CCpart2ch22

1 Oct
I-80 westbound in Nebraska

A few days have passed –even a few loads delivered—since I
penned that last chapter. I needed a little break. That was
probably the most intense Chronicle yet in terms of what it took
to write it. I remember I was wearing a T-shirt while driving, and
it was cloudy and chilly in the Midwest, and I was still sweating.
But Iowa was an Indian summer day, a gorgeous reward, and
an overnight thunderboomer that pushed through Lincoln has
brought cool air and clear sky. Making good time toward a Monday
morning delivery in Reno, riding into the sunset of my fifth tour of duty.
A couple days in Ashland next week await.

You may have noticed that I never really got back to making my
original point in the last part of the last chapter, that I sort of drifted
into an aside about Jesus and stayed there. But the point was a valuable
one so I’m going to try to make it now.

The reason that I did not want to turn the focus of Part Two into a
personal history of my spiritual path is the same reason I gave for
not reading the Gospels as an historical record of Jesus’ ministry: it
would make it egocentric, in a way that would strip it of its value as
an allegorical tale. Just as the Bible serves us best by offering what I
have been calling a metaphorical imperative rather than an historical
one, I believe the Chronicles can best serve the reader as an allegory
of one ordinary person’s search for meaning in a world where all the
alternatives seem absurd. The Good News of the Chronicles is that
you don’t have to be some spiritual adept or religious scholar for God
to start using you in ways that will bring unprecedented joy to your
heart –that even a rascal and a ne’er-do-well like the author can be smacked upside the head by God so hard that he can no
longer fail to pay attention. If God can smile on and share some wisdom with a complete screwhead like me –someone
who has watched his dreams burn down for most of his life, someone who otherwise would have nothing of value to say
to anyone other than “good morning” and “goodnight” –if I AM can make a willing ambassador of someone with the
dubious credentials that I bring to the table, friends, there is no one that cannot be reached. There is no one who
cannot be delivered to God’s doorstep on his/her personal terms.

To make any part of the Chronicles into a personal history of my ego would be implicitly saying, “Do what I’ve done,
believe what I believe, and you will find peace,” and that would be absolute rubbish. There are too many of those books
crowding the “religion” and “Eastern philosophy” and (especially) “New Age” shelves of our bookstores already.

But to offer myself as an allegory of the lost seeker / Prodigal Son / desert-wanderer to which you might relate, would be
saying “Do what you do, believe what you believe (like Joseph Campbell’s mantra: “Follow your bliss.”) as passionately and
independently as possible –and if you do not know what those things are yet, here are some heartfelt ideas, compiled from
some of the world’s most reliable sources on these matters, that may help you on your way. See if this lights the fire of
the Word of God in your heart.”

So that is the spirit in which the Chronicles are offered. There would be no greater joy for me as the author than to find
out that readers who were not doing so already were inspired to start Chronicles of their own in some manner, to wrestle
with God on their own terms.

I don’t pretend to know how many parts the Chronicles will end up having. Maybe it will be a five-part trilogy, like Star
Wars (actually, Douglas Adams’ Hitchhikers’Guide to the Galaxy series was the original “five-part trilogy;” that is where I
got the idea). Maybe there will be 67, my new lucky number (remember St. Michael). Guess it all depends on how long I
am called to stay Camerado, and Camerado in me, before God decides it is time to plant me again, possibly in Seattle. (I’ve
made a few erroneous presumptions before, so don’t hit the “save” key on that idea yet; there is always a chance I might
have to “backspace.”)

Whaddaya say, Evil Abe, should we mosey
on to Reno?

Alright, let’s go.

Hermit Crab
I-80 and Happy Jack Road, Wyoming
(right by the “Evil Abe” monument, an
absolutely sinister-looking bust of President
Lincoln overlooking the freeway atop Sherman
Hill, elevation 8640 feet)

copyright 2004 by Hermit Crab
a Fish Out Of Water production

Epilogue

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