the kind chicken farmer who saved him. Mom was turning green and even Dad was ashen. The boy should not have told the story.
But ever the Irish mystic, Mom declared, “Only God could have arranged that ride along the highway, because otherwise you would be dead in the desert!”
“Mom,” the boy responded, “something in the universe was at work.”
What a perfect moment of synchronicity. The boy could have died, but somehow the right truck driver came along, chickens and all, at the right time, and saved him.
Julie’s Big Worry
One day in April of 2015 the boy, now an adult and considerably older, went to Boston to see Julie Welles, his second-year dorm mother at St. Paul’s. He found her still vibrant and thriving despite her eighty-five years. She remembered how her husband, Rev. Welles, had wondered about the boy’s future, and the boy asked her to try to write down how she remembered him as a teenager. A few weeks later he received an email with her response: “I met you more than forty years ago, upon your arrival at St. Paul’s School. I was surprised by your openness and innocence. You wore your heart on your sleeve, and your lack of sophistication was a rarity at St. Paul’s. I remember hoping it would survive. I have never seen you compromise that ‘goodness.’ Many times, as a student you dared to take the road less traveled, and it has led you to a career as a beacon of thoughtfulness and integrity in a complex society. You worried me because I thought you would fail miserably or succeed plentifully.”
Clearly, Julie had picked up on things.
And she was right to worry about the boy. Meaning is everything, and when boys—and girls—don’t find meaning, they get pretty desperate.
The boy had decided to take Route 80 in the direction of his dream, but he doubted himself until that misty silver-gray morning, high above the western sea, just like in the dream. This is where he reclaimed his soul for good, despite modern skepticism.
Interlude
The boy pondering Jung in study hall at St. Paul’s
Hold fast to your dreams for if dreams die life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.
—Langston Hughes
Caminante no hay camino, se hace camino al andar.
Wayfarer, there isn’t any road; you make the road as you go on.
—Antonio Machado
The spiritual journey is individual, highly personal. It can’t be organized or regulated. It isn’t true that everyone should follow one path. Listen to your own truth.
—Ram Dass
How to Follow a Dream—The First Lesson: Boys can follow a deep recurring dream if they pray about it and come to feel a spiritual trust in its meaning over time, but some dreams are just made up, so careful discernment over time is the key. A boy has to feel that the dream is more than likely a calling, but that does not allow him to have absolute certainty. If he follows the dream on a highway pilgrimage he does so in faith until he arrives at he knows not where, and there he will know that he really was guided, and he will feel validated in believing that there is an infinite connecting Mind of cherishing love. This experience of arrival need only happen once to shape the course of a lifetime. A boy may feel strongly about a dream but resist following it because he does not want to upset family expectations, but discovering a destiny usually means setting aside acceptability and little human goals.
Once a boy sets out on such a pilgrimage and if he starts thinking he should turn around before it’s too late, the way will somehow be blocked. The car will break down. Otherwise it was not really his destiny after all, but at least he would have tried.
So many young people pursue materialistic goals that disappoint them in the long run. It is better to give all that up early and follow a pilgrim’s path because we need to know ourselves as in essence eternal spiritual souls connected with others, with nature, and with the universal Mind to truly flourish. Every day young people die of emptiness and affluenza. Following a dream can save them. Be free. Only the worldly will laugh.
Evil is the absence of the good. It happens when we get out of spiritual touch with the infinite Mind of love, and break into a free fall of emptiness, ego, and self-destruction.
The boy in art class at St. Paul’s (top row, fourth from left)
Let yourself be drawn by the strange pull of what you call love. It will not lead you astray.
—Rumi
The main school building after chapel
The Youth and the Ledge: “If You Save Him”
The biggest adventure you can take is to live the life of your dreams.
—Oprah Winfrey
Gary dropped the boy off in downtown Chicago, along Lake Michigan on Lake Shore Drive.
“Here, kid, take these forty dollars in case you need it, and you will, but let’s pray before you go.” And Gary said a second prayer, but not until he paused and quoted a passage that the boy remembered from Mr. Muller years before: “The Lord is with you wherever you go.”
“That was Joshua 1:9,” said the boy. That had been one of Mr. Muller’s favorites.
“Not bad, kid.” Gary prayed for safe travels and grace.
“Okay, thanks Gary, you were there when I needed you and now we go our separate ways.” Then Gary and the boy shook hands and the boy jumped out with his couple of books and his guitar case, which included a toothbrush and a few pairs of underwear crammed in next to his instrument. It was summer and no time for socks. He had ninety dollars in his jeans now, the fifty he brought from Westhampton Beach and the forty that Gary had added.
“Okay, kid, but call home,” Gary said, as he waved goodbye. “You can walk a couple of miles to Grant Park and grab a bench.”
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