Feeling Connected Pt. 2

I float up, a hundred feet off the ground.
I extend my arms and drift up to the zenith of the teepee with the smoke that is ebbing out into the night air, curling toward a coyote moon blazing orange and diaphanous like the devil’s iris in a parlor of twinkling diamonds.
I peer down at the little circle of celebrants beneath me who look like squatting ants around a cigarette spark. The flaming eagle flaps his wings in dreamy slo-mo. Whoosh. Whoosh. I feel my face wafted by the wind of his great wings, cool, breezy, even though they are made of millions of tiny, cherry-red coal fragments. The eagle hovers close to my face and I look into his eye that transforms from flaming ember, into a real eagle eye, full of wisdom and deep knowledge, unblinking, eternal, the Great God of Light and Air, the Protector, Vanquisher of Darkness, Giver of Eternal Peace. He conveys to me, through subtle intuition, that I am at one with the natural world, this earth, this realm, created by God for our majestic quest for truth and to find ourselves which is really only finding God again.
My God it is so simple, so radiant.
For one brief shining moment I achieve absolute knowledge, the realization that I myself and the universe are one and God is everything.
Then the Great Spirit Eagle shows me atoms. And I see atoms in my bed while I sleep. I see the atoms of my bedspread, my pillow, my sheets, spinning, constantly turning and bouncing every which way. Then I am in a trawler off of Anacapa, my hook skimming the reefs for rockfish, bat ray, guitar fish, barracuda, sea scorpions, thresher sharks and I see atoms too. Then I am running in a forest on Mt. Rainier, chasing mighty elk through dense thickets and there are atoms. Then I am riding the Bonzai Rapids on the Kings River in a flimsy pool raft and there are atoms. Then I am at work, amid the boredom and monotony of my little desk, chair and computer, and I see atoms. Then I am chasing a ball on a playing field and people chase me with atoms. And I am floating in the blue waters of a cinote in Chichen Itza, swimming amid the hundreds of tiny brown catfish and I see atoms everywhere. And then I am in a vast sea of cars on the 405 moving along endlessly in a gigantic river, millions upon millions of cars, and I see atoms too. And I am walking amid the throngs of people at the fair in Ventura or at a football game or soccer match with a crowd of ninety thousand at the Coliseum who are atoms. Then I am sitting alone, at night, on my living room floor, in my silence and everything is atoms. Then I am a child lying in the snow of Olympia, Washington, waving my arms to make a snow angel and it is all atoms. Everything atoms always.
The flaming eagle drifts back, smaller and smaller, floating down to a distant mountain a thousand feet below, disappearing behind a snow-capped peak, at the bottom of the teepee.
Holy Shit! They slipped me something in the tea. I dodged the peyote and still mind has conjured up multifarious visions. Sneaky Indians.
Eight hours into the ceremony, I am no longer at one with the burning eagle, the atoms or anything else. I’ve had it with the damn absolute knowledge. Screw the freakin’ eagle.
My knees ache. My ankles ache. My stomach aches. My back aches. I only want to get the hell out of the friggin’ teepee.
When Randy originally told me about the ritual, I thought, alright, maybe an hour or two, your standard ceremony length, get in, listen to the sermon, say some chants, dance around, we’re good. We went into the teepee around dusk on Saturday night. We didn’t get out until around eight a.m., the next morning. Let me repeat that: eight a.m. the next morning! No wonder you need the peyote -- you’re in a teepee, sitting on your laurels for twelve hours! TWELVE HOURS! Sitting! I haven’t sat anywhere for twelve hours. It’s hard enough for me to sit for an hour let alone twelve, on the floor. I couldn’t sit for twelve hours in a Lay-Z-Boy with a remote watching the World Cup. I’d have to get up, move around sometime, step out for a drink, grab some chips or something.
With the heat of the sun warming the teepee, the Fire Man covers the smoldering embers with dirt. People make their way into the open air. I stand up, my knees creaking, ankles sore and aching, and the chunks of peyote scatter over the dirt floor. I freeze, looking around to see if my iniquity has been detected. Everyone is collecting their things, oblivious. I drop my sweater on the scattered pieces and coolly stuff them into my pocket.
Randy and June are disappointed with me when I complain to them in the refreshing sunlight.
“That was absolute torture. I had no idea it was going to be so long.”
“You didn’t take the peyote,” are the first words out of June’s mouth.
How did they know? Everyone was spaced out and it was semi-dark in there.
“I drank the tea.”
“It doesn’t matter. The peyote was very vital to the ritual, Jay. That’s why we call it ‘Father Peyote’”, says Randy, accusingly.
“I didn’t feel comfortable.”
“Then why did you come in the first place?”
“I really thought I could connect without the drug.”
“It’s not a drug. It grows in nature. It’s natural.”
“I still just didn’t feel comfortable.”
“You disappoint me, Jay.”
“I’m sorry, Randy.”
“Until you learn to have courage and take chances and face your inner struggles, you’re never going to get where you need to be.”
Bottom line, I was a bad Indian.
I tell them I am tired and need to leave. Everyone has brought food and this is the potluck/socializing time but I want to duck out, go home and sleep. That’s all I can think about.
I catch Rick, the Road Chief and his sister Glenda’s disappointed looks as I shuffle to my car. I try to strike up small talk with them but they give me the cold shoulder. I try to tell him about seeing the Great Spirit Eagle and being carried a hundred feet off the ground and seeing everything as atoms but I am still a dick because I chucked the peyote in the weeds.
One other guy also suffers the humiliation of the outcast. This is the only guy who left the teepee early that night. He is a young white guy with glasses who looks like a carbon copy of myself. He also says he had the vision of being carried off the ground. Everyone seems to avoid this guy like a leper. He is worse off than me because he left the teepee prematurely and broke the sacred hoop.
I drive home, trying mightily to keep myself awake and almost dying about seven times from dozing off and drifting over the center line and getting in near head-on collisions with eighteen wheelers.
I never see Randy and his wife after that. I try to call but he avoids me. I want to apologize and tell him that maybe it was too much for me but he should have for-warned me about the twelve-hour-on-your-ass-in-a-teepee-Indian-ritual-thing. Would have been nice. I was thinking it was going to be camping in Ojai with maybe a one hour ceremony, dancing chicks, head dresses, the whole nine yards. Right now, I don’t have the faith or stamina for twelve hours in a teepee. Get back to me in about twenty years.
`