Friday, December 23rd
The voice was friendly enough. The face matched the voice. The smile covered the face, gentle, wide, sincere. Ready for visitors was this smile. Ready for David, the seeker after Sweet Mysteries, was this voice.
“I see that you are now back from the front, soldier!” the custodian laughed as David re-entered the church sanctuary after his recent escape attempt. “Would you like to come inside, or perhaps your feet are already frozen to the steps?” The old custodian retreated backwards slightly, an invitation for David to step forward, into the warm, dark, candle-lit-only sanctuary. And step forward he did, into the silent safety of his new unknown.
“Should I ask what brings you out on such a cold and lovely night, or am I rushing things a bit, David?”
This was the second time in two nights that the old man called David, a stranger, by name. This was not, by any means, a random encounter. Even David, in the midst of his mental and emotional misery, sensed a flash of foreboding future wrapped up in this mystical moment. Even lovesick and homesick David Lee wrestled with the sudden shift in consciousness that such a simply odd event might stimulate. But let’s not be rude now. Answer the man, David. Don’t crack so quickly and easily.
With all the grace and finesse of a stuttering swan came his vapid reply: “I, um, I, uh, was out, … walking, again, like last night, … and I, um, saw the light, again, … and, well, just kinda headed over…” That was brilliant, David. Smooth. Witty. Want to try it again, fella?
“You saw my candlelight in the window?” the custodian rescued.
“Um, yeah.” Pause. “It was cold. I was cold. This looked warm.”
“And so it is. Would you like to come in a little further, and sit beside my old woodstove for a moment? I was just fixing a last cup of hot mocha chocolate for the night. Come on over.”
The custodian directed David to a corner by the side of the front of the church sanctuary, an alcove with a drawn maroon velvet curtain. Sometimes connected to the rest of the sanctuary, sometimes secluded, the small room, like the small woodstove within it, radiated warmth. And David was offered his first taste of what the old man simply described as the hybrid between Mountain Mocha coffee and plain old Grandma-used-to-make hot chocolate. Warm, with or without melting marshmallows, David chose to take his straight up.
The old man smiled. Again.
“Wise choice. Most effective taste. Reaches the right spots more efficiently.”
It was time for the inevitable question. “Not to be rude in any way, sir, but….. just how did you know my name before we even met?”
“Not to be mysterious in any way, son, but….. Maybe we’ll be getting to that a little later. Maybe not. For now, we’ll just do the formal introduction thing, even though it appears that I have the advantage over you on this one.”
He nodded toward David. David accepted the challenge, and returned the silent acknowledgment.
“My name is Walton. Walton Masters. As you can obviously discern, I am the late-shift custodian for this illustrious house of holies. Call me ‘Walton’ right up front, all right? No ‘Sir,’ or ‘Mr. Masters’ please. Walton’s the name, communication’s the game, so let’s play. We’ll start by pretending I don’t know a thing about you. Hit it from the top, Pop!”
The man speaks a strange language. Odd, but I suppose it’s not that unusual for the common eccentricities of many New England folks. I like to mess with language forms and literary devices myself. So play along. Maybe he’s spent one night too many working alone in this too-quiet house of spirits. Maybe it’s the Pink Floyd addiction he has by demonstrating yet another of the band’s t-shirts this evening. It could be he’s got a secret stash of the “special” communion wine hidden in his work clothes. Give the guy some slack. After all, he gave you some warmth.
“Well, I am David Lee Hartland.” A pause to consider which direction to take here. “I’m a liberal arts student at the University of Maine, here in town, studying things like counseling, comparative religions, a bit of philosophy, and minoring in music, just in case my ‘fun’ gets a chance to also be my ‘fortune.’ A ‘singing shrink,’ perhaps.” Walton watched and waited. David took that as his cue to continue. “I walk these streets a lot, to work out problems, to get inspired, to rest after extended think-a-thons. I don’t usually hang out so late, but the Fall semester’s over, a new one is about to begin, and yet the pressure’s still on, even during the Winter Break, and, well, life’s turning to hell in a hand-basket. Pretty simple, really.”
At least ten more silent seconds passed before Walton responded. Along with the ever-present smile, his deep-set eyes fixed upon David’s own.
“Simple. Simple. A powerful word, David Lee Hartland. And very complex, too, no doubt.”
The guy was a mind-reader; honest, direct, to the point. A “communication game” indeed. There was no game going on here. Maybe a lack of games. This is new to me, but challenging. Let’s see where it leads.
“Yes, sir, I mean, Walton. Sorry, sir, I’ll get used to it in a moment.” Back to the stuttering self, David stumbled with words. “My life isn’t really simple at all. I’m into lots of things. And not a single one of them is simple, in the slightest.”
Then, in a brief moment of mystic magic, both men simultaneously, and spontaneously, said,
“Life should be simpler than it is.”
After a quick eyebrow raise from Walton, the custodian took the lead: “I hope you don’t feel too uncomfortable sitting here with me, David. I tend to watch words very closely, and that little habit of mine can throw people off sometimes. But, as you may have guessed, or at least wondered, there is a very solid reason you wandered in here for two nights now, and my odd way with words is a small part of that reason. But I won’t run a ragged race around you. This is not a contest of wits, wills, words, or wisdom. Just a communication event, if you’ll pardon the rather technical descriptor. I chose it. You chose it. And this is a perfect night to begin, despite your problems outside the shelter of this sanctuary.” Pause. “So, I beg your patience. I commend your intelligence. And I would like to share something with you, if you have the time.”
Well, there it was, and there is wasn’t. He wants to share something with me. Hmmm. The semi-revelation, still cloaked in sweet mystery, being revealed a single semantic drop at a time. Was David up for this type of adventure, at this time of the year, in this condition, with this strange timeless custodian, cleaner of pews and prayer books? “Turn off head, David” the internal message sent. “Turn off head, and listen, instead” a rhyming conscience spoke. “Go with the only flow you may ever know,” it continued on in its sing-song lyrical way. There was no point in arguing with his air-sign-induced intuitive voice, with its own unique sense of humor. Two (or more) can play at this game! Some part of David’s schizo-friendly head made the decision.
“Sure, I’ve got the time.” Wait a moment. “A bit tonight, and then maybe I meet you here again tomorrow? Maybe earlier in the evening?” The gauntlet of commitment had been thrown.
“Sounds fine, but let’s not rush anything. I plan to be here until my work with you is completed. So I suggest, now that we’ve been formally introduced, that you head back to your dorm room, take a quick shower, get into your woolly winter jammies, and lay awake all night trying to figure out just what occurred here tonight. How’s that sound for a plan?”
Walton was teasing, and testing, David, simultaneously. David, suddenly too tired to match sharp wits with this late-night master of words and swords, agreed to the terms.
“I like that idea. How about tomorrow night at eight? I’m free, studies can wait, we can spend a couple of hours together. I’ll help you around here a bit, too. Sorry. A bit hyper personality, can’t sit still for too long. Tomorrow night, then?”
“Tomorrow night then. More Midnight Mocha, also. Thanks.”
As the two rose for David’s departure, Walton added “Don’t forget to drop by for your Christmas presence!” Wait. Once again, David was unsure of what he had heard Walton say. Did he say “presents” or “presence”? Yes, it was going to be Christmas Eve tomorrow night, so was there some more magical and mystical hocus-pocus going to occur at that time? Or is my mind just working way too much overtime?
With those lingering questions still locked in battle within David’s busy brain, Walton escorted him to the front door, opened and closed it on him, always smiling, always watching. David smiled, waved, and returned to the snow-plowed streets of a sleeping, and suddenly stranger, city. Whew. I made it. I think.
***
Once David found himself safely back in the comfort and familiarity of his own rather un-elaborate dorm sanctuary of messy floor and cluttered desk, he flopped down on the never-made sheets of his bunk-like bed. He knew from past experience that he was about to have one of his quite common brain trains, an opportunity for his neural networks to attack, to assuage, and to instigate all kinds of ne’er-do-well mischief in his head. But tonight, after nearly risking his whole soul on a close encounter of the weird kind, he decided to just let the flow go. He turned off the mental controls, and let the parade of charade begin.
Who was that singing one of the band’s songs a few nights ago? Did I actually hear my own music traveling through the ethers of a lost winter landscape? Or was I the one doing the escaping by thinking I could hide from my problems in the pews of some old church? I am pretty sure I heard music. It really sounded like my music. But there’s no way that an old man janitor could know about our songs. And he didn’t have a stereo going. And he wasn’t even near the musical instruments at the time I entered the place. So what’s with that? Either there is some kind of Jungian collective consciousness energy transmitting an identical message from various separate sources, or …. I better walk around campus for a while, and see if any of the others have actually returned already. Although that seems quite dumb, since they all just barely left this madhouse.
Now that his mental magic was working, he noticed a shift in gears, as well as direction.
And who is that crazy custodian? A reject from the Happy Home in Concord? A tramp in disguise, or an angel from the skies? Am I about to step into a black hole, or a holy place?
And why did Joanna have to leave me here alone? Her daddy’s rich, “and her momma’s good lookin’” (David never could ignore a useful musical flashback from the past). She just vanished. Once her tests were over, I never even got to say “so long, old friend, I’ll see you when the break ends.” Just gone. A snowflake blown by another nor’easter. A fleet bit of sleet. A tease of a breeze, or rather a sneeze. Summoned by the high command of family commerce, no doubt. Keep the bucks flowing, so the banks can keep growing. Maybe I made a huge mistake by finding myself attracted to a member of one of the country’s wealthiest families. But there she was. Right in front of me. Singing. Sweet. Staring. At me. In the midst of her own reverie, I became her target of attention. And the arrow struck, and stuck, right through the heart of my heart.
JC, I’d die for thee. You are the only one who keeps my center sane. But I feel a distance growing, and I have no way of knowing, if that sane will become a stain any day now. You are an integral part of my life, of the group, of the music itself. You are the amusing muse who keeps me with pen in hand and word on tongue. The architect angel of my destiny, unaware of your power over me. And yet, Daddy’s checkbook is another kind of power with which I cannot contend. His money, by controlling your movements, controls mine as well. I am just the hick from the sticks, and you are the princess of Portland.
So, are we over? Is the magic now mud? The sweet mystery is now bleak history? David summoned up a brief moment of his own intentive control: I will not let what I cannot control, control me. Whether she is in, or out, or just wandering about, the music will go on. Our love, within hidden halls and beyond forbidden walls, shall endure. Even if I am not your love, you shall be mine. Now. And now. And now. And forever now. Good night, my fair princess. Sleep well in whatever dreary or dreamy dungeon you have been cast. This poor boy has a fateful fantasy to fulfill.
And, after further similar driveling and drifting, David finally fell restlessly asleep.