This short story is semi-autobiographical and adventure general fiction. The autobiographical part of this story is not completely accurate according to how these unusual incidents happened. Although they are real, some were the results of dreams, visions, and thought processes. I experienced the majority of these stories, no matter how unreal, over the life course. The adventure general fiction is my way of making sense of the bazaar dreams and happenings. Rather than stop the story where it ended in a dream, I added a fiction component to support the action of the general theme. I titled this story "I Fly" because in my dreams when I was faced with danger: cut, stabbed, shot, drowned, murdered, I always develop the ability to fly and I simply flew away. Although it is not mentioned here, I have landed on board of jet airplanes, ships, and have been suspended in mid air for hours. When I flew in these instances, I felt catheterized. A peaceful tranquility came over me in my sleep and rather than wake up, I sank into a deep sleep. The initial fear I experienced during a fight, disappeared each time I took flight. I have always said that I would have loved to spend my life in the deep jungles of Africa or Brazil on one adventure after another. After reading this book, I hope you will learn that you are a total person: mind, body, and spirit, and all these forces come together to produce a whole you. Don't be afraid to use your dreams, premonitions, and hunches to help you solve problems, arrive at conclusions, and become a changed individual.
I Fly
AuthorHouse
Copyright © 2009 Little Boy Blue
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-1-4389-9098-9Chapter One
I left Columbus, Ohio on September 8, 1965, relocating to Chicago, Illinois. I had never been to Chicago before, and I did not know anyone living there. I was getting away from my ex-wife, Janice, as fast I could. I promised myself that the next time she dragged me into court for late child support payments; I was going to leave Columbus. I paid her half the monthly support payment and I promised her I would catch up by the next month. Her Attorney, Ethel Jancowski, told her to issue a warrant for my arrest and take me to court. Ethel said, "She had enough evidence to have me jailed for a long time". I was shaking all over because Ethel Jancowski was unforgiving. As I walked to the edge of the down stairs steps in the courthouse hallway, I heard voices coming from the basement. I looked down there and there were no people in the basement. A voice seemed to have come from the basement and said, "We who are with you, outnumber those with her." I put my shoulders back and held my head high as I walked before the judge; the case was dismissed. I had already sold all my furniture, and I had moved into one room with nothing in it but a broken down sofa bed.
I had heard about the excellent job market in Chicago; thus, I left Columbus with $75 in my pocket. When I reached Indianapolis, Indiana, I felt sharp pains in my esophagus when I swallowed. I had just heard on the radio that Actress Dorothy Dandridge "died from an accidental overdose of Imipramine, a tricyclic antidepressant". All I could think of was that I too was dying.
When I arrived in Chicago the condition had grown worse. I got directions to the VA hospital, and drove myself directly to the emergency room. I called a friend back in Columbus and told him that I was dying, and I gave him directions on how to find my car. The Doctor came in and asked me, "What is the emergency?" I answered, "I am dying." He asked, "What brought you to that conclusion?" I explained, "I have cancer of the esophagus, because I cannot swallow." He asked, "Where do you work?" I told him, "I am unemployed; I have just arrived in Chicago tonight." He said, "You are fine, as soon as you get your life together, your esophagus will heal." He was right! I got me a room at the Chicago Avenue YMCA. I was tired from the ordeal of moving, not feeling well, up all night, and ambivalent about my physical condition. I sat down to compose myself, and that is all that I remembered.
I had been looking for work all day to no avail: I was tired. I was thinking of some kind of excitement to relieve the stress of the day. I entered the restroom needing badly to use the urinal. Just as I walked towards the urinal, three young hoodlums blocked my way. I asked them to, "Let me pass." Instead of allowing me to pass, they proceeded to move closer towards me, I backed off, and I found myself pinned against the west restroom wall. The restroom was located in the basement of an abandoned building. The room was dismal and lighted dimly. The whole room smelled of last week's urine, in fact, there was competition for which odor was stronger: crusted over fecal matter or urine. This is the kind of place one only dreams about in a nightmare. Underneath the toilet bowl rim was thick brownish and greenish plaque; the toilet bowls appeared to have never been cleaned.
Although I really did have to urinate badly, my subconscious mind probably brought me down here because this place had the reputation that homeless men persuaded crack headed women to come down here to engage in sexual activity of all kinds. Rumors were that one could see men inserting broom handles, and iron pipes into the vagina and anus of these women. It was also rumored that some of the men and women who frequented this place became crack heads themselves, and turnabout was fair play.
The wall I backed against was where the light switch was located. I was afraid to turn my back to these fellows, so I reached behind me fumbling for the light switch hoping to turn more lights on to brighten the place. My left hand came across the switch; I flipped the switch and nothing happened. The lights seemed literally to become dimmer. I was scared!
My right arm rotator cuff was injured when I was slam dunked to the floor by a diabetic attack several years earlier. Samuel lived with me, and we had an argument about whose night it was to wash or dry the dishes. Since washing dishes was easier than drying and putting the dishes away, Samuel wanted to wash each time. I pushed him aside, and I tried to take the position to wash. He called me a punk, pushed me aside, and he shoved me so hard I fell backwards into the next room. I became so angry that it raised my blood sugar level; thus, slam dunking me to the floor. I lay there for a few minutes assessing the damage. I tried to move, but I couldn't. At first the ceiling was out of focus, but as I lay there, everything started to return normal.
Samuel came over and lifted me onto the sofa. After several minutes, I recovered, but the damage was done. I could not lift my right arm above my waist. While I was still pinned against the wall in the restroom, the three thugs were in my face. Their gold teeth were repulsive; they needed polishing. The gold was tarnished, and between the teeth was a good portion of the last meal they ate. The one closest to me his breath smelled like burned copper. It smelled like putrid rotten flesh. His breath was so offensive; I had to breathe in intervals. The three of them were less than a foot away from me. I tried to push one of them back off me, but my arms were too weak to be effective. I tried to talk but my voice failed me. I felt something happening on the inside of me. It felt like when one sees a ground mole running underground. In college I was taught in psychology 101 that the body prepares for fight or flight when it is experiencing great danger. I was frozen; I didn't know what to do.
I was walking with Johnny, Kenneth, and Solomon one night as we were walking home from a basketball game. A car drove up behind us with four white boys, hillbillies, and they began to taunt us. The car stopped and one of the boys was getting out of the car with a baseball bat in his hand. I turned to tell Johnny, Kenneth, and Solomon to fight one-on-one, but they had already run away. I started to run, but my starting speed was so fast, I flipped head over heels. The white boys thought I had broken my neck, so they jumped back into their car and drove off . I was outside and it was easy to try to escape. Being pinned down in the restroom, did not afford me that luxury. One of the thugs pulled a knife from his pocket, and all I could think of was that he was going to kill me.
September 26, 1949, I was chosen by the family to stay out of school for a week to care for my terminally ill grandmother. One morning, around eight o'clock, after everyone was gone to school or work, my grandmother wet her bed. She asked me to change the wet sheets on the bed and replace them with dry ones. My grandmother weighted at least 250 pounds, and I weighted 100 pounds wet. I couldn't imagine me lifting her out of bed, changing the sheets, and putting her back into the bed. I was young and I did not know how to roll a person to one side, tuck the sheets under, and roll the person back to the other side, to remove the sheets.
I placed my hands under her and attempted to lift her from the bed. That is all that I remembered. When I came to myself, I was lowering her back into the bed. The wet sheets were lying on the chair. I was so scared! What happened? I asked her, "Mama, are you alright?" She replied, "Son, yes, I am fine, thank you".
I was always afraid of the dark and dead people. If I heard about someone dying, it didn't matter how far away; I had to sleep with the light on. A house had burned to the ground located on the street back of my house, and a paraplegic child was killed in the fire. At that time, I lived alone in my grandmother's house; she had passed. I slept with the light on for about a month. One night just as I was about to fall asleep, the light bulb seemed to explode. The entire room was full of light as if I had a 1000 watts halogen bulb in a room 15 x 20. I leaped up and turned the light off , covered my head, and was too afraid to sleep with the light on ever again. When I examined the light bulb the next morning, there was nothing wrong with it; it came on as usual. That same feeling came over me in the restroom that afternoon. It was moving through me like a ground mole moving underground; I felt trapped.
I was running from a bear. At least that is what it looked like to an eight year old. My job was to herd up the cattle, and direct them to the barn for milking. I had all the cows moving towards the barn when I saw something moving in the thick brush. It was a large black animal, and I just knew it was a bear. I ran for my life. There was a feeding trough in front of me, and instead of running around it, I tried to jump over it. My right leg landed on a 20-penny nail turned upwards. It pierced my leg. I shook loose, and continued to run for my life. When I reached home and told my mother, she informed me that there were no bears in the southern parts of Alabama, and what I saw was a sow and her pigs.
I was afraid to tell my mother that I had split a three-inch gash long and about an inch deep on the side of my leg. I thought that it would heal on its own; it didn't. Several weeks later, my mother asked me what the odor was coming from my bedroom. Of course, I told her, "I don't know." The next night while I was asleep, she gave my body a going over, and she found my leg had gangrene: she could see straight to the bone.
That morning she took me to the West Highland Hospital emergency room. The doctor informed her that my leg would have to be amputated. We sat waiting for the doctor to prepare for surgery, and my mother started to sing a hymn. She said to me, "Come with me because we are going back home." Then she said in a lifeless voice, as an afterthought, "you are too young to have your leg cut off".
We left the hospital and went directly to a lady's home: Mrs. Ethel Rembert. We were invited in and she and my mother began to talk in private. Mrs. Rembert sat me down and began to question me about my faith in God. She asked me, "Do you believe in God?" I replied, "Yes mam". She asked me to read the 23rd Psalm aloud. I could not read well, but I stumbled through it. She asked me to read the 68th Psalm. I could only read about three verses of it. She took a feather and dipped it in olive oil, and applied it to the open sore. We left her house and went back home. The next morning there was red raw flesh that had covered the bone, and the entire area was growing new flesh. One week after the visit to Mrs. Rembert's house, my leg was completely healed.
Chapter Two
The night I finished high school, I took three friends, and we went for a fifty-mile drive to Birmingham. I had borrowed my uncle's car, a 1950 Oldsmobile, and it was fast. I was driving 100 miles an hour when I came up behind a slow moving vehicle, I decided to go around the car, but that meant that I was facing a transfer truck, head-on, about 300 yards away. This was a two-lane highway, and there was no place to pass. The truck driver plowed his truck into a ditch to allow me to pass. I never looked back because I had to get the applause of the guys riding with me.
I wish I had gone to another restroom that afternoon. I wish I was not in this predicament, and I wish I could just fly away. Another time I was driving about 70 miles an hour on a gravel road, after returning from taking my girl friend home. Just as I was passing the cemetery, my car headlights went off . The sky was thick with black clouds. The clouds came down over me, and I could not see anything. My sense of direction suddenly collapsed. I could not tell where the road started or ended. I could hear the sound of gravel under my tires, and when I veered off the road, I heard a soft sound, which meant I was on the grass.
My rational thought processes were inoperative. It did not occur to me to stop the car. I kept on driving in complete darkness. Suddenly I was gripped with fear because the darkness became darker. The blackness had inundated my complete surroundings. Instead of telling me to stop, my mind began to wonder. What would happen if I ran off a Clift, and was buried in a deep ravine? Would anyone passing see my car? Would I be able to get out of the car and climb up for help? Each of these questions drew an answer of no.
I remembered a philosophical thought that I heard someone say when I was in college. What if someone passing saw my car and my predicament, and he decided to get me out of the ravine because that way to die was too good for me? So he saved me to inflict pain and kill me himself. I continued to drive faster and faster until I saw a car coming towards me whose driver started to flicker his headlights. I came out of the trance like stupor, applied my brakes and stopped.
These kinds of experiences happen once in a lifetime. There aren't any rational answers to them. I stopped at a gas station, and told the attendant what had happened and he just smiled. He took a look at my battery and it was ok. He theorized that maybe the battery cable shook loose, and now had settled back on the battery post. That was not a good answer, but I accepted it.
All the boys of the community could swim; I couldn't. When the boys went down to the muddy hole where they swam, I was always able to make an excuse why I couldn't go with them. The fact was I was afraid to go with them. On this particular day, I felt courageous so I decided to go with the other boys to the swim hole. We got there and before I knew it, the boys threw me into the middle of the water hole. The sides of the hole were slippery clay dirt. I was floundering, and flaying my arms. I tried to stand up, but I kept losing my footing and going under. Thank goodness Solomon saw I was in trouble, and he jumped in and brought me out.
In College I decided to take a course in swimming. My first week or two was holding onto the sides of the pool and learning how to kick. I did this well. About the third week the Professor said I should let go of the side of the pool and allow myself to float on top of the water. When I let go of my hold on the pool, I sank straight to the bottom. The Professor dived in and rescued me. This went on for several days, before both the Professor and I decided that swimming was not for me.
I was invited in 1976, to spend some time at the home of Dr. Maya Angelou, Writer, Poet, and Professor, in Northern California. I arrived late morning, and most of the people there had changed into their swim outfits. I acted brave, and I put on my swimsuit. I sat on the edge of the pool pretending I was going to swim. Someone called to me to, "Come on in, the water is fine", and like an idiot, I released my hold on the side of the pool, and allowed myself to slide down into the water. I thought I was going to drown, but I was too embarrassed to allow myself to drown. I took a deep breath, relaxed the way my College Professor told me to do, and I floated. You should have seen me! I started to clown; I even dived from the diving board and made a big splash.
I am sure I had ended up in a den of iniquity, which was called a restroom. I really didn't know what a den of iniquity was, but it sounded like an awful place to be and that was where I was. I was in a place where no one even noticed me or cared about the thugs I was facing. They didn't care if I lived or died. I couldn't see their faces because the three thugs had surrounded me, and because the lights were so dimmed, I could not see across the room. Lord, what do I do?
I think I know how a person felt who tried a drug like Methamphetamine for the first time and he became addicted. One did something out of curiosity and convinced him that there is a need pending that justified the action taken. I really thought I had to urinate, but my choice of place to use the urinal was a poor choice: a wrong choice. Now that I think about it, I could have waited for a better location. But this was a time and an excuse for me to find out if what was said about this abandoned building was true or not true.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from I Fly Copyright © 2009 by Little Boy Blue. Excerpted by permission.
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