Epiphany Part 1 - God's Little Secret

A memoir of a life foretold in a palm reading and my efforts to avoid my fate.

Imagine having your palm read as a fourteen year old, and not recognising or liking the person you become, so try being the best person you can be, to avoid all the disappointing predictions, without believing in such nonsense. Imagine everything turning out just as it was told, despite your efforts to avoid the unfortunate life you were warned of. Imagine being on the threshold of the most unbelievable and scary of the predictions, knowing your decisions will endanger those close to you, yet somehow save many lives.

I don't have to imagine any of the above. I have empirical knowledge. This is my life.

That's why I'm sitting here crying my eyes out in a marquee at the Wickerman festival, mid July 2007. The festival takes place near Kirkcudbright, south west Scotland. I cry for so many reasons. I've just experienced something that seems impossible and will sound unbelievable to you. I'm crying because I know the story I'm about to tell you is entirely true but you won't believe it. I barely believe it, but must tell my story, regardless of the consequences.

My story will test your beliefs. I know it will because it tests mine. I've spent so long since this day trying to remember everything and figure out what I must do. Today is the day I wake up, like Neo taking the red pill, the illusion of the Matrix no longer holds me. I see everything clearly now, yet those around me believe I'm mad.

I need you to remember, that on this day, I knew everything you're about to read was going to happen. I aim to prove that as impossible and unbelievable as my story sounds, it really is true. I've not had to make up a single word. I may sound matter of fact, that's because for me, it is matter of fact.

I'm presently writing ten years on from this day, what I know from the past, aware it's all going to pan out exactly as I imagine it will, sitting here crying my eyes out at a festival. Crying, not just because I'm struggling with what fate awaits me, but crying because I understand what my story means, what it proves. I’ve been an atheist my entire adult life, but now realise how wrong I was. I cry because I know how hard it's going to be to convince you that it's all true, because you’re going to judge me for taking drugs and being under the influence of them.

Two hours ago I smoked a legal high for the first time, despite turning thirty eight in two days. I hadn't planned to take it. Today just turned out to be the most enlightening day of my life.

***

I’m at this festival for the first time, with several friends. Ali, a dark haired six foot four man in his late twenties and the most hirsute man I’ve ever met, saw a herbal high stand while wandering around last night. We decide to find it today to see what’s on offer.

Eventually we find the discreet stall, situated within an eight foot by eight foot white cube, between two much larger clothes stalls. They have a table set up like a shop counter. A middle aged woman with long greying hair, wearing a very old heavy wraparound brown cardigan, stands beside it.

"Hello, are you enjoying your Wickerman experience so far?" she asks warmly.

"Yes very much thank you. This is our first time but I don't think it'll be our last,” I reply.

"Tell me this," Ali starts, "how come you can sell herbal ecstasy and synthetic weed here and the police don't bust you?"

"Quite simply because I'm not selling anything that is currently illegal,” she smiles.

"You say currently illegal, does that mean you have something that you think will be soon?" I ask.

"Well they change the laws for some of the ingredients and depending on what they are used in we just need to use another strain of that plant to replace it. Since there are thousands of types of plants and combinations there will always be a herbal alternative. We have so many customers who come to us not just for highs but for remedies they feel work better for them than prescribed medication. It's entirely up to the individual to find what works for them,” explains the woman.

"Very interesting. I had no idea there was so much on offer herbally. Have you got smoke?" I ask.

"Yes I do,” she says.

"I've heard of this but never tried it or any herbal high. What exactly is it and what does it do for you?" I ask.

"Well it's different for every person. I like to think of it as God's Little Secret. For me it's as if you’ve been touched by God,” answers the woman.

"That sounds very intense and just what we’re looking for," says Ali, "I'll take the strongest one you've got."

"There you go, that's £50 please including this pipe and gauze refills," says the woman, popping them into a paper bag. "Now let's try and keep it God's Little Secret boys’ okay? We don't want every kid on the block knowing about this, so be careful who you share it with and be responsible. Enjoy your enlightenment!"

We walk back to the rest of the group who know what we are away for. They’re waiting to see the state we get ourselves in. We sit next to them on the ground and put the gauze into the pipe. We’d seen a few funny videos on YouTube so have cameras ready.

"How much of this do you think I should put in Gaz?" Ali asks.

"I'd go for about half a pinch and work up from that just in case. But what do I know? I've never tried it before,” I say as I take the small plastic vial from Ali and empty a tiny amount of the black granules onto his hand from which he takes a pinch and puts it in his little black pipe.

"Right here goes nothing,” says Ali raising the lighter, putting flame across the small black grains of God's Little Secret, which glow orange just briefly until he takes another puff and they glow once more. "That feels really weird but nice, here,” he says laughing, passing me the pipe. I put a pinch of herb into the pipe and put flame to it just as Ali keels over onto his right side.

"Oh no, that doesn't look good." I say taking another deep inhale of the pipe, the little coals burn brightly in their oranges and reds against the black.

The instant rush is unlike anything I've experienced before. I start laughing uncontrollably and feel as if my head is being dragged skyward, with my neck getting longer and longer until I'm ten feet above the group, all sitting laughing at Ali and I. Suddenly my neck reacts like a bungee cord, propelling my head towards my sitting body, passing through it and out my backside into the ground.

Now I'm looking at the same group of friends through a dark tunnel from below the ground and I feel fantastic. The tunnel to my group changes from one large tunnel to a group of infinite tunnels, as if each leads to every moment of my life. The choices are limitless yet I don't get to choose, as instantly my friends vanish and this gateway opens. I feel every cell in my body and hear them flush as I fall through.

***

I'm inside my own body as a ten year old child. Dad had receding dark hair when I was ten. In fact, he's had receding hair since his teens like me. He'd recently sold his late father’s business and bought a pub, which meant he came home smelling of cigarette smoke and booze, yet he never smoked and very rarely drank. His dad did both most of his days causing his problems and subsequent death at just fifty seven. Dad worked long hours in his pub but he always made time for my two younger brothers, Ian, Alan and I.

Dad asked me a question, "What came first, the chicken or the egg?"

I said, "The chicken came first since where else would the egg come from?"

"Ah, so where did the chicken come from?" answered Dad with a smile. It's a question that has perturbed me since, yet it is a question that my story epitomises perfectly.

When I asked Mum, "Where do chickens come from?"

"They hatch from eggs,” she replied. Mum was pretty, blonde, busty and the most supportive mother a boy could ask for.

"So do the eggs come from God?" I asked.

"No Gary, they come from the hens,” she smiled.

"So is it only the first hen that came from God?" I asked.

"Who's been talking to you about God?" she asked, "You don't hear your dad and I talking about him."

"Rev Stevenson talked about it at school. Do you believe in God Mummy?" I asked.

"Erm, I've not given it much thought. We don't go to church because we aren't religious. I think if everyone treated everybody better, the world would be a better place."

During the summer of 1979, I was lying on my bed, looking out the window at the beautiful clear blue sky. The swing window was open, with the outside temperature in the twenties, causing a strange light to be refracted off my mirrored wardrobe. It shone the shape of a pure white angel on my yellow wallpaper. It was so intense and bright, surrounded by rainbows.

"God, why do you never show yourself and why don't you prove you exist?" I asked aloud to which I heard nothing. "If you prove your existence to me, I will tell the world. Show yourself now."

I didn't see or hear from him causing me to doubt, later to dismiss his existence but I still treated others as I hoped to be treated. With honesty, sincerity and compassion.

The gateway reappears and I flush through.

***

I'm inside my fourteen year old body, at boarding school.

During my third senior year, while in the laundry room of our boarding house, my year were putting away our clothes. We were laughing at the comments made about Paul by an older boy who kept calling him 'Chinaman'. He did have unusual eyelids but they certainly didn't look oriental. To prove his point, Paul dragged in Raymond, one of the sixth year Chinese boys who was watching TV in the common room next door.

Raymond Cheung was a quiet boy who always had his bespectacled head in a text book. He was much smaller than the rest of his year so was often the victim of their pranks. His thick black hair looked like a large bowl had been placed on his head before being cut around. He was softly spoken and very polite.

"Now c'mon guys, are you seriously sayin’ this guy and me look alike?" Paul asked us all with his usual big grin. He was such a good looking guy with his highlighted hair. Big, strong and great at every sport he played.

"Apart from the hair you could be brothers,” joked Douglas.

"You're certainly as stupid as an oriental,” I said not understanding why I was being horrible to Raymond who was such a nice boy.

"We are not stupid people!" Raymond replied, "We have many great scientists and visionaries."

"So what are you good at then?" I challenged him.

"I can read palms as my grandmother has taught me since I was little,” he retorted.

"What a load of mumbo jumbo, hocus pocus bullshit,” I said.

"It's not hocus pocus, nor mumbo jumbo. It's very real and I can prove it,” he challenged.

I walked round the large, white farm house table in the centre of the room. "Okay, but you could say anything you want, as there's no way to prove you right or wrong,” I said.

Raymond took my left hand and said, "Wow! You have a very full and interesting life."

"So am I going to be a professional footballer?" I asked.

"You could be but you don't and have bad legs from an early age, you meet your wife very young, she has the initial J, you have three children with her, a boy then a girl quite close together then many years later another boy. She treats you very badly. You split up but do not divorce until many years later,” he said.

"If that's the case I'll just not marry the first girl I fall in love with as I'm dead against divorce!" I cut in, remembering my dad telling me how sad he’d been when his parents divorced when he was six and sent him to this school.

"No, you must be with this woman as your children are amazing and so very important. Your first born is very clever and funny, he plays the guitar and moves to Australia, you meet him there. Your daughter is so very important to the future of mankind, as a scientist. Your youngest son has big hair and is extremely funny, he plays guitar in a famous rock band. He and his friend have many women but you must not introduce him to drugs so young. Even your dog is amazing, he saves your life and you don't even know it. You must exercise more and look after yourself better."

"I have a dog, excellent,” I smile.

"You are drawn to a house surrounded by darkness. The people associated with that house are very good for you. They help you get over your break up and remain your friends for the rest of your life. There is so much music in this house, and music in you. You go on to do great things together but in another house nearby also surrounded by darkness. You have so much to learn,” Raymond said imitating playing a guitar and smiling.

"You should learn it now. You write so many songs that are played for many years. You cause your family much embarrassment but you go from being so very poor to become so very, very wealthy in a short space of time. You make so many people laugh, you are a very funny man and a very important person to so many people, and save many lives. The house you build overlooking water, is famous for hundreds of years. My God, you change everything! You are very well known,” he said excitedly.