now was.

The story of what lead up to this amazing visit is incredible. It all started when I began to realize what had actually been going on during the last three and a half years of my wife’s life.

However, before we proceed further, I want to point out that this chapter, and the one that follows, takes you on a quantum leap out of my studies at the Los Angeles Academy of Scientology in 1966, and up into some adventures that took place in 2009 and 2010. So these two chapters qualify as being part of “The Johnny Raff Chronicles - The Post-Scientology Years“.

:surprise1:The World Treasure of Physics, Astronomy and mathematics Part one, page one, paragraph one, line four, made the following interesting statement, “The electrons orbiting each atomic nucleus obey weird rules - performing quantum leaps, which means, disappearing from one spot and appearing at another without having traversed the space in between.”

I think that by now, you will agree that I have often obeyed some really weird rules, and as noted in Chronicle Number - 6, me and my 1951 blue bullet Studebaker made a twenty mile quantum leap down a California freeway. Like the electrons in the book we disappeared from one spot and appeared at another without having traversed the space in between. So I hope you won’t mind this linear space-time continuum quantum leap in which we will disappear from one time and appear at another without having traversed the time in between. For I’m sure that this is an ability we would all like to consciously have, and there is nothing like practice to hone in one’s OT spiritual abilities.

I have some very specific reasons for making this leap that I believe will become apparent as we move along. So may I invite you to joyfully “Harmonize” with the leap and my intention to make these chapters interesting, fun and valuable? At the conclusion of these chapters, we will make another quantum leap back to 1966. So here we go. Ready?

It’s 1966 and I’m having some magical adventures at the Los Angeles Scientology Academy, and I would like you to join me.

So please do the following quantum leap exercise. It is actually a gradient step to developing the ability to teleport yourself to any place or time you desire to go to. However, even if you choose to believe that it will not develop your teleporting ability, I invite you to believe that it can be a lot of fun. So, for ability or fun, here are the steps.

1) Pretend that you can see me on course, and let your pretense (Imagination) be as real as possible, and whatever you get, consider that you are doing it perfectly.

2) Remember something that happened to you in 1966. (If you can’t remember a 1966 incident, pretend that you do, even if it has to be my life in 1966, or a past life incident of yours.)

3) Get in mind the physical location where the real or pretended incident occurred. Get it as clear and intense as you possibly can.

4) Now FEEL your presence in 1966 as best you can, and regardless of what you are, or are not getting, consider that you are doing this perfectly.

5) Now remember, or pretend, a specify place which you were at in 2009. Again, get it as clear as you can.

6) Now close your eyes, and shift (Quantum leap) from the 1966 location to the 2009 location, and consider that you did it perfectly regardless of what you do, or do not, experience.

Welcome to 2009!!! I’m here in 2009 with you, and I’m about to project myself into a lot of bad stuff.

Carolyn's Transition ​

My wife Carolyn died on the 26th of September 2009 after a three year battle with breast cancer, and I took pause when I realized that she had been gone for nearly nine months, as we humans know time to be.

During her long illness, and in the months following her death, I had orchestrated myself into a state of deep depression. For a few months following her death, I was too depressed to notice that I was depressed. I also did not want to admit that such a thing was even possible, for I had been blessed in my life with more miracles than an Earth human is ever supposed to have once they have decided to live as a limited Being on this small planet.

My beloved wife of nearly twenty years, had died in my arms following a three year emotionally and physically painful, intensely interesting and subsequently wonderfully enlightening battle with the cancer that she had orchestrated into existence for some, as yet unknown, reason.

Prior to her physical departure, she had been under Hospice care for many months. The Hospice people were wonderful. Their genuinely caring and loving mannerisms were a great comfort to us as Carolyn’s illness progressed, but as wonderful as they were, they paled in comparison to the loving care of my daughter Amy.

In July of 2009, Carolyn left the hospital for the last time. She had been given an operation in a last ditch attempt to handle a stomach blockage that had caused her to painfully vomit any food that she attempted to eat. This had been going on for many months, and nothing that I could do seemed to permanently handle it. We did all sorts of Scientology and Dianetic processes. In fact, we did them from the moment we discovered the cancer condition, but nothing seemed to work for very long. I could get her completely blown out of her ever loving gourd (that ugly looking, hard-skinned, highly misunderstood, fruit that we use to symbolize our entrapment in a lousy state of existence.) Over and over and over, she would become delighted with her certainty that she had at last discovered the true source of her cancer, and thus it would soon be gone, if it were not gone already. Over and over and over again, she would get thrown back into a state of pain and suffering that sought, like a true Suppressive person, to destroy any gain she had gotten. Why was this stuff not working when it had worked so many times before on so many people? Why was I not able to cure her when I had been able to successfully and miraculously cure others? What was happening to my basic spiritual powers, the powers that had enabled me to hear people think, teleport cars down a freeway and do a hundred other reality transforming things? Hell, I had even cured people psychically over a distance of thousands of miles. I remembered the time when my beloved Mom called me once in a panic. Pop had been rushed to the hospital for an operation. The doctors had told the family to prepare themselves, for the chances of Pop living through this were slim. In fact the doctors gave Pop less than a ten percent chance of recovering from the operation he was scheduled for. So Mom called me for help.

Although most of the family had considered me to be a really weird guy who had gotten into a really weird subject, they had also experienced many times the magic I could perform. Just like the Church of Scientology, that periodically called me in to handle a mess that was so bad it threatened to put them in legal danger, I was considered to be OK when they needed me, but really weird and out-tech when they needed me no more.

After I pulled the Church out of the latest mess, I was again relegated to the status of an outsider for my refusal to sign a billion year contact when my intellect could not even wrap its wits around that amount of time. Subsequently, I would again be attacked by the Church officials who had called me in to help. For I was once again considered to be one of those out-tech Field Auditors that were difficult to control.

Actually, my family was nothing like the not so wise, and not so nice people that I sometimes encountered in the Scientology organizations. They did not turn around and attack me after I saved their ass. They just re-energized their belief that I was weird, and that that was OK. The consequences of being weird, which means standing out from the ordinary, is something I suffered through all of my life.

I feel that it is important to also note that were wonderful, sane and beautiful people in the Scientology organizations, and I often basked in the pure joy of my being in their company.

With regard to Mom's call for help, I put on my spiritual OT hat, expanded my space to include the entire United States, contacted Pop spiritually to see if it was his choice to recover, and then I assisted him to do so.

Mom excitedly called the next morning, saying that just before the scheduled operation, they re-did the tests, and the tests indicated that somehow there was no longer anything wrong, and they planned to release Pop later that day!

So why, why, why, was I not able to permanently cure my wife?

The why questions were driving me nuts, for I was listing for answers that I could not find, and for a Class VIII Auditor, listing questions was one of the first things you addressed when you wanted to pull someone out of a mess. Failing to find answers, was considered to be a basic aberration.

It reminds me of a similar hell that Yvonne Jentzsch had gone through with her cancer. She had been given every process in
Ron‘s book, but she continued to suffer, and subsequently, she died. I had been with Yvonne when Ron first instructed her to create the first Scientology Celebrity Center.

Although my wife Carolyn, had succumbed to the idea that she needed to take a “Traditional Medicine” approach to handling the aggressive spread of her disease, she elected not to continue chemo therapy following her first hospital treatment, for the chemical poisoning of her body had made her so deathly ill, that she decided that death would be preferable to having to go through that degree of misery again.

Although I was, at an early age, programmed to accept a lot of the teachings of the Catholic church, the suffering that Christ supposedly choose to endure never really made any sense to me. I could not see how “dying for our sins” could do anybody any good. It seemed stupid and senseless, however these were not thoughts that I could share with my fellow Catholics, before or after my departure from that organized religion.

The Magic of Music

In an effort to bring her some joy and pleasure, my daughter Amy and I elected to bring Carolyn to a motel in Anaheim that was but a few blocks away from Disneyland.

It was the week of July the 4th, 2009, and once again, SPEBQSAI, “The Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America Incorporated“, was holding their International Convention within the permeating atmosphere of The Magic Kingdom.

Shortly after I met Carolyn, I introduced her to the pure magic of attending an International Barbershop Convention, and she fell head-over-heels in love with it.

Most people when they think of Barbershop Singing, find themselves pinned into a narrow corridor of understanding that prevents them from having any idea of how incredible one of these conventions can be.

As my beloved Carolyn used to say, “These guys are amateurs in the way that the Olympic athletes are amateurs”.


Many years ago, I took Sharlene, the gal I went with before Carolyn, to a Barbershop Convention in Salt Lake City Utah, a place close to where she grew up in the Mormon faith. At one point, the championship barbershop chorus of about a hundred and twenty four-part-harmonizers, were invited to perform in the auditorium of The Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

At the conclusion of their amazing performance, I went up to the director of The Mormon Tabernacle Choir to ask him what he thought of the performance, “To tell you the truth”, he responded, “I’m embarrassed. They are far better than our choir”.

I remember another time when Carolyn and I were roaming around one of the hotels that hosted the convention, and we went past a practice room that had the door slightly ajar. As we did, we were surprised to hear a band playing. “What’s a band doing at an acapella singing Barbershop Convention”, we thought. So to relieve our curiosity, we carefully pulled the door open a bit further, and to our surprise, it was a quartet. They were voicing the instruments, and you could not tell the difference between the vibrations of their vocal cords, and the vibrations that spill into the atmosphere when masterful musicians take up their instruments.

Then, there was the time when Carolyn and I went on our longest vacation ever. Three months it lasted. We first traveled by train to South Dakota for the Barbershop Convention. Then, we rented a car, and drove to the boyhood home of Mark Twain in Hannibal, Missouri. From there, we followed the muddy Mississippi River to Baton Rouge, St Louis and Nashville, where we toured Graceland, the home of another favorite music maker of ours. Then onto New Orleans for more music magic. From there we boarded a train again, and went up to Chicago, then to The Grand Tetons and the magic of Yellowstone National Park, a place I had longed to see since I was a kid.

One of the most memorable things at the Nashville convention occurred about ten PM at night as twelve thousand singing Barbershoppers left the performance auditorium after the final competition for the Gold.

Packing to capacity the eight car trolley that was to return us to our hotels, we encountered the only passenger that had been on the train. She was a little old lady, and the poor thing got a bit skittish and overwhelmed as we filled the cars to the point where we were as intimate as five hundred pairs of lovers.

“What’s this?” she asked almost frantically.

“It's Barbershopers”, a kindly baritone replied, “The Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America Incorporated“


“Oh”, the little old Lady replied. “I’ve never heard any Barbershop music.

“Guys”, the baritone shouted out. We have a lady here who has never heard Barbershop singing. And so they began, hundreds of four part harmonies in the closed space of a trolley, creating harmonies that the choirs of Heaven have never managed to pull off.

The old gal’s mouth dropped open, and it never closed. It was an experience that she will take to her grave, and after that she will share the story with a bunch of open mouthed angels, who are finding it hard to duplicate and understand how incredible it had been.

Carolyn’s arrival at the Anaheim motel was heartbreaking for me. She had just been released from the hospital, and she had a feeding tube that had to be replaced daily. An oxygen tube was permanently adorning her beautiful face, serving as a constant reminder of the severity of her condition, and it was apparent to anyone that she was struggling to just stay alive.

I had done everything I could, and my beloved Amy had done everything she could, to make it possible for Carolyn to make this last foray into the music she loved so much.

The contest part of the convention was taking place at the huge Kodak Center Stadium. Prior to Carolyn’s arrival, I had alerted the nurses at the complex, telling them that this would probably be the last chance that my beloved wife would have to bask in the four-part harmony of these Barbershop “amateurs”.

Their response was wonderful. They did everything they could to pave the way for a wheel chair confined, oxygen breathing, lover of music, who could only get her sustenance through a feeding tube. They even contacted and solicited the help of The Big Boss, the guy in charge of everything. In his turn, he alerted all the ushers and the security people to be prepared for the arrival of Carolyn.

AN INTERESTING SIDE NOTE - As I was writing this chapter, I got a call from my wonderful friend Mary Williams, and I began to read her what i had written so far. She was the first person to ever hear this, and as I read about the Barbershop music part, she said that this very day, the day of my writing this, is the one year anniversary of Carolyn’s arrival in Anaheim. It blew me away that I was writing the story one year to the day after it had occurred. (Then a few days later,as I read the story to my Brother Mike, he informed me that Carolyn had died on the same day that my mother Beatrice had died. I'd never made the connection until then. Talk about synchronicity.)

Unfortunately, for the first two days after her arrival in Anaheim, Carolyn could go nowhere. The old adage that “The Spirit is Willing but The Flesh is Weak“, cannot even begin to do justice to the hell that she, and we, were going through.

In addition to my beloved daughter Amy, my beloved daughter Laurel arrived to help. So did both of their husbands.

Just a little over a year ago, on the 17th of May 2008, Amy had been wed in a Renaissance ceremony that would have thrown the Queen of England into fits of envy. She had married that “Ideal Guy” that the story books talk about, and the reality books say is impossible. His name was Roderick, and he was, and is, an English gentleman of the highest order. He fully supported the decision of his relatively new bride to move in and spend ALL of her time caring for her mother. Thank God he did, and thank God Amy did, for if she hadn’t been there in the weeks and months that followed this time at Anaheim, I think I would have died along with my wife.

At one point, I encouraged Amy to take a break and go back to her husband. “You need and deserve the break“, I tried to convince her. At one point she faltered a bit, more for her concern for Roderick than herself. She put a call into the new fine English fellow who had joined our family, and told him about Johnny’s concern that she should spend some time with him. She said that although she longed to be with him, she really wanted to stay with her mother. “Of course you stay with your mother”, Roderick replied. “I am proud of you for what you are doing.” That’s Roderick.

As hour after agonizing hour went slowly by in that Anaheim motel, I suffered the torments of the damned, and damned I felt. I wanted so much for my love to get to hear and see the Barbershopers just one more time. At one point, I just couldn’t take it any more, so I left for a while, and roamed over to the Marriott Hotel, where a number of sing-alongs were going on.

It was there that I encountered Dick Van Dyke and his newly formed quartet “The Vantastix’s” As I listened to their joyful renditions of “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” and “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”, a smile came to my face and a flood of good times came into the core of my being.

I remembered the first time I had met and chatted with this wonderful and beloved performer. I had been the guest speaker at “The Young Presidents Association”, a group of hot shot, lively, young CEO’s of existing and up and coming companies. Dick was also there as their guest, and his Malibu home, was but a short walk away from the restaurant patio where I addressed the group.

I remembered when Carolyn first met Dick Van Dyke at the 1999 Barbershop convention in Anaheim. It was the first time that Dick had been introduced to “The Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Singing in America Incorporated“, and he was excited, really excited. He didn’t know that this level of quality singing existed, and he was thrilled with it, and we were thrilled with him

All over the world, the conventions take place, and almost always in a different city and location. However, in 2009, the convention returned to the place where Walt Disney had orchestrated his dream into reality, Dick Van Dyke had also returned, and this time, he had his own quartet.

As I listed to the harmonies of Dick and “The Vantastix’s”, I felt that they were diligently doing their best to give me a break from the pain and misery that they didn’t know I was in.

When they sang, “You’ve Got a Friend in Me”, I smiled on the thought that Carolyn had given birth to two daughters that were so much her friend.

When they sang “The Bare Necessities”, my eyes filled with tears, for it seemed the bare necessities were not enough.

As their harmonizing tones laced through their rendition of “High Hopes”, I tried with all my soul to embrace that idea. I tried to hope that Carolyn and I would get to enjoy the magic of these magnificent amateurs at least one more time.

As they sang “Pick Yourself Up“, I tried valiantly to do so. Taking the advice of my ET friend Bashar, to “Be Bold!”, I efforted to shift my attention to a happier time. Then, when my mind asserted that it was impossible to put my attention on happy times in light of what was going on with my beloved, my focus shifted.

With a smile, I found myself rescued by the words of another favorite guru of mine. “Do or do not”, the little runt asserted, “There is no try.”

“Alright, alright!”, I mentally screamed back at Yoda, the Jedi Master who had gotten Luke Skywalker off his ass and out of his insistence that it can’t be done. So I focused - focused on the good times.

I remembered a Barbershop convention up in Oregon. Always, we would leave the evening contest a bit early to beat the crowd to the “Cordatorium“.

This was our favorite part of the convention.

After each day’s performance, the losers, as well as anyone else who wanted to perform, would gather at “The Cordatorium“. This was the Barbershopers “After Glow”, and God would it glow.

This was pure magic. Always we would get front row center seats before anyone arrived, and we would patiently, and sometimes not so patiently, wait for the first performing quartet to arrive.

This is where they let down their hair from the rigid performance requirements of the contest for the prize of the gold medal, and this is where they would treat you to musical delights so splendid that the Gods of Olympus would scramble for a good seat.

As we sat awaiting the arrival of the first quartet, I was blessed with the arrival of a dear friend, Mary of Oregon. She had been a client of mine, a PC - a preclear - someone who has not yet cleared out all the mental stuff that prevents one from having a wonderful life.

I had called ahead to tell her that we would be attending the Barbershop Convention close to where she lived, and we arranged to meet at The Cordatorium.

I was delighted to see her when she arrived. I introduced her to Carolyn, and we launched into memories of good times passed. We must have gone on for an hour and a half, and then she apologized saying that although she would like to continue our delightful conversation all night, she had to be up at 5 AM to get to her job, and she needed to get a little sleep.

For some reason the competition was going real late, and no quartet had arrived.

“You can’t go yet”, I protested. “You have got to hear one of these quartets. They're incredible“.

She smiled warmly and said, “John I am glad that you love this stuff, but Barbershop music is really not my thing, and, like I said, I have to be up at 5 AM“.

“No, no, you don’t understand“, I franticly said, “these guys are amazing, and I’m going to be upset if you don’t get to hear at least one
quartet“.

Well, luckily, just as I finished that sentence, the first quartet arrived, and Sharon sat down to listen. Her expression and body language made it real clear that she was doing this for me, for she really had no interest in these Barbershopers.

Well, at four-thirty AM, in the wee hours of the morning, she was pissed because it was over. Her face was soaked with the tears that came forth when the quartets sang of their lost loves, and her mouth ached from too much laughter when they turned back to humor.

All of these memories and more flooded to mind, as Dick Van Dyke and “The Vantastix’s” sang their renditions of, “High Hopes”, and “Pick Yourself Up“.

As I listened, memories of other Cordatorium events came to mind, and I realized that anyone who loved fun, needed to come to one of these. For this is where “The Four Under Par”, would cause us to fall off our seats in stomach splitting laughter as they brilliantly took us on a irreverent tour of the foreign accents that are the delicious flavorings of every nation. This quartet had the honor of being one of the top ten finalists in the gold medal competition, an honor you have to be Barbershoper to fully understand. For the judges rarely allowed a comedy quartet to get this far. The members of the four-part harmony quartet looked like slobs. They truly were “Four Guys Under Par“. However, despite their appearance, they sang like angels, unruly, difficult to control angels for sure, but angels none the less.

The judges didn’t like them, for they smashed to pieces every sacred tradition of the society. However, the huge auditorium full of twelve thousand Barbershopers loved them. After every performance, they would give them a standing ovation that literally rocked the house. So, reluctantly, the judges had to give them high marks, for in addition to the magnificence of their comedy, they were also masterful singers.

This Cordatorium, is where Freddy King of the gold winning quintet “The Pro’s and Cons” would take out his false teeth in the middle of a heart warming rendition of “Oh Danny Boy”, as we totally destroyed ourselves with laughter. His rubber lips flapped on and on in a pretended sincerity as his son feigned a total disgust with the antics of his dad.

Tears still run down my face as I remembered my beloved mom, and my beloved Aunt Connie, as they all but busted a gut in a joy and mirth that seemed like it would never end. Although it may not be a socially correct thing to say, Mom and Connie were fat. They were the living image of wonderful loving Italian mothers who consumed all the things that the body encapsulates in fat tissues to protect itself from the toxins that alloy the delicious tasting food that we love to put in our mouth. When Freddy King took out his false teeth, my mother literally fell on the floor in a fit of laughter. Then, without missing a note, Freddy graciously got her back to her chair.

All these wonderful memories and more flooded into my consciousness as I continued to listened to Dick Van Dyke, and the three other members of his quartet that harmonized far better than he did.

However, when they sailed into a tear wrenching rendition of “Baby of Mine”, I fell apart. This is the song that Dumbo’s mother sings to her baby son in an effort to comfort him after he has been so cruelly ridiculed by the other elephants for his big ears.

I worked to extract myself from my torrent of grief as they concluded their performance with you got to “Ac-cent-tchu-ate the Positive”, eliminate the negative, and don’t mess with Mr. In between”. but I was still pretty much a mess as I got in line to get an autographed copy of their CD for my beloved Carolyn.

As I walked back to the motel with my signed copy of their album, that they had graciously signed and dedicated to Carolyn’s recovery, I was beset with a mixture of every emotion God ever orchestrated into existence.

You could sense that underneath her pain, Carolyn’s loving spirit truly appreciated the good wishes of Dick Van Dyke and the new quintet that she had not the strength or will to enjoy. She smiled weakly at the autographed album, and I wasn’t sure if I sense her regret at not being able to see them, or if the regret was mine.

As it turned out, in a couple of days, she did recover a bit from the poisoning the chemo treatments had subjected her to, and so it was, that we were able to get her over to the Kodak Center for a performance dear to her heart.

Carolyn’s loving heart, and my ability to love nearly anything, had blessed us with the ability to saturate ourselves in a sea of admiration, appreciation and awe at nearly all of the Musically Magical performances. However, a particular favorite of Carolyn’s was “The College Contest.”

Previously, this extravaganza of raw, delicious, harmonizing male energy, did not occur in the place where these “professional amateurs” competed for the gold medal. However, this year, for the first time, they did get to occupy the same stage.

It was quite an operation to get Carolyn’s wheel chair onto the main floor of the performance, for after our entrance through the performance area, we were met up with a considerable amount of resistance from the security staff that insisted we could not place Carolyn’s wheel chair next to the rows of chairs that faced the stage. In all of the scuffle, and emotional trauma of the last few days, I had forgotten to alert the nursing staff that we were going to make it after all. In fact, I had totally forgotten to contact them regarding when and where Carolyn would appear. I had been so enmeshed in the logistics of getting Carolyn to the performance area, that I had completely forgotten to alert the First Aid people and The Big Boss.

So when I went up to the First Aid station to solicit their assistance in handing the stubborn resistance of the security staff and the floor ushers, they greeted me with an intense “Where have you been? The Big Boss has been calling us several times a day asking us where this wonderful Carolyn gal was, and why hadn’t she arrived? He’s has been really concerned!”

Suddenly I was hit with the magnitude of my failure to let theses wonderful people know what was going on, and I fell over myself in an attempt to apologize for my failure to communicate. Like a rapid fire machine gun that is frantically attempting to eliminate a disgruntled enemy, a failure of yours truly had unintentionally orchestrated one into existence. I worked frantically to justify myself.

“I’m so sorry, I repeated over and over. “I am really, really sorry“, but she’s here now and I need your help”. And help they did. In rapid succession they readied themselves for any possible help Carolyn might need, and they called “The Big Boss“, who in turn rapidly cleared out any resistance that the security staff and ushers felt duty bound to place in our way.

“You can’t put her there”, a self-important security guard said courageously to The Big Boss. “It’s against the fire laws“

“I don’t give a shit what it’s against” The Big Boss asserted. You put her there.”

So as the first of those beautiful male-singing, testosterone endowed, collegiate harmonizers came onto the stage, Carolyn was positioned in a place where she could fully enjoy them - a place just a few feet away from center stage.

She loved it, and we loved her loving it.

Through all of this, my beloved daughter Amy was at our side.

One more time did Carolyn get a chance to see the contest, but that did not go well. Amy got real sick and vomited, no doubt from all the stress she had been under. I had to wheel Carolyn in and out, as she needed to get to a bathroom, so she only got to see a couple of quartets, and she was in too much misery to really enjoy them. But at least she got to enjoy those wonderful collegiate guys.

The Final Days Back Home​

On the 4th of July, the nineteen-ninety-nine Anaheim Barbershop Convention ended, but by then, we had returned to our apartment at 404 Porter Street in Glendale, California.

The next few months were a living hell.

Carolyn was dying. She was under Hospice care, and although they did the best they could to keep her comfortable, she was going through things that nobody deserves.

I was pissed, frustrated and forever invalidating myself for not pulling Carolyn permanently out the misery and suffering she was going through. I was in mystery as to why this was all happening , and I was slowly destroying the joy and spirit of play that had so often been the hallmark of my life.

Amy was taking over many of the things that had to be done. She was administering Carolyn’s medications 24/7, a real twenty-four-seven, not the one that people use to try to impress you with by how much work they are doing, or how much time they are devoting to something.

Every day she would set alarms so that she could rise in the wee hours of the morning to give Carolyn what the medical people said she needed.

She would change Carolyn’s feeding bags when the nurses who arrived confessed that they didn’t know how to do it. She would get the machines to work, when the professionals were not able to do so. She would handle the ongoing threats from the insurance people, who were ready and willing to cut off Carolyn’s life sustaining supply of liquid nourishment, even when it meant that she would die if they did so. Over and over and over she made things go right, often when the task to hand seemed impossible. Daily she would be on the phone with stupid, block headed people that had managed to develop a level of stupidity worthy of an Academy Award. She would deal in a gentle, sane, and efficient manner with these people despite all reason she should not, and despite all provocation to do otherwise.

She set out organized procedures and charts that would be the envy of an accountant or a business manager that held a master's degree in the subject.

So was wonderful, day after day after day wonderful, and she saved my life and my sanity over and over again. I will love her forever for the person she demonstrated herself to be.

The Hospice people were wonderful, and there were many others who supported us along the way as we sought to raise the money we needed to try alternate approaches to dealing with this body killing infestation.

Friends and family were wonderful. Several of them contributed thousands to the cause, and others contributed what they had.

Joan Newton, whom I always remembered as Joan Losslie, came from her home that was quite a distance away. She was one of Carolyn’s most beloved friends. Over and over she came to comfort Carolyn, to read to her and to rub her feet. Others came also, and if I were to list all of their names, and the loving contributions they offered, this chapter of these chronicles would become oppressively long, and Carolyn would undoubtedly return as a spirit to chastise me for going on and on and on. The idea that she might do that, almost entices me to ramble on a lot more.

In September, two months after the Barbershop Convention, Carolyn had begun to deteriorate rapidly.

As her illness progressed, and her doses of morphine increased along with it, she began to lose her focus on the agreed upon reality that we humans are normally attuned to.

At first she would catch some of her “crazy” excursions out of this reality. They would make her afraid, afraid that she was losing it. So many times Amy and I held her when she became afraid of things, afraid of what would happen after she died, afraid of being alone, and afraid of my being alone without her. It was hell to see her in fear. Often I could get her to laugh and extract herself from the thoughts that were seeking to drive her mad, but not always.

Daily, Amy and I kept al log of the happenings and soon they were taxing the computer's ability to find a place to store them.

Thursday 17 September, 2009 - 11:20 AM Amy said Carolyn was very much out of it during the night. She tried to stand to go to the potty, but she is so weak now she can hardly walk. She creeps forward on unsteady legs. Mentally she is all over the place. She was talking about a puppy and she got upset when Amy went to sit on the couch. She was sure that Amy was sitting on the puppy.

She also told Amy that it was pretty bad now but it would be OK when the body was gone. That one really got to Amy.

Seeing her day after day in this deteriorating condition, losing her ability to think and function in the most normal ways, how am I to respond?

With caring and love for sure, but how else?

My logical mind says that it is crazy to feel bad - to suffer myself as I see Carolyn suffer. “That just adds to the suffering“, I logically assert to myself.

Over and over and over again I remind myself of this, as I seek to see Carolyn well and perfect.

Often I succeed in feeling better. Often I do not.

Meta-physicians say that at some level of consciousnesses it is our choice to experience anything we experience in life. I try to see this as her choice. I try to see it as my choice, and my mind screams that only the insane and sadistic would make such a choice.

“Is this God‘s Will?”, an old Catholic part of me asserts.

“If it is”, I think, “I don’t want anything to do with that kind of God“.

“It’s a mystery“, another Catholic part of me says in response to the claim of religions and philosophers from the dawn of time, that these mysteries are also a part of God‘s plan.

“Why would I, or a supposedly loving God, want us to be in misery or mystery?”, I ask myself

“Because you choose to experience limitation“, another part of me responds.

“Limitation, OK”, my mind sort of agrees, “but pain and suffering???”

“It is to learn how to endure it” my friend Ken suggested in an effort to be of service. “You can become the greatest of the endurers. That was, or is, your choice. At some level of consciousness, it is your choice“.

Well if it is my choice, it is a choice, at least from this humanoid perspective, I never want to make again. In fact it is a choice I want to cease choosing right now. Yet it seems that my human choice has little or no power to relieve the suffering and pain. Yet that is what every philosophy says will happen when you fully accept responsibility for the condition.

“Give it to God and it will be handled“, my Religious Science friends tell me.

“Ask and you shall receive“ the Abraham people kept telling me over and over.

“Yeah”, my mind retorts. “I’ve been asking for forty years, and I still have not gotten the life that I have been asking for“.

“Well obviously you did not do it in the right way“, an echo of asserted philosophers and meta-physicians reply.

11:50 AM “How many kids are going with us?” Carolyn asks as I get the wheel chair and her oxygen into the car for our visit to the pulmonary doctor and clinic. She is to have the fluid removed from under her lung again today. She can have no local anesthetic because of her allergies to all the "caine" medicines. Last time she stood the pain as long as she could and over a liter and a half of fluid was removed. It needs to be done again as she is having difficulty breathing. I so don’t want her to go through more pain. I resist the image, although I know I should not. I work to release my resistance and accept what is.

Anyway it is noon, and it is time to go.

I am sitting next to Carolyn who is on the table in the procedure room, I am listening as the nurse begins to explain in detail all of the things that can go wrong. I try to stop her from doing this, but she insists that she has to.

As I sit with my arm around Carolyn, the nurse begins to do the ultrasound scan to determine how much fluid is in her system. As she does, all the things that could go wrong start going through my head. The idea that my love now has to endure the pain of having a needle, and then a catheter, inserted into her back with no anesthetic, is torture for me. It got so bad, that I had to leave the room for a bit. Thank God Amy was there to be with my love.

Unbeknown to me, my negative thoughts were slowly casting me into a depressed condition, but at the time, I could not afford the luxury of being depressed, for I had to be there for Carolyn and Amy.

I called my sister Sharon for comfort, but I could not reach her.

I tried calling Karen Mitchell, our beautiful and wonderful friend who has so often graced our lives with the magic of her songs and music. “She can help me“, I thought. “She’ll be compassionate and understanding”, but I could not reach her either.

Then I got a hold of Joan Newton, and she listened with love and compassion, helping me to relieve my fear stomach and shakiness. After that call, I went back in with Carolyn and Amy, and held my love throughout the procedure. Carolyn was an amazing trooper. She came through it seemingly better than I did.

Then they took another X-Ray to see how things were now. As they did, we dressed Carolyn in preparation for our leaving.

Then the doctor called us back in and informed us that they had unfortunately punctured Carolyn’s lung, and air was leaking out. This he said had to be handled by inserting a tube into the area to get out the air, and she needed to be monitored very closely. The idea of doing this surgical procedure on her without any anesthetic sent shivers through me, and the doctor.

So we got Carolyn back into her hospital gown, and into the recovery room. We had run out of oxygen for her and got another tank from the nurse. Now she was transferred to their oxygen system.

A bit later, the doctor came in having conferred with the head of the establishment, and they decided to wait on the surgical procedure and do another X-ray in a couple of hours to see how things were going. So we waited. Two hours later a 2nd set of X-rays were done. When the doctor came in concerned about chest pains Carolyn had reported, he wanted us to take her into the hospital for the procedure under a general anesthetic.

The complications of doing that, of getting her to the hospital in her present condition seemed a logistical nightmare. I then carefully questioned Carolyn so as to get the doctor more accurate data regarding her pain and breathing, After we discovered that her pain and breathing was not as bad as we had thought, it was decided that we would return home, and return the next day for a full day of X-rays and a continual watching of her condition.

Shortly after that, we returned home. Just as we arrived from our short, very slow trip down the freeway during at “rush hour“, two nurses arrived at the apartment.

One of them had to change Carolyn’s TPM feeding, and the other to do a checkout of some kind. Also, Amy tried to get more oxygen, and that ran into yet another set of problems needing to be solved. So I cooked Amy dinner, and I went into my office to write this log as she consumed the food I had prepared for her. Then I went to relieve her so she could get some much needed rest.

Friday, September 18, 2009, 8:10 AM. Apparently Carolyn has no memory of the procedure and the X-rays that were done yesterday. She overheard Amy talking to Sandy about it and wanted to know what she was talking about

Saturday, September 19, 2009, I found Carolyn picking at her nose and I asked, “What are you doing my love?’ She replied, “They sent me in the mail these boogers from different kids - disgusting. I have to clean it off. There are places with inch long boogers with labels on them. Most of them have shorter labels.”

9:15 AM Carolyn is getting dressed and Amy is helping her. Carolyn brushed her teeth and then wanted to put the toothpaste tube down her dress into her bra. She argued with me that this is where it belonged. I finally got her to allow me to put it down. (“We can leave it on the counter where you can get it later if you need it.”) After she finished getting dressing, she talked about her childhood friend Jonnie whom she grew up with in Anaheim.

Sunday, September 20th, 2009. Carolyn was mostly out cold except for a few times of agitation which got pretty bad in the wee hours. She of course wants to get up and do things, or feels she must handle something from some other reality that is not the one her body is in. Then she becomes painfully frustrated when she finds out that she cannot do the normal things she wants to do.

Monday, September 21, 2009 . 2:15 PM We went back to the clinic this morning to get another X-ray. They did not have the room they promised and Carolyn had a bad night and early morning with labored breathing and franticness. She has been talking out of some other reality for days. Some of it is funny from one point of view, and yet it is tragic to see how real and painful the realties often seem to her.

Thursday, September 24, 2009. 8:43AM

It was Wednesday night about 7 or 8 PM I think. I had been watching a stupid movie on the computer when Amy called out.

When I arrived in the living room Carolyn was sitting on the portable commode shaking uncontrollably. Her body had gone into some sort of spasm or convulsion. I held her with my face up to her ear and asked her to feel my hands. Over and over I moved my hands to different parts of her body asking her to feel them and flowing every ounce of love and comfort that I could muster.

The shaking went on and on, and Amy went to call for help. Tina, the cleaning lady that Anita and Guido has so generously provide for us, was also at Carolyn’s side. On and on, the compulsive, spasmatic shaking continued, as I whispered in Carolyn’s ear that it was OK. That if she choose to go now, it was OK.

After what seemed like forever, the shaking subsided. The laying on of my hands seemed to be having a positive effect, and then, the shaking started up again. I don’t know how many times this occurred. It happened for quite a while, but eventually the convulsions stopped.

During the shaking, her teeth were clinched shut, and Amy could not give her any medication to help.

I had been on my knees holding her the whole time, and at one point my leg began to spasm, and I had to get up and bend over to hold her.

After the shaking subsided, we tried to get her to the bed. She was dead weight. At that point, if I remember it correctly, she was totally non responsive. Her legs and feet were badly swollen. After the nurse arrived, it was discovered that her temperature was a hundred and one, and the nurse began to apply ice packs to try and bring the swelling down. Laurel arrived after a while, and I called Joan for some help with the trauma I was going through.

We were having a lot of trouble with Carolyn all day Tuesday. She was frantic and hallucinating, and constantly wanting to get up. She would plead with me to let her get up. She wanted to go into the kitchen.

So much of this is a blur of different things happening. The days and hours are so jumbled. I know at one point when Amy and I were eating a Mario’s sandwich after the visit to the cardiologist, she wanted to come over and sit with us. We helped her to do so and immediately she wanted to leave because we were eating and she could not. I offered her a fruit popsicle and that seemed to help a bit. Then she was up again, confused and disorientated. I tried to help her to bed and she insisted we go over to the desk area where she was trying to find her feet. She opened drawer after drawer and then sat down in a chair and sadly asked me if I had eaten her popsicle. I had given her a second one that I put back in the freezer when she didn’t want it anymore. I told her it was in the fridge and went and got it for her. Apparently she had confused losing it with losing her feet.

This morning (Thursday) she finally was able to speak again after a night’s sleep. She was very insistent that she had just spoken to Joan on the phone. I went along with her as I always do. She said how much she needed strong friends - friends who knew that what she said was true. When we called Joan so she could talk to her, we got Joan to verify that she had if fact talked to her a few minutes earlier, Joan tried to say it was yesterday, and she became frantic to have Joan know the truth that she has just talked to her. So I got the phone and told Joan to go along with her truth.

After the call, Carolyn told me that people were trying to get her to believe she lived somewhere else, and were trying to get her to do all sorts of things that were not true. There were people in blue coats and blue shoes, and some in white. It seemed very important to her that there were strong friends that would believe her.

Melissa, the Hospice nurse who had been wonderful, came in at that point. She said that while Carolyn was somewhat lucid, it was a good time for friends to come and say goodbye.

(As I am posting in these notes from my “Last Days of Carolyn Diary”, I am also wondering just how much of this I want to share with you. However. it does paint a picture of the things I reacted to that subsequently contributed to my depression. So it serves to delineate how I got into the mess I projected myself into, and how I later got out of it. So, I feel, that as painful as some of these memories may be for me and others, they may serve to keep us out of the crap in the future.)

I have found that I am very reactive to some of this stuff despite all my efforts to be otherwise. When Amy told me yesterday morning that Carolyn was in a lot of stomach pain, my stomach went into pain and agitation, even though I knew that is was a sympathy reaction that has no value. I taught for years, that when we go into sympathy, we are just creating for ourselves, the pain that others are experiencing. Yet it happens anyway, seemingly despite all my efforts. As I held Carolyn, my body spasmed into fear, fear of being helpless to change her condition, fear that this would happen to me also, now that I have been diagnosed with high grade prostrate cancer and diabetes.

“This is hell“, I thought, “and these writings are but a tiny part of the story.”

The idea that a loving God would ever allow this, brings the fear that there must not be a loving God. And that brings the fear that there is not a power to handle all this pain and suffering. It tends to enforce the idea that there are just fixed programs and mechanics that one is subjected to.

This is not something I would ever choose, or inflict, on myself or another. I would have to be a sadistic monster to do so. If I were a loving God, I would insure that no one suffered, that love and joy and pleasure and fulfillment were all that was. I would never choose this.

“It’s not your conscious self that’s choosing this“, some old mental programming says to me. “It’s your unconscious self, or your higher self that has some unseen purpose for all of this“.,

“Then my unconscious or higher self is nuts or sadistic“, I hear myself say.

You have to get the bigger picture they say, whoever the hell they are. This is just an instant in the eternity of time.

“Well it’s not being experienced as an instant in eternity“, I retort. “It is being experienced as ongoing, second to second, minute to minute, hour to hour, day to day week to week, month to month, year to year misery”. Yet at the same time, I sense that there is more to the picture than I am seeing from my limited human perspective.

Friday, September the 25th, at about 4 PM, I recorded in my log, but it was actually Saturday, the 26th of September 2009 at about 4 PM. It seems that somehow I had lost track of the days, and the names we give to them.

The attending nurse said that Carolyn seemed to have ceased breathing.

I rushed over to her and Amy burst into tears.

Over the next few minutes, the reality began to grip us. I held my beloved, and after a while I asked the nurse if her heart had stopped. I didn’t want to check myself.

The nurse came over, checked, and then said that it had.

I held Carolyn’s hand to my face and I cried.

It hit me, that as crazy as it may seem, I had never thought she would actually die.

After a few minutes, of Amy and I crying our eyes out, Amy got up and called our friend, Ken Gullekson. She asked him to come over right away. Then she began to call others that she wanted to come. Then I began to call people I wanted to be with me - Julie Sanchez, Karen Mitchell, Joan Newton, Paul Gibbons, Hal and Laney Clevenger.

Julie arrived with her husband Andrew and their two boys, and the boys stayed outside. Julie was a great comfort, for like Carolyn, she is pure love, Carolyn and I loved her more than words can say, and Carolyn always longed to be her friend.

Often, in the months that followed I would go over to the school where Carolyn taught just to bask in the glory of Julie's presence so that I could get a few minutes of relief from the pain and misery I had projected myself into. Unfortunately, most of the time, Julie would have very little time to spend with me, for she continually projects herself into the idea that she has too much to do to have time for anything else. One of these days I hope to entice her into the discovery that she has an infinite amount of time. Then maybe I can further entice her to not try to jam so much stuff, and so many activities into the idea and belief that you don’t have time. Actually my “Invitation to WonderWorld” book has a great chapter on the subject of basking in the glory of discovering that we actually do have all the time we desire. The chapter is entitled, “Adventures in Time”. I have been trying to get Julie to read it for some time, but she never
seems to have the time. I even sold her the book for less that it cost me, but so far, she, and her wonderful husband Andrew, and her fantastic son Nicolas, have not found the time to read it. Of course as the little runt Yoda says, I should stop trying to get them to read the book, and just find a way to entice them to do so based on the idea that it might really lead them into a wisdom that will afford them a lot more time. Maybe I can get them to read these chronicles, for as we progress, I will be spending a lot of time on the subject of mastering time. However, these chronicles are going to be a lot longer than the WonderWorld book, so unless I can entice them into the discovery that they do have the OT ability to have all the time they want, they won’t have time to read these chronicles either.

Of course all of these efforts to entice them into the discovery that we have masterfully occluded the fact that we are already Time Masters, is based an a totally selfish motivation. For when, Julie chooses to discover herself as a Time Master, I will then have more time to bask in the glory of her magnificent loving countenance, if she’ll let me, and if it‘s Ok with Andrew.

So it appears that it is going to take a bit more time for me to discover that I have the power to get back the love I seem to have lost, a love that is now basking in the glory of infinite ecstasy, infinite majesty, infinite peace, infinite glory and infinite time.

Anyway, getting back to the time that immediately followed Carolyn’s death, a time when I was not being so flippant and clever.

Carolyn’s parents had just left Carolyn’s side after a two day stay. When Amy called them, they said that they needed to rent a car as the transmission on their car had given out on the way home. They did that, and arrived some hours later.

After Her Death​

In the months that followed the death of my beloved, I could not spiritually contact her. In fact, I couldn’t seem to contact anyone spiritually.

To some that may seem a normal occurrence after the death of a loved one, but for me, it was just about as unusual as things could possibly get.

For years, I had been able to communicate with spiritual entities and departed spirits with the same degree of certain and reality that I am now typing words into the cyber space of the electro-magnetic universe of my computer’s hard drive. Often I would immediately contact the departed and share my views of what was occurring with a departed loved one. Often this would bring great comfort to the family and friends that I shared these things with. When Carolyn and I went to Japan, where I had been invited to do Life Enhancement seminars and one-to-one’s with some beautifully spiritually aware Japanese people, I was often asked to channel departed loved ones, and the results were wonderful. However, as I said, after Carolyn’s death, all of my spiritual channeling abilities disappeared. At times I even fell into the trap of wondering if it had all just been my wild and crazy imagination.

During, and especially following, Carolyn’s illness and death, my psychic ability all but disappeared, for I had used my energy, and my unlimited OT abilities, to focus on the idea that things were bad, and when we do that, our spiritual abilities seem to vanish.

It took months for me to recover form the messes I projected myself into, but when I emerged, my psychic abilities were greater that ever. Once again, I could telepathically communicate with all sorts of ET’s, including my departed wife.

You see, it all has to do with our RESPONSE ABILITY, our ability to respond the way we wish to respond, instead of responding to some old programming that seems to have the power to make us respond in ways we do not really want to respond.

It all has to do with the meanings we assign to what does and does not happen in our lives.

When we assign a negative meaning to a happening, or we define it as a bad thing, then instantly, at The Speed of Thought, we have a negative effect on ourselves, and that ain’t fun.

When we unwisely buy into negative ideas and meanings, we are subscribing to beliefs that can negatively affect us apparently without our consent. Actually the truth is that nothing can negatively affect us without our consent, but it can appear to, and these illusionary apprentices can seem to be very real when we fail to notice that we are creating the whole scenario.

Something happens, like the death of our wife, or the suffering of one we love, and we decide that we must assign a negative meaning to this, because to not do so would be unthinkable (unthinkable - a belief we subscribed to sometime in the past that is now so engrained that it would be unthinkable to think it was simply a belief that we could change.)

When we do not pay close attention to what we are creating, when we are not acutely aware that we are creating the negative meaning and definitions that are producing a negative effect on ourselves, then we are choosing to not be conscious of the things we are creating, and that is what the unconscious mind is, the creations of ours that we decided not to be conscious of. This is the source of a reactive mind, a mind that can slam us into negative feeling apparently without our consent. What we are actually experiencing is the effect of our own created negative meanings and definitions, meanings and definitions that we have programmed into a mind that we have empowered with the ability to affect us. Actually the power comes directly from us. We create and assign negative meaning to things, and then the negative meaning affects us negatively because that’s what we have created them to be, negatives.

It’s all so simple when we wake up, when we choose to see that we are truly the creators of the meaning and definitions, and we are the ones that have empowered them with the power to negatively affect us, and we are the ones who choose to not see what we were doing to the point where we birthed into existence an unconscious and reactive mind.

When we discover that we are doing it all, as Christ invited us to discover. When we CHOOSE to give up our false and fixed ideas and beliefs that it is ALL HAPPENING TO US, instead of the truth that WE ARE DOING IT ALL, then we enter into a realm of reality that seems to impose upon us the miseries that we say we do not want.

Carolyn’ suffering and death was hell for me because I made it hell. At the time I could not have experienced her suffering and death in any other way. It was, at the time impossible for me to feel good, and unethical for me to feel good, and unacceptable for me to feel good, for I had unknowingly created myself to be a human that could not feel good in the presence of suffering and death.

Like the people who watched the agonies of The Christ because they were there, or the people who watched the agonies of The Christ on a silver screen that our Hollywood wizards had birthed into existence, we were not aware that we had created ourselves into a humanoid state of existence that found it excruciatingly painful to watch the suffering and death of someone we love so much.

As I watched my wife suffer and die, I had no conscious awareness that I was creating my own suffering. I had no conscious perception that I was the one creating the negative meaning and definitions that were giving me so much pain. Well, I did at times notice that it was my creations, but I did not notice it often enough to free myself from my self-created miseries.

I had unwittingly projected myself into a limited humanoid consciousness, a state of being where we have mastered the ability to not see what we are creating, and to not know that we are the creators of the good feelings and the bad feelings we experience. I was not being the true Second Coming of Christ that The Christ said we would experience some time in the future. I had not taken Christ’s invitation to believe that “The Second Coming of Christ” would be the discovery that we are The Christ, and that we are the creators of the realties we were experiencing. I was still stuck in the self created game of being a humanoid Master of Limitation. I was still stuck in the self-created belief that I didn’t really create the suffering I was experiencing. I was still tenaciously adhering to the belief that the realties I was experiencing were being created by some force or deity that was outside of me.

I remember oh so vividly a channeling session of the alien ET known to us as Bashar. At the time I was having some difficulty believing that this channeled entity was really an ET from another planet. However, I was not having any difficulty believing the wisdom and truth he was imparting. I had asked him “What he was getting out of these interactions with us“.

“Oh, many things” he boldly responded. “You have often heard us refer to you as the Masters of Limitation”, he continued. “and some of you have considered this to be a derogatory statement, but I assure you that it is not. On the contrary. ‘The Masters of Limitation tag’ we have afforded you is actually a compliment of the highest magnitude. For you have pulled off something that we have never seen before. You have pulled off the ability to create things and not notice that you are creating them”.

“As I have said before”, he continued, I have two primary jobs, I pilot my space ship, and I communicate with people and entities on other planets. I share information back and forth just like you do. You do it verbally, for the most part, and we do it telepathically. In this way we learn new things, just as you do.

Recently, we went into communication with a civilization that we had not been in communication with before, and for the first time in three hundred our history, we got into what you would call an argument.”

“Wow!” I thought to myself. That’s impressive in itself, to not have had an argument in three hundred years. Won’t it be nice when we have evolved that far.

Anyway continuing with what Bashar was saying.

“Recently we went into communication with a civilization that we had not been in communication with before, and for the first time in three hundred our history, we got into what you would call an argument, because these beings would not believe that it was possible for someone to not know that they created their own reality.

How, for instance could a person be alone in a room, totally upset with their husband, wife or a friend, and not know that they were creating the upset. They are alone. The person they are upset with is not there. How could they not know that they were creating for themselves the reality that they are upset?

That’s impossible!.” these beings asserted.

Bashar said that it took a lot of convincing, but he finally managed to convince them that we have pulled it off. We have developed the ability to create an upset, and not notice that we are the ones creating it. We tenaciously hold to the idea and belief that the other person is the cause of our upset. We hold to the idea that the other person is doing it, even when they aren’t present.

Bashar said these beings found this amazing, and a wave of excitement rushed through their culture the likes of which they had not experienced in some time. Now they are studying us with rapt admiration, wondering how we pulled this off. They now fully agree that we truly are Masters of Limitation, and they admire our accomplishment as much as Bashar does.

And so it was with me.

During Carolyn’s long illness and death, and for months after her death, I created all sorts of upset and misery for myself, and I never noticed that I was the one who created it all. Of course, one could say I had very good reasons for creating all of my sadness, fear, anger, shame, blame, regret and personal misery, and I would tend to agree that I had good reasons. However, it was still I that created it all, and when I began to realize that, I began to RESPOND differently. I began to pull out of the bad stuff which I had created for myself.

It was then that my psychic abilities began to slowly re-appear, and it was then that I was slowly able to allow my wife to contact me spiritually.

The first contact that I allowed myself to perceive occurred on Friday the 18th of June, during a Bashar channeling session, the first one I had attended in over three years.

During the middle of the session, Bashar BOLDLY shouted out Strawberry!!! (His pet name for me. I’ll tell you about it later.)

“Yeah baby”, I replied

“I have a greeting and a message for you from Carolyn”, Bashar responded.

I practically fell off the chair. Tears streamed down my face, and the presence of my beloved wife became VERY apparent.

That was the beginning of the return of my spiritual contacting ability

Then, as I said at the opening of this chapter, on Monday, the 21st of June, 2010 at 10:34 AM Mean Solar Time, I got a visit from my beloved OT ET, former wife, and in the next chapter, and in the chapters to follow, I will tell you about my many more contacts with OT ET’s.

 

[The Great Zorg]

Another book?

<snip>

12,500 words in 1,158 lines, 26 pages of this stuff in this single reply and that's all you've got to say?

 

[Hatshepsut]

Thankyou Johnny Raff. THANKYOU.

 

[Stat]

I'm just spreading the love everywhere tonight. Love.

 

[The Great Zorg]

W T F ??????

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zixQYDeRtzI&feature=player_embedded

OK, I don't know what city that is but I'm packing right now and as soon as I find out where it is I'm a gonna buy a ticket and git gone!

 

[CarmeloOrchards]

Knowest thou the meaning of Potential?


I said I was going to write something on my take on this - here it is. It has made my week exiting - at times so much so that I couldn’t sleep with the exitement I had coursing through me.

Firstly we must recognise that the universe and all that is operates as a fractal. I could go into a long winded explanation of what that means and prove it logically or mathematically, but that would be BORING, so, in simple terms, it means that every offshoot that happens within it contains all of the qualities and properties of the original. It’s like a pip in an apple which grew on a tree - the pip contains within it all of the qualities and potentials of the original apple tree. Nothing has been lost in the subdivision of the apple tree. Or, you can divide infinity up as many times as you like - you will always still have infinity as the result.

Somebody mentioned the Hermetic Law which says “As above, so below”, or “As below, so above”. This in itself tells you that we are dealing with a fractal in this universe, and that by looking carefully at what exists here and now we can extrapolate what happened as the universe was created.

So what is it a fractal of? Well it started with this Postulate and Percieve business. A postulate being an intantaneous creation done by a being. He/she simply declared “Let there be dogs and cats” and so instantly there were dogs and cats.

Then the creator identified with the creation and so “became” it - but he still had within him ALL of the attributes and potentials of the original creator, just like the apple-pip does.

And just as apple trees make new apple trees which can produce even more apple trees, so too (in my view) does theta have the ability to bring into being more theta. Viewpoints make more viewpoints. Call it creation or subdividing or whatever you like, the important thing is that each has the full potential and all of the qualities of the original. Nothing is lost or weakened or diluted as this process happened. Or happens. As above, so below. We have children - each child has the full potential of a spiritual being.

Divide infinity up a zillion times and you still have each one being infinity. Knowest thou the meaning of Potential? Each life unit, each particle, each everything in this universe has the full potential of its original creator. How much is that? Infinite.

A few random examples: All of our western languages supposedly derive from some ancient proto-Indo/European language. OK. Every word in our English language has the full potential to be a seed-word that becomes the start of a entirely new family of languages that derive from it. It has that potential.

Ditto with all the food plants we have and consume - their genetics can potentially produce a million types of new fruits and vegies that we can eat and any of the attributes that food now has can be developed further to produce a whole array of desirable attributes.

Every individual has the full potential of God within him (if you like that term).

Any aspect of everything we know has the potential to become a complete universe of its own.

And so on.

=====================

Now what is important here is this crittur we call ‘OT’ that we came into Scientology hoping to attain. We tend to consider that OT is just the me that I am made much more powerful. Well, that’s how Hubbard saw it and promoted it - you can have it that way if you want to but I see it differently. I reckon anyone who can take himself as he is, or who can take anything he finds as it is, and then open up the potential within it that is not recognised as being there, open it up and release it and develop it into something fantastic - that person is a real OT.

So Bach could take primitive instrumental sounds and invent MUSIC ! ! ! And Beethoven and Mozart and all the others - JEEEEZZZZUUUSSS man, these guys were real OTs ! ! !

And all the others, Newton and Tesla and Columbus and all the genius inventors that are and that ever were - they are all OTs They open up the potential that lurks within things and people.

And each one of all of us has that potential. Each and every one of us is infinite creativity personified and made magnificent.

Knowest thou the meaning of Potential? I have had a teeny weeny little glimpse.

What a nice look. Thank you.

 

[FoTi]

Wow this is way out , is this possible FoTi, what did your twin say to you exactly about tesla ?

She just said that he had been Tesla in a past life. He left the SO and they divorced. He moved out of state and developed an advanced scientific technology for something that I won't say what it is here, because I prefer not to identify him. Sorry for the mystery.....it's just that it's his life and not for me to put it here. That's all she told me.

 

[Hatshepsut]

Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities. Truth isn't. :wink2: MARK TWAIN

 

[Hatshepsut]

All these OT ETs stick together. Below see Mark Twain with Nicola Tesla in lab circa 1894.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/Twain_in_Tesla's_Lab.jpg

 

[CarmeloOrchards]

Ah, yes....the wonderful 60's.....I loved the aesthetics of the hippy days.

1969, the current Captain of Flag Crew (on the left) with her boyfriend. Notice the Scientology bumper emblem.