Tuesday Afternoon

Im just beginning to see,
Now Im on my way
It doesnt matter to me
chasing the clouds away....
(thanks Mr. Heyward)
OK. well where do I begin? Years ago I was alone on a back road in upstate NY. I was thinkin about lonliness and dying and I was just 21. I thought about how I'd rejected the love offered me by several people in my life and how I'd been rejected by people who I thought I loved. I know this sounds mushy but believe me it gets worse.
I was picked up by a minister who was with the Reformed Church of America the Dutchpeople. He proseletyzed me and I became a "Christian" and after several difficulties in the little dutch town I ran off to join "The Children of God" in Virginia Beach, Virginia. I'd read about them in Time magazine and I wondered if that was maybe where I fit into the 'God' picture. A bunch of hippies running round reading their bibles and praying and living communally. I mean that was pretty much what I'd been doing for 3 or 4 years to that point. (living communally) I didn't work much and I didnt like work at all...Anyway I wound up in Virginia Beach.
Through many situations I was not able to contact the children of god but I wound up at Rock Church. It was an independent charsimatic church at the Beach and they were fundamentalists who were penecostal in their worship. Also they were reformed drug addicts. (that was up my alley as well)
I read the king James version of the Bible daily. I memorized all the passages pertaining to the charismatic doctrine and I felt I'd met God when one day when I was traveling with this black man who was going to jail for a while for flim flamming and some other petty crimes, I went through a astral-projection type experience.
I was in a volkswagon beetle with him, he was driving. I was shotgun. I felt myself get lifted out of my body and go up through the roof of the car. Then I kinda blacked out for a lil while. Then I was simply an eyeball in an upper corner of a tomb. There was a body on a slab near me, but down and a hole in the tomb and the sun was shining brightly through the hole. It was like a doorway. I saw grass and dandelions growing by the doorway as well. Anyway the figure on the slab sat up and smiled at me. He had long black hair and he ran his fingers through it. He was naked. He got up and he'd had some linen on him, he tossed that aside and walked naked out that doorway. I then swooped back down into the car where the black guy was screaming obscenities at me. All I could remember was the scripture that read "you will find me if you seek me with your whole heart." I finally gathered myself together because I was laughing with the extacy I was experiencing... and he said "mutherfucker! Do you know what you said to me???" I said uh..no I was't here for a while...He said "What? What chu talkin bout" "DO you what you said to me???" I said no. He said he was gonna hit me. I said "well, like I dont know whats goin on but I was just 'not here'. He started to calm down. He said, "you said I was gonna go to jail..that in jail I was gonna convert to christianity and preach the gospel there.." I said, "well, I wasnt here for that part..." He and I went to where we were going and he took me back home. I'd gone with him at the request of a lady who ran a commune on the beach and had a 'ministry' for blacks, the homeless, and anyone that "God" Sent her way. I remember thinking that day that "Christ actually walked the earth. He actually was a physical being and all that is written about him is true."
Anyway I wound up backslidden ( a condition the bible describes as not going forward with God) and married in New York State. (alcohol) After that divorce I moved back to the Midwest where I was involved with other women alcohol...then I met a and married my second wife. She and I lasted about 50 days. With the last arrest on Dec. 25th 1987 I entered treatment for alcoholism and I havent drank since that time. I gave up smokin pot and pretty much all the carnal stuff and i just was eating myself to death. I met my third wife at A/A and we have been together all this time. She is a fabulous woman who has her own relationship with God and really has not hasseled me at all when I've gone my own way. But today I got a call from a black man who is a prophet in the Church. He is an humble man and has his own demons that have been conquored. But he does walk in the office of prophet. Its plain to see by his life.
I have been bitter. I have been angry. I have questioned everything about the bible and God and said unequivocally that is it shit. I am 100% wrong. I am 100% sure that I have just avoided the things that God initially intended for me and walked away from them to do what ever I want to. Well this black man was God talking to me on the phone. I had recently insulted a Christian and told him to call God up and tell him what an asshole I thought he was.... God called back. Um soooooooo. I gotta do some changes in my attitude. I want you know if you read my blog, that I am going to try and do what "God" wants. I'm certain he exists and has had times with me, and that I have done his will in the past. Im certain I belong to him, and that he will see this country through this bad time and we will wake up to a brighter day....I dont have the answer 'how' except that we need to pay attention to what he speaks to us indiviually and pray for the ones who dont know him and the ones who do know and wont listen.
MO LATER
Bowe