Monday, July 29, 2002

This morning we spent backing up—over and over—and this afternoon we worked with maps. I needed the backing practice, so that was good; our trainer was impressed with both my and Wayne's (my driving partner) improvement.

Working with maps was no problem since I already know how; I not only did the navigating when my family drove from Vermont to Arizona when I was 10; I, myself had ordered the maps with the route printed on them! So when I say we had homework in which we had to plot routes across the country, you'll understand this didn't take me long.

Tuesday, July 30, 2002

I met a woman tonight at the Jacuzzi who started off as if she were your standard Evangelical. It turned out she was just looking for some guidance. She has dreams on a regular basis of a previous life, in which she is standing near an opening in a cliff where there is a temple. Her best friend has the same dream, and these dreams have continued for years.

When she was 18, she babysat for her nieces at her sister's house. While there, after the kids were asleep, she would hear a man's voice, even though she was certain no one else was in the house. At first she ran from it; but, after awhile she asked him what he wanted. He told her he had owned that house thirty years before; he had died in a car accident; his family, which had little money, had illegally and secretly buried him in the back yard in an unmarked grave and then moved away. He told her that he couldn't rest until he knew his family was okay, but he couldn't find them.

After a lot of misgivings, she finally did the detective work to locate the former owner of the house—or, rather, his widow. She had moved to a nearby town and, one day, Joyce drove over to see her. You are going to think I'm nuts, she told the woman when the door was opened.

Well, that's an interesting introduction, the woman replied. Why not tell me who you are?

So, Joyce explained who she was, that her nieces lived in her old house, and so on. She told the woman about the man's voice. When she described where the man said he was buried (which no one else could know), the widow invited her in, stunned. Finally, she asked Joyce, What do you want?

I just want your husband to find peace, Joyce replied. So he'll leave me alone. He just needs to know that you and your kids are all right.

So the widow showed Joyce the photo album: The kids growing up, the weddings, the grandchildren. The widow cried and she and Joyce embraced. When Joyce returned to her sister's house, she waited for the kids to go to sleep and then went to the room where she had first heard the voice. Are you here? she asked.

Yes, the voice said. So Joyce told him what she had learned. When she was done, the voice said, Thanks. She felt a weight lift from the room; and she felt alone. The voice never returned.

Joyce had been unable to align her experience with her conservative Christian upbringing, which said communing with the dead was Satanic. I reminded her of the passage in which Jesus states that one can always tell a tree by its fruit: A good tree can bear only good fruit. Was anyone harmed by the events she described, I asked? Were people's lives enhanced, or diminished? She had to admit that only good had come from what she had done. Then, it sounds to me, I said, like you have Jesus' blessing to exercise this gift. As long as it helps people, and does not hinder, you are performing a service. I then steered her in the direction of Zecharia Sitchin's The Twelfth Planet as a means of continuing her Bible studies by learning about the original Sumerian sources for Genesis.

As we are still practicing backing up (a struggle) and map reading (easy), I don't have much else to report. It did occur to me that I left data processing for truck driving, two careers in which backing up is a crucial activity.