Merlyn's Mind: Book Three of the
Merlyn's Mind Series

By Richard H. Orndorff

Merlyn's Mind completes the original trilogy of segmented story-dreams by the sixth century Merlyn, the Scotsman. The Present, real time story-dream brothers, Robert the poet and Richard the writer, continue their theoretical discussions in real time from May 2007 into late February 2008.

The Past, with Grandma's Stories begin with Lady Allowyn and Sir Geoffrey in the sixteenth century and works her way into the twentieth century where Grandma Earth ends her genealogical narratives with the nineteen year olds Robert and Richard Graystone and their future wives, Connie and Cindy Bleacher, at the dining room table celebrating the late FDR's January birthday with their respective parents and grandparents, first in 1960, then again in 1961. Thus, old Grandma completes word-filled human snapshots, fruitfully linking the Graystone and Bleacher generations from 12,000 years ago in the first book to the present, 2008, in the third book.

Merlyn's suggestive Future, titled 'Pouch Text,' concludes with all the major characters alive but one. The family group ( a mixture of human beings and their physically and mentally human-like marsupial counterparts from HomePlanets across the Milky Way galaxy) focus on raising seven year old Diplomat, a hybrid of both species and cultures, on Earth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 25, 2008
• ISBN: 9780595602483

Richard H. Orndorff

Richard H. Orndorff has lived in Ohio for all but two years of life. Spiritually, he is a humanistic transcendentalist who, while agnostic, leans toward the concept of a singular, personal G---D who accepts human-like beings for what they are. These books are written with that supposition in mind.

Book preview

MERLYN’S MIND

Book Three of the

Merlyn’s Mind Series

A Novel

Richard H. Orndorff

iUniverse, Inc.

New York Bloomington Shanghai

Merlyn’s Mind

Book Three of the Merlyn’s Mind Series

Copyright © 2008 by Richard H. Orndorff

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any Web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

ISBN: 978-0-595-48153-8 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-0-5956-0248-3 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Introduction

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

EPILOGUE

Dedication

To my dear, kind and patient first readers and their spouses: Alta and Craig Brelsford, Angie and Tim Edmonds, Patricia and Warren Ernsberger, Carol and Fritz Milligan, Kim Orndorff Paik and Paul Paik, Teresa and Gary Popplewell, Patricia and Robert Pringle, Jeanne and Jim Shumaker, Laney Bender-Slack and Jay Slack, and Cathy and Tod Stoessner. I humbly thank each for your trusted friendship.

Acknowledgments

As in the previous book of this fictional series the historical names, concepts, factual data can be found via Google and/or Encyclopedia Britannica. The Medieval dessert recipe described in Chapter One’s Grandma’s Story is used with the kind permission of Carly Abramowitz of Famous French Desserts and Breads, a well known online recipe site, [www.famousfrenchdesserts.com]

I thank, as always, Carol Hammond Orndorff, the soft-spoken but firmly independent-minded woman I married in 1967, for putting up with my personal foibles and eccentricities with the patience and the humor of a saint. I also thank her for giving me the retirement time and then some for the keyboarding of a couple of million words onto the hard drives. We are both enjoying our retirements with books, gardening, family, friends and traveling.

My old literary colleague and friend, Robert Pringle, again gives me permission to publish another of his previously published poems, Breakfast with the Arts. I am continually thankful for Robert’s contributions and look forward for more in the coming books.

M’lady Muse fires my neo-classic heart as I orderly press my fingers from one key to another. M’lady Muse and I dance without a question. I thank her repeatedly from one ten fingered digital dance to the next.

Amorella, the mysterious inner writing guide of this writer’s wordless mind, delivers the words and sentences to fingertips. Of her thoughts and considerations I can only wonder and give her this special silent thank you, once again.

* * * *

In the late 1990’s at Miami of Ohio I had been given the writing seminar assignment of listing the most influential authors and their books in my life.

These authors and their books visited my college prep, honors and advance placement classrooms many times throughout my thirty-five professional years. This is an acknowledgment of those who, in no particular order, still visit my heart and through these works from time to time.

The Oresteia—Aeschylus; The Word—I. Wallace; The Loved One—E. Waugh; Our Town—T. Wilder; Brave New World—A. Huxley; Totem and Taboo & Interpretation of Dreams—S. Freud; Paradise Lost—J. Milton; The Gallic Wars—

J. Caesar; The Hero with a Thousand Faces—J. Campbell; Existentialism from Dostoevsky to Sarte—(ed.) W. Kaufman; History of the English Speaking Peoples—W. Churchill; Henry V, Hamlet, Taming of the Shrew & MacBeth—Shakespeare; The New Golden Bough—J. Fraser; The Rockefellers—Collier & Horowitz; Extraordinary Endings—Panati; Childhood’s End—A. C. Clarke; Metaphysics—W. H. Walsh; The Sacred and the Profane—M. Eliade; William Blake—K. Raine; Oedipus & Antigone—Sophocles; Foundation Trilogy—I. Asimov; Coney Island of the Mind—L. Ferlinghetti; House on the Strand—D. DuMaurier; Class—P. Fussell; 1984 & Animal Farm—G. Orwell; Here I Stand—R. H. Bainton; The History of Knowledge—C. Van Doren; The Discoverers—D. J. Boorstin; Treasure Island—R.

L. Stevenson; The Varieties of Religious Experience—W. James; The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat—O. Sacks; Death of a Salesman—A. Miller; Dune—

F. Herbert; Stranger in a Strange Land—R. Heinlein; Thus Spoke Zarathustra & Beyond Good and Evil—F. Nietzche; The Republic—Plato; Ethics—Aristotle; Confessions—St. Augustine; The Canterbury Tales—G. Chaucer; Faust—J. Goethe; St. Joan—G. B. Shaw; Tom Jones—H. Fielding; Lady Chatterley’s Lover—D. H. Lawrence; Ulysses—J. Joyce; Candide—Voltaire; The Crash of 79—P. Erdman; The Sovereign State of ITT—A. Sampson; Moby Dick—H. Melville; The Prince—Machiavelli; Selected Essays—M. Montaign; Civil Disobedience—H. D. Thoreau; Essays—R. W. Emerson; The Universe and Dr. Einstein—

L. Barnett; The Angels and Us & Ten Philosophical Mistakes—M. J. Adler; The Iliad & The Odyssey—Homer; Mythology—E. Hamilton; The Greek Philosophers—R. Warner; The Exorist—P. Beatty; The Bible and The Koran; The Rise and Fall of Adolph Hitler—W. L. Shirer; Death of a President & Arms of Krupp—

W. Manchester; The Ancient Book of the Dead—(tr.) R. Faulkner/(ed.) C. Anderson; Ringworld—L. Niven; The Left Hand of Darkness—U. Leguin; Native Son—

R. Wright; The Time Machine—H. G. Wells; Codebreakers—D. Kahn; AMan Called Intrepid—W. Stevenson; Beyond Freedom and Dignity—B. F. Skinner; Man and His Symbols—C. Jung; Rime of the Ancient Mariner—S. T. Coleridge; Chaos—J. Gleick; The Andromeda Strain—M. Crichton; The Ascent of Man—J. Bronowski; The Jungle—U. Sinclair; Edgar Cayce: The Sleeping Prophet—J. Stern; Frankenstein—M. W. Shelley; This Perfect Day & The Boys from Brazil—I. Levin; On the Road—J. Kerouac; Howl—A. Ginsberg; Druids—M. Llywelyn; Burr—G. Vidal; The Crystal Cave—M. Stewart; Canticle for Leibowitz—W. M. Miller, Jr.; Thirteen Days—R. Kennedy; A Separate Peace—J. Knowles; The Grapes of Wrath—J. Steinbeck; On the Beach—N. Shute; Earth Abides—G. R. Stewart; The Peloponnesian Wars—Thucydides; Logic for Undergraduates—R. J. Kreyche; Plato for the Modern Age—R. S. Brumbaugh; The Straight Dope—C. Adams; One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich—A. Solzhenitsyn; Being and Nothingness & No Exit—J. P. Sartre; Upanishads (Confidential Teachings)—Indian Philosophy/ Religion; The Potting Shed—G. Greene; The World is my Home—J. A. Michener; Future Shock—A. Toffler; Lysistrata—Aristophanes; The Hairy Ape—E. O’Neill; and The Cherry Orchard—A. Chekhov.

Lastly, I also thank our three family genealogists who inspired me early on and during the writing of these three books: my late Great Aunt Floy Orndorff Gray, my Aunt Patricia Orndorff Ernsberger, and wife Carol’s late Aunt Ernestine Jones Hammond.

Introduction

This is the third installment and an important one in that it wraps up the first two books. Grandma’s Stories bow out at the end of this book though she will remain within you whether you like it or not, at least as long as you are living. Being Dead makes little matter, but Grandma Earth is in the genetic process and outcome of each generation that eventually ends up on the other side. On the other side, now there is a phrase for you. If you are thinking the other side of the River Jordan, then where is the river coming from or going to? As the same waters touch both sides, so does the human mind in this book. I don’t know if the mind runs one way or another, but my own appears (to me) to float about every now and then.

Physically, I’ll be sixty-six this year. Back in my younger, headier college days, the early and mid-Sixties, we friends would sit in the Basement of the Heidelberg North or the Heidelberg South on North High Street across from the Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio and sing songs and drink 3.2 percent beer. It was my solemn task to drink a pitcher of draft beer without putting the pitcher down once in the process. The songs were easier to sing afterwards though they lost their words in the process. I am still usually at a loss of words though I don’t usually drink more than a glass or two of wine or ale a year these days. One of my mellow favorites was Michael Rowed the Boat Ashore. Now I don’t know where I was going with this though I think it has something to do with the river.

This is Amorella, Richard’s writing assistant within. He is sitting here at his MacBook, the latest in generations of Apple computers that have been instrumental in writing his mind for the last twenty years. He has no idea what direction I am going to go because his mind is presently empty of words. I write when he is empty, when his mind is next to nothing, as it were. Human beings who cannot speak their minds usually have reason, and Richard is no exception. Satire is a game, and I can play it was well as anyone else.

If you are a person who sees pictures rather than words in your mind, think of this last book in three as a comic book, a kid’s comic book will do. If you want something more erotic, picture all the characters naked, after all I am writing from Richard’s naked empty mind, so you can read it from your own naked, empty mind if you like. That way the book will be more intimate, you see. Whatever the flavor, you can conjure it up, that is one of the things human beings are really good at these days, making up things for their pleasure, entertainment or just to pass the time.

As satire these books don’t offend too many people. Human beings though are mostly unlimited in terms of finding ways to be offended. How can human beings be offended? By being ignored by intelligent and reasonable extraterrestrial aliens. As an imaginary insider, so to speak, I find this quite humorous. That is one of the differences between Merlyn and me. He does not consider himself imaginary even as a dead man, and here I am as the piece of imagination, word gathering for these novels.

I like the name Amorella because the first and last letters are the same, both the first letter of your alphabet. Life and consciousness go together. Intelligent, reasonable beings cannot have one without the other. The only other element needed for indirect communication between your world and my own is more imagination. And, in here, since this is what I am, I’m going to capitalize it just like many of you capitalize on your own inner desires. Here’s Richard.

I don’t have anything else other than there are three more books in my head. Imagination will have to pull the words out as I don’t have the fishing equipment or a boat. I trust you are well and that your days are good ones. And, of course, I hope you enjoy the book.

With sincere regards,

Richard H. Orndorff February, 2008

PROLOGUE

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This is Merlyn. I arrive at the end of this book through the blood of the Living such as yourself. I arrive through reason and imagination both. I arrive by your ability to read and think and consider and by your own reason and imagination. Necessity is the mother of invention and I am a necessary fixture to the stated author of these books. I am the books because these story-dreams are my own.

In the last Prologue I stated that I am the coin on the top of the matchbox that was projected as a shadow on a classroom wall in the first book. I crossed from book two to book three in May of last year when the month held two full moons. Not so rare, but I was there. This book will end when I have arrived in the present to tell the rest of the story, the last three books that show in representation and symbolic form to two great human rebellions in the Place of the Dead. This third book of dreams will conclude when the Earth rests as a shadow on a full moon in the year 2008. Reason and imagination will show this in Merlyn’s way.

The reader can continue to believe whatever sheorhe thinks worth believing in. I survive, as all other humans survive physical death, by the conscious and unconscious will of the mind. The human mind is built to survive such a crossing and this book will show, among other things, a representation of this crossing.

First, I must work my way up to the present through a mind of the Living. We are cousins, you and I. The Dead are cousins to all the Living. We are conscious of the Living just as the Living are conscious of the Dead. Grandma’s Stories show this consciousness through the generations. A representation to be sure, of your own long lines of grandparents. Grandparents that I represent. The Grandma Earth segments of dreams are the rise of the generations of Dead to meet generations of the Living on their own earthly ground. You see, you do not have to believe a word of what old Merlyn in a whisper so quiet you have to see it with your own eyes.

The Brothers dream segments were written in your present, your present lifetime. The are to remind old Merlyn where he must end up. And, he will end up at a time of his own choosing, because I am Merlyn. I will arrive during a full lunar eclipse because it is my prerogative to do so. These are my dreams, not yours.

The Pouch Text segments are a reminder to me that a future has met the present. A future, not the future. The Marsupials in my dreams are human enough because these are human dreams. Presently they are less real than you are. And, they will remain so in my dreams.

This is how the Dead remain conscious of the Living. The double helix, a Past turning about a Future. The Present, invisible mostly to those who are too busy living it to take notice. The Present is visible to the Dead however. It is always Present. We are built to take an interest in our children’s development and education. Do you think a Mother or a Father would forget herorhis children on the threshold of death? If so, where is your humanity?

Read this Merlyn’s words, this Merlyn’s dreams if you will. Let reason and imagination be your guide for it is my own. Human beings are built with both so that they might gain an understanding, always in humor, of how the world really is. The human sense of humor is the shell, as it were, in which one survives physical death. Humor is a comfort to the soul and the spirit. That’s how the Dead see it in my dreams. How do the Dead see it in your dreams?

Merlyn

CHAPTER 1

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THE BROTHERS

Stop the car Rob.

Okay, let’s do it. Rob pulled over and stopped in front of the old tan brick Carnegie Library looking like a small, square architectural shrine in ancient Greece at the corner of West College Avenue and Grove Street in the once quiet peaceful village of College Town. It has be en a long time since we have been in old Towers Hall. What are we looking for besides fertilizer for some woe begotten memories?

I just want to go by the English offices. I like to think my two favorite teachers still walk the halls from time to time. Russian history was on the third floor. World lit was on the first.

Econ was on the second floor, smiled Rob.

The man gave me a D because I signed up to take a class that wasn’t in my major or minor fields.

What did you learn?

Humor and compassion, answered Richard as he shut the car door. Dr. Grissom used me as an example for his business students. He wanted them to take courses outside their majors so they could be more well-rounded.

What did you learn about economics?

They crossed the brick street to the original campus. I learned never to invest money in the stock market that I couldn’t just as easily light a match to.

That was practical advice.

I’ve never forgotten it. In fact, that weekend when we headed to the South Berg dive at Ohio State, I pulled out a buck and lit a matched to it and watched it burn in the ash tray. People looked at me weird but I found it rather pleasurable to be so free as to do such a thing.

Rob laughed, They looked at you weirdly because that buck would have bought you a pitcher of 3.2 beer.

Richard laughed too, A pitcher might have been a buck and a quarter or a buck fifty. I don’t remember.

We didn’t drink to remember such fine points about the South or the North Heidelberg. Both laughed as their younger memories decided to walk along beside them like old classmates.

As they walked into Towers, Richard asked, Where did we meet for Quiz and Quill?

Anywhere the man wanted to meet.

I was thinking it was in this room.

No, I think it was an office.

Over the years rooms get changed around. One generation might see a series of language labs another might be visiting their profs in the same area.

You drive by on the outside and see Towers Hall, your memories see a different interior to the building. Buildings are in a constant state of flux on the inside, where with people—we are constantly changing our outer appearance as we age, but our interior, are deepest sense of self remains a constant.

We change on the inside too, believe me, it’s just invisible until something comes back from the lab or from one scan or another.

That’s true.

Discover magazine has an article about the soul in the June issue.

I think it is a standard for science magazines. What is the difference between the mind and the soul?

It’s a great day, let’s head down to the cemetery instead. We can walk.

I thought you’d want to climb to the third floor Richie.

We can come back on a rainy day. I’m thinking about how to construct the Place of the Dead for book four.

What brought this on?

"Seeing the building from the outside then coming in here after twenty years and finding that I have forgotten where the classrooms were other than which floor and the north or south ends of the building. I have a general idea of how it was, but the reality is that the interior may have been changed several times in twenty years. It’s been more than forty years since we had our classes in here. Our teachers are long gone, most of them, and I doubt any are still hanging around haunting the hallways. Their students have all dissipated throughout the world.

Except, that is, for us few townies that have remained."

What does this have to do with the Place of the Dead?

Well, responded Richard, How can you construct a theoretical place where souls or minds go—let’s say where individual consciousness goes when it leaves the dead brain?

Mind is the right word here, stated Robert emphatically. The book takes the position that the mind is separate from the brain and the body.

If you have a Place for the Dead that has to be the assumed reality. Mind and consciousness and even unconsciousness are subsets of the mind. The mind is the soul without a religious dressing.

"I can go with that as this is all your imagination Richie. You start putting assumptions like Dante did in the Divine Comedy, and you have damnation, guilt, bliss, whatever. Your Place of the Dead is common ground, so to speak, for all the human dead."

That’s the problem. How can I construct a Place where minds can exist together, but who are literally generations and cultures apart from one another. A common telepathic communication is already set up in the books, but having the Dead all living together and then the first ten thousand souls rebelling seems unreasonable.

This is where ten thousand minds rebelling sounds much more reasonable than ten thousand souls rebelling Richie.

You’re right, it does sound better. A mind is similar in thought construction, but soul has too many connotations to it.

And some of them sound too spiritual to be containing only the human element.

Human minds rebelling to go home to Earth to help care for their living descendants, their children. It sounds human enough. It is natural for parents to want a better life for their children.

They were silent the rest of the walk south on Grove Street to the north cemetery entrance at the corner of Walnut Street. Look, said Robert quietly, there’s a horned owl in the old Oak.

Neat! Here it is midmorning. He’s probably a descendent of one of those we saw as kids.

I don’t know. How long do owls live?

I have no idea Rob.

Hey, there’s his lunch.

A skinny rabbit. He’s sitting down there by the crossroad.

And a fox. Are you kidding, look Richie, he pointed west. Over near Hanby’s grave. He just came up the hill.

Bad news for the rabbit, joked Richard. An owl, a rabbit, and a fox, he thought. Now what would Merlyn do with that?

The two watched the rabbit head south beside the tombstones an disappear to the left side of the mausoleum. They glanced over to where the fox was to find him gone, then to the tree, and the owl had left. Just like that, noted Robert, they all disappeared.

Richard smiled, I might get a Merlyn poem out of it.

Robert smirked, I don’t need Merlyn to write a poem about animals in the cemetery. Both chuckled.

We are nasty boys, commented Richard, thinking about the Dead as animals.

I wasn’t thinking about the Dead. I was thinking about the owl, fox and rabbit.

Richard grinned sheepishly, I was thinking about how some of these people might have been nasty animals to deal with when alive.

Did you know any?

No, not really. I was thinking about the human race in general. As far as I know these were all basically good people. College Town has always been a pretty quiet place.

Except when they bombed the saloon. Both laughed, Robert continued, home of the anti-saloon league, dry capital of the world.

At one time. No more. You can buy drinks Uptown. Who would have ever thought?

A lot of people are probably spinning in their graves, smiled Robert.

It was a dry town but there were a lot of wet beer bottles in basements.

That’s for sure, stated Robert. Remember when we worked with the garbage crew for the city?

Richard smiled, That was before the plastic bags. You would dump those cans in the back of the truck and find out what was really going on in the house forty feet back of the street. Both laughed. Garbage crew was not as enlightening as the sewage crew, added Richard.

You worked down there much more than I did.

How did you get picked for the water department? Clean, easy work.

"I had two chemistry classes under my belt. You had one Richie, and got a D in it at that."

You can tell a lot about a town from its sewage and garbage, responded Richard.

No question about that. Kidneys and colon show a lot about a patient.

Blood work too, would be like the water department.

Lungs the same. He thought about all those heart operations he had performed but said nothing.

I wonder how my concept of the Place of the Dead will work into the story? asked Richard seriously. It’s two-dimensional but rather abstract.

"You describe it in the Pouch Text," commented Robert.

But look around at this cemetery. It is a Place of the Dead people can relate to.

Model it after the cemetery then, suggested Robert whimsically.

I have a line of one hundred billion minds lined up from Mother Eve to the Living.

Put a billion minds a foot in length. People can relate to a hundred feet. That would be one-third the length of a football field for a hundred billion minds wouldn’t it?

I don’t know, Rob.

Well, a hundred feet—and there are a hundred yards in a football field. What is there not to know? Let’s go sit on the bench. The brothers headed towards the mausoleum side-by-side and talking along the way.

When they sat and looked north towards the large old tree where the owl had sat minutes before, Robert asked, Now that we have space taken care of, what about time?

Well, said Richard, In real dimensions the mind takes up no space from a living human’s perspective. And, later in this book, it is suggested that the real Place of the Dead, the imaginary real one, would be less long and wide than the smallest conceivable piece of physical matter. I can see why you would use a hundred feet. I don’t think time would exist in such a small area though. It is hard to think of the mind in terms of a physical form.

Robert looked at his brother as if he didn’t know what he was talking about. "You already describe the mind in the Pouch Text Richie, in this book."

Richard sat embarrassed and conjured up a defense. That’s true, I forgot I’d already written that, but that is describing a living mind in a cube form, in three dimensions, not a flat out dead mind in two or even one dimension.

If minds are one dimensional you can stack a hundred billion on top of each other and no one will ever know the difference, uttered Robert sarcastically.

Richard laughed, That’s true and funny at the same time.

Two dimensions will be better. At least in two dimensions you can have movement.

If I have movement from one place to another, there has to be a concept of time.

You can make minds imperishable but not everlasting, suggested Robert.

Except for free will, replied Richard. "If a human mind wants to drop into oblivion then it has a right to do so. The mind has to have a will to wish to remain immortal though not eternal."

That sounds reasonable, commented Robert. It’s fun thinking up this stuff.

The beauty of fiction, remarked Richard nonchalantly. I’ll put something together this afternoon. What do you think Merlyn would have thought of seeing an owl, a rabbit, and a fox in the cemetery?"

Robert humored his brother with a single word, Dinner.

* * * *

Much later in the day Richard sat in his home office doodling on the first page of a new college lined spiral notebook. What would Merlyn think, he kept asking himself. Richard had no idea. A wise, quick, and sly spirit popped into his head. He smiled. This is not what Merlyn would think; this is what real Merlyn would be, at least in my eyes, a wise, quick, and sly spirit.

Richard scratched the bridge of his nose then pulled out an irritating nose hair and flicked it on the area rug below. Those are gimmick ideas. I want something substantial and unorthodox. The phone rang. Richard answered.

You never got back to me on your Place of the Dead.

Hey, Rob. No. I didn’t. Heaven, Hell or What-So-Ever are all speculation.

Focus on the mind alone, suggested Robert sincerely. The mind is the Place of the Dead.

That’s it! snapped Richard sharply. The OverMind. The place where all individual minds appear to be connected.

The excitement rang in Robert’s ear. I didn’t say anything about the Over-Mind.

No. You didn’t. But think about it Rob, people understand coincidences and symbolism. The archetypes of the myths. Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung.

The unconscious connection of all living things—sounds like a cross between Ralph Waldo Emerson and William Blake.

A crossroad of letters flashed through Richard’s mind:

Image272.JPG

I’ll call you back later. I’ve got an idea, blurted Richard, and he hung up before Robert could respond.

* * * *

As dusk rolled through the western sky, Richard pulled his red GTI from the corner of Sybil and Lake into his brother’s driveway and parked behind Robert’s metallic silver Lexus. Cindy and Richard climbed out and headed to the side door. I have always liked the white stone on Rob’s Tudor, he commented.

Connie and I picked it out, she responded. He got the silver Lexus to match the stone.

I didn’t know that. Robert said he picked out the house and convinced Connie to buy it. Cindy laughed as they walked in the side door. I didn’t know he tried to match the car color with the stone either. It doesn’t really match.

Don’t tell him that. Actually, it does when there’s a full moon.

Tomorrow’s the second, look, it is almost full now. Richard added, Hey! when he saw Connie. Where’s Rob?

Upstairs. I think he’s setting up the chess board.

I don’t want to play chess tonight. I want to discuss my plan.

His book, said Cindy.

Connie gave him a look. Cindy mimicked it.

I just want to put some things by him.

Do you want a beer or something? asked Connie.

Diet Coke and popcorn.

You get the Coke, she said and Cindy pulled the popcorn out of the cupboard and placed it in the microwave. We get half, added Connie with a smile. It was really warm today wasn’t it, she commented to her sister.

Did you watch the Today Show today? asked Cindy.

I’ll just take the Coke, replied Richard after he poured a glass full from a two-liter bottle and headed to the stairs with a, you guys can have the popcorn, trailing after him.

Hey, greeted Richard. I got some ideas I’d like to throw at you.

No chess, whined Robert.

I can’t play chess and get this fixed in my mind at the same time, growled Richard. You can be such a prick. You knew I was coming over to talk.

Robert said nothing but beamed knowing he’d got to his brother.

You are a real prick.

So, paused Robert with his continued smile, what else is new?

I need some feedback on my concepts. The double helix symbol for the DNA, for instance, everyone knows that. I want to use the cross as the major symbol in the Place of the Dead.

Heavenorhellbothorneither?

Yeah, it is a place, a location. The setting for books four, five and six.

You aren’t even done with book three.

"I know Rob." (Rob is used as a pronoun, an antecedent of the understood word asshole.)

Are you going Christian with this cross business?

No. Pre-Christian. The cross is an ancient symbol so I am showing where it came from originally.

Where did it come from; out of the blue, like a lot of original concepts.

No, in the book, it comes from the Dead.

Concepts come from the Dead?

Tit for tat. If the Living can be influenced by the Dead, and if the Dead have their consciousnesses intact, the Dead can influence the Living through the unconscious mind if not the conscious one.

The mind is the medium?

The unconscious mind is. See, look at this.

He dropped the sheet of paper that had the names Ralph Waldo Emerson horizontally printed and William Blake printed vertically, using the italicized ‘m’ as the crossing point. This is the idea. Each letter, no matter which one it is, equals one human mind that crossed over."

"Very funny. M for mind or Merlyn, either way, it’s funny."

Let’s say these letters that vertically spell William Blake continue on until you have a total of about ninety billion stacked in front of the W and another ten billion letters stacked on the other side of the ‘e’ in Blake

Okay. So the William Blake vertical represents the one hundred billion still conscious minds of those human beings who are physically Dead.

That’s right. At the far end of the W in William rests our genetic mother, Eve, of a hundred and fifty thousand years ago, and at the other end, continued from the ‘e’ in Blake we have all the people Living.

This is like the ‘great chain of being’ between the Angels in Heaven and the Angels in Hell. Earth was in the middle. Very medieval in your thinking Richie.

"I hadn’t thought of that because, Rob, the Place of the Dead is An Existential State of Grace, so to speak, where minds continue to remain thinking and being human."

I don’t see how you are going to have the first Rebellion let alone the second. What are the minds going to do as they are lined up vertically as William Blake?

Richard grinned and his voice grew excited, Here’s the thing, the horizontal line represented by the letters of Ralph Waldo Emerson, represent the gathering of friends, of soul mates or in this case mind mates.

Your Place of the Dead is two-dimensional?

"Yes, Rob. The first Rebellion of the Ten Thousand occurred when those first ten thousand shifted and lined up horizontally, like friends holding hands. Like the Hands Across America movement of the 1980’s."

If they all decide to shift or scoot at once around a mind symbol, and line up horizontally, what happens to the vertical line? I mean, you have a hundred billion minds lined up vertical and they, by their own free will, suddenly shift to the horizontal, what does that do?

Richard paused in a perplexity of silence. I don’t know, he replied sheepishly. I hadn’t thought of that.

Robert and Richard sat in silence as if each was contemplating a chess move. In a few minutes Robert said, Let’s say that the minds are replicated as waves not particles.

Like light waves or thought waves, echoed Richard.

Right. Earlier I mentioned that if you have one dimension the minds can be stacked up one on top of the other and no space is taken. Well, if one dimension rests under two or over two or wherever, then perhaps the waves can find themselves where they were, first, vertically; and at the same time (so to speak) find themselves as friends holding hands horizontally.

Richard’s eyes grew big as he sat down in front of Robert’s desk, Something heartfelt, like living friends being in touch with other living friends even though they are not physically in the same space?

I hadn’t thought of that, but yes—something like that.

Then we can construct a giant square. One hundred billion minds vertically and a hundred billion of the same minds horizontally.

People can relate to a single letter. One hundred billion alphabetic letters both vertical and horizontal with fifty billion on each arm, forming a cross, like a red cross.

Or a blue cross or a white cross. Yes, Rob, responded Richard, In the move, human consciousness is expanded. When the Dead rebelled human consciousness expanded, and eventually this filtered into the consciousness of the Living in the form of a symbol, for instance. A cross, and it took on mythological proportions in storytelling. He paused, A kind of Emerson’s concept of an Oversoul, only it is a thought-like place where living minds with physical bodies attached can visit unconsciously.

Or math, stated Robert. The cross as a plus sign. It adds up, he smiled.

The unconscious symbols and concepts filter from the Dead. I hadn’t thought of that until now.

And, you can use it to explain Merlyn, added Robert. He may have been a real person, but he also represents a symbol of storytelling and magic.

I hadn’t thought of that either, acknowledged Richard. Merlyn’s braided dreams are as a symbolic message from the Dead to the Living. I guess. I don’t really know.

Robert laughed as the agnostic he is, In fiction, no less. The symbol of Merlyn comes back and rests in letters we read from left to right, but all the letters on the page are vertical too, whether they mean anything or not.

Secret codes, rejoined Richard’s sardonic twin laughter. Readers can look for secret codes one letter at a time. Wicked, really wicked.

You are out of your mind Richie! stated Robert in mocked seriousness. Both continued their laughter at the silent words satiric humor.

GRANDMA’S STORY

Here we are still at the dinner table in book one. Some time has passed in the real world of physics beyond the confines of these books. Readers of the first two books are older even in reference to books one and two alone. The Dead stay in their place much as the letters, into words, into sentences and into paragraphs do also. Paragraphs to segments and segments to chapters confined in sky blue covers with puffy cloud colored lettering. The black lettering in here is the color Merlyn’s pupils once were centuries ago when he was alive on the Earth as you are now. To see into the mind of the Living or the Dead is to see into darkness first.

Book two of the Merlyn’s Mind series was worked into publication during May, 2007. The month held two full moons, neither of them blue. The final proof was sent to the publishers on 23 May 2007, during a half moon phase. This would mean nothing were the dream not Merlyn’s, but as it is, there is existential significance. From Merlyn’s point of view time does not exist. It is as though the Dead exist within the framework of a book consisting of a single page. The difference is night and day.

The half moon is a reminder to one such as Merlyn that half a moon shadowed is better than no moon, and a moon in half-light is better than a moon reflecting no light at all. Otherwise, Merlyn would not have a ghost of a chance at being here. The dreamer is always first in a dream. It is a matter of grammar, of logic. It is a matter of the mind, a matter that is unseen but understood. Matter of this sort travels beyond the grave. People who attempt to prove an understanding can do no more than the people who would believe an understanding. The mind of Merlyn will have none of it.

Understanding, as Merlyn uses it, means to grasp the nature and the significance of the three story dreams in segments as well as in their holistic essence of humanity in your own living and in your possible sense of consciousness after physical death.

Reason is in the mind first, it is the breath of thought. Imagination is next. Meaning develops from the two intertwined. This is how Merlyn views the environs of being among the Dead. What need exists for belief or doubt when one recognizes a continued existence beyond one’s own demise? Hope presses on the mind of the Dead as gravity presses on matter.

An internal first question might be, ‘I still exist. Now what?’ One doubt or belief is resolved, ‘Where do I go from here?’ Human compassion and kindness are forced to the forefront. ‘A silent benediction will do.’ Then there is the common question, ‘Am I alone?’ A response, ‘Only if you want to be,’ is understood as ‘I still have free will.’ And with this, hope is renewed. To each their own of course, as free will is recognized. The Dead pay the piper for continued free will. Merlyn sees a humor in it as it helps to have an understanding of your own personal humanity. The mind has a choice to grow, to mature, or not. This is an example of the self-recognition of being physical dead. The mind paints its own portrait.

The Dead soon find they need their friends. Like minds attract. As always survival is first. Hope is the seed that is nourished by friendships. This is not an existence of levels of Heaven or Hell or even Purgatory. Where would you want your dead friends to find themselves? The mind is built for whatever question that comes forth, and it is here that humans reason and use their imaginations.

Grandma slapped her thigh as if she was a horse that, first and foremost, needed a tickle to remind itself it was in a horse race after all. She glanced out at her audience and said, Remember this. When you are dead to the world your mind is all you have left and you either learn to tame it or it tames you. She sat with a wisp of a smirk on her face. With the mind, life goes on one way or another. That is the way it reads in here and there is nothing that can be done about it. This is the same line used by Lord Robert as we reenter the dining room with the large table Merlyn once put his elbows on while studying the genealogy of Lord Renaldo and Lady Criteria.

If you remember, Lady Criteria’s parents were Count Athalaric and Countess Evangeline. The Count’s brother or cousin was King Thedoric. One set of her grandparents were Thanos and Peony who lived through much of the seventh century in Greece. Under such circumstances she may have been a part of the old Frankish bloodline that traced itself back to Sarah and Abraham.

Lord Renaldo’s parents were Konrad and Kaaje and a set of his grandparents were Maarten and Skylar, who also live through much of the seventh century. And, in a revised bloodline he might have traced himself back to Odin and Frigga, who were popular in the Scandinavian sagas. This family could also be traced back to the area near the Black Sea seven thousand years earlier. You may remember reading a story about one of them, the shaman in Grandma’s Story, chapter four of book one. The shaman who told the short story about being in two places at once.

The Place of the Dead where Merlyn exists to dream is a part of the greater Nature of being human. The reader is a part of that same greater Nature as far as old Grandma is concerned. It is a part of understanding who you are and where you came from. Blood roots. You don’t need a formal genealogy to realize a truth here. You share your blood with cousins all around the world.

* * * *

Time to get on to the story that includes Lord Robert and Lady Allowyn and their young children, Margaret who is ten and Duncan who is seven. Their dinner guests are Sir Geoffrey and Lady Jeannine who have brought their son, John, fifteen, and daughter Sarah, who is sixteen.

This is the afternoon dinner where Margaret announced her mother’s unexpected pregnancy followed by Lady Jeannine who announced her own. Sarah had remembered the story Sir Linwood Greystone, her grandfather, had told her about an ancestor in the seventh century who had carried a skull in a bag, Grandfather Linwood is by and far her family favorite with his neatly trimmed graybeard and actively bright and strangely Euro-Asian eyes. He told Sarah in whispers that his great grandmother on his mother’s side had married a man who claimed his mother’s great grandmother was half Asian on her mother’s side. He liked to add that he didn’t think it was true, and with a wink whispered that his deviously handsome dark eyes were swept into him from the days of the several Khan invasions in the thirteenth century.

Sarah was secretly and strongly attracted to the idea she had some Eastern mystery in her bones but while living she never told anyone that particular fantasy created, in part, by her grandfather’s supposed story. It was not the tone of his voice but his sparkling eyes and working and trimmed gray brows that told a skewed truth of an otherwise unknown family ancestor.

The two families are sharing a large table that Merlyn once studied the ancestry of Criteria and Renaldo. Merlyn was and is familiar with the table. That is enough to suggest a possible haunting, but these days of the Tudor royals were more honestly haunted by the supposed power of the darker arts so it would do well to stay clear of such dreaded thoughts on the supernatural. Besides, we all know Merlyn is dreaming the table and the partial human story surrounding it. All human stories are partial you see, whether being told by the Living or the Dead. Some of the great writers of the world have said that the best human stories are love stories, but I’m partial to a mystery myself as it is in my own inner nature. No mystery on Lady Allowyn’s dessert though, a custard pudding.

Lord Robert was the last to sit down for dessert, As for Queen Anne’s trial, there is nothing that can be done about it now.

I agree, added Sir Geoffrey. Her fate was sealed by the king’s court.

Lady Allowyn smiled, The dessert is about to be brought in. I made it myself this morning and we stored it in the cellar.

* * * *

More talk had ensued after the dessert when Lady Allowyn and Lady Jeannette found themselves sitting in the two more recently acquired red cushioned chairs with the fox heads carved in the arms. Lady Jeannette sat in the chair next to the old wood carved chest and said, What a lovely old table, is this from your family?

No, it is from Robert’s grandmother on his father’s side. It is a pretty piece. Then Allowyn added, I would like to have a new walnut chest of drawers in place of the oak cupboard though, it will present a less cluttered look.

A chest of drawers would look quite lovely. Geoffrey likes everything in its place, he is far too organized.

Allowyn laughed lightly, I think he is a bit disjointed over your announcement.

That is true. Perhaps it was that our announcements were so quickly pronounced. He seemed more shocked to find yourself in such a state.

Do you think? She smiled, I wonder whatsoever for.

You are younger and more ripe for such a digression.

We both have suffered from peeling back the fruit. enjoyed the secret womanly moment, both found themselves smiling and breaking into a short, shared laugh.

You mentioned that I could have your custard recipe.

Excuse me please Mother, said Margaret politely with her solemn and focused facial approach but Duncan wants to go out and romp about."

Take him dear. Perhaps Sarah will join you.

Jeannette said, Margaret works those eyebrows just like you do. And Duncan too. He looks devilish male even at his seven years. Such a sparkling personality in his eyes alone.

Margaret is a studious sort, and she has a strong moral sense like her parents. Lady Allowyn quickly changed the subject, You were asking—.

About the recipe.

Yes, of course. I shall have Anne dash it off for you, but the ingredients are four cups of milk, four eggs, two-thirds of a cup of cane sugar, a fourth of a cup of flour for thickening, a dash of nutmeg, cinnamon and butter. And, I make my tarte crust edible unlike Lady Joan.

It tastes much better, agreed Lady Jeannette. The blend of textures is so decidedly from the French court. An edible tarte crust, a heavenly flan. And my children would as easily enjoy the pudding mix crustless, thought Lady Jeannette.

* * * *

The children were outside playing a satirical form of hide and seek, called king and crown, in which all hide from the king, but each seeks his crown by gathering points by not being found. The four adults were sitting in chairs on the large veranda at the back of the house waiting for the sun to set.

We’re glad you decided to stay the night, said Robert to Geoffrey. We will have time to talk in private.

As we did a month ago. Wonderful. And, how are the horses?

They are fine, interceded Allowyn. The children love your pony.

That they do, responded Robert immediately. He is becoming quite a stud.

He’ll be good, added Geoffrey with a satisfied smile.

Looks like we are still fit for it too, laughed Robert.

Jeannette smiled, perhaps both our babes will have some added horse sense. All had a good, warm laugh as the sun eased down.

* * * *

Early the next morning Lady Allowyn was sitting on the porch alone waiting for the sunrise when Geoffrey’s voice interrupted the silence.

Allowyn, I did not expect to find you out here so early.

Whom did you expect to find, she sniped, Lord Robert?

We had our talk last night.

First things first among you men. She paused, What did you talk about?

Horses and politics.

Stayed clear of religion.

We do.

What about me?

Robert was surprised you are pregnant.

In a quieter tone Allowyn said, Sit down here, beside me, Geoffrey.

How surprised?

I do not recollect. Not so much that I remember.

That is a good sign.

I mean.

What, Geoffrey? she toyed.

I am afraid to ask.

Allowyn calmly commented, Better that you do not. Some things are best left unsaid particularly here on this porch no matter how early it is.

Sir Geoffrey’s strongest desire at the moment was to suggest Lady Allowyn take an immediate early morning walk with him, but he could not bring himself to ask. All he could think about was the memory of private moments a month ago while the last two nights they stayed over on his best friend Robert’s estate. He put the forefinger of his left hand to his lips and slipped into a secret patch of unsealed wonderment that did not conclude even unto his dying day.

The knuckles of Geoffrey’s left hand lightly bumped and touched Allowyn’s right hand from time to time as they sat quietly waiting for the sunrise. Both rested in their separate chairs at peace with themselves no matter how many shadows the daylight might eventually bring. Life has its own way with the events of ever loving couples. No one knows the future, and these two quite close friends were no exception.

If coyness could talk, what whispers would prevail? Modest minds may smile freshly or simply smirk, With the who, when, where and the what detail; A man and woman in silence are two minds at work.

It is interesting to discover the elements not there, It doesn’t take much to wonder this story on through; When a man and a woman sit close yet into distance stare, Imaginary mind developments promoting tensions ensue.

What do you say, what do you do, When the question pops up and no one knows; Is it an honest reckoning, or a comedic snafu, To wonder on playful sheets and a scatter of pillows.

POUCH TEXT

> This is the Soki. I am writing for the marsupial named Friendly. September has come and gone and we are in late October. People are somber still, mostly in the United States. Events have compounded themselves for most everyone. Friendly has returned to HomePlanets but she communicates regularly via a new secure memofaxnow. She will return in a few months.

I am a subconscious writing assistant for Friendly. She is writing the books to leave on Earth instead of herself and her friends. She is away now, but she knows that once she leaves HomePlanets this time she cannot return home in this life. None of them can return. The other two marsupials are Hartolite, one of Friendly’s best friends, and one of the mates they shared on HomePlanets, Yermey. Hartolite has found a human love also, in Glenn ‘Wolf’ Griffen, and Justin Burroughs and his human mate, Pyl Williams Burroughs, the carrier of the hybrid child Diplomat, and her brother, Blake Williams. This small group of mixed humans and marsupials are centering their lives, as good parents do, on their adopted child, Diplomat. Raising a child is a self-education in itself, thus the central theme is attached umbilical cord-like.

Diplomat turns up liking the nickname, CarpetGirl, so the group calls her ‘Carp’ for short. Here is how CarpetGirl came about. At the age of two she decided her name, Dip—low—mat, was like a mat that could dip low. The first thing she thought of at the time was riding a magic carpet like out of the Arabian Nights story theme or Swing Low Sweet Chariot. Diplomat understood that she is not magic because she is one-third human woman: Pyl’s DNA; plus one-third of two-thousand-year old human man’s DNA; and one-third marsupial male’s (Yermey) DNA. Diplomat assumes she has three aunts and four uncles. Later, new aunt may be included, her name is Jenna Alexander, a Brazilian friend of Blake’s whose name is Jenna. She is quite conservative and very leery of these new friends of Blake. Jenna has no idea some are not human. The group is being very careful to stay out of the limelight also. For now, the group of eight is enough.

At the moment, Yermey is dealing with two marsupials who have been banished from HomePlanets, Milantrex the Miser and one of his mates, Sloenshine. They were banished because six judges determined he was guilty of murdering their small, unnamed child who was born without a brain, but who did not die before someone cut her jugular vein. The Miser didn’t do the deed, and the only one besides the murderer who knows what probably happened, because she was in the room at the time, is the shifty-eyed, Camrasel.

Camrasel is also a good part of the problem that has called Friendly home to defend her father, the present Director of the Thirty-Six (the ParentsinCharge) from pending impeachment. The world judge committee of three wishes to impeach the entire Thirty-Six, but the Director, who is one of the Thirty-Six, is first, a symbolic gesture of what is to come for each of the others. None of the Thirty-Six have committed suicide yet, but they all know what to do thanks to Yermey. The first problem was to solve the mystery of the two red pills. Each citizen is given the two red pills at sixteen to help them think about the purposes in their lives first, while they are growing into early adulthood, which begins at sixteen. <

* * * *

It is October 30, 2001, a Tuesday afternoon. The Friday before, President Bush, the one known as W, signed the federal antiterrorism bill.

I don’t think this is going to work, announced Hartolite to Yermey. This is certainly not a good time for anyone in this country let alone a group of us aliens and humans.

No. Some contingencies cannot be planned for, replied Yermey, but hindsight makes it easier for everyone to blame. Our system would not work here because of biology and environment. We have pouches to share babes with all along the way, and we have three planets to share. We can’t do anything about it and neither can humans. This is one of the most depressing places in the galaxy. It is no wonder Earth is shunned.

Yermey, I was talking about our small group of marsupials and humans.

Oh.

What are we going to do with Diplomat? I carry her in my pouch but she doesn’t want my milk, she wants her mother’s breast milk instead.

Why are you asking me? That’s a woman’s problem isn’t it?

You can be such a hypocrite.

What did I do?

"You talk about what the earthlings don’t do, and you do what you can to get out of helping around here. At home we had help who came in. We can’t afford that here. We have to watch what we spend. It all has to look like it comes from Glenn, Justin, Pyl and Blake because of taxes.

Blake says we are paying rent, but we aren’t. He needs money. We all need more money. We have to go to work."

Work? You want me to get a job? whined Yermey.

She iced, What do you suggest?

Let me think on it.

This is what you always say.

How much money do we need?

A lot.

How about Pyl winning the lottery?

How do you propose to do that legally?

Good question. He thought. What a depressing way to live.

It would certainly be easy to lift money from major criminals, but then they would take it out on their own people. We could print money easily enough, but it would be illegal.

If we created a successful business, we would become conspicuously well-known. How do you make money legally and not become known by the government in the process?

You have to pay your taxes. You have to be legal. We marsupials are stuck.

Suddenly Yermey commented to Hartolite, We can’t stay here. That’s what it comes to. We will have to live incognito aboard small ship with blackenot-on.

That’s running away, she replied. "We can’t run away here. We have to stand and fight for our existence like everyone else.

Then, he smiled sarcastically and noted, we’ll have to learn to cheat the system.

Hartolite left the room in a huff.

* * * *

Yermey sat with Blake, Justin, and Glenn. There are the four of us against two women now, but when Friendly returns there will be three,

Four, said Glenn in almost a joyous shout, don’t forget Diplomat. She’s such a cutie.

Blake responded, "She has those come-hither and do my bidding eyes.

I know, said Justin. Three months old and she already knows how to flirt with the men.

She’s five months, said Yermey. Five months, and she understands too much. I speak in marsupialese and English to her, and she makes the same expressions whichever language I say it in.

I noticed too, said Justin, that she taps her feet and hands in rhythms she hears on the radio. He wanted to say that when the news comes on she appears to be listening even though she doesn’t have the vocabulary.

When do you think she will talk, Yermey? asked Blake. After all she is one-third marsupial.

She may be more, said Yermey without any pride attached. It is true that she has approximately one-third of each of our genetic make-up, but she has a deep natural bond with Pyl.

How so? asked Glenn.

She is extremely protective of her mother, replied Yermey. It is like she is the mother of Pyl in a way. I noticed this when she was born. Remember, we wrapped her quickly and almost threw her into Pyl’s arms. The baby moved in close when the doctor came over. I thought it was instinctive to protect herself, but I have seen her do it since.

Yermey’s right, noted Blake. I have seen this too.

Justin sat a moment as his face grew red, then he asked, Could it be that she is somehow double-sexed?

She is, stated Blake with a laugh.

Yermey laughed almost identically. We checked, you know.

What? asked Justin.

Pyl and Hartolite were with us, but we wanted to see her anatomy up close.

That’s weird, replied Glenn standoffish.

I was curious, said Yermey. What are you going to do? What do you think a doctor does? I am as a doctor. Hell, we are all doctors.

Not medical doctors, responded Glenn