William Rose: The Seven Habits

About thirty minutes later, that shit had really kicked in, man. By this time, I’d moved out onto the front porch and was just stretched out on the couch we had out there. I was watching the leaves on this old tree that stood in our front yard and they were so awesome. It was like I could see this faint aura around each one, like a golden glow that pulsed with the energies rushing through that elm.

Everything was so clear, so fuckin’ hyper-real. One point, I’m racked out there—just kinda controlling my breathing and meditating—when I begin to hear this beautiful music. It was like there was this angel hovering just over our roof and it was ringing tones and textures from the atoms and molecules of everything, man. Each note hung in the air with this perfect clear pitch, trilling and droning into eternity, overlaying the next note, and blending together into a chord that seeped down through my body and vibrated my soul.

So eventually I open my eyes, right? And I see this little night bird sitting in the limbs of that tree and he’s just warbling away. The bird was the angel, dude. His song was the music of the spheres and something about this knowledge made me feel like every cell in my body had just been stroked with the finger of God.

I rush into the house and Johnny is there doing this chalk and charcoal portrait of his mind on butcher paper. He was always trying to map out his psyche, see, because he had to understand where each of the roads lead before he’d be able to divert them. So I snatch away this piece of white chalk and run back out onto the porch and I felt so fuckin’ alive, man, so fuckin’ connected .

I get out on the porch and I start scrawling these veves all over the floorboards… a veve? It’s this complex symbol, man. Voodoo houngans draw ‘em in cornmeal to represent all these astral forces that are spiraling around out there and they kinda act like beacons for the loa. See the, loa are these spiritual beings that….

Shit. You’re getting me totally off topic, man. The point is, I drew these veves all over the damn porch and I was channeling my energy into each line, each dot and swirl. After a while, I realized that I wasn’t just drawing the ones I knew. I’d branched out into these geometrical shapes and patterns that had just as much power, just as much energy… only these were coming from somewhere inside me .

Finally, I stood up and started calling on the Watchtowers, man, the directions, the elementals. I invited them all in and could feel myself opening to them, unfurling like the petals of the moon flowers that crept all up and down our hillside. I could feel the energies surging into me, manifesting in my blood and coursing through my entire body. It was like a black hole had suddenly opened up somewhere within me and it was pulling everything in, man.

About this time is when I noticed how these dark clouds had crept across the sky and they kinda flickered with the glow of lightning that was just out of view. A wind was blowing and it felt like the universe was kissing me softly, running its cool fingers through my hair. I could feel the moisture in the air, could smell that fresh scent that pre-rain spores release, and I knew that this wasn’t just something that was happening to me.

I was part of it, man. I knew that I was just this little strand in the giant web of everything, and I wanted to experience it all. The cool grass between my toes, the wind rustling my pubes, the feeling of bare skin when those first, fat drops of rain finally started falling outta the sky.

So I took off all my clothes, right there on the porch. Left them in this rumpled pile and went running down the steps, across the sidewalk, and into the backyard. You’re never really free until you’re naked, ya know? You’ve never really experienced life until you’ve done it without all the hang-ups and impositions society tries to choke us with. If you’ve never danced nude to the rhythm of rain pattering on leaves, then you’ve never truly been alive.

Anyway, I’m out in the backyard, doing this little tribal two-step, when I hear howling way back in the hills. Sounds just like some giant wounded beast and it stops me in my tracks. I’m standing there listening to this sound, ya know, and all of a sudden all that zen just vanishes. I’m like Adam in the Garden of Eden, realizing his nakedness for the first time and feeling the shame warm my chest and cheeks. I wanna run to the porch, put on my clothes, go back inside where its bright and safe and protected, ‘cause I’ve got The Fear , now.

I’m listening to this moaning sound coming down off the mountains and it seems like it embodies every fucked up thing that’s ever existed. Violence, doubt, rage… it’s all there, whipped into a frenzy by the coming storm and fueled by the anger of the Earth and how her children have betrayed her. I can see the pines way back there swaying back and forth, the wind is really blowing now, driving these little stinging bits of dust into my eyes and peppering my bare skin with what feels like tiny pinpricks.

But I can’t move. It’s like roots have spread out from the soles of my feet and anchored me to the ground, ya know?

And then I hear this really loud popping and cracking, like the world’s largest .22 had been set to fully automatic somewhere back in those woods, and it just keeps getting louder and louder. That old wind is blowing stronger now and the pines are all bent toward me like they were bowing before the approach of some fearsome demon. So this image forms in my head, man. I see this dark and formless force racin’ down the hillside. It’s leaving splintered trees in its wake and kickin’ up these little tornadoes of dirt and dead leaves. All the forest animals are scurrying away, running and hiding, seeking shelter from the evil that crackles like static in the air.

And me? I’m right there in its path, man. It’s chargin’ through the woods, howling so loud I can feel it reverberate in my chest and head, and I know… I know… that within seconds it’s gonna be all over me like a skunk on peanut butter. It’s gonna slam into my body and poison my spirit with all that malevolent energy. It’s gonna wither my soul, drink my tears, and feast upon all that succulent fear and pain. It’ll consume me within seconds and scour the earth for more hapless bastards to feed on, growing stronger as its darkness claims the land.

Fuck that.

I broke through the paralysis and took off like a spooked deer, running straight across the yard. Took the porch stairs in two strides, and forgot all about my pile of clothes layin’ over there. I streaked by Johnny and ran to my bedroom, slamming the door shut behind me only seconds before I dove into bed. I pulled those sheets up over my head and I was shakin’ so bad I coulda washed an entire load of laundry if someone had tossed me into a tub of water with some detergent.

I just wanted to close my eyes and go to sleep, ya know? To pretend like none of this had ever happened and wake up in the morning to tell Johnny all about the fucked up dream I’d had.

But you can’t sleep on acid, man. Everyone knows that. So, instead, I tried to picture this protective ball of white light encircling me like I was a baby chick inside an egg of pure energy, only every time I started to get a fix on it in my mind, the white light was shredded into these long strands and pulled away like cigarette smoke through a fan. I’m shivering, sweating, crying, and my heart is hammering in my chest so loudly that I can only faintly hear Johnny on the other side of my door saying, “Dude, you wanna hit this? Hey, man, you wanna hit this?”

I feel like a damn fool now. Hindsight being twenty-twenty and all, I realize there wasn’t some all-powerful, dark entity willing itself into existence back there on the hill. I was just having a bad trip and letting all my negativity bubble to the surface where it tainted my perceptions, man. No, I realize now that what that was—the howling, the wind, the trees snapping like they were nothing more than dried twigs—I realize that it was just the Eye of Aeons opening up for the first time.